Ability Upgrade
Can a person fall asleep standing up? Of course, they can. Xiang Kun had this experience before his mutation; he fell asleep on the subway without realizing it, only to wake up suddenly when he arrived at his stop.
However, if you fall asleep standing up, you need to have something to lean against, or hold onto a handrail like on a bus or subway, otherwise you can easily lose your balance after falling asleep.
It's quite amazing that Lao Xia could stand up and not fall over while sleeping like that, since he wasn't leaning against the wall or holding onto a handrail.
Could it be that holding that wooden carving helped her regain her balance and center of gravity?
Xiang Kun put on a shirt, then squatted down in front of Lao Xia, looked up at her, and found it a bit amusing. He tried to take the Eight-Armed Eight-Eyed Wooden Carving from Lao Xia's hands, but as soon as he touched the carving, Lao Xia suddenly opened her eyes and lifted the carving up.
Lao Xia stared wide-eyed at Xiang Kun, who was squatting on the ground looking up at her. After a second of stunned silence, she finally put the wooden carving down. Without asking Xiang Kun what he was doing, she immediately looked at the camera set up and asked, "How long have you been awake?"
"About two minutes and twenty-six or twenty-seven seconds," Xiang Kun said. "If you're sleepy, go to sleep first. I'll measure the relevant data myself, and we'll look at it when you wake up." Being able to fall asleep standing up, Lao Xia was clearly extremely tired.
However, after recording Xiang Kun's sleeping time and saving the video files on her computer, Xia Libing still assisted Xiang Kun in completing various data tests and recordings.
Throughout the entire process, Xia Libing remained silent, her eyes half-closed as if sleepwalking, yet her actions of writing, recording, and measuring were still remarkably precise and fluid, without a single mistake.
Finally, Xia Libing handed Xiang Kun the notebook in which she had recorded data while he was asleep, and then opened Xiang Kun phone to the QQ chat interface with the Little Chubby Girl before heading straight towards the bed.
"I'll change your sheets and duvet cover..." Xiang Kun hadn't finished speaking when he saw Lao Xia collapse onto the bed and fall asleep instantly.
Xiang Kun shook his head and chuckled. He went over to help Lao Xia take off her shoes, pushed her legs onto the bed, let her hair down, put her head on the pillow, and then took out a quilt from the closet to cover her up— Xiang Kun slept before so that Lao Xia could observe more easily.
Xiang Kun picked up Lao Xia's softcover notebook and started flipping through it. The notebook was newly bought yesterday, and the contents were all written yesterday.
Xiang Kun could naturally understand the special markings that Lao Xia used for recording.
It was only after reading Lao Xia's records that he learned that during his blood-drinking slumber, his body temperature did not decrease slowly, but rather rose first, then returned to its pre-blood-drinking state, and then slowly decreased slightly just before he was about to wake up.
What changes occur in the body during this process?
While recording this data, Lao Xia also marked the equipment that needed to be purchased or customized in the future. Looking at these devices, Xiang Kun could imagine himself lying on a bed similar to a hibernation pod on a spaceship in a science fiction movie after he had drunk blood and fallen into a deep sleep. His body was covered with various data collection cables, and he was surrounded by various electronic devices. Lao Xia, wearing a white coat, was holding a tablet computer and recording various data.
As Xiang Kun looked at the data, he suddenly realized that some of it was not a record of his condition during his dormant period, but rather a description of the establishment and derivation of a new model. Moreover, some of the language summaries and descriptions were not marked with special symbols, but were written directly in Chinese characters, and they were all about magic and spellcasting, which was completely inconsistent with Lao Xia's style.
After turning another page, he saw a simple, round little figure that Lao Xia had drawn on the notebook page, wearing a hood and immediately realized that it was Little Chubby Girl in his dream wearing a "magic robe" with cat ears.
Lao Xia marked some abstract diagrams and hypothetical formulas next to the Little Chubby Girl's simple diagram, but most of them were crossed out or erased.
