Chapter 393

Chapter 393: Riding Cattle and Horses, But Not a Giant Dragon

"This thing is as brittle as a cookie. Without my split implantation, it can’t handle the Silencing Armor," Gold Coin said, swinging the control stick. Thanks to the constant influence around him, Gold Coin’s ability to control the fighter jet was almost similar to that of Lin Mo, not to mention the innate spatial awareness of a giant dragon. If the two of them flew the fighter jet into a match, it might be Lin Mo who got taken down.

The chance of a human and a dragon flying a fighter jet together was almost zero. The naturally gifted flying dragon didn’t want to use other tools.

"I understand. Gold Coin, think for me. Is there a suitable structural design to apply the Silencing Armor? Even if I can’t use metal, I can use composite materials!" Lin Mo was recording data on his tactical tablet. Although it was issued by the Night team and was subject to monitoring, its powerful performance and capacity made it far better than paper.

"Damn composite materials! I hate composite materials!" Whenever the topic of non-metallic composite materials came up, Gold Coin would be filled with resentment. In that other world, humanity primarily used metals for weapons, but now non-metallic composite materials were becoming more common in fighter jets, making Gold Coin find controlling the jet increasingly difficult.

Especially since this "monstrous" fighter had nearly 30% of its components made from non-metallic materials. Gold Coin knew that in the future, if it wanted to control the aircraft, it must actively fill in the gaps to increase the metal ratio. Otherwise, controlling balance and pitch during high-speed flight would be very challenging.

Although Gold Coin looked down on this "monstrous" fighter, Lin Mo had always provided for it and covered it, which counted for quite a lot. Now that it had truly regained its freedom, past grievances were coming to an end, and there was no reason to eliminate Lin Mo. As a trustworthy giant dragon, despite being called the Dragon of Slaughter, it would still honor its promises. Gold Coin provided Lin Mo with help to the best of its ability.

The Dragon Knight that it once hated so much for seemingly wanting to destroy it now had its own ride, which was certainly better than becoming that ride again.

"Damn Dragon Knight!" Just thinking about it made Gold Coin’s teeth itch with anger.

"Anyway, whether it’s riding a hen or a duck, or a cow or a horse, just don’t ride a giant dragon."

"I say, Gold Coin, don’t hate composite materials so much. I think they are great! They are not only lightweight and strong, but also easier to process. You should keep up with the times; I’ve heard that some metal materials can be combined with other materials to enhance performance, not inferior to metal materials at all," Lin Mo chatted with Gold Coin’s split robot in the hangar without worrying about being overheard.

It wasn’t strange for humans to talk to robots, cars, bricks, or trees. It was just a form of emotion. Moreover, the robot’s simple dialogue ability had been recognized by the base staff, and sometimes even the helicopter pilots and mechanics from the aircrew group would jokingly tease this seemingly clueless robot.

However, Gold Coin didn’t care at all. This was a victory; it was starting to be accepted by the human world again, which meant that soon, like in another world, it could freely move among humans, create its own smelting plant, and spend its days lounging on piles of metal, waiting to eat and rest.

To Gold Coin, this was a kind of happiness, even a sense of bliss that made it forget to long for the past. This world, filled with metal, belonged to it entirely.

"How terrifying!" Gold Coin gritted its teeth in the cockpit. As a member of the gold element, maintaining the purity of metals not only aids in digestion and absorption but also brings pure advancement energy. However, metals mixed with other materials were like porridge tainted with rat droppings. How could a giant dragon of gold possibly swallow that?

Unless it was necessary electronic components, Gold Coin was very averse to impure metal parts.

"Hahaha!" Lin Mo laughed loudly. This giant dragon was surprisingly funny, so deeply hating the use of non-metallic materials, yet being a complete metal nationalist.

"I still insist; it’s necessary to maintain the purity of metals! Keep working! If we drag this out any longer, who knows when this plane will be finished."

Gold Coin expressed its resentment and dissatisfaction with composite materials. When it had reawakened, Lin Mo had taken advantage of its weakness to control it with composite materials and electromagnets, which remained one of the sources of Gold Coin’s deep hatred for composites.

"I want to finish quickly too! But first, I lack funds, and the manufacturing cycle for fighter jets is long. The production of spare parts also takes time. Right now, I’m also missing the radar system; the hardware platform for the onboard computer system is a temporary assembly that needs continued upgrades, and the communication system has to be custom-made. There are many places where I need to spend money. There’s a saying in this world: a Great Wall isn’t built in a day, so let’s talk less and do more.”

