Reborn in 1950: Shorting the Federal Reserve at the Start

The stairs leading to first class were not easy to climb, especially when the whole ship was in a state of panic.

Shen Jinghong and Lin Qinghan rushed onto the deck one after the other. The sea breeze, carrying a salty and fishy smell, hit them in the face, making their clothes flutter. The first-class corridor was already crowded with people, and the noisy discussion was like a pot of boiling porridge. The air was filled with a suffocating sense of anxiety and the smell of sweat.

"Make way! Everyone make way! Don't waste oxygen by crowding around here!"

Shen Jinghong shouted as he pushed through the crowd with his shoulder, forcing a path through the crowd. Lin Qinghan followed closely behind him, the heavy leather suitcase still in her hand, her eyes scanning the surroundings warily, like a cat ready to pounce at any moment.

In the center of the crowd, an elderly man dressed in an old-fashioned Zhongshan suit was curled up in a recliner.

The old man's face was a terrifying purplish-red, his chest heaving violently, and a wheezing sound like a bellows coming from his throat. Sweat soaked through his white hair, and he was in a semi-conscious state, his withered fingers gripping his clothes tightly at his chest.

Standing nearby was a white ship's doctor, sweating profusely, holding a stethoscope, helplessly shrugging at the anxious Chinese people around him, looking utterly dejected.

"It's no use! This is respiratory failure caused by acute severe pneumonia! His lungs are full of fluid!"

The ship's doctor yelled, trying to drown out the surrounding noise, "I've given him a cardiac stimulant, but no antibiotics. He's just waiting to die! The ship ran out of penicillin yesterday!"

"How can there be no medicine? We'll pay double! US dollars! I have US dollars!"

A young man, who looked like a student, cried out, waving a wad of banknotes in his hand, his face covered in tears and snot, "He's Professor Wang! He's a famous physicist! He can't die here! Please, please save him!"

"This isn't about money! This is the ocean, not a New York pharmacy!"

The ship's doctor irritably shook his stethoscope, pushed the stack of US dollars aside, and said, "Unless God throws down a bottle of high-purity penicillin right now, no one can save him! Prepare for the worst!"

The air froze instantly, and despair spread like a plague.

In those days, penicillin was a strategic resource more valuable than gold, let alone on the vast ocean.

Shen Jinghong glanced at the old man, and his brows furrowed instantly.

Professor Wang.

The face in his past life memories gradually became clear—Wang Xuewen, a renowned nuclear physicist. If history had not deviated, he should have returned to China to oversee the construction of the first-generation reactor, but he died of illness on his way back, becoming a great regret for China's nuclear industry.

Unexpectedly, I ran into it myself.

"Since we've run into them, we can't let the King of Hell take them away."

Shen Jinghong took a deep breath, his hand instinctively reaching for his chest. In his system space, among the supplies he had smuggled from a New York pharmacy, there were several boxes of the latest type of crystalline penicillin.

But here is the problem.

At this very moment, on the outskirts of the crowd, the ever-present FBI agent mingled among the onlookers, his eyes fixed on them with a sinister glint in his eyes, his hands still in his pockets. If he were to conjure up a bottle of a rare, highly effective drug—one that was practically impossible to find even on the American market—what difference would there be between him and a self-destructing truck?

We need to find cover.

"Lin Qinghan".

Shen Jinghong suddenly lowered her voice, took half a step back, and turned her back to the detective.

"What are you doing?" Lin Qinghan asked coldly, gripping the box in her hand even tighter, her eyes full of vigilance.

"I'll borrow your body for a bit."

"you……"

Before Lin Qinghan could even get angry, Shen Jinghong had already made his move.

He didn't give Lin Qinghan any time to react. He suddenly reached out, grabbed her slender waist, and pulled her forcefully into his arms.

At this moment, time seemed to stand still.

Lin Qinghan froze, her mind blank. She felt a warm, masculine breath instantly envelop her, carrying a faint scent of tobacco and some indescribable, refreshing aroma, forcefully entering her body.

"You're insane! Let go of me!"

Lin Qinghan instinctively tried to struggle, and the suitcase in her hand almost hit Shen Jinghong's foot. Shame and indignation made her originally pale face turn red instantly.

"Don't move! At three o'clock, that guy in the gray trench coat is watching us."

Shen Jinghong's voice was low and urgent, close to her ear, his hot breath sending shivers down her spine. "Block me for a bit, I need to get my medicine."

Lin Qinghan's struggles came to an abrupt halt.

