"Then pressurise." Xi P mutters under his breath.

  The ordinary spray can in his hand is now filled with several dozen millilitres of medical spray solvent. After working night and day, they've finally prepared this solution. All that remains is to pressurise the can with nitrogen gas, and they will have the first can of medical spray made entirely from materials sourced on Earth. He is thrilled, but he knows better than to get carried away. Mark will have a lot of extra work to do if this is wasted.

  Fortunately, he makes no mistakes. The nitrogen is safely loaded into the canister. The next step is to squeeze the trigger, which will release the medical spray as a mist. This will quickly turn into a tough membrane that will form over the wound. That's the theory, at least. Through the transparent canister wall, the colourless appearance of the product is almost identical to the original spray. However, the impurities in the raw materials exceed 20% by volume or mass. Back on Lierus, any company using materials of this quality would have been suspended straight away. For submitting a sample to apply for a patent here, however, it's more than enough.

  Next is to test its effectiveness. He takes out a prepared piece of pork, cuts into it, and sprays it. A cloudy yellow film instantly forms on the surface. After gently touching it twice, he's certain — its strength and toughness meet the standards!

  Now he can't contain his excitement. With a loud cheer, he grabs the spray and dashes out of the study.

  ***

  Seeing Xi P's jubilant expression, Min really wants to pat him on the head encouragingly.

  "You succeeded?"

  This question is merely an attempt to draw Xi P's attention — it's obvious to everyone by now that he's succeeded. Xi P nods vigorously twice and holds up the small can: "It's been tested. It solidifies into a film."

  "Very well. Then there's the toxicity test. Do you want to do it, or should I, or should we find a lab rat?"

  Xi P's mouth stops twitching, signalling he has stopped laughing. He whispers: "This is just, proof-of-concept, this kind doesn't need to be that strict, does it?"

  "I don't think so. But it's better if it is, yeah."

  "Could you use that fox?"

  "How could I possibly hurt such an adorable creature?" Min refuses, adding, "Do yourself. I'd rather live a little longer myself."

  They exchange glances, neither willing to volunteer as the test subject. Eventually, Xi P relents: "Get you, the purity isn't high enough yet. Human testing is too risky. Should we buy some lab mice tomorrow?"

  "That's the way."

  ***

  After filming the process of its solidification and demonstrating its membrane mechanical properties, all materials for the patent application are now complete. Having revisited Mark's instructions and double-checked the procedure, Min hesitates for a long time before finally including Xi P's pseudonym in the applicant's name.

  This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

  "A non-toxic spray chemical that rapidly solidifies on skin or wounds, forming a membrane structure to halt further blood loss." That's the description he wrote — quite simple indeed, far shorter than some mechanical design summaries. Beyond the complex raw materials and manufacturing process, the final product itself holds little that warrants elaborate description. Of course, description length and practicality are entirely separate matters…

  Looking at the section where they set out the spray's potential uses. Min suddenly finds himself thinking of Fleming, who first used penicillin to treat patients. He lets out a soft sigh. What Fleming and his team accomplished was far nobler than his own work: they never patented penicillin, believing it would be inhumane. Consequently, they earned almost nothing directly from it. Admittedly, the medical spray won't be nearly as revolutionary as antibiotics, yet the contrast still stings. Especially since the spray isn't even their invention.

  ***

  "CP 1766, February 4. 188 days have passed since landing. Local time: AD 2017, February 21."

  "Even though Ye Min said this wasn't the norm, the processing speed for patent applications on Earth was unexpectedly fast. It's only been three days, and our medical spray patent has already been approved."

  "The response letter was absolutely lavished with praise. 'Highly successful', 'revolutionary for the medical field', 'the greatest invention of the 21st century' and such. Cringe, just cringe. Setting aside whether the medical spray is truly that significant, considering none of us are its actual inventors, all this praise feels like flattery bordering on destruction. Ye Min somehow acted more sensibly this time — just patted my shoulder instead of ruffling my head. What a relief."

  "Thanks to a research incentive policy, Ye Min also received a hefty bonus after the patent application. He plans to sell the patent to a company later for exclusive sales rights, before resigning from his lab immediately with lightning-fast efficiency."

  "'Gaining future advanced technology from aliens to achieve financial freedom' — such a clichéd plot. If electronic payments hadn't already taken off here, I bet we'd see scenes of him swimming in piles of cash, too."

  "Now that I have another human to compare him to, I can confirm Ye Min's personality: outwardly normal, but inwardly a bit eccentric with an overactive curiosity — at least when it comes to certain things. He clearly enjoys watching my reactions in different situations and comparing them to his own. I can understand why he does it... If I were the one who took him in, I might do the same. But regardless, I get this feeling of being a test subject. More accurately, his approach reminds me of one of those common ways aliens are studied in movies. Both perfectly logical and absurdly ridiculous..."

  "Like, he showed me Independence Day: Resurgence. I could tell what kind of movie it was: the usual alien-fighting fare. It wasn't bad, but did he really think showing me this was a good idea? Making an alien watch a movie about fighting aliens... really..."

  "It's worth pointing out, though, that when it comes to imagining alien appearances, species differences don't really make much of a difference. Like, they also love turning any holes in those aliens' faces into actual 'holes'. Plus a whole bunch of other random features like that, but I'd rather not write them down here…"

  "But the worst part isn't what he did, it's why he did it. When I asked why he enjoyed observing my reactions so much, he couldn't/wouldn't answer, but claimed part of it was because I resembled a fox, and if I looked like another animal, he might not have done it. But that's not the worst part. I now know that their term 'fox' actually refers to a broad category of similar-looking species. Out of curiosity, I foolishly asked which fox he thought I resembled. His description? 'A cross between a red fox and a fennec fox!' It truly infuriated me — perhaps because the comparison was just too accurate... utterly revolting.