“Jiang Fu, do you plead guilty?” The one who spoke was a serious-looking middle-aged man. The intense white light in the room fell on his cold and hard silhouette, making him look like a soulless robot.
True, he wasn’t a real human. In the highly technologically advanced Galactic Age where human life expectancy increased to a hundred thousand years, clumsy degraded organs became obsolete objects that could be replaced by alloyed machinery. It was common for any human to desire mechanical organs for a more agile and healthier body, to match with the rapid pace of the Galactic Age.
But the young man, Jiang Fu, sitting opposite the middle-aged man, was a very rare, complete and living human being. His black hair was fluffy and soft, his white skin was like a lambs’, exuding an alluring luster. His eyebrows were beautiful, like God had carefully carved them. His eyes were brimming with softness, his smiling lips were curved in an innocent and elegant manner. His shallow dimples were slightly sunken, revealing a thrilling charm that made people willingly give their hearts to him.
The young man’s hand casually rested on the table, tightly handcuffed, making the blue-green veins very visible to the eyes, like a green snake crawling without any sound, disappearing into the man’s bones.
“Sir, I’m just an honest good citizen. Did you arrest the wrong person?”
The middle-aged man was indifferent to the smiling youth. Without regard, he lifted the document on the table and read out a single sentence. ”Article 723 of the Interstellar Code states that no one shall plunder or trade human emotions by illegal means, and all forms of emotion trading shall be prohibited.”
After a pause, he continued, “Jiang Fu, you have traded human emotions in the underground auction a total of twenty-three times. The evidence is overwhelming. What else do you want to say?”
The youth’s eyes slightly dulled but his smile was still as brilliant, and his clear voice was warm and soft, like an innocent and confused deer.
“Sir, I don’t understand what you’re saying at all.”
Seeing the youth being so uncooperative, the middle-aged man’s face grew colder as his mechanical arm slammed on to the metal table. This action shattered the extremely hard table and created a few obvious cracks. Seemingly satisfied with such a deterrent, the middle-aged man sneered.
“Jiang Fu, the Interstellar Court won’t give you a chance to argue.”
As soon as he was done talking, he turned abruptly and left the room.
Surrounded by quiet darkness, he only had the bright light bulb from overhead shining straight down, illuminating the metal table’s horrifying cracks. Suffocating silence and terrifying shadows filled the cold room like a heavy boulder pressing over one’s head which could easily make any prisoner collapse and confess.
But Jiang Fu was just leaning lazily against the chair, his hands confined to the table by the tight handcuffs. In boredom, he played with his white finger and his two long legs were stretched out in a loose fashion.
His relaxed posture was devoid of any fear of the impending doom, looking more like he was on vacation rather than undergoing undoubted interrogation, but his mind was racing.
Why was I so unlucky to be caught in the act this time?
Thinking of all the debts he had accumulated, the youth rested his head on the back of the chair in frustration and sighed sadly.
At first, some people saw their innate emotions as a burden. They used technology to remove the emotional elements they did not want such as laziness, jealousy, and fatigue. Therefore, more and more emotions disappeared. It wasn’t until an emotionally disabled human suddenly went insane and did something terrible that threatened interplanetary security that the fearful humans finally realized the importance of emotional integrity, and began to try to find the missing pieces of emotions again.
However, as there were very few emotion shards left, the Federation enacted laws to regulate the seizure of emotion shards for the benefit of Starfleet warriors, who were responsible for interstellar security or the nobility of the Federation. Therefore, the ‘rainbow trade’ for private, high-priced purchases of diverse emotions was strictly prohibited. Still, it didn’t stop the frenzy of underground auctions.
(*Translator’s note: rainbow note = illegal trade)
Jiang Fu, because of his astonishing beauty, made a living in the interstellar world by soliciting human emotions and then reselling them at auction houses. Although the emotional shards he handled were incomplete, they were enough to be rare items that the rich and powerful scrambled to grab.
Having been caught with no one to ask for help.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
He laid on the table distressed, scratched the side of his face and immediately dismissed the idea that had just popped up after thinking of the gullible people who looked obsessively at him.
