127: Chapter 127 Ninth-Order Substitute Concept

The barrage scrolling across the bottom of the screen was so dense that the image was completely obscured.

[Young Master Qin has broken down, everyone.]

[The last time I saw him at the auction, he spent thousands without batting an eye, but today he's crying like a child.]

[If it were me, I'd cry too for 6 billion.]

[By the way, where is Su Bai himself?? Why hasn't he shown his face from start to finish??]

[He's probably in the basement eating instant noodles.]

Su Bai looked down at the teacup in his hand. It wasn't instant noodles, but the black tea Lin Xiao had sent over yesterday. However, the comment wasn't wrong; he had indeed been in the basement for several days.

Kyubey jumped down from the sofa and crouched in the corner of the card-crafting table.

[Su Bai, your account balance has been updated. Calculated based on a 70/30 split, your after-tax share of the 6 billion first-day sales is approximately this amount—]

A string of numbers appeared on the holographic screen.

Su Bai took a look. Then he looked again. After that, he set the teacup down and said in an extremely calm tone,

"The R&D funding is secured."

To make the Stand Card, the material costs he had burned through were already astronomical. Although the nano-interface membranes from Researcher Yun Zhi were free, the consumption rate of other rare materials far exceeded expectations. Especially the Rank 9 Crystal Core fragments and Abyssal Deep Silver; every failed test burned through hundreds of thousands. He had even seriously considered selling the causal interference right given to him by Li Qingyue for money.

Now, that was no longer necessary.

His phone vibrated again. This time, it was a message from Lin Xiao in their group chat.

[Lin Xiao]: [@Su Bai Congratulations. 6 billion. You're probably in the top thirty of the Forbes list now.]

[Zhao Dahai]: [Top thirty?? Wasn't it top fifty last time?? It jumped that fast??]

[Lin Xiao]: [The last time, the first-day data wasn't synchronized. Today, Tianbao Pavilion announced the total pre-orders across all channels, and Su Bai's share pushed his ranking up by over a dozen spots.]

[Zhao Dahai]: [Su Bai, can you hire some bodyguards when you go out from now on? Your net worth is higher than our school principal's now, and the principal is at least Rank 8.]

[Su Bai]: [Bodyguards are too troublesome. I can fight myself.]

[Zhao Dahai]: [Fight my ass!! That Rank 6 peak expert almost demolished your dormitory last time!!]

[Su Bai]: [Who died in the end?]

[Zhao Dahai]: [...That may be true, but you were lying on the floor that day too, you know!!]

Lin Weiwei's message popped up immediately after.

[Lin Weiwei]: [@Su Bai Congratulations! My dad asked me to pass this on—the Lin family's entire supply chain is now open to you with the highest priority starting today. Any material, as long as it's in the Lin family's warehouse, will be delivered to you within 24 hours. Also, my dad said he is already seriously researching commercial cooperation models for after the Magical Girl transformation, and he asked me to ask you if you can take on endorsements after transforming.]

[Su Bai]: [...Uncle Lin really wants to transform himself, doesn't he?]

[Lin Weiwei]: [I have that suspicion too. He's been practicing transformation poses in front of the mirror every morning lately.]

[Zhao Dahai]: [Chairman Lin, please get a grip!! You are a Chamber of Commerce Chairman!! Not a Magical Girl candidate!!]

[Lin Xiao]: [It's already too late. He drank too much at the Chamber of Commerce annual meeting yesterday and shouted in front of all the branch chairmen, 'A mere Magical Girl, I've wanted to transform for a long time.' Now the entire Jinghai business world is spreading rumors that the Chairman of the Lin family is going to personally debut as a Magical Girl.]

Su Bai buried his face in his palms.

Chairman Lin's obsession with cross-dressing was probably deeper than his entire commercial empire. Whatever, it wasn't his business. He was selling cards; how customers used them after buying them was the customers' freedom.

Just as he was thinking this, his phone suddenly began to vibrate frantically at an abnormal frequency, and message notifications poured down from the top of the screen like a rainstorm.

It wasn't a group chat; it was friend requests.

One after another, the dense red numbers piled up to four digits in an instant. Su Bai tapped open the application list and scrolled down one screen—he still hadn't reached the bottom. There were all kinds of verification badges, internal Truth Sanctuary accounts, and official guild accounts. There were even a few IDs mixed in with 9th-tier Supreme verification.

[Qi Yuan · Senior Material Master of Truth Sanctuary · 9th-tier Supreme requested to add you as a friend]

[Heavy Armored Dharma Emperor · Armored Mage Emperor Lu Chen · Rank 9 Lower Tier requested to add you as a friend]

[phantom spirit sovereign · Phantom Sovereign · Rank 9 Mid Tier requested to add you as a friend]

[Han Shuang, the Master of the Ice Prison · Rank 9 Mid Tier requested to add you as a friend]

[Deputy Commander Xiao Hongyan · 3rd Army Group Deputy Commander · Rank 9 Mid Tier requested to add you as a friend]—this message read [Little Su Bai, hurry up and accept my request; I forgot to add you at the exhibition last time]

Su Bai tapped through them one by one.

