Chapter 61: Pollution Fissure Research Institute

Chapter 61 Pollution Fissure Research Institute

Shen Ji desperately wanted to unsend the messages.

But the messages had been sent yesterday afternoon—the option to unsend expired long ago.

Shen Ji pressed his fingers against his temples, feeling a kind of embarrassment he'd never felt before.

"No way I actually replied like that, did I?" Shen Ji said in disbelief. "There's no way I would reply to Li Zhiyan's messages like that, right?"

"To be blunt, the little mushroom replied based on your consciousness. Even if the wording was a little childish, it was indeed your thoughts."

Shen Ji: …

What did it feel like to have a bunch of small mushrooms sharing the same consciousness as you?

Thanks for asking—gives me a headache. The person is a professional reporter who seems somewhat aloof, but the mushrooms act all cute and act coquettish. Totally two-faced.

Shen Ji opened the chat window, kept backing out and reopening it. He wanted to say something but had no idea what to say.

It felt like anything he said would sound like I'm being coquettish.

Weird.

Just as he was going back and forth about this, his phone suddenly vibrated. Li Zhiyan had sent another message.

"Butterfly Spirit: Give me your address. I can mail you some butterflies."

"Butterfly Spirit: It would be even better if you could mail me some mushrooms in return."

"Shen Ji: …"

"Butterfly Spirit: Huh? Back to normal?"

Shen Ji frowned and tsked in annoyance.

Did he think Shen Ji didn’t know what he was trying to do?

The sudden reply was definitely because Li Zhiyan had noticed the "typing…" notification appearing repeatedly without any message being sent, so he sent a message to see what was up. And that "Huh?"—so obviously fake.

"Shen Ji: Mr. Li is so charitable, willing to give away anything. You should host an online giveaway—I’m sure tons of people would want your butterfly collectibles. They might even sell for a high price."

"Butterfly Spirit: ?"

"Butterfly Spirit: Why does it sound like I’m selling something?"

"Butterfly Spirit: I’m not selling. I’m giving them to you for free."

Shen Ji: …

This guy really had no filter whatsoever. He lacked any normal sense of decency—nothing gets to him.

Annoyed, Shen Ji exited the chat and only then noticed the time: 1:51 PM.

He was totally late for work.

"Wait, it’s already this late?" Shen Ji hurriedly got out of bed.

He grabbed his coat from the hanger by the door and put it on, straightening out the wrinkles as he did. But for some reason, he noticed sand in the cuff of his shirt sleeve.

Baffled, Shen Ji unbuttoned the cuff, and yellow sand spilled onto the floor.

"What?" Shen Ji checked his other sleeve and found sand there too.

What? Did he sleepwalk in the middle of the night to dig up Li Zhiyan’s grave?

"...You didn’t sleepwalk to dig up Li Zhiyan’s grave. You dug a grave in the middle of the day for a pollutant that was trying to break down your door."

"A pollutant?" Shen Ji was confused. "Why would a pollutant try to break my door down? Did it have a death wish or something?"

"Yeah, I don’t know either. But it did try to break in, and then you sleepwalked and strangled it to death. The sand in your sleeves is what's left of it."

Disgusted, Shen Ji brushed all the sand away.

It was just sleepwalking and killing a pollutant. The system didn’t seem concerned at all, so he probably hadn’t been exposed while killing it. He must have just been half-asleep, so Shen Ji didn’t think much of it. After cleaning off the sand, he rushed to work.

He arrived at the Pollution Fissure Research Institute, scanned his ID card for verification, and with a click, the door unlocked. Everyone inside instinctively turned to look.

The moment they saw Shen Ji, they stared wide-eyed.

Everyone present was looking at him with a strange, almost reverent expression—especially Kang Xiaodong.

Shen Ji could even see Kang Xiaodong sneaking him a thumbs-up.

What was going on?

"Oh, Xiao Ji is here." Professor Yang waved him over. "Come quickly. We were just discussing the pollution fissure."

Shen Ji nodded, puzzled, and apologized first. "Sorry, I slept in."

"It’s fine, it’s fine. Young people should sleep more when they’re tired," Professor Yang said with a laugh, making excuses for him.

The people around glanced at each other, but no one dared to speak.

Wasn’t it just "tired people should sleep more"? After seeing last night’s surveillance footage, not even a ghost would have the nerve to knock on Shen Ji’s door. If that was his morning temper, it was absolutely terrifying—he’d choked out a pollutant with his bare hands!

