Yushi stood in front of an old, rusty door, facing the various flyers, which were torn and faded.

He panted heavily, squinting at a tiny camera perched above the doorknob.

“Click!”

A faint green light scanned his eyes, and the door creaked open.

He pushed forward, dragging the robot inside and tossing it onto a pile of sundries in the corner.

Slumping down on the floor, he took a few deep breaths before mustering the strength to crawl back downstairs to haul up the engine, grunting with each step.

“Ughhhh, already exhausted...”

This time, it took him six long minutes to wrestle the engine up to the sixth floor.

Finally, he collapsed onto the floor next to it, gasping like a pig stuck in the mud.

The floor and he were both soaked. They are mixed with 90% rainwater and 10% sweat.

The sixth-floor room was a bit larger than the ones below, but the rent was three hundred Worlb cheaper. It looks good, right?

But continuing for decades, there was no one came here and fixed the problems here, and problems now were everywhere.

Leaky roofs were a given, and even the balcony floor was cracked enough to reveal the steel rebar underneath.

It was downright terrifying!

As for the infrastructure inside...

Well, it wasn’t completely non-existent, but it was just enough to keep someone from dying in an undignified manner.

Yushi had overheard other tenants chatting about it:

“When the time comes... you can squat in a barely functional toilet and relieve yourself, then take a shower with water that’s sometimes god damn hot and sometimes f**king cold.

Then you can stumble into the room right next to the toilet, close the door, and light a charcoal burner next to a bed made from iron frames. Slip into your favorite polyester outfit and just lie down in bed for a good long night’s sleep! A permanent sleep!”

But Yushi’s room was a bit different. Aside from the standard shit toilet, an open shit balcony with no door, it was just a big shit living room.

The living room was cluttered with various mechanical parts and a large workbench, the smell of rust and machine oil lingering in the air.

On the wall next to the toilet, there were wide, clean streaks where the paint had peeled away, suggesting there used to be a room there. But the wall had been torn down, merging it into the living room.

Other than a bed that could barely fit one and a half people, the place was mostly a collection of parts. The balcony, though small, had a simple yet functional drainage system.

That was clearly Yushi’s creation, as the pipes were new and stood out awkwardly against the rusty old ones nearby.

Aside from some clothes that were supposed to be drying but were now even wetter than before, there was just a heap of filthy mechanical parts.

Yushi had requested these modifications himself to make his daily work easier. The landlord didn’t seem to mind and approved it right away.

No one knew why he was so quick to agree—maybe he felt sorry for the young guy trying to make it in the big city? Yushi thought.

After resting enough, Yushi wiped the sweat mixed with rain off his face and stripped down completely, even his underwear.

Wearing damp clothes only made him feel uncomfortable.

He grabbed a large towel and roughly dried himself off, tossing it back into its messy pile.

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

After slipping on a pair of stiff slippers, he hurried to drag the engine to the workbench, grabbing a hairdryer to blow off the water from the metal surface.

Every day, Yushi worked with machines, rarely interacting with anyone else.

Over time, he stopped caring about his appearance at home—comfort was all that mattered.

Besides, those industrial liquids were much easier to clean off his skin than his clothes.

He focused intently on the engine. If the processor inside the it got wet, fixing it would be nearly impossible. It would be regard as a scrap.

Not only would he lose 300 Worlb in final payment, but he’d also have to return the hundred Worlb he’d already got, plus owe that old man another six hundred Worlb!

That meant two or three weeks of starving for him!

“Awesome, now I’m working to pay off my own job?” he grumbled.

He regretted taking this task. Who knew it would rain today?...

He clenched his teeth in frustration, regretting his earlier greed, gripping the hairdryer even tighter.

Dry enough, Yushi began to take the engine apart.

He grabbed a cutting tool, pressing the grimy switch. The gears whirred as they sliced through the engine’s welds, yellow sparks flying everywhere.

The engine’s casing popped open, revealing droplets of water inside. His brow furrowed, and his jaw tightened in anxiety.

He quickly grabbed the hairdryer again, blowing out the moisture, then picked up some pliers to carefully unscrew the core area. His heart raced faster.

