"Experiment 0529, I want her." Kamichika Yao's voice was cold and stern, carrying an undeniable authority.
"She's already a corpse, what do you want with her?" Professor Trenton slammed his hand heavily on the table twice. "She's an experimental subject with a fusion rate of over ninety percent! Such precious data!"
"If you delay our experiment, will you take responsibility?"
"Are you going to give her to me, or not?" A dagger materialized in Kamichika Yao's hand, and Trenton had no doubt that if he refused, his head would roll the very next second.
"Have you lost your mind!" Trenton's fingers trembled with rage as he pointed at Kamichika Yao, his face turning crimson. "You've really gone too far!"
Kamichika Yao furrowed his brow deeply.
Not good! Based on their previous battles, Linyi realized this was a precursor to Kamichika Yao launching a heavy strike. With a light step, he glided in front of Trenton and caught Kamichika Yao's descending dagger in his grip.
"You can't lay a hand on Grandpa Trenton!"
"Qiqi!" Kamichika Yao hastily withdrew the dagger, expertly pulling out a handkerchief to bandage Linyi's bleeding palm.
"Xiaoqi, why are you here?" Trenton had also been startled by Kamichika Yao's readiness to strike without warning, but once he recovered, his first concern was for Linyi.
"I'm sorry, Grandpa Trenton. It was I who wanted the corpse of 0529. I promised her brother that I would bury them outside the base." Linyi looked at Trenton with an apologetic expression.
"I'm fine, but you need to be careful! How can someone doing scientific research not protect their own hands?" Trenton stroked his beard, looked at the scattered, withered vines on the workbench whose roots had been almost entirely burned away, and sighed. "Fine, let this old man keep a little tissue for analysis, and you can take the rest."
As for why he didn't make Xiaoqi take just a small portion and keep the vast majority for his own research, that was out of consideration on Trenton's part.
If anyone else had come, they wouldn't have been allowed to take even a single leaf! But as for Xiaoqi...
The experimental inspiration and developmental push this child could bring him were far greater than this little bit of data.
Linyi's eyes lit up. "Thank you, Grandpa Trenton!"
After giving Trenton a bow, Linyi left a few relatively intact vines on the workbench, gathered the rest in his arms, and hurried away.
"Sorry to trouble you this time, Yaoyao..." Once they were a bit further from the laboratory, Linyi borrowed an empty lab, put down the vines, and prepared to sort them into his backpack.
As he untied the handkerchief to return it to Kamichika Yao, he saw the bloodstains on it and hesitatingly pulled his hand back. "Let me wash it first before I return it to you, okay?"
Kamichika Yao rubbed Linyi's hair and said nothing.
It was only because he had been lucky—after becoming a member of the Deity Group for the Grafting Project, he turned into a semi-finished product, survived, and inherited a certain amount of power. Otherwise...
His life now would probably be just like 0253 and the others...
How could he still be receiving care from so many people? It had all been bought at the cost of Xiaobai's sacrifice back then...
As Linyi separated and sorted the vines, he mentally organized the tasks he needed to handle right now.
"I need to go to the Cleanup Team later and get 0253's body..." Linyi muttered to himself. Hearing this, a flicker of imperceptible panic flashed in Kamichika Yao's eyes.
"I'll go."
"Huh?" Linyi simply assumed this would be like dealing with Hanya Ya's corpse, and not wanting to trouble Kamichika Yao further, he shook his head with a smile. "No need to bother Yaoyao, I'll go myself."
"The Cleanup Team isn't a place just anyone can enter." Kamichika Yao turned to leave. "I'll go."
"Then, then I'll leave it to Yaoyao..." Before Linyi could finish his sentence, Kamichika Yao's figure had already vanished.
Strange... No matter when it was, Kamichika Yao always did things in a steady and orderly manner. Why was he acting so panicked this time?
Suspicion arose in Linyi's heart.
Or rather, ever since he remembered that Kamichika Yao had killed Xiaobai, Linyi had stopped trusting Kamichika Yao altogether.
Linyi understood that in this organization, no one could be trusted, and no one could be relied upon. Only himself would never betray him.
"That reminds me, I still haven't collected Sister Xiaoling's Energy Potion. I should head back and check."
