Lucas holed up in his own dorm on Rhodes Island for three days. For these three days, Lucas had been researching his 'Rule'.
The only bad thing about having a physical body was... it gets hungry easily and needs to eat.
Basically, Lucas made it quick every day. When his stomach growled, he went straight to the cafeteria to grab some takeout, ate it, and continued researching. Or he'd just grab lunch and dinner along with breakfast in the morning.
Amiya seemed to know what Lucas was busy with.
So she didn't actively disturb him these few days. Although she passed by Lucas's room many times and couldn't help but want to knock on the door and talk to Lucas, after thinking about it, she held back. Besides... the Doctor seemed to be taking High-Purity Originium from the warehouse a bit often these few days. High-Purity Originium was extremely expensive on the outside, and the Doctor had taken over thirty of them in just three days.
The price of over thirty of them converted to several million.
Several million...
For the currently destitute Rhodes Island, this was still quite a lot.
Although Kal'tsit had started a collaboration with Raythean Medica, this was a long-term collaboration. It was unlikely they'd get a large sum of money in the short term.
Jessica had also proposed continuous investment, taking a certain percentage of shares in Rhodes Island. In reality, this was purely an offer Jessica made on Lucas's account, but Kal'tsit refused the offer. So, despite the collaboration with Raythean Medica, Rhodes Island was still destitute.
Finally.
After three days.
Lucas looked at the ball of viscous, crimson liquid glowing with an internal gold floating in the center of his palm and let out a long sigh of relief.
These past few days, Lucas had been experimenting with his 'Rule'. He finally managed to use High-Purity Originium to store a part of his 'Rule's' power within it, extracting the energy from the High-Purity Originium and turning it into this viscous liquid. Just a tiny bit of this liquid should be enough to produce a dose of medicine far superior to any current Oripathy suppression drug.
Lucas filled this pure energy into the hollowed-out High-Purity Originium.
Then he went to the deck and summoned a transport drone to send this thing to Columbia. Lucas had upgraded and optimized the AI in the drone before, and had set a dedicated route between Rhodes Island and Columbia for the drone's automatic round trips.
It wasn't that Lucas didn't trust Rhodes Island.
It was just that...
Rhodes Island just wasn't as close to him as Jessica's side.
And on the other hand.
Rhodes Island's Kal'tsit was too shrewd. And she had lived for too long. Who knew what she was thinking deep down. Lucas himself couldn't quite get a handle on this woman. Compared to her, even Patriot was just a reckless young punk. Forget Patriot, even Nian and Dusk were reckless young punks.
If Rhodes Island didn't have Kal'tsit, if the leader was only Amiya, Lucas probably would have left a copy of this energy for Rhodes Island too.
Well~
He hadn't been out of his room for several days. Lucas stretched lazily, pushed open the door, and prepared to wander around Rhodes Island, to see if any office chair races were being held.
Tsk...
The Doctor's body had some very obvious downsides.
It was too weak.
And it got tired easily, frequently lacking 'Sanity'.
Lucas wandered around Rhodes Island for a good while, swung by the cafeteria for lunch, then went for a walk to digest and think about his next strategy.
Since the primary goal was complete.
The next task was to figure out how to save up two million Prayer Power to condense a divine body that was a 100% match for his soul.
For some reason.
Lucas had been dreaming a lot when he slept lately. Lucas didn't know why a spirit body like himself would dream.
He kept inexplicably dreaming of the scenes he saw when he received the power of the 'Rule'.
He even had a strong sixth sense in his heart, constantly hinting to him that some crisis was about to descend. Just like animals sensing an impending Catastrophe, except this sixth sense was very, very weak, extremely faint. This meant the unknown crisis in the future was still a long way off, maybe a few years, maybe decades, maybe even over a hundred or a thousand years.
Over a hundred years might be a lifetime for a normal human, but for someone like Lucas, it might just be a very short time.
That's why Lucas was so desperate for a physical body. After all, only with a fitting physical body could Lucas truly unleash his own authority.
How to obtain Prayer Power next was the problem.
As time went on, the Reunion Movement side was already barely providing him with new Prayer Power. At most, it was a thousand or so a week, just enough to get by. The Chernobog side was the same, and even Zumama's entire tribe was like this.
It wasn't that these people no longer believed in or were grateful to him.
It was that.
These people had become 'old users'.
'Old users' weren't valuable, not nearly as valuable as new users. Besides, the amount of Prayer Power one person could provide was limited. The limit of Prayer Power one person could provide was five thousand, so Jessica and the others couldn't provide any more at all.
So, Lucas urgently needed to develop new users. And where to find these new users was also a problem.
Maybe he could learn from a certain superhero who wears his underwear on the outside and become a superhero? But the Prayer Power provided by wishes where people don't know the specifics is really small. Unless Lucas went live on TV and said, "Hey, I'm the one who did XX thing, quickly send me Prayer Power." Is that possible? Obviously not.
Or maybe look for tribes like Zumama's?
That kind of tribe's faith was extremely devout. That was a good idea.
Or...
Continue to seek out the Infected?
Protect the Infected under his own name, and provide them with medicine. This was actually a pretty good choice.
But another problem arose.
Profit.
Protecting the Infected cost money, and providing medicine also had costs. The Infected were so poor they couldn't possibly give him money. He couldn't just keep living off Jessica, right? Although, that 'soft rice' was indeed delicious. No wonder so many people in his previous life chose this shortcut that saved them thirty years of struggle.
As Lucas was pondering his next move.
Suddenly.
The phone in his pocket vibrated a few times. He opened it and saw it was a message from Amiya.
Roughly, she was about to interview a new Operator. Kal'tsit was in surgery, and Amiya was shadowing her, so this interview task was dumped on Lucas. However, this person was an internal referral from an Operator on the landship, so the interview was basically just a formality.
