"Erosion? What erosion?"
"This is the situation that Heruni and others encountered. This kind of erosion is like a virus, except that it can be spread through cognition. The information contained in the recording is its carrier." Ke Lan explained.
Although Heruni had carefully deleted the content related to "forbidden knowledge", these recordings were still extremely dangerous. Ke Lan couldn't help but feel fortunate that the others were not around him at the moment, otherwise, Mo Jue might not be the only one to be corrupted.
"Why are you okay?" Mo Jue raised his hands in the air, a little overwhelmed, "What should I... do? Will I die?"
"Are you afraid of death?" Ke Lan stared into her eyes and asked word by word.
"With current means, this kind of 'erosion'... cannot be cured, right?" Mo Jue took a few deep breaths and asked in a calm tone as possible.
Ke Lan nodded without commenting.
Although Heruni mentioned that deleting memories might be able to prevent the erosion from getting worse, to do that, the person being eroded must be put into a deep sleep... and once in deep sleep, Ke Lan felt that Mo Jue would most likely be like Heruni... dreaming of that "terrifying starry sky."
By that time, even if the victim's memory was completely deleted, it would be impossible to save the person.
Although Ke Lan had never "seen" the starry sky described by Heruni in the recording, when Ke Lan used the Holy Word, the gaze from "Him" was like pressing the mass of the entire vast starry sky on Ke Lan's consciousness... This feeling is difficult to describe accurately in words, but Ke Lan's subconscious mind kept telling him that the essence of the two is the same.
The "horrifying starry sky" that Heruni saw can actually be understood as "His" sight - how does the classic saying go: when you look into the abyss, the abyss is also looking at you .
When Heruni saw the "starry sky", it was actually equivalent to "Him"'s sight sweeping over Heruni... In simple terms, when things developed to this point, "Him" as a hunter had already set his sights on "Heruni", the prey who accidentally entered the hunter's field of vision. At this time, it was no longer possible for the prey to pretend that he knew nothing and retreat from the hunter's field of vision.
"I'm not afraid of death." Mo Jue said to Ke Lan, "In fact, when I first followed you into the depths of the forest, I had already thought that I would die in this place."
“But.” Mo Jue changed the subject, “Even if I die, I hope to die with dignity, rather than being used as an experimental subject and being cut into pieces by a group of white coats on the operating table... I can’t live, and I can’t die.”
"...Do you think I will use you as experimental material?" Ke Lan curled her lips. She had to admit that Mo Jue's divergent thinking was quite broad - but from her point of view, it was completely reasonable for him to think so.
If Heruni could repair the "Shaojiang Kai" frigate and return to the Ark, the first choice of the Undead Crew would definitely not be to kill him, but to control him... The members of the Crew themselves are also suffering from erosion. With such a living specimen with a high degree of erosion, and one that has been watched by "Him", the Undead Crew will definitely spare no effort to study it.
What's more, Heruni also carries the "secret" from the Gray Mist Forest.
It is easy to artificially create an Erosion Subject who is on the verge of the critical point, but it is difficult to create such an "excellent" Erosion Subject... After accepting the "forbidden knowledge", most people will have their bodies highly mutated in a short period of time, just like other crew members, and finally transform into "Erosion Corpses".
Even among the symbionts that had Alpha gene fragments inserted through gene editing, only Ke Lan and the "Prophet" were able to survive for a long time. And someone like Heruni, who had a physique that persisted for a whole year under severe erosion with a "mortal body", can be said to be one in a million.
From Mo Jue's perspective, Ke Lan and his group represent the official side of the Ark. Judging from the way the Ark's upper echelons have always behaved, they might actually capture Mo Jue and use him as experimental material for studying human erosion.
Although her value was far inferior to that of Heruni... the key point was that Mo Jue didn't know that the undead crew was fully capable of mass-producing this kind of "experimental material".
"Isn't it possible?" Mo Jue said as he slowly took a few steps back, then quickly pulled out a pistol from his waist and pointed it at his temple.