"Xiaoling? She went to fetch raw materials." Professor Xia's gaze didn't shift in the slightest as he stared fixedly at the reaction of the potion before him. "Xiaoqi knows the location, right?"
"I know it. Sorry for the trouble, Grandpa Xia." Linyi hugged his backpack and left the laboratory.
After Linyi left, Professor Xia raised his head, looked at Linyi's retreating figure, sighed softly, and murmured in a low voice, "What a sin..."
"Sister Xiaoling!" Sure enough, Linyi spotted Xia Ling hauling items in front of the storage room and hurried over to help.
"Xiaoqi, you came just in time. The raw materials for the Animal Group were just intercepted by Lord Kamichika Yao when they were brought in. Let's finish moving these things and leave quickly so we don't run into him later." Xia Ling wiped her sweat, straightened up while supporting her lower back, and said, "These are really heavy..."
"Leave the rest to me, Sister Xiaoling. You can push the sorted ones out first, and I'll catch up in a moment." Linyi flashed a brilliant, sunshine-like smile and patted Xia Ling on the shoulder.
As soon as Xia Ling left, the smile on Linyi's face slowly faded. Massaging his stiff face, he closed his eyes and let out a long breath.
Didn't he say he was going to the Cleanup Team? Why would he appear here and intercept the Animal Group's raw materials?
Then... let me see what exactly Kamichika Yao is hiding from me.
Moving with ghost-like elusiveness, Linyi's footsteps were completely silent, failing to alert any of the staff members waiting at the doors of the freezing room.
Calculating the angle, Linyi slipped into the freezing room within their blind spots, only to be startled by the severed limbs and broken bodies inside.
The past few days of trials had exposed Linyi to all sorts of semi-beastified ability users. More or less, they all retained human characteristics; even 0310, who reportedly had a very high fusion rate, still had human facial and abdominal forms.
Therefore, Linyi could clearly distinguish that those piled in the corner like trash were simply the human parts of the semi-beastified ability users.
Quite a few of them were ones Linyi himself had eliminated during the trials.
Raw materials... raw materials...
Linyi's heart grew increasingly cold as he panicked and fled from the place.
A place resembling hell.
No wonder Grandpa Xia was certain that the Animal Group's potion would definitely have problems...
No wonder he never allowed Sister Xiaoling and me to come into contact with the Animal Group's raw materials...
No wonder... no wonder the smell of that potion had repelled me to the extreme back then...
Because that was the final warning one's own kind could possibly give!
In a daze, Linyi pushed the remaining Environment Group materials back to the laboratory and snapped out of it only after Xia Ling patted him twice.
"Xiaoqi, what's wrong with you? I called you several times and you didn't answer."
"I'm sorry, Sister Xiaoling..." Linyi rubbed his face and squeezed out an embarrassed smile. "I guess I was just hungry, my head feels a bit dizzy."
"Oh right, look at the time!" Xia Ling checked her watch and realization dawned on her. "We're pretty much done here anyway. If Xiaoqi is hungry, you can go eat first! Oh, here's your Energy Potion."
"Then thank you, Sister Xiaoling." Taking the Energy Potion handed to him by Xia Ling, Linyi clutched his backpack and strode away.
Inside the Plant Group's laboratory not far away, Professor Trenton and Professor Xia were conversing in low voices. Catching sight of Linyi's hurried retreating figure, they exchanged glances and sighed one after the other.
After a brief silence, Professor Trenton spoke first. "Is it really okay to let him know this early?"
"We have to, whether it's okay or not..." Professor Xia held several documents in his hands, his gaze resting on them without focusing. "Xiaoqi is a talented child; he shouldn't... perish here."
"Let's hope he can escape on his own..." Professor Trenton uttered this final sentiment before falling silent, refocusing his attention on the documents in his hands.
"What a sin..." Professor Xia shook his head, his normally steady hand trembling slightly.
"Speaking of which, that child Xia Ling should be able to independently compound the Energy Potion by now, right?" Professor Trenton asked in a flat tone.
Professor Xia paused for a moment, then gave a bitter smile. "I'm sorry, old friend, Xiaoling doesn't know anything..."
"That's good, not knowing is good..." Trenton didn't use Professor Xia's words to blame him. "It's just that there's still so much research unfinished, and I haven't taught all my knowledge to child Xiaoqi. Leaving now... feels a bit unwilling..."