Chapter 3615 Guanghan Zhenren

When Wu Bolin arrived at the Japanese Antarctic research station, the straight-line distance between him and Ye Chen was about 400 kilometers.

Like the Nordic research stations, the Japanese research station is surrounded by desolate landscapes and has few neighbors.

The problem is that Antarctica is such a vast place that when a limited number of countries come to build a limited number of research stations, they all leave some room for their own and other countries' future development. If they are too close to other countries' research stations, it will not only hinder their own future development, but may also affect the secrecy of some of their missions.

After all, Antarctic scientific expeditions are not simply about studying the local human environment and flora and fauna.

Antarctic scientific expeditions, like space exploration, are not only about science, but also about a country's strategic planning and even the development of certain strategic technologies.

For example, both the United States and China have tested their Mars rovers in Antarctica. This is because Mars is a planet with an average temperature of only around -60 degrees Celsius, and Antarctica is the closest place on Earth to this environment. Moreover, Antarctica has many glaciers and hills, which are quite similar to the terrain of Mars to some extent.

Because Antarctic scientific expeditions from various countries involve a wide range of cutting-edge technologies, they rarely choose to crowd together.

The Japanese research station is much larger than those in Northern Europe, but even so, Wu Bolin couldn't hide his disdain as he looked at the low-rise buildings under the starlight of the polar night.

Especially when he saw the characters "Showa" written in Chinese characters outside the research station, his face was full of disdain and he was extremely unhappy.

Suddenly, he conjured a tiny sword the size of a palm from his wrist, infused it with spiritual energy, and activated the array within. The tiny sword, less than a foot long, suddenly seemed to be enchanted, instantly growing larger and longer into a cold, gleaming sword a full 1.3 or 1.4 meters long.

This sword didn't actually grow to this length; rather, spiritual energy was injected into it to activate the array within, which then conjured up this sword body. With the sword body conjured by spiritual energy, it can cut through iron like mud and split mountains and shatter rocks.

Wu Bolin held a long sword and gently swung it at the stone tablet inscribed with the words "Showa Station". The entire side of the stone tablet with the inscription was instantly flattened. Then, with a flick of his sword, he left three elegant and unrestrained cursive characters on the stone tablet: "Wu Hangong".

Wu Bolin wasn't well-educated and couldn't think of any sophisticated or grand name for it. He just felt that if there really was a legendary Guanghan Palace on the moon, it would probably look like this: freezing cold and dark.

However, since there was no Chang'e here, and it was to become his palace for a period of time in the future, he simply changed one character in a vulgar way, and it became Wu Han Palace.

He pondered to himself that "Wu" represented the Wu family, "Han" was self-explanatory, being the most fitting word for this godforsaken place, and "Gong" was meant to highlight his extraordinary status.

After the name was changed, the research station looks much better now.

So he secretly pondered, now that Wu Han Palace is here, it is his own place of practice, and he should naturally have a Taoist name.

After much thought, he decided to use Wu Han Palace as the name of his Taoist temple and Guanghan Zhenren as his Taoist name, which sounded majestic, ethereal, and full of artistic conception.

So he summoned Kikuchi Kohei and instructed him: "Kikuchi, from now on, all of you must kneel on one knee and respectfully address me as Guanghan Zhenren whenever you see me, including you, understand?"

The power of psychological suggestion is that it can completely eliminate all ambiguity and maximize execution.

Without saying a word, Kikuchi Kohei immediately knelt on one knee and respectfully said, "I pay my respects to the Immortal Guanghan!"

"Wow." Wu Bolin felt much more refreshed after that.

Despite being a highly respected elder in the Qing Dynasty, he has never experienced true honor. He began his seclusion in his youth, meditating cross-legged for over a hundred years. His consciousness was almost always in his own sea of ​​consciousness, completely immersed in his own world. He was far more lonely than Sun Wukong, who was imprisoned under the Five Elements Mountain for five hundred years. At least Sun Wukong had a shepherd boy to bring him some fruit, but he hadn't had anyone to talk to during his years of seclusion.