She drew the gun very quickly, but in the eyes of Ke Lan, who had the ability to stop time, it was not fast at all. Ke Lan broke down her entire set of movements into dozens of frames, and in each frame Ke Lan had a chance to snatch the gun from her hand.
But Ke Lan didn't do that... Using force to suppress the other party would only make the other party distrust him more.
The next exploration process is still long. If possible, Ke Lan still hopes to get along well with this "woodcutter". No matter how strong the other party is, in such a strange and dangerous place, it is better to have one more trustworthy teammate than one less. Even if the other party can only talk to him, it is better than wandering alone in the forest.
"I would rather die here than be taken back to the Ark alive by you." Mo Jue raised his voice slightly and exerted a little force on the index finger holding the trigger.
Ke Lan could see that if she showed any intention of bringing Mo Jue back to "do research", she would pull the trigger without hesitation.
"Then you can rest assured. I don't have any good feelings towards those guys in the research institute... They once tried to use me as a research subject. I can completely understand your feelings, so, can you put down the gun first?" Ke Lan persuaded.
"No. I... I can't completely trust you right now... I..." Mo Jue originally wanted to negotiate terms with Ke Lan, but just as she was about to speak, she found that she had no idea what terms to negotiate.
The only bargaining chip Mo Jue has is his own life...but the problem is that Ke Lan can't offer any bargaining chips.
No verbal assurance could put her mind at ease. Even if she kept a gun to her temple, Ark had countless ways to safely disarm her after returning.
"Okay, if you really want to die, then just shoot me. I have no objection." Ke Lan suddenly gave up persuading him, shrugged, and made a "go ahead" gesture to Mo Jue.
Mo Jue was stunned for a moment, then a puzzled look appeared on her face. However, she did not ask why Ke Lan's attitude changed so quickly. She just pretended to be relaxed and said, "Then you should stay away from him. Be careful not to get splashed with blood and brain matter."
The pistol in her hand was a large-caliber hunting pistol. If she shot it at her head, not only would a hole be made, but half of her head would probably be blown off.
Of course, the more likely possibility is that it will explode like a watermelon dropped on the ground.
The inner hesitation lasted only half a second before Mo Jue pulled the trigger.
The gun didn't go off, and her head didn't explode like a watermelon.
She held the pistol in front of her in some surprise, pulled out the magazine, opened the slide, and checked it inside and out.
There was nothing wrong with the gun itself. She even tried firing a shot at the wall. The sound of the gun was like thunder, and the large-caliber armor-piercing bullet made a hole in the metal lining of the wall.
What happened just now?
Mo Jue didn't think about it. She pointed the gun at her head again, gritted her teeth and pulled the trigger.
The gun still didn't fire.
The first time she tried hard, the second time she failed, and the third time she was exhausted... When the first suicide attempt failed, the impulse had already subsided for the most part. When she pulled the trigger at herself for the second time, her hand was already shaking slightly. And now, she suddenly found that she didn't even have the courage to check the gun again.
"It was you who did it, right?" Mo Jue raised his head, looked at Ke Lan and asked.
She was right. With Ze Luo's spatial ability, it was very easy to make a purely mechanical pistol unable to fire. Ke Lan could even freeze Mo Jue in place, then slowly walk in front of her and take the gun from her hand.
"Look, you have absolutely no ability to resist. If I want to, you can't even commit suicide. So you might as well try to trust me this time. I will never hand you over to the Institute or any other scientific research institution, nor will I use you as an experimental material."
In fact, Ke Lan had another thing that she didn't say: With Mo Jue's ability to resist corrosion, her body had already undergone a mutation just by listening to these deleted recordings. It was highly likely that she wouldn't be able to hold on until Ke Lan and the others walked out of the Gray Fog Forest...
Just like Jack Garcia...she doesn't have much time left.
"..." Mo Jue stared at Ke Lan with his eyes wide open for several seconds before he threw the pistol to the ground and sat on the ground in frustration.
"Even if you won't use me as an experimental material... then why don't you just let me die? The doctor Liu in the recording has made it very clear that this 'disease' cannot be cured. With human medical technology, we can't even prolong my life... I know I won't live for many days."
