Geometry Group

The sky soared into the clouds.

Through a seamless pane of curved glass spanning four thousand square meters, Qin Yiguan gazed at the sea of clouds ahead.

The building resembled a water droplet laid on its side, ten thousand meters above the ground.

Its only support underneath was an elevator shaft fifteen meters in diameter.

From a distance, it looked like an impossibly thin, long toothpick holding up a glass droplet the size of a stadium seating ten thousand, suspended sideways in the air.

And that toothpick was attached to the very tip of the droplet's tail.

The young man nodded.

Nice office building.

Newton's coffin lid had already spiraled off into the heavens.

Then.

The young man narrowed his eyes. A hazy black line stretched across the distant horizon, dotted with flickering lights.

"What's that?" he asked.

Meng Jihe smiled. "That's an ordinary city outside the Experimental Zone. You can see it because the Metaverse is an entirely flat world. But seeing a mountain doesn't mean you're anywhere near it. We're currently about... forty thousand kilometers from that border city."

The young man nodded to himself.

What a dream.

Not only had I logged into the Metaverse outside the time lock, I'd traveled this far and gone straight into the Experimental Zone.

At that moment.

Beside Meng Jihe stood a beautiful woman in a short black business skirt, with a slender figure and an icy, striking face.

She suddenly spoke. "Mr. Qin, I'm President Meng's personal secretary. Would you mind letting me check your information? If it's convenient, please grant me access. My name is Rong Qian."

Just then.

Qin Yiguan noticed a metal sphere the size of a walnut floating above Rong Qian's shoulder. A blue ring glowed at its center, and it seemed to be sending him some sort of information.

The young man tilted his head curiously. "How do I grant access...?"

Meng Jihe burst out laughing. "Yiguan just got here. He doesn't have an electronic assistant. Just check it."

The metal sphere above the beautiful Rong Qian's shoulder flickered rapidly for an instant.

She then returned to Meng Jihe's side and whispered into his ear, "Fusion Rate... zero percent."

Meng Jihe froze, clearly finding it hard to believe. "How much?"

Rong Qian repeated quietly, "Zero percent Fusion Rate."

The men in black suits exchanged glances, seemingly just as surprised.

Qin Yiguan asked in confusion, "Boss Meng, this Fusion Rate...?"

Boss Meng gazed into the distance. "Our way of life has essentially become consciousness uploading, so there's bound to be a metric for it-the compatibility between human neural consciousness and the Metaverse."

"It's like how, back in the old days, some programs weren't compatible with certain computers and couldn't run properly. Conversely, the more compatible they were, the smoother they ran and the more fully their functions could be used."

The young man nodded quietly. "Compatibility between the human brain and the Metaverse... interesting. And that metric is called the Fusion Rate. A fitting name."

Meng Jihe nodded. "The central region of the Metaverse follows the logic of real life, so Fusion Rate doesn't manifest there. But once you enter the Experimental Zone, it appears—and becomes an extremely important metric!"

Meng Jihe pondered for a moment, then added, "The Gemini Superbrain must be cooking up something strange."

Qin Yiguan couldn't help growing interested in the logic behind this "Experimental Zone."

He remembered the people who had welcomed Ninth Brother saying that ordinary people started at one percent Fusion Rate when they entered the Experimental Zone.

Then.

The young man thought of Ninth Brother again. It had apparently been his first time entering too, yet his Fusion Rate had been sixty-eight percent?

Didn't that mean he was naturally attuned to the Metaverse?

Was he really that powerful?

The young man smiled inwardly.

-Once I woke up, you'd still vanish into dust.

"Are people with zero percent Fusion Rate rare?"

The young man glanced over the men in black beside Meng Jihe.

Meng Jihe laughed heartily. "Not rare. Unprecedented, never to be repeated. Anyone who enters the Experimental Zone has at least attained the most basic compatibility. One percent is as low as it gets."

Then Meng Jihe looked up at Qin Yiguan. "As for your zero percent... have you ever heard of hemiplegia?"

The young man looked embarrassed. "You mean I'm effectively paralyzed on one side?"

"No."

Meng Jihe mused, "You're effectively paralyzed all over."

Qin Yiguan: "..."

"Fusion Rate below ten percent represents a person's basic ability to move and act."

