JFWCM Chapter 24

Quantum Heartbeat Carnival

Quantum Heartbeat Carnival

The wormhole’s ethereal blue halo twisted into a vortex outside the porthole. Jiang Wan’yuan’s neural combat suit suddenly emitted a piercing screech—the β-star crystal Yi Shang had sewn into her wedding dress hem was vibrating violently, bathing the hibernation pod in a crimson light like a dying star.

“Tidal lock in 37 seconds.” Yi Shang’s mechanical left hand plunged into the console, the liquid metal eroding the warship’s mainframe backward along the circuit board. The coordinates of the pursuers on the holographic screen suddenly twisted into the Rosette Nebula, while her human right hand caressed the feverish neural interface at the back of Jiang Wan’yuan’s neck. “Your adrenaline is off the charts.”

Jiang Wan’yuan retorted, grabbing Yi Shang’s collar and synchronizing the vibration frequency of the other’s mechanical heart with her own: “Isn’t this the monitoring data you wanted?” Before the words left her mouth, the warship abruptly rolled ninety degrees. The β-star fluid solidified into a protective net in zero gravity, enveloping them like the embryo of a binary star system.

The Interstellar Tribunal’s flagship materialized from the other end of the wormhole, but the muzzles weren’t glowing with destructive beams. Zhang Yao’s mechanical body had been modified into a living projectile, her eye sockets embedded with a diary chip left behind by Jiang Wan’yuan’s mother.

“Time to sign for the gift.” Jiang Wan’yuan bit her fingertip, and droplets of blood hovered in zero gravity, forming a star map. Yi Shang’s mechanical heart suddenly detached from her chest cavity, and the β-star fluid cascaded like a galaxy, casting the entire warship into a massive ring setting. When Zhang Yao’s mechanical body crashed into the porthole, it wasn’t a burst of fire, but a wedding invitation broadcast simultaneously throughout the universe.

The hibernation pod’s emergency lighting suddenly switched to a warm yellow. Jiang Wan’yuan discovered the inner layer of her combat suit was covered in raised and recessed Braille—Yi Shang’s mechanical fingertips had painstakingly inscribed “Records of Human Senses” night after night:

[04:37 The strawberry scent of her hair is composed of 37 compounds, 3 more than the Orion Nebula]

[12:15 Oral temperature rises by 2.3°C upon lip contact. Permanent maintenance of this anomaly is recommended]

The warship AI suddenly announced in the Starlord’s voice: “Eternal Contract energy detected. Initiating self-destruct protocol.” Jiang Wan’yuan, however, smiled and tore open the energy core of her neural combat suit, stuffing Yi Shang’s mechanical heart into the gap: “If we’re going down, we’re doing it our way.”

As the Interstellar Tribunal’s fleet was sucked into the artificial black hole, they exchanged breaths in a nuclear-like white light. Tears welled up in Yi Shang’s human pupils for the first time, and the β-star fluid solidified the teardrops into a necklace, each bead encapsulating Jiang Wan’yuan’s laughter from when she was six years old.

The destination of the warp wasn’t the β-star ruins, but a childhood laboratory covered in glow-in-the-dark stickers. The radiation-proof wedding dress was quantumly dissipating, revealing a yellowed “Field Trip Permission Slip” underneath—in the guardian signature field, the handwriting of machine and human finally overlapped into eternity.

Meanwhile, in the Interstellar Tribunal three thousand light-years away, all the screens were looping the most dangerous cosmic phenomenon: the resonance waves of two hearts, reconstructing the entire galaxy’s marriage vows.

As the interstellar school bus traversed the quantum cherry blossom tunnel, the entire class’s neural enhancers suddenly popped up with a high-risk warning: [Individual #0927 detected. Recommended safe distance: 3 light-years]. Jiang Wan’yuan kicked the prompt box out the window and turned around to inject a strawberry-flavored tranquilizer into the back of Yi Shang’s neck: “Senior, your mechanical hormones are scaring the kids.”

