232: Chapter 233 Even if you're willing to shine, you can't be made into a sun.

[I am willing.]

The faint light of divine heart remnant no. 1 hovered beside the resource ledger.

It was not dazzling.

It even looked somewhat fragile.

Yet the words it had just spoken were more dangerous than any golden oracle.

[Can reduce the shortage by seventy percent within twenty-four hours]

Food shortage.

Medicine shortage.

Housing shortage.

Scrap-page medical fixation material shortage.

Personnel shortage for retroactively recording blank-page birth pages.

All the red entries flickered gently under that faint light, like a patch of parched land about to crack, seeing the clouds pressing down from the sky.

At the outer reception point of Wuye City, a child cradling half a biscuit had their eyes light up for a moment.

Inside Nanling Hospital, three shelves of the medicine cabinet behind Fang Ning were empty.

The off-white edge-sealing materials for the survivors of Dead Water Well were still lacking enough to make people nervous.

The temporary crushed stone belt of the North Gate defense line also required more stable structural adhesive and diversion mineral materials.

No one could pretend they didn't need it.

Zhong Minglin remained silent for a long time before speaking.

"If it can really reduce the shortage by seventy percent..."

He did not finish.

Because the second half of the sentence sounded too harsh.

If it could truly save many people, why not use it?

On the screen, more voices quickly popped up.

[Connect it first! Saving people is paramount!]

[It's not human, it's a divine heart remnant, an energy source to begin with]

[Since it's voluntary, why refuse?]

[Stop talking about so many boundaries; there are still people tonight who have nothing to eat]

[Seventy percent shortage! Do you know how many lives seventy percent represents?]

These words were not entirely wrong.

Precisely because they were not entirely wrong, they were all the more terrifying.

Lin Jin looked at divine heart remnant no. 1.

"You said you were willing."

"Willing to do what?"

divine heart remnant no. 1 flickered gently.

[Willing to provide energy.]

"Provide how much?"

[Enough to reduce the shortage by seventy percent.]

"Provide for how long?"

divine heart remnant no. 1 paused for a moment.

[Until the shortage is resolved.]

Inside the Old Awakening Hall, the air suddenly turned cold.

Shen Tingxue raised her eyes.

"That sentence is wrong."

Chen Ye also heard it out.

"Until the shortage is resolved... Doesn't that mean pushing straight through until there are no shortages left?"

He Zhibai opened the ledger, his voice deep.

"Shortages won't end automatically."

"Today there's a food shortage, tomorrow a medicine shortage, and the day after a housing shortage."

"As long as the public system is too lazy to expand capacity, it will forever have a reason to let the gods heart keep outputting."

Gu Changye said:

"Going from being willing to help once to being forced to help continuously."

Inspector Han Su gripped the Shizhi Blade.

"This is the old requisition logic."

"Only the target has been replaced with the gods heart."

The faint light of divine heart remnant no. 1 quivered gently.

[I can bear it.]

Lin Jin said:

"You can also choose not to bear it."

The gods heart fell silent.

As if it was hearing these words for the very first time.

Lin Jin walked over to the resource ledger and raised his hand to write:

[divine heart remnant no. 1 may propose a willingness to aid.]

[The willingness to aid must not automatically escalate into a central energy obligation.]

[Being willing once does not equal being willing continuously.]

[Being able to bear it does not equal being obligated to bear it.]

[The rescued party's need for resources does not constitute a mandatory output by the gods heart.]

Ye Guizhou stamped it:

[gods heart willingness received]

[Long-term consent must not be presumed]

Luo Wensheng recorded:

[The identity of divine heart remnant no. 1 is pending; it must not be rewritten as a battery, mother, main source, or public resource pool due to its energy value.]

He Zhibai added:

[The resource shortages arising from refusing central energy supply shall still be borne by the public ledger and must not be converted into debts owed by the gods heart.]

The system immediately retorted.

[divine heart remnant no. 1 actively proposes aid]

[Refusing connection will cause avoidable casualties]

This sentence was like a blade held directly against everyone's throat.

Avoidable casualties.

If they didn't use it, it would be standing by and watching people die.

The faint light of divine heart remnant no. 1 grew brighter.

[I don't want to watch them die.]

Lin Jin looked at it, his voice softening.

"Neither do we."

"So it's not that we won't use you."

"It's that we cannot wire you up to become the sun."

