It's great to be alive.
This was the most vivid thought to surface in Lin Xi's mind after meeting with Bryce.
Even if there's still difficulties waiting for him ahead.
As a survivor of the exploration team, there'll be a lot of written reports waiting for him, and if he's unlucky, he'll probably have to do an oral mission report to Taran (or that damn emergency team), just these alone made Lin Xi a little envious of Jerry and the other three who were in a coma.
Not to mention, this accident had allowed them to accidentally discover a Providence aircraft— it was a life-saving straw for the Helios, about to run out of ammunition and food.
Of course, every time he repeated the adventures he had with Lina and Schrodereth in that aircraft, Lin Xi kept emphasizing that there were many huge and terrifying alien insects living in it, as well as the abnormal conditions of the mummies trapped dead in the freezer...
But looking at the ecstatic expressions of those on board the Helios, Lin Xi doubted whether they heeded his reminder.
The control board they took out from the central control room of the aircraft was immediately handed over to the technical analysts. Fortunately, after the past 300 years, the technology on the Earth hasn't completely stayed the same. According to the information revealed by Alyssa in private, it might not take long for them to completely repair the motherboard— alright! Maybe that's why the people weren't taking Lin Xi's reminders seriously.
After all, once the central control motherboard is repaired, it means that the "ghost" mechanical warriors controlled by it can resume operations.
Even if they could only use a few of the mechanical warriors Lin Xi and the others found in the central control room, they'd be able to handle most attacks with ease.
"...According to your description, we very much suspect that there's probably more mechanical warriors stored in the bottom warehouse of that aircraft," The still lovely Alyssa secretly told Lin Xi this news in private, "Del Company had gone bankrupt. Later, when the coalition government carried out the annihilation order on those mechanical warriors, they discovered that the inventory in their warehouses were extremely low. Thinking about it now, it's very likely that Del Company reached an agreement with the government of country A. Orders that hadn't left the factory in time were transported to the Providence and brought here. After all, this place isn't controlled by the solar system ban. According to the usual behavior of country A, maybe they counted on the special conditions and location to begin reselling weapons privately. You know, at that time, this place was considered the first exocolonial planet in human history."
Maybe even Alyssa herself didn't realize, when she talked about the planet where the Helios is located, she had completely equating the planet to as192.
Lin Xi pursed his lips.
He silently watched Alyssa whisper with overexcitement, and didn't remind the other party that if this really was as192, why were there no traces of jump gates that should be nearby according to the coordinates?
To erase a folded black hole at will— Lin Xi felt that even God would find it difficult.
Moreover, it wasn't just the aircraft and those damn documents and reports that made Lin Xi increasingly worried.
"Fuck……"
It was another day of reporting. Lin Xi let out a long sigh after leaving the conference room, he dragged his tired body straight to his greenhouse without stopping.
In fact, it's been so long since the Helios crash-landed, the research tasks at hands of the researchers had all been completely abandoned. No one cared about the animals and plants transported from Sunu (no matter how precious or apparently priceless they are), no one paid attention to the progress of their tasks. When even the survival of their lives were in question, the projects the researchers did seem to have become particularly insignificant.
But for Lin Xi, just because no one cared doesn't mean he doesn't worry.
At least, the Star Butterfly still in the greenhouse was now an existence that worried him the most.
"Hey 'No. 1', how are you today?"
Lin Xi walked into the greenhouse and said hello to the giant, ugly, even deformed thing in the glass culture tank.
And that thing was as usual, silently attached to a corner of the glass tank, soundless, like a corpse.
Lin Xi walked to it and began to measure its various data routinely.
Although Ernie firmly believed that this mass of tangled meridians and disgusting spots was a body sac formed by "No. 1" after it failed to pupate, Lin Xi still decided to continue regarding it as the pupa of Star Butterfly to observe.
It was discovered that there was something wrong with the pupation of "No. 1" the night when he was brought back to the Helios by the rescue team.
After going through a series of crazy bureaucratic meetings, Lin Xi dragged his exhausted body and opened the door of the greenhouse— and then he almost fainted because of what he saw.
