Toward a Better Life

Yaxiu's expression froze for a moment before he changed the subject. "Tea cafes are one thing—after all, I like looking at pretty girls too. But the real problem is, why are there a bunch of scantily clad men posturing and flirting in places called 'mud cafes'? It really hurts my eyes. If I weren't an escaped convict, I'd report them to the Sin Hunting Hall for being a public eyesore. There ought to be an explicit law banning that—" "I suggest you mind your own business," Freya warned him. "You might not like looking at them, but we do. Who says only men get to look at beautiful women, while women aren't allowed to look at handsome men?" "Well, putting that aside, it is a traditional profession, even if the scale has gotten pretty large. That much is understandable." Yaxiu's expression darkened. "When I wandered a bit further, I saw workers at a construction site." "What about the workers?" "They... more than half of their bodies were mechanical. Wheels for feet, multi-toolboxes for hands, and even their eyes were replaced with mechanical prosthetics... If I hadn't seen them drinking and heard them bantering, I would have thought they were robots." "How could they possibly be robots?" Freya waved a hand dismissively. "Fully automated robots are absurdly expensive and require constant maintenance. Hiring mechanical workers is dirt cheap by comparison. As I recall, you haven't been in prison for very long. Mechanical workers took Kaimeng City by storm over a decade ago. Why do you act like you've never seen one?" "...Are there really that many mechanical workers in Kaimeng City?" "They're not just on construction sites either. Their hands can be swapped out with different attachments, and after some brief training, they can immediately work as assemblers, maintenance technicians, fabricators, and other skilled trades." Freya took a huge bite of Blazing Lalafell, mayonnaise smearing the corner of her mouth. "Generally speaking, most ordinary people with no hope of becoming sorcerers will transition to becoming mechanical workers. Even clerical office workers are no exception; the only difference is the degree of mechanization." Yaxiu was stunned. "Even non-technical labor gets mechanized?" "Of course. Putting aside limbs and spines, swapping internal organs for mechanical implants offers huge advantages." Freya poked her chest. "The heart can be replaced with a more powerful 'Spark,' the lungs with an 'Internal Combustion Engine' featuring stronger circulation, the stomach with an 'Energy Pool' boasting vastly superior digestion and nutrient absorption..." "Mechanical modifications are very cheap nowadays. For a standard set of mechanical implants, working diligently will let you pay off the loan in just three or four years, yet the results are incredible: it gives you longer endurance and far better energy efficiency." "When times are tough, you can scrape by on just water while still maintaining plenty of energy. And when you're flush with cash, you have more stamina to enjoy yourself and experience far more intense sensory pleasures." "If mechanical implants didn't reduce a sorcerer's efficiency in absorbing sorcery power in the Void Realm, many sorcerers probably would have opted for mechanical implants instead of the vastly more expensive biological implants." Freya shrugged. "Still, for ordinary people these days, an 'Omni' mechanical hand and an 'Energy Pool' mechanical stomach are practically mandatory. Otherwise, no company would be willing to hire them. Most practical tools are designed to interface directly with mechanical hands—without one, you can hardly use any tools. For instance, the head chef at my university cafeteria connects a spatula to his mechanical hand, which automatically heats, cools, and dispenses seasonings. The steaks he sears are delicious." "And with a mechanical stomach, you can eat a whole day's worth of food in the morning and digest it slowly throughout the day. It not only increases your working hours, but also saves on food costs—take this dinner of ours, for example. It could be traded for thirty portions of 'fodder.'" "A mechanical worker only needs one portion of fodder to get through a full day of work. In other words, tonight we've effectively eaten a mechanical worker's rations for an entire month." Yaxiu couldn't comprehend it. "What about the Human Rights Association? Or the Racial Rights Protection Association? Do they just do nothing?" Freya frowned. "What does this have to do with the Human Rights Association? Nobody is forcing them to get mechanical modifications. They do it entirely voluntarily. The Human Rights Association has no right to restrict their freedom to undergo mechanical modification, much less