Monkey King's Birth, Monkey King's Mishap

Mobius's lips twitched slightly before she handed the last bucket of instant noodles to Xu Ziling, who was already devouring it at light speed. Around them lay over a hundred neatly stacked empty noodle buckets.

Xu Ziling finished the last one in three seconds. With that, the instant noodles Mobius and Blanca had brought from Mu, which were supposed to last them half a year, were completely wiped out by him.

Mobius kept telling herself it was okay, that this sacrifice was worth it for the experiment... but the more she thought that, the more her little heart pounded in her chest.

Noodles! My noodles! My many flavors of noodles! ...Gone! All gone!

They were all children I'd only bought less than a month ago! How could they be gone just like that!

And the worst part... I didn't even get to eat a single bite myself...

No! I need to find a way to tie this little mouse completely to myself! Only with experimental data from his body can I justify the sacrifice of hundreds of noodle buckets!

But as she thought this, Mobius found herself in a dilemma.

For ordinary people, Mobius had plenty of ways to steal, cheat, and deceive.

But Xu Ziling... this oddity, after just going through "Chapter 1: Monkey King's Birth" in the stone statue, learned the common language of current human civilization from Mobius's few words. This proved his intelligence was definitely not low... If she used the same methods as with ordinary people on him, it would backfire and wouldn't be fun.

To completely tie down Xu Ziling, a monster capable of tearing through alloy with his bare hands, and make him her exclusive experimental subject... the best way would naturally be to make Xu Ziling himself develop the desire to follow her.

But how could she possibly... Oh? Right, didn't this guy just forcibly kiss me earlier?

That's right! This guy just forcibly kissed me!

Thinking of this, Mobius felt like the clouds had parted. At the same time, she secretly laughed at her own foolishness. This walking experimental data had already handed her the "rope" to tie him down, and it took her so long to realize it.

Meanwhile, on the other side, Xu Ziling finished the last bucket of instant noodles. Driven by instinct, he closed his eyes to assess his current physical condition.

Xu Ziling's current state... Good! Better than ever! But... he felt very empty.

It was like a river that had once run dry, now receiving a trickle of spring water. Although his condition was much better than when it was dry, it was still just a drop in the bucket.

Thinking of this, Xu Ziling couldn't help but be curious. Was he a soul transmigration or a body transmigration? If it was a soul transmigration, what on earth had he transmigrated into? To be this weak.

System, do you know?

[Beep~ System restarting...]

Great, looks like this will be a system with a low presence.

"Ahem... um, Little Mouse?"

At this moment, Mobius gave a tactical cough, collected the empty noodle bucket from Xu Ziling's hand, and said, "Are you full?"

"Mm..."

In reality, he wasn't full at all, but... looking at the hundreds of empty noodle buckets and Mobius, whose initial confidence had turned into hesitation and helplessness, if he told the truth, it would make Xu Ziling seem too callous.

"Thank you for your hospitality, Doctor."

After thinking for a long time, Xu Ziling said what he thought was the most polite phrase, "Do you need me to help you deal with this trash first, Doctor? Or should I directly accept your experiment?"

"Ahem... that can wait."

Between a one-time experiment and a long-term stable one, Mobius could easily make the calculation.

She stacked the empty noodle buckets she had just brought with the others, then pushed them all aside. Mobius sat down opposite Xu Ziling, propped her cheek with one hand, and after a moment of thought, also tried to communicate in what she considered her most polite tone, "Little Mouse... look, although I don't know why you were born from a stone statue... before you were sealed in it, as an intelligent being, you must have had your own 'civilization,' right?"

"Mm..."

Mobius's question successfully silenced Xu Ziling.

As a transmigrator who had arrived halfway through, he didn't even know why he had transmigrated into a stone statue, let alone the civilization that existed before that statue.

However, if he considered Earth, where he was before transmigrating, as his past civilization... the question Mobius asked wasn't entirely unanswerable.

Thinking this, Xu Ziling nodded and replied, "Mm."

Mobius's eyes lit up at his response. Xu Ziling's simple nod contained a tremendous amount of information!

This was enough to prove that in Mobius's current era, there indeed existed a "pre-civilization era" belonging to them!

Seeing Mobius's increasingly excited eyes, and combining it with the desperate backdrop of the previous civilization, Xu Ziling could easily guess what Mobius was thinking.

However, Xu Ziling before his transmigration was a corporate slave. Under the pressure of a unscrupulous boss, he had long developed a passive skill of always being cautious, coupled with god-tier acting skills. Facing Mobius's reaction now, he wouldn't be immediately labeled with [Suspicion] for giving the wrong answer.

So, Xu Ziling pondered for a moment, put on a sorrowful expression, and rationalized his previous answer, "Doctor... I understand your excitement at knowing a 'pre-civilization' now exists, but... my civilization era is not worth mentioning, and it has long since vanished with the wind...

If you need me to cooperate with some physical examinations, I am very willing to cooperate, but regarding my civilization... please allow me to temporarily refuse to answer. I need time to accept everything that is happening now. I also need time to accept the passing of my civilization."

Mobius's spirit jolted upon noticing Xu Ziling's reaction. But thinking about it carefully, it made sense. If Xu Ziling's civilization still existed, he wouldn't have appeared in the manner of "Monkey King's Birth." Since he was buried deep underground and emerged from a stone statue, it could only mean... his civilization era had passed.

She had only wanted to confirm Xu Ziling's cultural and civilizational cognition, but she had forgotten that this action was also reopening old wounds.

"Hmm..."

After a moment of rapid thought, Mobius shifted the seat beneath her closer to Xu Ziling and said, "Um... I'm sorry, Little Mouse, I didn't mean to offend you... I just wanted to tell you something."

"Mm."

Sadness flickered in Xu Ziling's eyes as he nodded. He never expected that the acting skills he'd honed in his previous life to slack off under his boss's nose would be useful after transmigration.

"Doctor, you can just tell me whatever you need to say."

Xu Ziling had perfectly adopted the persona of a survivor from a lost civilization, speaking to Mobius with a tone of hardship and helplessness.

"I don't know the customs of your civilization, Doctor... but in mine, if someone does you a favor, you remember their kindness. You were the one who fed me after I woke up, and I won't forget that kindness."

"Mm..."

Hearing this, Mobius's earlier excitement slowly subsided. After a long period of thought, she said, "Little Mouse, I'm a down-on-my-luck biologist and not good with words. Some things I say might seem presumptuous, so please don't mind... I've been talking to you for a while now, and I just wanted to ask you, if your civilization had 'kindness'... then it must have had 'feelings' too, right? Do you know what a 'First Kiss' means?"

Xu Ziling was completely bewildered by Mobius's sudden question and instinctively asked back, "First Kiss?"

"Ahem."

Mobius quickly pulled out her phone, brought up a surveillance feed, and showed it to Xu Ziling, saying with a serious expression, "A First Kiss means you can't... no, it means you can't be with any other woman besides me, understand?"

When Xu Ziling saw the "himself" in the surveillance footage, tackling Mobius, his mind went blank, and his previous acting completely fell apart.

On one hand, Mobius was saying he'd forcibly kissed her. On the other hand, it was because...

The "himself" in the surveillance footage... when he'd just emerged from the statue, he was... completely naked.

So what was he now...!!