Mutants - Chapter 11

Chapter 11: An Advertisement?

Jenny: "It's strange. It was incredibly painful before, like my insides were being chewed up. But now, I'm actually fine. I just feel a bit weak and hungry, but nothing else hurts."

"Yeah, it's weird. Could it be this worm isn't trying to harm us?"

"Don't be too optimistic. The worm is definitely inside our bodies for a reason. It can't be doing nothing. It's like being poisoned; it could flare up at any moment."

Ye Chen wasn't so optimistic and reminded the now-rejoicing group. Hearing this, Sui Xin added, "How about I pick them out for you? I've got the technique down now. I just successfully removed that worm."

The group took a closer look. The bandage wrapped tightly around her arm was stained with dense clusters of blood spots. She had clearly been pierced more than seven or eight times. The red stains on the bandage were visibly spreading; for all they knew, the puncture wounds were still spurting blood. Then they looked at the 20cm-long silver needle in her hand.

"No, no, thank you."

"Not right now."

"Let's wait until the poison acts up again."

The main reason was that their worms were no longer in easily accessible places like their arms.

Sui Xin thought to herself: As expected. This makes it even less likely to be a Red Corrosive Ironworm. Plus, it has a dormant period before it acts up.

The others, unaware of Sui Xin's thoughts, grew collectively agitated. "This worm is vicious. We have to get it out. Since the people at the outpost created it, our only option is to go there."

"Indeed. Hopefully, we can get the antidote before the next attack. The research lab is our target."

Though they had originally planned to defect, the group now had no choice but to head to the outpost together.

Sui Xin's heart felt heavy.

After all these twists and turns, they still had to go to the outpost in the end.

This was also the consortium's goal. There had to be some secret hidden in that outpost.

Of course, to the audience watching on television, these warriors were braving the threat of a poisonous worm to continue exploring a perilous environment and uncover the mysteries of mutation…

It was just that the frail-looking woman was rather peculiar. She had removed the worm; did that mean she was out of danger?

"Let's go!"

They were all frontline personnel, people of action. Fearing the worm would act up again, the group packed their things, taking some usable equipment and weapons. They all put on the backpacks containing energy bars, since they could be used to charge their protective suits.

Moreover, these backpacks had been snatched from the Red Eye Organization.

The group moved quickly toward the outpost. About fifteen minutes later, they reached the outer edge of the forest cover on the hill outside the outpost.

The outpost was deathly silent, as if completely deserted. Some areas still bore old bloodstains, a testament to the battles that had once taken place here.

It seemed unoccupied, yet there were signs of an invasion, such as wastewater in the temporary tents and simple sheds outside the outpost.

At first glance, it looked like people were living there but were now in hiding.

Sui Xin had already concluded that the consortium was the mastermind. She knew that since they had the ability to create the gray fog and the Red Corrosive Ironworms, they wouldn't let a second party of invaders comfortably occupy the outpost.

A reconnaissance mission to determine if the ruin excavation had failed, my ass.

Most likely, the ruin had already been deemed a failure, and the consortium was now using it as a site for human experimentation.

And the previous eight teams had probably suffered the same fate.

Looking at it this way, the so-called traces they'd seen earlier were most likely faked by the corporation to deceive them.

Sui Xin didn't expose this, merely following them as they quietly approached the outpost.

After getting closer, Ye Chen checked the wind tower outside.

"The usage data is from three days ago. It shows they were indeed here before. They've probably relocated now, guessing we'd come looking for them to avoid being ambushed."

"Watch out for traps."

"Move in!"

"Consultant Sui, please enter the access code."

The 24 people had already set up a defensive perimeter. After carefully approaching the gate together, they saw a square, chessboard-sized keypad lock on the heavy metal gate. It secured two half-meter-thick composite metal gates with interlocking reinforced bars.

The gate's material could withstand the simultaneous explosive force of 100 Kinetic-01s.

Conventional force couldn't breach it directly.

Ye Chen actually had the password too, but he was currently on high alert, gun raised and scanning their surroundings, so he had Sui Xin do it. Sui Xin glanced at him, knowing he wanted her to deliberately leave her fingerprints, to attribute as many of the traces here to her as possible.

He didn't know there was a second layer of surveillance.

Everything they did was under the consortium's control.

Sui Xin quickly entered the password.

"Password correct. Gate opening…"

With a clang, the gate unlocked and slid open heavily. Half of the group aimed their guns inside.

And then!

A buzzing swarm rushed toward them.

"Watch out!"

Seeing a dark cloud of something flying out, the group scrambled for cover.

Having just been infested by worms, they were now terrified of other insects.

A swarm of flies buzzed past them. Some brushed against their protective suits, while others, smelling the blood, lingered and were promptly swatted dead.