Ke Lan sighed. Although he hadn't said the hurtful truth just now, Mo Jue was obviously aware of it.
"You are not afraid of death, so are you afraid of the process of dying?" Ke Lan walked forward and pulled Mo Jue up from the ground. "Humans have no means of treatment, but that doesn't mean that Alpha civilization doesn't have any. Maybe, in the core area of ​​the Gray Mist Forest, there is a way to slow down the erosion process."
"Are you trying to comfort me?" Mo Jue smiled miserably.
"You think so, right?" Ke Lan said, "But I think that until the last moment, one should never give up hope... Don't worry, if you really turn into that kind of monster in the end, I will help you get rid of it."
"I hope you won't break your promise..."
"Ivan, the Russian doctor who just got separated from us, you should have noticed his robotic arm, right?" Ke Lan said.
Mo Jue nodded and said, "He replaced his arm with a cyborg prosthesis to facilitate surgery in the wild?"
"No, his original arm was infected by the cells of the Seed of Corrosion."
When Mo Jue heard the words "Seeds of Erosion", her expression changed significantly - as a Hell Paratrooper, she knew a lot of intelligence. During her service, she had participated in combat missions in which more than 100 targets were members of heretical sects or settlements.
Anyone who knows something about heretical sects and the Seeds of Corrosion knows that being infected and parasitized by the Seeds of Corrosion is truly an "incurable disease." Even though the Ark has mastered the method of restraining the Seeds of Corrosion, there is still no way to save those "containers."
The only thing they could do was to kill the container and the seeds of corrosion inside the container.
Mo Jue's superior also told her that if a comrade-in-arms was accidentally infected during combat operations, he must be "dealt with" in a timely manner. As for the method of treatment, everyone can guess it without being told.
This thing is just like the zombie virus in the movie... But later in the movie, even if the protagonists are infected, they can always find serum or antidote. But in reality, the institute has been studying the seeds of corrosion for so long, but has not been able to save any infected people.
"He...how long has he been infected?" Mo Jue couldn't help but ask.
"Two years. But the erosion cells in his body have been suppressed. In the past two years, the infection process has not changed at all." Ke Lan said, "The method of suppression was not discovered by the people in the institute, but came from the ruins of an Alpha civilization. We all thought he was going to die, just like you are sure to die now."
Extra Chapter: The Age of Hunger (Part 1)
The 500th year of the New Era.
For the humans who survived the Ark, this was the first year of their survival.
Although this result is much better than expected... at least, humans did not become extinct because of it.
In January of the 499th year of the New Era, not long after the Lunar New Year, the department responsible for route observation discovered an anomaly - all of the Ark's pathfinders and unmanned aerial vehicles had lost contact, and no signal was transmitted back to the Ark... not even a piece of garbled code typed out in a hurry.
The observation department immediately realized the seriousness of the problem - these pathfinder ships and unmanned aerial vehicles were only fifteen to twenty light seconds away from the Ark, not very far. If any accident occurred, even if the ship crashed, at least the corresponding information could be transmitted back. It was impossible for all the ships and aircraft to disappear silently in the vast universe.
The observation department's first reaction was that they might have encountered a high-level alien civilization - these pathfinders and unmanned aerial vehicles were most likely destroyed or captured by the alien civilization. Only in this case would they not be able to send out even a brief distress call.
But just as the report was handed over to the Joint Parliamentary Group and the members were on their way to the meeting, something strange happened again!
On the route directly in front of the Ark, an extremely abnormal gravitational field appeared. Under the influence of this gravitational field, the entire Ark began to gradually accelerate...
According to calculations, this level of gravity requires at least a celestial body with a mass hundreds of times that of the sun to exist within the observable range of optical equipment. However, on the route directly in front of the Ark, let alone stars, there are no small celestial bodies that can be seen everywhere in the universe...
No... this area of ​​the universe is too clean. This is a very suspicious point. The leader of the observation department looked at the holographic star map on the table, and a drop of cold sweat slid down his forehead.
