Chapter 12: “Fusion”

Xia Mi did not understand what Shield meant by “we’re even,” and she did not care to guess.

The current situation was troublesome enough; she had no mental capacity to spare for deciphering Shield’s cryptic words.

As for the secret of the game being discovered, Xia Mi was a little worried, but not overly so.

The greatest crisis at hand was not whether a secret she did not even fully understand herself had been leaked, but how to survive within this Domain.

Xia Mi stared patiently at her phone, waiting for Liao Tianhua’s reply.

Liao Tianhua did not disappoint her, replying quickly: [Where did you find this photo?]

Xia Mi did not hide anything: [You saw me playing that game earlier, right? I found time to play it again and hit a failure ending, which gave me this photo. I saw this person once while I was cleaning windows about two months ago. You can investigate him.]

Liao Tianhua: [You still have the energy to play games?]

Xia Mi: [It is all thanks to the help from the neighbors in Building 6. They even provided me with a comfortable table and chair. Truly, a good neighbor is better than a distant relative.]

Liao Tianhua: “…”

Xia Mi had played the game for a full two hours, from the star-studded night until the eastern sunrise.

During those two hours, Liao Tianhua and the others had received no news. They had been waiting anxiously, terrified that their only hope, Xia Mi, had also met with disaster. If she fell, the residents of this building would truly be beyond saving.

They were burning with anxiety, yet Xia Mi was playing games!

Liao Tianhua suppressed the urge to snap at her and replied seriously: [I do not recognize this man. The data group is currently investigating the surveillance footage from that day. However, I recognize the material of that box. It is a brand-new material developed in the United States, an incubator for Zhuo larvae.]

Xia Mi was startled when she saw the message and quickly asked: [Cultivating Zhuo? Are they insane?]

Liao Tianhua: [Don’t you know how they are over there? Research, utilization, mass production, biochemical weapons. You have seen those old Hollywood horror blockbusters, haven’t you? They want to mass-produce zombies and aliens, let alone Zhuo.]

Xia Mi furrowed her brows.

Liao Tianhua: [However, our country joined other nations in sternly condemning the US for this behavior. After that, they stopped conducting Zhuo-related experiments openly, and all their public laboratories were closed. But whether they are still researching this stuff in the shadows is anyone’s guess.]

Xia Mi: [You said before that the range of Zhuo usually is not very large. In past cases, the number of people affected did not exceed ten. This time the range is so vast, could there be a human factor behind it?]

Liao Tianhua: [We are investigating based on the photo you provided. Without factual evidence, I cannot give a subjective personal judgment.]

Xia Mi: [Captain Liao, your professional rhetoric is truly impressive. I really need to learn from you.]

Liao Tianhua: “…”

For a moment, he could not tell if Xia Mi was being sincere or sarcastic. Moreover, he felt Xia Mi’s rhetoric was actually superior to his own, at least he could not bring himself to say things like “the Zhuo-transformed are all helpful and kind neighbors.”

However, as the captain, he still had to soothe Xia Mi’s frustrations. He could not let the heart of a frontline worker turn cold.

Thus, Liao Tianhua sent a message: [I can only provide you with some empirical data. As I have said before, Zhuo open their nests to feed. They feed on human emotional energy, it is an instinct.

[Under normal circumstances, the feeding cycle of a Zhuo is one month. Therefore, within a month, it will definitely open its nest. Enduring hunger to build a nest goes against a Zhuo’s instinct, it is illogical.

[Furthermore, a Zhuo’s nest-building capability is quite limited. The size of a nest they can construct within a month is roughly equivalent to a 150-square-meter house, with an upper limit not exceeding 200 square meters. Even if it endured hunger and spent an entire year building, the volume of Building 6 far exceeds its capabilities.

[I originally thought you had encountered a mutant variant, but now that new clues have surfaced, the reasons behind this have become quite complex. Further investigation is required before a preliminary conclusion can be reached.]

Xia Mi read the text carefully, thinking that Liao Tianhua truly lived up to his status as a high-ranking official, his speech was incredibly rigorous.

He seemed to have offered many inferences, but not a single word was a definitive conclusion. Xia Mi could make her own guesses, but no one could ever use these words to accuse Liao Tianhua of speaking recklessly or making malicious speculations.

Xia Mi’s previous comment had not been sarcastic, she genuinely felt that Liao Tianhua’s way of speaking was worth studying. As a candidate who had not even passed the written exam yet, she truly ought to learn from him.

While Liao Tianhua was explaining the intelligence regarding Zhuo to Xia Mi, the Logistics Group had already used the Skynet system¹ to identify the man in the photo. They then used AI to pull videos related to the man from the Skynet database to trace his movements on that day.