Lin Mo seemed to have found the feeling of teasing this gold dragon that had made it so angry before.

"Money? How much have you put in so far? More than fifty million, right? That’s enough to buy a J-8 fighter jet!"

When it comes to money, Gold Coin had no concept of it. Like Lin Mo, it only knew how to spend money and had no clue about earning it. Even though it had once consumed gold, that didn’t mean it could separate gold from its body. Gold Coin could only help Lin Mo spend money.

"Little Lin, what are you talking about so happily?" Old Pan drove his troop carrier from the passage connecting the base to the hangar, arriving at the position of several parked planes and spotted Lin Mo seemingly chatting with the robot named Gold Coin.

In Old Pan’s eyes, the robot was just a machine controlled by an artificial intelligence program. It could move, talk, and recognize people and speech commands, which wasn’t too remarkable. For Lin Mo, who was starting to work on fighter jets, creating a robot seemed no more difficult than building a plane.

"Captain Pan, just back from the meeting!" Lin Mo paused his handwritten notes on the tactical tablet.

Every week there was a meeting where all group leaders, department heads, and squad leaders had to summarize last week’s work and report this week’s plans in the base’s large conference room. This kept Captain Feng and Political Commissar Ma informed about the status of the Night team and provided relevant directions.

As the deputy leader, Lin Mo was more of a figurehead and didn’t take charge; Old Pan did all the heavy lifting.

Even during mid-level meetings at the base, Lin Mo still buried himself in his fighter jet work.

Although a pilot’s rank was high, a major in the army could at least be a company or battalion commander. In the air force, however, they often led just themselves, and at most in formations could mix in as the lead.

Even if Lin Mo were to rise to colonel, he still wouldn’t have the real power to compare with Colonel Feng Chenye, the captain of the Night Special Forces.

"The meeting just finished! Things have been quite calm outside lately. Captain Feng has given a top directive—everyone needs to focus on training to prepare for the Special Forces Military Competition held every four years. This is a huge event where several Special Forces teams from across the nation compete against each other. If we can make it into the top three, we’ll get rewards and more equipment and resource support."

When Old Pan spoke of "outside," he referred to the armed organizations of external forces in the business areas managed by the Night Special Forces team. The Night team was responsible for killing, while gathering intelligence was the job of national security, with the two working together.

Recently, since the Dragon Knight returned to the team, they had been clearing out many areas, causing those armed organizations to retreat more cloaked than ever.

"Special Operations Team Military Competition?" Lin Mo repeated, curiosity piqued by this strange competition. Could it be that the teams were to pull in manpower and have a showdown?

In Lin Mo’s memory, there had been competitions at the Dragon Knight training camp in another world. However, those were brutal elimination contests where one hundred young people battled to the death. Only the last twenty standing could qualify for the dragon deity contract selection.

That brutality still lingered in Lin Mo’s mind. From his own experience at that life-and-death elimination match, only eleven people survived, one of whom was his close friend, fire element Dragon Knight Akka. Even among those eleven, only four became newly minted Dragon Knights.

In the arena of combat, those who were lucky enough to be gravely injured but not dead would have only faced the cold, heartless swords of the instructors awaiting the eliminated.

The training camp didn’t nurture useless people.

The dragon kin only acknowledged the strong. This selection process effectively improved the success rate for contracting. After all, Dragon Knights were rare beings, and achieving soul resonance with a giant dragon to complete the dragon deity contract was not an easy task.

Since the ancient pact between humanity and the dragon kin, the rule established by the dragons was that every giant dragon around a thousand years old had to participate in three verifications of the Dragon Knight contract with humans.

However, during the third one, the gold giant dragon, Gold Coin, had ended up in the line of fire, facing Lin Mo’s weapon. Wasn’t that just unfortunate?

Not every youth attending the training camp had to face such a challenge. With backgrounds as nobles or wealthy individuals, they could use money to avoid the brutal elimination process. However, such candidate knights often turned out just to be for show and had a minuscule chance of becoming Dragon Knights.

Lin Mo’s Dragon Knight comrade Akka, though also from a noble background in the imperial capital, chose to prove himself through blood and combat rather than buying his way in.