Later, Chen Ting examined it and confirmed the pollutant was at least Level D!

He’d choked out a Level D pollutant with his bare hands!

Shen Ji sat in the seat Professor Yang indicated, and Professor Yang continued.

"Since Xiao Ji is here, let’s go over everything again so he’s caught up."

"First, regarding the pollution incident at our research institute, Dr. Chen is currently looking for ways to identify it. If any of you notice a colleague acting strangely, please report it to Dr. Chen. Of course, we can’t let our work slide."

"The readings we got this morning are very unusual."

Yang Xu handed Shen Ji a copy of that day’s data sheet.

The data was relatively basic, and even though it was Shen Ji’s first time looking at this kind of data, he could understand it.

The values shown were significantly lower than previous peaks, and the density had plummeted.

What were these two metrics?

"This is the pollution readings from the pollution fissure and the machine-detected density of pollutants around the fissure."

Shen Ji: …

Damn, so it was this data.

"Poor polluted fissure, eaten by a small mushroom until its pollution levels plummeted and the pollutant count crashed."

Yang Xu said worriedly, "Everyone can see that this pollution fissure has undergone a very noticeable change in both pollution level and pollutant density, plummeting to a significant degree. In all my years working, this is the first time I've observed such a phenomenon."

"So during this period, everyone should check diligently to find the cause."

Everyone present nodded seriously; only Shen Ji nodded, feeling guilty.

Couldn't be helped, since he was the reason.

"One more thing." Professor Yang looked at Shen Ji and Kang Xiaodong. "You two newcomers, I originally planned to have veterans show you the ropes, but now it seems both of you have excellent qualities yourselves and probably don't need us old folks messing things up. Why don’t the two of you team up?"

Shen Ji looked up, "The two of us?"

But Kang Xiaodong nodded eagerly, "No problem! Thank you, Professor Yang!"

Shen Ji looked puzzled at Kang Xiaodong, who flashed him a big grin.

This guy's strange.

Professor Yang smiled with satisfaction, "Oh, and Xiao Ji, when you have time, head over to Dr. Chen's. He has something he needs your help with."

"Oh, okay." Shen Ji nodded.

So Yang Xu assigned Shen Ji and Kang Xiaodong their patrol areas again, then called the meeting to a close.

After the meeting, Shen Ji remained in his seat. His perception was quite sensitive; he could feel everyone around him sneaking glances at him every so often.

The last time he had this feeling was when Li Zhiyan announced to the entire Pollution Harmless Treatment Center that he had been led on and dumped.

What? Has this rumor of being led on and dumped spread here?

Before Shen Ji could confirm the power of this rumor, Kang Xiaodong came up to him.

"Mr. Shen, let's go see Doctor Chen."

"Oh." Shen Ji stood up from his chair. "After seeing Doctor Chen, wanna go check out the pollution fissure?"

"Of course, no problem!"

Kang Xiaodong was clearly way more enthusiastic than when he first arrived, or perhaps a bit too enthusiastic. Shen Ji looked at him like he was seeing a big dog excitedly wagging its tail for its owner.

"Oh right, Mr. Shen, since you weren't here this morning, I swapped contact info with everyone here. Now I'll send you everyone's contacts. Oh, and there's the group chat here too."

Shen Ji exchanged contact info with him without much thought, then said, "You don't have to call me Mr. Shen, just call me by my name."

Kang Xiaodong thought for a moment, "Little Ji?"

"...That won't do."

"Alright, Shen Ji." Kang Xiaodong nodded. "You can call me by my name too."

Shen Ji agreed, and after adding each other's contacts, Kang Xiaodong sent him several recommended contacts. He had even thoughtfully added notes on who each person was, their specific position, and what work they were responsible for. In just one morning, he had gotten the lay of the land for this research institute.

Looking at this data, Shen Ji understood why Cheng Feng thought highly of him.

This power of observation is really something else.

"Can't you do it?"

'I sure can.' Shen Ji casually shot back to the system. 'Not only would I investigate everyone and their duties here, but I'd also record everyone's physical characteristics. Reporters earn their keep!'

"So it seems you're more suited to be the successor than him."

'I'm a pollutant. Pollutants shouldn't become top brass in the human government.'

After sending requests to each of these contacts one by one, Kang Xiaodong added him to the group chat.

