After Bloed left Aya in the infirmary, he returned to his room.
A quick bath later, he was ready to start the day.
Today, Bloed planned to spend most of his time working in the virus. He wanted to have the second prototype ready for tonight.
The plan to sightsee the city was at night, and he did not have anything else planned for the rest of the day, so Bloed dedicated himself to his work after breakfast.
With Regina as his assistant, Bloed started to work.
The first prototype of the virus had shown… very undesirable side-effects, so Bloed had to find a way to solve them. Unfortunately, it was not something easy.
His experiments with the first prototype showed three main adverse effects.
Dehydration/Mummification.
Severe hemorrhage.
Bursting of the heart.
Bloed did not need long to find the reason behind the three side-effects.
In the end, it was related to Bloed's attempt to give a magic core to each cell of the body.
In the first case, when the magic core was formed, the cells tried instinctively to fill them with energy. The problem was that instead of getting the energy from the surroundings, they tried to get energy from the body itself. In the end, it caused the body to quickly dehydrate until dying.
In the second case, the formation of the magic cores caused a genetic collapse, so the cells and internal organs started to breakdown one after another, causing severe hemorrhage until the subject died.
In the third of the cases, the red blood cells acquired mana first, greatly increasing the blood circulation of the body. Due to that, the heart was unable to endure the new burden, bursting in the process.
All three problems were lethal and occurred not long after the virus was injected. In other words, until Bloed did not resolve them, the virus was nothing but a lethal weapon.
Of course, Bloed was not naïve enough to believe everything would be alright after taking care of these three problems. In fact, these were just initial problems. Bloed was sure that once he resolved them, more problems would surge.
During his time learning bio-engineering, Bloed read that sometimes bio-engineers needed to resolve hundreds of problems before getting a successful product.
"It can't be so easy, huh," Bloed muttered to himself.
Well, he was already prepared for a long project since the start.
In fact, this project would be worth it even if he took five to ten years to complete it. Much less just one week.
And it was not as though he was planning to take so long.
Bloed immersed himself in the process of perfecting the virus. With the help of samples of his blood, he analyzed the behavior of the virus and slowly worked in the solutions.
Perhaps because he was immersed in his work, but Bloed felt time passing quickly. By the time he finally finished the second prototype, Bloed realized it was already night.
"Is it done?" Regina asked.
Bloed nodded. "For now. I don't know what kind of problem will crop up after this, though."
"At the very least, it's already an improvement."
Bloed nodded. Regina was right. At the very least, he was confident his next subject would not bleed to death from its pores.
"Master, now that you are finished here, don't you think you forgot something?"
"... My date with Liu Ying, huh." Bloed smiled bitterly.
Regina nodded and sighed. "She has been waiting for you outside the laboratory for half an hour already. You should hurry and go with her. I'll clean the mess here."
"… Sorry about this, Regina. And thanks."
"Don't worry about it, master. Also, be nice to her tonight."
Bloed nodded with a smile.
At the same time, he could not help but feel happy by the fact Regina's relationship with Liu Ying did not seem as bad as at the start.
As Regina said, Liu Ying was waiting for Bloed outside the laboratory.
As soon as Liu Ying saw Bloed, she frowned.
"You… Sigh, what am I going to do with you? We are leaving fifteen minutes later. Hurry up and take a bath!"
"Yes, ma'am. Sorry, ma'am."
Liu Ying rolled her eyes and sent Bloed to take a bath.
Fortunately, as a man, Bloed did not need too much time to change. After a quick bath, he grabbed a set of casual clothes and put on a bit of perfume.
Just with that, he was ready to go.
Liu Ying was waiting for Bloed outside the room. When she saw Bloed come out, she smiled.
"Great. If we hurry up, we will arrive before it's late."
"Let's go then. Right, can I hold your hand, beautiful miss?"
Liu Ying rolled her eyes.
"So mushy."
Despite saying that, Liu Ying blushed slightly and gave her hand to Bloed.
Bloed grabbed her hand firmly and intertwined his fingers with hers.
He could feel the warmth of Liu Ying's hand and her quickened pulse. Just with that, he could feel Liu Ying's nervousness, happiness, and expectations of tonight's date.
Perhaps infected with her mood, Bloed could not help but feel a bit nervous himself.
Now that he thought about it, this could be considered as his first official date.
Looking at Liu Ying, he noticed she had dressed up beautifully for tonight. Her usual ponytail-styled hair was let free, falling until her waist like a pitch-black curtain, and instead of wearing easy-to-move clothes, she was wearing a red jacket with an amber shirt below, plus a short blue skirt.
To be honest, Bloed could not deny she looked stunning.
In fact, Bloed was in a daze for an instant after looking at her.
"… What are you looking at?" Liu Ying asked with a slight blush.
Bloed was startled before smiling and holding her hand tighter.
"Nothing… It's only I just realized my girlfriend is stunning."
"You just realized it now?" Liu Yin asked with a frown. Her lips, however, were curved up in a smile.
Bloed was briefly tempted to steal her lips at that moment, but in the end, he resisted.
Mainly because they had already reached the place where they accorded to meet with the others; and Rana, Greta, and Rhone were looking at them with strange smiles.
Even so, he could not help but want to tease her just a little bit.
"Should I give you a kiss now?"
"… Idiot… Later, okay?"
"Later then."
...
P4TRE0N: patr-eon.com/aidnovels