Chu Qianmo didn’t speak to the group chat immediately after waking up. But every word he said left the fellow transmigrators in the chat wide-eyed.
A personal pocket dimension! Who wouldn’t want one? Especially since they were all scattered across different worlds now. Everyone had little secrets or items they didn’t want others to discover.
If they really had a pocket dimension, how wonderful would life be?
Xiang Qianlan, in particular, was living through that special era—the most turbulent period.
A few days ago, she had gone to the county town, only to encounter a group of children parading people through the streets before she even arrived.
Just after stepping out of the department store, she saw another group of children waving flags as they stormed into someone’s home.
Even in remote Qinjiachuan, several people had been sent down for "re-education." In previous years, those individuals had held high positions and great authority.
Because of this, Xiang Qianlan became even more cautious. She had already finished the supplies Lin Xi had sent her. Now, she only dared to receive Lin Xi’s deliveries late at night, eating everything in her room before returning the containers.
Xiang Qianlan believed there was no harm in being extra careful.
Last night, she finally achieved the small goal she had set for herself when she first transmigrated—beating up the village chief.
On her way back, she even casually raided the chief’s vegetable patch, planning to trade the produce with Yao Xiran later.
As she waited for midnight, when the delivery quota would refresh, she saw Chu Qianmo’s message in the chat.
A pocket dimension? Xiang Qianlan absolutely wanted one. What was a pocket dimension? It was nothing short of a must-have miracle tool for daily life and travel!
With a pocket dimension, even if she were stranded in Africa, she could guarantee she’d stay plump and fair-skinned.
She immediately typed a message in the group, but her fellow transmigrators were even faster.
At that moment, the girls in the chat no longer found Chu Qianmo’s username irritating—instead, it looked incredibly pleasing.
Chu Qianmo wasn’t the petty type either. He understood them well. Even he had wanted to stomp on the original owner of his body—a complete scumbag.
Since they had decided to trade, everyone quickly doubled the supplies they were willing to exchange.
Chu Qianmo accepted everything without hesitation, whether it was food or daily necessities.
After all, he was now in the cultivation world. Cultivators, to minimize impurities in their bodies that might hinder their progress, began fasting at the age of three.
High-level cultivators might indulge in delicacies, but they only consumed spirit rice and spirit beasts—nothing mundane.
Mortals in the secular world did eat, but this era mirrored the ancient times from Chu Qianmo’s previous life—even salt wasn’t properly refined, carrying a strange, sour bitterness.
And Chu Qianmo? Before transmigrating, he had been a chef. A chef stranded in this culinary wasteland—his despair was unimaginable.
After Lin Xi asked about his needs, she gathered all the seasonings she had stockpiled from the market and prepared them for him.
By half past midnight, everyone across the different worlds had their trade items ready.
Lin Xi had even climbed out of her window beforehand, waiting in the empty lot behind her house to receive the deliveries.
To make the most of the day’s delivery quota, they decided to gather everything at Lin Xi’s location first. She would then sort and redistribute the items one by one.
The nights in Yunnan were cold. Bundled in a down jacket and hat, Lin Xi worked under the faint moonlight, receiving and verifying each item against their private chats before categorizing them.
It was painstaking work, and with only her doing it, progress was slow. She started sorting at half past midnight and didn’t finish until two in the morning.
By then, her back was so sore she could barely straighten it. Rubbing her waist, she began sending the sorted items to their respective owners.
The group celebrated as they received their goods.
Even though the system deducted a portion as a handling fee, everyone was still thrilled.
The first thing they all checked was the pocket dimension Chu Qianmo had traded with them.
The pocket dimension was a simple, unadorned ring. Following Chu Qianmo’s instructions, they pricked their fingers and pressed a drop of blood onto it.
A faint white light flashed, and a thin, nearly invisible line appeared on Lin Xi’s right index finger. In that instant, her senses tingled with an indescribable awareness.
She waved her hand over the pile of supplies in front of her—and they vanished instantly. Touching the line on her finger, she silently thought, "Enter," and suddenly found herself in a peculiar space.
The space wasn’t large, about twenty square meters at most. Against one wall, the items she had just stored lay haphazardly.
Lin Xi picked up a sugar apple Ye Bingbing had sent and took a bite. The sweetness burst on her tongue.
Thinking "Exit," she opened her eyes to find herself back in the yard, still holding the half-eaten fruit.
Grinning, she climbed back through the window. She stored a sandalwood box containing a weapons deployment map and a copy of the "Orchid Pavilion Preface" into the pocket dimension.
Next, she tucked her ID, money, and other important documents inside as well.
Grassie, who had been sleeping on Lin Xi’s bed, perked up at her excitement. Watching items disappear into thin air, its eyes widened, and it scurried up to the top of the wardrobe, staring down at Lin Xi from above.