The head of the Logistics Group, Mi Xiangyan, pushed up her glasses and reported to Liao Tianhua: “Captain Liao, we have found the relevant information on this person.

“Zhang Xun, a Chinese male, 35 years old. He attended university and graduate school in the United States, majoring in biotechnology. He currently works for a pharmaceutical company, which is a foreign enterprise.

“The photo Xia Mi sent is dated July 19, 2024. He departed from the pharmaceutical company’s laboratory wearing casual clothes, carrying a black leather suitcase slightly larger than this silver-white one.

“He got into a car midway through. The car drove to an area not covered by surveillance. Immediately after, Zhang Xun reappeared from a different alleyway, having changed his clothes, wearing sunglasses, and with his facial features slightly modified. The black leather suitcase had also become a gray one.

“Zhang Xun carried the gray suitcase to the Xingfuli Community. It is unknown when the suitcase in his hand turned silver-white.

“Xingfuli Community is relatively old, and the surveillance coverage is incomplete with many blind spots. The surveillance equipment in front of Building 6 happened to be broken that day. If not for the photo provided by Xia Mi, we would not have been able to lock onto Zhang Xun at all.”

Liao Tianhua thought for a moment and said, “Contact the Second Team. Under the pretext of a wanted criminal hiding in the pharmaceutical factory, conduct a full-scale lockdown and investigation.”

Mi Xiangyan said, “Captain Liao, the fact that they dared to release something like this means they must be confident. Two months have passed, so I am afraid they have already moved any relevant information. It will be very difficult for us to find any useful leads.”

Liao Tianhua looked at Mi Xiangyan and said, “You said it would be ‘difficult’ to find, not ‘impossible’.”

Mi Xiangyan nodded. “I am applying to accompany the Second Team to investigate the pharmaceutical factory. At the same time, I would like to request the secondment of ‘Eye’.”

Liao Tianhua hesitated for a moment before saying, “If the enemy left behind any residual power of Zhuo, I am worried ‘Eye’ will become corrupted.”

Mi Xiangyan gave a confident smile. “I will inspect the factory first. I will only activate ‘Eye’ if I truly cannot find any clues. I will not let ‘Eye’ face that kind of risk.”

Mi Xiangyan quickly printed out an application form, signed it at lightning speed, and handed it to Liao Tianhua. “Captain, sign it.”

Liao Tianhua signed it without further hesitation and handed the form back to her.

“If anything happens to ‘Eye’, the nest he constructs will not be any smaller than the one in Building 6. Both your Logistics Group and the Second Team would be caught in the fallout,” Liao Tianhua warned.

“I know.” Mi Xiangyan looked at Building 6, which was currently shrouded in darkness. “It is still better than sacrificing all the residents in this building.”

Knowing that Mi Xiangyan was mentally prepared, Liao Tianhua said nothing more and immediately arranged a helicopter to transport her and the Second Team to the pharmaceutical factory.

If Mi Xiangyan and “Eye” could find intelligence related to this Zhuo at the factory, Xia Mi’s chances of success would be much higher.

Liao Tianhua sent a message to Xia Mi: [Get something to eat. If you have nothing to do, go to the other floors and hack away at some of the corrupted. Once the environment stabilizes, you can play the game again and try to get a different ending.]

Xia Mi: [?]

Liao Tianhua: [Our intelligence personnel and ‘Eye’ have already gone to investigate the pharmaceutical factory where the man in the suit, Zhang Xun, was employed. In two hours at most, we will definitely have uncovered the truth behind this Zhuo.]

Xia Mi: [The suit guy’s name is Zhang Xun? Our investigation speed is really fast!]

Liao Tianhua: [Technology has advanced, after all. AI screens video footage much faster than humans, and the facial recognition systems have been upgraded to be more accurate.]

Xia Mi: [Why are you so certain the intel team will find something? Is it because of ‘Eye’? What is ‘Eye’? Is he an esper like Shield?]

Liao Tianhua did not answer. He was not sure if he should reveal such highly classified information to Xia Mi.

It was Shield who answered Xia Mi’s question instead. Writing appeared on her helmet: [We are similar, but I do not know if we count as espers. We do have a collective name, though,]

Shield left it on a cliffhanger.

Xia Mi hated people who only told half the story.

Just then, a message from Liao Tianhua arrived: [Yes, they are the same. They are both ‘Rong²‘. The existence of the ‘Rong’ is a top-secret matter. The reason I am telling you this is because I suspect that you are also a ‘Rong’.]

“Rong.” Just like the word Zhuo, this character also contained the radical for “insect.”

Translator’s Notes