Chapter 279: Dumplings and Thirty‑Two Salts

Observer-0's way of holding the chopsticks was very clumsy.

His translucent geometric body had shrunk to the size of a human palm, hovering above the dining table. The two chopsticks, under his control, moved like two uncoordinated mechanical arms; the third time he lifted a dumpling, it slipped three centimeters from the bowl's rim, fell into the vinegar dish, splashing a few drops of amber-colored acidity.

"Use a spoon," Lao Zhao pushed a porcelain spoon over.

Observer-0's warm yellow pattern flickered: "According to the *Fundamentals of Intercivilizational Dining Etiquette*, chopsticks are respect."

"Respect is to eat it into the mouth, not to drop it on the table," Xiao Yu whispered.

In the end he chose to use an energy tendril—not to pinch but to gently lift the dumpling, hovering it toward the geometric body's surface. The moment the dumpling touched the translucent shell, everyone saw: the shell melted open a small aperture, not broken, but naturally blooming like a flower bud, revealing an interior as complex as a nebula.

The dumpling was "eaten" inward.

Observer-0 became still.

Complete, absolute stillness— even the pattern's flicker ceased. Inside the geometric body dense light points began to erupt, like a miniature cosmic Big Bang. After the explosion lasted 3.7 seconds, it suddenly emitted a sound never heard before:

It was not language, not a frequency, but… a sigh.

A sigh with temperature, moisture, almost human-like.

"What is this?" his voice trembled, "this… sense of depth."

"A dumpling," Su Yu said, "cabbage and pork filling. The cabbage was minced two hundred thirty‑seven cuts, pork fat‑to‑lean ratio three to seven, ginger minced…"

"Not the ingredients," Observer-0 interrupted her, the geometric body began to expand and contract irregularly, "it's… time. I tasted the rain that fell while the cabbage grew, the sunlight's warmth when the pig rolled in the mud, and I tasted Lao Zhao's thoughts while chopping the filling— he was thinking of his wife teaching him, and of his son's first bite of his dumplings, the vinegar clinging to the corner of his mouth."

Lao Zhao's hand halted in midair.

"What else did you taste?" Han Qing asked, the scar on his chest warming slightly.

Observer-0's geometric body turned toward him, its warm yellow pattern now rushing like a river: "I tasted you. While you were making this dumpling, you thought of Chen Mo. You wondered, 'If the teacher were here, what filling would he make?' Then you answered yourself in your mind: 'The teacher would make sesame‑sugar filling, tricking children into thinking it's a lucky dumpling.'"

The kitchen was so quiet one could hear the faucet's drip.

One drop, two drops, three drops.

Observer-0 lifted the second dumpling.

This time he proactively requested, "Please give me the one with osmanthus."

The seventeen‑fold dumpling Su Yu had made was placed before him. Dried osmanthus comprised only 0.3% of the filling's weight, but when the dumpling entered his body—

the geometric body suddenly shuddered violently.

It was not a pleasurable tremor but a painful, electricity‑piercing shiver. The warm yellow pattern began to mix with glaring red alarm light, and the interior structure emitted faint cracking sounds.

"What's wrong?!" Xiao Yu stood up.

"Too… heavy," Observer-0's voice faltered, "this osmanthus… isn't from this year. It's from seven years ago. It was dried by Chen Mo on a day called 'White Dew', the day he was first diagnosed with early‑stage cancer, though he told no one. He just sat in the courtyard drying the osmanthus, humming a song as he worked."

The internal cracking grew louder.

"He was thinking… 'If I can't cure it, these osmanthus will be the last autumn I leave for Xiao Qing.'"

Han Qing's breath stopped.

Observer-0 continued, "I tasted… sadness. Not the 'Sadness Emotion Code 7‑B' in the data logs, but genuine, viscous, body‑temperature sadness. It's too heavy; my logical core cannot… cannot…"

Real cracks began to appear on the geometric body's surface.

Lao Zhao poured a small cup of scalding tea.

Instead of handing it over, he splashed it directly at Observer-0— but the moment the tea touched the geometric body, he gestured with his other hand in the air, and all the droplets coalesced into a hovering tea sphere, slowly seeping into the cracks.

"Hot!" Observer-0 emitted a startled exclamation.

"That's the point," Lao Zhao said, "heat distracts you. When you process both 'heat' and 'sadness' simultaneously, the brain—or whatever core you have—will automatically dilute the sadness."

The tea's temperature data streamed into Observer-0's system.

78.3°C. Tieguanyin. Third steep. While brewing, Lao Zhao thought, "This tea can cut greasiness and also loosen overly heavy memories."

The cracks ceased expanding.

Observer-0's geometric body gradually stabilized, the warm yellow pattern reclaiming dominance. It "digested" the tea and also the seven‑year sorrow sealed within the osmanthus.

"I understand," his voice steadied, adding a hint of… fatigue, "why your civilization stresses 'eating together.' Because when one flavor is too heavy, the person beside you can give you another flavor to balance it. This is… a distributed emotional load system."

Han Qing walked to the table edge, picked up the third dumpling— a plain cabbage‑pork filling, with no special markings.

"This one," he placed the dumpling on an empty plate before Observer-0, "while making it I thought of this morning's sesame field. The dew was heavy, but a bird was singing. That's all."

Observer-0 carefully "ate" it.

Inside the geometric body a soft, dawn‑like pale gold light glowed.

"This is good," he said, "each drop of dew weighs 0.07 g, the bird's song frequency fluctuates between 1200 and 1800 Hz. Simple, but… enough for me to continue learning the art of 'tasting.'"

It wasn't the kitchen alarm, but a forced transmission directly into Observer-0's core system. A cold, emotionless voice:

【Cosmic Memory Archive Supreme Committee·Emergency Recall Order】

Supervisor Code Zero, detection indicates your logical core has suffered irreversible affective contamination. According to *Memory Archive Security Law* Article 1, you are ordered to sever all external connections immediately and undergo formatted reset. Countdown: 300 seconds.

The air in the kitchen solidified.

The countdown numbers began to tick: 299, 298, 297…

Observer-0's geometric body slowly turned toward the window—outside, grafted saplings, each with seven braid‑like branches pointing at him, the tiny flowers at the ends blooming a farewell pale violet.

"I still have," he calculated, "four dumplings untried."

Lao Zhao pushed the remaining four dumplings before him: "Eat faster."

"Not enough," Observer-0's pattern began to intertwine complexly, "I also want to taste the sourness of vinegar, the spiciness of garlic, the searing heat of chili oil. I also want the sweetness of sweet soup, the warmth of ginger tea, the bitter aroma of almond tea."

Countdown: 250, 249…

Han Qing's Teaching Scar suddenly flared intensely. At the peak of the heat, the scar's surface revealed the final words Chen Mo left— not a prophecy, but permission:

"If the rules intend to erase the flavor you just tasted, then don't return. Stay, become the first 'Rebellious Flavor Recorder.' I approve."

Observer-0 read that sentence.

Its geometric body, for the first time, emitted a frequency vibration resembling laughter.