Shepherding Humanity

Xu Zhi didn't feel like deliberately stepping on them, and was just thinking about how he could best make use of these free laborers. He needed them to work hard for his sake and help him evolve new species for his sandbox.

When he got past the gate, he found that Chen Xi had already stopped the electric scooter and was waiting by the entrance. She laughed and said: "What's the point of farming all day long? It should be more fun to date pretty girls."

"Farming improves my mood and helps me with my cancer." Xu Zhi replied distractedly. "Girls aren’t anywhere near as interesting as farming."

"You’re such a blockhead. Now, let's go and have some fun at my high school reunion." She started pulling on Xu Zhi's hand.

The two drove out of the county town and stopped at a relatively empty street in Dongcheng. It was not a very prosperous neighborhood, and there was only a mid-scale restaurant around the corner. Her classmates were first year college students and didn't have much money after all.

They walked up to a party room on the second floor, and pushed open the door. A large number of energetic young men and women were gathered around a couple of dining tables, chatting and enjoying their meal. When Xu Zhi stepped through the door, a great commotion started in the party room.

"Who is this!? Did you get the room number wrong?"

"So handsome and stylish! Did some movie star enter our room by mistake?"

Xu Zhi awkwardly rubbed his nose.

At this time, a cheerfully smiling Chen Xi walked out from behind Xu Zhi. The uproar made her feel very satisfied, and she proudly raised her head. "This is my boyfriend, Xu Zhi. I have already told everyone in our group, right? He’s super handsome!"

Girl, are you quite done with showing off?

Xu Zhi helplessly looked at the smug Chen Xi.

He and Chen Xi sat down together. Girls who were Chen Xi's good friends and high school classmates gathered around them. They started grilling Xu Zhi, without bothering to pay any attention to their manners.

"He’s really handsome. Chen Xi where did you meet? Is he a model? Or an actor?"

Another girl started analyzing his face: "With his handsome and well-defined features, he looks like a half-Asian, with the unique characteristics of other races. He’s not quite inhumanly beautiful, and his looks are a little short of perfect, but he has such a striking presence. The more you look at him, the more attractive he seems."

The girls chattered. A tall and slender girl in a black silk skirt gazed at Xu Zhi with sparkling eyes as she started to caress his face. Another small and cute girl took advantage of the chaos and sneakily touched Xu Zhi's abs.

Chen Xi immediately placed herself in front of Xu Zhi and held his arm, acting like a mother bear defending her cub. "Stop stop stop! What are you idiots doing? He's mine! Are you trying to steal my man? You may look and drool, but do not touch!"

"Cheapskate!"

"So what if I touch him? It's not like he’ll lose anything."

"Right! He looks so handsome that I couldn’t help myself. I was just touching to confirm that he’s not a statue. And those abs! I really want to touch them…"

Ahem.

Xu Zhi let out a dry cough. Girls these days were so bold, he could feel the generation gap.

Though the girls crowded around Xhu Zhi, he was unruffled. He knew that Chen Xi had asked him to accompany her so that she could show off, and quietly sat in his place.

He hadn't purposefully adjusted his body and face to look shockingly handsome. This was simply the natural result of evolution. After evolving and discarding his miscellaneous useless genes, he had gotten closer to being a perfect life-form.

"Yes, that’s right, he's my boyfriend." Faced with her friend’s envious gazes, Chen Xi happily preened. She enjoyed her meal with her friends, while bragging about how good Xu Zhi was to her, and how they’ve loved one another since childhood. She went on and on.

Xu Zhi did not contradict her. He had accompanied her to the class reunion so that she could brag after all.

"He’s an alumni of our high school, and went to a famous college. Until just recently, he had been working in a foreign company."

"You guys are childhood sweethearts, and he’s five years older than you. No wonder you’ve ignored all the boys in our class, even though so many of them had been chasing after you. You already have a prince charming who grew up together with you since childhood."

Chen Xi was a mischievous and lively girl who had many admirers. There were quite a few boys with unpleasant looks on their faces who came over to offer Xu Zhi a toast. Xu Zhi did not refuse anybody, and laughed with them as he drank down the wine.

He was unruffled.

Over the course of his work, he had encountered a lot of malicious people. He knew that the young men before him didn't have much ill intent. They were just beginning college, and were still inexperienced and naive. They simply wanted to get him drunk and make a fool of himself.

But with how Xu Zhi's body was currently, that would be very difficult to do.

After dinner, they went out to sing.

In the karaoke box, the group’s interest in Xu Zhi slowly faded. To the side, the three or four boys Xu Zhi had drunk under the table lay collapsed on the ground, red faced and mumbling nonsense. No one dared to approach him with wine anymore.

The girls sang while some of the boys played with their phones. Others chatted, and some were watching a live broadcast.

Xu Zhi had also been playing with his phone as he silently sat on the couch. He was waiting to drive Chen Xi back home after she got tired of singing. But then, he casually glanced at the boys next to him and grew a little concerned.

The live stream they were watching was from the game “Spore Evolution”.

"Wow! It's so amazing! There really are infinite possibilities. I’ve seen this streamer do the same thing every time. And yet, he always gets a different species." A boy marveled as he sat on the couch looking at his phone. "They’re probably using a supercomputer similar to the one used for AlphaGo to do the calculations in real time."

"This player is so stupid! I'm way better than him. Really looking forward to the Open Beta." Another boy was also discussing the game as he looked at the video’s comments. His spittle flew everywhere. "I also want to start from a single cell, evolve into a new creature, share its hyper realistic senses, and live a second life."

"No way, according to expert analysis, it probably won’t be open to the general public, and there cannot be too many people online at the same time." Somebody else sighed helplessly. "After all, a virtual reality that’s no different from the real world requires far too much processing power. Furthermore, each species is random, and the possibilities of evolution are infinite. There should be several supercomputers maintaining the sandbox game. That’s why it can only be a niche game. There’s not enough processing power to support too many people."

Apparently, this game has become super popular on the internet. Everyone wanted to check it out, to no avail.

It wasn’t a hardware problem like they had speculated, this wasn’t really a computer game after all. Xu Zhi simply didn't want too many players because he had nothing to gain from that.

"This game is just too hardcore. If you ask me, the current batch of players are a bunch of noobs! Their species are all deformed, it's simply a waste of this game. Better to let the pros show them how it’s done." A student who boasted that he was studying the subject of natural evolution looked really envious and said: "If it were me, I’d surely evolve a proper species."

Let the pros have a go?

Xu Zhi was startled. Why didn’t he think of that?

He now knew what he needed to do. This outing with Chen Xi had been a most productive trip.