The knife-like tip of the pen slid lightly on top of a light gray card. A sleek blue line flowed out from the pen tip and spread. The light blue lines grew continually on the palm-sized cards until a complex pattern gradually begun to take form.

Chen Mu’s eyes furrowed as he concentrated on the card. He breathed lightly and slowly as if afraid to make a mistake. His right arm had not moved a fraction from start to finish — only his wrist moved. His wrist was nimble like a snake and soft as soap. The pen tip moved softly and a graceful arc appeared on the card’s surface. It halted abruptly, and the previous gentle tip transformed into the tip of a sharp spear. The card’s pattern suddenly flashed and then quickly dimmed back to its original state.

Cheng Mu put it onto the pile of cards on the table. His movements were natural and elegant. No sluggish movements could be seen. After finishing the card, a look of concentration remained on his face. He had only finished fifteen cards and still needed to finish another ten before completing the daily task. He was currently in the process of making a one-star energy card, which was the lowest rank energy card. The card was the most widely used type of card and had the highest rate of consumption. At this moment, the room suddenly darkened.

“Damn it, the energy has been used up already!” Chen Mu cursed to himself. His left hand conveniently took out one of the energy cards from the pile and pressed on it lightly with his right hand. The apparatus on his right hand emitted a bright light and with the light’s help, Chen Mu carefully walked to the corner of the room. The room really was too messy. He didn’t want to accidentally bump into something. On the corner of the wall was a rectangular shaped meter and beneath it was a little slot. Chen Mu put the energy card into the slot.

Once the energy card was put in, the room lit up again. The meter had the number 100 displayed on it. Chen Mu didn’t think that the energy had already been used up. It looked like the daily task had been increased by one. Returning to the desk, Chen Mu went back to work. His livelihood depended on these lowest level cards. Once he had first learned how to create these cards three years ago, he had never taken a break in the task of creating twenty five of these cards every day.

Chen Mu’s room was very small; it was only 40 square meters. The inside had an old work desk. Except for the comparatively clean desk, the rest of the room was piled with mountains of junk of all kinds, from old books to every kind of raw material.

Chen Mu had lived inside this simple and crude area for three full years. This was a government’s special emergency relief room. In this kind of house, he only had to pay 150 Odi every month to continue living here. For poor people like Chen Mu, there was no better place to live in than here. To him, this place was already pretty good, he had seen entire families living inside a room with a similar size to his room.

At 5 o’clock in the evening, Chu Men finally finished the daily task — twenty five energy cards. He carefully counted the amount of cards and even counted them twice to make sure that he hadn’t made an error before putting them away into his card pouch.

Walking out onto the street, the night sky had already darkened. The bright lamp lights lingered in the night sky. The back of the passing shuttles left a beautiful track. Chen Mu tightened up his outer clothing and looked up, gazing at the sky. The cold air thickened, it looked like winter was coming. He did not have enough space in his mind to keep track of the time. Winter was a time when he had to consume even more heat. Chen Mu began to calculate the expenses in his mind.

He passed through the Dong Wei School’s back door. Chen Mu had already walked through here for three years, but every time he saw those students, his heart felt a type of indescribable feeling. Clearing his mind, Chen Mu walked hurriedly towards a small store. The store was called “Dong Wei Grocery Store” — around the Dong Wei School, there were at least twenty stores with similar names. For the past three years, Chen Mu had visited this small store every day regardless of the weather. However, instead of going there to buy things, he was going there to sell things.

When he walked in, the shop owner saw him and called out: ”Oh, Chen Mu, you’re here!”

“Yup, Uncle Hua.” he replied. Shop owner Uncle Hua was a fifty year old old man. His age could be seen in the appearance of his body: fine wrinkles, half white hair, and large glasses.

“These are today’s goods.” Chen Mu carefully took out the goods from his card pouch and gave them to the shop owner: “Twenty five cards.”

Uncle Hua took the cards from Chen Mu’s hands and without even checking them, chuckled: “Luckily, I have Chen Mu to deliver these cards to me every day, otherwise my supply of goods would be gone.”

Chen Mu faintly smiled, but did not respond. He knew that Uncle Hua’s words had a joke-like meaning. One-star energy cards were the cheapest cards, but were also the most widely used ones. How could Uncle Hua only be able to sell twenty five of these energy cards in one day?

