Chapter 319: with translation of chapter title

As dawn just began to break, Zhao Jianguo woke up.

The breakfast stall at the hutong entrance hadn't been set up yet, the courtyard was very quiet, only a neighboring rooster gave a half-crow as if dozing. He sat up, rubbed his eyes, and habitually murmured in his mind: 'Check-in.'

A light screen appeared silently, white characters on a blue background, a clean line: 【Today's check-in successful, obtained "Anti-gravity Device Blueprint" ×1】.

Zhao Jianguo stared for three seconds, thinking his eyes were playing tricks. He blinked again, leaned in to look—still the same line.

"What the heck?" he muttered, "Anti-gravity? No way, last time I checked in I only got an energy-saving stove design, and just a few days later it jumps straight to flight?"

Zhao Jianguo sat cross-legged on the kang, staring at that line of text, reading it over and over; the more he looked, the less it seemed fake. The system never jokes—previous vaccines, water purifiers, barrier‑free apps, which one wasn't outrageous? Yet in the end they all became real.

"Could it really be possible to make something that floats in the air?" Zhao Jianguo scratched his head, then broke into a grin. "When Jia Dongxu sees this, he won't be able to hold back his excitement and will throw his glasses away?"

Zhao Jianguo put on his shoes and jumped out of bed, not even stopping for breakfast, grabbed an enamel jar and gulped some Cool Tea, hopped on his 28‑inch bicycle and raced to the research institute. The wind on the road slapped his face, and as he rode he laughed, "If this really works, the coal stoves in our courtyard could be hauled aloft—no more Old Li complaining about hauling them."

Arriving at the place, gatekeeper Old Zhang was gnawing on a sesame cake.

"Yo, Engineer Zhao, you're here earlier than a chicken!"

"There's an emergency!" Zhao Jianguo locked his bike, not breaking stride, "Is Engineer Jia in?"

"Upstairs Laboratory, he'd been up all night, just now slumped over the desk dozing."

Zhao Jianguo took the stairs three at a time, pushed the door open, and a strong coffee smell hit him. Jia Dongxu leaned in his Chair, his glasses sliding down to the tip of his nose, half a pencil still pinched in his hand, a stack of draft papers spread before him, covered in dense formulas.

"Wake up! Something big's happened!" Zhao Jianguo slapped his palm on the table.

Jia Dongxu jerked awake, his glasses almost falling off. "Who? What's wrong? An earthquake?"

"More intense than an earthquake." Zhao Jianguo pulled out the small notebook he always carried, flipped to a page with a messily drawn schematic, and pushed it toward him. "Take a look at this."

Jia Dongxu straightened his glasses, squinted, and his brows immediately knotted into a shape resembling the Chinese character for 'river' (three short parallel lines). "What… is this device? A magnetic field deflection ring? A closed‑energy loop? These symbols… aren't part of our current physics system."

"Anti‑gravity Device." Zhao Jianguo said calmly, "I got it from this morning's sign‑in."

Jia Dongxu lifted his head, staring straight at him, as if judging whether he was feverish and talking nonsense.

"You didn't hear wrong." Zhao Jianguo nodded. "It's the kind that lets people or things break free of gravity."

Jia Dongxu took a deep breath, took off his glasses, wiped them, put them back on, and looked over the drawing again. This time he traced the lines with his finger, muttering, "Local spacetime curvature regulation…… negative‑energy field shielding…… this design concept…… is way too ahead of its time."

He sprang to his feet, pinned the paper to the Blackboard, grabbed a piece of Chalk, and began calculating.

Zhao Jianguo dragged a Chair over and sat down, watching him work. Outside the window the sun rose higher; from the Courtyard came the sounds of sweeping, pouring water, and a child shouting for its mother, while inside the only noises were the tick‑tick of Chalk on the Blackboard and the rustle of turning paper.

At noon, Zhao Jianguo had the downstairs cafeteria deliver two boxes of Meal Ticket, rice Meal Ticket with stewed pork and potatoes, plus a bottle of soda.

"Have a bite first." Zhao Jianguo pushed the Meal Ticket box over.

