Half an hour later.
Daphne pushed Mark into a slightly old and run-down neighborhood.
The buildings on both sides of the street had mottled exterior walls, covered in messy graffiti sprayed with paint.
Some trash cans had overflowed or fallen to the ground, and plastic bags, tin cans, and various rotting debris emitting a pungent odor were scattered on the ground, with no one to clean them up.
Some abandoned cars were also parked along the roadside.
Their windows were shattered, their bodies rusted, and the interiors were stuffed with trash.
In the corners of the street, Mark also saw some tents built with waste cardboard, inside which homeless people of various skin colors lay in twos and threes.
“To think that my mother in this lifetime actually lives in such a terrible environment?”
Mark raised his little hand and covered his nose to block out the stench.
Now he somewhat understood why Martha was so eager to have Tony Stark acknowledge him as an illegitimate child.
She must be extremely unwilling to let her child live in this kind of place with her for a lifetime.
The place where Rosalie lived was an old five-story low-rent apartment building.
The exterior walls of the apartment exposed red bricks, and one could tell at a glance that it had been around for quite a few years.
She rented a place on the third floor.
After opening the door, the interior was cleaned to be quite neat and tidy.
“Rosalie, if the baby cries, it’s either because he’s hungry or wet, remember to carefully check the diaper…”
While helping Rosalie tidy things up, Daphne patiently instructed her on how to take care of the baby: “Anyway, I live right upstairs from you. If the baby has any other issues in the future, you can come to me anytime.”
After settling Rosalie in, the sky had already grown dark.
To thank Daphne for her care, Rosalie cooked personally and prepared a sumptuous dinner.
Over the next few days, Rosalie officially embarked on the path of a novice mother.
Lacking any experience, she was completely absent-minded and full of mistakes in everything she did.
Fortunately, Mark was not an ordinary baby.
With his active cooperation, a lot of Rosalie’s workload was reduced.
“Oh gosh, Mark is simply too smart! I have never seen such a sensible baby!”
Daphne, who came over to help after work, was also endlessly amazed by Mark’s performance.
“Is that so? Aren’t all babies like this?”
“Of course not! Those babies I’ve seen at the clinic are really too difficult to deal with…”
Rosalie had originally thought that other babies were just like Mark!
After listening to Daphne’s account, she realized just how lucky she was.
She kissed Mark on the face with a face full of affection: “Baby, you are truly the best gift God has given Mommy!”
A month’s time passed in the blink of an eye.
[sunlight value: 100]
“Finally gathered 100 points of sunlight value!”
Looking at the sunlight value displayed in his mind, Mark was so excited he almost cried: “For these sunlight values, I’ve had it so hard!”
Rosalie kept Daphne’s injunctions firmly in mind.
Once she found that Mark had been exposed to sunlight for a long time, she would immediately carry him to a shady place.
Even if Mark pretended to cry loudly to protest, it was of no use.
Only when Rosalie was focused on doing other things would she occasionally forget to stare at Mark, giving him the opportunity to collect a bit more sunlight value.
Coupled with some rainy weather during this period, it took Mark a full month and more just to save up this 100 sunlight value.
“Upgrade Super Brain!”
Mark immediately added this 100 sunlight value to his only unlocked superpower—Super Brain.
[Super Brain LV0 → LV1]
As the superpower upgraded, Mark instantly felt a burst of clarity in his brain.
Previously, for addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division involving numbers over 10, Mark had to count on his little fingers for a long time before he could barely figure it out.
Many memories from before his transmigration were even more hazy and unclear, no different from senile dementia.
Now, after upgrading Super Brain to level 1, Mark’s intelligence directly rose to a level comparable to an ordinary adult.
His originally vague memories also became clear again.
“This is only level 1, and the improvement effect is already so significant. As long as I continue to upgrade Super Brain, my computing power will sooner or later be able to match a supercomputer!”
Mark clenched his fists, full of endless anticipation in his heart.
Of course, Super Brain only enhanced the computing capacity of Mark’s brain.
Wanting someone with so little life experience to directly become the kind of wise man who could calculate everything was obviously impossible; these were completely two different directions of intellectual development.
Just like Tony Stark in Marvel, even though his IQ was second to none, he still did many stupid things in life.
Another benefit after upgrading Super Brain was that Mark no longer needed a large amount of sleep time like other babies.
The nights in this neighborhood were not peaceful.
Often there were drunkards or hooligans making noise in the quiet, deserted midnight, loudly singing vulgar songs.
Some people also drove racing cars or motorcycles, roaring and ripping through the streets.
One night, a gang shootout even broke out not far away, and the continuous gunfire lasted for more half an hour!
Under such circumstances, Mark’s sleep quality was naturally very poor.
Now that Super Brain was upgraded, the sleep time Mark needed was greatly reduced, and the situation had improved a lot.
After Mark’s full moon, Rosalie started returning to work, heading to Hollywood to shoot films.
Her savings were already not much, and she still owed money to the Thomas Clinic.
If she continued to eat into her savings without working, she and her son would soon be unable to afford the rent.
Rosalie hired Daphne at a monthly salary of $3,000 to take care of Mark full-time.
This price was higher than Daphne’s salary at the clinic, so she chose to resign without any hesitation.
Compared to Rosalie, Daphne was indeed much more professional.
The temperature and consistency of the milk powder she brewed were appropriate, and her movements in changing Mark’s diapers were also gentler, not making him feel uncomfortable like Rosalie did.
The only problem was that Daphne stared at Mark even more closely!
As long as he was exposed to sunlight for more than five minutes, Daphne would inevitably go over and push his stroller to a nearby shady place.
“Daphne, I’m begging you, can we please not be so dutiful!”
Mark was practically going to cry.
But crying was useless!
As a professional caregiver, Daphne wouldn’t be as careless as Rosalie.
Upgrading Super Brain to level 2 required consuming 200 points of sunlight value.
Under Daphne’s strict care, this time Mark took a full half a year to finally gather all these sunlight values!
[Super Brain LV1 → LV2]
Mark’s Super Brain upgraded once again.
He could clearly feel that his brain’s computing power had once again greatly improved.
Many questions that he couldn’t figure out before could now be answered with just a slight thought.
Some memories that Mark had forgotten before his transmigration were now recalled once more.
If a level 1 Super Brain was equivalent to the intelligence of an ordinary adult, then a level 2 Super Brain was already comparable to those top academic achievers Mark had seen in his past life.
“If I had a brain like this before my transmigration, wouldn’t getting into Tsinghua or Peking University be a piece of cake? How could I have fallen to the point of only being able to attend a third-tier university…”
Mark thought regretfully in his heart.
Feeling the intelligence boost brought by the Super Brain upgrade, Mark was now even more eager to elevate this superpower to a higher level.
And upgrading Super Brain to level 3 required consuming 400 points of sunlight value!