The last cycle of Brainiac was a seamless one; in early December, it repelled the enemy, a full month ahead of schedule, and the adjustnt and recovery period took only over ten days.
Around mid-December, Gotham had its first snowfall, and the snow fell throughout the night. Everywhere was draped in silver. The heavy snow broke quite a few branches of the huge beech tree in front of the Schiller's house.
In the morning, the temperature had ward up a bit, and the wind blew from the nearby lake, carrying dry, cold air that coated the window glass with a thin layer of mist. The snow-clearing trucks played lodious music, and the community sanitation workers greeted each household:
"Good morning! Mr. Bucky, your little daughter's school bus is five minutes away, you'd better hurry her up."
"Good morning, Mrs. Hans. Is the milkman faster than today? That's rare; it's quite cold out, I thought he'd sleep in."
"Professor Shiller! Oh, Professor, it's rare to see you back, how's everything at the university?"
Shiller took out the morning newspaper from the mailbox and greeted the sanitation worker, saying, "It's fine, nothing major. Tomorrow is the day for the rugby match, hope it goes smoothly."
"Yes, God bless the athletes."
Shiller, wearing sheepskin gloves, untied the newspaper's string, unfolded the paper, and sighed, "The Gotham Daily has finally spared so quality ink. Since I moved here, I've rarely ironed a newspaper, I've lost count of how many tis I've gone to work with ink-stained hands."
"Indeed, since Brainiac kicked that damn newspaper boss to the farm to feed pigs, the daily's quality has improved quite a bit... Oh, Professor, your breakfast has arrived. I can't chat now; I have to get back to work."
Shiller nodded to him, then glanced toward the street corner, and sure enough, the breakfast cart had already arrived.
Since Brainiac implented the rationing system on Earth, the traditional concept of US Dollar currency ceased to exist. Now, Earth uses Brainiac's universal points, recorded in Brainiac's system, allowing face recognition paynts everywhere.
However, it's still quite recent, and thorough market reforms haven't been carried out, so there's almost no need to spend money. Everyday necessities are delivered straight to the doorstep, for example, three als a day.
Shiller works at Gotham University, so lunch is eaten in the school's cafeteria, only breakfast and dinner are delivered.
Now every community has a cafeteria, according to Brainiac's rationing standards, it's uniformly prepared and distributed, but it's not mass-cooked food. Instead, it's a nutritionally balanced al tailored to each person's height, weight, and physical condition after check-ups, ensuring optimal human health.
The taste is actually quite alright; although it surely doesn't match the dishes offered by upscale restaurants, it's definitely better than most whitey's food, and especially a significant improvent over the unhealthy, heavily flavored dishes that the forr lower-class people ate.
Shiller actually quite enjoys these als, mainly because European and Arican restaurants all love drenching dishes in sauces. Shiller doesn't like sauces, especially high-calorie ones like mayonnaise. He'd rather munch on raw veggies without any salad dressing.
But since most sauces aren't healthy, Brainiac rarely adds them; there's less cheese, cream, and sugar, favoring a mild taste, similar to Shiller's usual preference.
The approaching breakfast cart also played music, and at this ti, the young people from the surrounding households were just getting up, wrapping themselves like bears, groggy-eyed, coming out to collect breakfast.
"Oh, why is it an egg sandwich again today?" Shiller heard soone across the street complaining, "I don't want eggs. Lina, is yours a jam sandwich? Let's switch..."
Shiller took a small package from the delivery worker's hand, opened it and saw it spread with blueberry jam, so he waved to Bucky's son across the street, "I have a jam sandwich here, let's switch."
However, they didn't exchange the entire breakfast package, just switched sandwiches, as the package also contained fruit, cookies, and customized trace elent tablets for each person.
Shiller took the breakfast and newspaper back inside, sitting at the dining table to open the package. His breakfast was generally a sandwich, half an orange, a cup of fruit and vegetable juice, an egg, two soda crackers, and two gummy-like trace elent supplent candies.
The average clerical staff breakfast was basically this; the sandwich and fruit types occasionally varied between an apple and a kiwi. Compared to these two, Shiller still prefers orange.
Shiller was eating breakfast while reading the newspaper when the doorbell rang outside. He glanced out the window and saw Waylon had arrived.
"Good morning, Professor, have you had breakfast?" Waylon entered carrying a breakfast bag, the chilling cold from outside on him, quickly dispelled by the cozy warmth of the fireplace.
"Having breakfast. Are you heading to the east to move things again today?"
