017. Wool harvesting

Li Aozi kept a low profile and, with his extremely high charm, he easily played the role of a sunny, thoughtful, and gentle character—also a stereotypical image of Frost Plated males, where a dominant female culture inevitably gives rise to gentle and less aggressive males.

When Nodley spoke the common language, she had a bit of a Frost Plated accent, and Li Aozi tailored his approach accordingly, making an effort to chat with her during downtime.

Taking advantage of his high charm, Nodley would almost always engage in conversation. Li Aozi immediately also displayed the characteristics of Frost Plated males, with phrases like "How cool is your Brother Ao" coming to him effortlessly.

Li Aozi's judgment was not wrong.

In a harsh and remote place like the Outer World, it was unlikely to find people who had received an education. Nodley, although physically imposing and robust, actually had an education level of at least a bachelor's degree.

Living in the Outer World, where survival was the main concern, education was naturally not a priority. After being chatted up indifferently by Li Aozi for a while, Nodley inadvertently revealed that she was one of the Frost Plated People.

There's always much to talk about between fellow countrymen, and Nodley herself did not notice that after getting to know Li Aozi, she didn't hassle him as much.

Li Aozi was also very discerning. Although he knew that ZX-101 was one of his targets, he deliberately avoided talking about the sensitive topic of room ZX-102 with Head Nurse Nodley.

As time went by, and with Li Aozi cooperating with the training, his favorability with Nodley was ground down to 20 points after a few days—already at the level of indifference.

Assistant Doctor Anna would also occasionally come to conduct some checks on Li Aozi, drawing some blood for testing and taking X-ray pictures after administering indicators.

Every afternoon he would be called away by the psychologist Doctor Ernny. This kind and gentle "big sister" would patiently talk with him about his past, with Li Aozi initially deliberately acting "restrained," "impatient," and "nervous," but gradually he opened up and began to cooperate with the therapy and counseling.

Come evening, Li Aozi would be in the isolation ward by himself, quietly practicing with gravity, training in an arcane energy with which he was already familiar. However, his Dexterity attribute was not high enough, making the practice somewhat strenuous.

"Such a miraculous power."

Li Aozi tossed a spoon toward his palm, and with a thought, the spoon floated 10 centimeters above it. He flicked his hand gently, and the spoon quickly spun around, performing a circular motion, until his arcane energy was depleted, his brain sent a slight pain, and the spoon, losing its gravity, fell into his palm.

Li Aozi found this kind of repetitive game exceedingly enjoyable.

As a humanitarian aid organization, Mingji's isolation wards naturally didn't have surveillance cameras installed. However, the monitoring bracelet on his hand constantly sent his personal physical condition and information to the physicians.

This was even more useful than plain surveillance. Through his heart rate, brain wave frequency, pulse, and body temperature, physicians could easily infer his mental state and physiological condition. Was he exercising? Was he feeling stressed? Had he had a good dream or a nightmare?—All these could be deduced.

However, the physicians overlooked one thing: on Azure Star, only the Four Nations had the capability to detect traces of arcane energy use, and gravity was renowned for its discreet and invisible nature.

It can be said that unless Li Aozi himself explained it, no one would know that he had mastered an Omega-level top arcane energy.

Li Aozi ate and drank as usual, engaged in conversations with people, and had company. The physicians also kept a close eye on his physiological conditions, and he had enough time to exercise every day—aside from his personal freedom being severely restricted, there were almost no major issues.

The physicians collected his various samples, starting with blood and some fallen hair and then moving on to take away his excrement. Later on, they simply fed him various drugs, then observed him producing excrements under supervision to monitor his condition.

Although Li Aozi showed some resistance, he was indifferent at heart; when the physicians observed him as if he were a lab rat, Li Aozi was also observing them.

Sometimes he would casually ask about the purpose of the experiments, then show conflict and hesitation, prompting them to voluntarily explain. By comparing this to the content of his initial conversation with the Professor, discrepancies and doubts became much more pronounced.

"It's been 13 days."

