The old things I repaired have become fine

Chapter 783 Shen Le: So you guys only outlasted me?

Chapter 783 Shen Le: So you guys are just going to wait out me?

Shen Le tried hard to chat with Azi, trying to find out the source of its abilities and their limits. After much questioning, he received only a lot of blank answers.
I don't know!

I really don't know!

I just believe I can do it!

I can definitely do it!

How far can it cover? I don't know, I'll have to try it out...

[Which kinds of beings can I guide? Those who can sense it and are willing to come will come... Wait! It seems I can't guide those who aren't of my kind!]

[Could this ability be bestowed upon other similar magical artifacts? Probably not...]

Shen Le felt that chatting with it was really tiring...

But think about it, if he himself, as a human being, were asked, "What are the physiological mechanisms that allow you to see and speak?", he probably wouldn't be able to answer either...

Well, even if he can answer it, it's the result of his education and the product of researchers' hard work, not something he can figure out through his own introspection.

In that case, it's quite normal that a newly enlightened spirit with its own consciousness wouldn't be able to answer, isn't it?
Shen Le had no choice but to carry Azi and communicate with the staff of the Shanghai Special Affairs Bureau, giving them feedback:
"It said it didn't know why it had this ability. I think that each spirit's unique ability is related to the expectations given to it when it was formed."

"Coverage range? We need to test it more, no problem, I can accompany it during the testing!"

"It seems that it can guide anyone who is a descendant of the Chinese people, but not those who are not of our race. Is it based on bloodline? Nationality? Cultural identity? I don't know!"

"How can this ability be copied? I... I'll try to study the structure of the runes within it and see if I can replicate it..."

"Do you need help? That's great! Please be sure to ask an expert for help! How long would it take me to figure this out by myself on my own!"

The experts arrived quickly, as expected. The recent unusual events caused by the resurgence of spiritual energy had the Special Affairs Bureau in a state of chaos, with manpower severely strained.
Upon hearing that Shen Le had conjured up a new magical artifact, which seemed to be a perfect match for their expertise and had the potential to be replicated, they were overjoyed and celebrated with great excitement!

Hurry up and get some people over here to help Shen Le study and analyze it, and make a copy, at least a downgraded version!

The sooner the better!

Within a single day, Shen Le saw all sorts of incredible instruments that he had never even imagined.

First, there was a glass cabinet, which looked somewhat like a temperature and humidity control cabinet used for restoring cultural relics. However, after Taowu was invited inside, someone quickly lit incense, and the smoke filled the cabinet.

Then, colorful spotlights shone in turn from the top and bottom of the glass cabinet in all directions, creating a distinct Tyndall effect in the smoke.

Rays of light fell on the pottery house, reflecting and refracting, and various patterns rose from the smoke, resembling talismans or distorted parts of talismans.

Around the glass case, several video recording devices were placed. Some people were analyzing these videos, while others were on-site, diligently taking notes and drawing diagrams...

She shook her head and sighed as she drew. She changed incense stick after incense stick, and the spotlight shone round and round.

From early morning until late at night, the director of the Shanghai Special Affairs Bureau, even in a daze, came over to take a look:
"How's it going? Any progress?"

"No……"

The person in charge of drawing the talismans was dressed in Taoist robes, a bamboo and wooden crown, and black cloth shoes, with a pair of gold-rimmed glasses perched on his nose. His style seemed out of place no matter how you looked at it.

He had already put down his sketchbook and was typing away on the computer. Hearing this, he shook his head and sighed.

"There's too little information that can be analyzed, and it's too fragmented. This magical artifact has an overly complex structure and contains too many runes; it can't be analyzed in a short time..."

"Sigh, if only we could take it apart, at least we could take pictures of every side..."

Shen Le, standing nearby, felt a pang of sympathy. During the restoration process, in order to preserve complete scan data, he had to disassemble the half-restored fragment and scan it piece by piece.

Scan one piece, piece it together, scan another, piece it together again. Constantly adjusting the size and edge angles is incredibly frustrating.

Now, scanning the talismans inside the pottery house is even more troublesome, since the pottery house can't be cut open!
"Hmm, let's think of another way then." The bureau chief frowned and circled the glass case.
"Could you get a light with fiber optic cable or a flexible tube, and shine it into every room? Would that illuminate the room?"

"Not sure... but let's give it a try..."

The first expert took his leave, then went off to fiddle with the flexible tubes, clearly determined to capture every corner of the pottery house in photographs.

