The rain hadn't completely stopped when the wind blew in, and the dampness seeped into your bones.

Chen Hao squatted in front of the last solar panel on the south slope, his fingers stiff with cold. The screwdriver slipped halfway through, cutting his thumb. He ignored it, wiped the blood with his sleeve, and continued hammering the bracket into the mud. The sky was as gray as a swelled old rag, and the clouds pressed down on the mountain ridge, not giving a ray of light.

“Recharge efficiency… six percent.” Nana’s voice came from behind. “At the current rate, the energy storage unit will be completely depleted in one hundred and seven minutes.”

"So, you can't even last two hours?" He stood up, his legs so numb he almost knelt down, and he steadied himself by supporting his knees. "Is this system just going to live as long as it lasts?"

“The system design did not anticipate more than 36 consecutive hours of cloudy weather.” Standing beside the control panel, her mechanical eye scanned the terminal screen. “I suggest immediately shutting down unnecessary modules and retaining the main control and timing core functions.”

"Turn it off." He waved his hand. "There's nothing to turn off anyway. The lights are already off, the water valve is manually on, and even mosquitoes won't come here for a meeting."

She tapped her finger lightly, and several lines of data appeared on the screen. A moment later, the main power cut-off indicator lit up in red. The blackout curtain control system instantly went black, the irrigation pump stopped running, and the holographic projection went completely out.

The entire farm fell silent.

It wasn't the quiet you should have at night; it was the deathly quiet of a power outage.

"It's over." Chen Hao stared at the black screen. "Maizi is going to have to work all night again."

He turned and rushed into the rain, heading straight for the east side of the wheat field. The blackout curtains there were still hanging, but no one knew when they might automatically restart due to an electrical leak or simply jam. He reached out to pull, but the rope was slippery, and his palm went empty. He stumbled and fell face-first into the mud.

"Damn it!" he cursed, got up and shook his head. "This thing is even harder to control than an exam."

Nana followed and scanned the plant's growth status in the field: "Some plants have an abnormally high chlorophyll synthesis rate, and signs of cellular metabolic disorder are beginning to appear. If uncontrolled photosynthesis continues, tissue brittleness, lodging, or even root necrosis may occur within 48 hours."

"So you mean—they'll die from exhaustion?" He wiped the rain from his face, panting. "I keep saying I don't want to go to work, but the crops seem more eager to retire than I am?"

“Plants have no subjective will,” she said, “but energy imbalances can lead to physiological collapse.”

"But we're out of power too." He gave a wry smile. "The solar panels are at the mercy of the weather, the battery packs are practically empty like my wallet, and the alien rocks are almost burned to ashes. How are we supposed to survive like this?"

She didn't answer, but simply looked up into the depths of the fields.

There, a glimmer of light.

The very pale purple shimmered faintly in the rain, like someone had lit a small lamp underground.

Chen Hao was stunned: "Wheat... lit up by itself again?"

“A weak electromagnetic fluctuation was detected.” She quickly walked to the nearest wheat seedling, squatted down, and attached the sensor to the base of the leaf. “The current value is stable at 0.48 watts, with a fluctuation range of less than three percent.”

"How much?" he leaned closer. "What did you say? Crops can generate electricity?"

"Based on preliminary assessment, the roots of the purple wheat seedlings and the mycelium in the soil have formed a conductive network." She pulled up a waveform diagram. "Each plant outputs about half a watt of electricity, and the theoretical total power of the entire field can reach more than 2,300 watts."

Chen Hao stared at the glowing ear of wheat, speechless for a long time.

Then he laughed.

He laughed so hard his shoulders shook, and muddy water dripped from his hair into his neck.

"I was wondering why this place felt increasingly eerie," he said, pointing to the wheat field. "So we're not growing crops, we're running a power plant?"

"The energy source mechanism cannot be confirmed at present," she said, "but we can try to build a temporary collection system."

"As long as there's electricity, that's fine." He slapped his thigh and stood up. "I don't care if it's solar, wind, or wheat-powered, as long as it can be turned on, I'll treat it like my own father."