Li Aozi carved a new mark into the bed with the spoon. An ordinary person might feel dejected or even break down in such a closed environment and under repeated monitoring, but Li Aozi felt no pressure at all.

Back in version 5.0, he had terrible luck. His live-streaming career had just started; not only were there requirements for the duration, but it coincided with the start of a new version of the game.

Although the "Meteor Fall Master" could be said to be a solo occupation, only large guilds organized expansion activities. The pressure on Li Aozi, who expanded by himself, was tenfold or even a hundredfold that of an ordinary player.

In order to keep up with the live-streaming hours and manage the expansion, Li Aozi worked overtime for 12 days straight, never turning off the camera except for bathroom breaks and meals, single-handedly completing the expansion tasks and earning his base salary for the month's live streaming.

If it weren't for complying with the psychological exams by Doctor Ernny, and his occasional sighs of "feeling too bored alone" and "wishing to interact with more people if possible," Li Aozi felt he could stay in Mingji until the organization went bankrupt.

Not only that, but he had 150 contribution values deposited into his account daily, and sometimes when they drew his blood, or he seemed a bit down, he'd even get an extra chicken drumstick with dinner.

Mingji Humanity was indeed humane, if not for the daily exercises and blood and bone marrow extractions, Li Aozi reckoned he would've probably even gained weight.

Various Faction tasks put together—up to today, Li Aozi had accumulated 2065 camp contribution points.

There were plenty of inhumane human experiments out there, but it was quite rare for a test subject to fleece the research institution. Li Aozi was starting to like life here.

"Ersha Drug-VI Trial is priced at 2500 contribution values, I'm still a bit short of points to exchange for it," he mused.

He glanced at his Attribute Panel and noticed that over the past few days, his "Constitution" and "Strength" had each increased by 2 points.

"Current Attributes Panel: Strength 6, Dexterity 5, Constitution 7, Charm 15, Will 8."

Li Aozi stroked his chin, his attributes, if compared to an average person, were already not low. Ignoring Arcane Energy and Charm, they were about on par with a non-Transcendent Athlete.

The Ersha Drug Trial that could be exchanged from the Mingji Faction was guaranteed to awaken Arcane Energy—whether one could awaken to Omega Level was another matter.

As long as it wasn't the lowest Alpha Level, Li Aozi was confident he could make the most of it.

"Actually, as a 'Mutant,' I don't need any equipment, and 'Gravity' Arcane Energy is quite strong. Maybe... time to stir up some mischief?"

Doing Faction tasks every day had Li Aozi feeling bored; he started to file his nails, already thinking about mingling with some of the plot characters tomorrow.

Ding ding ding dang!

While he was pondering what to say, suddenly, a tapping sound came from the iron bars of the isolation ward's window.

"Who's there?"

Li Aozi became alert; he immediately rolled out of bed, stuffed his pillow under the covers to create the silhouette of a sleeping person. Then, he tiptoed over, pressing himself against the wall, using the light coming through the bars to cast a vague shadow on the floor, like that of a head.

Was someone peeking through the bars into the room?

Li Aozi looked up, but he did not see anyone at the bars.

He stayed silent and did not make a sound. After a while, the shadow on the ground seemed to shake its head anxiously and then knocked on the door again.

Clang...

The door panel trembled slightly, and then the figure vanished without a trace.

Li Aozi was puzzled by the new development. Just as he was about to move away, he suddenly noticed something falling down from outside the bars.

He bent down to pick it up and saw it was a prescription slip given to a patient by Doctor Ernny, but it had been scribbled over with messy colors. Li Aozi strained his eyes in the dim light, barely making out the chaotic lines. After a moment, he realized that while the different colored markings seemed random at a glance, they actually followed a pattern.

"If you follow this line, there's an encircled dot, and on the other end in a box, there is a 'hurry' character—wait a minute, these are common words, I can't interpret them using Fiery Summer's language... So, the actual meaning of these two characters is..."

Li Aozi gently tapped the back of the paper, his gaze growing serious:

"Run."