Two campus security guards in black waterproof coats dragged a heavy metal storage rack out through the double doors of Basement Lab Number Four on the western campus of Jiangcheng University, dumping it onto the wet asphalt.
Around their boots, cardboard boxes filled with research notebooks and glass test tubes lay scattered across the concrete.
“Be careful with those circuit boards!” an elderly voice cried out in anguish. “Those are three years of graphene resistance measurements! If moisture touches the silver terminals, all our calibration data will be destroyed!”
Professor Xu fell to his knees in the puddles, his thin hands trying desperately to shield a stack of paper charts from the falling rain. The sixty-three-year-old mentor wore a faded gray wool cardigan with frayed sleeves. His silver hair was plastered against his forehead, his glasses fogged with mist and tears.
Beside him, two young graduate researchers in damp white lab coats knelt on the ground.
Lin Xiaoxiao, a twenty-three-year-old orphan scholar with short hair and patched sneakers, used her own coat to cover a delicate laser sensor. Next to her, Chen Yu, an impoverished student from a remote mountain village, held two cracked plastic storage bins against his chest, shielding experimental graphene cells with his own body.
Standing under a large black golf umbrella held by an aide was Vice-Dean Ma.
The executive vice-dean wore a tailored cashmere overcoat and gleaming leather shoes. His round belly strained against his silk vest, and a sneer of arrogant contempt curled his lips.
“Save your tears, Old Xu,” Vice-Dean Ma barked, tapping his gold-tipped fountain pen against a leather clipboard. “This basement lab belongs to the School of Materials Science, not your private family charity. Young Master Zhao Kai’s technology company has reserved this entire floor for the Centennial Alumni Exhibition.”
“Vice-Dean Ma, our solid-state battery testing needs only forty-eight more hours!” Lin Xiaoxiao pleaded, her voice trembling with cold and fury. “Our battery cell reached nine hundred watt-hours per kilogram yesterday! It is a national breakthrough! You cannot evict us on the eve of the alumni gala!”
“Breakthrough?” Vice-Dean Ma chuckled mockingly. “A breakthrough made by two broke orphans without a single yuan of corporate funding? Who do you think you are?”
Vice-Dean Ma stepped forward, his leather shoes splashing dirty rainwater onto Professor Xu’s papers. He pulled a printed contract from his leather folder and thrust it toward Lin Xiaoxiao.
“Sign over your Solid-State Graphene Battery data to Young Master Zhao Kai’s tech firm for five thousand yuan today,” Vice-Dean Ma snarled in a low, venomous voice. “Or neither of you orphan brats will graduate from Jiangcheng University! If you sign, Young Master Zhao will generously give each of you twenty-five hundred yuan in relocation aid. If you refuse, I will cancel your degree defenses and blacklist you from every university lab in the country!”
Chen Yu’s eyes turned crimson. “Five thousand yuan?! Our battery patent is worth hundreds of millions! Zhao Kai wants to steal our research for his stock listing!”
“He has the capital and the political connections,” Vice-Dean Ma snapped coldly. “You two have nothing. In this world, poor students don’t own intellectual property. Guards, clear out the rest of the junk! Throw that oscilloscope into the garbage bin!”
A burly guard grabbed a precision digital oscilloscope from the doorway. The fragile instrument was worth forty thousand yuan, bought with Professor Xu’s personal pension savings. The guard casually tossed it toward the puddle-strewn pavement.
Professor Xu screamed in horror, reaching out with both hands.
Suddenly, a gust of wind swept through the courtyard.
A figure appeared like a phantom beside the falling machine. A slender, pale hand shot out with terrifying speed, catching the thirty-pound oscilloscope by its steel handle an inch above the puddle.
Not a single drop of water touched the sensitive casing.
Lin Mo stood in the drizzle, wearing a simple white shirt and dark trousers. His eyes were calm, dark, and utterly cold.
Behind him, Su Wan stepped out of a black executive van, holding a large umbrella. Shen Qiaoqiao followed closely, carrying an embossed legal briefcase. Tie Niu and six Iron Guard veterans in tailored charcoal suits fanned out across the courtyard, their sharp military presence freezing the four security guards in their tracks.
“Lin Mo?!” Professor Xu gasped, pushing his foggy glasses up his nose in utter astonishment.
Lin Xiaoxiao and Chen Yu looked up from the wet concrete, their eyes wide. Three years ago, Lin Mo had been their senior classmate in the same basement lab, working night shifts to pay for his college tuition.
