The Fallen Merman

Rimbaud lay in the fish tank. He put a cushion against the wall of the tank to avoid hurting his waist while soaking in the water. Using a remote control wrapped in waterproof cling film, he switched channels, trying to find a movie to watch. Meanwhile, he had applied a few blue jellyfish on his face for moisturizing.

The TV showing the movie unexpectedly turned into a blue screen with lines of white garbled code, and a dynamic black worm logo gradually appeared in the very center of the screen. 

The worm logo then crawled towards the top left corner, and a video recording automatically played in the middle of the screen.

The background in the video was the eerie Enxi Hospital. As soon as the camera turned, the scene of Bai Chunian dodging poker cards began to play.

Rimbaud climbed out of the fish tank in surprise and sat down in front of the TV to watch Bai Chunian seriously, holding out his finger to poke the Bai Chunian on the screen.

However, the video was edited. The last frame stopped at a poker card about to cut into Bai Chunian’s throat, and whatever occurred afterwards was not played.

The video disappeared at this point, and only a crawling worm logo was left on the entire screen.

The worm slowly climbed away and left the scene. Rimbaud’s sight followed the bug sign. Biting through the TV, he bit it wherever the worm went. Finally, the worm crawled to the edge of the screen and disappeared. There were five tooth marks on the TV. Rimbaud went behind the TV and searched for it for a long time.

At the same time, Bai Chunian had already entered the hospital’s technology research and development areas through the corridor. Enxi Hospital was not only a first-tier hospital in China by virtue of its several veteran experts, but more so because of its drug engineering and technology research and development. Enxi Hospital had a separate closed technology building, while it was Dr. Lin Deng, the director of the R&D Department, that the crawler omega had asked Bai Chunian to find.

The solitary building in the R&D area was so silent that even the echoes of their breathing could be heard. However, it wasn’t deserted. Through the door windows, they could see that in the rows of research rooms they passed, there were various doctors in white lab coats sitting and standing, obviously infected with the Looping Virus. Their eyes were bloodshot, and they were mechanically repeating the same thing. 

Some of the empty research rooms had entire walls of incubators, but the doors of the incubators were open and there was nothing inside, only large puddles of dried blood.

Bai Chunian gestured the two behind him to walk lightly and try not to disturb the infected who were still in the early stages of infection and had no obvious hostility.

However, not all the doors of the laboratory were closed as some were open. Doctors who had already been infected inside immediately entered the advanced stage of infection after seeing three people passing by and rushed out to bite them.

Bai Chunian’s strong fist struck the infected person’s jaw from below to shut him up, and then twisted his neck hard, completely destroying his cervical spine. The infected person collapsed soundlessly to the ground, turning into a highly decomposed corpse. 

Han Xingqian glanced at the blood splattered on the corner of his white coat and dusted it off.

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“I also can’t figure out why such a young and talented professor would work for the 109 Research Institute.” Bai Chunian laughed contemptuously, “You also know, right, that there are countless cultivation bases under the 109 Research Institute? They raise cultivated experimental embryos to hatchlings, and then select the most valuable hatchlings to sell to the 109 Research Institute, or directly capture suitable humanoid creatures to transform them into cultivation stage experimental subjects.”

“This Lin Deng is one of the breeders of the cultivation base. He used the public equipment in the R&D department of Enxi Hospital for private use. He also utilized the hospital’s resources to secretly breed experimental embryos. Experimental Subject 408 Samael came from him.” Bai Chunian’s words were tinged with mockery and taunting, “Since the 109 Research Institute’s database was stolen, many experimental subjects took advantage of it to escape, and 408 is one of them—who seems to have come back for revenge.” 

“What do you get for doing something like that?” Firefly interjected carefully, “Professor Lin Deng is so highly respected, he’s not short of money at all.”

Bai Chunian snorted, “What do you know? Who dislikes having much more money?”

Han Xingqian didn’t argue and only said calmly, “I heard that his family moved to Germany five years ago. However, it was extremely strange, Dr. Lin Deng refused employment in the top German hospital and insisted on returning to China. How could he endure sending his family far away from his side?”

“I don’t know, I’m only responsible for taking him away.” Bai Chunian said bluntly, “I am bothered by all the breeders, not just Lin Deng.” 

“I know,” Han Xingqian sensed something and raised his eyes to look around. He saw that the hallway ceiling was equipped with pinhole cameras at regular intervals.

Bai Chunian also noticed these hidden cameras but didn’t care about them.

As they searched each research room up until the deepest part of the hallway, there was a rustling in the stairwell that sounded like something was shouting.

A small, white creature as big as two fists quickly climbed down the stairs, squeaking. 