After leaving the pass, although the members of the Anti-Qing Society treated him with great respect, he could also sense that their respect was not due to their blind obedience to him, but rather to their deference to Wu Feiyan.

This made him feel like he was the star of the opera troupe back then. Although everyone in the troupe bowed and scraped before him, they were all the troupe owner's people. They were not only disloyal to him, but he also had no real power in the troupe.

Now things are different. These dozens of Japanese research team members, including Kikuchi Kohei, are all loyal lackeys to him. In this "Wu Han Palace," he is the undisputed boss and doesn't need to live in Wu Feiyan's shadow at all.

So he immediately said to Kikuchi Kohei, who was kneeling on one knee, "Go, call everyone over and have them all worship me!"

Kikuchi Kohei, with utmost respect and deference, loudly proclaimed, "Your subordinate obeys!"

Then, he immediately went to make arrangements for everyone.

Although those people did not understand Chinese, Wu Bolin used Kikuchi Kohei's words in Japanese to give them psychological suggestions, so they were absolutely obedient to Kikuchi Kohei.

So, the group immediately gathered in the freezing square.

In front of the "Wu Han Palace" stele, Kikuchi Kohei spoke to them in Japanese, instructing them to learn the pronunciation of eight Chinese characters from him.

The Japanese are not particularly gifted in languages, as evidenced by their daily practice of learning English and the Chinese phrase "识时务者为俊杰" (a wise man knows when to yield to circumstances). It took a group of people a full twenty minutes to rack their brains to learn the pronunciation of these eight characters.

Wu Bolin is also patient.

With his hands behind his back, he stood on the platform in front of the stone tablet, looking down at the group of people practicing pronunciation in small groups. Kikuchi Kohei kept running and weaving among them, constantly correcting their pronunciation problems.

At one moment, Wu Bolin suddenly understood what kind of life Wu Feiyan had been living for the past few hundred years. She was an empress surrounded by tens of thousands, even hundreds of thousands of people! And she had been sitting on the throne for hundreds of years!

I wish I had the chance to live as freely as she does for hundreds of years.

In temperatures below minus fifty degrees Celsius, Kohei Kikuchi managed to break out in a sweat. The sweat fell onto his eyelashes and was blown into ice crystals by the cold wind. Over time, this resulted in two thick, icy eyebrows hanging on his eyelids.

He rushed to Wu Bolin, knelt on one knee, and said like a Qing Dynasty servant, "Reporting to Guanghan Zhenren, all members of the Showa Station are ready!"

Wu Bolin frowned and demanded, "Say it again, what station?!"

Kikuchi Kohei then noticed the three Chinese characters on the stone tablet behind Wu Bolin and quickly corrected himself, saying, "Reporting to Guanghan Zhenren, all members of Wuhan Palace are ready!"

Wu Bolin was finally satisfied and said coldly, "Since you're ready, let's begin!"

Like a conductor of a symphony orchestra, Kohei Kikuchi turned to look at the crowd, waved his hands, and the group shouted in extremely strange accents: "Zai Xia Shen Jian Gong Han Zhenren!"

The crowd shouted with great enthusiasm, and the white mist they exhaled rose up simultaneously, merging into one, creating a truly spectacular sight.

Wu Bolin was momentarily stunned, thinking he had misheard. He was the Guanghan Zhenren, so how could these Japanese people insist on calling him the Gonghan Zhenren?

I initially thought these Japanese were deliberately being disobedient, but then I realized that didn't make sense. They'd already been given psychological suggestions; even if I made them stand naked in minus fifty degrees Celsius, they wouldn't hesitate for even half a second. It was clearly a matter of language ability.

So he said to Kohei Kikuchi with a dark face, "From today onwards, teach them to speak Chinese for six hours every day, and each person is only allowed to sleep for three hours a day!"

