Chapter 10: Unlocking the Handbook, Exploring the 1st Dangerous Room

"Is there really a need to be so angry? You wanted the item yourself, the side effect triggering has nothing to do with me."

Li Zheng scratched his head, not wanting to dwell on it. There was no real friendship between the two, it was just a casual greeting.

He opened the chat hall and glanced at it. Not finding any valuable information, Li Zheng proceeded with his main task.

A pitted Iron Ingot appeared in his hand. He skillfully took off his jacket to wrap it, raised his hand, and prepared to smash it towards the computer.

"Wait, if there's a scientific resource platform, why wouldn't there be blueprints?"

Li Zheng leaned over the drawer to check carefully. The water purifier blueprint that had been plugged in earlier had already been learned by him and disappeared automatically, leaving only two empty USB ports.

There was nothing in the drawer, completely empty.

"There's really no blueprints..."

Unwilling to give up, Li Zheng searched the study again, finally focusing on the bookshelf he had been ignoring.

The bookshelf was filled with no fewer than a hundred books, all imprinted with text Li Zheng couldn't understand.

"Huh? Why don't these books have system information prompts?"

Li Zheng's gaze swept over the books one by one. When he saw a black-covered book, the previously meaningless white security text on the Detector suddenly turned green.

"There's something here! The Detector we got from the Treasure Chest is indeed reliable!"

Li Zheng grinned, pulled the book out, and after checking the remaining books, the Detector did not react again.

"Looks like the last piece of information is in this book."

Li Zheng looked at the black leather book in his hand and found that the cover was illustrated with strangely shaped creatures.

A lion with three heads, a spider full of eyes, an entirely green centipede, and snakes with heads at both ends...

These were only the creatures Li Zheng could recognize. There were more that were indescribably bizarre.

Opening the cover, Li Zheng discovered that the book was hollowed out, with a black USB drive marked with blood-red veins inside.

"There really is something..."

Li Zheng was first delighted, but immediately realized that the system provided no information about the USB drive either.

"Strange... Could this thing not be a product of the Matrix Game?"

Li Zheng looked bewildered, "No matter, isn't this a ready-to-use resource platform? Let's plug it in and see."

Bow down and inserted the black USB drive, and indeed, the scientific resource platform displayed an image.

"Why is it still in indecipherable text?"

Li Zheng frowned.

After the resource platform read the USB drive, it only displayed the creatures on the book cover in graphic form, but all the text were distorted lines with no discernible meaning.

"These words... why do they look more and more like a doctor's prescription..."

Li Zheng couldn't help but quip.

"Fortunately, this thing, like the blueprints, can also be learned through the resource platform."

Li Zheng noticed the "Learn" icon lighting up on the side of the screen and instinctively pressed it.

The next moment, the graphic materialized into a beam of light, entering Li Zheng's mind.

A flood of graphic and text information poured in, consolidated, and turned into various biological shapes.

Focusing, Li Zheng noticed an additional feature on his panel.

[Matrix Atlas]

Upon opening, it turned out to be a directory: Matrix Creatures Atlas (Seven)

Expanding the Creatures Atlas (Seven) was the graphic and text information from the USB drive.

The originally unreadable linear text was now converted into Chinese characters, making it easy to read.

"Three-headed Ghost Lion."

"Thousand-eyed Spider."

"Venomous Centipede."

"Two-faced Snake."

...

Selecting the Three-headed Ghost Lion, he checked the details.

"Three-headed Ghost Lion, a genetic creation, although possessing three heads, they share a single consciousness. They live in groups with only one male lion, the rest are female lions. No Alien Gene abilities found."

"Features: Female lions prefer hunting in groups, male lions prefer one-on-one battles."

"Weakness: Soft abdomen."

"Danger Factor: 302"

"Quite something, the value of this one atlas alone is worth at least a Silver Level item."

Putting away the atlas, Li Zheng felt quite satisfied.

Just when he was preparing to explore the dangerous room, possessing the atlas made it much more convenient.

At least when encountering creatures recorded in the atlas, he could identify their weaknesses and exploit them.

After storing the atlas, Li Zheng noticed a "scan" icon on the side of the directory.

Upon opening it, a virtual lens appeared in front of his eyes, with a blue line moving up and down.

Indeed... it was exactly the scan feature.

"This function is quite comprehensive. In the future, if I encounter an unknown creature, I just need to scan it before battling—it'd be a breeze."

Li Zheng felt completely satisfied, raised his hand, and smashed the scientific resource platform into pieces.

[Decomposed damaged scientific resource platform, obtained: Technology Core *1, Copper Ingot *1, damaged Power Core Type I *1.]

"Hmm... looks like I smashed it too hard this time. I got one less Iron Ingot compared to last time, need to be more mindful next time."

Leaving the study room for the large bedroom, Li Zheng muttered, "Yet, these Power Cores are just too fragile. Every time I smash the device, they always get broken."

"Speaking of which, I seem to have forgotten to smash the four crop Cultivation Dishes from the last room..."

Scratching his head, he felt frustrated.

Such an important matter, at the time he was too excited about obtaining two Flame Flowers, that by the time he left, he completely forgot about it.

"But those things are too large, and they seem to be made of iron. If I really smash them all, it would be quite exhausting."

"Oh well, it's fine as it is. At least it's not so tiring."

Thinking this, Li Zheng had already arrived at the large bedroom.

He started by dismantling the bed, decomposing the bedding and drapes, obtaining Fiber *50.

He then circled around the room but didn't find anything valuable, the Detector also didn't react.

Taking out his Desert Eagle and lantern, Li Zheng swiped a card in front of the metal door.

Beep.

The metal door opened slowly, revealing the familiar light film behind it.

"Phew, finally about to face the dangers within the Matrix head-on."

Li Zheng took a deep breath, suddenly feeling a hint of regret.

Actually, just entering safe rooms, scavenging resources, dismantling whatever he comes across, wouldn't have been that bad.

A life without ambition...

Who needs dreams?

"But playing a game without fighting monsters seems a bit lacking..."

Li Zheng exhaled the breath he had just inhaled and sighed, "Perhaps this is just being cheeky."

Muttering, he stretched his limbs, gritted his teeth, and stepped into the film.

The colors before his eyes faded away, meeting with darkness, with only the halo of light from his lantern shining in a small area around him.

"Oh no! It's actually a room without a light source!"

Despite the surrounding darkness, the rocky ground and slightly damp air suggested to Li Zheng that this must be a room resembling an underground cave.

"The lantern's illumination diameter is less than three meters. Beyond that, it's hard to see anything. I wonder if the atlas can help in this situation."

Li Zheng tried activating the scan feature, looking around.

Meanwhile, in the darkness, he heard flapping sounds, as if some creature was beating its wings.

"What is it?"

Li Zheng turned to look, only catching a glimpse of a shadow flitting by, fleeting and quickly vanishing back into the darkness.

However, that moment was enough.

The atlas beeped, locking onto the shadow, and unfolded the information.

"Terror Bat, a genetic creation, likes to live in groups, each group living with at least twenty together."

"Features: Sound localization, fast flight, weak toxicity."

"Weakness: Afraid of light, fear fire."

"Danger Factor: 20."

"Only a danger factor of 20, compared to the Three-headed Ghost Lion, it's just a small fry."

Li Zheng chuckled, "And I perfectly counter its weakness, this is a win."