stop them from rushing toward a better life." Rushing toward a better life. Yaxiu was dumbfounded. He fell silent for a long time. Only after Freya had eaten her fill and wiped her mouth did he suddenly ask another question. "If mechanical workers save so much money, where do their wages go?" Freya ticked them off on her fingers. "Mud cafes, tea cafes, casinos, sugar shops, drama voting, clothes, jewelry, biological modification, chip version upgrades, Curtain of Knowledge upgrades, Rise of Sorcerers, Void Realm Fantasy XIV, World of Miracles..." After surfing the web for a day, Yaxiu knew that those last three titles were the hottest multiplayer games on the Curtain. The Curtain was the information realm co-constructed by all citizens, equivalent to the internet. It was called the Curtain because of its high degree of secrecy: aside from the Sin Hunting Hall which managed the chips, ordinary people could never trace anyone else through the Curtain. In that digital realm, everyone was an invisible person 'behind the curtain.' Because of that anonymity, people spoke with utter abandon on the Curtain. In a single day, Yaxiu had learned all kinds of profanities and slurs targeting race, gender, education level, and profession. Even though the Blood Moon Country had no mothers, their mastery of swear words still left Yaxiu in awe, wishing he could swap out his eyes for a pair that had never seen such vulgarities. For a brief moment, he even felt that Shattered Lake Prison's speech restriction policies had some merit; a bunch of foul-mouthed trolls like that ought to be locked up and reformed. As for drama voting, it was a unique monetization model for television shows and films in the Blood Moon Country. Put simply, once viewers watched the first half of a series, the producers would provide multiple choices for the ending. Viewers could vote—by paying money—for their preferred storyline, and the studio would produce it exactly as desired. For example, take that comic Yaxiu had read, Blame It on Me Saying I Like Married Women. If it were adapted into a show, it might offer over a dozen ending choices, like 'The Male Lead and Female Lead Live Happily Ever After,' 'The Male Lead, Female Lead, and Second Female Lead Live a Shameless Life Together,' 'Female Lead Ends Up with Second Female Lead,' 'Male Lead Ends Up with Second Male Lead,' and so on. Once audiences watched the first half, the finale was entirely up to their votes! As for clothes and jewelry, Yaxiu had discovered today that although Freya's apartment was small, she had three full wardrobes crammed with pretty outfits and accessories. He had assumed it was just a woman's hobby, but once out on the street, practically everyone dressed in high-end, stylish, upscale fashion. Even the male clerk at the grocery store was dressed like a wealthy young lord. Furthermore, except for middle-aged and elderly folks, most young people were remarkably attractive, regardless of gender. Even goblins possessed delicate, handsome features, and some people's eyes literally sparkled—real starlight, the kind where their pupils actually glittered and twinkled. Clearly, everyone's appearance had undergone artistic tuning by healers. Still, Yaxiu was hardly in a position to criticize—his own face had been remodeled by Healer 222. As for purchasing a Curtain of Knowledge, updating chip versions cost money as well. Most people had a Miracle Type 1 chip implanted at birth, which was slow, had little storage, and could only be considered 'usable.' Most adults upgraded their chips to Type 10 or higher. Newer chip versions offered greater functionality and better performance, not to mention that many applications had version requirements and couldn't run on older chips. The Curtain of Knowledge was the glass display screen they were currently watching. Compared to the narrow light screen projected by a chip, the Curtain of Knowledge featured higher resolution, larger screen size, superior color, larger storage capacity, and higher performance. While both were infotainment terminals, the chip functioned like an implanted smartphone, whereas the Curtain of Knowledge was equivalent to a personal computer. "In other words, after most people earn money, they pour it all into sex, gambling, drugs, bodily modifications, fashion, jewelry, and virtual entertainment?" "Exactly." Yaxiu parted his lips to say something, but held his tongue. Only after eating the last piece of quiche could he not help but ask, "Are you like that too?" "Pretty much. Though I'm not really into gambling or drugs, and since I'm going to become a sorcerer in the future, I can't undergo biological modification for now." "Then are you happy?" Freya gave him an odd look. "Extremely happy."