Natsuhi walks around the underground shelter of the Svalbard seed vault.

She emitted a powerful light and warmth that maintained the temperature of the Vault.

After leaving Anxin-in, Natsuki has been trying to find the place where the sun first rises, but the attempt to chase the sun to the east is very unworkable, and there is a sea in the middle.

In the end, she chose the north and south poles with polar daylight, which can bask in the sun for at least half a year.

Every summer, from March 21 to September 23, Natsuki spends time in the Arctic Circle. When the polar day in the North Pole is gone, she goes to the South Pole.

Due to the natural disaster on June 6, Natsuhi was stranded in the Arctic Circle and ended up in a global crop refuge in Svalbard.

Even after the collapse of human civilization, this place still exists.

Five-metre-thick steel and concrete structures form isolated low-temperature orchards that protect the earth's botanical heritage.

Several frost demons blocked the passage, just enjoying the Arctic cold, but had no intention of forcing their way through the blast door.

As a result, about 400 survivors have survived here, relying on the light and heat brought by Natsuki for two years.

They didn't notice the girl who had blended in with the crowd at first, but only later realized how precious her presence was.

In such bitter cold conditions, Natsuki is tantamount to a god.

At first, many people committed suicide, and the remaining survivors were motivated by Natsuki's presence to continue the research project in an attempt to extract the best resources from the Earth's plant gene pool.

A crop capable of feeding most people in extreme conditions, codenamed "Abundance".

Natsuki often walks around here, about twelve hours a day.

It was only later that it was noticed that she walked in an unchanging trajectory like the sunrise, passing through different areas of the vault, emerging from the east, descending from the west to the ground floor by elevator, and then walking through the passage below.

There was hardly a break, at least they hadn't seen Natsuki rest.

To this end, they also cooperated with Xia Xi's trajectory, made the sunrise and rested day by day, and also placed the incubator of plant production in the place where Xia Xi would pass, so that the light emitted from her body would shine on the plants, so that they could still grow in the cold at a depth of fifty meters underground, cultivate generations of crops, and complete harsh agricultural experiments.

"Seeds." Natsuki muttered.

She passed through the storage room on the lower level, where rows of huge black pods filled the vast room, each with a high-strength metal blast door in front of it, which could withstand the attacks of ground-penetrating missiles and nuclear bombs, and protect tens of thousands of different varieties of plant seeds.

Nearly all of the major crops and their wild versions of their ancestors are buried here, frozen in ice, waiting for researchers to take them out for breeding.

"Cultivation room." Natsuki muttered to herself again as she walked into the next room.

She didn't know anyone else, but the scientists respected Natsuki.

Hydroponic agronomists are growing seedlings under ultraviolet light.

As soon as Natsuki arrived, they quickly removed the spotlights and let the natural light brought by Natsuki warm the crops.

Natsuki finds their work interesting, with a different crop on the tray every day, and today it's a plate of spinach and lentils, both of which have been genetically edited.

Spinach is infused with fortifiers to make muscles swell after eating, while lentils are heat-resistant and can be bred in boiling water.

One day, these seeds will once again stick their fragile roots into the scarred crust of the Earth.

They all thought so, when Natsuki didn't come, and when Natsuki passed by, they wanted to make the results of this deep ice shelter come to light.

"Food." Natsuki saw something to eat.

She didn't need to eat, but she picked up a small green biscuit and ate it.

They are plant chunks that are very soft and crunchy to bite and have a light taste.

She remembered that it was an algae that came from a huge tank of algae, and in the other direction, as she had passed before, she had seen algae all desperately growing with light and temperature.

Thanks to previous ideas and attempts, as well as the light brought by Natsuki, the scientists at the shelter realized "chlorella survival" after the natural disaster.

Chlorella is very reproductive, has a lot of protein, and also has various vitamins and minerals. A bucket of chlorella can satisfy a person's energy needs for a day.

The 400 people at the shelter have cultivated about a thousand barrels of chlorella, achieving food self-sufficiency and surplus! A minimum of physiological conditions has been achieved.

They eat algae, algae eats me, they eat me, I eat algae. Natsuki easily thought of such a logical chain.

All life on Earth is eating the sun. She felt like a perpetual motion machine, but it didn't last long, as she felt that her mana level was much lower than before, and her energy was losing in the process of transmission.

Sooner or later, she would run out of sunlight and she would have to go up to the ground to replenish it.

Otherwise, you will die.

The sun fades, withers, becomes shorter. Natsuki felt like she was getting shorter. To change from the Sun to a Pettigrew.

"Look, this is our latest development." Dr. Ling is very happy today and took the initiative to share the new achievements in the hydroponic farm with Xia Xi.

Dr. Ling remains optimistic even in the most difficult conditions, and despite his age, he often jokes with everyone.

Sometimes they excitedly reported that a rescue team was coming, sometimes they used a loudspeaker to inform them of the New Year's party project, and sometimes they danced during a meal, pretending to have received a telegram from another human survivor.

People find it funny at first, but then they gradually stop caring about his bluff. But he still entertained himself.

He operates the agricultural machinery, and Natsuki sees a plant hanging in the air.

It looks so cute, it reminds Xia Xi of her former child Qingxiao, full of vitality, the leaves are divided into five petals, spread out like an elephant's ears, juicy and translucent, very moist, like jade.

The most amazing thing is that its rhizome, like a vine, winds several meters long and stretches in the air, moving quickly, as if to draw something out of the air. Waxy flowers are clustered in clusters.