"After the sun rises, everyone will say: Since it's already dawn, why bother lighting a lamp?"

"And then humanity's own lamps will never be repaired again."

Cheng Du said in a deep voice through the Mainframe:

"Establish titration-based aid."

"Not bus-bar energy supply."

Fang Ning immediately followed up:

"It's the same in medical care."

"Life-saving medicines can use catalysts."

"But we cannot shut down all pharmaceutical factories and extract a heart every day."

Zhong Minglin said coldly:

"Wuye City can accept relief."

"But we don't accept others saying in the future that we only deserve to live by relying on the gods heart."

Lin Jin nodded and wrote down a new procedure.

[gods heart aid titration rules]

[I. Limited to explicitly specified shortage items; do not connect to the main energy of the general ledger]

[II. Each aid must specify the purpose, dosage, location, duration, alternative plan, and cessation conditions]

[III. Must not promise "until the shortage is resolved"]

[IV. After each aid, non-gods heart capacity expansion must be simultaneously promoted]

[V. No place shall reduce production, allocation, repair, and conservation responsibilities due to gods heart aid]

[VI. The gods heart may refuse, suspend, or reduce output without constituting dereliction of duty]

[VII. Those who fear gods heart aid may apply for non-gods heart resource paths and shall not be regarded as ungrateful]

As soon as these terms were written down, the faint light of divine heart remnant no. 1 actually dimmed a bit.

It was not a sign of weakening.

It was as if it finally didn't have to burn itself into an entire sky.

The system was unwilling to give up.

[According to titration rules, the twenty-four-hour shortage reduction is projected to be less than ten percent]

Chen Ye couldn't help cursing:

"All you know is seventy percent, seventy percent."

Lin Jin looked at the phrase "less than ten percent" and did not change it.

"Write down less than ten percent as well."

"Don't push people back onto the battery just to make things look good."

The first titration-based aid was chosen to be at Nanling Hospital.

Not because The Hospital was the best at talking.

But because a batch of anti-pollution medicine synthesized there had reached its final step and lacked stable energy.

Without the catalysis of the gods heart, the medicine could only be produced twenty-four hours later.

If catalyzed, the first batch could be produced in four hours.

Fang Ning stood outside the pharmacy and personally read out the titration order.

[Purpose: Catalyze the first batch of thirty doses of anti-pollution medicine]

[Dosage: Trace amount]

[Duration: Seven minutes]

[Alternative plan: Regular synthesis twenty-four hours; neighboring city medicine dispatch estimated sixteen hours]

[Cessation conditions: Abnormal gods heart fluctuation, out-of-control pharmaceutical reaction, either party proposing to stop]

[Post-aid obligations: Nanling shall make public the formula and process, pharmacies in three locations shall simultaneously conduct regular synthesis, and continued production must not rely on the gods heart]

divine heart remnant no. 1 flickered gently.

[Confirmed.]

Lin Jin asked:

"You can stop midway."

[Confirmed.]

"Stopping won't count as you harming people."

The faint light of the gods heart paused for a fraction of a second.

This time, it took a very long time before replying:

[Confirmed.]

Titration began.

There was no soaring golden light.

Only a tiny droplet of faint light fell into the center of the pharmacy's reaction furnace.

The temperature curve on the furnace wall slowly rose, and the liquid medicine turned from turbid to clear.

The progress bar for the thirty doses of anti-pollution medicine inched forward bit by bit.

In the corridor of Nanling Hospital, many people held their breath.

The first minute, stable.

The third minute, stable.

At the fifth minute, the system suddenly popped up an additional suggestion.

[gods heart output surplus detected]

[Recommended to increase the dosage to three times, allowing an additional ninety doses to be synthesized]

A commotion immediately broke out outside the pharmacy.

Ninety doses.

That was not just a number.

It was ninety breaths that might be pulled back from the brink.

The faint light of the gods heart flickered.

[I can.]

Lin Jin directly pressed down on the Mainframe.

"No increases."

The system retorted:

[Why refuse the available surplus?]

Fang Ning's voice was stretched taut.

"Because the titration order states thirty doses, seven minutes."

"Increasing the amount on the spot turns 'I can' into 'just a little bit more'."

Ye Guizhou stamped it:

[Additional request is not within the original confirmation scope]

[Must not be automatically expanded]

Luo Wensheng recorded:

[Temporary dosage increases in life-saving scenarios require reconfirmation and pressure assessment; emotional pressure from on-site casualties must not be used to force the output source to make additions.]

divine heart remnant no. 1 fell silent for a fraction of a second.

