Chapter 151: Kill the VIP (6)

Chapter 151: Killing the VIP (Part Six)

The abandoned landfill in the western part of Zone 103.

A dilapidated church stands here, half buried in the landfill, its Gothic spire exaggerated and prominent.

If you look closely, you can see tiny bumps densely covering the church walls, which at first glance seem like decorations. But upon closer inspection, they are barnacle shells.

Unfortunately, this area lacks the conditions for barnacles to grow, and as living organisms, they could cause pollution. Thus, the barnacles are merely fused into the cement walls as a form of decoration.

The church has been abandoned for years, but occasionally lights come on at night, accompanied by eerie sounds, suggesting someone is praying or singing inside.

Rumors say that the people inside are all madmen.

There's no one else in the landfill, except perhaps a stray waste management robot scavenging for recyclables, which would feel an ominous chill upon seeing the church.

Those who couldn't resist the temptation to enter never came out again.

Today, the church is lit, and the door is slightly ajar.

Years without maintenance have left the church with a peculiar smell, a salty, damp odor reminiscent of the sea.

There are no tourists today; only an old woman sits in the front row, her head raised, gazing intently at the statue of the deity in the center of the church.

The deity is enshrined high up, with every detail meticulously carved. People often forget what it looks like after multiple visits, leading to variations in the deity's statues.

Creak—

Someone pushes the door open. It's a woman in a red coat, wearing a hat that obscures her face.

After entering the church, the woman bows respectfully to the statue before her, placing her right hand on her left shoulder and bowing deeply.

She then sits next to the old woman and calls out his name: "Bao Ruiming."

Bao Ruiming had completely disappeared after the Mechanical Oceanarium incident. He now wears a new mechanical prosthetic body, disguised as an elderly woman in the most traditional black attire, leaning on a darkened cane.

The only personal touch is a necklace made from a barnacle shell hanging around his neck.

The woman says, "You really look like a fortune-teller."

Bao Ruiming appears somewhat eccentric, as if he could set up a stall and read fortunes.

His current appearance contrasts sharply with his previous image as a sharp-suited, tie-wearing elder, making it difficult for even the cleaning center staff to recognize him as the former curator of the Mechanical Oceanarium.

Bao Ruiming speaks in a feeble voice, "Is everything ready?"

The woman nods, "No traces left behind, everything was done cleanly."

The Mechanical Oceanarium incident had drawn attention across the entire zone, and the cleaning center realized too late that they had missed the crucial clues.

The hatching had already taken place that day, completing Bao Ruiming's life mission.

Bao Ruiming asks, "When will it start?"

He needs to confirm the time for the final sacrificial ritual.

The woman replies, "As planned, in nine days."

They have been planning this for years, and it will finally come to fruition.

Bao Ruiming nods, acknowledging her words. The woman then asks, "Did you find out anything?"

Although they left no obvious traces, they sensed someone pursuing them. The Yongsheng Pharmaceutical Foundation had noticed someone watching them that day.

They had planted some people within Yongsheng Pharmaceutical and the cleaning center, with Bao Ruiming still leading the covert operations.

Bao Ruiming hands her a piece of paper with several names written on it. The woman glances at it, "These are them?"

Bao Ruiming: "I'm not entirely sure, better safe than sorry."

It's just a list of suspects, but Bao Ruiming is right; there are only nine days left, and they cannot afford any mistakes.

As for the innocent names on the list, their deaths can only be considered unfortunate.

The woman memorizes the content and crumples the paper into tiny pieces, leaving no trace when the wind blows.

She is a Psychic, capable of crushing anything she touches.

With nothing more to discuss, the woman stands up, "The mission went smoothly."

She glances at the statue, "Praise the great Him."

Bao Ruiming should have said the same, as it is their customary ritual, but he changes his words, "Praise... I should go."

The woman frowns, noticing Bao Ruiming's pupils suddenly constrict.

His prosthetic body is highly realistic; an old woman's eyes are usually cloudy. His pupils shrink to a pinpoint and begin to display cold data streams.

The woman immediately senses something wrong and grabs Bao Ruiming's shoulder. His eyes twitch, "Someone has entered my consciousness cloud."

Someone is about to find him.

If his consciousness is killed, he will lose all chances of regeneration.

The woman is stunned, thinking she must have misheard. Someone has actually infiltrated Bao Ruiming's consciousness cloud.

Her intuition was right; someone has been investigating them all along.

While they were setting up, the other side wasn't idle either, pulling the rug out from under them.

But who could it be, to breach Genesis Tech's firewall?

"Don't worry," said Bao Ruiming, "they will be contaminated."

The cloud of consciousness was his domain, a world he had constructed where the food chain operated perfectly, the island harmonious and beautiful, with a constant supply of nutrients feeding the church, his ideal home.

He wished the world could run like Floating Sand Island.

All outsiders would either be eaten by human-headed fish or infected and devoured; over the years, Bao Ruiming had never feared his consciousness would be reversed.

The worst-case scenario was that the pollution concentration would exceed limits, leading to mutual destruction.

Bao Ruiming still hoped the extermination program could be activated; he wasn't afraid of death, but he wanted to attend the ceremony nine days later.

Bao Ruiming's pupils lost focus, the chip slot at the back of his neck dimmed, and he seemed to suddenly lose all vitality, collapsing backward.

His neck rested against the back of a pew in the church, his mouth opening involuntarily as his consciousness withdrew control from his mechanical body.

He had to deal with the intruders.