Shen Le yawned, shook his arms and legs, and was about to slip away to rest when he saw a middle-aged woman in a white coat, looking imposing, rushing straight toward the pottery house.
"My turn! My turn! -- Hello Mr. Shen, I am Lin Su, a first-level researcher from the Jinling Institute. Could we apply some paint to this pottery house to facilitate exploration?"

"Hello, Ms. Lin." Shen Le straightened up, intending to shake hands politely, but seeing that the other party didn't reciprocate, she stepped aside, watching Lin Su direct the students to remove the glass cover and push in a bunch of instruments:
"Its name is Shen Zi, you can call it A Zi. May I ask what kind of paint it is? Could you show it to it? If it's not harmful to it, I can try to persuade it."

Before Lin Su could wave, a student pushed a small cabinet forward and pulled out a huge 500cc plastic bottle from a drawer. Shen Le smiled as soon as she saw it:
"To have an ultrasound?"

"The principle is somewhat similar, anyway, it's a water-based coupling agent, pH 7, and non-corrosive. Could you please talk to Mr. Shen Zi about this?"

Shen Le took a handful, dipped his fingertips in it, rubbed and kneaded it. It felt light and moisturizing, and there was indeed no stinging sensation. It was similar to the stuff he used for ultrasound scans.

He spread his mental energy and scanned the area again, but didn't feel any particular danger. Only then did he turn and walk to the edge of the pottery house.

"Azi, do you agree to let them study it? Should I put some of this paint on you so you can feel it?"

Hmm...shall I give it a try?

Tao Wu indicated he was indifferent. Shen Le dipped his fingertip in a little transparent coupling gel and applied it to the exterior wall of Tao Wu. His hand trembled slightly as soon as he applied it.
[Take it away! Take it away! This stuff makes me uncomfortable! It's sticky! Wash it clean right now!]

"Uh..." Shen Le relayed the information truthfully while quickly using the cleaning technique to find wet wipes and cotton swabs.

After serving this little tyrant, Lin Su turned around and saw that she was not disappointed. She directed the students to quickly find three more bottles of coupling agent, smiling as she waited for Shen Le to try again...

Shen Le didn't know what method Tao Wu used to judge, or what standards he used to select and taste these coupling agents that all looked pretty much the same to him.

In short, it hated the first bottle, hated the second bottle even more, and even yelled and screamed, forbidding Shen Le from getting even a drop on it.

However, it was very satisfied with the third bottle:
It's sweet! It tastes great! I want more!

"No problem, it needs this. Apply it, then proceed with the ultrasound!"

Azi had no objection to the third bottle of coupling gel and was willing to cooperate, provided Shen Le accompanied her. She didn't have to personally handle it, apply the gel herself, or perform the cleaning ritual, but she had to be there.

You must stay here! Stay in the room! You can do whatever you want, but you can't run away!

"Alright..." So, Shen Le, who originally thought she could happily go home and sleep after get off work, had no choice but to set up a computer next to her to browse the web, read novels, and play games.

I spent two hours refreshing the page, then another two hours, and then another two hours.

Over there, things were bustling about, as if they were working late into the night. Lin Su led several students, climbing up and down, striking all sorts of strange poses.

One moment they're perched on a ladder on the roof of the pottery house, the next they're struggling to crawl under it, and then they're shakily sticking their arms and even their little fingers into the corners of the house, clearly trying to explore every detail.

Seeing that they had been busy for six hours and had only explored the outer walls of the pottery house, Shen Le had no choice but to call Zhong Xiaomei to bring him a chaise lounge, lay out blankets and quilts, and go to sleep...

Anyway, as long as he's in the room, that's fine, right?

When Lin Su woke up, she looked regretful and muttered, "I'm not done yet" and "I have to work overtime tonight," before quickly finishing her work.

Shen Le tidied himself up, ate something, and then the Taoist priest with the gold-rimmed glasses from yesterday arrived again with his team. They installed the glass cabinet and started working on it a second time...

After three days of back-and-forth work, the optical path team and the ultrasound team finished their tasks and called it a day. Shen Le had just caught her breath and thought she could pack up and go home to rest when two more teams of experts arrived:
A group of people carried a large number of talismans, lit them one by one, and tried to create various light and shadow effects on the exterior of the pottery house in order to explore its essence;
Another group, carrying bronze bells, bronze chimes, and tuning forks (?), circled the pottery house, striking them repeatedly and recording the various sound patterns inside...

