C132 — Cocoon of the Earth

After completing this final step, Mu Sichen could no longer hold himself up. He glanced at Lin Wei once, then lowered his head and fainted while still standing.

Because of the walking assist device, he couldn’t fall down; even when unconscious, he could only remain upright.

Lin Wei was still stunned, completely immersed in the reality of the scene from the novel manifesting right before his eyes. He couldn’t look away and wanted desperately to slap himself a few times to see if he was dreaming.

At that moment, he heard Mu Sichen’s words.

“Take care of the newcomers in Hope Town.”

The voice did not enter his brain through his ears; somehow, it was mysteriously implanted directly into his mind.

Only then did Lin Wei force himself to look at Mu Sichen. He saw Ji Xian’an approaching, her entire body reflecting a metallic sheen. Mu Sichen’s walking assist device automatically became Ji Xian’an’s hands.

Before retracting her hands, Ji Xian’an lifted him up horizontally and said to Dan Qi of the medical team, “He just fainted from exhaustion. Find a place for him to rest and try to give him some nutrient solution.”

“All right!” Dan Qi glanced curiously at Ji Xian’an’s face, then looked again, and once more.

Ji Xian’an: “….”

By now, the 2,500 people running behind had also arrived. The scene became extremely chaotic.

The 3,000-strong medical team gazed at the suddenly appeared Mengdie Town and prayed in their own ways—some with hands clasped, some with hands on their foreheads, others with their right hands over their hearts, and some kneeling on the ground crying uncontrollably.

The three senior experts huddled together, partly thinking their eyesight was failing, partly trying to explain this unbelievable phenomenon with scientific theory.

Cheng Xubo was dumbfounded, Chi Lian had fainted, and only He Fei stubbornly kept his eyes wide open. He crawled out of Cheng Xubo’s cart, rolling and scrambling to Ji Xian’an’s feet.

He lay on the ground, grabbing Ji Xian’an’s pant leg, and struggled to say, “Ji… sister Ji… when I… wake up… you… must… let me… see… your… mechanical body…”

Before he could finish the last word, He Fei fainted, unable to lift even a finger.

Ji Xian’an slightly lifted her leg and gently shook off He Fei’s hand, holding the unconscious Mu Sichen as she looked at Dan Qi.

Lin Wei hurriedly said, “Come on, put him on the tricycle. I’ll ride him to Hope Sanatorium.

“Sanatorium?” Ji Xian’an thought for a moment. “Fine, I know where it is. I’ll take him, and I’m familiar with medicine too.”

With that, she carefully placed Mu Sichen in the tricycle’s cargo bed and rode the tricycle herself.

Ji Xian’an’s physical ability was extraordinary. Though it was her first time riding the tricycle, she figured out how to control it after just a couple of pushes.

She pressed hard with her legs, and the tricycle shot forward like an arrow.

Dan Qi exclaimed, “How did she turn a tricycle into a wheel of wind and fire? Riding like that, will the tricycle even survive? It was so hard to assemble!”

“Forget the tricycle! Save him!” Lin Wei patted Dan Qi on the back of the head, grabbed a megaphone from another tricycle, and shouted, “Attention!”

For the past three days, they had woken at five in the morning, ran three kilometers, done basic military training, eaten at eight, and started serious work at eight-thirty.

After several days of training, the people of Hope Town had gradually formed conditioned reflexes. Hearing Lin Wei’s shout, everyone immediately stopped praying and lined up within two minutes.

Lin Wei raised a megaphone and shouted, “In the newly appeared town, there are nearly fifty thousand people who have been long-term bedridden and severely malnourished. We need to arrange their housing, and also perform simple checkups and treatments.

“The number of patients is huge. I’ll immediately mobilize the remaining 17,000 residents of the town to help. If we work together, we should be able to settle everyone within a day. Do we have the confidence?!”

“Yes!” Three thousand voices shouted in unison.

“Good. Form teams of five, move in an orderly manner with stretchers,” Lin Wei instructed.

“Yes!” Everyone immediately began moving forward with their belongings.

These stretchers had also been modified over the past three days by Dan Qi and the medical team, mainly by dismantling the empty beds in the town.