As an experienced astronomer, the leader realized at this time that he had made an irreparable mistake.
"Black hole..." He muttered as he looked at the pairs of eyes in the control room looking at him.
The reason why this area of ​​the universe is so clean is that all celestial bodies have been sucked into the black hole, even light is no exception... Even light cannot escape the gravity, so the wireless signals sent by pathfinders and unmanned aerial vehicles cannot escape even more.
But it was too late... With the Ark's propulsion power, it was impossible to break free from the gravitational pull of the black hole... Even if they abandoned the ship and escaped at this time, it would be useless, and the escaping spacecraft would also be dragged into the black hole by gravity.
The entire ark, including all the people on board, have been captured by the black hole. All that remains is just a matter of time.
The United Parliamentary Group concentrated all the computing power of the core brain and finally came to a conclusion: the Ark and mankind only have three months and nine days left.
Although the United Parliamentary Group decided to keep it secret from the public, the truth could not be hidden. In just over a month, everyone on the Ark knew the desperate fact: the ship was rushing towards the black hole with the last seeds of human civilization.
In less than two months, human civilization entered the most chaotic and darkest period in history.
As the countdown to the end of the world begins, people who have lost their minds can do anything crazy... Even the army that maintains order no longer obeys the orders of their superiors. For those who have not personally experienced that period, it is difficult to understand the despair and madness based on video and text materials alone.
According to official statistics, the Ark lost more than 50% of its population when it passed through the wormhole, but in fact, among this 50% population, one third was lost in less than two months before entering the wormhole.
The cowardly committed suicide, the greedy plundered at will, the tyrants killed and burned... Civilization seemed to have lost its meaning, people turned into beasts, allowing their inner desires to control their behavior.
Of course, these things are all in the past.
Most people didn't expect that the Ark could actually successfully pass through the wormhole... Although the hull was severely damaged, the thrusters completely lost power, and the broken streets were littered with grotesque corpses killed by abnormal spatial forces... But no matter what, the fire of human civilization was still preserved.
The survivors gradually woke up from their crazy state - they realized that the doomsday catastrophe was gone, but the more serious problem of survival was facing all the survivors.
Although many areas inside the Ark were no longer habitable, thanks to the population reduction, the relatively well-preserved areas could barely accommodate the 50% of survivors. After the living environment problem was solved, the food problem was placed in the first place.
Since ancient times, food has been the primary need of the people. Only when people are well fed can they think, work and reproduce.
However, more than 80% of the food production bases on the Ark have been destroyed, and most of the food reserves have been burned in those two crazy months. The output of the remaining 20% ​​of the food production bases cannot keep up with consumption, and the food reserves in the warehouses are decreasing at an alarming rate.
However, the resources that the Ark can invest in the project of restoring food production are not abundant. This is not because food is not important, but because there are things with higher priority than food - the Ark's power and protection system.
Famine due to lack of food is not a problem that cannot be solved at present. As long as the people above are cold-blooded enough, they can deal with the shortage of food by further reducing the population. But if even the most basic living environment cannot be guaranteed, then everyone will die in this vast space.
The top priority task is to restore the Ark's power system and repair the damaged main structure of the hull. As for restoring food production, it ranks third.
In this era, the food an adult can get every day is just synthetic rations equivalent to 600-800 calories. It is like flour, which can be eaten after being mixed into a paste by dissolving it in cold water. There is no seasoning or side dish. In order to increase the feeling of fullness, a large amount of artificial cellulose is added to it (these cellulose cannot be digested by the human stomach and intestines, and can be separated after collecting the feces for multiple uses).
This thing is actually similar to the black bread mixed with sawdust that the Soviet army ate during World War II.
The only things that could be eaten with this synthetic ration were those colorful vitamin pills, and the supply of the pills was very tight. Scurvy, which had disappeared from human society for hundreds of years, became one of the main causes of death among humans in that era.
As for minors, the amount of food they receive is only half of that of adults. Even for 17-year-olds who are still growing up, the amount of food they receive is still only 300-400 calories per day.