The two returned to the controlled area and rummaged through the warehouse, finding the remaining metal brackets, discarded wires, and old junction boxes. These were originally used to secure the blackout curtains, but now they had been disassembled and reassembled.

“Use the iron frame of the irrigation system as a water collection array,” Chen Hao muttered as he tightened the screws. “It saves on materials and is waterproof—although we don’t need to be waterproof now, since it’s all soaked anyway.”

Nana connected the wires to the input port of the main control terminal and adjusted the impedance matching parameters. After the first set of lines was connected, a white light flashed at the edge of the screen and then went out.

“Insufficient voltage,” she said. “At least three hundred plants need to be connected to start the basic system.”

“Then we’ll make more.” He picked up his tool bag. “I’m going to the field to bury the nodes.”

The rain was getting heavier.

He crawled through the mud, inserting metal probes one by one into the soil and connecting them to the main line. His fingers had long since lost all feeling; he only knew where to twist and where to lock. His clothes clung to his body, feeling as cold as if he were encased in ice, but he didn't stop.

When the hundredth probe was inserted, he heard a soft sound behind him.

drop.

The indicator light on the control panel lit up by one level.

green.

He turned around abruptly.

Nana was standing in front of the terminal, her finger hovering over the start button.

“Ready,” she said. “Would you like to try restarting the main system?”

"Wait for me to get there!" He crawled back on his hands and feet, his knees leaving two deep furrows in the mud.

He rushed to the control panel and reached out to wipe the water droplets off the screen.

The green light is still on.

It's not an illusion.

"Drive," he said. "Drive quickly."

She pressed the button.

Buzz—

A low, rumbling electrical hum emanated from inside the chassis. The screen flickered a few times, and the holographic projection slowly rose, displaying a line of text:

[System restarting...]

Energy Input: Bioelectricity

Current power: 1.8 kilowatts

Chen Hao plopped down on the ground, leaning against the cold computer case, looking up at the words and grinning.

"He's alive... he's really alive."

"The bio-circuit is operating stably." Nana continued scanning the data. "The overall potential of the wheat field is balanced, and no local overload was found."

“So,” he gasped, “we don’t need to pray for sunshine anymore? This wheat can feed itself and even provide us with electricity?”

“The logic holds true,” she said. “An ecological closed loop is forming.”

“Hey.” He raised his hand, looking at the dirt under his fingernails. “I thought I was here to farm, but it turns out I’m in energy development.”

He slowly stood up and walked back to the edge of the wheat field. Rain dripped from his hair, pattering softly onto the leaves.

Those purple lights are still flashing.

It's not flashing randomly; it's rhythmic, like a heartbeat.

He squatted down and gently touched a stalk of wheat.

It was cool, but there was a strange vibration that traveled up from my fingertips.

"You..." he said in a low voice, "did you already know you could generate electricity? Were you just waiting for us to be desperate before you showed off your skills?"

Nana walked to his side, her mechanical eye locking onto the distribution map of the underground mycelial network.

“We detected a 22 percent reduction in signal transmission delay,” she said. “Network response speed is improving.”

"What do you mean?" he asked.

“They are learning,” she said. “And adapting.”

He didn't speak again, but just quietly looked at the field in front of him that was glowing softly.

Darkness still enveloped the surroundings, but it no longer felt oppressive.

He suddenly remembered something and turned to look at the control room.

"By the way, is the timer system still working?"

“The quantum module is still in standby mode,” she said. “Precise timing can be restored as long as there is an energy input.”

“Then let it go back to work.” He patted the mud off his hands. “Turn on the lights at eight o’clock sharp tomorrow and turn them off at eight o’clock at night. Let the wheat have a job too, instead of always working overtime.”

He turned and walked toward the tool shed, his steps heavy, but he didn't stop.

“I’ll go and connect the rest of the lines,” he said. “Now that we have our own power plant, we have to make it work.”

Nana stood still, her gaze sweeping across the entire field.

Purple spots of light merged together in the rain, like the earth opening its eyes.

She raised her hand and reconnected a broken section of wire to the main line.

The moment the interface closed, the lights in the control room flickered.