Tong Zhi Town had originally been a city of nearly a million people. The disaster instantly killed 80% of the population, and over the following twenty years, the city’s territory gradually fell into ruin. After being repeatedly ravaged by various God-level monsters, the current population of the town was only about 20,000—just 2% of what it was twenty years ago.

Because of this, there were many unoccupied houses in the town, many still containing daily necessities. With resources scarce, Lin Wei consolidated these unclaimed supplies and transformed them into usable items.

Although Mengdie Town had many people, even after the disaster, Tong Zhi Town’s remaining size could still accommodate roughly 100,000 people. The available rooms and non-food supplies were more than enough for these fifty thousand new arrivals.

Lin Wei shouted into the mobile game app, “Jin Xile, organize all the town members. Tell them to put down their work and come to the library to support the medical team. Form a line, and don’t crowd!”

Under Lin Wei’s coordination, everything became orderly.

Seeing everyone busy, Cheng Xubo was also encouraged. He tossed He Fei and Chi Lian under the Guardian Totem inside the library and rolled up his sleeves to join the work.

The team searched the Mengdie Town building by building and eventually found a spacious warehouse. On the floor, more than a thousand white “cocoons” were neatly arranged.

Lin Wei and Dan Qi exchanged uneasy glances, hesitant to touch them.

Cheng Xubo, being experienced and braver, stepped forward and poked one cocoon with his finger. The white cocoon split open, releasing some liquid and a sleeping person.

The cocoon disappeared the instant it broke, and the transparent liquid evaporated within seconds.

The person who fell out had a healthy, rosy complexion, showing no signs of malnutrition.

Dan Qi approached for a quick check and hesitated, saying, “Although we haven’t done any blood tests yet, the initial assessment shows no signs of malnutrition. They’ve just been lying down too long, so their muscles are a bit atrophied and will need massage and rehabilitation. Also, if they haven’t eaten for a long time, their digestion will have declined; they should start with a liquid diet and then gradually transition back to solid food.”

“Have these people really been trapped in these cocoons for years? Their muscles look like they’ve only been lying down for one or two months. And what exactly are these cocoons and the liquid?” an elderly professor asked, puzzled.

“They’re ‘Cocoons of the Earth,’” a voice came from outside. Lin Wei and the others looked up to see Ji Xian’an.

“You’re back so soon?” Dan Qi’s eyes widened. “What about the tricycle…?”

“It’s scrap metal now,” Ji Xian’an said.

She walked up to the group and pointed at the unopened cocoons. “At the sanatorium, I found pre-disaster nutrient solutions and gave Mu Sichen an infusion. He should be able to wake up after about a day of rest.”

“I thought you might not understand the ‘Cocoons of the Earth,’ so I’ll give you a quick explanation.

“I’ve seen these cocoons before. Before our people from Xiangping Town went to Mengdie Town, General Qin would prepare these cocoons for the soldiers going out to fight.”

“The ‘Cocoons of the Earth’ draw continuous nutrients from the ground as long as they touch it, supplying the person inside and sustaining their life.”

“Anyone inside the cocoon has enough life support—they won’t lack nutrition. They do grow weaker the longer they stay inside, but this weakening process is deliberately slowed down, roughly at a ratio of 50:1. That is, fifty days pass outside, while only one day passes inside the cocoon.”

“The cocoon will disappear if it is removed from the ground or opened externally. The liquid inside comes from nutrients absorbed from the earth; please pour it back onto the ground to return the nutrients.”

After hearing Ji Xian’an’s explanation, Dan Qi, though still skeptical, mechanically accepted it and nodded. “No wonder they look like they’ve only been lying down for a month. That’s great—the difficulty of the rescue is greatly reduced. We just need to do massages and rehabilitation properly.”

Knowing these people weren’t as fragile as they seemed, the medical team’s operations became much more efficient. Only the heaviest patients required stretchers; most could simply be carried.

Seeing the team working effectively, Ji Xian’an finally relaxed.

Cheng Xubo approached her, concerned: “Sister Ji, I remember you were in the dream for about eleven days, right? Aren’t you tired?”

Ji Xian’an’s body wavered slightly, her steps heavy. She knelt on one knee and said weakly, “I managed only by relying on my mechanical mode. Seeing you and the people from Xiangping Town so orderly, I can rest assured.”

