Can Ci Pin - - - Chapter 139

Chapter 139 – I’m Here Again, is Dinner on You?

The wrinkles on the old doctor’s face were deep enough to cover up his expression; it almost seemed like his whole body was a rusty robot, so most of the time it would look as if he was calm and collected. However, Lin Jingheng did detect a hint of fear in the old man this time.

Doctor Hardin had lived a life surrounded by people with many faces and had seen too many dreams and morals corrupt into toxic waste. All of his friends had turned their backs on him, every bit of kindness used as a facade for more fearsome agendas. Even if the Eighth Galaxy was pumped with a new vitality after the war, he could no longer bring himself to trust in any of these professional liars that walked beside him.

Lin Jingheng pretended to not notice the change of expression and continued in an objective manner: “When the Cayley pirates returned to the Eighth Galaxy, they brought in a group of extremists from the AUS and started a series of human experiments on satellite Ema 3. Among the people they kidnapped for the experiment were the former Prime Minister of the Eighth Galaxy and his cabinet; these people managed to escape to the Milky Way City base and coincidentally ran into us. We didn’t realize they were infected with a more powerful mutated version of the Rainbow Virus, so we made close contact with these people without any protection and even spoke to them. I eventually caught the mutated virus, but he didn’t.”

Doctor Hardin was shocked, and after a short moment of hesitation he asked: “Do you have records of this? Samples of the mutated virus or even a medical report…”

“We do. Aside from that, we were also the ones that took the vaccine out from the homebase of the AUS. You can even check the real-time footage recorded on the mechs.”

Doctor Hardin fell silent–according to the research data from the extremist party of the AUS, vaccuocerebrals tended to have better immunity against the Rainbow Virus than normal people. However, the data also emphasized that their immunity was only a tad bit better; the difference was almost as small as the difference between a healthy young person versus an elderly person.

Professional soldiers in the Silver Fortress like Lin Jingheng have taken more antibiotics than anyone; their immune systems are significantly stronger than the average person. Under the same conditions, the chances of him being infected while the other remained untouched was virtually impossible.

Yet again, this was also quite possibly another story Lin Jingheng made up; the Eighth Galaxy was his territory, the lie could cover the whole galaxy no matter how much the old doctor tried to probe.

Doctor Hardin’s heart pounded against his chest as he shot a quick glance at Lin Jingheng, then answered with reservation: “It’s been too long. I have indeed come up with certain results about the Nuwa Project and human evolution, but the massive amount of data left behind has already been destroyed. I’m not used to using memory-aid devices, there was no way I could keep all of that information in my head.”

Lin Jingheng: “If that’s true, would the effects of biochips be much less harmful to him than the average person?”

“That will depend on the kind of biochip,” Doctor Hardin answered carefully. “In theory, if he can safely pass through the stages of evolution under perfect conditions, it should not have any harmful effects.”

The corner of Lin Jingheng’s lips relaxed a bit at this answer. Zhanlu once said that during the early days of Lu Bixing’s experiment with the chip, he’d repeatedly inject and remove the chip from his body, so he should at least have a better understanding of the chip now.

Before Lin Jingheng could let out a sigh of relief, Doctor Hardin spoke up: “You said that you’ve seen an artificially-made ‘birdman’ before; is this true or were you lying to me again?”

Lin Jingheng: “It’s true.”

The Doctor asked: “Is this birdman still doing well? What happened to them?”

A cloud of melancholy flashed across Lin Jingheng’s eyes.

This birdman didn’t live a good life; he spent his days struggling in this harsh world carrying a noble and kind soul of a human in his deformed body. Yet he never lived the honorable life of a man…not even for a single day. He later died, and even until his last breath, he never received a proper name outside of ‘birdman.’

“I think you understand what I mean now,” Doctor Hardin said. “Regardless if the chip on him is safe or not, if you don’t want him to carry the same burden as me and suffer the same fate as that birdman, you should keep this secret in the black hole for the rest of time.”

Lin Jingheng clenched his fist; the two men stared in silence at each other for a short while.

After what felt like an eternity, the front door of the apartment sent out a small notice that two visitors had arrived at this floor; the camera showed Thomas and White waiting outside.

Doctor Hardin commented in a whisper: “You shouldn’t test the limits of human nature, Commander.”

Lin Jingheng turned to stare at the old man: “Do you realize that you, as the one who made this comment, will not be given any freedom even in the Eighth Galaxy from now on?”

