Folks, it finally happened: they gave a robot a sword.
Over the past few years, engineers have often used dancing and martial arts to showcase their humanoid robots. Now to ring in the Chinese New Year, some marketing genius decided to give a robot a sword, and the results are impressive.
Meet the robot nicknamed “Linghu Chong” by Chinese media, after a fictional swordfighter described by the twentieth-century novelist Jin Yong. The robot wields what the developers are calling the “Dugu Nine Swords,” a reference to a fictional fighting technique employed by Linghu Chong.
In the demo video shared by China News, the robot is seen practicing thrusts, kick flips, and slashes with a sword in hand. Unlike some clumsier bots, this unit — a Robotera L7 — has some top-notch motor skills, leaping and twirling without getting tangled up with its weapon.
According to the Robotera website, the L7 features 55 degrees of freedom, the number of independent movements a robot can make. Its arm features seven degrees of freedom, while its hand alone is said to boast 12.
That said, the L7 isn’t ready to do battle with humanity just yet — the human hand is commonly understood to have a whopping 27 degrees of freedom, meaning we still have a tactical advantage, at least in theory. Still, the fact that the L7 could execute such dynamic full-body movements in rapid-fire succession is undeniably impressive.
The L7 first made its debut in July of 2025 with help from Tsinghua University. When it was announced, Robotera emphasized its agility, showing off its breakdancing moves as well as its more practical capabilities in commercial environments.
It’s just one of many Chinese engineering accomplishments of late — evidence that, though it’ll soon be the year of the horse, the year of the armed robot may already be upon us.
More on robotics: This Robot With a Working Human Face Is Incredibly Unsettling
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