“Professor Xu, Xiaoxiao, Chen Yu,” Lin Mo said, his voice gentle and warm as he set the heavy oscilloscope safely onto a dry bench. “Forgive me for arriving a few minutes late. Please stand up. No honest scholar in Jiangcheng will ever kneel in the mud again.”
Lin Mo reached down with both hands, lifting Professor Xu and Lin Xiaoxiao gently from the wet pavement.
His [Pure-Heart Eye Lv.1] blinked softly.
[Target: Professor Xu.]
[Goodness Score: 93/100.]
[Moral Status: Selfless educator, spent life savings supporting impoverished students, refused all corporate bribes.]
[Target: Lin Xiaoxiao.]
[Goodness Score: 94/100.]
[Moral Status: Brilliant researcher, dedicated orphan scholar, refused to falsify lab data.]
[Target: Chen Yu.]
[Goodness Score: 94/100.]
[Moral Status: Hardworking rural scholar, sends eighty percent of student stipend home to sick parents.]
Lin Mo’s heart warmed with deep respect. These three people represented the purest spirit of scientific pursuit. They had endured three years of cold basements and moldy bread, yet their moral character remained flawless.
Lin Mo then turned his gaze toward Vice-Dean Ma.
[Target: Vice-Dean Ma.]
[Goodness Score: 12/100.]
[Moral Status: Extorts student patents, embezzles departmental research grants, colludes with Zhao Kai to falsify academic credentials.]
Vice-Dean Ma frowned, glaring at Lin Mo’s simple white shirt. He remembered Lin Mo as a quiet, penniless undergraduate who had graduated a few months ago.
“Lin Mo?” Vice-Dean Ma sneered, crossing his arms under his umbrella. “You graduated six months ago as a broke orphan. Who gave you permission to bring outside thugs onto campus and interfere with university administration?”
Lin Mo took a slow breath, stepping forward until he stood three feet from Vice-Dean Ma.
“Interfering with administration?” Lin Mo asked in a deadpan tone. “I only see a greedy bureaucrat attempting to extort a five-thousand-yuan robbery from two brilliant students.”
Vice-Dean Ma laughed coldly. “They used university electricity and university lab benches! Under our regulations, all research conducted on campus belongs to the department! Young Master Zhao Kai has already agreed to donate ten million yuan to our school at tonight’s gala. In exchange, this battery patent belongs to Zhao Technology. Now take your hands off our school property and get out!”
Shen Qiaoqiao stepped forward, opening her leather briefcase with a crisp snap. She pulled out a stamped legal document bound with blue ribbons.
“Vice-Dean Ma, I suggest you review the National Higher Education Intellectual Property Law,” Shen Qiaoqiao said in a clear, sharp voice. “Section Forty-Two explicitly states that graduate research funded by student personal stipends and independent mentor pensions belongs entirely to the individual inventors. Furthermore, the university failed to provide any departmental grant funding to Basement Lab Four for twenty-four consecutive months.”
Shen Qiaoqiao thrust the document directly against Vice-Dean Ma’s chest.
“This is an emergency Intellectual Property Preservation Injunction issued by the Jiangcheng Intellectual Property Court,” Shen Qiaoqiao announced. “Any attempt by you or Zhao Technology to seize, copy, or transfer the Graphene Solid-State Battery data will result in immediate criminal prosecution for trade secret theft.”
Vice-Dean Ma’s round face flinched. He glanced at the official court seal, his fingers twitching nervously.
“Injunction?” Vice-Dean Ma blustered, trying to maintain his arrogant stance. “An injunction is just paper! Filing international patents and setting up high-level testing costs millions! Lin Xiaoxiao and Chen Yu don’t even have fifty yuan to replace their broken test tubes! Without money, this research will rot in the dirt!”
Lin Mo pulled his Black-Gold Card from his pocket and handed it to Su Wan.
“Su Wan, execute the funding package immediately,” Lin Mo instructed calmly. “Allocate five million yuan right now. Two million yuan goes directly to the top-tier global patent agency for international fast-track priority filings in Beijing, Washington, and Geneva, registered solely under the names of Lin Xiaoxiao, Chen Yu, and Professor Xu.”
Lin Mo pointed toward the western campus gate.
“The remaining three million yuan will deploy a luxury modular mobile clean-room lab to this courtyard within thirty minutes,” Lin Mo added. “And provide each of these two researchers with a fifty-thousand-yuan monthly research stipend.”
