An Zhe helplessly watched his spore reach out its hyphae and touch Lu Feng through the glass. When Lu Feng's hand left, the hyphae even drooped, its appearance carrying a hint of loss.
Seeing his spore act this way, An Zhe felt a bit distressed as well, as if he had just personally experienced it. When Lu Feng lifted his hand, An Zhe didn't want him to get close to the spore, but when the man let go, An Zhe wanted him to stay a little longer.
In this brief second, the camera switched to a researcher in a white coat who said that the sample showed an unprecedented inertia against infection and mutation.
"After four months of analysis and research, the sample's extracts will not infect any organisms. Likewise, when we infected the sample with mutated organism extracts, we have not observed any changes whatsoever in its composition," the researcher said. "The Lighthouse believes this may be our breakthrough point to overcoming mutations."
An Zhe gripped the thermos handle. The human said that his spore was the breakthrough point to overcoming mutations, which meant that the spore would be under heavy protection.
Finally, the newscaster summarized the news in a very optimistic tone, said that the future of the base was bright, and thanked the researchers for their efforts.
After the news ended, the weather forecast followed. According to the Lighthouse's observations, within the next three days, the region where the base was located would welcome a substantial rise in temperature, and there was a reminder to all areas—especially the Lighthouse's laboratories and the Garden of Eden's crop husbandry base—to respond to it.
An Zhe was not in the mood to continue listening. He left home and got onto a shuttle. Along the way, he pondered how exactly he should get close to his spore—firstly, he had to know the exact location of that laboratory, then observe the researchers' work patterns. Under normal circumstances, researchers wouldn't stay in the laboratory for all hours of the day. If he could enter the laboratory through the ventilation pipes when nobody was there, then think of a way to take the spore back into himself— Then he could think of a way to leave the human base and return to the Abyss.
If the experimental sample was stolen, the humans would chase it to the end.
Apart from escaping, he seemed to have no other options.
At that thought, An Zhe blankly turned his head and looked at this city with its lights blazing in the night through the shuttle's glass. The aurora had already risen, its green light fluctuating in the night sky and swiftly changing, just like the flow of time.
The announcement sounded. He had reached the Twin Towers.
An Zhe got off, holding the thermos in his arms, then swiped Lu Feng's ID card to open the door, entered the hall, and went upstairs. In the silver corridor, every laboratory was brightly lit. Various instruments emitted sounds at various rates, the back-and-forth rising and falling. He found the doctor's laboratory, but only Dr. Ji and his assistant were inside.
"You've come." The doctor lifted his head and looked at An Zhe. "Lu Feng will be back later."
"All right." An Zhe put the thermos on the workbench, unscrewed it open, and filled a bowl for the doctor. The insulation device's function was very good.
The soup was boiling hot, and the rich fragrance wafted out along with the rising steam, filling the laboratory.
"My God." The doctor picked up the tableware An Zhe handed over. "You're wonderful."
An Zhe smiled.
"You aren't eating?" the doctor asked.
"I'll wait for him to come back," An Zhe replied.
The doctor clicked his tongue.
"I'm not waiting for him," the doctor said, then looked at the assistant.
"Continue rolling the clip."
The assistant replied, "All right."
An Zhe looked at the computer interface in front of the doctor. The window in the very center was playing footage of Si Nan. Beneath this window was another window that was partially covered, but a mailing list was visible. The doctor had sent one email each to the recipients "Underground City" and "Research Institute".
His gaze turned back to the Si Nan in the footage, the gray bee. Lily was aimlessly chatting with him, and in the previous second, she was even saying, "Will you have honey?" which was promptly followed by "Is it more fun to be a person or a bee?"
He said, "It's gotten bigger."
Moreover, it was a very easily-detectable increase in size.
The doctor ate a piece of chicken and narrowed his eyes as he looked at the screen. "Indeed."
The assistant chimed in, "An increase of ten kilograms."
"What has it eaten?" the doctor asked.
"It has taken no sustenance," the assistant replied.
The doctor said, "It's like this yet again."
