Little Pink Starfish

In the dim red light, the six round black holes resembled the compound eyes of an insect, silently staring at him.

An Zhe instinctively took a step back, bumping into the metal platform behind him. In that moment, he lost his balance and steadied himself by pressing a hand on the engraved epitaph. The raised lettering gave a tactile sense of presence. For some reason, this cold, solitary metal platform standing in the hollow hall, holding the ashes of the dead, made him feel safe.

An Zhe quietly exhaled and carefully walked forward to the row of pipe openings.
He crawled into each of the six ducts in turn but still couldn’t find any trace of the marking mycelium—it was too thin. Once it snapped, it would retract and likely got carried off by the wind, stuck who knows where in some corner. Besides, it was too dark here.

He looked around in confusion.
On each of the four walls of this cylindrical space—front, back, left, and right—were six pipe entrances each. Twenty-four in total, all leading in different directions. This was the source of the entire city’s ventilation system.

An Zhe knew he had two choices—either find the way back before dawn and try again the next night, or… simply not go back at all.
He could abandon his human identity and let “An Zhe” disappear from the main city. As a mushroom, he would roam the underground ventilation system day and night. As long as he didn’t dry out, he could eventually reach the Lighthouse.

The wind howled louder. An Zhe shivered slightly, realizing that the choice he was about to make would determine his entire future.

But even if he decided to return—could he actually find his way back?

He didn’t know.
Looking at the six black tunnels in the direction he had come from, he gritted his teeth and crawled into the one slightly right of center—he wasn’t sure if this was the right one, only fate could decide fate now.

In fact, it would be easier to enter the pipe as mycelium, but with three human predecessors buried here, he didn’t want them to see an alien species intrude.
So, only after he had fully entered the pipe did An Zhe return to his mycelium form.

The mycelium sped up, moving along the wind. The current pushed from behind as An Zhe turned past several corners and crossed many intersections. Now he only wanted to reach a pipe leading into a human room—if it had a window, even better.
He could quietly slip out the window, find the nearest shuttle stop under cover of night, attach himself to the underside of a shuttle, and let it carry him near Building 24. From there, he could sneak back into his residential tower. As long as the night was deep enough, no one would notice.

He wandered aimlessly like this for a long time. When the duct grew narrower, a faint light finally appeared ahead. He approached the vent opening.

—It was a ceiling vent.

Looking down from the pipe, what appeared in the center of his field of vision was a cylindrical transparent container filled with slightly cloudy liquid. Floating inside was a flesh-colored mass, small, about the size of two human fists. A transparent tube connected this mass to a complex-looking device.

A strange sensation rose from the device. An Zhe couldn’t describe the feeling exactly, but he knew—the object inside the container was alive.

He froze.
He understood now.

It was a cub.
No, an embryo. A human infant’s embryo.

Looking further to the side, there was another identical device. Not just one—in fact, the entire spacious room was filled with them, densely packed. His vision was limited, so he couldn’t gauge the full size of the room, but he knew—this base could produce five to ten thousand cubs each year.

So, this wasn’t just any place—he had accidentally wandered into Eden.

An Zhe exhaled in relief. Eden was familiar. But at the same time, he felt the situation had become more troublesome—he knew how dearly humans treasured their cubs. Nearly all areas of Eden were monitored by cameras and staffed 24/7. No one could harm the cubs.

Thinking of this, he grew angry again.
If mushrooms had cameras, how could his own cub have been dug up by Lu Feng?

But after three seconds, An Zhe realized the flaw in his logic—
Even with cameras, they couldn’t have stopped Lu Feng from taking the spore.
The real problem wasn’t the surveillance—it was Lu Feng, that awful person.

…No,
The real problem now was: how was he going to get out of here?