…I might as well stay in prison.
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The youth turned sideways, becoming slightly vigilant and took a defensive stance.
“Sir, didn’t you leave me alone?”
He spoke to the middle-aged man behind the three strangers as his smiling eyes still cautiously stared at the strange trio.
The middle-aged man frowned deeply, and spoke coldly.
“You have to follow them.”
The handcuffs on the young man’s hands were detached from the metal table as soon as he finished speaking, still imprisoning the young man’s hands. The handcuffs emitted a shallow blue glow. It was so that a powerful current could be sent out to electrocute the youth into unconsciousness in the event of an emergency.
Jiang Fu glanced slowly at the three men, and then said, “Okay.”
Passing through the open suspension passage, the three brought the youth to a starship. Jiang Fu glanced at the Federation logo on the starship and the stern guards behind it, touched his nose, and resigned himself to walking in with his own feet.
While the starship flew smoothly, Jiang Fu admired the scenery outside through the skylight. His ears were quietly pricked up, preoccupied with listening to the three people who were not far away in a circle whispering and occasionally looking at him with eager and creepy eyes.
…Hey, what the hell?
The starship flew extremely fast and came to a steady stop a moment later. Jiang Fu stepped out of the starship and froze when he saw the white building in front of him.
He had seen the signs on the building – the research base for the top interstellar scientists, where all the experiments were created and developed, including the technology to cut emotions into peelable extractable pieces, or to implant machinery into humans to alter their structure. The three of them were scientists!
His face suddenly froze.
They’re not going to give him, a felon, to the scientists as a guinea pig without even a trial, right?
He was beginning to feel a great deal of regret for choosing the underground auction in the central city of the Federation for the ‘rainbow trade’ this time. Although the sale price was relatively high, his little life was more important now!
The three scientists just looked back at him from time to time, and then they kept talking and walking in a certain direction.
It was only after getting almost dizzy from walking around the interior of the research base, did they finally reach their destination.
Compelled, confused and curious, he walked over towards the clear glass tube filled with a top secret material and looked at the naked man lying inside.
“Who is this?”
The man was so tall even when he was lying down, his perfectly proportional body was like a unique and wonderful sculpture. His body was slender and well-defined. His muscles were tight and smooth, even his eyebrows were long and handsome, and so were his high nose, deep eyes and thin lips. His quiet sleeping appearance was like a stunning painting, it could be said that he was the most beautiful person the youth had seen so far.
It was the kind of person Jiang Fu wanted to have some intimate relationship with.
After the three of them saw that he showed interest in the man lying inside the tube, they exchanged glances with each other, and one of them eagerly asked.
“Do you know about Bioroids?”
Jiang Fu certainly knew about them.
One of the notable new technologies of the galactic age was the invention of Bioroids. They were superficially indistinguishable from humans and could do many things humans couldn’t. Due to the fact that they lacked self-awareness, they were not treated as real organisms, even though they were used extensively in homes, restaurants, and various places.
An unbelievable conjecture floated in Jiang Fu’s mind, and his thin white fingers pointed straight at the man in the glass.
“Is he a bioroid?”
“That’s right, he’s the most perfect Bioroid we’ve developed and built so far.”
No wonder he looks so much better than the average Bioroid. Jiang Fu muttered quietly, his earlier enthusiasm gone, and just stared at the man’s face as he asked distractedly.
“Then, what do you want with me?”
“We’d like to ask you to cooperate with us in an experiment.”
“What kind of experiment?”
“Using catalysis to make artificial humans derive emotions autonomously.”
“???”
The youth stared at the serious-looking trio in stunned silence, suspecting that he had misheard and burst out in laughter.
“No kidding, he’s a bioroid, how can he derive emotions on his own?”
One of the scientists took a step forward, looked at the youth with even more eager eyes than before, with all his hopes, and said firmly.
“That’s why we brought you here.”