"I shouldn't have considered this question while eating," he said. "I was very happy."
An Zhe asked him, "What's the matter?"
"The change and growth of xenogenics not only violates the existing definition of biology, but also has always challenged the law of conservation of energy." The doctor looked at Si Nan. "Organisms take in energy from the outside world and convert it into the self. But when humans change into xenogenics, their bodies may grow tenfold in size, and the muscle mass is also many times higher than that of humans. Where does that energy come from? As Petri dishes, human flesh can't provide that much. They're practically made out of thin air."
An Zhe said nothing. He didn't have this knowledge, but the creatures in the Abyss were indeed all very massive.
"Never mind," the doctor said with a sigh. "The complete failure of our knowledge framework isn't something recent."
He continued devouring the bowl of delicious mushroom soup, but his gaze was still fixed on the screen.
When he was almost done drinking, An Zhe asked, "Do you want more?"
The doctor didn't reply. An Zhe looked at his eyes and discovered that he was staring relentlessly at the screen.
"Replay it," he said.
The assistant replayed the video from one minute prior.
Lily, already worn out from talking, was leaning against the glass wall.
"Don't bump into the wall anymore, it hurts so much."
Then she added, "Although it's very tiring to constantly talk, the Lighthouse is more fun than the Garden of Eden."
Right at that moment, Si Nan recovered his lucidity for a brief spell, and his fluff- and spine-covered mouthparts gently tapped on the glass.
"You're awake," Lily said.
The gently-trembling mouthparts continued tapping a few more times.
The doctor frowned.
"Half speed, play it again."
The frame was enlarged and the speed was reduced, focusing on the bee's movements as it tapped the glass.
"The intervals of the first and second taps are the same, tapping again after a long pause, and then another long pause." The doctor took out a notebook and swiftly made marks with a ballpoint pen. "This time after the pause, there were three consecutive taps with the same interval."
As he spoke, he jotted down on the paper the numbers 2, 1, and 3.
After the segment of footage finished playing, the doctor said, "The next recorded segment of when he was lucid."
The assistant began adjusting the video timing. He looked like he was the doctor's student. "Are you suspecting that he's transmitting a message via the tapping frequency?"
The doctor said, "This is absolutely not normal... but he's just a six-year-old child."
He looked at An Zhe. "What do you cover in your mathematics and logic classes?"
An Zhe said, "Arithmetic, geometry, and reasoning."
"Will you tell them stories outside the classes?" the doctor asked. "Such as about radio code and such."
"That's not right," he then said. "He hasn't entered Class A, so he wouldn't have such a high IQ."
An Zhe said, "He got full scores on his tests. Not being able to enter Class A was because of psychological factors."
The doctor nodded to indicate that he understood and began watching the next video. In this segment of footage, the period Si Nan was lucid for was very short. He swiftly tapped twice, the interval different than before.
The doctor drew two very closely-spaced dots on the paper. "Next segment."
In the next segment, within the same span of time, Si Nan tapped the wall seven times.
Then the next segment—in this recorded segment, he was lucid for a full five seconds. In the first half of the recording, his behavior was surprisingly consistent with the first segment of footage. Two taps, one tap, three taps. After completing the third set of taps, he paused for a long span of time, then swiftly tapped twice immediately afterwards. This segment of footage was like an amalgam of the first and second segments.
The doctor took notes in his notebook, and the videos continued to play. In the fifth segment of footage, he once again evenly tapped seven times in a row.
After that, in all the lucid fragments, his tapping maintained this repetition until five o'clock rolled around and Lily was taken back by the Garden of Eden's staff.
The doctor recorded a string of numbers in his notebook.
2, 1, 3, 1, 1, 7, 2, 1, 3, 1, 1, 7, 2... The assistant said, "Do you want to get someone well-versed in mathematics to come and decode it?"
"No need," the doctor said. "The message he wants to convey is very short, so it won't be difficult... Let me think."
An Zhe frowned as he looked at the string of numbers. Humans communicated through language, so he didn't know how numbers were to assume the function of transmitting messages, unless these numbers implied characters.
