261: Basic Units and the Birth of "Little Beans"

The blueprint for a living starship was so grand that it was dizzying, but Wen Youyi knew very clearly that even the greatest concept had to start from a single brick and tile.

For "hope", these "bricks and tiles" were the basic functional units—the smallest living structures carried by "Flowing Silver", driven by specific "Star Pattern", and capable of completing specific tasks.

This job sounded simple, but doing it made one want to pull out their hair.

The first challenge: standardization and simplification of the "Star Pattern".

The "Dao of Star Pattern" that Wen Youyi obtained from the "key" "Legacy" was as vast as the sea, filled with "Advanced" stuff like manipulating stars and folding space.

To let a group of "Flowing Silver" with an IQ equivalent to a smart puppy understand and execute such complex things was no different from having kindergarteners solve calculus.

"We have to lower the dimensionality, lower the dimensionality!"

Senior Brother Li grabbed a handful of messy hair, staring at the "energy flow Star Pattern" on the light screen that was so complex it made people dizzy, as if looking at a heavenly book.

"We have to dismantle these high-end 'Universe' 'Law's into 'little actions' that 'Flowing Silver' can understand!"

Senior Brother Zhang pushed up his glasses, the lenses reflecting dense data streams: "Analogous to programming, we need to design a set of 'low-level instruction sets'."

"For example, 'gathering energy' is not a complex Star Pattern, but a combination of a series of basic 'Star Pattern actions' like 'sensing energy', 'generating suction', 'guiding flow', and 'preliminary filtering'."

Wen Youyi nodded in agreement: "Just like building blocks."

"We first define the most basic 'building blocks'—that is, the most basic and stable single-function Star Patterns."

"For example, 'maintaining form', 'conducting energy (specific frequency)', 'sensing pressure', 'fine-tuning density', and so on."

He tried to sketch in the air.

Silver light flowed from his fingertips; this time it was not a complex pattern, but a very simple, clear-lined light pattern.

A straight short line represented "maintaining current form"; a small inward vortex represented "absorbing energy from this direction"; a wavy line represented "transmitting vibration signal"...

These basic Star Patterns were so simple they had almost no power, but they had the advantage of being stable and easy to understand.

Next was the second challenge: teaching "Flowing Silver" to read.

Xiao Wu was once again entrusted with a critical mission, carrying the title of "friend of Flowing Silver", and went to work with a pile of specially made "teaching slates".

The surfaces of these slates were engraved with different basic Star Patterns, and they would continuously emit extremely weak energy fluctuations corresponding to the function of that Star Pattern.

"Come, little silvers, look here!"

Xiao Wu squatted in front of a large group of curious "Flowing Silver" onlookers, pointing to the "maintaining form" Star Pattern on the first slate.

"The meaning of this is—don't move! Maintain the ball shape you have now!"

Xiao Wu released the intention of "maintaining the status quo" while guiding the Star Pattern on the slate to emit corresponding energy fluctuations.

The "Flowing Silver" extended their tentacles, touched the slate, then touched Xiao Wu, and transmitted back a mixed intention: [This... feeling... don't move?]

"Yes, yes, yes! Don't move! Good children!"

Xiao Wu hurriedly rewarded them with a wisp of pure star energy using the "key".

Having tasted the sweetness, the enthusiasm of the "Flowing Silver" greatly increased.

Soon, they "learned" the first basic Star Pattern—although there were some deviations in execution, for example, when asked to "maintain form", they might understand it as "keep it roughly a ball, but the surface can slightly ripple like jelly", but at least the core meaning was correct.

Then came the second "absorbing energy", the third "transmitting signal"...

The teaching scene was often chaotic.

For example, when teaching "fine-tuning density", a few "Flowing Silver" were too excited and adjusted themselves from liquid to near solid, resulting in a "clatter" as they fell to the ground and rolled far away, scaring Zhao Iron Pillar who was passing by.

Also, when teaching "simple repair", Xiao Wu took a cracked metal plate to demonstrate.

As a result, the "Flowing Silver" swarmed up, not to "repair" the crack, but happily "analyzed-dismantled-reassembled" the whole metal plate, finally turning it into a smooth but useless lump of metal, making Xiao Wu jump with anger.

"Patience, patience! They are still children!" Wen Youyi comforted the nearly collapsing Xiao Wu with a suppressed smile.

Hard work pays off.