The swatted flies had eggs on them.

Sui Xin carefully examined the flies' forms and found they weren't the mutated, poisonous flies caused by radiation.

"They're ordinary flies."

"But we don't know if they carry deadly germs. Be careful. If you have a wound, you must bandage it immediately. Don't let any wounds come into direct contact with these creatures."

The flies escaped the enclosed space into the open air, but the group had barely calmed down from the initial shock when they saw corpses picked clean lying on the metal floor inside. Many fly eggs clung to the bones and within the hair matted with remnants of flesh and blood.

The frontline personnel had seen plenty of corpses and weren't bothered by the sight, merely stepping around them.

"No gunshot wounds on the bones."

"A total of twelve people, all dead. Judging by their clothes, they look like frontline armed personnel?"

"It's the previous recon squad. The eighth squad. This one is team member Ye Long."

There were identification marks on their clothes. When the group recognized them as the previous reconnaissance squad, they grew much more tense.

Were they infected with the same worm-poison?

Ye Chen turned back to look at the panel behind the gate. "The panel is clean. No fingerprint marks from entering the password. They died here before they could even open the gate. They were probably poisoned."

No gunshot wounds, no sign of the gate having been opened, yet they all died here together.

The group suddenly felt as if the worms in their bodies had them in a chokehold, squeezing the life from their destiny.

Fear welled up inside them.

Sui Xin also looked at the panel. It was clean, with no fingerprints. But the wall next to it had blood splatters, along with fly specks left by flies drawn to the blood. It was highly unlikely for only the panel to be so clean.

Unless someone had wiped it clean later, erasing any traces.

In that case, the gate had been closed by someone.

The eighth reconnaissance squad had been deliberately trapped here to die.

Then they weren't the first wave of test subjects; the previous waves had been as well.

At this moment, among the audience watching from the outside, a white-haired man touched his sword and said slowly, "As expected, it's a prepared cage. But this woman has noticed something is wrong."

The others looked at Xi Liang.

The short-haired girl licked a piece of candy and said with a smile, "The panel was wiped. And she's aware of the hostility from Huang Ye and the others; she's felt insecure this whole time. I just don't know how she'll handle what comes next."

The white-haired man said, "It will be difficult. Once a person enters a cage, they become prey."

"But I'm more curious about the worms Tianxi has put in them… Can we get our hands on the worm eggs their lab hid in the nutrient supplements? Also, look into all the exploration teams that were infected."

He was quite formidable, deducing just from the live broadcast that the worm eggs came from the nutrient supplements distributed that morning.

"I'll go make the arrangements."

A young man asked curiously, "Boss, are you planning to make a move? But from what I see, this live broadcast must have a commercial purpose related to capital operations. There can't be much more to it, can there?"

The white-haired man stood up, brushed the dust from his pants, and said lightly, "I'm curious. I have a feeling this is no small matter."

Regardless of whether the purpose of this live broadcast was related to capital operations, those worms gave him a strange feeling.

Their reproduction rate was too fast. What if the corporation lost control and it spread into the wild or the general population? It would be a catastrophe.

---

"Let's hurry to the lab."

"I'm not feeling well."

"Let's hurry! What if the poison acts up again? What if we die next time?"

The group was already divided, and now their fear of death made them much more irritable. Even Ye Chen couldn't go against the will of the majority, especially since he, too, was panicking about the worm's threat.

Perhaps the only one here who wasn't afraid was Sui Xin, who had already removed her worm.

It's not scarcity that breeds discontent, but inequality.

This applied to both benefits and detriments alike.

Whenever there was unfairness, where some gained an advantage or avoided harm while others didn't, people would inevitably feel resentful.

Perhaps sensing their hostile gazes, Jenny stepped in front of Sui Xin. Sui Xin whispered her thanks and silently moved closer to Ye Chen.

"The surveillance cameras here have all been destroyed."

"Probably the work of the invaders. They were afraid of being recorded and broadcast back to the company, exposing their identities."

"Those bastards. At least they know enough to fear the consortium's retaliation."

With the surveillance cameras gone, the others became much more unrestrained in their words and actions. Sui Xin, knowing about the second layer of surveillance, became much more taciturn, acting only as a technician to assist them.

The existence of the worms and the entire setup forced them toward the research lab, where the consortium surely had some objective waiting.

It wouldn't be directly lethal; it was probably related to human experimentation.

In that case, the path there should be quite smooth.

As expected, they encountered no danger along the way, only various corpses—the slightly fresher bodies of the eighth squad, the skeletons of previous squads, and even older skeletal remains. All of it proved this place had long been a forbidden zone for the living, a death trap laid by the invaders.

