Chapter Three: The Fool and the Madman

“Sister Eight! I’m all better now, please let me do it myself. I’m grown up, and if you keep bathing me, the people in the village will laugh at me!” Wei Hua pleaded with his eighth sister.

“All right, Little Nine! Sister Eight knows you’re grown up now. But no matter how big you are, you’re still the brother I love most. Our parents told us to take good care of you, how could we not listen? Besides, I’ve been bathing you all these years—what’s there to be shy about?”

“Sister Eight! Let me do it myself! I can handle it!” Wei Hua continued to beg.

“What are you fussing about? Hurry up and come here!” Sister Eight pulled Wei Hua over, swiftly stripping off his pants and underwear, then lifted him and put him into the large wooden tub. She picked up the soap and bath towel by the tub and started washing him. While lathering him up, she said,

“Little Nine! You’re completely recovered now. From here on, you have to do these things yourself. After all, your sisters will get married someday, and you need to learn to take care of yourself. Over the years, your eldest sister and the others have suffered a lot for you. Now that you’re grown, you must remember to repay us.”

Wei Hua didn’t reply. When Sister Eight’s rough hands touched his bare skin, his body shivered involuntarily and he felt a bit awkward inside. But hearing her words, something seemed to spread from his mind, and without realizing it, tears began to flow. He felt he could truly sense the deep, heartfelt love that filled little Wei Hua’s heart. Wei Hua quickly wiped his tears away and said,

“Sister Eight, don’t worry! I’ll remember everything you said. You’re all wonderful sisters, and I will repay you. I swear it on our Wei family ancestors!”

“No need for oaths! Sister Eight believes Little Nine won’t forget. Hurry up and finish bathing, then we can eat!” Sister Eight replied.

After breakfast, Wei Hua’s sisters bombarded him with questions, which he answered one by one. Although some answers didn’t fully satisfy them, the sisters confirmed that Wei Hua was indeed normal now—not mentally challenged, but truly recovered.

Within just one day, news that the Wei family’s little fool was cured spread throughout the small mountain village at the foot of the Changbai Mountains. People discussed it at length, saying it must be due to the accumulated virtue of the Wei family’s ancestors. In a few days, Wei Hua had learned everything he wanted to know through various means. The small mountain village where Wei Hua now lived was under the jurisdiction of a county in Jilin Province—a place his previous self had never heard of. The current date was May 1970, that special era when the Cultural Revolution was raging across China, leaving countless painful memories.

Faced with his situation, Wei Hua had to consider his future. In his previous life, he was an angry youth, dissatisfied with some of the government’s diplomatic policies. Yet he understood these policies involved complex issues, not easily solved with a few words or by one or two people. Ultimately, it all boiled down to China’s weak economic and technological strength. The gap between China and the developed nations meant China had little influence internationally and couldn’t steer global trends in its favor.

Now, it seemed heaven had granted Wei Hua a chance to change this, but he knew that the current political landscape in China made his dream impossible. History taught him that this political movement would last another six years. Was he to spend those six years aimlessly? When that great, short-statured statesman began unprecedented reforms, what could he do to influence such a monumental change? What could he use to realize his ideals? All he had was his knowledge of history and technology. To gain enough influence by then, he needed to prepare from now.

As Wei Hua pondered his future, the alien biocomputer lodged in his body began to stir. For several nights, the message in his dreams was: Execute energy collection program. The biocomputer indicated that two types of energy could be collected: solar and electrical. But solar energy was inefficient and became Wei Hua’s second choice. Electricity was his first option. Yet this era’s rural areas, especially small villages like his, had no electricity; people still used oil lamps for lighting at night. Finding electrical energy was not easy. Influenced by the biocomputer, Wei Hua became sensitive to static in the air—after all, lightning was a form of electricity and could be collected.

Summer had arrived, bringing frequent thunderstorms. The static in the clouds would turn into lightning, and whenever thunder began, Wei Hua would dash out of the village into the fields, seeking the energy the biocomputer needed, the power contained in lightning. As this behavior became habitual, villagers started gossiping again. They pitied the Wei family: Little Nine had finally recovered, but now it seemed he’d become a lunatic—one who went crazy every time it thundered.

Even so, the biocomputer remained dissatisfied with the efficiency of energy collection. It needed faster and greater amounts to repair its core. Wei Hua, meanwhile, had a plan for his future: he had to leave China and go to another country—preferably the United States. There, over six to eight years, he would earn his first pot of gold to fund his return and future ventures. He planned to rely on technological advancement as his foundation, but his knowledge was vastly different from that of the 1970s. He needed to reacquire some basic knowledge, but in China at this time, that seemed impossible. Thus, studying abroad became Wei Hua’s only way forward.