The third floor of the underground building, C-14 Project Team.

Jiang Baimian, with a tactical backpack, met Mei Shou'an.

"Mianmian is here?" Mei Shou'an wore an amiable smile. "The team responsible for making your bio-cochlear prosthesis and the corresponding equipment and materials are all ready. We'll try to get it done in one go so you don't have to suffer any extra pain."

According to the planned procedure, Jiang Baimian would receive anesthesia in the final step of the Awakening experiment and enter a deep sleep. Mei Shou'an intended to divide this into two parts, the first half for her Awakening and the second half for implanting the bio-cochlear.

In terms of time arrangement, this was entirely feasible.

"Thank you, Uncle Mei." Jiang Baimian sincerely thanked him.

She was afraid of being anesthetized, losing consciousness, falling into darkness, and no longer being able to control herself. Therefore, if it could be resolved in one go, she would definitely support it with both hands and feet.

Mei Shou'an nodded, his expression gradually becoming serious:

"Before officially starting, there are things I must tell you.

"You should already know that the risk of the C-14 project is very low, but that doesn't mean it's completely non-existent.

"There is a 0.5% probability that the experimenter will never wake up, and 20% will have various problems, including anxiety, mania, transient amnesia, and skin that is easily allergic for a period of time. After treatment, most of these have obvious improvements and will recover in the foreseeable future.

"And the success rate of the experiment, that is, the probability of an Awakened appearing, is very unstable. Sometimes there are two or three in a batch, and sometimes there isn't a single Awakened in three or four consecutive batches.

"In addition, the probability of problems increases linearly with continuous experiments, almost equivalent to suicide.

"Think about it again now, there's still a chance to back out."

After explaining the risks, Mei Shou'an sighed and said:

"You're already a D9, entering the management is only a matter of time. If you were my daughter, I would definitely not want you to take such a risk."

The underlying meaning of his words was:

Mianmian, you have to consider how your dad and mom feel.

Jiang Baimian said with a smile:

"Uncle Mei, you also know that I've been running around outside, and the tasks I'm responsible for are a bit dangerous. The probability of death is probably more than 0.5%."

That being said, she had not actually discussed it with Ms. Xue, having Lao Jiang approve it first.

Mei Shou'an "Mm"ed:

"Since you've already thought it through, I won't say more. Let's start directly."

He called in a female researcher and asked her to lead Jiang Baimian to change clothes, since surgery would be required later.

With a mindset of gaining knowledge and research, Jiang Baimian calmly followed instructions, changed clothes, put away her backpack, and then accepted a test. After the results came out, she was injected with a reagent.

Then, she was exposed to three types of light in succession and stayed in a small, dark room with no light or sound for nearly a quarter of an hour.

This differed somewhat from the process Shang Jianyao had previously described. It could be seen that the C-14 Project Team had made many improvements over the past year.

At the end of the experiment, Jiang Baimian entered a room cast of silver-white metal, with several medical personnel and equipment waiting nearby.

"Lie down on the bed." Mei Shou'an pointed to the movable operating table fixed in the center of the room.

Jiang Baimian nodded, walked over, sat down, and lay down in one smooth motion.

"Next is the injection of anesthetic." Mei Shou'an said simply.

At the same time, two researchers, carrying a medical kit, entered the room.

"Wait a moment!" Jiang Baimian suddenly raised her hand and sat up.

"What's wrong?" Mei Shou'an asked kindly.

Jiang Baimian "Uh"ed and asked hesitatingly:

"Can, can you play some music?"

At the thought of falling into uncontrollable darkness, she felt nervous.

Mei Shou'an frowned slightly:

"Music?"

Jiang Baimian wore a flattering smile:

"Uncle Mei, just play a song to relax my mental state a bit. After the anesthetic is injected, you can turn it off.

"The song is on my computer, and the computer is in my backpack. Please ask someone to bring it over for me."

Mei Shou'an, who always followed procedures strictly, originally wanted to say whether this would affect the final results, but hearing Jiang Baimian say that the music could be stopped as soon as the anesthetic was injected, he swallowed the words back.

This wasn't a problem. We're already talking now, playing an extra song doesn't make a fundamental difference… Mei Shou'an thought for a moment and nodded slightly:

"Okay."

Soon, a researcher took the key handed over by Jiang Baimian and brought her backpack over.

According to Mei Shou'an's cautious instructions, the portable computer was not taken into the room cast of silver-white metal, but placed at the entrance.

Jiang Baimian only gave a few instructions, and the researcher, who was not unfamiliar with computers, successfully opened the music player.

"Do you still remember the dreams of your youth?
Like a flower that never withers,
Accompany me through the wind and rain,
See the impermanence of the world,
See the changes of vicissitudes..." (Note 1)

The melodious singing echoed, Jiang Baimian took two deep breaths, lay down again, and closed her eyes.

After a few seconds, she secretly squinted her eyes into a slit.

"Why is it so thick?" Jiang Baimian suddenly sat up again, pointed at the needle, and blurted out.

