Chen Hao's fingers touched the edge of the cardboard, and he paused. He didn't reach for a new cardboard, but instead looked down at his hand, which was wrapped in bandages. The tattered "Sandstorm Warning" card was still on top of the wooden box, like an old scar that no one dared to touch.

“You draw,” he said. “I’ll mix the colors.”

Nana stood in front of the workbench, the camera slightly panning as if to check his expression. She didn't speak, but simply reached for a blank piece of cardboard and placed it in the center of the table. Her fingers were steady, without the slightest tremor.

Chen Hao sat back down on the low stool and rummaged through the corner of his toolbox, pulling out several small porcelain bowls. These were used to hold glue when repairing pipes; now they were clean and lined up in a row. He then took out several tubes of plant-based pigments—the green was made from dried and ground spinach juice, the brown from charred sawdust, and the red from the sediment that settled after juicing beetroot.

"Which one should I draw first?" he asked.

"Resource cards," Nana said, "Crop cards are preferred."

She picked up a fine charcoal pencil and lightly sketched lines on the cardboard. Her movements were quick, but each stroke was clear. Potatoes, corn, and pumpkins—simple shapes, distinct outlines. She referenced photos taken in the greenhouse at the base, meticulously scaling down the leaf orientation and fruit size to scale.

Chen Hao watched her paint, adding water to the porcelain bowl to mix the paint. He tried several times, finding that too thin a consistency would cause it to bleed, while too thick a consistency made it difficult to apply evenly. Finally, he used his fingernail as a measuring tool, adding three drops of water to each tube of paint, stirring well, and then trying again.

"These colors need to dry for a while before you can stack them," he said. "Otherwise, they'll all clump together."

Nana nodded and continued drawing the next set. This time it was action cards: a wrench, a screwdriver, and a filter cleaner. She drew them very straight, with clean lines, like illustrations in an instruction manual.

“It’s too rigid,” Chen Hao suddenly said. “Look at this wrench, it looks like a tool list posted on the wall.”

“Function recognition takes priority,” Nana replied.

“But this is a game.” He dipped his brush in green paint and drew a crooked face on a scrap of paper next to him. “What if it makes everyone laugh just by looking at it?”

Nana stopped writing, and the camera turned to the doodle in his hand.

"Recommendation: Keep the main subject clear and place additional elements in corners," she said, "so as not to affect recognizability."

“Okay.” Chen Hao grinned. “Then you draw the serious part, and I’ll add some little trinkets on the side.”

They divided the work. Nana was in charge of drawing the main image, while Chen Hao was responsible for color matching and embellishments. The first card they completed was a "Potato Harvest" card. Nana drew potatoes piled in a basket, with leaves spread out and soil dappled on them. Chen Hao drew a smiley face in the lower right corner, with two leaves curving into eyes and vines twisting into a mouth.

"Like the batch Old Li grew," he said, "even if it cracks open three times, it's still edible."

The second drawing is titled "Emergency Repair." Nana drew a pair of hands holding a wrench to turn a valve, with a red light flashing in the background. Chen Hao drew an ant on the wrench handle, carrying a small screw and crawling forward.

"Whoever does the work gets tired," he muttered. "Even ants know to take advantage of others."

The third and most difficult piece was the "Sandstorm Warning." Nana originally planned to replicate it exactly, but the paper was already torn and the edges were wrinkled. She tried twice, but the paint seeped into the tears as soon as it touched them, making the image blurry.

“This one’s ruined,” Chen Hao said.

“Not necessarily.” Nana took out a small bottle of gold powder. “There are cases of ‘restorative decoration’ in the knowledge base. Damaged parts can be transformed into design elements.”

She used a fine brush dipped in gold powder to draw crack-like lines around the hole, extending outwards in concentric circles, like lightning or tree roots. After it dried, the card no longer looked damaged, but rather like a deliberately aged souvenir.

"It's kind of cool." Chen Hao leaned closer to look. "It looks like a veteran's medal."

“The number will be kept as 001,” Nana said. “This is the meaning of the original sample.”

