Chapter 23: Absurd

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At dawn, the birds outside chirped lightly, humming happy little tunes. Their voices, sounding remarkably close, drifted into the dim room. The person on the bed seemed to stir at the noise, only to retract a hand back under the covers.

The room returned to silence.

Suddenly, the bundled quilt, which had been wrapped tightly from head to toe, was flung open, and the person inside sat bolt upright with a start.

The "wall" at the foot of the bed, previously obscured by the arc of the curtains, seemed to receive a signal. It parted down the middle and slid toward both ends, revealing the scene outside in its entirety.

It turned out that what the curtains had been hiding was not a solid wall at all, but a massive expanse of glass—or perhaps, a thoughtfully designed open-air garden corner.

Beyond the floor-to-ceiling windows, which stretched as far as the eye could see, various flowers and plants were arranged in a tasteful, colorful, and well-spaced display. Beyond the orderly greenery, the horticultural space did not feel cramped in the slightest; it was, for all intents and purposes, a small garden. To the side, a path led toward another section, presumably another part of the garden.

With the curtains drawn back, a flood of sunlight poured in, instantly brightening the entire room.

This sunlight, however, was different from that of Blue Star. Sunlight on Blue Star was warm and bright, yet occasionally harsh and scorching, depending on the environment and climate. Here, the light of this planet was gentle, casting everything in a subtle, golden hue that felt entirely natural and unobtrusive, with no discernible change in temperature as it touched the skin.

The light filtered through the small garden and finally settled on the person in the bed... It was, by all accounts, a perfectly pleasant morning.

Yet, it was clear that the person on the bed was not in the right frame of mind to appreciate any of it. She had missed the moment to enjoy the view because she was currently feeling absolutely frantic.

She knew last night had been a dream.

But knowing it was a dream didn't explain why she couldn't wake up. She had waited for what felt like an eternity in that dream, growing frustrated and trying every method she could think of, yet she remained as if welded to that spot, unable to stir. She had even begun to suspect that perhaps it wasn't a dream and she had truly returned home, only to find that the door still wouldn't open...

After much struggling, she had exhausted herself, and then, simply fallen asleep within the dream.

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Waking up again to find herself in bed number 385—so this was finally waking up? How difficult it was to shake oneself from slumber. It just went to show how deeply she longed for her home on Blue Star; the moment she caught a glimpse of it in a dream, she hadn't wanted to wake up at all.

Still, it was better to have fewer dreams like that in the future, as being unable to wake up was actually quite terrifying.

Jiang Hui sat up, intending to get out of bed, when the window directly ahead opened.

Back then, opening it had revealed a glorious garden vista, and with the room's lights casting a glow outward against the backdrop of the planets arranged in the sky, it had felt quite poetic, like viewing a landscape on a moonlit night.

But that wasn't the issue. Why was the sky outside black?!

She had discovered that the celestial phenomena of this planet differed from Blue Star's back when she was in the hospital. Later, once she got hold of the basic rules and common knowledge of Blue Star, she had crammed quite a bit. Even if she didn't know other things—after all, the original owner of this body had just arrived at this star system—it would have been absurd for her not to know the common knowledge of time and seasons that applied across the entire interstellar community.

Fortunately, she later found that she didn't need to relearn much, as it was said that the time and seasonal cycles of the Capital Star System were similar to Blue Star's, almost a one-to-one ratio: three hundred sixty-five days a year, twelve months, twenty-four hours a day, and so on. They were all prefixed with the word "Star." These traditions, it was said, were inherited from the old ways of the mother planet before immigration and had remained unchanged since.

However, many other star systems and planets outside the Capital Star System were quite different, with varying planetary rotation patterns. Some planets even had no night, only day, or vice versa.

For the sake of consistent measurement, the entire interstellar community used the time of the Capital Star System. Only some planets, if necessary, retained their own local calendars and timekeeping systems to be used alongside Capital time.

The Grade-X planet she currently inhabited was a recently settled planet from the last few years. It didn't have a name yet, only the designation 732, and its scale was considered above average for the inner star systems. Its resources matched its population, and its development and administrative performance were relatively balanced.

However, the only downside to this planet was that its planetary rotation did not conform to the Capital calendar; the planet never set, meaning there was no night.

This, obviously, was not suitable for human sleep habits. Therefore, to make it suitable for habitation, the Immigration Bureau had constructed a nighttime ecological simulation system when building the city, capable of mimicking a nighttime environment according to the Capital Star System's calendar.

Instead of altering the planet's environment, they constructed an ecological projection screen within the city system, allowing the planet to enter a nighttime simulation mode at the appropriate time. This created an ecological system suitable for human life.

If it was dark outside now, did that mean it wasn't even six o'clock in the morning yet?

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Jiang Hui felt a sense of disbelief. She had struggled for so long in her dream and then slept for such a long time—how could it not be dawn yet? Surely she hadn't slept for two whole days and nights?

She immediately activated her optical computer and looked at the time display in the bottom corner. She was truly stunned.

No way. Had she misremembered the time? Not only had the date not changed, but the time was also completely absurd. She had gone to bed around eight or nine in the evening, and it seemed she had fallen asleep shortly after.

What time was it now? The optical computer displayed... 9:45 PM!!

To think that all the time she had spent dreaming had amounted to only a dozen minutes or so—this was ridiculous! Jiang Hui sat up with a jolt, unable to fall back asleep.

She felt it was necessary to verify the situation. Otherwise, she would start to suspect that her physical body had sustained some damage to her brain during that recent accident; otherwise, how could she be so confused about basic counting and timekeeping?

If that were the case, she might need to reconsider the compensation negotiations with the Helus Group. What she had accepted before would have been far too generous to them—

Acting on the thought, Jiang Hui couldn't lie still. She took out the stack of medical records and receipts she had brought back from the hospital from her space ring.

To be honest, the medical terminology was too complex for her to understand. However, she could read the dates. By checking the discharge time recorded on the papers, she could determine if her memory was off.

But when she saw the date recorded in the medical file, she was completely dumbfounded: Star Calendar, 8th Era, 9983, August 2nd, 9:45 PM—she had been discharged on August 2nd at 5:30 PM.

So it was indeed still the same day. Could she really have woken up after only sleeping for a dozen minutes?!