"Your constitution is far superior to ordinary people, and the dose of anesthetic required is definitely different," the researcher in charge of anesthesia explained.

Jiang Baimian instinctively retorted:

"I'm not an elephant!"

"It's just a little more than normal," the researcher in charge of anesthesia comforted her.

Jiang Baimian opened her mouth, hesitated for a few seconds, suddenly closed her eyes, and fell straight down.

Out of sight, out of mind!

"Do you still remember the dreams of your youth?
Like a flower that never withers…"

The repeatedly looping song lingered in her mind, making her hold on and not sit up again.

After a sting, she knew that unconsciousness and darkness would inevitably arrive.

…………

Vaguely, Jiang Baimian saw light.

She slowly opened her eyes and found herself in a strange place.

This was an unusually vast and empty hall, the surrounding walls cast from black metal that shimmered with a cold light.

The upper part of the hall was dim, like the night sky.

In the "sky," there were countless dazzling stars, slowly rotating and weaving together into thirteen dreamy rivers.

Countless starlight sprinkled down, converging into a blurred figure in the center of the hall.

This figure spread its hands outwards, strictly symmetrical, like embracing the world and simulating a balance.

"His" voice was grand but hollow, echoing repeatedly within the hall:

"One price, three graces."

"One price, three graces..."

Seeing this scene, Jiang Baimian roughly understood where she had come.

"Hall of Stars"!

This was exactly the same as the "Hall of Stars" described by Shang Jianyao!

I've awakened… The experiment was successful… Jiang Baimian was first delighted, and then filled with strong doubts.

She never thought her luck was far superior to others, and had long been psychologically prepared for the failure of Awakening. As a result, things went smoothly beyond her imagination.

Could it be that I have some conditions that secretly meet the requirements for Awakening? Or, have we deeply intervened in the investigation of the cause of the Old World's destruction, so some or several have given a little "blessing"? Jiang Baimian had always been smart, and smart people always liked to think too much and be suspicious.

She calmed her mind and forced herself to focus her attention on the figure in the center of the hall.

Now that she had reached this point, no matter what the reason, she could only continue.

Regarding which field of ability to awaken, Jiang Baimian, who liked to make various plans, had already thought it through.

She preferred those that she felt could complement her other characteristics and the specific situation of the team, including the six major fields of "Zhuang Sheng," "Bodhi," "Daybreak," "Last Man," "Shattered Mirror," and "Fate Weaver."

Because there was already an Awakened in the "Zhuang Sheng" field on the team, and their strength was very strong, Jiang Baimian directly excluded this option while listing them.

For the "Daybreak" field, the only prices she knew were intermittent coma, schizophrenia, and abnormal senses. She couldn't bear the first two at all and didn't plan to choose them. As for the latter, taste was the best direction, but in that case, she felt that she would lose a lot of the joy of being human—life was already so hard, and not being able to eat something good to comfort herself would lead to depression sooner or later;

For the "Last Man" field, the prices Jiang Baimian knew were memory loss, sleep disorders, and a lack of self-discipline in certain aspects. These were all problems that she felt greatly affected her usual state, so she abandoned this field second;

For the "Bodhi" field, Jiang Baimian didn't want to be mentally disturbed, have strange senses, or be unable to lie—this would easily cause big trouble at critical moments. As for enhanced desires, she didn't think she could harm her team members;

For the "Fate Weaver" field, Jiang Baimian didn't consider limb paralysis and lethargy. The former would directly reduce her combat power, and the latter would obviously affect her ability to think. As for the abnormal eyeballs, she felt that it was still bearable, just relatively ugly, and put it in a relatively low position;

For the "Shattered Mirror" field, being afraid of light, afraid of water, and afraid of mirrors all affected daily life too much and were easily discovered. Jiang Baimian gave up immediately. "Claustrophobia" was the same. She still remembered the death of the "Virtual World" master. As for the remaining face blindness and being a bad sense of direction, the former was easy to mistake friends for foes and was too dangerous, while the latter could be considered…

In the blink of an eye, Jiang Baimian quickly went through the options of taste abnormality, fixed eyeballs, and being a bad sense of direction.

After a dozen seconds, she made a decision.

"Being a bad sense of direction!"

This was a price she could rely on the auxiliary chip in her bio-prosthesis to reduce the negative impact of.

Although this would mostly reduce her ability to observe and remember the surrounding environment, in important occasions, she could "remember" while watching, not afraid of forgetting and not making mistakes.

In addition, always acting as a team could effectively avoid problems.

Hu… Jiang Baimian exhaled, walked to the front of the figure, raised her head, and said loudly:

"I exchange my bad sense of direction for ability."

As soon as she finished speaking, three stars in the sky rapidly fell.

They turned into different light clusters and flew towards Jiang Baimian's body.

There were some words in these light clusters, namely:

"Spatial Illusion," "Object Agnosia," and "Stimulus Dysregulation."

Note 1: "Love's Price," Jonathan Lee