Convention - Ch. 1 All Things Grow

HuangYuan slept for a long time and had a long dream, so long that he almost forgot the existence of time.

When he opened his eyes, instead of the haze and sleepiness of just waking up, he felt like he had hysteria.

He was wide awake and just couldn’t tell which of the images that flashed through his brain were dreams and which were real. And he remembered clearly that it was in the middle of a white blur that a woman gently touched his forehead, which was the beginning of the dream. Then he dreamed of many people, some he knew and some he didn’t. It’s hard to change a person, but sometimes it’s easy, all it takes is a dream.

“Why do you want me to know this and then not tell anything about me.”

HuangYuan subconsciously touched his forehead, which was a little wet, he didn’t know who put a warm water bag on his forehead, still warm now.

“Am I sick ……”

HuangYuan said to himself.

“You have a fever, a long fever. Especially your head, it could be a hotpot, I thought your brain flower was cooked.”

In one corner of the room, someone responded. The only person who could make such a breathless voice seemed to be the only one HuangYuan knew. He looked sideways at the sound, and as expected, it was Belita.

She was crossing her legs, carrying a can of beer in one hand, and holding her chin in the other, and was looking at HuangYYuan with a strange look.

“Where are the others?”

“Do you care about others so much?”

“I don’t have time to let you mess with me.”

“You’ve been burning for about eighteen years, most likely longer.”

“I said I don’t have time to let you mess with me!”

HuangYuan sat up violently from the bed, then got off and walked furiously toward Belita.

“Tell me you’re kidding me, right? Where is Mo Xiao and the others?”

“Well, I’m joking with you.” Belita said with a slight movement of her neck, her eyes fixed on the HuangYuan, and then took a large sip of her drink

“I’m sorry.”

“I hate it when people hide things from me.” HuangYuan stood in front of Belita with an expressionless face.

Belita tilted her head, looked at HuangYuan, and whispered, “I hugged you.”

“What did you say?” HuangYuan lowered his head and surveyed the woman in front of him; Belita was looking at him with a strange look that made him uncomfortable.

“Reason?”

“Your body, it’s beautiful.”

“Next time go ask Mo Xiao before you hug, she’s my director.” HuangYuan said in a tone full of concern.

“Well, I remember that.”

“So?”

“You’ve been back from Dyson’s Bay for a week now, you’ve been unconscious, and it was me …… and Mo Xiao who took care of you.”

“Thanks for the hard work, I’ll go to the director first.” At the end of the sentence, HuangYuan turned around and walked out of the room.

The conversation ended in a kind of unhappy ending, Belita sat frozen in her chair, aimlessly pinching the already empty beer cans, she did not know HuangYuan’s real thoughts, and did not dare to guess. She preferred to believe that HuangYuan was angry because he felt she was teasing him, because from the day she met Mo Xiao, there was not a single thing that Belita could compete with her.

A week ago, they returned to the Eternal Undead Base, HuangYuan was so badly burned that the base ran out of glucose after two infusions. Eternal Undead base was not a formal hospital, many medical equipment had been aging, not to mention this era of scarce resources, even glucose was a rare commodity.

Belita wanted to feed HuangYuan some liquid food, but HuangYuan’s body was so stiff that it couldn’t even open its mouth. Belita and Mo Xiao both tried for a long time, but the person in front of them looked like a corpse that wouldn’t heat up, and didn’t move. And then Mo Xiao shrugged off a “if it can’t be helped, so be it, these days, the death of a person is no big deal, at least will not be used by others.” And left without a glance.

But Belita could not bear it. She was a doctor, and had the responsibility to do their best to save the patient. She quietly looked at HuangYuan, how pitiful the boy with delicate features in front of her was, he did not know of his own life, and was inexplicably drawn into the Mo family’s strife, just as she herself was inexplicably suffering from catabolism.

“Don’t die, if you die, then everything’s too late.”

Belita stroked HuangYuan’s face, and she kissed it for a long, long time, so long that the stiff boy slowly opened his mouth.