Kohei Kikuchi immediately replied loudly, "Yes, sir!"

At this time, the Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, thousands of kilometers away, was unaware that members of its two scientific expedition teams, along with the crew of its only heavy icebreaker, had become Wu Bolin's lackeys.

Since they learned that the research vessel had safely arrived in Antarctica, they hadn't paid much attention to the research team's situation, because the team was carrying out routine tasks, and they assumed that these professionals would smoothly complete the handover of personnel and supplies in the next few days.

Three days later, when the Chinese language skills of these research team members had improved significantly, the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology received a message from the research vessel.

The research vessel experienced a mechanical failure and needed to be cleared on the spot before it could begin its return voyage.

The officials from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology were a little puzzled. How could a brand-new research vessel break down as soon as it arrived in Antarctica? Normally, minor mechanical failures would not affect normal navigation and would be repaired as it sailed. But now it was completely immobile and would have to be repaired in Antarctica.

So they immediately called the research vessel, expressing their biggest concern: "Can you dare to come back before the coastline freezes beyond its icebreaking limit?"

Captain Matsushita Heikichi replied: "It is unpredictable. Please have the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology prepare for the possibility that the research vessel may not be able to return this winter."

The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology was immediately in an uproar.

Leaving dozens of people and a ship stranded in Antarctica is not considered dangerous, since the ship and research station have ample supplies, enough for these people to stay until the Antarctic summer arrives.

But the key question is, who the hell can afford to lose face like that?

While the news of the research vessel's departure wasn't exactly attracting widespread attention, it did garner interest from a segment of polar enthusiasts and the families of the research team. If it didn't return, and the news got back to Japan, wouldn't that be a disgrace to the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology? And if it got back to Japan, it would be a disgrace to the entire Japanese scientific community.

This isn't just the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology being overly worried; there are precedents to follow. Not long ago, two American astronauts were stranded in space for 286 days due to a Starliner malfunction, ending their planned eight-day mission. The image of one of the astronauts, who had become skin and bones, shocked the world, and NASA almost lost face. With American astronauts stranded in space and Japanese researchers stranded in Antarctica, if this gets out, it will be enough to give the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology a run for its money.

Although the fine tradition of seppuku (ritual suicide) by the person primarily responsible for the Fukushima nuclear accident is no longer popular in Japan these days, the tradition of hanging oneself still exists in Japan. For example, Yasuhiro Sato, the person in charge of the Fukushima nuclear accident, knew that he had made a huge mistake and ultimately chose to atone for it with his death.

If a major blunder occurs in polar scientific research and causes an international scandal, the person in charge will be under at least 70-80% of the pressure, even if it's not as great as Yasuhiro Sato. The public pressure would be unbearable for most people.

Therefore, the person in charge convened a top-secret internal meeting. After some discussion, they decided to send a request to the Antarctic expedition team members and the crew of the research vessel, asking them to tell their families that they were carrying out a secret scientific research mission in Antarctica and would not be able to return home for a short period of time. They also asked them to keep a consistent story and not mention that the ship had broken down.

To appease everyone and ensure their full cooperation, they even offered a rule of ten times the daily wage. That is, if everyone stayed in Antarctica for one more day than originally planned, they would receive ten days' worth of wages, continuing until they returned.

The research team members and crew had completely submitted to Wu Bolin and had truly become uninterested in money. When Wu Bolin asked them to agree, they immediately and without hesitation agreed.

The fact that everyone agreed so readily and without exception moved the high-ranking officials of the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology to tears several times. They thought their researchers were the most dedicated in the world. Reassured, they immediately announced that Japan would launch its largest and longest-running winter scientific expedition to Antarctica in history. This made the Japanese public think that there was some major discovery that could not be announced for the time being, and everyone was excited online.

Little did they know, it was all the work of Wu Bolin, the Guanghan Immortal.