Amiya instructed Lucas to just ask a few symbolic questions and it would be fine.
However, she also added a special note.
P-S: Don't ask for her three sizes, don't ask if she has a boyfriend....
Lucas was speechless. Why would Amiya think he'd ask such absurd and ridiculous questions? Was he that much of a pervert?
Since there was an interview.
Lucas turned right back. The fourth-floor reception room. Because he arrived too early, the Operator being interviewed wasn't there yet. Lucas sat bored in the seat that should have belonged to Kal'tsit, crossed his legs, and thought about what questions to ask during the interview.
Why did you join Rhodes Island?
What are your special skills?
What can you bring to Rhodes Island?
Are you willing to work overtime unpaid?
Our Rhodes Island is a startup company, the future is bright, but we're tight on funds right now. If you join now, in the future, when the company gets big, you'll be one of the veterans. You'll get millions in dividends from shares every year, making money while lying down without doing any work.
However, right now, we can only give you 2k. But we hope you'll work 18 hours a day, with no weekends, one day off a month, no salary. You must be on call 24/7. Any request for leave for any reason will be counted as skipping work. First time skipping, a fine of two hundred. Second time, a fine of one thousand.
Lucas thought to himself of many of the ridiculous conditions offered by scummy companies in his previous life.
To this day, he still didn't know.
It was one thing for companies to offer these ridiculous conditions, but why was there still a huge bunch of suckers who went to work there? And they were all university graduates.
Before long.
The door to the reception room opened.
A Vulpo lady wearing what looked like a maid-style work uniform walked in from outside. When she saw Lucas already sitting inside, she said in surprise.
"Ah! Doctor?"
"I thought it would be Amiya doing the interview."
Lucas said: "Amiya is shadowing Kal'tsit, so she asked me to fill in. By the way, Miss Perfumer, you are this new Operator's referrer?"
The girl stomped her foot.
"Call me Laina, Doctor. There's no need to use codenames on a normal day, it's not like we're on a mission."
Lucas was stunned.
"So Miss Perfumer's real name is Laina? This is the first I'm hearing it. But, it feels a bit familiar... Laina.... Laina... Reiner?"
Lucas stood up and said.
"Don't just stand, Miss Laina, please sit."
"By the way, where is the Operator being interviewed?"
Laina called out the door.
"Come on in."
However, after Laina called, the new Operator outside didn't come in, as if she was shy.
"Don't be shy, we're all going to be family soon."
Laina went outside and pulled the shy Operator in. Then, a cute Perro with short gray hair walked in from outside.
The moment he saw this Perro lady, Lucas almost lost it. He couldn't help but spit out the coffee in his mouth.
Fuck...
"Miss Podenco?"
Lucas never expected to meet Miss Podenco here.
If it weren't for Lucas's inherently strong memory, he might have already forgotten this character.
Lucas remembered.
Back then, he had gone with Jessica, Franka, Magallan, and the others to Bolívar to carry out a commission, and they had accidentally met Miss Podenco in a settlement. Before parting, Jessica had even stuffed a large wad of cash into this cute little sister's pocket. Lucas hadn't paid attention afterward.
In any case, the tree monster was already dead, and those ghosts would never appear again. Podenco's settlement was safe. Whether Podenco would go to the outside world as she originally did, or continue to stay in the settlement, Lucas didn't know either.
He never expected to meet her at Rhodes Island. What a surprise.
Podenco was stunned. She immediately tensed up, looking Lucas up and down. In her memory, this seemed to be the first time she had met this person.
Laina, at the side, was also confused.
"Doctor, you knew Podenco before?"
"Er... I can't say I know her, but I heard a friend mention her. My friend said they met Miss Podenco in a settlement while on a commission in Bolívar."
Podenco was originally still a bit confused, but after Lucas said these details, Podenco's tension eased a bit.
"May I ask? The friend you're talking about is?"
"Jessica. Do you remember Jessica, Miss Podenco?"
"Ah! Miss Jessica!!"
Podenco's heart leaped with joy.
If you asked who had the biggest influence on her, in Podenco's opinion, it was of course Miss Jessica. After all, she had decided to go to the outside world after chatting with Miss Jessica.
Of course, Podenco didn't know that the Jessica back then was afraid of strangers and wasn't good at talking. How could she have chatted with her? The one chatting with her back then was me! I was just wearing a different skin, so you don't recognize me.
Since they knew each other, the rest of the interview turned into a reunion.
Podenco told Lucas in detail about her experiences afterward.
At that time.
After Lucas's group left, Miss Podenco packed her luggage and left the settlement. As a girl who grew up in the countryside and had never been to the outside world, when she arrived at the first nearby town, it was as if she had arrived in a new world. Afterward, Miss Podenco, relying on her love and knowledge of flowers, found a job as a clerk in a flower shop in the town.
However, the good times didn't last.
The Bolívar civil war. A Columbian squad and a Leithanien squad started fighting near the town. Many of the town's residents fled, and Podenco followed the main group out of the town to the nearest Mobile City. Then she found another job related to flowers and lived honestly for over a year, until she met Miss Perfumer, who had come to the flower shop to look at flowers, not long ago.
"Alright, since you're the one who brought her, Miss Perfumer, then you can arrange her work from now on. Here's the dormitory card. However, the dorms on the landship have been tight lately. Why don't the two of you just live together? Is that okay?"
"Yes, it is!"
"Mhm."
Finally, Lucas also took the initiative to exchange contact information with Podenco, telling the little girl to contact him directly if she ran into any problems on the landship.
And just after getting Podenco settled.
A message came from the Reunion Movement, which hadn't contacted him in a long time.
Another Infected squad had arrived, wanting to join the Reunion Movement.