Moreover, this standard is being continuously lowered as food reserves decrease.
If you want to get more food, there is only one way: work.
The "work" here only includes those Ark repair projects that are ranked in the top three priorities... As for other jobs, although there are rewards, the rewards are pitifully low and cannot fill the hungry stomachs of the boys at all.
Linden is sixteen years old and is a "wormhole orphan" - this new name was born in the 500th year of the New Era, referring specifically to those children whose relatives all died in the various secondary disasters caused by crossing a black hole, leaving them the only one who survived.
Like the protagonists of many tragic stories, Linden once had a happy family. His father was a senior engineer in the engineering department, his mother was a lecturer at a college, and he had a beautiful 20-year-old sister. He himself skipped three levels in business education and was admitted to an engineering college with a reputation in the field of electromechanical engineering at the age of 15.
But in the 499th year of the new era, everything changed.
The first person to have an accident was Linden's sister. On the first day of those two desperate months, her sister went out and never came back...The father used many connections and finally found his daughter's naked body in a garbage disposal station a week later.
A month later, Linden's father was ordered to repair a stalled thruster. Although everyone knew that whether the thruster could be repaired or not, the Ark could not escape the fate of being swallowed by the black hole...but in order to prevent his family from losing protection and food, Linden's father still took on the task.
Then, the thruster exploded, wiping out the entire maintenance team.
Fortunately, Ark did not break its promise and took Linden and his mother to a safe area. Under the protection of the soldiers who were still loyal to Ark, the mother and son spent these two months safely.
When the Ark was passing through the wormhole, everyone's consciousness stagnated for a long time. By the time Linden felt that the surrounding time and space had returned to normal, the Ark had arrived in a completely unfamiliar universe.
His mother turned into a pool of minced meat less than three meters away from him.
The sad mood did not last long, because the feeling of hunger became more unbearable. Seeing the food rations getting smaller every day, Linden decided to participate in the repair of the Ark and use his work in exchange for enough food to fill his stomach.
Relying on his own abilities and knowledge, Linden stood out among the other subjects and successfully got a job repairing thrusters - this made him think of his father. At that time, he never thought that he would one day follow in his father's footsteps.
This job is dangerous. The damaged hull of the Ark is one of the biggest sources of danger, followed by the vacuum and radiation from outside the ship.
On the first day of work, one worker was crushed to death by a steel beam that suddenly broke and fell, and another worker was electrocuted by a high-voltage wire that touched the ground.
On the second day of work, when the leader of Linden's maintenance team pushed open a stuck hatch, he did not expect that the cabin behind the door had been damaged and was directly sucked into space. The other two people were exposed to a large amount of cosmic rays without wearing protective equipment and suffered from severe radiation sickness.
On the third day of work, Linden received his first pay.
Workers' wages are not physical coins, nor credit points in their accounts... but food. In this era, food has once again become synonymous with hard currency.
Six packets of synthetic rations were packed in small bags, each weighing fifty grams, but Linden knew without weighing it that none of the packets were full... The white powder in this packaging always reminded him of the banned drugs in old-age movies that made people shudder.
However, synthetic rations are not the highlight... Although this job is so dangerous, the biggest reason why people still flock to it is the other two things in this reward.
Meat and vegetables.
This meat is of course not real meat, but artificial meat synthesized from soy protein... Compared with the real artificial meat produced before 499 years of the New Era, this batch of artificial meat tastes like dehydrated dried tofu, and with the extremely salty seasoning, it would have been garbage that could not be sold on the shelf in the past. But now, it has become a precious commodity that everyone is chasing after.
I heard from the leader who died yesterday that outside, you only need a piece of artificial meat the size of your little finger to make a pretty young girl satisfy any of your requests, and the piece that Linden has in his hand now is the size of half a palm.
What is more precious than meat is vegetables - even before 499 years into the new era, vegetables have always been synonymous with "luxury" on the Ark. Whether it is grown in soil or hydroponics, the cultivation of vegetables consumes a lot of precious space and resources. For the vast majority of the lower-class people, they may still be able to eat meat, but they may never have the chance to eat real vegetables in their entire lives.
