Looking at Ronggui who was placed together with a pile of "garbage", Xiaomei's expression did not change at all.
In eight hours, he did walk very far, and the surroundings were dark. There were countless forks in the narrower and narrower mine, like a huge maze. In order to return accurately, Xiaomei made marks.
However, in fact, he did not use those marks in the end.
He followed Ronggui's "singing" and came back little by little.
In the narrow corridor, Ronggui's ordinary robot standard voice also became transparent and ethereal, sometimes absent, looming, no matter where he went, he could always hear Ronggui's voice.
Like a line, Ronggui is always at the other end of the line.
He would not say that Ronggui's voice sounded a little beautiful after being filtered through layers of narrow mines.
Just like the audio disc he played in the room in the White Tower not long ago.
Then no matter where he was, there was always a faint singing.
It was probably because of this that he found a familiar rhythm again. The eight hours were spent on observation and excavation, and they passed quickly.
He didn't feel lonely, and the loneliest place was not here.
He looked at the sky——
But it was just pitch black there now.
Then he continued to work.
"Xiaomei, Xiaomei, how much ore did you dig?" In the end, it was Ronggui's voice that interrupted his moment of contemplation.
The searchlight on Ronggui's miner's hat shone brightly on him. After a short period of darkness caused by the conversion of the visual system, when he could see again, he felt that this place was two different places from before.
"..." Without saying anything, Xiaomei just turned slightly to let Ronggui see the waist bag on her waist.
It was the waist bag that contained the necessary supplies for miners before, and the things in it were taken away by Xiaomei as garbage.
Now the waist bag is bulging and looks very full.
"Wow! It looks like a lot! Xiaomei is worthy of it. She got it right the first time she mined!" Ronggui immediately exclaimed.
Xiaomei did not refute.
She lifted Ronggui's head, put it back into her backpack and hung it on her chest, then turned the small backpack on the ground over and put it on her back, throwing everything on it on the ground. He was about to leave when Ronggui called him again.
"There are so many foods here! Take them, and our radio! This must be taken, I have to charge it when I go back~"
Looking at the "garbage" on the ground that was useless to him, Xiaomei finally squatted down to pick them up, and then threw them all into the small backpack behind her.
Ronggui was satisfied.
They arrived at the elevator entrance on time three minutes before the designated time. There was no one there. Ronggui was a little worried at first whether they were stood up, until other miners appeared from a distance one after another, he was relieved.
Other people's backpacks were either full or half full. Compared with Xiaomei who only had a small waist bag of ore, others had more than Xiaomei.
But it was Xiaomei's first time~
I was afraid that Xiaomei would lose confidence...
Ronggui was worried for a while, and soon, he heard the sound of the elevator behind him, and the familiar sound of music. With the sound of the door opening, a bright room appeared again in the middle of the dark mine pit. The miners walked in one after another, the elevator door closed, and then rose quickly.
There was still nothing in the room. The miners seemed tired, all sitting in their seats, and no one spoke.
It was too quiet, Ronggui didn't dare to say anything.
He just hummed along with the music in the room in his heart.
This dead silence ended after 20 minutes. When Ronggui just hummed the last note in his heart, the music in the room stopped at the same time, the elevator door opened, and a man came in.
Ronggui looked: It's still an acquaintance, the tall man at the door!
"Okay, it's time to collect the goods." He walked in directly with a big bag in his big hands like a palm leaf fan.
Led by the guide miner, the other miners immediately lined up in order, so Xiaomei could only be the last one.
Fortunately, they didn't fight for a minute or a half, so they could just look at the results of others during this time~
"... a piece of germanium raw stone, the appearance is not very good, give you 6 points, this piece of Kuroda stone is big enough, 20. Sandi..." The tall man calculated the account quickly, Ronggui didn't see him use any testing equipment, could it be that he relied on his eyes to judge? How good at seeing is this? Or is this nonsense...
Ronggui was a little worried: what if he made a mistake when showing the stone to Xiaomei~
Here, Ronggui's mind was full of inexplicable and unfounded questions, but Xiaomei observed the ore mined by others with a cold expression and calculated the points everyone finally got.