"Above ten percent, it represents talent."

"Of course, judging by your data, the word 'talent' has absolutely nothing to do with you!"

"You're still the same dumb kid you always were."

The young man pressed his lips together.

Even in a dream, I got mocked.

Secretary Rong Qian asked, "President Meng, with his Fusion Rate this low, he probably can't even perform basic work. What position do you intend to give him?"

"A position?"

"He doesn't deserve one."

Meng Jihe shook his head, his gaze suddenly turning ruthless. "I'm going to teach this brat just how cruel the world can be!"

"I'm going to make him understand that personal achievement has nothing to do with talent!"

"I'm going to let him laze around at my company, give him everything he wants, and have him waited on hand and foot!"

"Even if he goes out into the street and abducts girls, I'll clean up the mess for him!"

"I won't let him suffer a single hardship or lift a finger. I'm going to turn him into a spoiled brat, a useless little bum who does nothing but enjoy himself every day until he dies of old age, without ever learning the meaning of 'hard work'!"

As he spoke, Meng Jihe looked at the young man. "That's what he gets for being the brother I grew up with in the orphanage, the one who always depended on me while I depended on him!"

The young man froze.

Scenes from their childhood flashed through his mind.

Boss Meng had said those same words while squatting on top of a wall, back when bubbles of snot still hung from his nose.

A caregiver had overheard and given him a beating, saying his values were already warped at such a young age.

Qin Yiguan pressed his lips together slightly, feeling touched.

The men in black suits and Secretary Rong Qian all looked at Qin Yiguan helplessly, silently shaking their heads.

Qin Yiguan, too, had unconsciously begun settling into this dream.

He asked with a smile, "Boss Meng, what sort of business does your company do?"

"Design."

Meng Jihe walked to the enormous floor-to-ceiling window and stood beside the young man, surveying the view with pride. "Here in the Metaverse, we don't have all the restrictions of reality. Building materials aren't a problem. Construction technology isn't a problem. So 'design' has become the most valuable technical skill in this world!"

"Oh?"

The young man's eyes flickered. That really did make sense.

Boss Meng had been obsessed with geometric constructions since childhood. At ten, he had mastered the classic Elements. The orphanage director had said he would surely become a mathematical genius, and had even renamed him Meng Jihe.

"Kid, you know this."

"The Metaverse is connected to our brains."

"When..."

"When our brains have something special about them-say, we have a particular aptitude."

"The Metaverse amplifies that 'aptitude.'"

"We call it 'reality enhancement.'"

"And that enhancement manifests inside the Experimental Zone."

"For example, some children have exceptional eyesight in reality, scoring 5.2 or 5.3 and so on. Once they enter the Experimental Zone, their basic visual range might increase by a hundred to three hundred meters."

"It's as if the Gemini Superbrain has given your consciousness a 'boost.'"

"Or some sort of liberation."

The young man nodded in wonder, finding it fascinating.

At that moment.

Meng Jihe looked at Qin Yiguan with a mysterious smile. "Do you know what happened after I entered the Experimental Zone?"

Qin Yiguan smiled too. "You got better at taking a beating?"

"Pfft..."

Meng Jihe puffed out his chest. "When I turned on the faucet to wash up, I unexpectedly discovered that I no longer saw just flowing water. I could clearly see through to... its patterns of motion and the geometric shapes within it."

Secretary Rong Qian added, "What Boss Meng sees is actually the external patterns governing all things. He also became the only person in this world who can see an object's 'fractal diagram' with his eyes alone."

Meng Jihe continued, "From then on, I could see the design principles of any object in the Experimental Zone. And I could also apply that ability in reverse, creating design principles for any object."

At that instant.

Meng Jihe waved a hand through empty air, opening a panel in front of Qin Yiguan.

Meng Jihe

Time logged in: 11 years, 5 months, 7 days.

Fusion Rate: 22%

Reality enhancement: Geometric perception.

One in 4 million, superpower class.

Qin Yiguan was stunned. "A superpower..."

Meng Jihe declared with commanding confidence, "My Fusion Rate was eleven percent when I first logged in. Then, using this one-in-four-million reality enhancement, I founded the Geometry Design Group—the top-ranked company in the Experimental Zone's 'Echo Hill' sector!"