"I think that group blocked the communication network after invading the outpost. Then, the arrival of each reconnaissance squad was like a delivery of equipment and resources from a bunch of suckers. They've plundered several waves here, and by using this worm-poison, they could easily defeat the squads without needing intense combat."

"But some people did resist."

This was Ye Chen and the others' analysis. As they neared the research lab entrance, they saw clear signs of a firefight. Many of the skeletons here had gunshot wounds, and there were bullets on the ground.

The research lab's door was open, and it was silent inside.

The first thing the group did was check the surveillance cameras, only to find they had all been shot out.

"In!"

"Jenny, you check the network here."

"Consultant Sui, please help check the research situation here, see if it's related to these worms."

Although Huang Ye asked politely, his gun was aimed at her.

Clearly, he deeply distrusted her, the only one without a worm in her body.

Ye Chen: "Huang Ye!"

Huang Ye: "Captain, I'm just asking for Consultant Sui's help. We're all in this together."

Sui Xin cursed inwardly but smiled to smooth things over. "It's fine, it's fine. We're all one big family here. No need to be strangers. I'll take a look."

With the muzzles of Huang Ye's and the others' guns on her, she and Jenny split up to investigate. She examined the paper-based experiment logs and the equipment, while Jenny sifted through the research data on the computers.

No petri dishes.

This wasn't the breeding ground for those worms.

After all, they hadn't been implanted with the worm eggs here; they had been infected back at the company. But this also meant the Red Corrosive Ironworms weren't cultivated in this lab either.

What on earth was the Tianxi Group trying to do?

Sui Xin was confused, until she found some scattered text in a notebook.

Worms, poison, antidote, armory, excavation zone, and a route map.

Antidote

Would they prepare an antidote here for the previous reconnaissance squads and for them?

Poisoning them first, then giving them an antidote—what was the point of such a human experiment?

Were the worms more important, or the people?

The next second, Sui Xin realized her previous judgment had been wrong.

Perhaps the worms weren't important, and neither were the people.

What was important was this thing right in front of them.

She had an epiphany.

"Found it!!"

"The experiment logs here say they were attacked by unidentified assailants. After fierce resistance, they forced the assailants to the lab's perimeter and held them off for a time, until the assailants released a terrible worm-poison. They were infected and on the verge of death. Later, a reconnaissance squad arrived and drove the assailants back, but unaware of the poison, they too were quickly infected. To save themselves, they had no choice but to develop an antidote here… Later, we discovered this worm is a mutated species of the ironworm family. The strange toxin it releases can alter base point mutations in cells, even causing base deletion, which leads to cellular malfunction and failure. This forces the body into a process of mutation. As the poison's effects intensify, the process becomes violent and painful, causing the circulatory system to collapse and nerve pain to reach its limit, resulting in shock, sudden cardiac arrest, and ultimately, death for all."

"We were unable to eliminate this toxin directly, so we had to find another way. By utilizing the toxin's mutagenic effects, slowing its release, and reducing the damage to the body, a portion of us managed to survive, and…"

And what, it didn't say.

The rest of the information was missing.

Jenny relayed these words, leaving everyone in suspense. But at the very least, the existence of an antidote was the best news they could have hoped for.

"Where's the antidote?!"

Huang Ye grew agitated, and the others shouted excitedly, preparing to tear the place apart to find the antidote. They were worried it was in short supply and that if they were too slow, they wouldn't get any.

"I think, it might be here."

Just then, a faint voice was heard. The group turned to look and saw that a cabinet had been pulled open, and their Consultant Sui was standing there.

Her round helmet looked a bit comical, and her expression was hidden.

Anyway, the people watching the live broadcast only saw this utter weakling, who was the first to find the antidote, get shoved aside by an eager Huang Ye. She was so frail; one push nearly sent her crashing into the wall.

After steadying herself against the wall, Consultant Sui watched them frantically snatching the vials. Her inner monologue went like this: Where is the antidote?

The antidote is right here!

And so is the advertisement!

Just now, listening to Jenny's artistic recitation, she, who was completely familiar with the methods of capitalist commercial operations, finally understood the consortium's goal.

This whole flashy, convoluted process was just to make them take these drugs. The key was mutation—the worm-poison induced it, and the drug improved it. Not only would they not die, but it might even be beneficial. It was just like a health supplement. For a human population currently plagued by various diseases caused by radiation and the climate, it was practically a life-saving miracle drug.

What's the most effective kind of advertisement?

A true life-or-death advertisement, proven with human lives.

Only then would the people on the outside believe. In that case—the second layer of surveillance on their bodies wasn't just being watched by the consortium. This broadcast was likely also being shown to the general public.

A live broadcast?

Sui Xin's mind was about to explode. She directed curses in every language she knew at the Tianxi Group.

She didn't know if other consortiums were involved, but she was definitely cursing Tianxi.

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