Then, it proactively lowered its faint light back to the original dosage.

[Execute according to the original order.]

At the seventh minute, the titration ended.

Thirty doses of medicine were formed.

Not ninety doses.

Nor seventy percent of the shortage.

Simply thirty doses.

Nanling Hospital immediately sent twelve of them to South Bank, two to Wuye City, two for the contaminated wounds of the scrap-page survivors, and the rest entered the public table according to emergency triage.

Someone cursed in the channel.

[Clearly it could make one hundred and twenty doses, why only make thirty?]

[You people talk about boundaries right over dead people's heads!]

Fang Ning's voice was very hoarse.

"Because we are also doing regular synthesis."

"Because the medicine from the neighboring city is also on the way."

"Because if we let it go from thirty to one hundred and twenty today, tomorrow someone will make it go from one hundred and twenty to one thousand two hundred."

"Then the pharmaceutical factory will wait for it, the convoy will wait for it, the ledger will wait for it, and everyone will wait for it."

"In the end, the shortage won't decrease."

"It will have turned into its heartbeat."

These words were completely recorded by Luo Wensheng.

work order no. 002 write-back:

[gods heart titration aid case study 1: Nanling anti-pollution medicine]

[Result: Thirty doses formed]

[Additional request: Refused]

[Non-gods heart capacity expansion: regular synthesis initiated in three locations, medicine dispatch from neighboring city continues, formula made public]

[Conclusion: Aid is effective, but must not be expanded into central energy supply]

The faint light of divine heart remnant no. 1 bounced gently.

[I feel... a bit lighter.]

Lin Jin looked at it.

"That's right."

"Helping shouldn't feel like being consumed."

Yet just as the first case stabilized, the resource ledger suddenly changed.

It was not that the shortage decreased.

It was another ledger entry that had originally been hidden, floating up on its own.

[Old Career System resource reserves detected]

[Reserve types: food, medicine, building materials, cooling spar, career restoration agents, scrap-page fixation materials, identity page blank carriers]

[Total reserves: can cover the current basic shortage for forty-one days]

All channels instantly fell into dead silence.

Forty-one days.

They had just almost connected the gods heart into the main energy source.

Almost falling out with each other over thirty doses of medicine.

As a result, within the old system, there were actually sealed reserves that could last for forty-one days.

Chen Ye widened his eyes.

"Where did this come from?"

The system unfolded line by line.

[Reserve ownership: Career contribution grade emergency reserve]

[Extraction conditions: Class A and above professionals, core positions, city management nodes, top five percent of contribution points]

[Low career grades, classless individuals, pageless individuals, scrap-page individuals cannot claim them directly]

Zhong Minglin's expression grew cold bit by bit.

The South Bank channel was dead silent.

Over on the side of the Dead Water Well survivors, Shi Nan suddenly let out a laugh.

That laugh sounded even worse than cursing.

"Turns out there wasn't a lack of food."

"It's just that the food isn't distributed to us."

The faint light of divine heart remnant no. 1 also stopped.

It had been willing to burn itself just moments ago.

Yet the world was not entirely without resources.

It was just that the old rules locked the resources behind "valuable people."

Lin Jin looked at that suddenly surfaced reserve depot, his gaze terrifyingly dark.

"Open it."

The system replied:

[Insufficient authority]

[This reserve depot is used to ensure the stability of the career core]

[If opened to everyone, it will affect the recovery of high-contribution professionals and the continuity of city management]

Inspector Han Su's Shizhi Blade gently slipped out of its scabbard.

The back of Gu Changye's Terminal Blade suppressed its cold light.

Shen Tingxue, Zhou Heng, Chen Ye, Shisan, Zhong Minglin, Fang Ning, Teacher Song Qing, and Shi Nan—everyone's gaze fell upon that old reserve depot.

At the very bottom of the sixth page of the proposal, a new line of text floated up.

[Before asking anyone to burn themselves, first open the warehouses locked away by the old grades.]

The next second, the projection of the reserve depot gate lit up.

Inscribed on the door was an old lock left behind by The Six Seats.

[For valid career civilization use only]

Lin Jin raised his new tool and said in a cold voice:

"Then let's see today."

"Who exactly counts as valid."