The morning after the skyscraper's completion, the macroeconomists arrived in Binhai City.
Jiang Ye, along with a contingent of military officers, waited near the landing zone. He had expected a colossal spaceship, but what arrived was a small craft, roughly the size of a bus.
As the hatch lifted, a bevy of beautiful women descended. Each was dressed more fashionably than the last, exuding an aura of wealth and nobility. Among the forty macroeconomists, there wasn't a single man.
Jiang Ye was taken aback but quickly stepped forward to greet them.
Upon seeing the lead macroeconomist, he felt as if struck by lightning. The hand he had extended froze mid-air, and the welcoming speech he had prepared vanished instantly.
The woman, who had initially worn a professional smile, also froze upon seeing him. Her eyes widened, her face a mask of disbelief.
Jiang Ye: "Is... is that you?"
Feng Zhi Shuang: "It's actually you!"
The officers and other economists behind them were stunned. From the looks of it, the leaders of both groups knew each other. But how was that possible?
Jiang Ye felt a dizzying sensation, as if he were dreaming. He forgot where he was, even what he was doing. Memories flashed before his eyes.
His sixth-grade class monitor had been a fiery girl named Feng Shuang Shuang, and they had even shared a desk for half a semester. Back then, Jiang Ye enjoyed catching rhinoceros beetles in the poplar trees on the playground and keeping them in a mineral water bottle to bring back to the classroom. Feng Shuang Shuang, however, was terrified of rhinoceros beetles. Every time she saw one, she would scream and thrash Jiang Ye violently, her attacks fierce and unyielding, like someone resisting an invasion. Jiang Ye's head was often covered in bumps, and he would get angry, thinking, "What's it to you if I catch a tiny beetle? I'm not letting it out to bite you!" After half a semester as desk mates, they parted ways with a sense of relief, akin to a divorce.
The Feng Zhi Shuang before him was unmistakably Feng Shuang Shuang!
However, she wasn't the same as she was in childhood, nor did she possess the youthful vigor of someone in their early twenties. Despite her meticulous makeup, her skin condition and subtle wrinkles betrayed her age, likely over thirty-five.
Feng Zhi Shuang's eyes reddened, and she suddenly embraced Jiang Ye. A murmur swept through the economists behind them.
...
The top floor of the Macroeconomic Building.
A sprawling, ultra-luxurious office of fifteen hundred square meters was brightly lit, every lamp ablaze.
Jiang Ye and Feng Zhi Shuang sat by the desk, each holding a cup of black tea. The other macroeconomists were in the lower-level offices, settling in. The two old acquaintances, seizing a moment of leisure, had retreated here to chat, and indeed, they had much to discuss.
Jiang Ye studied her for a long time, then smiled, "I never would have imagined."
"I never would have imagined it either."
"I thought I'd never see an old acquaintance again in this lifetime."
"Most of the people we knew back then have indeed turned to fossils. Over a millennium has passed," Feng Zhi Shuang smiled. "You look so young."
"I contracted a terminal illness in my twenties, was cryogenically frozen, and thawed the year before last," Jiang Ye explained. "So, purely in terms of physiological age, I'm still in my twenties. In terms of actual age, I've lived longer than a turtle. I'm ancient, a hundred-year-old would be a mere infant before me."
"I was frozen at twenty-five, but I've been thawed for fourteen years," Feng Zhi Shuang calculated, counting on her fingers. "So, I'm thirty-nine now."
Jiang Ye looked at her strangely. "Aren't you a senior macroeconomist? How do you need to count simple addition and subtraction within a hundred by counting on your fingers?"
"Who told you macroeconomists are good at mental arithmetic? We focus on trends and data changes; computers handle the calculations," Feng Zhi Shuang laughed heartily. "I was a year younger than you back then, and now I'm over a decade older. Back then, you would have called me 'little sister'; now you have to call me 'auntie'!"
"I'll call you 'sister'; you don't look old, you look like a young girl," Jiang Ye took a sip of tea. "Unlike me, who lived rough in the colonies. The wind weathered my face. My face looks decent now, but when I was working alone in the wilderness early on, my face would get so dark and peel in the summer, I looked as ugly as a gecko."
"Young girl? I've been a mother twice already," Feng Zhi Shuang burst into laughter.
Jiang Ye was shocked, then quickly composed himself. It was true; at thirty-nine, she was of an age to be a mother.
"What about you? Are you married?" Feng Zhi Shuang tilted her head, looking at him. "Do you have any children?"
"Not yet, but I've settled down with someone. She owns a bookstore and a dumpling restaurant on Nexus Star. Once the war with the Mil people stops, I'll find time to get married," Jiang Ye gazed out the window. "My child will be a prince. After I'm gone, they will surely inherit my position and rule this planet."
"Retiring so soon? You're only working for a hundred years?" Feng Zhi Shuang asked.
Jiang Ye chuckled. "After a hundred years, I'll be buried. How can I work then?"
"Through rejuvenation surgery?" Feng Zhi Shuang blinked. "You don't want to live long, do you?"
"What the heck is rejuvenation surgery?" Jiang Ye looked a bit horrified. "Turning back time?"
Feng Zhi Shuang chuckled. "You're so ignorant. Do you think it's still the 21st century? Nowadays, as long as you have money, you can live as long as you want."
"Damn, this is huge news! So, there's technology to borrow five hundred years from heaven now? Tell me everything you know."
"For immortality, there's rejuvenation surgery and a reverse rejuvenation surgery. The current prices are 12 billion and 36 billion respectively."
"When you're close to death, you undergo rejuvenation surgery. It's usually done around eighty years old for better safety. This surgery modifies the state of all your cells, causing them to reverse their aging process, meaning you get younger day by day. Your age will then be calculated backward: eighty this year, seventy-nine next year, seventy-eight the year after, and so on. Age-related illnesses will gradually disappear, your body will be more vigorous, and you can climb into a young woman's bed again."
"When you reach twenty years old, you undergo reverse rejuvenation surgery. This is because the human brain reaches its peak around eighteen years old. If you become any younger, many memories and brain structures will become disordered, your physical organs will weaken, and you'll be prone to various premature illnesses. After undergoing reverse rejuvenation surgery at twenty, you can begin to age again."
"As long as you have enough money, you can cycle between aging and de-aging, theoretically living forever. This surgery has a very popular television advertisement set in ancient times. It depicts an ancient scholar presenting a youth-restoring elixir to an old emperor. The dying emperor drinks a cup, his white hair turns black, and his wrinkles vanish. As he praises it, a baby's cry is heard from nearby. It turns out the emperor's favorite concubine, having drunk too much, has become an infant. The advertising concept is just so-so; it's the product's quality that makes it popular. However, this technology has only been around for three hundred years, so the maximum number of cycles performed has been two and a half. What happens clinically after more surgeries is still unknown."
Jiang Ye was overwhelmed by the immense shock, rendered speechless for a moment.
He had thought his cryogenic freezing back then had merely extended his lifespan by a few decades. Now, it seemed it might have extended it by hundreds, even thousands, of years!
The prices were also incredibly reasonable, entirely affordable. Immortality had become an effortlessly attainable feat.