Meng Hao felt fortunate.
He was glad he wasn't a dropout from the nine-year compulsory education system.
He vaguely remembered, half-asleep in a primary school class, hearing the teacher, who was spewing saliva, talk about an exam strategy.
"For multiple-choice questions, when you're unsure which option is correct, use the elimination method."
Time was tight.
To ensure that the remaining less than five minutes wouldn't become his last moments in this world,
Meng Hao didn't have time to consider whether this elimination strategy was scientific or reliable. He just used it directly.
First, he looked at option D.
Understand Einstein's theory of special relativity?
And develop and build a time machine?
Then use the prehistoric era as a temporal anchor to travel back?
And figure out how dinosaurs went extinct?
This was not a scientific topic, nor even a science fiction one... it was purely the stuff of fantasy novels.
Damn it.
He set aside the idea of a time machine for now.
Let alone Meng Hao, a science student from a third-rate university, how many top physicists in the world today would dare claim to fully understand Einstein's theory of special relativity?
Besides,
Even if a god of fantasy appeared and he time-traveled to the prehistoric era.
Those giant dinosaurs, weighing hundreds or thousands of tons, could easily stomp him into a meat patty from ten thousand years in the future with a single step.
Option D must be eliminated!
...
Option C, complete the periodic table of elements?
Any modern person who wasn't a dropout from compulsory education knew that the scientist Dmitri Ivanovich Mendeleev first created the modern periodic table of elements in 1869. Now, 154 years later, only 118 elements have been accounted for.
More importantly, these elements were either already discovered or synthesized by researchers based on existing ones.
If all the elements on the periodic table were to be completed, it might not be possible on Earth and would require venturing into outer space.
Even if the system promised to provide necessary assistance, allowing Meng Hao to enter outer space in some way, how vast an area would be needed to detect all the elements?
Several light-years?
Dozens of light-years?
Or hundreds, thousands, or tens of thousands of light-years?
How much time would it take?
It took countless researchers over a hundred years to account for 118 elements.
The remaining elements would undoubtedly be even rarer and harder to find.
Meng Hao didn't believe he could live as long as a pine tree on a southern mountain, becoming an ancient demon living for hundreds or thousands of years... Well, it was highly probable he would become mere carbon-based dust in the universe!
This option also had to be passed!
...
Option B!
Draw a three-dimensional model of a Dyson sphere and achieve at least 20% completion of its construction.
Well.
Let's not even mention the thousands of degrees Celsius of heat, enough to vaporize steel, that would need to be endured within 1 million kilometers of Earth's closest star, the Sun, to build a Dyson sphere.
Just to draw the three-dimensional model of a Dyson sphere, a supercomputer with a computational frequency of several zettahertz would be required. Meng Hao had no idea where to get one!
Even if the system, in its benevolence, provided him with a supercomputer capable of completing the three-dimensional drawing, Meng Hao would still have to solve the power supply issue himself.
These national-level supercomputers were equipped with dedicated small-scale power plants... enough to meet the daily electricity needs of tens of thousands of town residents.
Where would Meng Hao get a small-scale power plant?
Even if he got one, he couldn't afford the electricity or coal bills!
Seek national assistance?
That was even more absurd. Not to mention whether the country would believe his ridiculous proposal... The system had clearly stated earlier that if he failed the mission, to prevent the system's existence from being discovered by the outside world, it would erase all traces of him in the world.
He probably wouldn't even get to utter a word about the mission before this damn system vaporized him from existence... yes, completely vaporized, leaving not even a speck of dust, not even the possibility of becoming cosmic dust.
...
After eliminating the three least likely options, the remaining one must be the only correct answer.
And compared to building a time machine, a Dyson ring, or completing the periodic table, the task of building a mech seemed extremely feasible and practical.
The choice was confirmed.
All that remained was to pray to any gods Meng Hao knew to bless this system so it wouldn't be as unreliable as their stone-like homeroom teacher, Gao Ping.
He no longer expected this crappy system to lead him to the peak of human achievement... he just hoped the system would keep its promise, provide sufficient help, allow Meng Hao to complete the mech's research and development, successfully accomplish the initial mission, and not be erased from the world.
After careful consideration,
Having pondered all possible and impossible details, and before the system's countdown reached zero.
Meng Hao spoke his choice into the void with a hint of frustration.
"System, I've made my choice..."
"Option A, build a mech..."
The countdown froze at "4 seconds".
The cold system text once again refreshed before Meng Hao's retinas.
"Host Meng Hao will complete Option A... 'Build a mech, perform a set of Wing Chun, and record a video'!"
"Do you confirm the final choice..."
This system.
Was it just overcomplicating things?
After receiving Meng Hao's confirmation again, the interface before his retinas updated.
This time, what appeared before Meng Hao was a rotating 3D globe of Earth.
As crosshairs continuously scanned the 3D rotating globe,
Corresponding text pop-ups continuously refreshed in the sidebar of the 3D graphic.
[To ensure Host Meng Hao can complete the initial mission, the system will provide necessary assistance.]
[Mission location selected... Taklamakan Desert heartland... Target area's mineral distribution is sufficient to support mission completion... Mech R&D laboratory generating... R&D and manufacturing zone generation complete... Mining and smelting zone generation complete... Drilling machinery storage generation complete... Living quarters generation complete!]
[Warp engine shuttle is being deployed... Carrying one passenger... Passenger Meng Hao's life key inputting... Complete... Shuttle on standby...]
[Warning: During the mission, you must not expose the existence of the system or the laboratory, and you must not leave the 100-kilometer radius centered on the laboratory without authorization, otherwise... you will be erased!]
Cannot expose the laboratory?
Cannot leave the 100-kilometer radius of the laboratory?
Meng Hao was amused by this system.
The Taklamakan Desert, for goodness sake!
An area of 330,000 square kilometers, the largest desert in China, known as the "Sea of Death," the world's second-largest shifting desert, the Taklamakan Desert!!
In this place, let alone dying of dehydration after walking for two or three days on foot, it was a shifting desert... What is a shifting desert? It's a sea of sand that can swallow everything, like a vast ocean!!!
At this moment, Meng Hao felt that this system, which constantly emphasized secrecy and was so mysterious, might be overestimating him a bit!