Shen Le: We agreed on eight hours of work, eight hours of rest, and eight hours to myself, right?
Why do you all take turns every 12 hours?

Also, the price for you two groups sharing 24 hours is that I have to stay with you 24 hours a day, I can't leave my post for even a moment, and I can only go to the small room next to the suite to use the restroom...

So you're only tormenting me?!
Fortunately, after going through six groups of experts in quick succession, the Special Affairs Bureau finally ran out of ideas to assemble a new expert team.

It's also possible that due to limited resources and the prohibition of destructive research, this was the only amount that could be retrieved.

Shen Le had just breathed a sigh of relief and was about to head home when he was respectfully invited out and asked to take Azi to the city center:

"We need to test Azi's effective range? — Can't we do this experiment in my house?"

“I really can’t do this at your house!” He stayed with Azi, while Gu Yulin was also busy, being run around by the Shanghai Special Affairs Bureau.

Having been sent away, she had dark circles under her eyes and looked extremely tired and listless.

"There are so many powerful demons that have transformed into human form over Zhuxi Town! What weak creature would dare to go there? Even if they dared to risk their lives, they would be burned to ashes if they got even a little closer!"

"Ah...oh..." Shen Le himself was actually the biggest one among the big guys. When he came to his senses, he smiled helplessly.

He peeked out the car window, then glanced at the navigation system in front of the car:
"Go to the east side of Huangpu River? Why? For testing this kind of thing, shouldn't we go to the City God Temple?"

"Please, what's so great about the City God Temple in Shanghai?! You know perfectly well that there's no temple or City God there anymore, it's always packed with people!"

Ah, that's true. The City God Temple, and the Yu Garden within it, are among the most famous tourist attractions in Shanghai.

During the Mid-Autumn Festival and Lantern Festival, crowd control measures are in place. Even on ordinary days, you can only move slowly on the Nine-Turn Bridge. Queues at places like Green Wave Corridor and Nanxiang Steamed Buns can stretch for twenty or thirty meters...

Hoping to test Azi's ability to "guide the dead home, attract them, gather them, and soothe them" in this place is definitely not right; he was mistaken...

"Then... let's go to People's Square? Isn't that in the city center?"

"That place, according to you, has an extremely strong dragon energy..."

So where are we going?

"The Imperial Palace! It's ancient, and the expertise is perfect for it. We can gather people here and then dispose of them there!"

The Imperial Temple is indeed a perfect fit for the profession. It is one of the oldest existing Taoist buildings in Shanghai and is known as the "Millennial Ancient Temple".

As the car approached the vicinity, Shen Le's spirits lifted, and he immediately began touching the outer wall of Azi, explaining to it:
"This place is incredibly ancient! It's said to have been built during the Three Kingdoms period as Sun Quan's ancestral temple, but that's impossible to verify..."

Well, actually, the main thing is that Tao Wu had passed by that area two or three times in his memory, but he had no recollection of the temple or monastery. However, there is one thing that is more verifiable:

"During the Qing Dynasty renovations, an inscription was discovered on the beams that read 'Supervised by Qin Shubao, the official in charge of construction'! This is definitely reliable! By the way, it was a temporary palace for worshipping the Eastern Peak Emperor during the Tang Dynasty, which is also reliable..."

[The Great Emperor of the Eastern Peak, I seem to remember he also governs the underworld?]

"That's why I said it's about matching your major! Think about it: if entering this field is a hindrance to you, then we'll stop; if it's beneficial, then we'll go for it!"

No problem, watch me!

Azi was full of confidence. The car circled around and finally stopped at the back gate of the Taoist temple, where Taoist priests came out to greet them and welcomed them into the temple.

Taking advantage of the fact that night had fallen, they simply placed Azi at the entrance of the Earth God Temple, where a group of people watched expectantly.

"The test begins!"

"Attention all units, test begins!"

"Attention at the 100-meter diameter measurement point!"

"Attention, 200 meters!"

"Attention, 500 meters!"

"Attention, 1 km!"

"It's lit! It's lit! It's working! All units, please pay attention to the measurement readings—"

On the screen, ripples and dots of light appeared.

"Signal detected at point 100A!"

"Signal detected at point 200C!"

"500F point..."

In the special operations group set up by the Special Affairs Bureau, messages were being leaked like a flood of messages.