Obviously, the order of the teams is based on the total points they have earned.
They were arranged like this at the beginning, and now the test results are still in this order, which means that the test results are similar every time.
Mining ore really depends more on the ability to identify ore, and the probability of relying on luck is extremely rare.
And the tall man should be the manager of this mine. From the details of his hands, it can be seen that he should also be a miner. However, other miners are still miners, but he has become a manager.
This shows that in Euni City, there are other career options besides miners, but they just don't understand the promotion and selection mode.
It doesn't matter, you can take your time-although the things you think about are completely unrelated, but in the end, Ronggui's last thought in his mind strangely overlaps with Xiaomei.
"Okay, newcomer, it's your turn...you guys." The tall man's bag is full, but he threw more on the ground. Those are naturally ores that he judged to be worthless. The miners who dug it didn't mean to put it away, but just let them lie on the ground.
The other miners had not left yet, standing indifferently near the door. Ronggui guessed that they probably wanted to see Xiaomei's harvest←just to evaluate the strength of the newcomers.
So Xiaomei dug out ore in full view of everyone.
The ore that Xiaomei dug out had a big feature: small.
Other people's ores were large pieces, but when it came to Xiaomei, they were basically the size of a palm, or the size of Xiaomei's own palm. The largest piece was a circle smaller than Ronggui's head, and the small one... was only the size of an egg.
If he had hands, Ronggui would almost cover his face.
Even if he was an outsider, he knew that it was easier to contain raw stones in large ores, right? At least the probability was higher, such a small ore...
Ah! It's all my fault for tossing my body to pieces. Xiaomei must not be able to carry it! ! ! ! !
Ronggui screamed in his heart.
Sure enough, one miner left the room at that time-probably because he felt there was no need to continue watching.
Although the others were still there, they also started to pack up.
Only the leader of the miners who was in charge of leading the way was still watching from the side. The tall manager stretched out his big hand and first took an egg-sized ore from Xiaomei's palm:
"Well... this one... doesn't have it."
Then Xiaomei handed out the second egg... no, the second ore.
"This one... unfortunately, doesn't have it either."
Xiaomei handed out the ores in her waist bag one by one. With the judgment results of "no", "no", more and more miners in the room walked out. After hearing the judgment of the last ore, the leader of the miners finally walked out without mercy. In the end, only the tall manager, Xiaomei and Ronggui... the big head were left in the room.
The judgment result of the last ore was slightly better, containing a little Kuroda stone, so Xiaomei got two points.
Among all the miners who went out today, he gained the least.
However, he didn't care, and the administrator obviously didn't care too much either, just lazily asked: "Take out your pass, I'll give you the points now."
The pass is a salary card, which is widely used here.
Xiaomei rummaged in the bag where Ronggui was placed, and took out two passes after a while: "Can I get one point for each pass?"
"Huh?" The administrator seemed stunned.
Ronggui was also stunned.
Of the two passes in Xiaomei's hand, one was naturally Xiaomei's, and the other one was...
It was his!
However, he didn't shout loudly, ask Xiaomei or refute at this time.
Feeling a little uneasy, Ronggui looked at Xiaomei's chin timidly.
"No." The administrator denied it: "If the points can be transferred, then people in this place will definitely fight for them every day. We don't care about the fights between miners, but it will be difficult for us if everyone doesn't work hard because of this." "So the points are basically forbidden to be transferred." "You just said that it is basically forbidden to transfer, so there are also situations where it can be transferred." Xiaomei asked again after grasping the key words. "..." After a moment of silence, the man suddenly laughed. "You are really smart. You know that your strength is not great, and you know that the probability of digging ore for the first time is extremely low. Moreover, as a newcomer, you can't get any good mines. I simply gave up the hope of finding ore and chose to classify the ore in the mine. I knocked off a small piece of ore of one type as a sample. You brought them here just to let me help identify them. It's a very smart way. Among so many miners who came here, you are the second person to do this."