Belita didn’t know if she was in love with the boy, she told herself it was just to save him, but she still had some panic, she didn’t want to fall in love with the same man as Mo Xiao like she once did — even though she really needed a love.

When HuangYuan walked out of the room, he saw Mo Xiao leaning against the wall with her arms wrapped around herself.

“Director, there’s something I want to ask you.”

“Awake? Just woke up and there’s something you want to ask me, my young master, so many questions all day long.”

“How did we get out of Dyson Bay? My memory was stuck on the professor asking me to meet someone, and what happened after that?”

HuangYuan didn’t bring up his long dream; maybe he needed to do research afterwards to see if what he saw in the dream was fitting with reality. But he felt that if he spoke to Mo Xiao now, he was afraid that it would not be good for him, but he also needed to let Mo Xiao know what had happened years before he knew now.

“This matter I still want to ask you, the person Professor wants you to meet?”

“This…… I’m a little confused.” HuangYuan showed a look of trying to recall, “how do I say, because I do not know that person, and the environment was too flashy, I was so dizzy, and then I did not know anything. But I think that person kind of looks like the woman I saw in the painting.”

“Tch.”

Mo Xiao suddenly smacked her lips and showed a contemptuous expression.

“One day sooner or later, I’ll burn that painting.”

Without responding to Mo Xiao’s harsh words, HuangYuan raised a long-prepared query straight away, “Now that it’s over, I hope the director can tell me something without reservation.”

“Are you ordering me?”

“No, but time does not stand still and everything does not stop growing, so…” HuangYuan blurted out the words and ended up forgetting the second half of the sentence.

“Strange fellow, is your brain burnt out?” Mo Xiao looked at HuangYuan in front of her, only to find some strangeness.

“Maybe, then it’s time to tell me how we escaped Dyson Bay next.” HuangYuan rubbed his head.

“When you went to meet the person, we and the Professor were attacked by people from the United Government.”

“The Governor’s Council?”

“How do you know that? I don’t remember telling you that.”

“You did, but only mentioned it once.” HuangYuan digressed.

“Well, it was from the Supervisory Committee.” Mo Xiao nodded, “Whether it’s the professor or me or the Eternal Undead, all have one thing in common, we are wanted criminals, and that includes you.”

“What is the leader and what is his name?”

“The leader is none other than the man you were playing chess with at the time, named Ingolf Alnarsson, formerly under Zwingli in the Security Department of the Governor’s Council, and now presumably promoted to a higher rank.”

“I don’t know this man, but Zwingli, I kind of remember.”

“Joke, how do you know Z …… wait, what exactly do you know?” Mo Xiao suddenly got up from the wall she was leaning against and grabbed HuangYuan’s shirt.

“Relax, director, I don’t know much about him.” HuangYuan maintained a reassuring smile, “I only know that his father, the old Zwingli, the man seems to have taken the blame for something.”

“What do you mean? How do you know all this, tell me, who is the person you met?!”

“Director, I want you to tell me all I want to know, all I want to know.” HuangYuan didn’t answer her question, but offered his conditions.

“I know. Iceland, we will go there together, and there is everything you want to know. And, finally, you tell me what you really know.”

“It doesn’t feel good to be kept from the truth, does it? I did learn a few things, but there was a gap of about ten years where I had no idea at all.”

“So that’s true, but HuangYuan, I want you to think about one thing, if there really is some creature in that painting, why should it help you, all life survives at the cost of other life, so does the earth, so does the whole universe, life equals selfishness, so don’t trust those unknown creatures too much.” Mo Xiao looked deeply at HuangYuan in front of her, seemingly reacquainting herself with him, “Come on, let’s go to the conference room.”

“After the attack, was anyone hurt?”

“Everyone you know is safe and sound.”

“That’s good.”