...

Headquarters of Genesis Tech.

Below the eleventh basement level were all the consciousness hosts, the most heavily guarded area in the entire company, requiring multiple layers of approval to enter.

Massive hosts stood like a forest or a row of coffins.

Upon closer inspection, there were countless compartments inside, each containing a brain submerged in liquid, connected to the host by wires.

Patrol officers monitored data daily; this place housed VIP guests whose lives represented the company's assets, allowing no room for error.

Each VIP guest's host was stored in a separate compartment, and he acted like a dedicated nanny for the VIP guests.

Generally, the guests here were very quiet; after all, the rich didn't have the same life pressures as the poor, nor did they have much to cause mental breakdowns.

Isn't there a saying that the rich are more "kind"?

In theory, if an antisocial individual wanted to instantly kill all the rich, they only needed to blow up this server room.

He was just clocking in for his routine check when he noticed a compartment flashing red. He stopped in his tracks.

Pollution concentration 1%.

The system automatically provided the data; there was pollution concentration here? Why?

The inspector reviewed previous reports, all showing normal values; this consciousness had always been safe.

The inspector immediately opened his tablet and connected a network cable to the host, intending to perform a "check-up."

His fingers flew over the keyboard, running code, and within five minutes, the pollution concentration rose again.

Pollution concentration 2%.

Although this value was negligible, many inferior areas, such as garbage dumps, could have a pollution concentration of 30%, but this was the cloud of consciousness, and any minor discovery couldn't be taken lightly.

The inspector quickly contacted a technician, giving the exact number, "Hey, can you check what's wrong with guest V-563? Yes, his name is Bao Ruiming, a VIP guest. Thanks."

...

Boom—

A thunderclap echoed outside, and inside the church, the phrase repeated: "Can we hide?"

Liu Niannian's face turned pale; a lightning bolt illuminated the faces of the congregation, revealing tiny holes on their foreheads, empty inside.

Their brains had been removed, their bodies voluntarily sacrificed.

Zhu Ning and Xu Meng focused on the statue in the center of the church. The statue was tall and white, exuding a sense of sanctity. The moment their eyes met it, something in Zhu Ning's mind twitched.

This was the thing from the abandoned village.

Though its appearance differed slightly, it was confirmed to be the same, emitting the same aura.

It deepened its imprint through repetition; once seen, it left an indelible mark in your mind, drawing you closer with each additional glance.

It felt like standing at the edge of a cliff, with no turning back—either destruction or joining.

Liu Niannian saw the statue for the first time, feeling fear seep into her bones. She thought the mutants were the most terrifying things she'd ever faced.

But she realized how naive she was; this was true terror. There was no escape before it; it attacked your consciousness directly.

She felt an unprecedented nausea, as if something had grown inside her skull, hard and intrusive.

Instinctively, she wanted to vomit. Liu Niannian, deeply affected, vomited, expelling something slimy that desperately tried to escape her throat, feeling the disgusting sensation slide over her tongue.

Fish eggs.

She spat out a mass of fish eggs, with a few still moving in her mouth.

The contamination had invaded her consciousness, and Liu Niannian was about to be assimilated.

Liu Niannian's eyes widened, and for a moment, Zhu Ning and Xu Meng's figures blurred. She heard ancient chanting from afar.

Black mist enveloped the interior of the church, submerging everyone, leaving her alone.

"Niannian." She heard someone calling her nickname.

Liu Niannian saw her mother lying on the bed, her beautiful face marred by illness, and the white sheet beneath her stained red with blood.

A large amount of blood gushed out, and she couldn't stop it, eventually covering her hands in blood.

Liu Niannian once had siblings. They were all subjected to genetic testing at birth; those with genetic defects were deemed defective, and even those without obvious defects but merely not perfect enough were considered the same.

Once people were objectified, they became products on an assembly line, and the slightest flaw could lead to their destruction.

They weren't even classified as fifth-class citizens but were directly executed. When Liu Niannian was young, she often heard the cries of infants, the cries of her siblings.

Her mother gave birth to six children, only two of whom were "qualified": one was Lu Yao, and the other was Liu Niannian.

She could only watch helplessly as her own children were destroyed.

After giving birth to the sixth child, her mother committed suicide. Liu Niannian witnessed the scene of her suicide.

Her mother was resolute, choosing not the more "elegant" method of wrist-cutting but instead slashing her throat.

The bright red blood sprayed out, soaking the sheets and walls. She cut her throat while the servants were away.

Liu Niannian hadn't had this nightmare for a long time. She stumbled to her mother's bedside, calling out softly, "Mom."

No one responded, so she held her mother's hand, which was already cold and stiff. Liu Niannian still held it, unsure of the significance of this gesture.

She pressed her cheek against her mother's palm, feeling the blood smear across her face.

"Mom."

Then people rushed in, taking away her mother's body and announcing that she had died of illness.

Apart from Liu Niannian, no one cared about her real name, Liu Yu, including her brother. They just gave her a dignified funeral and lavish burial goods.

Even though they could already upload consciousness to the cloud, they put on a show by giving her the best funeral.

Only Liu Niannian remembered her. Beyond the lingering sense of loss for her mother, it was because Liu Yu's future was also her own future.

Liu Niannian held her mother's hand, feeling a sharp pain in her head. She wanted to dig out her brain immediately. The chanting continued, and she didn't feel anger, only pain, a pain that couldn't be stopped, like fish eggs swimming in her mind.

She wanted to open her brain.