Doctor Hardin chuckled: “A free soul is even more valuable than a naturally habitable planet. Everyone builds the boundaries of their own prison cell, the only difference is the size; some people don’t realize they’re living in a prison while others that wake up will learn pain…aside from that, there are no fundamental differences no matter where you go. I’ve never been truly free my whole life anyway. Commander, I’d like to believe that regardless of what you can do to me, you can’t possibly torture an old man like me, right?”

Lin Jingheng didn’t respond. After a short while, he finally answered in an almost courteous fashion: “I’ll let them arrange a place for you to stay near my house. If you have any trouble at home, you can always call Zhanlu over to take care of you.”

Doctor Hardin looked at him; the Lin twins grew up on Wolto and were both very well-mannered. But only at the times when they had requests would they lower their heads and show this side of themselves. Though fortunately compared to Lin Jingshu’s eerie demanor and unreadable coldness, Lin Jingheng’s straightforward asshole attitude seemed much more reasonable.

The old doctor responded in a slightly sarcastic tone: “Oh, I’m even blessed by this kind of treatment? What an honor, Commander.”

Lin Jingheng didn’t mind the sarcasm: “Are you busy today? You can come visit my house tonight and meet him in person.”

By the time Thomas dragged White over to the old doctor’s apartment door, this was the first line he heard.

“Look at that, our commander’s here too,” Thomas knocked on the door gleefully as he whispered to White behind him, “Who can they meet at his house? Zhanlu?”

White gave an awkward but courteous smile back: “Perhaps…that ‘Engineer 001’?”

Thomas’ instinct was that this title sounded like an ID for an AI that strangely fit their boss’s aloof aesthetics. This was that psychopath who didn’t even know how to give the AI they were talking about a cuter personality, so he responded: “I’ve known him for so long and Commander’s never taken us to his house before, what a loner. But I wasn’t that interested in that elite hub on Wolto anyway, I’m definitely going to have a good tour of his house this time.”

The ‘Engineer 001’ in Thomas’ gossiping mouth, Lu Bixing, sneezed on the train back home.

He had been dragged to the Milky Way City Base Command Post before the sun went up and worked restlessly the whole day until he finally settled these workaholics near dusk. There was a group of single and young workaholics in the Command Post who worked day and night like their Prime Minister that Lu Bixing often spent time with during working hours.

Yet today, Prime Minister Lu didn’t want to join them in overtime. He used the excuse of pouring himself another cup of coffee in an attempt to sneak out of the post, only to be stopped by a whole line of people waiting for him outside the door.

For the first time in his life, Lu Bixing felt like a popular dungeon boss in an MMORPG that always had a group of players waiting to fight him.

Finally after the sky was dark, Lu Bixing found an opportunity to sneak out the backdoor. He giddily opened up the door only to find the director of planning already waiting in the parking lot. Lu Bixing turned around immediately and snuck onto the public train connecting the base to Milky Way City like a thief afraid of being caught.

The high-speed mobile passed through an enclosed tunnel quietly. There was no scenery outside the window and only strange lights glowing from the equipment inside the train; all the passengers around were late-night shift staff of the command post. Every single one of them was falling asleep on their seats and didn’t even notice the Prime Minister in their exhaustion.

The whole car was silent. Only Lu Bixing sat wide awake as if he’d had a bit too much coffee, like an excitable child on a school field trip.

He hadn’t been excited to go home in years. Every time he passed through this terminal, it was only due to those times when everyone was entirely exhausted from work and he allowed his staff to go home for some rest. He would drag out overtime until he really had nothing else to do and reluctantly go back home to listen to Zhanlu’s ramblings. He would close his eyes for a short rest on the train until he reached home. It wasn’t until today that he realized that the signal lights inside the terminal were so colorful, like a kaleidoscope; a projection of armed mobile safety ad on the walls of the tunnel followed at the same speed as the train. Lu Bixing had always ignored the video until today; when he watched the full clip with all his attention, he strangely found it comical and fresh.

After about two minutes, the video ended as the train stopped at his station.

Lu Bixing followed the crowd down the platform and checked the time, knowing that Lin Jingheng should already be home by now. As this thought arose, a strange sense of excitement consumed his whole body from the bottom up. His footsteps grew lighter as he passed through the streets of the residential area, elevating his enthusiasm the closer he got to his house. By the time he saw the light in his residence, he could almost feel that sense of delight inside him lift his foot off the ground.

It wasn’t that he wanted to do anything in particular or had any plans; it was a simple feeling of pure joy.

Yet this balloon of excitement popped the moment he opened the door…there were too many people inside his house.

White carried Popcorn in his arms and was first to stand up as he greeted his teacher: “Hey Teach, I’m here again, is dinner on you?”

Lu Bixing: “……”