Uncle Hua also knew Chen Mu’s character and without any more nonsense directly asked: “Chen Mu, would you like to be paid in cash or have it transferred to your bank account?”

“Transferred to my bank account.” Chen Mu took out a light green card and handed it to Uncle Hua. After transferring the money, Chen Mu waved goodbye to Uncle Hua and left.

Uncle Hua suddenly shouted towards Chen Mu: “Ah, Chen Mu wait a second.”

Chen Mu stopped, turned around in surprise and asked Uncle Hua: “Is there something left, Uncle Hua?”

Uncle Hua brought out a yellow piece of paper from a drawer and said smilingly: “I almost forgot . This is a Card Creator’s training class admission ticket. I got it yesterday as a gift from a seller. Keeping it for myself would be a waste. Chen Mu, why don’t you take it?”

Looking at the compassionate Uncle Hua, Chen Mu could not help but feel moved. He knew how much of a help this old man had been to him these past few years. If it wasn’t for him, Chen Mu believed that his current life would be unattainable.

Three years ago, when he had just learned how to create energy cards, he ran all over the place looking to sell them. Although many showed interest, none of the sellers were willing to buy them. Businesses needed a large quantity of one-star energy cards, so they wanted to buy them in bulk. Chen Mu could at most make thirty cards, and to the businesses, this amount was just like scraps to them.

Luckily, he had met Uncle Hua. Uncle Hua agreed to purchase these energy cards, but each cards would only be bought for 103 Odi, which was two less than the wholesale price. Even so, Chen Mu was incomparably grateful towards Uncle Hua.

Four years ago, Chen Mu was homeless. At that time, he came across a Card Creator, one on the verge of death. He had used five-month’s worth of living expenses to prolong his death by seven days. In these seven days, he learned how to make one-star energy cards. The Card Creating Master did not leave behind a will, so Chen Mu buried him in a desolate area. He did not know where this Card Creator came from, but he knew that his fate had changed ever since.

He had spent one year bitterly working at different temporary jobs. That year, he had been twelve. That was also the year he had finally put together a small amount of savings: 1000 Odi. With these 1000 Odi, he had used up all of it buying the raw material for energy cards. His teacher had said that the wholesale price for a one star energy cards was 105 odi, altogether selling for 110 Odi. But the manufacturing cost was only required 98 Odi.
All Card Creators could make one star energy cards, but few knew the difference in prices. Even if they knew, no one would fight against the issue. One star energy cards were the simplest cards. These cards could all be manufactured. If a great Card Creator were to create them, they could at most make twenty to thirty cards. The output was too pitiful. With that small of a profit, even if a card fell off the table, people would not stoop to pick it up. But as for Chen Mu, this money was his dinner.

He had created eight cards on his first run, which gave him newfound hope. But what he didn’t know, was that when he was selling cards, he met obstacles. Towards his pitiful amount of energy cards, businesses showed no interest whatsoever. He ran around all day without eating anything until 8 o’clock when he began heading towards Uncle Hua’s store. Entering the store, his legs had begun to shake and he was on the verge of collapsing.

Selling the cards for 103 Odi each compared to 105 Odi was a loss, but Chen Mu still owed Uncle Hua a huge amount of gratitude. Selling all of his cards, he bought some food and spent the rest on raw materials.

Since then, Chen Mu’s life stabilized.

Twenty five cards every day without a single break.

In these three years, he only made one type of card — one star energy cards. In the second year, he could already make the manufacturing cost 97 Odi. Although it was only a one Odi difference, but to him, it was a big encouragement. When he wasn’t working on creating cards, he spent the time researching how to further reduce the costs.

Finally, in the third year, the manufacturing costs decreased to 95 Odi. Every time he sold a card, he earned 8 Odi. His everyday income increased by 200 Odi. Before these three years, this number was unimaginable to him. Every month, a 1000 Odi income could let him live a regular life, but he had to pay the rent of 105 Odi for the emergency relief room.
Turning around, Chen Mu smiled and said: “Thanks Uncle Hua!” Holding that attendance ticket, he carefully put it away into the card pouch.

Training classes, especially Card Creator training classes, were the most popular type of classes. They had an incomparable amount of advertisement; for example, this training class provided such claims as “Dong Wei School Excellence Recognition”, “Dong Wei School Senior Upper-Class Card Creator lectures”, and so on. But Chen Mu knew what exactly these training classes were. The only relationship between these training classes and the Dong Wei School was that these classes had to give a little bit of money to keep the nominally “united conduct”.