Although she was aloof, she was by no means stupid. Upon hearing the words "get medicine" and recalling what the ship's doctor had just said, she immediately understood Shen Jinghong's intention.

Does this man have drugs on him?

But he clearly found nothing when he searched me!

Before she could figure it out, Shen Jinghong had already taken advantage of the blind spot created by their overlapping bodies and quickly reached his right hand into his clothes—to onlookers, it looked like he was impatiently unbuttoning his shirt.

From the FBI agent's perspective, they were nothing short of a shameless young couple, embracing and kissing amidst the chaos of an emergency, and even taking the opportunity to grope each other.

"These damn yellow-skinned monkeys, they're in heat at a time like this."

The agent spat in disgust, looked away, and stopped paying attention to the situation.

In that very instant.

Shen Jinghong's fingers touched the medicine box labeled "Pfizer" in the space. With a thought, a white crystalline powder sealed in a glass bottle appeared in his palm.

The cool touch of the glass relieved him.

"alright."

Shen Jinghong released his grip and casually straightened Lin Qinghan's disheveled collar, his movements as natural as a considerate husband's, while deliberately speaking loudly:

"Don't be afraid, darling. Professor Wang is a lucky man, don't scare yourself."

Lin Qinghan's cheeks burned like fire, a mixture of anger and embarrassment. She glared fiercely at Shen Jinghong, gritting her teeth in a voice only the two of them could hear:

"Shen Jinghong, I've remembered this. If you can't produce the medicine, I'll throw you into the sea to feed the sharks!"

Shen Jinghong chuckled, turned around and pushed through the crowd, raising the glass bottle high in his hand like a torchbearer.

"Get out of the way! I'm a doctor! I have medicine!"

That shout drew everyone's attention.

The ship's doctor, who was about to announce the death, froze, staring wide-eyed at the small glass bottle in Shen Jinghong's hand that shimmered with a pure luster in the sunlight. His jaw nearly dropped to the ground.

"This...this is..."

Shen Jinghong strode forward, shoved the medicine bottle into the ship's doctor's hand, and spoke with an unquestionable tone, carrying the authority of a professional:

"80 units of crystalline penicillin, and it's the latest high-purity sample from Pfizer's lab. Enough talk, get the skin test done and inject it!"

"80 units? Or is it crystalline powder?"

The ship's doctor's hands trembled, as if he were holding some sacred relic. As a professional, he knew all too well the value of this substance. Most penicillin on the market was an oil-based preparation, containing many impurities and causing significant side effects. This pure white crystalline substance, however, was a special supply reserved only for high-ranking officers at the Pentagon!

"Where did you get this? This thing could be exchanged for a gold bar on the black market!"

"I also wanted to exchange it for gold bars, but now I think it's more worthwhile to use it to save my life."

Shen Jinghong urged, her eyes sharp, "Don't just stand there! If you dawdle any longer, even God can't stop you!"

The ship's doctor snapped out of his daze and hurriedly called the nurses to prepare the medicine, his movements as swift as if he were rescuing his own father.

As the needle pierced the old man's withered veins and the precious medicine was slowly injected, the surrounding crowd let out a suppressed cheer.

The young student knelt down with a thud and kowtowed to Shen Jinghong, his forehead hitting the deck with a loud thud.

"Thank you! Thank you, sir! You are Professor Wang's savior!"

"Get up, get up, stop with this feudal etiquette."

Shen Jinghong pulled the person up, dusted off his hands, but kept his eyes on the outside world with vigilance.

The FBI agents had obviously noticed the commotion and were squeezing over to check what was going on.

"It seems we shouldn't stay here any longer."

Shen Jinghong pulled Lin Qinghan, who was still in a daze, and said, "Come on, doing good deeds anonymously is like Lei Feng... oh no, that's my good character."

Taking advantage of the moment when the crowd was cheering for Professor Wang, the two quickly slipped back to the corridor on the lower deck.

Lin Qinghan only shook off Shen Jinghong's hand when they returned to the entrance of 303.

She leaned against the door, her chest still rising and falling slightly, the sensation of the embrace seemingly lingering on her skin. But now, her eyes held a deeper sense of inquiry and awe, as if she were seeing this man for the first time.

"Shen Jinghong".

She called out to the man who was about to open the door, her voice less cold and more serious, even with a slight, almost imperceptible tremor:

"That level of penicillin purity is not available on the American civilian market right now. Even Pfizer is still in the laboratory trial production stage."

She pushed up her glasses, her gaze sharp as a knife, staring intently into Shen Jinghong's eyes:

"Don't tell me you bought this from a roadside stall."