The first… well, technically the second person to truly start paid work.
Lin Yi said,
"Qiqing, when you have time later, compile the important loss reports."
"As for the smaller issues, just handle them yourself."
Dongfang Qiqing nodded.
"Understood, sir."
"First I'll introduce you to a few people and let you get familiar with the place."
Lin Yi then turned to Zhuxing.
"Zhuxing, I'll leave that task to you."
"I'm a little worried about the main body over there, so I'll go check the progress of the experiments."
"And I should also organize everything we gained from this trip."
Zhuxing nodded.
"Okay."
Lin Yi's body suddenly collapsed.
Zhuxing caught him smoothly.
A hovering mechanical assistant quickly flew over.
It took Lin Yi from Zhuxing's arms and transported him toward a nearby cultivation chamber.
Zhuxing removed the lollipop from her mouth and put it away for now.
Then she greeted Dongfang Qiqing formally.
"Qiqing-jie, nice to officially meet you."
"I'm Zhuxing."
"The teacher's student and assistant."
"This time it's my real body, by the way~"
Dongfang Qiqing laughed lightly.
"Well then—nice to meet you too… little Zhuxing~"
She stood with her hands behind her back, leaning slightly forward.
Her laughter sounded like silver bells.
Zhuxing was extremely friendly.
She immediately tugged at Dongfang Qiqing's sleeve.
"Qiqing-jie, come teach me how to use this!"
"There are so many things I don't understand."
She pulled up a holographic screen.
It displayed a website.
The official homepage of "Universal Premium Goods."
Dongfang Qiqing thought to herself:
Ah… so that's it.
She needs help.
No wonder she's being so polite.
Of course, this was actually a misunderstanding.
Zhuxing was always polite with people she was familiar with.
Zhuxing pointed at different parts of the screen.
Then she suddenly realized something.
If the screen floated too high, she had to stand on tiptoe.
If it floated too low, Dongfang Qiqing had to bend down.
That wouldn't work.
Zhuxing stomped lightly.
A small platform rose from the ground.
Standing on it, she became the same height as Dongfang Qiqing.
Dongfang Qiqing patiently taught her how the system worked.
Zhuxing was extremely smart.
She understood everything almost instantly.
Unfortunately…
Since the teaching was done through practical demonstrations—
They accidentally bought a lot of useless items along the way.
After some time, Zhuxing happily closed the screen.
Then suddenly froze.
(๑•̌.•̑๑)ˀ̣ˀ̣
She slapped her forehead.
"Oh no!"
"I got so excited chatting that I forgot the teacher's instructions!"
"Qiqing-jie, hurry—come with me!"
"I'll show you around the space city!"
She grabbed Dongfang Qiqing's hand and started running.
Extremely lively.
Dongfang Qiqing's physical fitness couldn't keep up.
At first it was fine.
But after a while she started panting and quickly stopped.
"Slow down, slow down!"
"Zhuxing, slow down!"
"There's no rush."
Space City Central Core
Lin Yi looked at his main body sleeping in the central chamber.
Even though this wasn't the first time he had seen it from this perspective—
It still felt strange.
A special device stood in the center.
On both sides were two massive cultivation chambers.
Between them was a small connection module.
On the left side—
Inside the giant chamber lay Lin Yi's true body, quietly asleep.
In the middle chamber—
A small sealed space was filled with liquid containing extremely high life energy.
It came from the true blessing of Abundance.
The original Verdant Life Vine.
The towering green vine that reached the heavens.
Lin Yi had once cut off a branch.
He extracted the energy within it and compressed it repeatedly.
Eventually it became this small pool of liquid—
Life Source Fluid.
Even though the life energy was abundant—
It still wasn't enough.
Every day the chamber required multiple injections of new source fluid.
All to sustain a single object:
The Origin Cell.
Origin Cell
One of the accidental byproducts of the Panacea Project.
Born from an irreproducible accident during experiments with the Life Equation.
Unless the Aeon of Abundance—Yaoshi—personally descended and granted the same blessing at the exact critical moment—
The experiment could never be replicated.
During the Life Equation experiments—
While testing high-frequency transformations between organic and inorganic states—
The Aeon of Abundance had bestowed a blessing.
A seed fell.
Divine blood of Abundance nourished it.
And from it grew the massive Verdant Life Vine.
The Origin Cell was born within that extremely unique environment.
Research later discovered its properties were astonishing.
When supplied with enough life energy—
It could slowly divide itself.
The rate of division was directly proportional to the available energy.
The cells produced from division—
Temporarily named Origin Cell II—
Had another remarkable property.
They rapidly differentiated into the same type as the most recent cell they came into contact with.
But—
If they failed to find a template cell in time—
They would quickly undergo irreversible death.
This phenomenon made the Origin Cell completely irreplaceable.
A unique entity.
At the same time, its differentiation ability fascinated Lin Yi.
He began feeding it all kinds of bizarre biological samples to test its limits.
At one point—
He even inserted a fragment of a Twilight Ancient Beast.
The result proved that wasn't its limit either.
He also tested Verdant Vine cells.
The Origin Cell could still imitate them.
That was exactly how the many replica Verdant Life bracelets had been created.
Cheap imitations.
Fake knockoffs.
Lin Yi had no idea why those Xianzhou Borisin kept trying to steal them.
Everything about those experiments was normal.
Completely ordinary research.
But then—
One day—
Aha threw Lin Yi a cup of alcohol.
Lin Yi didn't dare drink it.
Instead he analyzed it.
Inside were multiple lethal biological toxins.
It even contained:
Hair from Propagation
Golden blood of Destruction
If he had actually drunk it—
He would have died on the spot.
But…
The golden blood of Destruction…
Curiosity won.
Lin Yi placed the Origin Cell together with Nanook's golden blood.
The result shocked him.
The golden blood increased.
The change was extremely subtle.
Only extremely precise instruments could detect it.
But the Origin Cell had truly replicated Nanook's golden blood.
The rate was incredibly slow.
After many years—
It had only produced half the amount of a little finger.
That golden blood was contained in the right chamber, held within force fields.
The system continuously transferred newly generated Destruction blood from the middle chamber to the right chamber.
From time to time—
One or two cells were extracted.
Diluted into tons of life source fluid.
Then injected into the left chamber, where Lin Yi's main body slept.
Gradually increasing his body's resistance and adaptability to Destruction energy.
Lin Yi had an extremely bold idea.
In the future…
Could he artificially guide the cells within that golden blood…
To differentiate again?
To form tissues?
To achieve the basic conditions required for sustaining life?
And then…