There were about a hundred people in the group, mostly from this Pollution Fissure Research Institute, but not exclusively. He even saw Cheng Feng's name in there; probably some people in charge or those who had come to help before were in the group.

Shen Ji could scroll back through the chat history.

He saw Cheng Feng venting in the group yesterday that Li Zhiyan, that jerk, had sent his complaint letter to the Pollution Prevention Center.

As a result, a psychologist showed up at his door and talked through his psychological issues with him for three hours, leaving him to work overtime until the early morning to plow through the backlog.

Shen Ji: ...

Li Zhiyan really gets on people’s nerves everywhere he goes.

The two walked towards Chen Ting's temporary clinic, the cold wind biting the whole way. Kang Xiaodong was shivering from the cold, while Shen Ji buried himself in his coat as much as possible, acting like he was freezing too. Only when they stepped into the clinic did Kang Xiaodong seem to thaw out, letting out a sigh of relief.

The outer layer of the clinic was isolated with transparent glass, looking like a sun porch, which also allowed sunlight to better penetrate inside.

Through the glass, they could see Chen Ting.

Kang Xiaodong was about to greet him, but as he raised his hand, he saw Chen Ting suddenly stop what he was doing, pick up his phone, and start tapping away furiously.

After a series of frantic tapping, he pressed send. Instantly, both Shen Ji and Kang Xiaodong's phones rang simultaneously.

Shen Ji took out his phone and glanced at it, finding that Chen Ting had sent a message in the group chat.

He opened the group chat.

"Chen Ting: Everyone! I've edited the surveillance footage from yesterday!"

"Chen Ting: It's absolutely awesome, this segment is like something out of a movie. I've lost count of how many times I've admired it!"

"Chen Ting: /video/"

Shen Ji opened the video, and the soundless footage played on his phone in full view.

The surveillance happened to be directly facing Shen Ji's dorm door, so he could easily see himself.

Too tired to change clothes, he had lain directly on the bed, so his white shirt was all wrinkled and messy, his black trousers creased, and his messy hair didn’t hide his eyes. Without his glasses, his gaze became sharp, his black eyes filled only with the rage of someone woken up.

The pollutant tried to retreat but for some reason hesitated for a moment. It was this hesitation that gave Shen Ji the opportunity.

He grabbed the pollutant by the neck with one hand and slammed it hard onto the floor, yellow grit splattering onto his cuff from the impact.

Even without sound, watching this video, you could almost hear it—probably a sickening crack as he broke the pollutant's neck.

Silent and effortlessly.

In that moment, he truly looked just like the terrifying S-class pollutant, Hui, from the original work.

Shen Ji: ...

"That was so badass!" Kang Xiaodong quickly saved the video, his eyes sparkling as he looked at Shen Ji beside him. "Shen, how are you that good?!"

Shen Ji said nothing.

No one had called him "Brother Shen" in ages. The last person to call him that was an intern he'd mentored.

But that wasn’t the issue. He was thinking about how to talk his way out of this.

He was a Class D psychic mutant, but he'd just snapped a pollutant’s neck.

System! Why didn’t you hack the cameras?!

"What good would hacking the cameras have done? You killed the pollutant right in front of everyone—Kang Xiaodong was standing right there, and Yang Xu showed up with a whole squad of guards. You did it right out in the open. How could I possibly hack the surveillance after that? It would’ve been way too obvious."

"I…" Shen Ji looked at Kang Xiaodong’s shining eyes. "I have a serious case of the wake-up crazies."

"It's not usually this bad."

"If this was your usual, it'd be a nightmare."

"Shut up!"

"I’ve always thought pollutants were terrifying. They’re inhuman things that can kill people, as scary as ghosts." Kang Xiaodong said, admiration thick in his voice. "But after seeing you, Brother Shen, I realized pollutants aren't so tough. They can be taken down! Even by back-office guys like us."

Shen Ji sighed helplessly. "You really shouldn't try to pull a stunt like that. They’re still pretty dangerous."

"I get it! You can only take on pollutants head-on if you're strong enough!"

"Seriously, man, you're just built different."

Somehow, he’d gained an admirer.

He closed the video and the group chat. Shen Ji pushed open the door of the medical clinic. *Better to just focus on work.*

Chen Ting had called him in for the same reason as yesterday: in another round of people ratting each other out, he had identified several staff members suspected of pollution issues. After yesterday’s events, those who were still conscious understood the severity of the situation and didn’t dig their heels in about being clean like Ning Peng had.

