At 9 a.m., the Imperial University’s administration hall was bustling with activity, as students from all corners of the empire went about their tasks.
Almost every counter had a long queue, except for one tucked away in a quiet corner—the counter responsible for registering work at the interstellar station. A young woman stood in front of it.
“Are you sure about this?” The teacher in charge of registration looked at the girl and asked again.
“I’m sure.”
“Then sign here.”
The girl took the registration form, grabbed a pen from the desk, and swiftly signed her name: Lin Huanyan.
The teacher accepted the form and reminded her, “You have three days to pack and prepare. Be sure to report back here after three days; someone will escort you to the interstellar station.”
“Understood. Thank you, teacher.”
“You’d better handle any unfinished business quickly. Once you’re there, coming back won’t be easy.”
“Got it. Thank you.” Lin Huanyan turned and left.
The teacher watched her slender figure disappear into the crowd, lost in thought.
Her colleague, just finishing their work, nudged her. “What’s with the daze? Didn’t someone finally sign up for the interstellar station? That’s good news. You won’t have to worry about meeting your quota.”
Unable to hold back anymore, the teacher burst out, “I know it’s good news, but do you know who just signed up?”
“Who?” the colleague asked, confused.
“Lin Huanyan! You know, the Lin Huanyan!”
“Wait, you mean the academic prodigy Lin Huanyan from Imperial University?”
“Yes, exactly her! Now you know why I’m so stunned.”
“But why would she want to go to the interstellar station?”
“Who knows?”
Unaware of the conversation she had left behind, Lin Huanyan returned to her dorm to prepare.
In this interstellar era, Lin Huanyan was already a legend. Originally from a remote planet, she had used her exceptional intellect to rise from an F-ranked school in a far-off galaxy to the prestigious Imperial University, an S-ranked institution in the capital.
Once enrolled, she broke university records by maintaining the top spot in her field for four consecutive years.
Imperial University was known for its rigorous exams, which were created collectively by the university’s professors. Each test included three additional questions that often required expertise in niche fields, sometimes even baffling other professors.
Yet, Lin Huanyan aced every exam with perfect scores: 100 points on the core test and 30 points on the additional questions.
Her peers, despite their efforts to compete, could never surpass her.
No wonder the teachers were shocked—such a prodigy choosing the interstellar station seemed incomprehensible.
However, the principal was very pleased. Lin Huanyan’s cohort had become the best-performing group of students, with grades far surpassing their rivals at Federal University.
As a result, the principal kept Lin Huanyan’s file under even tighter wraps. Other than himself, only the assistant who initially helped with the registration knew the secret: on that piece of paper gleamed an IQ score of 500, a full 200 points above the interstellar average of 300.
But despite being such a person—undoubtedly the top scholar of Imperial University—Lin Huanyan chose to apply to the Interstellar Space Relay Station.
The Interstellar Space Relay Station was established around a circular black hole.
The black hole was discovered in the year 5000 of the Interstellar Calendar.
At that time, the galaxy was celebrating the grand Interstellar 5000 Anniversary, a festival marked by universal cheer.
Everyone was busy preparing for the festivities, including sanitation workers. Various intelligent floating sanitation vehicles were deployed to clean up the debris scattered across the cosmos.
In a remote and primitive star system, a sanitation worker was piloting a sanitation vehicle, searching for and handling trash, when an old, yellowing cardboard box fell from the sky and landed on the vehicle’s porthole.
The box was perfectly rectangular, its outer layer made of paper packaging and plastic tape—materials the worker had only ever seen on television. Such items had long since been eliminated due to their environmental impact and poor durability and now existed only in museum collections.
Yet, here it was, this antiquated object, appearing before the worker. The sanitation worker activated the robotic arm, carefully retrieving the box and bringing it inside.
As they steered the vehicle upwards, an enormous black hole appeared before them.
Surrounded by flashing lightning and visibly chaotic spatial currents crackling around it, the black hole looked extremely dangerous.
The sanitation worker dared not conceal the discovery and immediately reported it.
This unexpected black hole naturally caught the attention of the Academy of Sciences.
When it was discovered that the black hole had appeared out of nowhere and that the old parcel contained previously unknown plants to the interstellar realm, countless experts and scholars gathered to study and discuss the phenomenon.
During this time, the black hole would occasionally eject boxes containing objects the experts couldn’t identify.
Some of these objects were plants, though most attempts to cultivate them ended in failure.
As the timeline stretched out, it was now the year 5100 of the Interstellar Calendar.
A hundred years had passed, and the once sought-after black hole research laboratory had long been abandoned. Researchers had given up due to the lack of progress.
In a galaxy that valued efficiency and results, failure to produce findings meant relying solely on a basic salary, barely enough to survive.
But the black hole, along with the occasional unidentified items it emitted, couldn’t simply be ignored—especially after the Academy of Sciences concluded that the black hole might lead to a low-level alternate dimension.
Although the dimension was considered “low-level,” it might still harbor resources unavailable in the interstellar realm.
Thus, a position was created: Chief Researcher of the Black Hole Research Lab. The role came with strict academic requirements, excellent benefits, and high pay.