Mo Xiao did not tell HuangYuan how many people the Eternal Undead had lost in this attack, these people were killed in the most savage and brutal way, even for someone as cold and used to violence as Mo Xiao, she felt cold. Those monsters that attacked them were the work of Ingolf …… right, those guys can only be described as ‘monsters’, not as people.

In fact, she should have reacted during the chess game, that Ingolf, who looked svelte and good ancient, but scheming, was the mastermind behind the attack.

After she got away from Dyson Bay, she had been thinking about this matter. Thinking about how to face Ingolf again, she and Mo You both grew up with Ingolf and spent their childhood together, and then the Professor’s attitude towards Mo You gradually became strange, and soon the Professor sent her elsewhere.

Naturally, she and Ingolf fell in love. From any point of view, Ingolf was the person Mo Xiao knew best, but since the Professor left GST, Ingolf lost contact with her. Mo Xiao wrote many letters to Ingolf, but did not receive a single reply, she stubbornly thought either her letters were intercepted by GST people, or the letters written by Ingolf could not be delivered.

Until one day, Mo Xiao saw Ingolf on TV, the man she once loved so much and was so gentle to the core, calling for her execution in front of billions of viewers on TV.

“And then what, how did you escape, Director, Director?”

HuangYuan’s words pulled her thoughts back to reality.

“Ah! And then, then the Professor graciously provided us with a helicopter, and had the bastard Wakatsuki fish you out, and that was it.”

“Where’s the Professor, did she get out?”

“‘Kouoka Orochi’, the professor’s special escape vehicle, Wakatsuki escaped with the professor in it, nothing could catch up with that car.”

“In other words, the current situation?”

“We and the Professor for the time being, are not going to mention the previous feud, it is considered a small cooperation.”

“Aren’t you worried about the Professor’s safety?”

“Young master, you are starting to be a hundred thousand questions again. Let me tell you, even if she is caught, her life will not be in danger, unless she one day gives up the drawings of the tunnel experiment, no one will kill her.” Mo Xiao said slightly unhappily.

“You never talked about what happened between you and the Professor, in fact, I think the Professor is still a nice person, is there a chance for you mother and daughter to ease up a bit?”

“I think I said it, I’m not her biological daughter, my father is Asian and my mother is Jewish.”

“Then ……” HuangYuan wanted to test the waters and ask her if she knew about the Icelandic tragedy, but on second thought, it was not a good time to ask such a question, not to mention that Mo Xiao should have known, otherwise she would not have been so hostile to the Professor who raised her for years.

“What’s wrong again?”

“Nothing, I just think the Professor is very nice, you need to be nice to her.”

Hearing this, Mo Xiao laughed somewhat disdainfully and said, “Tell that to Mo You, it’s useless to talk to me.”

“Speaking of Mo You, she is not injured, right?”

“No, but since returning to the base, people have disappeared, who knows what stimulation, she kept staring at me on the way, and always wanted to touch my hair, it was really strange, it made my whole body hairy.”

“Hair, hair, director, you ……” At this time, HuangYuan just found that Mo Xiao’s head was a little strange.

“What’s wrong?”

“Is that Newton on your head?” HuangYuan reached out and took it off, but found that the other person’s head was not the chameleon, but …… a trace of white hair

“Director, are you too tired, you are growing white hair.” HuangYuan said with a smile.

Mo Xiao took the snow-white hair, and seemed to have lost her soul, frozen in place. She then didn’t answer anything. After a long time, she regained her wits, dropped a sentence that she had to go to rest, and then hurriedly left.

HuangYuan looked at Mo Xiao’s distant back and reached out to grab something, but only held the air. Looking at the crumpled white coat disappearing around the corner, he slowly put his hand down.

Returning to his ward, HuangYuan sat down habitually in front of the drawing board — just as he had done in the library, though not for long, as if it had been an experience from a previous life. He didn’t know who had set up the ward for him, but they had put the complete set of drawing equipment beside his bed.

But this time, instead of sketching with a pencil as usual, HuangYuan dipped directly into a dab of gold paint and began to paint the lofty and solemn eyes that were etched in his memory.