“Now I’ll sleep for a while—please give me a nutrient infusion.”

She slowly closed her eyes, and her mechanical body gradually relaxed, revealing her young and beautiful face.

“Don’t sleep yet!” Dan Qi hurriedly said. “The nutrient solution and medicine here are from twenty years ago. Won’t they be expired? Is it really safe to use them directly?”

Ji Xian’an weakly lifted her heavy eyelids, glanced at Dan Qi, and in a barely audible voice said, “The time in this world… has been fixed… since the Great Disaster…”

Before she could finish, she curled up and collapsed to the floor.

Cheng Xubo finished her explanation: “Everything here has been preserved as it was twenty years ago. Sister Ji looks young, but she is actually over forty. Her appearance hasn’t changed in all these twenty years.”

Lin Wei and the others finally felt reassured and continued their work.

Mu Sichen and the others slept for a full day and night. If not for physiological needs forcing them awake, they could have easily slept for seven days straight.

Mu Sichen woke first. He saw the four of them arranged together in the same hospital room. The room was familiar—it was the old Sanatorium, now renamed the Hope Sanatorium.

This was also the room Mu Sichen had cleared previously; a wall in the middle had collapsed, leaving a bathroom on each side.

The IV lines had been removed. Mu Sichen got out of bed and went into the independent bathroom to wash up.

Warm water poured over him, and he felt a wave of relief, as if all the exhaustion from before he fainted had vanished.

He had slept very deeply, with almost no dreams. When he woke, the only sensation left was a faint touch on his forehead, as if someone had gently caressed it while he slept.

Thinking of the three fellow patients still unconscious, Mu Sichen realized that his recovery speed was unusually fast—so fast it seemed almost abnormal.

Last time, He Fei and Chi Lian had needed four or five days of rest to fully recover, yet he felt as light as a feather after just one night’s sleep.

Why was he recovering so quickly? Mu Sichen wondered, rubbing his shoulders.

When his palm touched his shoulder, it felt as if something springy—soft and bouncy—had poked him.

Puzzled, he looked at his shoulder and saw a small guardian totem still embedded from his shoulder to his collarbone.

That touch just now… it felt a little like a tiny octopus tentacle.

Did the little octopus just high-five him?

Mu Sichen instinctively smiled.

But the next second, his smile froze.

He suddenly remembered that Qin Zu had been able to see—and even feel—his interactions with the little octopus.

Thinking back to the vision of his chest inside the giant cube, Mu Sichen felt a bit uneasy.

He hadn’t properly high-fived the little octopus; instead, it felt like he had been burned, and he didn’t dare touch his shoulder again. He quickly dried himself, put on clean clothes, and left the room.

As soon as he stepped out, he saw Ji Xian’an already awake, fully alert and in just as good a state as him.

“You’re okay?” Mu Sichen asked. “Your spirit was separated from your body for over eleven days, and you’ve recovered this fast?”

Ji Xian’an replied, “I was once a dependent of General Qin and have received His blessing. My recovery is faster than ordinary people. As long as it’s not a life-threatening injury, I can fully heal in at most three days.”

Without expression, she then snapped her own pinky finger.

“You…” Mu Sichen hadn’t even had a chance to react when Ji Xian’an straightened her pinky.

About five minutes later, she moved the finger; it was slightly stiff, but the fracture had essentially healed.

“Initially, recovery is especially fast. Once you can move normally, it slows down,” Ji Xian’an explained. “A small finger bone like this only takes a few minutes to set, but complete healing takes at least a full day. My body prioritizes repairing heavier injuries first; once this injury no longer affects routine movements, the healing slows to conserve energy as much as possible.”

Having said that, she went to another unused bathroom to take a shower.

Mu Sichen, reflecting on her words, looked at his two companions who still showed no signs of recovery and curiously rubbed his arms.

His own recovery had followed a pattern similar to what Ji Xian’an described: initially, he regained most of his strength after just one night, but afterward his body occasionally felt sore or heavy, with full symptoms only subsiding after two or three days.

Could this rapid recovery be a blessing only those blessed by Qin Zu could have?

Mu Sichen touched his forehead, still puzzled.

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