However, the reality was that qualified B-level researchers, who could already manage major projects on their own, saw no value in a dead-end position like this.
The female teacher and her colleagues were puzzled.
Lin Huanyan walked toward her dormitory with a calm expression. Along the way, many students glanced at her.
At first, she was uncomfortable, but as time went on, Lin Huanyan learned to ignore their stares.
This made her marvel at the resilience of human beings.
In just two days, she had accepted that she had transmigrated into the interstellar era and into the body of a top interstellar scholar. She had even mapped out a way forward for herself.
Lin Huanyan had once been an ordinary young woman with only one unique aspect—her unusual occupation.
She was a lighthouse keeper in the nation of Xia. Xia’s coastline was long and dotted with many lighthouses. Lin Huanyan guarded one of them, warning passing ships about the dangers of the nearby waters.
The sea in her area was treacherous and complex, making access extremely difficult. Even the delivery of daily supplies required risking lives.
As a result, she spent several years there, relying on novels to pass the long and tedious hours.
But Lin Huanyan had read those novels merely to kill time. She had never imagined that one day, she would actually transmigrate into another world, much less an interstellar one from human imagination.
Thankfully, her years of lighthouse work and numerous brushes with danger had toughened her mental resilience.
Though she was ultimately swept away by the waves, leading to her transmigration into the interstellar era, Lin Huanyan still cherished her old job.
So when she arrived in the interstellar world, absorbed the original host’s memories, and learned that the top-tier research company, Tianyu, had been planning to hire the original host only for a jealous rival to use family connections to steal the position, Lin Huanyan wasn’t the least bit flustered.
She was no longer the original host. While she had inherited the host’s memories and IQ, she hadn’t yet internalized the knowledge. To her, the original host’s expertise was just theoretical, with little practical experience.
So when she learned that the job had been snatched away, Lin Huanyan actually felt a sense of relief.
Finally, she wouldn’t have to worry about hiding the fact that she was, in essence, an imposter, she thought calmly.
The school required graduates to move out within two weeks. Lin Huanyan flipped through the career guidance manual sent out by the school.
She found that most of the good jobs had already been taken, leaving behind a selection of positions with various drawbacks.
With her predecessor’s credentials, Lin Huanyan knew it wouldn’t be difficult to land another decent job. But looking at options like the Nutritional Solution Research Lab, Starship Research Lab, Gene Research Lab, and Mech Research Lab…
These names, familiar to every interstellar citizen, still felt alien to this purebred Earthling who had just inherited her predecessor’s memories.
Lin Huanyan hesitated for a long time, unsure which to choose or whether to simply take the plunge.
After all, while she wasn’t interstellar-born, her predecessor’s exceptionally high IQ was indisputable.
Lin Huanyan found her mind clearer and her thought process more efficient than before.
She tested herself: originally capable of mental calculations only within 1,000, she could now solve any math problem as if she were a supercomputer.
Finally, it was on the back page of a career brochure that she came across an introduction to the Black Hole Research Lab.
The magazine, printed with a futuristic design, clearly listed its generous benefits and high salaries.
At the time, Lin Huanyan wondered why such a good job had no takers.
After researching on the interstellar web, she found out why.
Though the salary and benefits were excellent, the strict academic requirements eliminated a large portion of candidates right away. Lack of career prospects ruled out even more, and the lab’s remote location in the outer star systems turned others away. Finally, the restricted mobility due to space turbulence and particle radiation near black holes, with only one opportunity to leave the station per year, drove away the last remaining hopefuls.
As a result, the position remained unfilled.
But for Lin Huanyan, was this a problem? Not at all.
High pay, excellent benefits, light workload, far from the central regions, and no need to interact with others—there was no risk of exposing her secret.
It was practically a job tailor-made for her!
Checking her predecessor’s credentials, she found that she had just been promoted this year to a B-level researcher, thanks to solving a long-standing issue for Professor Liu from the Mech Department. He then introduced her to other professors, who collectively recommended her.
She was the only student at Imperial University to become a B-level researcher before graduation.
Advancing from C to B as a researcher was notoriously difficult. It required accomplishments, recommendations, passing a government exam, and scoring above 80% on a test co-produced by the Academy of Sciences.
The process had to be fully transparent, with a dedicated review panel conducting social relationship checks. Any report or accusation during this process would trigger further verification.
The stringent and systematic process, entirely managed by the intelligent brain system, left no room for manipulation, with all records meticulously documented.
So Lin Huanyan’s successful promotion before graduation caused quite a stir, even sparking jealousy in a certain male student who stole her original job.
But now, the transmigrated Lin Huanyan was only grateful, not expecting her predecessor to be so capable.
Without delay, she packed her things and headed to the administrative office to register for the job.
Discord
@dogfoodplease or @dogfoodplease#8837translation works:
ARTTEDSBGT (After Rebirth The True Eldest Daughter Starts Brewing Green Tea):
main story – completed translating
extras/side stories – i still dont have money and account to access this
ATISIUP:
ongoing
