Chapter 9

Number One sat quietly in the bathtub, letting the breeder's fingers massage his head.

As he rubbed, a strange feeling rose from his tailbone, crawled up his spine, and finally a tingling sensation came to his scalp.

He couldn't help but close his eyes comfortably.

This was an experience he had never had before. Even among the other cubs in the nursery, he had never seen anyone receive such attentive care from the breeder.

Of course, other cubs may not be rare either.

In the brooding center, keepers are not welcome, and the cubs are not nice to them. When they get mad, they will even hurt the keepers, so each keeper does not stay for long.

In the past, Number One was indifferent to all of this and didn't care much about the breeder's stay or departure, but now...

He likes the new keeper.

He felt comfortable being around him and wanted this breeder to stay and didn't want him to leave like the other breeders.

At this moment, the hands on the top of his head began to wipe down with fine foam. The flexible fingers fell on his cheek, rubbing it lightly with the fingertips, and then slid down to his fragile neck.

Number One's back stiffened slightly and he subconsciously opened his eyes.

What appeared before his eyes was the young man's handsome face.

His skin was very white, revealing a jade-like luster under the light. His crow-feather-like eyelashes drooped slightly, and his gaze was light and shallow, as if nothing in the world could affect his heart.

Number One stared at him blankly, feeling the friendly and comfortable aura from the young man, and slowly relaxed.

He was like a kitten with its neck pinched, motionless, docile and quiet, with an inexplicable trust in the keeper in front of him.

There seemed to be a voice in his heart telling Number One that this breeder was trustworthy and would not hurt him.

Soon, the breeder's hands left his neck and fell on his back, scrubbing hard to wash away the stubborn dirt on his body.

"Wash your own feet." said the breeder.

Number One lowered his head. White bubbles were floating on the surface of the bathtub, and the originally clear water became turbid, but he could still vaguely see his dirty feet.

Although it has been rinsed once, there are still black stains on it.

Number One's little face felt slightly hot, and he quickly stretched out his little hands, held his feet, and obediently rubbed the dirt off them.

After a while, the dirty feet revealed their original white color.

The child raised his head and looked at Su Ci with his big eyes, looking eagerly, as if asking for praise.

Su Ci took a look at his work and patted his head in appreciation.

The child who was praised for the first time opened his eyes slightly, and the faint light in his dark red eyes seemed to make him more lively.

Number One lowered his head slightly and touched his head secretly with his little hand.

“Clatter—”

Su Ci grabbed the shower head and the water flowed down again, washing away the foam on the child's body. Next, he changed the water again and washed him again.

Number One lowered his head again and rubbed his feet vigorously, not even leaving out the tiny specks of dirt hidden between his nails.

He was very serious, so he didn't notice that the palm of Su Ci's hand that was gently caressing him was shining with a faint golden light. The golden light fell on his skin and merged into his body.

Number One was unaware of this. He only felt comfortable soaking in the water, his whole body warm. At this moment, he could no longer feel the cold pain in his body that tormented him day and night.

Perhaps it was because he felt too comfortable, he felt his eyelids getting heavier and heavier. Slowly, the child's head tilted and he fell into the bathtub.

Just as he was about to hit his head, the young man's thin white palm supported his little head steadily.

Su Ci looked at the child who was sleeping soundly with his eyes closed, leaning on his palm. The golden light on his palm dissipated, and the spiritual power attached to his palm was all retracted into his body.

However, the frown on his face did not relax.

He had just examined the child. Not only was the little guy malnourished and had many hidden injuries in his body, he was also eroded by some extremely twisted and negative energy.

Such negative energy...

The strange red fog and the wailing of the earth appeared in his mind. Su Ci frowned even more tightly, but of course his hands did not stop moving.

By the time the child was washed from head to toe and taken out of the bathtub again, he was already soaked.

Su Ci habitually wanted to wipe off the water stains on the two people, but when he sensed the limited spiritual power in his body, he stopped.

I carried the child to the cabinet and opened the door. Some daily necessities were neatly arranged inside, basically left by the previous breeder.

He took out a clean towel, wrapped the child in it, and walked into the drying room.

Three minutes later, when they came out again, they were dry all over, but their fair skin was a little red from being roasted.

Su Ci walked barefoot on the warm and comfortable floor and carried the child to the bedroom.

Although humans of this era were not very particular about food, they did quite well in other aspects.

Su Ci tapped the wall lightly, and the sensor light on the bedroom ceiling automatically turned off, leaving only a small night light on the bedside, emitting a soft light in the dim room.

After rummaging through the space button for a while, he finally took out a clean shirt and casually put it on the child, then Su Ci stuffed him into the quilt.

The child was sleeping on the bed, with only a small head exposed.