Linden's family conditions were pretty good before, and he could eat vegetables almost every day. Among the vegetables he had eaten, the most common one was the one he had now.
“Bean sprouts.”
Low cost, no need for additional fertilizer, extremely low environmental requirements except for sunlight, recommended planting and rapid growth, extremely short maturity period... With all the above advantages added together, bean sprouts are simply the most cost-effective vegetables during interstellar travel.
What Linden got now was a bag of raw bean sprouts, weighing about 100 grams. He carefully stuffed the bag of raw bean sprouts into the inside pocket of his clothes, fearing that he would be seen.
Bean sprouts can be eaten raw, but for some reason, he suddenly had the idea of ​​cooking them.
Extra Chapter: The Age of Hunger (Part 2)
In this era, the word "cooking" can almost be equated with "luxury".
Food is scarce and no one can fill their stomachs... In this environment, as long as they can find someone to eat, many people's first reaction is to stuff the food into their mouths before others notice... At least the taste and texture are not important at all.
As long as that thing can fill my stomach, that's enough.
But on the Ark, finding food was a difficult task.
If famine breaks out on Earth, people can choose to go deep into the mountains and forests to look for food... Although it is dangerous to do so, anyway, as long as there are living things, there will be something to eat. But on this colony ship, even if people dig three feet into the ground, they can only see metal and concrete.
Almost all food sources are controlled by the government and a few powerful civil forces.
A few months ago, people were still selling dead rats skewered with steel rods on the black market, but now, even creatures like cockroaches are almost extinct on the Ark.
People were almost eating their own children.
Before the disaster, although supplies were also scarce, at least most people could have enough food and clothing... Many people miss their previous lives, but they also know in their hearts that that kind of life can never be returned... At least their generation will definitely not see the Ark restored to its previous state.
Linden, holding the bag of bean sprouts in his arms, lowered his head and walked quickly through a narrow alley.
At the entrance of the alley, there sat a pale and thin old man with his eyes closed and his arms hanging on both sides of his body, as if he was asleep.
In front of the old man, there was a dented aluminum bowl, which was empty.
When Linden approached the old man, a disgusting stench of corpse immediately entered his nostrils, and he realized that the old man had been dead for a long time.
As to whether he died of starvation or some other cause, Linden had no idea.
No one came to collect the bodies, and the people from the sanitation department also couldn't get enough food. After completing their work, they just wanted to rest for a while to reduce their calorie consumption as much as possible... I'm afraid this body will have to wait until it is completely decayed before it can be disposed of.
Of course, it is also possible that you will be secretly dragged away by some people who "cross the bottom line".
"Cannibals" are no longer just stories that appear in urban legends. Just last month, the military executed a group of people who were arrested for mutilating and eating their own kind. Linden watched the entire execution process on the big screen in the mall.
The cannibals were tied up with restraints, curled up on the ground, their bloodshot eyes bulged outward, their lips were covered with ulcers, and their loose hair covered most of their faces... They didn't look like humans, but the kind of monsters called "ghouls" hidden in the dark sewers in horror novels.
According to the newly enacted laws of the Ark, cannibals will be sentenced to death, regardless of whether the corpse was killed by the cannibal or not.
But under the pressure of hunger, there are always people who choose to take risks.
Linden no longer looked back at the old man's body, but chose to quicken his pace again.
Half an hour later, he finally returned to his residence safely.
Since the Ark came out of the wormhole, the original "safe zones" protected by the army were abolished, and Linden moved to a shantytown in the East Fourth District.
East District 4 originally belonged to the superior area of ​​the Ark. It is no exaggeration to say that every inch of the commercial streets and luxury residential areas here are worth a lot of money. Even considering Linden's family situation before the disaster, they only lived in East District 6... Compared with the rent and land prices in District 6, East District 4 is more than twice as expensive.
