Shen Cong didn't go to see the New Hefei people, but Zhu Li found him.

She shared a bit of New Hefei's recent situation. Like Zhao Weiliang, Zhu Li worried that New Hefei's geographic position was too peripheral, that it would go overlooked within the Command, and she hoped Shen Cong could show New Hefei more consideration.

Shen Cong answered that he'd do what he could.

On the whole, New Hefei surely had fewer schemes brewing than the Command's other factions — they counted as "his own people," and there was nothing wrong with lending New Hefei a hand.

Of course, only a hand, and no more. In Shen Cong's eyes, whether New Hefei or Huai'an City, none of these people were trustworthy.

The only one he could trust was himself.

Having seen Zhu Li off, Shen Cong summoned Old Wei and asked after Zhao Zilong's circumstances.

Old Wei looked rather haggard. "Zilong's in a bad way. Because she won't use C1 herself — she won't even take saline now — she's reached the wasting phase of the necrosis sickness. She probably won't last two more days."

Shen Cong was quiet for a moment. "Is she in the hospital?"

"No. She went to a farm. She wants to be a gardener."

"Which farm?"

"Ping'an Farm."

He thought it over, then drew out some money and passed it to Old Wei. "These last two days — take good care of her."

After that, he left Huai'an City.

On the way back, Shen Cong took with him an unpublished draft manuscript of The Science of Evolution. His name was in The Science of Evolution; many of its terms originated from him. As for the compilation credits, his name was there too — Nan Guohua had absorbed a great many of Shen Cong's suggestions. And since he was a Military Committee member, the review personnel couldn't leave him off either.

However you looked at it, Shen Cong was a heavy stroke of the brush in the Eastern Theater Command's rebuilding.

In this age of the old civilization giving way to the new, he…