Infinite Cosmic Cafeteria Chapter 3: Insect Egg

Translator: Stellar Novels Editor: Stellar Novels

Ma Lu managed to secure the shop with 629 yuan and then ordered 10,000 plastic bags on Pinduoduo, totaling 59.4 yuan, which meant each plastic bag cost less than 0.6 cents.

Next, he spent 115 yuan to rent a gas tank, with a 100-yuan deposit. As for the remaining supplies, he would wait to purchase them until he determined what to sell.

More accurately, it depended on what ingredients Ma Lu could acquire from the other side.

Ma Lu already had a preliminary target in mind and then consulted Old Wang about some questions related to the Insect Egg and dimensional travel.

Old Wang, having lost a lot of data due to sector damage, still managed to provide some useful information.

Ma Lu grabbed some paper and a pen and summarized the information into seven rules:

1. The Insect Egg requires charging to activate and has a cooldown period; it can only be used once per week.

2. After visiting a dimension once, you can return to it repeatedly, similar to establishing a route. At this stage, the Insect Egg can only open one route.

3. The maximum time you can stay in a different dimension is 12 hours, no more. If you suffer a fatal injury, your journey will end early.

4. In principle, the user cannot carry items from this dimension to another, and vice versa. The four pieces of Equipment provided by Old Wang are not subject to this restriction.

5. Ingredients stored in the Collection Bag can be brought back to this dimension. The Collection Bag can and only can store ingredients. If the user dies, the ingredients in the Collection Bag cannot be brought back.

6. Death does not result in the loss of the four pieces of Equipment provided by Old Wang.

7. Keep a good mood.

After finishing the summary, Ma Lu picked up the paper and reviewed it, feeling that the conclusions were clear.

This is a typical time management game. Simply put, it's a type of game where you maximize output by reasonably allocating limited time.

The college entrance exam is a prime example of this. In this "game," every student needs to make decisions, allocating three years of time to different subjects in hopes of achieving the best results in the final exam.

Ma Lu actually quite enjoyed time management games, even though he tended to get sleepy whenever he studied and only got into an ordinary university after high school.

However, he had his strengths: he was good at socializing, had excellent on-the-spot reactions, and could adapt well to his environment. He was also flexible in handling situations, as evidenced by his bold decision to take Old Wang in that day.

In a way, this made him quite suited for the job of ingredient collection.

After Ma Lu finished his summary, the Insect Egg on the other side had also completed its charging.

However, Ma Lu didn't rush to set off. He first ordered some takeout to fill his stomach, then took a two-hour nap to ensure that both his body and mind were in peak condition. Only then did he sit cross-legged on the sofa, following Old Wang's guidance.

He closed his eyes and placed the white egg on top of his head, trying his best to enter a meditative state, free of distractions.

"The universe is full of eggs, and all eggs are interconnected!"

As Ma Lu cleared his mind and uttered this phrase, he felt the egg on top of his head seem to twitch, as if responding to him.

In his previously empty mind, thousands of eggs suddenly appeared. There were chicken eggs, duck eggs, quail eggs, as well as snake eggs, ostrich eggs, dinosaur eggs…

In addition to these eggs, whose names Ma Lu could recognize, there were many he had never seen before, such as eggs with transparent shells, glowing eggs, and eggs floating in space, as huge as planets.

These familiar and unfamiliar eggs gathered together, forming a grand and magnificent egg diagram, slowly rotating around the white egg on top of his head.

However, before Ma Lu could fully appreciate the scene, one of the connections lit up.

The next moment, Ma Lu felt his body lighten, as if something was pulling him rapidly toward the other end of the light path, eventually crashing into an egg covered in scales.

Immediately afterward, a wave of heat rushed over him. Ma Lu opened his eyes and found himself sitting in the middle of a desert.

All he could see was sand, like an endless, yellowish ocean, with the rolling dunes resembling waves on this sea.

After confirming there was no immediate danger nearby, Ma Lu looked down to check his body.

Although the rules stated that he couldn't bring any items from his own dimension to this one, except for the four pieces of Equipment provided by Old Wang, the Insect Egg had at least given him some courtesy by providing a basic set of clothes, so he wasn't left naked.

However, this outfit looked even simpler than the most basic designs from Uniqlo, with no patterns or logos, just a single color from head to toe.

If that wasn't bad enough, the outfit was black, which absorbed heat exceptionally well. Wearing this black clothing, Ma Lu felt like he was inside an oven.

When he looked up, he realized that there were actually two suns hanging in the sky.

One red and one yellow, the two suns seemed to be reminding Ma Lu that he was no longer on Earth.

At the same time, a countdown appeared on the orange wristband on his right wrist.

When Ma Lu looked at the wristband, the numbers on it just changed from 11:59 to 11:58. Ma Lu knew that when this countdown reached zero, his journey in this other dimension would end.

In fact, this piece of Equipment called the Traveler's Wristband had more functions than just the countdown. It also had built-in features like a translator, thermometer, level gauge, and various other small tools. Additionally, Old Wang had preloaded the entire "Multiverse Ingredient Encyclopedia" into it.

By activating the detection mode, the Traveler's Wristband could scan a circular area within a 20-meter radius to identify any potential ingredients.

Thinking of this, Ma Lu quickly performed a scan, but the wristband displayed [Target Object Not Found].

Ma Lu wasn't too surprised by this result, as there was almost nothing here besides sand—no plants, no water sources, just monotony and deathly silence.

It was hard to imagine what kind of decent ingredients could be produced in such a harsh natural environment.

Not a great start, Ma Lu thought, scratching his head.

Moreover, aside from the difficulty in finding ingredients, the survival challenge he was facing was also severe.

The two suns above weren't a joke—the Traveler's Wristband showed that the surrounding temperature had already reached 46.5°C (about 116°F), and after just a few minutes, Ma Lu could feel a slight stinging sensation on the exposed skin.

If he didn't quickly find a place to escape the heat, Ma Lu figured he wouldn't last until the countdown ended.

However, when he looked around, all he could see were endless dunes, and the hot wind blowing sand into his nose and mouth didn't make things any better.

What he initially thought would be a sightseeing tour in another world had turned into a survival challenge, leaving Ma Lu a bit frustrated. Although dying wouldn't cost him anything, it would mean waiting six days before he could use the Insect Egg again, and getting dehydrated under two suns definitely wasn't on his bucket list.

Ma Lu decided to climb a nearby dune to get a better view—perhaps he could spot something from there that wasn't visible from below.

But before he could make a move, he noticed something new. Ma Lu saw that one of the dunes in the distance seemed to be moving.

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