Life always continues, unaffected by human will.
Regardless of whether one adapts or finds happiness, everyone lives this way.
Time is like a sharp chisel, carving indelible marks into the stone of years.
The pale blue afternoon sunlight streams through the window lattice, falling on his face, yet not warming.
Ren Zhong quietly lies on the chair, enjoying a rare moment of peace and leisure.
He has gradually adapted to everything around him, even the bizarre blue sun.
This place is his own home.
Without having to count, the number thirteen unconsciously surfaces in his mind.
It has been thirteen days since he came to this world.
Every day is extremely fulfilling, leaving him hardly any time to reminisce, much less wallow in self-pity.
With the deliberate strengthening of memory, he clearly remembers every day, every event, every person, every Ruined Beast, and every road.
As a stranger who has crossed countless years and trillions of miles, he has always strived with all his might to familiarize and understand this world.
Every fragment of memory is his precious resource for survival, losing even a drop would be a shame.
Ren Zhong gets up from the lounge chair, moves to the window, and overlooks the vast slum spreading out endlessly below from the modest height of the building platform.
Now, Ren Zhong fits in well, like a fish in water, so well-disguised that even he almost deceives himself.
He has even gradually forgotten the brutality of the Hunters.
Yet, whenever he is alone, an inescapable confusion and anger linger in his eyes.
Even though he is living well, he still harbors an instinctive aversion to this world.
Other people’s matters feel distant, but he often sees the teenage mother and son living next door.
The old woman is not lazy; almost every morning, she and her son position the heavy sewing machine at the door, clack clack mending clothes for others.
Her charge for an average repair is 0.02 Contribution Points.
However, due to the 10% transaction tax, she has to resort to a ledger-based charging system, seeking out customers with higher recorded amounts when she needs to buy something.
But that’s where the problem lies.
Some customers default on payment.
Some customers happily die with unpaid debts.
The old woman often ends up making a loss in her business endeavors.
As for the teenage boy, during the day he either drifts around town like a ghost, seeking temporary work, or pitifully visits the second-hand bookstore to browse the books there.
He has read "Starfire Town Gunsmith Survival Guide" three times now.
Such hardworking mother and son, yet they still live in such misery.
Under Ren Zhong’s mansion, there still occasionally gather mischievous children, either scribbling graffiti or using the solid, high-end alloy walls of his house—sturdier than ordinary homes—as soccer goals for play.
Then, from time to time, distressed parents would come by, tugging children’s ears, spanking their buttocks regardless of gender, casting pleading and anxious eyes at him, repeatedly apologizing.
Many of the female parents are dressed in ill-fitting, loose clothing, clearly leftovers of men’s wear at home, and empty inside.
All it takes is for them to bend down, and Ren Zhong sees too many scenes that are hard to define as springtime or tragedy.
Here comes another scantily clad woman.
She is tall, her hastily managed hair slightly disheveled.
She is bare-faced, standing in the sunlight looking up towards Ren Zhong’s window.
She lifts her neck, thrusting out her chest.
She is flaunting the little beauty she has.
This is the eighth time she has come to the basement of Ren Zhong’s building.
Ren Zhong knows what she wants to sell.
She is not the only one.
There are even more, including him... and them.
Just a somewhat decent prefab house, a basic First Level Exoskeleton Armor set, and a brand-new motorcycle, all enough to entice these underclass people like moths to a flame.
This cannot be called noble or base, but merely the way myriad beings show their ingenuity to survive.
However, Ren Zhong does not enjoy any of this.
Having seen paradise, he cannot view hell equitably.
He holds only anger in his heart, anger constantly reminding him that the world shouldn’t be .
Anger only makes him recognize more clearly that he is inherently at odds with this world.
Avoiding the eager gaze of the woman below, Ren Zhong clenches his fist, suddenly turns around, and heads back inside.
Tonight, he must give it his all.
Since the eighth day, he has been spending an extra five days outside during the nighttime.