Listening to the administrator's slow narration, Ronggui was stunned: Oh my god! I didn't expect it at all!
Sorry - Xiaomei, I am not your confidant! ! ! !
However, it is said that people with the same IQ are not easy to be friends. Smart people generally like stupid people, and they do need a stupid person as a friend. For example, now, another smart person - the administrator obviously wants someone to take up the conversation, but Xiaomei, who is smarter than him, is arrogant and does not respond. At this time, a person who is not too self-confident about his IQ is needed to take up the conversation with understanding.
So, Ronggui decisively asked: "Hey? Has anyone done this before? Who is that person?"
Fully showing his good acting skills, Ronggui asked innocently and stupidly.
Then the administrator was really happy: "Haha, it's me."
Sure enough - Ronggui thought, I knew you wanted to take the opportunity to show off.
However, it was rare to see someone using the method he had used before, so the administrator was in a good mood and continued to instruct them: "Ordinary people's points cannot be transferred, but family points can. Points are an important tool for going to other cities. In order for a family to act together, points within the family can be transferred to each other."
"But correspondingly, when various punishments are received, they are also for all family members. This is also to prevent someone from taking advantage of this loophole."
"How about it, do you two want to open a joint family account?"
Ronggui was stunned.
Then, he heard Xiaomei coldly say: "Yes."
"Okay, it just so happens that the machine here has the authority to open a family account. Will it be opened for you now?"
"Okay."
"After opening it, no matter how many points you earn, half will be equally divided among another family member. Are you sure?"
"Sure."
Xiaomei's answer was very fluent and free, so the administrator didn't ask much, and opened the account for him neatly. The next second, when he handed the card back to Xiaomei, although the card looked the same, the information inside was already very different. If Ronggui had a heart, his heart would be beating very fast now.
Would it beat fast, right?
However, he didn't have a heart now, so he could only stare blankly at Xiaomei's...chin.
"Okay, I'm leaving now. You guys should leave quickly, as the next batch of workers will start working." The man picked up the heavy bag and prepared to retreat.
"Can I take these ores with me?" Xiaomei stopped him, and then pointed to the ores she had dug out on the ground.
"Yes, but you need to come to me to stamp them later."
"Thank you! Thank you!" Ronggui immediately thanked him on behalf of Xiaomei.
Waving his hand, the man staggered away.
Then Xiaomei squatted on the ground and picked up the ores thrown on the ground one by one.
After picking up his own, he went to see other people's abandoned ores.
"Xiao, Xiaomei, why are you looking at other people's ores? Are there any omissions?" Ronggui didn't know what to say, so he could only find a topic at random. "That person has a very good eye, there is no way he missed anything. I was just observing what other people's ores that were judged to contain no minerals look like. In the future, we can just ignore them when we dig up such ores." Xiaomei answered while looking through the stones.
"Oh!" Ronggui was quiet for a while, then-
"Xiao, Xiaomei, why do you want to set up a family account with me? That... that..."
"Your body is broken and you need new materials. New materials that cannot be provided here, we must go to other cities to obtain, so you must have enough points to go to the new city."
"And with you now..." Xiaomei said, looking down at Ronggui's big head: "I guess you can only sell the other body in your freezer to save enough points to go to the next city. Do you want to do this?"
"No! Why should I sell my real body to repair the robot's body!" Ronggui immediately refused.
"So for now, I can only use the form of a family account."
"Uh... that's right..."
It seems that something is right, and something seems wrong. Ronggui thought for a long time and couldn't figure it out.
He didn't know that at this moment, even Xiaomei herself who made this decision didn't understand.
For Xiaomei, he just made the simplest choice under the circumstances.
In the short term, before he figured it out and found a replacement, he still needed Ronggui's freezer, and the damage to Ronggui's mechanical body was also directly related to him. He didn't want to owe him a favor, so he just wanted to repay him.
It was just a choice.
But for Ronggui, it was an extra "home".
After thinking about it again and again, Ronggui smiled foolishly.
From today on, he and Xiaomei were no longer just friends.
They were family.