“19th warning…” Yi Shang’s mechanical left hand crushed the seatbelt, but the β-star fluid automatically wove into a cherry blossom bracelet, tethering Jiang Wan’yuan’s swinging ankle. The remnants of Zhang Yao’s gang had just raised a spy camera when they were bound into a Valentine’s Day gift box by the bracelet’s forked tendrils of light.

“Attention, students!” The homeroom teacher’s mechanical tentacles slapped the holographic map. “β-star Ruins Third Law—No feeding mechanical lifeforms!”

Before the words were out, Jiang Wan’yuan had already stuffed a homemade warp cake into the relic guardian’s muzzle. As the mecha became sweetly deadlocked, she dragged Yi Shang onto its shoulder armor: “Guide service upgraded! 0927 docent at your service~”

A Starlord’s blue light flashed in Yi Shang’s pupils, and the relic’s password door swung open in response. The moment the entire class poured in, Jiang Wan’yuan’s neural combat suit suddenly went berserk—her mother’s abandoned laboratory was rising from the ground, the access control system being a stick figure family portrait she had drawn at the age of six.

“Special field trip mission!” Jiang Wan’yuan pushed Yi Shang into a scanner. “Find the DNA combination that matches this doodle.”

When Yi Shang’s mechanical heart resonated with the doodle, the laboratory suddenly collapsed into a wedding ring workshop. The β-star crystals sleeping in the display cases collectively awakened, transforming the students into a temporary wedding honor guard—Zhang Yao’s gang was forced to hold photon bouquets, while the homeroom teacher’s mechanical tentacles were scrolling through the ring setting’s instructions.

“I object…”

Zhang Yao’s mechanical body fell from the quantum cloud, her protest smothered by Jiang Wan’yuan’s warp cake. Yi Shang’s β-star fluid seized the opportunity to invade her core, overwriting the slaughter program with a “Wedding March” DJ program.

The twilight bonfire party became a universe-wide live broadcast. As the students ignited antimatter fireworks with neural pulses, Jiang Wan’yuan discovered that Yi Shang’s mechanical heart was overclocking—the slaughter data that once belonged to #0927 was now sculpting the fireworks into their star trail wedding photos.

“High-risk romance index detected!” The class president’s mechanical eye popped up with an evacuation alert, only to be hacked by Jiang Wan’yuan into a proposal cannon. As the entire class counted down in unison, the β-star ruins bloomed into an artificial aurora, and Yi Shang’s human tears crystallized into eternal flowers for the first time—each petal engraved with Jiang Wan’yuan’s neural pulse pattern.

Late at night in the camping tent area, Jiang Wan’yuan’s neural combat suit suddenly issued a warning. She pulled open Yi Shang’s sleeping bag to find a mechanical body #0927, shrunken to a seven-year-old’s size, curled up inside, a melted strawberry candy clutched in her palm.

“Field trip bonus question.” The miniaturized Yi Shang’s electronic eyes flashed blue. “Should I collect the guardianship fee now?”

Jiang Wan’yuan tucked the small mechanical body into the inner layer of her combat suit, and the galaxy behind her was reorganizing its laws: [When the entire universe becomes an accomplice, elopement automatically upgrades to a honeymoon parade].

In the morning light, the entire class received graduation gifts from the Interstellar Tribunal—black hole keychains embedded with wedding livestream screenshots. And on Jiang Wan’yuan’s field trip diary, Yi Shang wrote a comment in β-star fluid: [Next guardianship target: the entire galaxy].

The interstellar school bus burned a pink trail through the β-star’s atmosphere. Jiang Wan’yuan set the entire class’s neural enhancers to wedding support mode. Yi Shang’s mechanical left hand was being surrounded by three girls applying strawberry-flavored nail polish. The β-star fluid solidified into a “0927 Wan’yuan” relief on the nail surface.