The short hair was slightly yellow, but it had become fluffy and soft. After washing, the originally pink and white skin was revealed, shining brightly under the light.

Su Ci couldn't help but touch the top of his head and felt that it felt pretty good.

"It's much better this way."

After settling the little one down, Su Ci got up and left the bedroom, went to the window again, and opened the curtains with a swish.

The blood moon outside the window has been obscured by red clouds. Street lamps are embedded on the walls of the nursery, emitting bright light, which is enough to see things even without moonlight.

Su Ci looked at the scenery outside, his figure gradually becoming lighter and lighter. When he raised his hand and lightly touched the wall, he actually merged into it.

The next moment, he arrived at the yard between the nursery building and the wall, and at the window of Room 303, a figure was still standing there.

The nursery building and walls were covered with surveillance cameras, guarding the nursery without any blind spots. However, when the induction ray swept over Su Ci, there was no reaction and no alarm sounded.

Su Ci glanced at the monitor, then looked away and focused his attention on the red clouds in the sky.

At night, the concentration of the red fog in the base was obviously much higher than during the day. It could be vaguely seen without switching perspectives, but inside the building, it remained at a level that was almost zero.

It seems like it is restricted by some rules.

Su Ci stretched out his hand, and a ball of red mist gathered and floated in his palm. He closed his eyes and sensed it carefully.

The monitor seemed to have detected an increase in the concentration of red fog in the area, and the induction rays kept scanning, but nothing was found.

After a long time, Su Ci opened his eyes and raised his eyebrows in surprise.

This is actually spiritual energy.

It is just mixed with all kinds of negative energies such as resentment, despair, and tyranny, and has long been unrecognizable.

This red mist is different from the gentle and harmless spiritual energy. It is extremely aggressive and will actively infect all living things.

If practitioners absorb it directly, they are likely to be mentally infected and eventually lose their sanity and become possessed. Ordinary people who stay in such red fog for a long time will also passively absorb it into their bodies and gradually be corroded and harmed.

At this time, the red mist that was originally gathered by Su Ci began to spontaneously condense towards the center, gradually forming a small vortex.

The speed of the vortex continued to increase, and the concentration of the red mist continued to rise silently, reaching a level visible to the naked eye in the blink of an eye.

“Ding ding! Ding ding!”

The nearest surveillance camera sounded an alarm.

Su Ci frowned and waved his hand to disperse the red mist vortex, and the alarm on the monitor also stopped.

Soon, footsteps were heard outside the wall, and soon several figures appeared above the wall.

Seeing the dark red uniform that almost blended into the red mist, Su Ci thought of Xun Xiaoyu during the day, and knew that it was someone from the Operations Department.

This is a six-man team.

Three people stayed on the wall to keep watch, while the other three formed a triangle, jumped into the courtyard, and came to patrol near Su Ci, where the vortex had just been formed.

Su Ci stood there, watching them walk by. One of them suddenly turned around and looked in his direction.

Under the mask are a pair of sharp eyes.

"Captain Yan?"

The man's companion called out to him, then gathered with the remaining person and looked at the empty courtyard warily.

Yan Ping stared in Su Ci's direction for a long time. Just when Su Ci thought he was exposed, he retracted his gaze and put down the gun he was holding high.

"Nothing." He shook his head. "Did you find anything?"

"Everything is fine."

"Apart from the higher concentrations of pollutants, no other abnormalities were found."

It's normal for pollutant concentrations to rise at night, but it's rare for them to exceed warning levels and trigger an alarm...

Yan Ping's eyes were filled with contemplation. "Observe for a while longer, and don't let your guard down!"

"yes!"

The action team patrolled the yard and surroundings again, but found nothing. Seeing that there was no danger, they finally left.

Su Ci stood there the whole time, and only moved two steps to the side when they were about to touch him.

Watching their figures disappear over the wall, he withdrew his gaze and walked to the back of the nursery building. He looked around and finally chose a corner where the light should be good during the day.

He gestured with his hands, then stepped lightly on the ground, and a spiritual shield with a radius of about one meter that could block all prying eyes rose from the ground.

Su Ci looked down at the ground, a golden light flashing in his black eyes.

He was originally floating above the spiritual shield. As golden light flashed in his eyes, he lightly tapped his toes again, as if stepping on the water, and ripples spread out.

Tick-tock——

As if with a crisp sound, the hard and flat metal ground under the spiritual shield suddenly shattered and dissipated, revealing the slightly blood-red soil underneath.

The golden light in Su Ci's eyes dissipated, his body slowly sank, passing straight through the transparent spiritual shield, and his toes gently landed on the exposed ground.

When his feet touched the ground, his brows couldn't help but frown.

He squatted down and gently stroked the ground with his palms.

The dry and hardened soil had almost no fertility and seemed to be infected by the red mist, with a faint blood-red hue.