"Yes, I suppose I'll be moving things all day again," Waylon said, opening his breakfast. Their breakfast packages were the sa, but Waylon's was much larger.
His package contained a full-sized beef sandwich, two pure at sausages, a large fried fish fillet, a box of individually packaged salad dressing, two bananas, and a vegetable salad.
Shiller glanced at it, feeling stuffed just looking at it. But that's how most physical laborers' food rations are: lots of protein and carbohydrates, with plenty of high-calorie items.
"I have to say, this is much better than before," Waylon said, taking a big bite of the sandwich. "I used to have nothing to eat in the morning. My appetite is too big and buying breakfast was too expensive, and I couldn't make it myself. My claws aren't made for handling those tiny fruit knives. After I broke six cabbages in a row, I knew I wasn't cut out for this..."
Shiller looked at Waylon's hands. The Killer Croc in their universe had a higher degree of mutation, with fingers that resembled a crocodile's more than just a skin transformation seen in many other universes.
Waylon's hands, while distinguishable with five fingers, were larger than a normal human's, but his fingers were much shorter, making it difficult to perform delicate tasks. That's why he kept working as a mover.
Waylon was clearly satisfied with his life now. In fact, Shiller thought his scales were looking shinier recently. Unexpectedly, Brainiac turned out to be quite the expert in taking care of crocodiles.
After finishing their breakfast, Shiller led him upstairs and said, "This room. Move this cabinet to my bedroom, move the desk to the east side of the living room, and place that small bed over here..."
Shiller directed Waylon in moving the furniture, preparing to clear out his study to turn it into a bedroom.
Brainiac had specific requirents for everyone's living space. People like Shiller, who are in administrative roles, are usually allocated work and living spaces, with Brainiac setting limits on both.
Simply put, the size of one's work and rest areas is fixed, neither too little nor too much. If there's less, Brainiac will move them to a larger place; if there's more, they have to share with soone else.
For example, if a wealthy person has a mansion covering thousands of square ters, Brainiac won't allow it because the living space exceeds the upper limit. So, they either move to a smaller place, leaving the big house for more people, or they find soone to live with them.
Of course, Brainiac is more humane than many real estate developers. He gives you ti to resolve it, allowing you to invite relatives to live with you. But a person can only have one residence, and those relatives' houses must be freed up for others.
Shiller's new ho, although much smaller than the estate, was still quite large, exceeding the requirents for his living space. However, because of the reduced population on Earth, the allocated space per person was larger, not exceeding by much, so he just needed to find one roommate.
anwhile, Victor was sent to Krypton by Brainiac as a special technical talent. But since Billy could turn into Shazam and needed to stay on Earth for his bone treatnt, he didn't go with them. Shiller took him in, letting him stay temporarily.
Waylon was always moving people in the East District because the average residential space there was insufficient, with most people having to move to the North and South Districts.
The South District is a wealthy area. Logically, they wouldn't want to vacate their hos for the poor. However, Gotham was a special case; the wealthy had mostly moved to the inner world.
Although they wished to have the best of both worlds, Brainiac's Iron Fist didn't compromise. Real estate in the inner and outer worlds could only be chosen from one, forcing them to reluctantly abandon the relatively older properties outside and turn the entire inner world into a new wealthy area.
The inner world was also under Brainiac's jurisdiction, but since it had entry points to the Magical World, resource managent wasn't as strict. Brainiac turned a blind eye to these magical creatures, making the rich more inclined to co here.
Most of the South District residents had left, and though many mansions remained, they weren't really suitable for the East District residents to live in. After all, their social classes were different before, and so are their current jobs—what use do dockworkers have for four or five studies? It's better to convert more rooms for the kids to sleep in.
So now, the South District is undergoing a massive renovation project, and most mansions' original structures remain unchanged, just adapted for ordinary people's lives. After a period of warti efficiency, most of the renovations were completed, and East District residents were moving here with their families.
As many moved out, the East District was left with more vacancies. These need to be transford, rging the previous small rooms into larger ones suitable for families to live in.
A significant portion of Gotham's young labor force was transferred, but maybe because the previous tal residue wasn't cleaned up, many young workers failed the dical examinations, resulting in only about one-third of the labor force moving, much less compared to neighboring tropolis.
Originally, Shiller wanted to go to Krypton with Victor. He answered the ntal health questionnaire well during the dical examination, but Brainiac insisted he cheated, calling him "a severe ntal illness patient unable to take on any order-based work," denying his Krypton visa.
During the intense ongoing battles, Shiller applied three tis, but all were rejected, so he stayed teaching at Gotham University.
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