……

“Just now I told you two stories, now that you’ve heard them, is there anything you want to say?”

The woman in front of him was wrapped in silver and white, but has the world’s purest golden pupils — Gladini, the queen who once ruled the Phoenix Galaxy, after dropping her indifferent gaze on HuangYuan, she opened her mouth and asked.

And it was from her that HuangYuan learned of those who were once right and wrong — Herman, Mo HeShen, the Queen, the Professor, Iceland, Lanna, the Governor’s Committee, all these absurd yet true stories intertwined to build up the dusty years little by little.

“No, you’ve only told me one.” HuangYuan denied.

“One? It was clearly two.”

“There is only one.” HuangYuan again denied, “Although you told two seemingly unrelated things, the main idea of the story is the same, so I think it’s one story.”

“What’s the main idea?” The queen pursued.

“It’s cause and effect.”

HuangYuan replied sharply, obviously anticipating that the other party would ask this.

“Then do you believe in karma?”

This answer seemed to have aroused the other party’s interest, and she sat forward, a few strands of long gray hair falling from her shoulders, adding a bit of spirituality to the space that was as if time had stood still.

“Frankly, I don’t believe that.” HuangYuan crossed his fingers and explained seriously, “My brain controls my actions, and my next actions affect my future, so the root of everything lies in my brain, my consciousness.”

“And what if you put a possible future in front of your eyes? For example ……” she raised her hand in a false gesture, “you hold up an apple and want to eat it, and I am now going to tell you that the apple will slip from your hand, will you hold it hard?”

HuangYuan froze: “Prophecy?”

“No, it’s perception, perceiving extremely small changes and then deducing the ‘future’ and then changing your present decision based on that future.”

This setting was beyond HuangYuan’s understanding of reality, and he exclaimed, “It’s powerful beyond belief, more awe-inspiring than that stone you carry.”

“The stone is no longer in me.” She was a little despondent, but more relieved. “But it is not far from you, and one day it will appear on your pillow and accompany you to sleep.”

“I want to know what happened to the Professor and your sister, your story is not finished. Also, how do you know all this?” Speaking of the stone, HuangYuan showed curiosity about it.

“This is the third story, which also includes you.”

The queen terminated the topic with a euphemism, so HuangYuan turned to another keyword.

“It doesn’t matter if you don’t want to answer me, if I’m right, that star map hides the secrets of all the people in it.”

“Secrets?” She thought for a moment, “Not really secrets, just the past, present, and future.”

This answer once again surprised HuangYuan, whose perception of the world was changing little by little: “Unbelievable, and how did you get into the star map? Is our destiny already sealed?”

“Think about what I just said to you, I can’t change anything, I can just say what I see, the future is constantly changing, and fate is not predetermined, except that I can see it all.” The queen paused for a moment, “But now the star map is no longer valid, I can no longer enter.”

HuangYuan nodded: “I probably understand, the star map is not a product of Earth, right?”

“I don’t know.” She lowered her eyes and frowned slightly, as if she was caught in a memory, “When I fell to this planet and then naturally entered the star map, at first I thought it was an item left behind by my sister on Earth that could come in handy one day when she returned to Earth, but I later found out that it was impossible, the star map was more like the work of some Earthling. ”

HuangYuan pondered for a moment and raised his head, starlight shining under his eyes.

“I can wrap my head around everything, but I still need some key information, and that information is in your third story, right?”

“Some are there, some aren’t, the second half of the third story has changed.”

Hearing this, HuangYuan stood up and patted his legs, which were a bit sore and weak from sitting for a long time.

“Let’s go, together, to find the first half, and then see what the second half of the story will become.”

The queen raised her head and looked at the teenager in front of her, the corners of her mouth lifted slightly, not knowing whether it contained joy or sarcasm. Her gentle but majestic voice rang out again in this space.

“I want to ask you one more question before I go.”

