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He summed up gravely, "Life never lacks beauty; what it lacks are eyes that can discover beauty! Don't let prejudice blind our hearts!"

The moment those famous words came out, Yang Chun and Fan Qiao were immediately stunned into silence.

Jing Yi continued brainwashing them. "Insect meat is highly nutritious, and insects reproduce at an astonishing rate. Have you ever considered that if we could accept insect meat, it would not only improve our dining tables, but more importantly, greatly increase our chances of conquering Planet Five? By consuming high-energy insect meat instead of artificially synthesized nutritional supplements, humanity's physical fitness could improve further... At this critical moment, when we have run into the X-Star people head-on, every bit of strength we gain raises our chances of victory—and all it takes is a small change in our narrow-minded thinking!"

His eyes blazing, he turned to look at Yang Chun and Fan Qiao, who had been utterly dumbfounded. For an instant, in their eyes, countless rays of golden light seemed to shine from behind this excessively beautiful young man!

Fan Qiao's face was still somewhat pale, but he resolutely stepped forward, took Jing Yi's hand, and said, "You're right. I was too narrow-minded. In that case, let's do it!"

What he was really thinking was, With a boss this good at spouting nonsense with a straight face, how could we possibly fail at anything big...

It was just eating insect meat, yet he had even dragged national righteousness into it. Somehow, it felt like following him would lead to a brilliant future.

Fan Qiao was only pretending to be excited, but Yang Chun beside him was genuinely fired up!

As a career soldier, he deeply felt that the future Jing Yi had described was simply wonderful—and so easy to achieve, too. Wasn't it just eating insect meat? He barely had any psychological shadow left about it. Especially that hotpot meal the other day; even now, thinking about it made his mouth water! If insect meat could always taste that good, promoting it surely would not be difficult. When the time came...

—Sigh, what a foolish child.

Yang Chun was exceptionally strong in combat and obedient to orders, practically a model soldier. So why had he remained General Chen's chief guard for years without ever being sent down to serve elsewhere?

The answer was certainly not that General Chen could not bear to part with him or did not want to make long-term plans for his future. In fact, General Chen had tried sending him to grassroots units long ago, but this foolish child was always missing a screw. He was highly capable at handling affairs but poor at making decisions. He could be an outstanding subordinate, but if left on his own, he could be fooled so thoroughly he would not know which way was north... After he had been tricked into several pitfalls, General Chen could only call him back with a heavy heart. At least this was more reliable.

Yang Chun took Jing Yi's other hand and solemnly promised, "Whatever ideas you have, just go ahead and do them! If there's anything you're unsure about, leave it to me! I believe you'll succeed!"

Jing Yi nodded. Once the two of them released his hands, he proactively held out his right hand, palm up, signaling Fan Qiao and Yang Chun to place theirs on top. In the end, all six hands were stacked together, and the three of them shouted, "Go!" in unison, full of energy and inspiration... And just like that, a temporary alliance was formed.

Tasks were assigned—Fan Qiao would consolidate Jing Yi's "dowry," Yang Chun would handle the documents, procedures, and office space, while Jing Yi would focus specifically on... publicity.

After returning home, Jing Yi carried handmade pastries around to visit the neighbors. There were seven households in total; two happened to be empty, while three of the remaining five accepted the gifts normally, thanked him, and gave him small return gifts. The other two had clearly been lurking on Jing Yi's personal page. Upon learning that he had moved in and that his first-visit gifts were food, they became so enthusiastic that Jing Yi fled home after only a few words. He then fretted to himself, What should I do? I really haven't adapted to being a celebrity yet, hehehe.

With everything now ready, Jing Yi went into seclusion and focused on designing the homepage decor for his online shop.

For the Mi Star people of today, physical stores were exceedingly rare. Shopping had long since shifted online, and with the extensive delivery network, anything one wanted could be found. It was extremely convenient.

The largest shopping platform was called JoyBuy, a colossal entity controlled by the Federation. To become a seller, one simply submitted the necessary materials to apply for qualifications, and it could be processed in less than an hour. Then, depending on the size of the shop and the category of goods, a certain security deposit had to be paid. JoyBuy was responsible for supervision and for protecting merchants. If a merchant was found to be engaged in illegal transactions or deceiving consumers, the lighter penalty was a fine, while the heavier one involved revocation of their business license and civil or criminal liability. It was the usual routine. Jing Yi felt it was much the same as Taobao and quite simple.

Among his own "dowry," there had actually been an online shop as well. But after looking into it, he found that poor management was one thing; it sold the most common, utterly uncompetitive nutritional supplements and nutrient powder. Somehow, its reputation was also abysmally low. He immediately sentenced it to death. He would rather start from scratch than "make flowers bloom from the ruins"—Jing Yi was actually quite particular. On his own turf, he needed absolute control. It was a kind of obsession, and there was no changing it.

For the new online shop, he also wanted to roughly follow the design of his original Taobao shop, because it felt more familiar and more comforting.