After Jiang Che left, Zhou Chen went through all the messages he had missed in the past two days.
Aside from the important matters they had just discussed, the rest were all trivial.
The Fire Slave Crystal had reached the buyer the day before yesterday. After confirming receipt, the guy had sent a special message to express his gratitude, praising the Fire Slave Crystal's high purity and superior quality. He then went on and on with a bunch of Alchemy jargon, but the gist was that it made him more confident about his Alchemist assessment next month.
Since they were mailed at the same time, the Liberation Dust had also arrived. It was at the delivery station downstairs, ready to be picked up at any time.
On top of that, his university's student group chat had become active again over the past few days, with people chatting about the school anniversary every day.
In five days, Jinzhu University would celebrate its 60th anniversary with a massive ceremony. Many long-graduated alumni would be returning for the event, including plenty of successful people from all walks of life.
For the alumni, it was a gathering not to be missed—a chance to expand their networks. For the current students, it was also a rare opportunity. Who knew, they might just meet a benefactor and find their path to the top.
But when Zhou Chen thought about how both of his missions had ended in disaster, he couldn't help but panic. 'What if something goes wrong again? I might accidentally blow up the school and send every student and teacher to kingdom come…'
'Besides, I have absolutely no experience being a mole!'
'Is it too late to binge-watch *Infernal Affairs*?'
Zhou Chen felt a headache coming on. 'Still, with Jiang Che and headquarters helping me from the shadows, it shouldn't be a huge problem... right?'
'Being a pawn is getting harder and harder these days...'
After getting a clear picture of what had happened over the past two days, Zhou Chen habitually closed his eyes and looked at the Wish Bottle deep within his soul. Then, he froze.
Inside the Wish Bottle, a speck of light far larger and much brighter than any Star Dust was drifting about. Compared to this brilliant speck, the surrounding Star Dust particles seemed pathetic, as minuscule as motes of dust in a sunbeam.
'What is this?'
Zhou Chen was baffled. 'Could the vision I had before passing out have been real?'
He stared at the speck of light, pondering for a moment before it suddenly clicked.
—That night, over fifty staff members were working overtime with us on the mission. As normal people, they must have all hoped it would go smoothly so everyone could just go home and get some sleep.
'They might not have all been thinking the exact same thing, but it was probably close enough. They had all pinned their hopes for the mission's success on me.'
'So, the moment I completed the mission, I also fulfilled the "wishes" of those fifty-odd people, which is why the wish value skyrocketed.'
'And once the wish value crossed a certain threshold, all that tiny Star Dust must have fused together to form the star I'm seeing now.'
'This must be the basic unit of wish value.'
Zhou Chen couldn't help but wince. 'All that effort, and this is all the wish value I have to show for it. If I remember correctly, a portion of it even came from Fina—the moment I agreed to spend the night with her, I instantly received a contribution. It was the biggest particle of Star Dust I'd ever gotten, which just proves how desperately she wanted to sleep with me.'
'If I'd just gone through with it, I might have collected one or even several stars that very night.'
'What a shame... wait, what the hell am I thinking!'
Zhou Chen hurriedly shook his head, trying to banish the terrible thoughts and stop his mind from going down that slippery slope.
He looked at the star inside the Wish Bottle and could clearly feel the Power it contained.
It was a Power that far surpassed Star Dust, capable of fulfilling even greater wishes.
For example, if he were heavily injured and wished to recover, this single star could instantly restore him to his peak condition, catching his opponent completely off guard.
Or, if he wished for a blade, the star would transform into one and appear out of thin air in his hand.
Then again, if he'd had this star when containing the C-220 Bloodthirsty Chainsaw Sword, he could have just wished for it to be contained directly, instead of having some of his own blood drained.
Only now was the Wish Bottle beginning to reveal the tip of the iceberg of its terrifying power.
—As long as you had enough wish value, it could make anything happen.
After some careful consideration, Zhou Chen decided to experiment with the star.
He made a silent wish in his heart. 'I wish to restore my Soul.'
The Wish Bottle remained motionless.
'Not enough wish value, I guess...' Zhou Chen rephrased his wish.
'I wish to restore part of my Soul.'
Still no response from the Wish Bottle.
After a moment's thought, he tried again. 'I wish to restore as much of my Soul as possible.'
The next second, the Wish Bottle flared with light. The brilliant star drifted out and merged into the depths of Zhou Chen's Soul.
HISS...
Zhou Chen shivered, then involuntarily let out a long, deep breath.
A fleeting sense of satisfaction spread from the depths of his Soul. It was gone in an instant, yet it had managed to slightly fill that seemingly endless void, bringing with it an indescribable feeling of wholeness and relief.
'It was only a little, just a tiny little bit...'
'But it was enough to make me ecstatic!'
Zhou Chen's breathing grew heavy, and he couldn't suppress the smile spreading across his face. He had finally confirmed that the Wish Bottle could repair his Soul. A weight that had been pressing on his chest for ages finally lifted, and he felt a great sense of relief.
'It didn't repair much, but at least now there's hope, right?'
As an Ascender, Zhou Chen could intuitively feel his own damaged Soul. By combining that sensation with the projection of the Stars in his Spiritual World, he could make a rough calculation of how much of his Soul had been repaired.
'About 1%?'
He checked again and again, finally concluding that one star could repair 1% of his Soul.
Given that he was missing 53% of his Soul—or 52% now—he would need to collect another 52 stars to repair it completely. That meant undertaking 52 more missions of a similar scale, and the wish value gained from completing them wasn't even guaranteed; it all came down to luck.
At that thought, the passion that had just ignited in Zhou Chen's heart was doused with cold water.
'How the hell am I supposed to do that? A veteran Gold Medal Operator like Old Yang probably doesn't even take on fifty-two missions in a year. Never mind the danger, just running out every other day for knife fights, gun fights, and grenade battles, not to mention the occasional brawl with an Ascender... the exhaustion alone would be lethal.'
'No, I have to find another way to farm wish value...'
Suddenly, a flash of inspiration struck Zhou Chen. A spark of wisdom ignited in his mind, giving rise to an idea that could only be described as genius.
'How did I not think of this before?'
He opened his phone, pulled up several major forums, and started browsing. He specifically sought out threads where people were posting lewd images and asking for the source. Then, drawing upon his vast experience from two lifetimes and more than twenty years of surfing the web, he got to work searching.
Then, he would quickly reply to the post with a link to the source.
And so, he received the praise of countless netizens.
"A hero has arrived!"
"You're doing God's work!"
"The real hero.jpg"
Along with the countless replies full of praise, shiny particles of Star Dust began to appear in his Wish Bottle.
Zhou Chen smiled, satisfied.