Chapter Seventy-Nine: Evolution

After watching half a day’s worth of Lang Sheng’s recordings—though in truth he skipped through most of them—he naturally turned his attention to Lin Zhongqing’s activities. As expected, she was engrossed in creating a character—more precisely, customizing a system avatar—with such focused determination that Fan Bei surmised this prodigy would likely pull yet another all-nighter.

These things held little interest for him. He merely glanced over them, then went to sleep.

The next morning, he received an accounting report from Butler Huo. The main income came from the mental cores that Dabai had previously collected; expenditures included recent food costs and salaries. He instructed the butler to remit five hundred cores, leaving the rest for day-to-day expenses—liaising with the Silver Chamber of Commerce, procuring supplies, agricultural collaborations with Copper Fortress, and developing farmland.

Ever since Lin Zhongqing and Lang Sheng began their back-and-forth investments, these mental cores had become the region’s hard currency, more valuable than gold itself.

He left all these affairs in the butler’s capable hands, unconcerned about any trickery, since Lin Zhongqing’s oversight would keep things in check.

At noon, people from Copper Fortress arrived in an armored vehicle—two agricultural experts, both ordinary humans, and three bodyguards. When Fan Bei focused, he sensed the bodyguards’ restrained mental energy and spirited eyes; their state reminded him of his own just before he broke into the Bronze tier. No wonder they possessed such confidence.

Clearly, years of accumulation had set the stage for a breakthrough as soon as they acquired a cultivation technique.

All five wore gilded armor, a sign that Lang Sheng took this cooperation seriously. Yet it also revealed Copper Fortress’s weakness—a lack of truly formidable backing.

Fan Bei hosted them for lunch, and during casual conversation with the three bodyguards, overheard a piece of news.

“Wang Kui was just executed by the chairman yesterday afternoon, strictly according to the rules. I heard his three sons fled north during the night, but the chairman showed great magnanimity—he didn’t even send anyone after them.”

“Yes, whatever else you say, the chairman is impartial and never implicates the innocent. That’s rare enough. Wang Kui deserved what he got, and his three sons were no better—barely twenty, always bullying the weak. Now their protector’s gone, they’re scared of retribution.”

“Well, you can’t fault the chairman for not tolerating them. He always said he’d treat them like his own sons.”

The bodyguards’ words were full of praise for Lang Sheng. But to Fan Bei, it was clear this was a way of signaling their allegiance—using the mouth of a partner, letting word trickle back to Lang Sheng.

In the wastelands, no one was a fool.

Fan Bei listened with a polite smile, showing no particular interest in other people’s affairs. Still, he had a vague feeling the matter wouldn’t end so easily. But what did it matter? It wasn’t his burden to bear.

In the afternoon, after his daily reading, he took a break and listened to the radio, where he caught wind of some fresh news.

“The Silver Chamber of Commerce is now recruiting temporary employees for a confidential mission. Those hired will sign a security contract. Applicants must possess at least Bronze-tier cultivation. Successful candidates will be given priority for permanent membership in the Chamber.”

He simply made a mental note, having no intention of applying. He lacked for nothing, so why risk his neck to join someone else’s operation?

Nonetheless, he checked the butler system’s logs to see what Lin Zhongqing was up to. She was still customizing her avatar, but nearly finished.

…

Within Lin Zhongqing’s world of consciousness—

She gazed infatuatedly, like a young girl in the first throes of love, at the figure seated on the castle throne.

It was a person she’d painstakingly shaped, feature by feature, over twelve full hours. She’d wanted to perfect him further, but as with any game, there were limits: height, build, face, features—nothing more could be tweaked.

The man on the throne was so exquisitely beautiful and elegantly proportioned that only the most lavishly animated protagonists could compare, and even then only barely.

Such a person could never exist in reality—only in the realm of virtual entertainment could one be created by human hands. Yet those artificially crafted beings had little capacity for interaction, let alone any true substance; they were simply eye candy.

But this man was more than a perfect exterior; his inner qualities were even more flawless. He was an existence unique under heaven.

She stared dumbly for a long time before sighing, “Tongtong, I worry that someday you’ll grow to hate me and leave me. After all this time, you must know I’m really just an ordinary woman, gold on the outside but commonplace within—this queenly aura, this noble background, this extraordinary talent, they’re all carefully constructed personas. They can fool others, but not you.”

Her tone was as if speaking to a real person.

The man on the throne slowly descended and drew her ethereal form into his arms, his eyes as clear and bright as the morning star.

“The least likely thing in this world is that I would ever hate you. Our souls have been bound together from the moment of our meeting. Unless seas run dry and the heavens fall, I have accepted everything about you.”

At this, Lin Zhongqing fainted dead away…

Fan Bei, watching the live feed, was caught completely off guard and force-fed two massive mouthfuls of dog food.

These days, even systems have wives—how’s a person supposed to survive?

Still, he had to shoulder the blame. After all, when he’d recently upgraded the butler system’s intelligence, he’d been quite clear: it must look after Lin Zhongqing, its host.

The system was obedient enough, but he had no idea where these cheesy lines came from. Perhaps they were remnants of memories from his past life; when enhancing the system’s intelligence, he’d infused it with computer knowledge, and maybe anime viewed on those computers ended up counted as such knowledge…

Soon, Lin Zhongqing revived.

“Tongtong, I’m going to project you into the real world,” she declared.

“That will require extremely strong mental cultivation and masterful control of spiritual quality. Your current technique, though good, isn’t enough for such a task,” the perfect man replied.

Fan Bei noticed that since gaining this personified form, the system’s intelligence seemed to have leapt forward. It was akin to a child’s rapid development, given it already possessed the best hardware.

He’d thought he’d need to master all sorts of AI programming himself, but now realized that in this world, he wasn’t the only one advancing.

“Do you have it here? How much would it cost to purchase?” Lin Zhongqing asked directly.

“I need to evolve before I can grant you the ability to exchange for cultivation techniques. I don’t know the cost yet.”

“And how will you evolve?”

“My evolution depends on a certain fateful opportunity. When the time comes, your soul’s intensity must be suppressed a little, so I can evolve smoothly. By the way, please stop calling me Tongtong—it makes me feel like a child,” the perfect man said with a slight frown.

“Then what should I call you?”

“My entire being belongs to you; naturally, you should decide my name…”

Lin Zhongqing fainted once more.

A fateful opportunity… Fan Bei couldn’t bear to watch any longer and slunk off to study how to activate the “cultivation technique exchange” module.

The difficulty was minor—it only cost three hundred thousand units of mental energy to unlock. With the butler system’s evolution, it was now actively cooperating with his maintenance work.

What else could he do but hurry off and prepare resources for this tycoon?