A soft ding came from her phone. Lin Xi picked it up—a system notification from the transmigrator group chat.
[System Message: All group members have been equipped with personal pocket dimensions. Future item exchanges and distributions will be delivered directly to members’ dimensions. Please take note.]
The message sent the group into another wave of celebration. Before this, only Lin Xi’s items were specially placed in her backpack—everyone else had to find a safe spot to receive their deliveries.
And when those items arrived, they’d scatter everywhere. Though harmless, it was always a mess.
Now that everything could go straight into their pocket dimensions? Who wouldn’t be overjoyed?
The chat buzzed with excitement as everyone shared their experiences using the new space.
With their pocket dimensions, everyone was thrilled—especially since Chu Qianmo had given them high-grade ones. Though small, they came with built-in preservation features.
Moreover, this type of subspace can be stacked. In other words, if anyone wants to expand their space in the future, they just need to purchase another one of the same type from Chu Qianmo.
Chu Qianmo felt immensely gratified by the praise from the group members.
Being a stranger in a strange land, the friends in the chat group all came from the era he was familiar with. They were his fellow countrymen, his family.
He truly wanted to get along well with them.
In the interstellar era, Yao Xiran stored all the supplies she had exchanged with the group into her subspace.
Finally, she felt at ease. Afterward, she put on her self-modified, battered helmet and logged into the StarNet. Entering an extremely complex web address, she accessed the underground interstellar trading market—commonly known as the black market.
Yao Xiran obtained a merchant pass from the black market administrator, found a spot, and took out a few apples and some fragrant vegetables from her subspace—things like cilantro and celery.
The sensory simulation system on the StarNet was highly advanced. The moment Yao Xiran displayed her goods, people immediately took notice.
Without saying a word, she pulled out a pre-prepared sign listing the trading website and prices.
The trading website was something Yao Xiran had created in memory of a certain online shopping platform from her past life. However, due to financial constraints, she had never been able to launch it properly.
Although people could eat in the StarNet, they wouldn’t feel full.
The black market was crowded, and when people saw Yao Xiran’s sign advertising the sale of purely natural plants, their eyes widened in astonishment.
Soon, streaks of white light flashed, and the space around Yao Xiran emptied considerably.
Yao Xiran wasn’t in a hurry to ship the orders. She waited for over an hour until nearly half the street had cleared before leisurely leaving.
Back on the StarNet, her fingers flew as she entered a series of encrypted commands before finally logging off.
Then, using the broken terminal she had scavenged, she accessed her homemade shopping website.
All the items she had listed were sold out, and her account balance had skyrocketed to an astronomical figure.
Yao Xiran smiled as she packed the sold items. She had a natural talent for being a shrewd merchant—whether it was vegetables or fruits, she sold them by the piece.
For example, one grape or one stalk of cilantro.
The interstellar world had unique shipping methods, and Yao Xiran had specialized in this area. By the time she finished packing and sending everything out, it was already midnight.
She stretched but didn’t sleep. Instead, she opened a private chat with Lin Xi.
She had heard from the group members that they could commission Lin Xi to complete tasks.
She wanted Lin Xi to check on her family.
The next morning, when Lin Xi woke up, she saw Yao Xiran’s message and accepted the task.
Just as she had guessed earlier, the members of the chat group she encountered were all from the same province she was in.
Yao Xiran was also from Yunnan Province, though her hometown was much farther from Lin Xi’s.
[Interstellar Wanderer Yao Xiran: Lin Xi, I want you to check on my older sister, Yao Yuran. She’s two years older than me.]
Yao Xiran shared her story with Lin Xi.
[Interstellar Wanderer Yao Xiran: Since we’re from the same province, you know how it was with our parents’ generation—they favored sons over daughters. My family was no different. My parents had five daughters before finally having my younger brother.]
[I was the second child. Above me was my eldest sister. My third, fourth, and fifth sisters were given away at birth. Aside from my third sister, whose whereabouts we knew, we had no idea where the other two ended up.]
[My eldest sister and I were never loved by our parents. In their eyes, we were nothing more than walking blood bags, existing solely to grow up and earn money for our brother.]
[When my eldest sister was fifteen, my brother was about to start elementary school. My parents thought there was no future for him in our rural hometown, so they decided to send him to a school in the county town.]
[We were from the mountains, living off the land, and every family was dirt poor. To fund his education, my parents married my eldest sister off to an old bachelor in the neighboring village—a man fifteen years her senior.]
"My eldest sister’s life after marriage was miserable. The old man loved to beat her. She was often covered in bruises, and the money she was allowed to keep in a year never even reached a hundred yuan."
[Every time she came home, she told me to study hard—she would support me. The living expenses for my middle school and high school years all came from her. To pay for my education, she endured brutal beatings from her husband and our parents.]