After consuming a massive amount of patience, energy rewards, and teaching slates, the first batch of about a thousand "Flowing Silver" finally mastered the twelve most basic "Star Pattern instructions".

Although the reaction speed varied, and the depth of understanding differed, at least they could understand instructions and make roughly correct responses.

With soldiers who could "read", the next step was the third challenge: letting them "collaborate".

Senior Brother Li and Senior Brother Zhang designed the architecture for the first type of "basic functional unit": a stable spherical frame made of "maintaining form" Star Patterns; internally embedded with "energy absorption", "energy conduction", "signal reception and forwarding" and other Star Patterns; externally, according to different functions, attached with "sensing pressure", "fine-tuning density", "simple repair" and other Star Patterns.

They "instilled" this architectural model directly into a small group (about fifty) of the best-performing "Flowing Silver" using the "key" and "Star Core Power", and issued the instruction: "Combine according to this structure."

This time, the "Flowing Silver" did not disappoint.

They seemed to have an innate understanding of this kind of "division of labor and cooperation".

Fifty "Flowing Silver" quickly gathered, their bodies began to deform, extend, and intertwine.

Some turned into sturdy frame nodes, some became channels for energy flow, others formed "skin" to perceive the outside world...

In just a few dozen breaths, a silver sphere the size of a fist, with a faint silver luster flowing on the surface and shimmering light flowing inside, was suspended in mid-air!

It was no longer a loose pool of liquid, but a whole with a stable structure and clear function!

"Suc... success?" Senior Brother Li's voice trembled.

Wen Youyi tried to connect to this silver sphere with "Mental Energy" and issued an instruction: "Absorb surrounding energy and convert it into stable light energy output."

The surface of the silver sphere flashed with brilliance, and the Star Patterns inside flowed.

It began to rotate slowly, and the weak star energy around was attracted over. After flowing and converting inside the sphere, it shot out a soft and stable milky white beam from the top, illuminating a small area.

"Command execution successful!" Xiao Wu excitedly recorded the data, "Energy conversion efficiency... increased by three times compared to individual Flowing Silver dispersed operations! Structural stability is good!"

"Let's give it a name!" Senior Brother Zhang suggested.

Everyone looked at this suspended, softly glowing little silver ball, feeling like they were looking at a newly born, ignorant life form.

"Let's call it 'little bean sprout'." Wen Youyi smiled, "Our first living functional unit, like a newly sprouted little bean."

"little bean sprout" seemed to understand, trembled slightly, and emitted a trace of joyful fluctuation.

With the first successful case, subsequent replication and expansion were much faster.

The "Flowing Silver" that had mastered the collaboration method seemed to have opened the door to a new world and began to spontaneously combine into various "little bean sprout" units.

There were "light bulb little bean sprout" units responsible for "lighting", "ear little bean sprout" units responsible for "monitoring vibration", "band-aid little bean sprout" units responsible for "repairing scratches", and even a few particularly creative "Flowing Silver" combined into a "sweeping little bean sprout" unit that could move slowly and specifically pick up tiny metal debris, working hard in the base, which was so cute that even Mu Wanqing couldn't help but take a few extra looks.

Soon there was a group of "little bean sprout" employees in the base, they worked tirelessly to perform simple tasks, although occasionally there would be small glitches—such as "light bulb little bean sprout" units suddenly adjusting the light to a flickering disco mode, or "sweeping little bean sprout" units trying to drag Zhao Iron Pillar's boots away as trash—but overall, it greatly improved the operating efficiency of the base, and also made everyone more and more confident in the "living starship".

"This is just the first step," Wen Youyi looked at the "little bean sprout" units running around the base and said to the core members, "Next, we need to design more complex 'organ-level' units, such as 'energy heart module', 'neural network node', 'propulsion muscle fiber bundle'... and then, let these 'organs' work together under a higher-level 'Star Pattern framework', and finally combine into 'hope'."

The road was still long, but at least, the first "bean" had sprouted.

And at this moment, no one noticed that in a quiet corner of the base, a few of the earliest born "little bean sprout" units quietly gathered together.

The Star Patterns on their surfaces flickered slightly, seemingly conducting some kind of simple "communication" in a way that humans could not understand.

A trace of an extremely weak, "Chaos", but definitely existing ripple of "collective consciousness" quietly spread between them.

The "Seed" of the living starship was not only on the blueprints, but also silently taking root in the hearts of these ignorant "little bean sprout" units.