Chen Mu nevertheless wanted to listen in to see what these training classes taught. Creating cards was the most complicated area of study. All of these years, he had never given up on self-studying, however the results were very small. Only until last year, had he understood what was going on. His foundational knowledge was too poor: after ten years of wandering around, he had not received any education.

Regarding a education-less youth, to self-study something as complicated as creating cards, was exceedingly difficult. However, he never doubted his intelligence. To be able to learn how to create a one-star energy card in one week, even that year’s Card Creating Master had praised his talent.

From then on, he let go of his temporarily too high of a goal and went on to a different path and study the basic theory. No matter how tiring the work was, every day he would take out some time to study the dull knowledge.

After bidding farewell to Uncle Hua, Chen Mu went along a small alley towards the south. Today was the weekend, he still had one more task.

Going through two streets, walking for around twenty minutes, he arrived at a second-hand worn out card purchase station.

“Hey, you came partner!” A dark bald-headed man named Xiao Hei (TL Note: Literally Little Black lol) greeted him.. He was also this shop’s owner. Every weekend, Chen Mu would come here to work for three hours.

Chen Mu nodded his head towards Xiao Hei, but his face had a small trace of astonishment.

Xiao Hei became accustomed towards Chen Mu’s expression long ago. When Chen Mu came her to ask for work, Xiao Hei had initially refused. His family had originally started the store and only had one person to manage it. When it came to his hands, he also became the only person to manage it.

Hire an employee? Xiao Hei did not have the money to do so.

But when Chen Mu said that he did not need a salary, Xiao Hei reluctantly agreed. Of course, Chen Mu needed some sort of compensation, usually Chen Mu chose some old scrap cards to take with him. Sometimes, Chen Mu would take out some not completely used up energy cards. Xiao Hei let it be, every month, he saved a large chunk of money due to Chen Mu’s work. Silently, Xiao Hei was curious about Chen Mu, how did the kid know that there was still energy left in the cards?

Nevertheless, every time he saw Chen Mu, his brows were raised in delight.

Chen Mu crouched down and began ordering the scrap cards into different types. There were many types of cards: energy types, material types, and the rarer plant and animal types. Except all of these cards were worthless and all Chen Mu had to do was order them by type.

Work went by quickly. His familiarity with this type of work could be seen.

With a small flip of his wrist, he pointed to a small black scrap card: “Look, this card can still be used one more time.” This two-star energy card still had half capacity. Chen Mu wondered why the original user would waste it. Two-star energy cards had a capacity of 1000, which meant that there was still 500 left.

“Haha, thanks little bro!” Xiao Hei saw the two-star energy card and his eyebrows almost split apart from happiness. Eager, he ran towards a meter and put the card in the slot. When he saw the reading “523”, Xiao Hei he almost fainted from joy.

If Chen Mu hadn’t noticed, Xiao Hei would have continued on with his work. Although there would sometimes be three star or four star scrap cards that would show up, the probability was rather low. But to Chen Mu, those cards were worthless. The only thing he was interested in were one-star energy cards.

Three years of creating these cards gave him had some comprehension towards them. There was more than one way to create one-star energy cards. Chen Mu had already gathered twelve types of methods to creating one-star energy cards. The different structures of these one-star energy cards gave Chen Mu rather large insights into them. Only through borrowing from these card’s techniques was he able to reduce the manufacturing cost to 95 Odi. But this type of luck was not something that happened every day; up until now, he had only come across 12 different types of cards.

But today’s luck was pretty good.

Looking at the one-star energy card in his hand, from the outer appearance, it was some sort of never before seen one-star energy card.

He put the card aside and continued to browse through the piles. The quantity of one-star energy cards really was too much, but Chen Mu went through the pile one card at a time. His speed was extremely quick. He only had to lightly feel the card to know that it wasn’t a card he wanted.

This was all from his familiarity with one-star energy cards. This familiarity came from the unceasing study of manufacturing. He didn’t need to look; with just a feeling, he could see whether or not it was a one-star energy card, whether or not it was a structure he had not seen before. He knew that cards down to their finest details.

His hand suddenly stopped.

This card……