Chapter 998 — The Psychic Songster
Blade of Dawn Page 2 of 2
"The Psychic Songster project..." He suddenly raised his head and looked at Heddy. "What stage is it at now?"
Psychic Songsters — special-ops soldiers purpose-built to counter all forms of mental contamination, including the mental contamination of gods. These special soldiers took the Siren's "Deepsea Song" as their core technology and the Evernight's "Psychic Choir" as their training template, relying on neural thorns and a series of ancillary devices in the biochemical, soul, and magitek fields to achieve "mass production." From the very beginning, this special-soldier project had been something Gao Yang paid particular attention to.
As a nation that had endured a divine calamity and begun studying the gods long ago, Cecil already possessed certain technologies capable of resisting mental contamination, but each had its flaws — the most basic "Mindguard System" was a crude, primitive application of Siren runes, limited in effect and capable only of passive defense; the most advanced "Humanity Barrier" ran within the neural network, stronger in effect and able to actively purge or even "prey upon" mental contamination within range, and could also interface with a mortal's mind to provide effective "treatment" — but it depended on the network to function, placing high demands on equipment and basic infrastructure.
For Cecil today, the neural network could not even achieve full coverage within the nation, and for armies on campaign abroad, maintaining an unbroken network was obviously even harder — after all, there were no communications satellites in this era; the neural network could still only rely on magic-net nodes to keep running, and even the most advanced "Steel Ambassador" multi-purpose war chariot had a communications tower capable of sustaining signal transmission only over a limited range.
Originally these problems had not been so urgent — the Mindguard System and the Humanity Barrier were already enough for Cecil to protect itself within its own borders — but this sudden war had disrupted Gao Song's pace of development. Now he urgently needed a new unit that could actively resist the gods' mental contamination, move flexibly at the front, and also operate independently free of network constraints, with no loss of protective effect even in expeditionary combat under complex conditions.
The "Psychic Songsters" being trained by Wendy, formerly the "Spirit Song" of the Evernight's Yaoji Sect, best fit his requirements — yet this project had made no progress for a very long time.
"Regarding the Psychic Songsters, Lady Wendy sent word just yesterday," Heddy said. "The prototype soldiers at this stage still cannot be committed to the battlefield... stability is a serious problem. But if you have the time, you could still go and take a look at the situation."
As expected, this was not the sort of thing that could be wished into being just by thinking about it...
Gao Yang thought for a moment: "Is there anything else on my schedule today?"
Heddy recalled for a moment: "There is a consul meeting in the evening; before that there is nothing else arranged."
"Then let us go and take a look," Gao Yang said, rising to his feet. "At least see what state the prototype soldiers are in at this stage."
...
On the north bank of the Whitewater River, in a research facility belonging to the Empire's military research department near the pyramid-shaped computation center, testing of the Psychic Songster prototype soldiers was still underway.
This was a spacious, brightly lit large laboratory, with a broad open space at the center of the long rectangular room. At the four corners of the room could be seen four alloy square pillars gleaming with metallic luster and the faint glow of runes, while around the central open space were arranged many neatly ordered cylindrical devices only half a meter tall. Technicians in short white robes bustled around those cylindrical devices, and among those technicians were many familiar faces.
Standing at the very front was a young lady with her hair piled high, dignified and lovely of feature — she was Wendy, once of the Evernight's Yaoji Sect and now a researcher of the Empire, an expert in neuroscience and the psychic field — and beside her stood Yuri and Semler, likewise once of the Yaoji Sect. Also present was Pi Yun, who had come to assist in the work as a biochemical specialist.
The test subject was a young man standing at the center of the open space, still bearing freckles on his face.
The young man wore a suit of specially made light armor — or rather than armor, it might be called a "close-fitting frame" used to secure various rune plug-boards; the rune devices for the test glimmered faintly at various points on that armor. On his hands and forearms he wore special "arm-guards" that looked somewhat like the second-generation military magitek terminals now in widespread use, yet no weapon units could be seen; where ray guns or lightning emitters would originally have been mounted, there were instead a great many finely structured metal protrusions, clearly meant for some special purpose.
While the technicians around him bustled about, the young man was checking the clasps of his arm-guards, flexing his wrist from time to time, looking a little nervous.
This was the scene that greeted Gao Yang and Hedy when they arrived.
He stepped among the busy technicians, raising a hand to signal that no formalities were needed, and nodded with a smile at the young man on the testing ground who was bowing to him in a fluster. Then he turned his gaze to "Spiritsong" Wendy nearby: "To be honest, a psionic singer is a little different from what I imagined... I assumed that with a word like 'singer' in the name, there would at least be something in the laboratory connected to 'song.' Instead, all I see is rune armor, a magitech terminal, and a storage case for neural thorns."
Wendy was unsurprised by these words from Gao Song. She smiled faintly: "A psionic singer's 'song' is not something that can be heard with the ears, so naturally it does not need to be 'sung' with the mouth either — please do not be misled by the name. They are called 'singers' simply because the power they wield originates from the deep-sea song of the sirens."
Gao Cen froze for a moment, only then realizing that he seemed to have harbored a slight misunderstanding about this matter. At the same time, Wendy smiled and continued: "Therefore, in theory, a psionic singer does not even need to be able to 'sing' at all — being proficient in operating neural thorns and a series of brainwave amplifiers is quite enough."
Hedy, who had come over with Gao Cen, could not help but glance at Wendy upon hearing this: "I have heard the songs you recorded on the program, and I thought..."
"A personal hobby, nothing more," Wendy said with a faint smile. "The 'song' of a psionic singer is meant to do battle against those mad, chaotic gods and evil spirits. Those things... have no appreciation for music."
(End of this chapter)