But in the process of crossing the wormhole, the entire East District 6 has completely turned into a dead place where people cannot survive. According to the official budget, it will take at least 20 years to restore these dead places to their original habitable state.
Apart from other things, just repairing the damaged hull, clearing the radiation, and reconnecting the gas and water supply pipes and power lines would take years to complete. Not to mention that the Ark simply couldn't spare so many resources and manpower to repair a residential area that had no strategic value.
The buildings in the East Fourth District were also severely damaged during the crossing process, but at least the basic life-sustaining facilities were not greatly affected, and there were no problems with the airtightness of the space and the oxygen supply. As for the power outage, it was not a big problem.
More than fifty mobile searchlights are distributed at various street corners in the East Fourth District as lighting equipment, but in order to save energy, these searchlights are only on for one-third of the day. Apart from that, residents of the East Fourth District have to survive in the dark most of the time.
This shantytown was originally a high-end residential area in a prime location, but all the valuable mansions were destroyed in the secondary disasters caused by the crossing. The military used the building materials cleared from the ruins to build a series of simple shanties to accommodate refugees relocated from other uninhabitable damaged areas.
Linden checked the simple homemade lock on his door. After making sure there were no signs of prying, he took out the key from his pocket and unlocked the door. Then he put the lock on the other side of the door and locked it.
With a hint of excitement, he walked to the sleeping bag in the corner of the room, reached into the sleeping bag and fumbled for a long time before he took out a small package of transparent crystals in a plastic bag.
This was an essential seasoning for every household when cooking before the disaster: salt.
Now, the main way to obtain sodium and chloride is to swallow small pills with those paste-like synthetic foods every day. As for real table salt, it has long become a luxury that is as difficult to obtain as vegetables.
Of course, Linden couldn't afford real table salt. These transparent crystals were actually sodium chloride that he extracted from industrial raw materials for repairing ship hulls using chemical means.
In the old days, people often mistook "industrial salt" for "table salt" and got poisoned. But in fact, the ingredients of industrial salt and table salt are completely different. The former is also called nitrite, and its main ingredients are sodium nitrite in addition to sodium chloride. If it is pure sodium chloride, whether it is obtained by traditional salt-making technology or purified from industrial raw materials, it is actually edible.
Linden used the crystallization method to separate sodium chloride. After waiting for the crude salt to crystallize, he carried out multiple purifications. Although it was impossible to completely eliminate all impurities, at least the toxicity was negligible.
You don't need to use too much salt, just a little bit is enough to enhance the flavor of the dishes.
Although bean sprouts are simple, because people have so few kinds of vegetables to eat, this seemingly monotonous ingredient was almost made into a variety of dishes by the residents of the Ark before the disaster - just from Linden's memory, there were at least twenty kinds of dishes that his father used bean sprouts as the raw material.
But most of the dishes require woks and oil, and salt can be purified from stolen industrial raw materials, but he really has no idea how to make these two things.
In line with the principle of using local ingredients, Linden decided to make two dishes that his father used to cook often: bean sprout pancakes and bean sprout soup.
He found a metal cup whose bottom had been charred black by smoke, tied a wire around the edge of the cup, and hung it under a tripod about 30 centimeters high. He found this tripod in the ruins of a residential area. It was supposed to be an accessory for a certain model of camera, but the camera had been picked up by scavengers who had arrived first, leaving only this slightly deformed tripod lying among a pile of rubble.
As for drinking water, he had plenty of it. The engineering team where Linden worked had an enviable benefit, which was breakfast and lunch, which naturally included drinking water. Because the work intensity of the engineering team was very high, the supply of drinking water was also sufficient, and each person could extract at least 3,000 milliliters of water every day.
As for the drinking water originally distributed to the residents, he stored it all.
Linden carefully poured the clean water from the plastic bottle into the metal cup, then added half of the bean sprouts and a pinch of salt.
The fuel used was oblate solid alcohol, which he also got from the engineering team...On the second day after the team leader died in an accident, he took advantage of the fact that no one was there to take over the team leader's job and updated the material requisition form in time, and secretly brought back a lot of small but very useful goodies from the engineering team's warehouse.