After the invention of Bioroids, the severe fragmentation of emotions in the interstellar gave rise to a bold idea – to create Bioroids that could derive emotions on their own, and then strip them and give it to the interstellar inhabitants, so that everyone would have complete emotions again, and the society would become stable again.
Therefore, scientists began to try to accept volunteers into the spiritual world of artificial human beings, so that volunteers could catalyze the awakening of the emotional factors of bioroids, and thus create advanced bioroids that could generate their own emotions.
But each attempt had failed, and all the volunteers woke up, exhausted from the test stimulation, stating that they could not affect the emotions of the artificial human in the spirit world. The scientists were reluctant to give up on this challenging adventure, and after lots of search, they found the young man who appeared most frequently at auctions and had the fastest access to human emotions.
Lively as a ghost and good at playing with people’s minds; he was the perfect candidate for this experiment, however one looked at it.
“So that’s how it is.”
The youth flexed his fingers and lightly tapped the glass, looking at the unresponsive artificial man inside, smiling in refusal.
“But I don’t want to cooperate.”
The three scientists were shocked and felt incredulous, and fiercely grabbed his arm, their eyes bursting with excited and hopeful light.
“Why? Why won’t you cooperate? If a more advanced Bioroid can be developed and created, it will bring about the most astoundingly great era!”
The youth gently drew back his hand and took a step back, his smiling face pretty and ruthless.
“Because I don’t like bioroids.”
How can an emotionless machine object presume to possess precious human emotions?
It was ridiculous.
The three men’s faces changed dramatically, turning suddenly resentful and hateful, as if it was because of his lack of cooperation that human history could not cross this barrier to reach the new epoch.
After another whispering among themselves, they spoke victoriously.
“Don’t you want to be free?”
The youth’s eyes moved and he lifted his eyes.
“What do you mean?”
“If you’ll agree to cooperate, we’ll apply to exonerate you of all charges after the experiment is over.”
The youth’s eyes lit up, then he thought about it and asked suspiciously.
“How could you possess so much power to do that?”
The three laughed and gave their names. They were the names the youth had often heard in the Federation reports. They had unparalleled privileges due to all of their immense contributions to the interstellar era.
By cooperating with the experiment, he could become a free person again.
The irresistible temptation caused the youth’s eyes to flicker slightly, then he dropped them and quirked a small, seemingly imperceptible smile, like a cunning child quietly casting a prank that no one would notice.
Since he was a cold artificial human, it wouldn’t matter even if he messed up in his spirit world, right?
“Yes, I promise.”
It seems interesting.. Thank you for the chapter 🙂
Ooh, this seems interesting 👀 and came just when i was looking for QT novels! But quick question. Is there a lot of drama and angst?
Thanks for the chapter! 🙂
drama yes but angst probably as we have a slag shou
What does it mean that the shou/mc is a slag?
Translator-san used ‘slag shou’ because he used to trick people into having feelings/emotions for him which then he can sell for money. In simpler and general term, a slag would be a playboy/manwhore/whore/slut.
Ooh ok, thanks!
Yes our shou/mc is really slag
What exactly does it mean that he is a slag? Does that mean that he sleeps around before he is with the ml and also after? Please tell me?!
To the wishiwas, he’s a slag because he manipulates peoples’ emotions and uses them to his advantage. He seems to not sleep around if he doesn’t like those obsessive suitors of his.
Hm. Looks interesting! Good luck~
Thanks for the chapter! ^^)
Intriguing – thanks for the chapter 💕
And if they develop their own feelings, wouldn’t it be cruel to take them away?
Thanks for the chapter <3
This will probably the main problem/conflict or at least one of them if not. After finishing the Quick Transmigration period, they will go back to main world then be informed that the gong’s emotions would be extracted… sad.
This sounds interesting :O
Okay, so in general, Slag Shou gonna make the bioroid love him, but even if slag shou falls in love too, there’s still the threat of his bioroid boyfriend getting stripped of his emotions and those emotions pawned off to people
Wait a minute. If ML’s emotions gonna be stripped away then what about his feelings when he falls in love?? 😱
Thanks for the chapter <3