The pollution detector couldn’t get a read on their pollution levels, so Chen Ting had to turn to Shen Ji for help.

The system helped detect the actual pollution levels of these individuals. Out of five people, three were contaminated, while the other two were false alarms.

When released from isolation, the two who were cleared let out huge sighs of relief, threw a 'thanks' over their shoulder at Shen Ji, and hurried away.

"Mr. Shen, please come back at this time tomorrow." Chen Ting said, all business. "Right now, we can’t determine patients’ pollution levels or even confirm if they’re suffering from pollution sickness. We have to rely on you."

"Actually, I’m a bit curious—how can you tell what their pollution levels really are, Mr. Shen?"

Shen Ji pushed his black-framed glasses up his nose. "I’m a psychic mutant."

Chen Ting looked puzzled. "Class D?"

"Maybe I’ve leveled up. Could be Class C or B now." Shen Ji replied casually. "That’s how I can detect it."

After saying this, Shen Ji made a casual exit with Kang Xiaodong.

Chen Ting watched them go, bewildered. A few seconds later, he finally spoke.

"...Now that's dedication."

"Even now, he’s still keeping up the act, even though it’s pretty much impossible to hide."

"What kind of Class D psychic mutant can slam a pollutant into the ground and kill it?"

/

Yang Xu didn’t assign them to areas too close to the pollution fissure. Since they were both newcomers, they were temporarily sent to survey the periphery.

The two suited up in full isolation gear. Unlike the outfits at the Pollution Harmless Treatment Center or the containment facility, these protective suits covered them from head to toe. Shen Ji felt like he was in a spacesuit—even communicating with his teammate required a wireless earpiece.

"It’s so stuffy in here," Kang Xiaodong grumbled as he trudged through the bitter cold.

The weather was bad today, like it was about to snow any minute. They had to climb a staircase to scale the high wall and reach the other side.

After climbing for a while, the wind was so brutal he could barely move.

He slumped on the steps and sighed. "This pollution crap is like a virus, but medical viruses are affected by environment and temperature. Why isn’t pollution the same?"

"I wish they were scared of the cold or something…"

Shen Ji grabbed his arm and hauled him up. "Given the intensity of pollution, even if it were vulnerable to extreme temperatures, it'd have to be so hot or cold we'd die too. It’s like how the body raises its temperature to kill germs during a fever, but if it goes unchecked, the person could die from the fever itself."

Kang Xiaodong looked up. "Really? Ordinary people can die from fevers like that?"

Oh, right—he’d forgotten again that things were different after the apocalypse. Mutants’ bodies had changed, and they didn’t get sick anymore.

"Man, you know everything. Are all doctors this smart?"

Shen Ji pulled him up onto the high wall. "I’ve never been a doctor."

"Chen Ting said you were."

"He's full of it."

"Oh, okay."

The howling wind atop the massive wall made it hard to keep their balance. Kang Xiaodong crouched down, clinging to the edge.

Before them stretched a enormous fissure.

This was the second pollution fissure Shen Ji had seen with his own eyes. Unlike the one at the botanical garden, this fissure cut across the mountains—a dark, bottomless chasm. Just staring into the abyss made it easy to hallucinate shadowy figures churning within.

Kang Xiaodong frowned and closed his eyes, sitting on the wall to steady himself.

The Pollution Fissure Research Institute’s first rule: Do not make eye contact with a pollution fissure for more than 10 seconds.

"Did people used to live here?" Shen Ji noticed several residential buildings split apart by the pollution fissure. They looked relatively new, not like they’d been abandoned for long.

Kang Xiaodong turned to look at Shen Ji, then averted his gaze after a few seconds.

He’s fine?

He’s that strong?

"Before the pollution fissure appeared, there were indeed residents living here. They’re all dead now."

Kang Xiaodong explained, "The containment facility did everything they could to rescue them, but the pollution fissure opened right under their feet. There was nothing anyone could do. In the end, they were sent one by one to the Pollution Harmless Treatment Center. Survival rate: zero."

Shen Ji was taken aback.

Sometimes, he felt like he’d already grown accustomed to this era. Pollution incidents happened around him, he encountered pollutants, he witnessed many sacrifices, but he also saved quite a few people.