“Attention!” The homeroom teacher’s mechanical tentacle suddenly pierced through the roof of the bus. “Interstellar Tribunal detected ahead…”

The warning was cut off by Jiang Wan’yuan’s modified amplifier, and heavy metal rock blasted from the school bus’s speakers. A Starlord code flashed in Yi Shang’s pupils, and the entire bus suddenly quantumly phased through a meteor shower—the death moments the students screamed and snapped were all tampered into behind-the-scenes footage of the wedding photo shoot.

A strange sweet scent permeated the field trip campsite. Jiang Wan’yuan kicked open a supply box labeled “High-Risk Radiation” and pulled out a star dust firework left behind by her mother: “Props for tonight’s bonfire party!”

Yi Shang’s mechanical heart suddenly resonated, and the β-star fluid reassembled the fireworks into a holographic projector—the last experimental data before her mother’s death was transforming into a sky full of aurora.

“Students!” Jiang Wan’yuan jumped onto the mecha wreckage summoned by Yi Shang. “Tonight’s homework is to rewrite Interstellar Law #0927!”

As the entire class raised their neural enhancers, Yi Shang’s mechanical left hand decomposed into billions of nanobots, turning each device into a legislative voting machine. Zhang Yao’s mechanical body drilled out from underground to obstruct them, only to be glued into an amber specimen by the β-star syrup the students accidentally triggered.

Late at night in the tent area, Jiang Wan’yuan found that Yi Shang’s sleeping bag was glowing blue. Pulling it open revealed a mechanical body #0927, looking like seven years old, assembling a miniature warp engine with her childish mechanical arms. “Guardian authentication,” Little Yi Shang’s electronic eyes flickered. “A goodnight kiss is required to activate.”

When Jiang Wan’yuan’s lips touched the cold forehead, the entire campsite suddenly levitated. The students screamed and grabbed the cherry tree roots, watching the β-star storm turn into wedding ribbons outside the protective shield. Yi Shang’s human form materialized from the starlight, stuffing the miniaturized version of herself into Jiang Wan’yuan’s backpack: “Permanent guardianship program, initiated.”

Amidst the pre-dawn chaos, the class president discovered an update on the last page of the field trip handbook: [Graduation assessment: Witnessing a reverse-light wedding grants +∞ Cosmic Credits]. The entire class’s neural enhancers simultaneously received an encrypted file from the Interstellar Tribunal—a 4K video of Zhang Yao’s mechanical body dancing the hula, with Jiang Wan’yuan’s tone-deaf wedding march as the background music.

As the returning school bus traversed the wormhole, Jiang Wan’yuan’s backpack suddenly glowed. A miniaturized Yi Shang was reassembling a starship model, the porthole engraved with the entire class’s neural code. As the model expanded into a real warship, a mechanical child’s voice rang out on the intercom: “Next stop: The Honeymoon Special Express to overthrow the Interstellar Tribunal Headquarters.”

Yi Shang’s human right hand and mechanical left hand overlapped on the console, setting the graduation trip’s navigation coordinates to “the limit of heartbeat frequency.” And at the warship’s tail, Zhang Yao’s mechanical body, sealed by β-star syrup, was flashing SOS signals along with Jiang Wan’yuan’s humming—every beam of light was in the shape of a heart.

The β-star storm shattered into stardust outside the protective shield. Jiang Wan’yuan dragged the miniaturized Yi Shang onto the flagship’s console. The entire class’s neural enhancers suddenly resonated, transforming the warship’s energy core into a giant projector—Jiang Wan’yuan’s mother’s sealed laboratory data was now being broadcast in every corner of the universe.

“Watch closely!” She inserted a fragment of Yi Shang’s mechanical heart into the terminal, and the holographic projection exploded into countless starlights. “The so-called purge protocol of the Interstellar Tribunal is just afraid of the virus of human heartbeats!”

Yi Shang’s human right hand suddenly became transparent, and the β-star fluid flowed backward along the warship’s pipelines. As the Interstellar Tribunal’s flagship materialized, all the muzzles were blooming with metallic cherry blossoms—the tracking programs that had been implanted in the students’ neural enhancers were now all transformed into wedding invitation generators.