Next came the issue of maintaining a consistent style. Chen Hao always wanted to add a touch of humor to each card, drawing a mustache on the filter and a hat on the oxygen tank. Nana insisted that all the icons must be instantly recognizable.

"You want people to have to guess what it is when they play with it?" she asked.

"I'm not guessing, I'm just happy," Chen Hao retorted. "Work is hard enough as it is, isn't it easy to find something to be happy about?"

After some discussion, the two decided to compromise. The main image would remain simple and practical, with all key information clearly displayed; a small blank area would be left in the lower right corner for Chen Hao to freely doodle. Nana also suggested adding a category symbol to the upper left corner of each card—a green dot for resources, a blue square for actions, and a red triangle for events.

“That way it’s easier to tell the difference,” Chen Hao agreed.

Finally, they drew a new design on the back of all the cards: a simple line drawing of a tree and a gear intertwined. The trunk grew from the center of the gear, and the branches spread out like an umbrella.

"Did you draw this?" Nana asked.

“We came up with this together,” Chen Hao said. “Don’t you remember? Last time we discussed modifying tables and chairs, I said we should ‘have living things and metal lumps living together.’”

Nana scanned the emblem into the terminal to generate a standard template, which she plans to print directly on the back of each card in the future.

The first batch of twelve cards was completed. There were six resource cards, two for each of the three crops; four action cards, covering routine maintenance items; and two event cards, "sandstorm warning" and "oxygen valve blockage".

They were neatly laid out on the table to dry. Under the light, the gold powder shimmered, the graffiti-covered figures grinned, and the ants on the wrench were still hurrying along.

Chen Hao reached out and touched the top "Sandstorm Warning" sign, his fingertips gliding along the cracked border. The strip of cloth had loosened a bit, hanging down on his wrist. He didn't roll it up; he just let it hang there.

"So this is what it looks like when it's drawn," he said.

“Visual feedback enhances cognitive retention,” Nana said.

Speak like a human.

"You'll remember it once you see it."

Chen Hao smiled. He collected the cards one by one, stacked them by category, and put them into a cardboard box. He had made the box from the outer packaging of a discarded circuit board, with an opening on the side just big enough to pull out the cards.

"What's the next step?" he asked.

“Auxiliary prop design,” Nana replied, “requires scoring markers and extraction containers.”

“The lottery tube is easy to make.” Chen Hao stood up and walked to the materials rack. “There’s half a PVC pipe over there. Just cut a section off.”

He reached for the saw, but just as he grasped the handle, he suddenly remembered something, turned around, and asked, "Wait, what's the scoring system for?"

Nana opened the storage compartment and took out a small bag. It contained dried beans left over from making sachets—red beans, mung beans, and black beans, separated into three colors.

“Each person will receive five,” she said. “Rewards will be given for completing the task, and deductions will be made for mistakes.”

"This is just pocket money." Chen Hao grabbed a handful of beans and listened to the sound of them clattering together. "The more you work, the more beans you get; the less you work, the less you get to eat."

He poured the beans back into the bag and tied it tightly. Then he picked up a pencil and wrote four words on the side of the box: **Don't touch mine.**

After writing it down, I read it aloud to myself and burst out laughing.

"If someone really steals your beans, will you hit them with this box?" Nana asked.

“I can’t smash it.” Chen Hao shook his head. “But I can draw a new card called ‘Thief’s Unlucky Day’, specifically to ward him off.”

Nana didn't smile, but her camera lens lit up slightly.

They packed up their drawing tools. The paints were sealed tightly, the charcoal pencils were put back in their boxes, and the palette bowls were stacked together and placed back in the corner. Only the cardboard box and an unopened new cardboard box remained on the workbench.

The fan was still running, blowing a piece of draft paper on the corner of the table, causing its edges to tremble slightly.

Chen Hao sat back down on the stool, looking at the stack of completed cards. His fingers were no longer trembling, and the cloth strips were no longer bleeding. He reached out and picked up the top card, examining it against the light.

The gold powder cracks traced a thin line under the light.