“Drip!”

A single drop of water fell into the engine with a barely audible sound, but to Yushi, it felt like an explosion in his chest.

“F**k that shit…”

He sighed heavily, removing the core processor and placing it on the floor beneath the workbench. He turned on a big lamp and grabbed a cylindrical magnifying glass to inspect it.

“We’ve shit done… I shouldn’t have trusted that bloody shell to keep out the rain. What was I thinking...”

The more he looked at it, the worse he felt. He sighed again, tossing it aside and leaning back in his chair. His head was dizzy, feeling a bit hot.

“The chip has extensive circuit damage, severe water infiltration, and some parts are burned out. I can’t even distinguish what the original circuit looked like...

Great. tiny and complicated, and you want me to fix it? I’m not the chick god…”

This engine wasn’t like the ones from twenty years ago… or even like a regular engine.

Who knows if today’s technicians were trying to show off or just a dumbass, cramming smart hardware into a power-generating engine?

Couldn’t they make it detachable on the outside?!

Yushi forced a smile, vague images flashing in his mind, but nothing was clear—like a person with over a thousand degrees of nearsightedness...

Memory loss.

“Ha, life… life is just so ridiculous. The lower you feel, the more it tries to crush you to a dog crap.”

He felt a pang of regret. He remembered how he had been living comfortably with those kind old folks in a cabin in the Alberta woods. It wasn’t luxurious, but at least he could had a good eat and sometimes caught small animals for dinner...

Why had he suddenly decided to venture out into the world a year ago?

...Ugh, he left home last year, was taken in by them the year before—what about before that? Where were those memories?

As soon as Yushi thought about it, his head throbbed.

Where did all those memories go? What happened to me? Am I a traveler from different universe? Can people really be born knowing how to fix machines?

...Ugh, what a mess. All these useless memories are just chaotic brain signals—let’s focus on living well now. Does reminiscing help me eat or earn money?

If this damn engine really costs me money...

Suddenly, Yushi turned his gaze toward the robot lying among the sundries.

She had been there all along, still and quiet.

“Hmm… I guess I’ll have to rely on this to break even. Come on, girl, give me a hand!?”

He gritted his teeth, moving the engine parts aside and hoisting the robot onto the workbench.

Outside, the rain continued to pour.

It was probably around eight or nine at night. The already gray, steel city looked even more desolate in the dim light.

The empty streets occasionally saw vehicles speeding by, mocking anyone who could hear them.

“Tsk, at least the torso and head are intact,” Yushi shook his head.

Many of the robot’s parts were beyond repair and would need a major exchange. But first, he needed to check the core components and processor.

That was the priority—the core components and processor were what mattered most.

He adjusted her lifeless form. Despite the apparent damage to the torso, it still looked quite appealing.

Her features were perfectly sculpted, nearly indistinguishable from a real person. The curves of her chest were beautifully crafted, full but not overly so.

In that moment, Yushi felt like he was trying to save a corpse that had survived a massive explosion, who only retained the head and torso remaining.

The term “necrophilia” flashed through his mind, making him chuckle softly.

He slid a sharp scalpel across her chest, carefully cutting through the surface. He wasn’t sure if the processor was in the torso or the head.

“Usually, robots have their processors and core components stuffed in their bellies. The belly can hold more than the head, right? What can you fit in a head?” Yushi mused.

“Huh?”

But to his surprise, as he pried open the isolation layer, he found some components inside the torso.

And to his shock, there were even human-like bionic organs, complete with what looked like “blood”!

“No, this isn’t blood…”

He dipped a finger into the liquid that leaked out and brought it to his nose, catching an abnormal smell of blood.

“This seems like some kind of energy transport fluid designed to mimic blood. Regular robots just rely on their skeletal structures and wires to move.

But this… this is a whole different level of technology.”

He thought, “Creating a transport liquid similar to this 'blood' shouldn’t be too difficult; I can work on that slowly.”

It was terrible. Even though the remains were soaked in such filthy, possibly corrosive water, and the severed limbs were exposed, there were no signs of impurities invading her body.

It was so pure to be terrible.