Compared with the vibrant and full of vitality before he fell asleep, it is hard to believe that this is the same land.

When his palm lightly touched the ground, Su Ci felt the earth's anger and sadness more clearly. In addition to confusion, there was also a bit of heartache in his eyes.

He sighed, and a faint light appeared on his palm, injecting his spiritual power into it.

When he removed his hand, the death and resentment that had accumulated in this small piece of land for who knows how many years finally slowly dissipated.

The blood-red color faded, and the compacted soil loosened, revealing its original brown-yellow color, even mixed with a bit of black. It was obvious at a glance that it was very suitable for planting.

However, Su Ci's brows did not relax.

A drop in the bucket.

He couldn't use this method to revive the entire planet.

His power comes from the earth, and the earth's weakness also affects him...

Su Ci pursed her lips and stood up.

The young man turned over his palm, and saw a few fine grains of powder appear on his white palm. It was the pollen stained on the handkerchief he had given to No. 5 before.

He tilted his palm slightly, and the pollen grains floated gently down and fell into the ground under his feet.

A few grains of pollen are so small that they disappear once they fall into the soil, making it difficult to identify their specific location with the naked eye.

Su Ci didn't care. He stared at the ground beneath his feet, his bare feet exuding the beauty of jade. He gently tapped down again, and saw a faint golden light shining slightly, and then spread out like ripples again.

This time, he hummed softly, like a spring breeze blowing on your face.

"Earth, you give birth to all things—"

The low hum was ethereal and distant, as if it came from ancient times, carrying some mysterious and unknown power, awakening the sleeping land.

I saw a little light in the soil under the spiritual shield.

The light was extremely weak, like an old light bulb accidentally found in a pile of junk. Even when stimulated by electrodes, it could only flicker out a few faint lights in its last moments of life. Then the filament broke and the light faded away weakly.

The land became peaceful again.

The land, which had regained some fertility due to the infusion of Su Ci's soul power, turned gray and dark again. Fortunately, with the protection of the spiritual shield, the blood-red death energy did not invade it again.

If it is well maintained, there may be a chance to restore it to its original state.

Su Ci bent down, fiddled with the soil with his fingers, and soon found two dark brown particles.

These are two seeds, teardrop-shaped, with plump grains and smooth surface. You can tell at a glance that they are of good quality.

Looking at the two seeds, Su Ci sighed softly.

With so much pollen, if it were in the past, once this magic was used, more than just two seeds would be produced.

The pollen will turn into seeds within a few breaths, then take root and sprout, grow into a small forest, and then bloom and bear fruit, with the branches full of the most delicious and sweet fruits, inviting him to taste them.

It’s not like now, where there are only two pitiful tree species?

As Su Ci was thinking this, the ground beneath his feet seemed to become even darker, as if it had sensed his disdain and fallen into autism.

Su Ci paused, then reached out and patted the ground in a comforting gesture.

Then he dug a small hole in the mud and buried one of the tree seeds in it.

This is a spiritual seed that he nurtured using his soul power and the power of the earth. It contains rich life force. During its growth, it will absorb nutrients from the earth and also feedback spiritual power to the earth.

Complement each other, coexist and win together.

Of course, it is not easy to make the spiritual seeds take root and sprout.

Su Ci had never farmed before, so he tried hard to recall the experience in his mind. Then he got up and went back to the dormitory, fetched a bucket of water, and evenly poured it on the soil under the spiritual cover.

The dry land was moistened and emitted a faint pleasant scent. The spiritual seeds that had entered a dormant state seemed to be slowly waking up.

Feeling that breath, Su Ci's mood finally improved a little.

He took out another can of food from the space button. After eating it, he threw another one into the empty can, dug some soil to fill it in, and then picked up the bucket and went back to the room.

The figure standing by the window had a dull look in his eyes that became lively again. In his hand, a bucket appeared, and in the other hand, there was a can filled with soil.

Su Ci casually placed the can on the coffee table, then carried the bucket back to the bathroom and took a shower himself.

When looking for clothes for the child, Su Ci discovered a box in the space button, which was filled with clothes of various styles.

He picked out a set of pajamas, put them on, then slowly walked to the bedroom door and looked inside.

The child's breathing was steady and he was still sleeping soundly.

Su Ci retreated back to the living room again, sat on the sofa, saw the communicator on his wrist, thought of something, and put his mental power deeper into the space button, and soon turned out a round ball called a light brain.

He held the ball, studied it for a moment, and then pressed the switch.

The originally silent metal sphere suddenly lit up, flashing cool light effects, and hovered in the air. At the same time, a transparent light curtain popped out from the sphere.

Su Ci collapsed back on the sofa.

The sphere automatically adjusted itself so that the light curtain was always directly in front of Su Ci's sight.