When he got to Qi Yuan, he paused. This was the person who had previously called him an idiot, a fraud, and a charlatan, and also the same person who had praised him on the forum as a rare genius of the millennium. The person involved in both incidents still didn't know that they were cursing the same person.

Su Bai pressed accept.

Qi Yuan's profile picture lit up, and the message was replied to almost instantly.

[Qi Yuan]: [Young Friend Su!! I have long admired your name!! I am Qi Yuan from the Material Research Institute!! A few days ago, I had the honor of reading your question post on the forum; that problem-solving approach for two-way mass-energy conversion is simply miraculous!! In my life, I have reviewed thousands of papers and have never seen such an unconventional derivation path!! I wonder if Young Friend Su is free recently; I would like to ask you a few questions about materials science in person—]

Su Bai typed a line.

[Su Bai]: [Senior Qi, you are too kind. The problem-solving approach on the forum that day wasn't thought of by me alone; Researcher Yun Zhi was the key. Also, she should have a paper waiting for a reviewer recently.]

[Qi Yuan]: [I have already accepted her paper!! And it's on the fast track!! Researcher Yun Zhi is a great talent!! I've reviewed countless papers in my life and have never seen anyone deliver a finished product on the first pass of parameter adjustment!! Speaking of which, Young Friend Su, how did you and Researcher Yun Zhi meet—]

[Su Bai]: [The archives. She was stuck on a research bottleneck, and I helped her adjust a few parameters.]

[Qi Yuan]: [A few parameters!! You call that level of coupling coefficient correction just a few parameters!! Young Friend Su, do you even know that the things you changed are enough to produce several Ph.D.s in materials science laboratories around the world!!]

Su Bai thought about it and replied: [I really don't know. I am Rank 2.]

The other side of the chat box was silent for nearly ten seconds. Then Qi Yuan sent a long string of ellipses, followed by a sentence: [Young Friend Su, I retract all my previous age discrimination against you. Genius knows no rank. After your National Competition ends, I must invite you to give a lecture at the Material Research Institute. No, not invite you, I beg you to come.]

Su Bai put the phone on the table.

[Su Bai. Eleven 9th-tier Supremes from the Truth Sanctuary have added you as a friend. Three of them are currently editing messages in the chat box. Venerable Qi Yuan is currently in the Material Research Institute laboratory, gesturing wildly while telling a group of assistants about your deeds, using rather exaggerated wording.]

"...How do you know he is gesturing wildly?"

[Rank 9 Kyubey told me. It can see the causal fluctuations in the core area of the Truth Sanctuary. Venerable Qi Yuan's emotional fluctuation is roughly equivalent to one-third of when Chu Yin transforms.]

"Can't you report to me in a normal human way?"

[I am Kyubey.]

Su Bai leaned back in his chair.

His phone was still vibrating, and friend requests were still rising. The follower count on his personal social media account jumped from tens of thousands to millions, and his private message box was filled with requests for cooperation, interviews, and custom cards. A few were particularly eye-catching; an account verified as a popular idol publicly @ed him, saying [Teacher Su Bai, may I ask if it's possible to hold a concert after the Magical Girl transformation? I want to transform on stage]. It was followed by tens of thousands of retweets, and the comment section was full of people seriously analyzing the feasibility of this plan for her.

There were also game companies sending collaboration invitations, asking if the Magical Girl system could be licensed to make a mobile game. Clothing brands asked if they could release co-branded puffy skirts. Chocolate manufacturers asked if they could print Kyubey on the packaging.

Su Bai flipped his phone over and placed it face down on the table. Leave that aside for now.

Because there was a more important question now.

Qin Ye had been watching him on the sofa for a full five minutes. She had been turning the Stand Card in her hand over and over a dozen times. She was clearly not interested in the principles of the Stand; she was just waiting for Su Bai to tell her what to do next.

Just as Su Bai was about to speak, a thought suddenly popped into his head.

The Stand Card was currently Rank 2. A Rank 2 Stand could cause Rank 4 peak expert Wei Xiaoyu's Mental Power to collapse and allow Qin Ye to burst out with magic density comparable to a Rank 3 peak expert the moment it was activated. What if it were changed to a Rank 9 Stand?

Use Rank 9 materials to make the Arrow, seal it into a 12-axis causal framework, and then use Li Qingyue's Spatial Circuit for encapsulation—theoretically, one could make a Stand Card that directly raises an ordinary person's Mental Power to Rank 9.

No, this was too absurd. Even Su Bai felt this idea was too crazy. What would a Rank 9 Stand mean? It would mean how long Time Stop could last, how strong the destructive power would be, and even whether it could touch the legendary Requiem or Heaven Over Heaven—he didn't even dare to easily begin simulating these.

But he couldn't help but think about it.

Li Qingyue was a Rank 9 peak expert, with a fusion of three laws. If she were to draw the circuit for the Rank 9 Stand, and he were responsible for the conceptual framework—

Su Bai picked up his phone and turned to Li Qingyue's private chat window.

[Su Bai]: [Master. Are you free? I want to show you something.]