"2, 1, 3..." The doctor's deeply-furrowed brows seemed to relax a bit.
An Zhe hesitated for a while before saying, "Is it B, A, C?"
"The alphabet." The doctor scribbled down the letters 'bac' on a page. An Zhe looked at the recording from before. After 2, 1, and 3, Si Nan knocked twice in a row, so it should have been 'bacaa'. The sixth knock consisted of seven hits, and the number 7 corresponded to the letter 'g'.
In accordance with An Zhe's thinking, the doctor wrote down the six letters 'bacaag' but then underlined the consecutive 'a's.
The assistant said, "The interval between these two knocks is very short. It's a different expression of language."
"Eleven," the doctor suddenly said. "Two short knocks don't represent two separate 1s but rather the double digit 11."
The letter corresponding to 11 was 'k', so that string of letters became 'backg'.
The doctor asked, "How was his English?"
"Full marks as well," An Zhe said.
Foreign languages accounted for nearly half of the content in the language and literature courses. If these children were to enter the Lighthouse after growing up, consulting the documents of human civilization would require very high levels of linguistic competence.
"Back." The doctor uttered one word, then moved the letter 'g' up to the very front and narrowed his eyes. "'Go back', a very concise expression. In other languages, it wouldn't be so short. Furthermore..."
The assistant said, "Furthermore, it's within the scope of Lily's understanding. If she is able to notice, she will understand it."
The doctor nodded. "He wanted to make her go back. What does this mean?"
The videos continued to play. Lily said listlessly to Si Nan, who was throwing himself and flying around wildly, "The doctor said that it's very dangerous in the base now. You have to help us or everyone will change into monsters. It's very scary."
The assistant said, "If they are very good friends, that means the Garden of Eden is a safe place, and he knows or predicts that the outside world is very dangerous, so he wants her to go back."
"But it was in precisely the Garden of Eden that this boy was infected and turned into a xenogenic." The doctor thought for a while. "Could he be saying that the first xenogenic appeared in the Garden of Eden, and then the Trial Court's investigation center was transferred there, so it is a feint strategy instead?"
"Do you want to hold a meeting and discuss it?" the assistant asked.
The doctor glanced at the laboratory door. "How come Lu Feng still hasn't returned yet?"
He picked up the communicator and dialed, but a busy tone came from the other side. The assistant said, "Perhaps he entered the signal-jammed laboratory."
An Zhe astutely picked up on the opportunity and seized the opportunity to ask, "What did he go to do?"
"The same project from this afternoon," the doctor said. "They believe the Colonel can advance the growth of a sample, so they insisted that he go over there and babysit."
An Zhe said without hesitation, "I can go find him."
Smiling, the doctor looked at him. "You two have a really good relationship.
That's fine too. Bring him back and have dinner while you're at it," the doctor said. "That laboratory's level is very high, as it's combined between the military and the Lighthouse. Take the elevator up to the thirteenth floor, cross the corridor bridge, and look for room D1344."
"All right," An Zhe replied.
He turned and left the laboratory—it was obvious that Lu Feng was with his spore again now, and probably this person was somewhere very close to the glass tank or once again holding out his hand to play games of touch with the spore. He didn't know why this sort of thing would happen, but he absolutely didn't believe the "Lu Feng advances the spore's growth" nonsense. When the spore was taken away, it hadn't yet reached the point of maturity where it could grow by itself. It would only grow when it was either within his body or next to him.
The elevator arrived, and inside were two people. They were researchers, and they were discussing the recent weather.
"A rise in temperature after high winds. The recent weather has been very extreme."
"Summer has come, so it counts as normal. Compared to a rise in temperature, the base is more afraid of drops in temperature."
"That's true."
"But I heard this is because of fluctuations in the magnetic field's strength."
"Is it a problem with the artificial magnetic pole?"
"The neighboring laboratory observed several abnormal fluctuations. Our East Pole has no problems, so everyone believes that the frequency of the West Pole is being manually adjusted."
"Wow." The researcher smiled. "Has there been new progress in the Underground City Base's technology?"