"Ding ding—face recognition successful, optical brain starting up."

"Startup completed in 3.22 seconds."

"Su Ci, good evening. I am your wisdom elf, Xiaoqiu."

Very cute child's voice, the gender is unrecognizable.

"Ding ding—network signal detected, automatically connecting...connected successfully."

"Warm reminder: This signal is under official monitoring, please use with caution."

"Paired communicator detected, connecting... Synchronizing communicator information... Synchronization complete."

After a series of messages popped up, the optical computer finally quieted down.

Because the communicator was connected, the interface of the communicator automatically popped up on the screen, and Su Ci clicked on it to take a look out of curiosity.

There were many dialog boxes in the chat interface. At the top was a group chat with "Base 24" written on it. No one was talking in it. The last message was around 6 pm and showed:

You were pulled into a group chat by "Administrative Department-Guo Hui", and the base's intelligent computer has changed your ID to "Nursery-Su Ci (Trainee)".

Su Ci flipped through it with some curiosity and found that before taking him to the administrative office to report, Shi Yjiang had sent a message in the group chat to tell the people in the administrative office.

This makes communication quite convenient.

Guo Hui...

Su Ci's mind emerged with the woman wearing black-rimmed glasses and with her hair neatly combed. It seemed that this name was written on the nameplate on her chest.

At this time, a message reminder popped up on the communication interface.

"You have a new message."

When Su Ci clicked it, a new window popped up.

"Medical Purification Department-Gu Qingchen" requested to add you as a friend - from the group chat "Base No. 24".

【Accept】【Reject】

Gu Qingchen?

Su Ci clicked accept and accepted Gu Qingchen's friend request.

As soon as he passed by, Gu Qingchen's private chat window popped up. The other party's avatar was a cartoon character wearing a pair of gold-rimmed glasses. He lowered his head slightly and pushed the glasses to the bridge of his nose with his index finger.

Medical Purification Department-Gu Qingchen:

Good evening, Keeper Su.

[I am the resident physician of the Medical Purification Department, Gu Qingchen.]

Su Ci can't type, but the optical computer supports voice input.

He replied with "Good evening", then looked at his avatar and found that it was a snow-white long-haired cat with one yellow and one green eye, which were very beautiful mandarin duck eyes.

At this time, Gu Qingchen's message came again.

Medical Purification Department - Gu Qingchen:

[Keeper Su, the treatment for cubs number two and four has concluded. Please come to the medical decontamination center promptly at 10:00 tomorrow morning to take them back to the nursery.]

Su Ci then remembered that when No. 2 and No. 4 were taken away in the afternoon, the people from the Medical Department had indeed told him this.

Su Ci: [Good]

On the other side, the medical purification department.

Gu Qingchen looked at Su Ci's reply and saw that he didn't seem to have anything to ask. He couldn't help but touch his chin and pulled out the small group that had just been closed.

Gu Qingchen: [There shouldn't be any problems at the nursery.]

As soon as he showed up, the already lively group started flooding the screen with messages again.

Jiang Zhong Xiao Shitou: [How did Lao Gu know? I heard the alarm went off over there, and Captain Yan even brought people over to check.]

Old Chen: [If there really was danger, the alarms would have been sounded throughout the base by now. The fact that it's calm proves nothing's wrong. Young people, don't scare yourselves.]

Gu Qingchen curled his lips. This happened at night, before most people went to bed. It was indeed a bit irritating, and it was normal for everyone to be nervous.

but……

Since the intelligent computer only notified the people from the operations department to go and check it out, and the new breeder was so calm, there probably wasn't any big problem.

Just as Gu Qingchen was thinking this, he saw the dialog box of the breeder Su pop up, and his heart couldn't help but jump.

Is there really no situation?

When I opened it, I saw the other party asking, "Doctor Gu, do you know where I can get fertilizer?"

Gu Qingchen was stunned. He had never encountered such a question before, especially when it was asked by a new breeder.

This Su Ci, he should have come into contact with the cubs, right?

Wouldn't he be panicked when he encountered the cubs going crazy on his first day? Although the cubs were not seriously injured in the fight, I heard that the restaurant in the nursery was severely damaged.

He had just seen the maintenance team members complaining in a small group chat, saying that No. 2 could now control flames, and their maintenance work would become increasingly difficult in the future.

And... judging from the discussion among the maintenance workers, it seems that this breeder has very poor physical fitness, right?

Questions kept popping up in Gu Qingchen's mind, but he still responded calmly: [Keeper Su, what do you want the fertilizer for?]

Su Ci replied slowly: [Growing flowers]

Gu Qingchen: "..."

This breeder seems to be quite leisurely...but doesn't he still understand the situation on Prison Star?

He could only edit and reply: [The environment on Prison Star is special, so it is impossible to grow crops.]