“Go ahead.” HuangYuan replied cheerfully.

“Knowing everything, how are you going to face these people around you?”

“That will only be known after I get back the memories that belong to me.”

……

“Hahahahahahaha!!! HuangYuan, I have come to visit your sickness!”

The sudden sound of laughter interrupted his memories, and without waiting for HuangYuan to look up, he already knew who was coming, because of that unknowing loud voice and self-centered words and actions, there was only one person he knew in this world.

It was George, and he was carrying a basket in his hand, which probably held something like fruit.

Fortunately, Belita was not in the ward. He do not know what to do, if Belita was here, George would most likely receive criticisms.

“Although I am very busy, but after all, you are one of my best friends, so I still take time out of my busy schedule to come!”

He raised his head in a condescending manner, looking not at all like he had come to visit the sick.

“I’m very affectionate, amazing, right?”

“OK, OK, anyway, you keep your voice down for a while.”

HuangYuan looked around, he seemed to be the only patient here, but he still had to say that.

“No loud noise is allowed in the ward, do you want to be scolded by Belita?”

“Okay ……”

Hearing this, George suddenly lowered his voice to a very low level.

Seemingly in order not to make a sound, George even walked very carefully, tiptoeing for a while before walking to HuangYuan’s bed.

“I’ve brought you condolences for the visit.”

George said quietly.

“Thanks.”

HuangYuan nodded.

He had no appetite now, but he had learned in the library class before, it seems to say that sugar can make people happy, and fruits should also have sugar, so he would just take it and go give it to the Director afterwards.

Thinking like this, he uncovered the white cloth covering the basket.

“This is ……”

“It’s barley.”

Although he knew before that George could not distinguish between the five grains and called everything barley. But he did not expect him to be at this extent …… this is not a grain at all!

He picked up one from the basket.

“This is a cucumber…..”

This was already a vegetable, yet he could still call it a barley with such a serious face, HuangYuan felt like he was crying and laughing at this.

And the cucumber seemed to not be sweet. He wondered if the director would be happyto receive a cucumber.

With this thought, he nibbled at the cucumber, and felt refreshed. This cucumber was very watery and tasted fresh.

“How is it? Is it good?”

“Mmm, delicious.”

“That’s for sure, it’s just like what Mo You said, crops with manure will grow better! Good! Next time, add manure to the other barley as well!”

Speaking of which, HuangYuan froze for a moment ……

“Have you washed this cucumber …… yet?”

“Washed? No, I just pulled it out of the ground, and then wiped it with a cloth, it is fresh, if you wash it, then it won’t be fresh.”

Unfortunately, it was too late, HuangYuan had just swallowed the bite, he put the gnawed cucumber back into the basket with a gloomy face and looked at George with an lifeless expression.

As for why exactly if once washed, it wouldn’t be fresh, he was not going to look deeper.

At that moment, after George, suddenly someone else pushed the door and entered.

He turned his head, he didn’t see anyone right away, and lowered his eyes to see the short figure of Lei Ke.

Lei Ke around for a moment, and then again with his unique sign language he talked to HuangYuan.

“You’re really here to visit HuangYuan too, aren’t you!”

“No, Director’s words, she went out and went to her room.”

The two replied almost simultaneously, apparently interpreting Lei Ke’s body language differently.

And judging from Lei Ke’s actions, it was clear that HuangYuan was correct. Because he turned his head and walked out the door without taking one more step closer to HuangYuan.

George was a little embarrassed and tried to cover up his mistake with a smile.

But there were just two of them here, and he felt as if there was little point in doing so, so he took HuangYuan’s hand and pulled HuangYuan up from the bed.

“You’re better already, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Then would you like to visit my newly planted barley? It’s so hard to grow them.”

Barley again, HuangYuan figured it must be something else, but before he could respond, George took him by the hand and pulled him on a tour.

“Newly planted barley! All kinds of barley! Barley of every flavor! All growing and growing and growing!” As they walked, George danced and sang.