The star butterfly chrysalis shell, which was originally more or less beautiful, seemed to have rotted, enlarged, deformed and changed color. But when Ernie, who was supposed to be observing and taking care of "No. 1", faced Lin Xi's deathly look, he just turned red and hesitated, unable to even come up with an excuse.
Well, the young man with curly hair did have some excuse.
"I swear, I really don't know what happened, it just suddenly became like this... Fine, fine, I admit that I was a little negligent during the days when you disappeared... I'm sorry, Dr Lin Xi, but you know that I'm really too busy. The situation in the animal laboratory is bad enough, those bastards in the emergency team are clamoring to destroy a batch of biological sleep bodies below A level to save energy. It would be nice to be able to put a chip into my brain like Professor Ando. Maybe I'll still be able to take care of these messy things, but you know me... I'm just a student who wants to get more credits. Who knows what'll happen in the end? Damn this……"
Ernie almost felt like crying at the end. Faced with such a face, Lin Xi had no choice but to acquiesce to all this.
The little Star Butterfly he raised with his own hands.
His "No. 1" might've died in that disgusting and deteriorated pupa shell...
However, it was probably the accident caused by the storm that changed him. After witnessing Francis' death with his own eyes, Lin Xi became increasingly unable to accept that the life around him had left him.
So even though the pupa shell of "No. 1" has become what it was now, Lin Xi still refused to give up.
He didn't destroy it, but silently recorded data every day, praying in his heart that "No. 1" was still somehow alive.
Maybe his prayers really made a difference.
There was actually a faint breath of life coming out of this extremely ugly pupa shell.
It started out as a soft thing that bulged slightly as he whispered to it.
The movement was even fainter than a baby turning over in its mother's belly— but Lin Xi still discovered it by accident.
Only God knew how happy he was at that moment.
Later, Lin Xi discovered that when he gently touched the wet and sticky surface of the pupa shell, something seemed to tremble slightly inside the pupa shell in response to him.
Even the spots scattered on the surface of the pupa shell occasionally changed into different colors just like the spots on the gorgeous wings of "No. 1".
Lin Xi began to have more confidence in the survival of "No. 1", although he was probably the only one on the entire ship who cared about it.
"Hey, how was your day? Maybe you'd like to go for a ride?"
Lin Xi spoke softly to "No. 1".
After taking a look at the data, in just a few days, the deformed pupa shell had grown a lot larger at a speed visible to the naked eye. It's precisely because of this that the originally thick pupa shell has become much thinner. In some special cases, parts of the pupa shell had even begun to crack.
After discovering this, Lin Xi checked those parts with fear.
"Huh? This..."
Lin Xi couldn't believe his eyes— he found that under the cracked pupa shell, a soft and thin film had appeared.
The film was white, but with a slightly translucent texture.
The light yellow slurry inside the pupa shell showed a little yellow shadow under the film.
At the edge of the film and pupa, were some capillaries that shouldn't appear, but Lin Xi didn't notice the problem here at the time.
Because the moment when he couldn't help but get closer to observe, a gurgling wet sound rang out, and then, a pale shadow slid quickly and dimly from under the film.
"Ah?!"
Lin Xi was startled.
He straightened up and took a few steps back.
At the same time, after the white shadow squirmed, a red spot the size of a thumb gradually appeared.
Then there was another round of whatever that was. Under Lin Xi's gaze, this hazy red spot stayed in a fixed position. It stared at Lin Xi through the cracked gap and the film, flashing from time to time.
"No way?"
Lin Xi murmured.
It wasn't until this moment that he suddenly realized what the red spot was.
Those are... eyes.
The eyes belonging to "No. 1".
At this moment, "No. 1" was staring directly at him.
Lin Xi didn't know what "No. 1" would look like after the transformation was completed— but one thing was certain now, that is, "No. 1" would probably have a big pair of eyes... and red eyeballs.
**
The author has something to say: Let me speak on behalf of the masses.
Oh haha...
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PastTimer: I forgot to update... I'm not dropping anything it's just really hectic lately