Jia Dongxu didn't even look up: "Just leave it there; I'll eat it later."

At three in the afternoon, Jia Dongxu finally put down the Chalk, rubbed his sore shoulders, stared at the Blackboard for a full five minutes before slowly saying, "The drawing is real."

"What do you mean?" Zhao Jianguo asked.

"I'm not saying it can be used; I'm saying——its logic is self‑consistent." Jia Dongxu turned, eyes bright, "Every module has theoretical backing, the Mathematics Corner model is complete, even the material stress distribution has been worked out. This isn't random scribbling; someone actually made this."

Zhao Jianguo grinned: "Then isn't that settled? Let's build one quick!"

"Hold on." Jia Dongxu picked up the draft paper and flipped to a page. "The problem here—the core component needs a metal with 'Negative Mass Response' property."

"What's Negative Mass Response?"

"It means…… when force is applied, it doesn't follow Newton's laws. You push it, it moves toward you; you pull it, it springs away. Such a material doesn't exist in our periodic table at all."

Zhao Jianguo frowned: "What do we do then? Make it now?"

"Can't be made." Jia Dongxu shook his head. "This isn't a craftsmanship issue; the substance simply doesn't exist in our world."

The two fell silent for a moment. Outside, the sky grew dim; the corridor lights switched on automatically, casting a yellow glow into the room that fell on a corner of the drawing.

Zhao Jianguo stayed silent a moment, closed his eyes, and shouted in his mind: "System."

The Light Screen appeared again: 【Detected user query, hint: that metal exists only in a Parallel World】.

The image flashed, showing a purple star‑sky with mountains floating in the air, rivers flowing upward, a stone bridge spanning the clouds, and shadowy figures walking across it. Less than two seconds later, the image vanished.

Zhao Jianguo opened his eyes, his face turning a little pale.

"What did you see?" Jia Dongxu asked.

"The System said——that metal isn't here."

"Where is it?"

"Another world."

Jia Dongxu froze, his lips moving as if to speak, then he swallowed the words. He slowly sank back into his Chair, crossed his arms against his forehead, the eyes behind his lenses fixed on the ground without blinking.

After a long while, he whispered, "If this is true…… we're touching the edge of the universe."

Zhao Jianguo didn't respond. He gazed out the window; the sky was completely dark, lights in the family building opposite the research institute flickered on one by one, a child on a balcony called out a companion's name, and from below came the radio's storytelling—everything was as usual.

But he knew, something had changed.

The lights in the room stayed on, the boxed Meal Ticket on the table had gone cold, the soda bottle cap still tight. Jia Dongxu picked up his pen again, and, stroke by stroke, wrote a few words on the material notation in the corner of the drawing: 【Cross‑World Resource Acquisition·Possible Route Analysis】.

Zhao Jianguo stood by the window, hands shoved in his pockets, unmoving.

Night wind slipped through the window crack, stirring the draft papers on the desk; one sheet floated to the floor, bearing a ring‑shaped structure with small caption underneath: "Simulation levitation test·preliminary design."

Jia Dongxu bent down, picked it up, brushed off the dust, and slipped it back into his notebook.

Zhao Jianguo turned, glanced at the wall clock—eleven twenty‑three at night.

"You're not going back tonight?" Zhao Jianguo asked.

Jia Dongxu nodded. "I need to look at this drawing one more time."

Zhao Jianguo grunted acknowledgment, then said nothing more. He walked to the door, rested his hand on the knob, paused, and glanced back at the drawing on the Blackboard.

On it, a tiny arrow pointed to the central ring, with the note beside it: "Activation condition: unknown."

Zhao Jianguo pulled the door open, stepped out, and gently closed it behind him.

The corridor lights were dim yellow, and his footsteps faded away.

Only Jia Dongxu remained in the room. He took off his glasses, wiped them with the corner of his shirt, put them back on, flipped to a fresh sheet of draft paper, and wrote the first line: 【Assuming a Parallel World exists……】.

The brush tip rustled.

Outside the window, the moon broke through the clouds, shining on the siheyuan's tiles, casting a bluish‑gray glow.