Dead on Mars

Tang Yue was deeply aware of this point.

From the look of it, socialism with Chinese characteristics was universal, literally.

Choosing to terraform the Martian atmosphere clearly wasn’t worth it. This project fit for God was in no way easier than creating a Dyson ball. If human civilization had the ability to create a Dyson ball, they probably wouldn’t have much interest in a godforsaken planet like Mars.

Atmospheric pressure on Mars was a hundredth of Earth’s. To create a greenhouse effect to raise the global temperatures required immense amounts of energy.

Furthermore, Mars didn’t have a magnetic field that reduced the radiation concentration. Under such radiation, normal creatures could hardly leave.

If creating carbon dioxide to raise global temperatures was within Tang Yue’s realm of imagination, artificially creating a magnetic field was something only a deity could accomplish.

“Lady, stop laughing at me. Haven’t you been single all your life as well?” Tang Yue quipped. “It’s just the pot calling the kettle black. We are both the same.”

“Oh come on, the pot calling the kettle black?” Tomcat kicked Tang Yue under the table and rolled its eyes. “You can’t find someone, but she’s not interested in finding anyone. What do you mean that you are both the same?”

“She’s about to evolve into a monster known as a female professor, alright?” Tang Yue kicked back. “Female professors can only marry Saint Seiya ¹ .”

“Saint Seiya?” Tomcat didn’t get it.

“In the pyramid of societal love, the matching of men and women isn’t equivalent.” Tang Yue explained. “Men are inclined to find women a level lower than themselves, while women are inclined to find men a level higher than themselves. Therefore, probability-wise, female Bachelor’s degree holders will marry male Master’s degree holders, and female Master’s degree holders will marry male Ph.D. degree holders. As for female Ph.D. degree holders, they can only marry Saint Seiya… This is also where leftover men have bottom socioeconomic status, while leftover women have the top.”

“So, after beating about the bush all day…” Tomcat scratched its head. “You are proving that you are a bottom-class leftover man?”

Mai Dong hugged the tablet computer as she floated in the core module, looking at its white inner-linings without a word.

Tang Yue was right. She had been single all her life. In the past twenty-five years, she only had a handful of friends of the opposite sex. She had never held the hand of another guy despite her age. In an era when other girls were getting three boyfriends a year, she was extraordinarily staid and silent.

Mai Dong was the kind most guys would like. She was smart and slim. Even though she wasn’t short, she appeared petite. She had a very classic Asian face with soft facial features. She looked very plain without makeup on, but her dark, bright eyes spoke for themselves.

Old Wang once gave a very objective comment: If this lady were to openly put herself on the market for boyfriends, the number of people who came could form a company of men.

Typically speaking, such an excellent girl wouldn’t be a leftover.

However, Mai Dong had spent four years completing her Bachelor’s degree as a single person before spending another three years completing her Master’s degree as a single person.

It was because she was quite an introverted nerd.

No matter how excellent you were, once you were an introverted nerd, it basically meant zero chances of having a rich and satisfying life.

Mai Dong spent most of her time in university as a recluse in her dormitory. She never went out in summer because of the heat, unless necessary. In winter, she would huddle herself in blankets on the bed because of the cold. The rest of the time, she would hole herself up in the library. During term breaks, she would punctually appear at the library’s study areas at seven in the morning, spending time with her research buddies, eating together without staying together.

Along with the worsening air quality of Hangzhou, Mai Dong preferred wearing a face mask and hat, covering herself up fully. She also kept her hair short, so it was difficult to tell if she was male or female from afar.

“Why didn’t you find a boyfriend at university?” Tang Yue asked. “You could use him as a long-term food coupon. Mai Dong, with your assets, you could even find one, keep two hanging, and even have a bunch of spare tires… Thinking back to my dorm mate, he was quite a tragic spare tire. He thought that he had succeeded in pursuing his goddess, but in fact, she only treated him as a food coupon. He paid for everything—meals, karaoke, movies—when they went out during weekends. He didn’t even get to touch her hand.”

“Your dorm mate was that stupid?” Tomcat asked.

“Love makes one blind.” Tang Yue threw up his hands as he acted profoundly. He wore a look as though the untainted him had seen through life. “You have no idea how much my dorm mate liked that girl. He called her some school belle of some campus, extolling her to the skies. Even at night, he would murmur her name in his sleep. The first time he met her, he said that he had thought about how many children to have and even their names.”

“Isn’t this a common illness of long-tenured bachelor dogs?” Tomcat asked. “They are good at making deep illogical conclusions. A girl might glance at them, and they might think that a previous life’s love was being continued in this life. In fact, it’s only because they had their fly open.”

“Is that so?” Tang Yue was alarmed. “Why haven’t I experienced that before?”

“It might be because you have already evolved. You aren’t a bachelor dog,” Tomcat said. “You are a lone wolf.”

Tang Yue nodded in enlightenment.

“What happened next? Did your dorm mate realize what was on the girl’s mind?”

“She obviously noticed it, but he believed that his persistence had touched his goddess,” Tang Yue said. “In the words of my dorm mate: ‘Humans are not a stalk of grass or a tree, how can they be emotionless? There will come a day when she discovers it and realizes deep down that she truly loves me.’ For this, my dorm mate spent an entire week getting up in the middle of the night to knit a scarf as a birthday present. Inside it, he even sewed his initials and the words ‘I LOVE YOU.’”

“What happened in the end?” Tomcat asked. “Did the goddess discover that the person she loved deep down was him?”

“Before that day arrived, the goddess ran off with a wealthy guy who had just returned to the country.”

Tomcat fell silent for a few seconds.

“What a tragic story.”

“Therefore, leftover men not only have the bachelor dogs and lone wolves lining the bottom, but there are also heartbroken people.” Tang Yue stirred the seeds in the beaker. The light above him was dim—to conserve electricity, they typically only switched on a simple light. In the dim Kunlun Station, the man and cat sat there chatting as though they were sharing late-night stories.

“I later saw that so-called goddess.” Tang Yue shook his head. “Her figure was only slightly better, and she was not even as good-looking as Mai Dong. Indeed, it’s different strokes for different folks.”

“Hey, hey, Tang Yue!” Mai Dong shouted out Tang Yue’s name through the earpiece. “What’s the meaning behind your last sentence?”

“Not as good-looking as Mai Dong?” Tomcat asked. “Then, if Mai Dong’s looks are a ten, how many points is that dorm mate’s goddess?”

“Mr. Cat—!”

Tang Yue recalled and made comparisons deep down. “If Mai Dong is a ten, that girl is probably a six, at most seven.”

Tomcat nodded.

“See? At the end of the day, Mai Dong is better.