Bai Chunian frowned and took two steps back.

“A rat?” asked Firefly, holding his rifle and tilting his head to observe it. The little white rat had uncharacteristically red eyes, a lot of pus in the corners of its eyes, and the corners of its mouth were strangely cracked, revealing a human-like smile.

Suddenly, the white rat let out a piercing scream, and a large, shrill response followed from the stairwell as the floor shook with small magnitude and a strong stench of foul and decay rushed into their nostrils.

Large dense patches of small red-eyed white rats crawled down the stairwell, squeaking, and they were running so fast and in huge numbers that caused the three to suddenly feel trypophobic. 

Firefly looked back in a daze, “”Ins—Instructor, the rats used for experiments are running out. Wh—What do we do…?”

Bai Chunian had already run about ten meters away.

“You guys charge first. I’ll retreat.” Bai Chunian nimbly climbed up to the ceiling, hooked his fingers into the diffuser, and swung it hard. He then stepped lightly on the wall, flipped and leapt several meters, and borrowed the strength of the wooden box stacked in the hallway to jump again—without his feet touching the ground the whole time.

“Let’s go,” Han Xingqian said as he grabbed Firefly’s arm and quickly yanked him away. His pistol knocked down the frenzied, biting white rat that was picking at the hem of his shirt, leaving blood-stained holes. 

The horde of white rats swarmed around them, so dense that the floor was almost completely covered. Just as the trio was about to leave the R&D department the way they came, the walls suddenly lit up, and Bai Chunian realized that what was on the ceiling was not a pinhole camera, but a miniature projector.

The smooth walls around them were all projected with images. Suddenly, the floors, walls, glass and ceilings were full of confusing and mottled images.

A clown in an exaggerated red and gold striped plastic costume jumped into the frame, wearing a smiling mask with a large, red-painted mouth raised high, and a funny red ball at the tip of his nose.

“Samael…” Bai Chunian watched the clown dancing in the projection. 

The clown was performing a card pull at first; the poker cards in his hands were stacked one by one smoothly. Soon, he put away the poker cards, took out a hula hoop with a red spiral pattern from behind him, and excitedly performed a somersault in the hula hoop.

After the comical and strange performance, the clown tossed the hula hoop at them.

Unexpectedly, the hula hoop turned into a real entity and spun rapidly in the narrow hallway, turning from one into two, two into four, and soon enough, the sky was full of rings flying around—three of which flew towards the heads of the three people like a ring game in a park stall.

“Hide,” Bai Chunian pushed Firefly to Han Xingqian’s side, “Hurry up.” 

Experimental Subject No. 408’s M2 differentiation ability, “Happy Candy Ring”: Those who were caught in the ring teh first time would be infected with the Looping Virus. The second time an infected person caught in the ring, they would abruptly degenerate into the advanced stage of infection.

In other words, a healthy person was bound to die if caught in the ring twice.

Bai Chunian climbed and jumped nimbly on the wooden boxes stacked in the corner, but these flying rings, which seemed to fly irregularly, actually had the tracking ability. No matter where Bai Chunian dodged, the rings would never stop chasing him, driving him towards the swarm of rats.

Seeing that he was about to collide head-on with the large group of white rats, Bai Chunian stopped sharply and jumped up, and climbed onto the ceiling diffuser with both hands. His arm muscles suddenly tightened, his shirt sleeves protruding with the lines of his muscles, and he used all the strength in his arms to stick his entire body to the ceiling. The two tracking rings collided, making a loud bang, before falling to the ground in pieces. 

Bai Chunian jumped down, nervously and haphazardly slapping away a rat that had taken advantage of the chaos to crawl up his arm, “Go, get out of here.” He pushed Firefly and Han Xingqian, “It’s a trap. Samael is preventing us from finding Lin Deng.”

The red and white looking plastic rings were in fact rock hard, easily smashing through the doors of each research room, choosing an infected person at random and then looping over them.

The infected person caught in the ring’s snare instantaneously cracked open his mouth with a blood oozing smile, pupils disappearing, eyes bloodshot, and came roaring out with the rest of the infected people in the research lab who were in the late stages of infection due to the interrupted loops.

The movement of hundreds of infected people running and roaring in the building was extremely oppressive. A sense of despair rose in the heart of the almost exhausted Firefly when he heard it. 

He struggled to throw flash bombs down the corridor—their glare carrying a blast wave toppled a large number of infected people and rats, buying a brief moment to escape. He grabbed Han Xingqian and ran wildly.