Su Wan’s fingers moved swiftly across her mobile financial terminal: ¥5,000,000.00.
BEEP.
A crisp, celestial chime rang out in Lin Mo’s mind:
[Ding! Detected spending of ¥5,000,000.00 RMB on Impoverished Scholars Lin Xiaoxiao (94/100), Chen Yu (94/100), and Professor Xu (93/100)!]
[Target Integrity Verified: Defense of academic justice, protecting vital national energy patents from corporate extortion.]
[Triggered 100x Pure Benevolence System Refund!]
[Received Cash Refund: +¥500,000,000.00 RMB!]
[Funds deposited directly into Host Personal Liquid Vault!]
[Personal Liquid Vault: ¥50,500,000,000.00 RMB!]
[Benevolence Merit Points: +500,000 BMP | Total BMP: 143,449,528 BMP!]
[Good People Network Expanded: 8,210 Verified Righteous Allies (+10: Professor Xu, Lin Xiaoxiao, Chen Yu, and lab assistants)!]
Five hundred million cash refund, Lin Mo thought, watching his vault balance reach fifty point five billion. Spending five million to protect honest scholars from academic parasites, and earning half a billion in profit. Doing good is the most efficient investment in the universe.
Lin Xiaoxiao dropped her clipboard in pure shock. “Five... five million yuan?! International patent priority filings in our names?!”
Chen Yu covered his face, bursting into tears of overwhelming relief. “We don’t have to sell our life’s work for five thousand yuan... Professor Xu, we did it! Our battery will be built!”
Professor Xu gripped Lin Mo’s hand with trembling fingers, tears streaming down his wrinkled cheeks. “Lin Mo... Xiao Mo... you saved our research. You saved our lives!”
“You taught me to seek truth, Professor,” Lin Mo said softly. “The truth should never have to beg for bread.”
Right on cue, two heavy flatbed trucks rolled through the western gate of the campus.
Master Lu Jian jumped down from the passenger cabin, wearing his yellow hard hat. “Chairman Lin! Taichu Mobile Clean-Room Lab Unit One has arrived! Class-100 dust-free environment, independent solar power grid, and thirty liquid-nitrogen refrigeration chambers! Where do you want it parked?!”
“Right here outside Basement Lab Four,” Lin Mo ordered with a grin. “Set it up and move all of Professor Xu’s equipment inside immediately.”
“Yes, Chairman Lin!” Lu Jian shouted, blowing his whistle as forty construction workers began unloading the gleaming titanium-alloy laboratory pod.
Vice-Dean Ma stood frozen under his umbrella. His face turned from red to purple, then to a sickly white. Five million yuan cash paid on the spot, backed by a world-class mobile clean room, had completely shattered his extortion scheme.
Before Vice-Dean Ma could open his mouth to speak, the roar of a high-performance sports car engine echoed from the campus main boulevard.
A gold-wrapped Porsche 911 convertible sped through the rain, followed by a luxury Mercedes Maybach. The Porsche pulled to an abrupt stop beside the faculty administration building, splashing muddy water across the sidewalk.
The driver door opened. Zhao Kai stepped out, wearing a midnight-blue velvet tuxedo and gold-rimmed glasses.
From the passenger side stepped Liu Yan, dressed in an extravagant backless crimson evening gown. She held a crystal champagne glass in one hand and adjusted a glittering diamond choker around her neck.
Behind them, two assistants unloaded a massive six-foot foam check covered in gold foil. Emblazoned across the foam board in giant glitter letters was: Zhao Technology Holdings Donates ¥10,000,000 to Jiangcheng University Centennial Fund!
Liu Yan stepped onto the red carpet that led to the alumni auditorium, holding up her smartphone for a live broadcast.
“Hello to all my followers!” Liu Yan purred into her phone with an arrogant smirk. “We are here at the Centennial Alumni Gala! Young Master Zhao Kai and I are presenting a ten-million-yuan endowment to build the new Zhao Science Center! True success is about elite influence and seven-figure charity!”
As Liu Yan turned her camera toward the crowd, her gaze suddenly caught Lin Mo standing outside Basement Lab Four.
Her rehearsed smile instantly vanished.
“Lin Mo?!” Liu Yan gasped, her voice shrill with venomous disgust. “What is that broke courier doing here on our red carpet?!”
Zhao Kai looked up, his jaw clenching as his eyes locked onto Lin Mo’s calm, smiling face.