Chapter 1

Jiang Junming carefully opened the window of the anatomy laboratory and took a look around. It was a quiet night, and even the couples strolling on the playground had dispersed. In the silent night, only the cicadas of summer continued to chirp tirelessly.

Other courses were manageable; Jiang Junming was good at memorizing. Even the most difficult subjects like pharmacology and physiology posed no challenge to him. But anatomy was different. Studying without a cadaver was useless. So Jiang Junming always managed to leave the window of the anatomy laboratory slightly ajar, and after dark, he would sneak in to use the time others spent on romantic dates to study cadavers.

He was late again, Jiang Junming thought. The cadaver behind him, emitting the smell of formaldehyde, seemed to slowly rise, as if it were coming to life, reaching out to grab Jiang Junming and keep him company.

Shivering, Jiang Junming gave a wry smile. This was already the fifteenth cadaver this semester. The knowledge he had learned in anatomy class had been deeply imprinted in his mind through the dissection of these fifteen cadavers. Even if he was scared, it was worth it.

Opening the window, Jiang Junming jumped out of the anatomy laboratory and looked around. No one was there. He then crouched down and moved through the low shrubs until he reached the edge of the playground. There, he stood up straight, hands in his pockets, and whistled.

Looking back at the window of the anatomy laboratory, it was quiet, showing no sign that he had been there. Perhaps there would be another ghost story circulating among the students tomorrow, Jiang Junming smiled.

As he turned his head, Jiang Junming felt his eyes were playing tricks on him. He rubbed his eyes hard and saw a meteor hurtling towards him.

Is this some kind of retribution? I haven't done anything bad, Jiang Junming thought. He forgot to dodge and had no time to do so, only staring in shock as the meteor flew closer, the white light becoming clearer. Soon, Jiang Junming realized it wasn't a meteor at all, but a flying saucer!

The silver metal shell glowed softly, not glaring. It spun so fast that it seemed to be stationary. Several red-white beams trailed behind the saucer, like meteors falling.

Jiang Junming lost consciousness the moment the saucer "hit" his head. His last thought was—The saucer isn't as big as I imagined.

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When Jiang Junming woke up again, he found himself as an infant, being held in someone's arms. An old man held Jiang Junming, seemingly indifferent, as if he were used to it. Soon, Jiang Junming learned his situation—he was in an orphanage and had become an abandoned infant.

Years of working in the anatomy laboratory and morgue had made Jiang Junming calm. Even being thrown into a strange world, he quickly accepted the reality. He grew up carefully, just like the other children, and even habitually wore a smile, living a sunny life every day.

Jiang Junming grew up in the orphanage, like countless other orphans in this small city called Moonlight City, eating barely edible food, and preparing to leave the orphanage at the age of ten to seek a living in Moonlight City.

The only time he was stubborn was when he refused to be called Paul, a name allegedly written on the swaddling clothes. Jiang Junming rejected this name and insisted they call him Junming. Although it had no real significance, he always felt it might help him retain a bit of his past memory. When a child insisted on such a thing, no one took it seriously, thinking the child might be a bit foolish.

Everything was ordinary, just like the other orphans in the orphanage, with no difference. Not only did he have no advantages, but the knowledge he had from his previous life—such as anatomy and medicine—became a forbidden area in this world.

Any research involving the human body would be categorized as necromancy, and anyone discovered would be hunted by the temples of the gods of justice and light, then burned at the stake.

Jiang Junming carefully hid his meager knowledge, becoming an ordinary child, with a warm smile on his face, accepting the new life and making himself better.

It wasn't all bad, though. Jiang Junming discovered that before falling asleep, he would enter a strange world.

This happened when Jiang Junming was six years old, and a plague of bubonic fever spread through Moonlight City. People around him fell ill and died one by one. One day, Jiang Junming felt a fever, chest tightness, and shortness of breath. In this era of scarce medical resources, contracting bubonic fever meant certain death. Priests and clerics would never come to an orphanage, and the outbreak had already overwhelmed them.

Jiang Junming knew he had the most severe form of pulmonary plague. He held on for less than a day before falling into a coma.

Then, he found himself in a strange place, a rectangular six-sided space that didn't seem very large, spotless, like a hospital's sterile room or a research lab's server room. The difference was that this space seemed soft, emitting a gentle glow. The light appeared to be made of countless data streams, flowing like water on the walls of the six-sided space. The data moved so fast that Jiang Junming couldn't see what it was.

After entering this space, Jiang Junming felt a refreshing coolness spread through his body. The deadly pulmonary plague was miraculously cured. After escaping death, Jiang Junming "woke up" and returned to the orphanage.

This discovery excited Jiang Junming. After countless experiments, he found that he would enter this rectangular space in a half-dream, half-awake state before falling asleep. Each time he entered, he felt as if he had returned to a space that belonged to him, feeling incredibly familiar and close.

Every night, after sleeping in this space, Jiang Junming would wake up feeling refreshed. With each sleep, he would "return" to the outside world.

Although he had slept all night, in the "outside" world, only about ten minutes had passed. After leaving, Jiang Junming felt as energetic as if he had slept all night, even more so than after a full night's rest.

Jiang Junming didn't know why this happened, but regardless, in this world with poor medical conditions and rampant diseases, this small change allowed him to live better, and he was very satisfied with it.

In the orphanage, there was a diligent child named Junming who always wore a smile. No matter how trivial or heavy the work, Jiang Junming would complete it happily. He would use his free time to read the few books available in the orphanage, desperately absorbing the knowledge of this world.