"It's done, Fruitful!" Dr. Ling introduced, "Look at it, it is the earth, just like the embodiment of Gaia's will, as delicious as rice and soybeans, and as prolific as potatoes and cassava, it is a prolific tuber crop, which has a strong conversion effect on minerals and is resistant to lodging, and these leaves and flowers will secrete anthelmintic pheromones and do not need to be sprayed." These rhizomes can be cleansed of toxins and radiation residues, and they can be planted anywhere, in the Arctic, in the desert, or deep in ruins. It grows quickly, and its fruit feeds many people. If only we could have developed something so good before the war......"

Dr. Ling gushed endlessly, and Xia Xi thought thoughtfully.

"I'm leaving." Natsuki told them.

"Let's go?"

"Where are you going?"

"Can't go! If there is no sun......

"Ah......" the researchers were startled.

Natsuki shook her head.

She left her established walking path and headed straight for the exit of the vault.

"She can't leave without a password to get in."

"Is she going to give up on us?" People panicked, but also hurried to follow Natsuki.

For the past few years, they have relied on this light to survive.

Once Natsuki walks out of the vault, the rest of the population will run out of fuel stocks extremely quickly.

"I'm going outside to get some sunshine." Natsuki pointed to the dark door.

"Our research has finally made progress......

"I don't want to die......," they were extremely worried.

"Outside this door are the Frost Demons, and once the door is opened, the frost wind will pour in, it will be terrifying, and we will freeze to death in a matter of seconds." Security Captain Kerry warns.

"Let me out, I can help you." Natsuki said.

A fierce quarrel erupted in the crowd.

"Don't tell her the password...... We can live for a while, and we can even live for ten or twenty years with chlorella! ”

"But if she didn't have the sun's supply, she would have died of exhaustion sooner or later. We can't restore the witch's magic, not even basic supplies. ”

"Maybe she'll bring something back?"

"Then we should freeze to death?"

"The humans outside are all gone, and it's useless to go out! Nothing to be found! ”

"Can't you supply her with sunlight with ultraviolet lamps?"

"The password is in Captain Kerry's hands, she doesn't know, we just don't tell it."

They were noisy, and there were some things that were not worth saying in front of Natsuki, so they let Natsuki stay at the gate and returned to the atrium area of the vault by himself.

"Captain, when the natural disaster came, you closed the gate in advance, causing thousands of refugees to die outside, freezing to death there, she didn't know that a group of people were left outside to freeze to death! What do you think she would think if she opened the door and saw the frozen corpses in the hallway outside? Will she ever come back to take care of us? A surviving non-commissioned officer said.

A hint of fear and shame appeared on the face of Security Captain Kerry.

"There could be poison gas and radiation everywhere outside, and the cost of opening the doors of a shelter is unimaginable." The surviving non-commissioned officers added.

"The sensor and camera elements are damaged, indicating that the outside temperature has dropped again, and something big must have happened. We don't know anything about it, what if it's all monsters and demons out there? Letting her out is tantamount to killing her. Said the engineer representative.

"She's a witch of the sun, and she has to get the sun, the natural sunlight." Speaking as a representative of the plant cultivation team, Dr. Ling said, "We can't imprison her here forever. ”

"Isn't the life of our 400 lives? It's been more than two years, and now it's four hundred and one, because yesterday a baby was born, born to Researcher Christine. We can also build a self-sufficient community here, and our lives will last for a long time. Said the resident representative.

"I also agree that if that child is left here, maybe she will die, but we can all live. If we open the door and let her out, not only will she be uncertain, but we will all freeze to death, adding to the casualties in vain. We all survived on her natural heat, and without her, we wouldn't even have enough fuel for our heaters. Said the engineer representative.

"Besides, how can we decide whether she lives or dies? Let her figure out how to get out by herself, if she can't get out, she deserves it, who let her in the first place. We can't let go of a live heat source anyway. Said the resident representative.

"Listen to me, maybe the rebuilding has begun outside, and they are in need of the precious seeds from our seed bank." Dr. Ling advocated, "We can save them, we can save them all." We have the most seeds in the world, the best seeds, and the abundance to plant and sow for the survivors...... In the future these seeds will take root and sprout, in real fields! Think about it, everyone! A real 10,000 acres of fertile land! On the banks of the big river, the wind blows the fragrance of rice and flowers...... Shouldn't we be working for that little chance? ”

"It's ridiculous!"

"If you want to die, you can die!" They shouted.

"Vote." Security Captain Kerry took a deep breath, "We vote. ”

……

……

After two hours of voting, Kerry was in charge of the votes, and the surviving non-commissioned officers counted the votes.

Kerry read one vote after another, positive, negative, positive, negative, for, against, against, against.

401 survivors, including newborns, voted, and his mother, Christine, named him Lazarus, voted against letting Natsuki leave the vault.

“…… 224 votes in favour and 177 against. The non-commissioned officer looked at the results incredulously.

"Cheat!"

"How is that possible?"

"We are against it!" The naysayers were anxious.

"Let her out!"

"Enough is enough! She has helped us enough! "Those who support it also spoke out.

"It's a lie!"

"We must not let her go!"

"Leave the sun behind!"

"Shut up the sun!" Those who oppose it are even louder, and the crowd is surging with emotion.

"Don't look at us as weak, but we have a conscience, and the end result is that more people want her to leave! More people support! Time to go! Captain Kerry said angrily.

They were silent for a moment, but their expressions were still angry.

"She's waited long enough." Security Captain Kerry shuddered.

She came to the door and told Natsuki the code to leave.

Natsuki was delighted, and entered the code, and the door was rumbling open.

The outside world is waiting for her, and the sun is coming.

"They want me to go." Natsuki felt incredulous, "Thank you. ”

"I read 150 more votes for the supporters." Kerry, the security captain, said, "Run, they're going to come and get you in a minute." ”

(End of chapter)