Then he remembered that before Lao Xia went to sleep, he had given him a QQ chat interface with Liu Shiling on his phone, so he took the phone and looked through his conversation with Liu Shiling.
Most of their communication was via voice, with Lao Xia also using images and various emojis for about a third of the time.
After listening, Xiang Kun immediately understood the source of some of the feelings he had when he woke up—it turned out that the Little Chubby Girl had upgraded and expanded her "development" abilities again.
Xiang Kun looked up at the light on in the bedroom and instinctively wanted to try it out, but then he remembered that the main unit of "Alice" was still in the bedroom, so he had to hold back.
He got up and went to the balcony with his phone, took out a one-yuan Coin that had already established a "Super-Sensory Link," placed it on the phone screen, and then sensed it for a while.
Soon, the phone screen went out, but he didn't press the power button, and the screen didn't automatically turn off after a certain time.
The next moment, the phone screen lit up again, and the lock screen appeared. The hand holding the phone didn't move at all; it didn't touch the power button or the fingerprint unlock.
Xiang Kun can now directly control the phone screen to turn on and off by relying on his senses and the influence of "Super-Linked Object".
Previously, if he entered a "Hyper-Sensory State," he could also do this using "Super-Linked Object," but now he can do it directly, which means that his control precision over electronic devices through "Super-Linked Object" has improved by several levels.
He stared at his phone for a while longer. Soon, the little fan icon for the phone's Wi-Fi signal disappeared, followed by the 4G signal, and then the little ladder icon for the communication signal. His phone lost all signal. After a while, the signal was restored.
Xiang Kun put his phone away, took a deep breath, listened carefully, and then took out two tungsten steel balls and flicked them towards the balcony diagonally below.
The two beads didn't fall to the ground together; instead, they floated like two mosquitoes and slipped into the living room through the balcony door.
A few seconds later, the sound of a television came from the living room, followed by the other appliances turning on and starting up.
However, not all electrical and electronic devices can be controlled. For example, some devices are plugged into power strips, but if the power strip switch is off and there is no power, then they cannot be turned on or controlled.
The electrical appliances made quite a bit of noise, but no one was home, so no one noticed. This is why Xiang Kun chose their house as his experimental target.
After trying for a while, Xiang Kun was able to basically do what the Little Chubby Girl had done the night before, and successfully reproduced her function.
Now, he is more sensitive to the various electric and magnetic fields around him. Electromagnetism is like water, and the various devices that rely on electricity to operate are like floating objects on the water. Xiang Kun is soaking in the water and can affect those floating objects by splashing the water. And the various "Super-Linked Object" are equivalent to the paddles he uses to splash the water and stir the water.
However, this influence cannot extend too far for the time being; it can only be used within the range where "Super-Linked Object" can be sensed and controlled. Moreover, the way it influences is still too crude. For example, it can turn a phone screen on and off, block all phone signals, and even destroy the phone, but it cannot perform more precise operations on the phone.
However, if he enters a "Hyper-Sensory State," the distance limitation can be bypassed by using "Emotion-Infused Object" to descend. And if he can find the specific way to implement the corresponding ability through the "Hyper-Sensory State," he should also be able to perform more precise operations.
Xiang Kun speculated that the expansion and enhancement of the Little Chubby Girl's electromagnetic abilities this time should also be related to his coincidence of drinking blood and falling into a deep sleep, and the significant improvement in his "sixth sense".
Xiang Kun thought for a while, then contacted the Little Chubby Girl via voice message on QQ:
"Are you there?"
He knew the Little Chubby Girl didn't have her own phone and was using her mom's tablet, so she might not see the message in real time. After sending the message, he went back to his bedroom to do other things, but to his surprise, less than two minutes later, the Little Chubby Girl replied with a voice message:
"Hey! Chicken Wing Sister... Uncle, no, Baldy Uncle, are you awake?"
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I recommend a super funny novel called "Becoming the Richest Man Through Games," which is even better when read along with this chapter summary. You'll laugh until you cramp up.