Bai Chunian was responsible for the rear. He was used to the command position, and paying attention to the state of the team members at any time was his instinct. When he cultivated Firefly, he was interested in Firefly’s grasp of the timing, which was extremely suitable for assisting the team. However, this time, he was forced to separate from the team. From the support combat position directly into the main assailant, he could see that Firefly’s consumption had reached the limit of what his glands could bear; if he continued to exhaust himself, he was afraid it would cause irreversible damage to the gland itself.

He encountered such a difficult situation on his first mission. Bai Chunian also took pity on these unlucky trainees.

As they broke away from the R&D department and fled into the vicinity of the hospital’s safe passage, vague growling sounds approached from another direction. This time, it sounded in much greater multitudes. 

Bai Chunian came to the very front and heard the sound of hard tapping on the opposite side of the security door calling for help and smashing the door. Thus, he put his hand on the heavy hydraulic lock and easily broke the strong security lock like tofu. It opened at once, and people across the safe passage swarmed in.

The clownfish omega carried a Nova shotgun with an overheated muzzle and a KS23 with little strength left in each hand, and pushed the doctors he was protecting closest to the security door while he himself held off dozens of wildly pursuing infected people, firing alternately between the two guns. The area of the shotgun blast was much larger than the rifle. The fragments of the infected people exploded and even stained the walls.

“Get out quickly and close the door!” Clownfish yelled at the doctors without looking back, “Shut the door and help me open it when I’m halfway done, or this door won’t hold for long either!”

After all, the shotgun’s firing speed was limited. Taking advantage of the interval between Clownfish’s bullet changes, the infected people pounced on and bit his body armor. He kicked one off, turned, and took two steps back. When he faced the infected people again, a golden shimmer floated behind him, which turned into a solid, and countless round blunt golden-orange tentacles that were full of life and shielded Clownfish tightly in the center. The tentacles shot out purple poisonous threads from their tips, and the infected patients touched by the poisonous threads went stiff and convulsed, gradually oozing black blood from the nails, spitting white foam, and falling to the ground. 

Clownfish gland’s J1 differentiation ability, “Tentacle Anemone”: A rare symbiotic summoning ability that materializes symbiotic creatures and protects themselves by attacking with neurotoxins.

Clownfish already felt a sudden, vague pain deep in his gland as he changed his ammunition. The number of times he squeezed the energy to repeatedly summon the anemone had reached its limit, and he had a premonition that if the anemone came out again, his gland would immediately fall apart.

The shotgun still had ammunition, but the few guns on him were already overheated and deformed and would soon be pieces of scrap. In the current situation, once he had no weapon in his hands, it was no different from sitting around waiting to die. Moreover, at this point, he didn’t even have much physical strength left and already began to feel blank, only remembering to get the doctors out safely.

As the anemone behind him disappeared, Clownfish took a deep breath and closed his eyes, squeezing out the last energy from his gland. 

Nonetheless, before his anemone could appear, a hand with a rough handguard pressed lightly on the gland on the back of his neck, and a strong wisp of soothing pheromone with the smell of brandy was injected. The moment the pheromone entered his body, the pain of the exhausted gland became much fainter.

“That’s enough,” Bai Chunian pulled Clownfish behind him. With the M98B in his hand, he raised the muzzle of the gun to fire headshots and called back to Han Xingqian, “For the sake of my trainees who’re so dedicated to protecting your subordinates, at least help out a little.”

Han Xingqian stood still with one hand in his pocket and gently pushed the gold-rimmed glasses on the bridge of his nose, the thin chain swinging slightly, “I thought using me wouldn’t be necessary.”

A layer of white cutin sprouted from between the hair on his forehead, which spiraled and grew into a white and glistening one-pointed horn. 

He didn’t move, but everyone felt a strange warmth pouring into their glands. Firefly and Clownfish, who were the most depleted, felt it most profoundly.

Their strength reversed, their glands refilled, and even their hunger and exhaustion were swept away.

Not only that, the overheated muzzles of their guns and almost scrapped weapons quickly cooled down—the scratches disappeared and reverted to their brand new states. Clownfish’s tattered body armor returned to the same appearance as if it hadn’t been worn, and the tactical dagger on Bai Chunian’s leg was once again as sharp as ever.

Pegasus gland’s J1 ability, “Strength Reset”: A ranged restoration type ability that instantly revitalizes stamina, energy, and equipment integrity of the targets within range, with each restoration upgrading the durability limit to half of the original. 

Having deformed glands, Han Xingqian was the opposite of the twin glands that each of the He brothers inherited. Combining the strengths of both parents, he had inherited the characteristics of both his father’s white horse alpha and his mother’s swan omega, which completed the genetic mutation to create a “fusion gland” that was exponentially more powerful.