"I'm guessing so, otherwise nobody would dare to touch the magnetic pole.
They've already contacted the United Front Center, applying to open strong frequency short-wave communication and communicate with the Underground City Base."
"Everything is changing for the better."
Everything was indeed changing for the better, for he was about to see his spore—the elevator door opened, and An Zhe walked out.
The corridor bridge connecting the buildings of the Lighthouse and the United Front Center was very wide, and both sides were transparent, being made from glass or some other material.
Laboratory D1344 was very easy to find. He knocked on the door.
A female voice said, "Please enter."
As soon as An Zhe entered, he saw the glass tank in the center. It was identical to the one on the news, and that small white mass— Next to the little white mass was Lu Feng in his black uniform. He had put his fingers on the tank, and the spore was once again bobbing towards him— then this person withdrew his finger and put it at a different place much farther away.
Then the spore slowly changed direction, going to a new place.
When it almost caught up, Lu Feng changed places again, deliberately not allowing it to touch.
When An Zhe saw this, he was so angry he almost forgot to breathe— whereas Lu Feng's expression looked impassive when he was in fact completely joyful. He seemed to be finding pleasure in bullying and playing with the spore.
At that very moment, Lu Feng lifted his head and looked over at An Zhe, eyebrows raised.
An Zhe looked around. With sophisticated instruments and surveillance equipment as well as a dozen or so researchers, he could only look at his spore from afar.
No, he could do one other thing, which was to take away this person who bullied his spore.
He walked over to the tank, but hatefully, the spore didn't approach him, but rather continued to linger around Lu Feng.
Lu Feng's tone was very light. "What is it?"
An Zhe said in a very unkind tone, "You should go back and eat."
There seemed to be a trace of a smile in the gaze Lu Feng looked at him with. Unexpectedly, playing with the spore made the man this happy.
Lu Feng walked over to him, then said to a researcher, "I'm leaving."
The researcher replied, "Please be sure to come tomorrow as well."
An Zhe gritted his teeth as he took one last look at the little spore floating helplessly in the nutrient solution, and the laboratory door mercilessly shut right in front of him.
He and Lu Feng walked through the corridor.
He said, "Are you coming here tomorrow too?"
"Mm-hm."
"Were you playing with the sample?"
"I'm cooperating with a study."
An Zhe wouldn't believe his blatant lies. He didn't say anything, and they turned around a corner and arrived at the corridor bridge leading to the Lighthouse. On either side was the city's night sky and the aurora on the horizon.
But Lu Feng seemed to have sensed his mood. "You're unhappy?"
An Zhe said nothing.
Lu Feng stopped walking and looked at him.
An Zhe turned to look at the aurora outside, and the entire world seemed to go quiet for a second.
Right at that moment— An Zhe's pupils sharply contracted!
A sharp pain traveled through his entire body. The light was too strong, so he unconsciously shut his eyes. Just a moment ago, the aurora that filled the sky released a burst of light that was as bright as day, cleaving the sky like a flash of green lightning.
Lu Feng grabbed his shoulder and yanked him down, pressing him to the ground, and then the two of them rolled over once. All of it happened within tenths of a second.
An Zhe wasn't hurt by the impact, for Lu Feng had protected him with his arms. He opened his eyes and discovered that he had been brought back into the corridor.
Lu Feng pulled him up.
The inside of An Zhe's head buzzed. He looked at the outside of the corridor bridge and was stupefied.
The aurora was disappearing—all of it.
After the short-lived burst just now, it was like an ebb tide disappearing in the night sky. The color faded within ten short seconds, then completely disappeared.
A resplendent Milky Way spanned the indigo night sky.
He had never seen such a sight before. Then his gaze lowered. The entire human city's lights were blinking wildly, complementing the Milky Way.
The corridor lights flickered madly, and chaotic sounds came from the laboratories as several researchers ran out.
Lu Feng pulled An Zhe back to a place where the outside wasn't visible, then asked grimly to a researcher hurrying past, "What happened to the magnetic field?"