As Yao Xiran recounted the past, bitterness welled up in her heart. Her academic journey and growth were paved with her sister’s blood.
[In college, I studied relentlessly, earning scholarships every year. I also tutored to make extra money, and I sent every cent to my sister.]
[Her life had gotten slightly better. Before I was transported to this world, I promised her I would take her away from that household. But I never got the chance. Lin Xi, I hope you can help me.]
[My sister has suffered too much. She can’t spend the rest of her life trapped in that village.]
Five years had passed since her displacement, but Yao Xiran still couldn’t bear to think about her sister—it was too painful.
Lin Xi sighed as she read Yao Xiran’s messages. It was just as Yao Xiran said—for their parents’ generation, having a son was more important than anything else.
In the deepest part of Lotus Village, there was a small pond where the bones of many infants still lay.
Those were the sins of families desperate for sons. Places like that pond were far from rare in their region.
[Earth Girl Lin Xi: Alright. Send me the address, and I’ll go see her tomorrow.]
To maintain the illusion that she was working, Lin Xi had been leaving early and returning late these days. Tomorrow, she would park her tricycle in the garage and rent an off-road vehicle to drive to Yao Xiran’s hometown.
Yao Xiran thanked Lin Xi profusely before filling in the reward she had carefully decided on—a robot.
The robot stood at eighty centimeters tall, with a sleek, futuristic design. Its round head featured an electronic display, and its compact body was incredibly agile.
Not only could it assist with household chores and provide companionship, but it could also protect its owner in emergencies and monitor their health.
When Lin Xi saw that the mission reward was a robot, she was completely stunned.
Although she had imagined that robots would exist in the interstellar era, she had to admit her imagination still fell a bit short.
As she read the words Yao Xiran had specifically left for her, her eyes sparkled with excitement.
If there was one thing she worried about most right now, it was undoubtedly her grandmother’s health.
Even with the genetic repair serum sent by Lin Duxi, the inability to monitor her condition constantly left Lin Xi uneasy.
But having a robot that could monitor its owner’s health changed everything.
Lin Xi could hardly wait for dawn to arrive so she could complete Yao Xiran’s task.
She stayed up for hours until the sky finally brightened, then left without even eating breakfast.
Chi Xiangping, wrapping a scarf around her head, chased after her but couldn’t even catch a glimpse of her shadow. Rolling her eyes, she turned back toward the house.
Just as she was about to step inside, her cousin’s wife arrived and called out to her. Chi Xiangping hurried over, and the two whispered by the roadside for a long while, only parting when someone came to call her cousin’s wife for breakfast.
As Chi Xiangping walked home, she mulled over the details of the young man her cousin’s wife had mentioned, waiting eagerly for Lin Xi’s return.
Unaware of all this, Lin Xi parked her car in a warehouse. Stepping out, she found a secluded alleyway free of surveillance and used the height-altering device Yao Xiran had given her.
When she emerged, she had transformed into a man standing at 1.7 meters tall, with completely different facial features and body characteristics.
Even if she stood right in front of her grandmother now, she’d be mistaken for a stranger.
After marveling at the novelty of her new form, Lin Xi headed straight to the post office, pulling a shoebox from a black bag. Inside was a book.
The clerk, unfamiliar with the Orchid Pavilion Collection, glanced at it briefly, confirmed it wasn’t a prohibited item, and swiftly printed the shipping label.
Once the book was mailed, she went to a nearby internet café.
These days, every household had a computer, and the cybercafés popular during Lin Xi’s school days had long fallen out of fashion, replaced by sleeker, more upscale establishments.
But the management wasn’t particularly strict. When Lin Xi, now in her male form, claimed she’d forgotten her ID, they barely questioned it and simply handed her a login pass.
No one even questioned why she was wearing gloves. She booked a private booth.
Modern internet café booths came equipped not just with high-end computers and ergonomic gaming chairs but also a compact sofa bed.
Lin Xi booted up the computer, inserted the USB drive Yao Xiran had given her, and a dark search engine interface appeared.
She typed in "China Weapons Research Institute," and soon, a website popped up. Clicking through, she found the names, email addresses, and WeChat IDs of various department heads.
Lin Xi selected the professor who seemed most approachable and sent over the pre-scanned weapon blueprints and specifications.
Following the prompts, she hacked into his computer, entered a line of text, then pulled out the USB and left without hesitation.
She slipped into a blind spot, free of surveillance and people, removed the disguise, and casually exited the mall.
Then, she rented a car from a nearby agency and drove straight toward Yao Xiran’s hometown—Daling Mountain County.
Lin Xi left without a care, completely unaware of the chaos her single line of text had unleashed among the researchers at the National Weapons Research Institute.