“Graduation defense begins!” Jiang Wan’yuan kicked open the door to the courtroom, followed by mecha flower girls driven by the neural pulses of the entire class. The miniaturized Yi Shang sat on her shoulder, her mechanical eyes shooting out the ultimate key left behind by her mother, transforming the Interstellar Tribunal’s mainframe into a cake decorating machine.

Zhang Yao’s mechanical body erupted from the console, only to slip on strawberry-flavored lubricant. Jiang Wan’yuan seized the opportunity to stuff a warp engine into her core, and at the moment of the explosion, screens throughout the universe were broadcasting the mechanical body dancing Swan Lake—the soundtrack was a recording of Yi Shang’s heartbeat from her first humanization.

“The last step.” Yi Shang’s main body materialized from the starlight, stuffing the miniaturized version of herself into Jiang Wan’yuan’s combat suit inner layer. Their clasped hands simultaneously pressed the button, and the Interstellar Tribunal’s judges’ seats suddenly collapsed into a wedding altar, the code of law rewritten into wedding vows in β-star fluid.

As the homeroom teacher’s mechanical tentacles reluctantly handed over the rings, the entire β-star ruins suddenly quantumly reassembled. The students screamed and grabbed the cherry blossom branches, watching the mechanical wreckage grow into a wedding banquet hall. Anti-aircraft missile wells spewed champagne foam, and Yi Shang’s toy bear, which had been destroyed when she was seven, was waving at the usher’s stand.

“Now, let us announce the Universal Law Amendment.” Jiang Wan’yuan’s neural combat suit projected a pink code of law. “Article 0927: All data named with love automatically obtains the highest authority.”

The miniaturized Yi Shang suddenly jumped out of the backpack, smearing the melted strawberry candy she had treasured for seven years on the cover of the code of law. The syrup seeped into the interstellar network, and all the war machines in the universe simultaneously crashed, their gun barrels drooping with cherry blossom branches.

As the returning school bus traversed the star sea, Yi Shang discovered a hidden folder on Jiang Wan’yuan’s neural interface—a program her mother had coded with her last breath, turning the entire field trip into a key to reversing time and space. As they pressed their foreheads together in the morning light, the afterimage of the β-star storm solidified into a new timetable on the classroom blackboard:

[Monday to Friday: Regular courses

Saturday: Universal Rebooting Practice

Sunday: Guardian and Bride’s Elopement Day]

The sunset gilded the desks in a golden-red light, and Jiang Wan’yuan discovered a new inscription on the shell of Yi Shang’s mechanical heart—the interstellar coordinates that the miniaturized version of herself had carved on the field trip night, the destination shimmering with the lights of her mother’s laboratory. The cherry blossoms outside the window grew against gravity, and the Interstellar Tribunal’s apology letter was being folded into a paper airplane, carrying a real graduation certificate, flying towards the spring of a new universe.

As the morning bell rang, the holographic blackboard automatically played the wedding video. Jiang Wan’yuan’s neural enhancer popped up with a school rule update prompt: [The early romance deduction item has been changed to a cosmic-level dog food allowance]. Yi Shang crushed the chalk expressionlessly, but the β-star fluid presumptuously reassembled it into a heart shape, accurately hitting the spy mechanical dragonfly in the back row.

“Quiet!” The homeroom teacher’s mechanical tentacles slapped the cherry blossom-shaped chalk dust. “Now, let’s explain the Interstellar Law Article 0927 Amendment…”

Before she could finish speaking, the mechanical pen of Zhang Yao’s gang suddenly played the wedding march. The virus that Jiang Wan’yuan had implanted last week awakened, tampering the “Interstellar War History” courseware into a “How to Legally Marry a Starlord Guide.”

Yi Shang’s mechanical left hand uncontrollably carved words on the desk, and the originally cold, hard alloy desktop bloomed with glow-in-the-dark cherry blossoms. Jiang Wan’yuan seized the opportunity to stick her neural interface to it, and the two’s heartbeat frequencies projected a real-time star trail on the desktop—the neural enhancers of the girls in the front row automatically activated scream mode.