Using a fire starter to ignite the solid alcohol, a bright flame suddenly rose in the originally dark shed. Although the temperature did not change much, Linden still felt a little warmth - in addition to the power lines that were damaged in the East Fourth District, the temperature control facilities also stopped working. The outdoor temperature was maintained at around five degrees Celsius all year round, and the indoor temperature was barely around ten degrees Celsius.
Fine bubbles began to emerge from the bottom of the metal cup, and Linden vaguely felt as if he smelled a long-lost fragrance.
"Maybe it's an illusion..." He rubbed the wings of his nose, "How can bean sprouts boiled in plain water have a fragrance?"
Linden smiled self-deprecatingly and pulled a dented aluminum bowl from his coat pocket.
This was the bowl that was placed in front of the old man's body, but the old man could no longer use the bowl, so Linden brought it back.
The aluminum bowl was very thin. It was called a bowl, but it was actually a disposable container made of pressed aluminum foil and used to hold cooked food. The old man probably picked it up from some ruins, but judging from the thin layer of dust on the aluminum bowl, it must have not held food for a long time.
Linden wiped the aluminum bowl clean, cut one side of it, and flattened it into a piece of aluminum foil - he didn't have a pan, but using this piece of aluminum foil as a cooker for pancakes was perfectly sufficient.
In the past, Linden’s father used an electric baking pan that could hold the dough, but now, Linden has neither an electric baking pan nor electricity.
He took out a bag of synthetic rations, added a little water to it, and then slowly stirred it with his fingers until the white powder and water were completely mixed and turned into a sticky dough.
According to the eating habits of most people, it is ready to eat at this time, but if too much water is added, it will be difficult to swallow. Generally, the batter will be diluted and drunk as porridge.
But for Linden, he thought the water was a bit too much.
He had only seen his father do it before, and this was his first time to actually do it.
Looking at the soft dough in the bag, he thought for a moment, took out a clean piece of clothing, poured the dough on it, and then wrapped the clothing tightly.
The excess moisture was quickly filtered out from the holes in the clothing fibers. Looking at the dough whose moisture content had been reduced by at least half, Linden nodded with satisfaction.
The main ingredient of this synthetic ration is actually starch. Although it is not as easy to process into various pastries as flour, it can still be shaped as long as the proportion of water added is controlled.
Linden kneaded the remaining half of the bean sprouts into the dough, added an appropriate amount of salt, rolled the dough into a ball and flattened it, wrapped the dough with aluminum foil, and then sandwiched it above the burning solid alcohol, letting the flames lick the surface of the aluminum foil again and again.
An alluring aroma emanated from the gaps in the aluminum foil. This time, Linden could finally confirm that this was not an illusion, but a real smell captured by his olfactory organs.
How long had it been since he last smelled the aroma of food? After the Ark passed through the wormhole? No, to be precise, it should be since his father died and he and his mother moved into the safe zone protected by the army that they had never eaten cooked food again.
At that time, the only food we had every day was compressed biscuits. Linden still remembers the soap-like taste...but now even compressed biscuits have become a popular delicacy.
Just in East Fourth District, a soldier was attacked by civilians last week. He was hit on the back of the head by a brick and died instantly...and the reason for the attack was simply because he was holding a cardboard box with compressed biscuits printed on it.
However, the attackers did not find any food in the cardboard box. Instead, the box contained a pile of documents, which were important intelligence rescued from the ruined building.
The disappointed attackers were shot dead by the soldiers who came to support them before they had the chance to vent their anger on the documents, and the video in the news broadcast also came to an abrupt end.
The aroma of pancakes became stronger and stronger, and Linden's stomach began to make gurgling sounds... He couldn't help but swallow.
At this moment, there was a sudden knock outside the door of the shed.
"Is there anyone inside? Open the door quickly!" an impatient male voice shouted outside the door.
Linden's hand shook, and the dough wrapped in aluminum foil fell onto the solid alcohol, and the flame was immediately extinguished.