But every now and then, something would happen to remind Shen Ji that he hadn’t fully adapted after all.

In this era, death is just a statistic.

"Do all pollution fissures cause this many casualties?"

"More than 90% of them do, unless the fissure opens in an uninhabited area. But on this Earth, people are spread out everywhere. Aside from the oceans, there are people everywhere on land."

Kang Xiaodong said, "That's why the Pollution Fissure Research Institute exists—to control the fissures from further affecting humans."

"Moreover, this is a small pollution fissure; it only affected a few apartment buildings. The pollution problems around it aren't too severe either. You wouldn't believe how bad Zero Abyss is. It's said that when the Red Mist incident occurred and Zero Abyss split open, it wiped out hundreds of thousands of people, almost destroying an entire city."

"Now, various big and small quakes can also kill many people."

"Speaking of which, are we due for another big quake at Zero Abyss again?"

Shen Ji nodded and began recording the currently detectable data, also checking out the state deep within the fissure.

The hyphae had already eaten quite a bit, and since Shen Ji was holding back, they didn’t continue eating the pollution in large quantities. Instead, they hung on the high wall to sleep. The small mushrooms looked like rows of little lights, resembling strings of decorations.

After a while, Shen Ji stopped recording and looked up at the sky.

"It's snowing."

Kang Xiaodong also reached out his hand. "It snows early up north, and the temperature keeps dropping. Are you cold, Brother Shen?"

"It's alright." Shen Ji finished recording the last set of data. "Let's head back first."

"Sure thing!"

The two descended the high wall with the data and walked back to the research institute in the light, steady snow.

Meanwhile, in the distant Central District, the only Class B Healingtype mutant at the shelter headquarters finally finished treating the last batch of patients.

After clocking out, he was so exhausted that he returned to his dorm and lay on the sofa, not wanting to move.

Recently, it had been the pollution outbreak season. Contaminated patients kept coming nonstop, leaving almost no time to rest.

Once he felt a little better, he reached for his phone on the coffee table to check for any new instructions, only to see a new message in a group chat.

He remembered this should be the Pollution Fissure Research Institute’s group. Back when this pollution fissure suddenly opened, many people were harmed or affected, and he had voluntarily gone there to help. Later, he even assigned some promising young people from the shelter to gain experience there.

The higher-ups from the treatment center, Cheng Feng and Yang Xu, were also in the group, occasionally bitching about their workload.

He clicked into the group chat and found a bunch of people saying things like, "So handsome," "Too strong," and "How'd he even do that?"

Curious, he scrolled up and saw the video.

"Taking out pollutants with his bare hands? So effortlessly? Is this someone from the guard team?"

"Did the guard team send an A-level mutant over?"

Just then, Cheng Feng, who had been working overtime and completely zoned out, finally noticed the video.

"Cheng Feng: Xiao Ji is truly extraordinary. We old folks are counting on you young ones to grow up. @Shen Ji"

"Wait, Shen Ji?"

The name sounded familiar—very familiar.

So he started going through the records on his phone. Because his memory wasn’t great, he liked to write down anything important in his memos.

He flipped through his notebook and soon found three entries related to this name.

"Qi Yuanhai said Shelter Q might have a Healingtype mutant, quite high-level, named Shen Ji."

"Li Zhiyan claimed he was led on and dumped, and the person involved was Shen Ji, a staff member at Shelter Q."

"Li Zhiyan sent Cheng Feng’s complaint letter to the Pollution Prevention Center because Li Zhiyan tried to steal Cheng Feng’s hand-picked successor, Shen Ji."

Shen Ji, a Healingtype mutant, unknown level but definitely high, suspected to be A or even S.

Mixed up with Li Zhiyan, left Shelter Q and joined the Pollution Harmless Treatment Center. Cheng Feng noticed his skills and selected him as a successor, but Li Zhiyan sought him out.

Now assigned to the Pollution Fissure Research Institute.

He put it all together in his head and watched the video again.

After a moment, he said curiously, "Normally, Healingtype mutants don’t have such scary attack power—at least, I don’t."

"With skills like that, could he really be an A-level or even an S-level?"

"If he really is an S-level Healingtype mutant, then the Pollution Harmless Treatment Center is wasting him. He should be a natural fit as a doctor for treating pollution-related illnesses."

"No, I need to find out more."

He quickly scrolled through his contacts and started messaging people who might know the story.