Zhao Hen’s smile gradually faded.
His dark complexion effectively concealed his complex emotions. Lowering his head to look at the display screen in his hands, the cold, bone-chilling night wind cut through the air. After a while, Zhao Hen spoke, “… Did you see any special objects underground?”
Xiao Jinyu: “…”
The handsome young man managed to muster a somewhat awkward smile: “No.”
Zhao Hen looked at Xiao Jinyu with a deep gaze.
Xiao Jinyu: “…”
Zhao Hen: “…”
Fortunately, both being high-level users, they weren’t too concerned with these details.
Xiao Jinyu had never encountered such an awkward situation in his life.
Growing up in a single-parent family with his mother, he faced more pressure and worries than most. From a young age, he was sensible and obedient. As he grew older, his demeanor became calm, and he would always think twice before making decisions, always cautious. He never thought that the one time he spoke ill of someone behind their back, the person would hear it firsthand.
It wasn’t really speaking ill, though. He just saw a hardworking girl who, for no good reason, felt ashamed of her user ID and remained stuck at level two, unable to advance. He couldn’t help but offer a well-intentioned reminder…
Haah.
Xiao Jinyu let out a soft sigh.
Not dwelling further on this issue, Xiao Jinyu and Zhao Hen split up, each taking a special object detector and working with the team to search for the mysterious object’s trace.
They had previously used the special object detectors during the excavation of the Ivy at Kangde Middle School. This high-tech instrument’s maximum effective range is thirty meters. By now, they had already ruled out the entire Kangding Garden area and expanded their search another five hundred meters in the southwest direction.
6:00 AM.
As dawn broke, the edge of the sky turned a pale blue-white.
The subway heading towards the Zhongdu center began operating. Xiao Jinyu and Zhao Hen temporarily set aside the Kangding Gardens case, traveling together to the city center. From there, they took an underground train to Haidu.
Meanwhile, the Zhongdu extermination team continued their busy search in the Bishan area.
A team of just over a dozen members was clearly insufficient for the task. Unlike the Ivy incident, which was confined to a single school, Haidu Middle School wasn’t very large. It was possible to excavate the entire school in three days and nights. But the area of concern this time was much larger. Even with Doggy Hero’s help in narrowing down the direction to the southwest, the team spent the entire night searching and digging up lots of underground trash without finding the real pollutant.
The User Committee immediately issued a mission, filtering out users with a clean background and trustworthiness to rush to the Bishan area, assisting the extermination squad in their search for the mysterious object.
“Captain, if we go further west, we’ll enter Pollution Zone 132.”
Hearing this, the robust and tall level five user lifted his head to look at the abandoned factory shrouded in hazy dust not far away. After a moment, Wang Tao’s voice boomed, “I personally confirmed that Pollution Zone 132 is a safe zone. Permission granted to enter.”
“Yes!” A team member turned and instructed others, “Continue the investigation towards the west; don’t worry about the south, keep working!”
Wang Tao squinted, gazing at the desolate industrial area.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
In 2031, a user executing a mission in Pollution Zone 132 was accidentally contaminated. Afterward, the extermination squad arrived at the scene to deal with this unwittingly polluted user. It took them a full three months, fully equipped, to find the small robot hiding in a pharmaceutical company’s laboratory.
Fcilxf atf vbmlif jcv delfa lns, 004 kjr vlrmbnfgfv yfmjerf la vlv cba tlvf lar qbiiealcu jylilas ja jii jcv tjv j cjras mtjgjmafg, vfilutalcu lc mgjhlis mbcajwlcjalcu tewjcr.
Jjqaeglcu 004 mbra atf fzafgwlcjalbc afjw rfnfc wfwyfgr, lcmievlcu j vfqeas mjqajlc ja atf alwf.
Coafg mjqaeglcu 004, la abbx afc sfjgr obg atf fzafgwlcjalbc afjw ab boolmljiis vfafgwlcf atja Ubiiealbc Ibcf 132 cb ibcufg mbcajlcfv tlut-ifnfi qbiieajcar bg ragbcuis gjvlbjmalnf jgfjr, mjafubglhlcu la jr j rjof qbiiealbc hbcf.
Now, this mysterious object was too close to Pollution Zone 132 for comfort.
The capture of 004 was an event that took place fifteen years ago. At that time, Wang Tao was just a child, far from awakening his logic skill. He only learned about the situation by reviewing the committee’s records. Although this area had been designated as a safe pollution zone, caution was still paramount.
After a moment of contemplation, Wang Tao requested, “Give me a special object detector.”
A team member responded in surprise, “Captain?”
“I’ll lead the inspection task into Pollution Zone 132. Everyone must follow behind me in a radial formation, detecting all around!”
“Understood!”
…
As more users took on the task and arrived in the Bishan area to assist in the search for the mysterious object, the operation expanded.
Wang Tao didn’t believe that after the appearance of the Ivy and 004, two high-level pollutants in Zhongdu City, a third one could possibly emerge. Moreover, it seemed unlikely that another powerful pollutant would appear just a week after the discovery of the Ivy. However, he couldn’t risk the lives of his team members.
Wang Tao’s ears were pricked up, cautiously observing his surroundings. All the logic factors in his body were in a state of alert, ready to activate his logic skill at a moment’s notice. If Xiao Jinyu were present, he would have seen the muscular man surrounded by dazzling logic factors, glowing particles orbiting his body. These colorful lights pulsed energetically as if they had been suppressed for too long and desperately sought their adversary.
Wang Tao announced, “All first and second-level users, evacuate immediately. Do not proceed any further!”
“Understood!”
Wang Tao looked down at the underground water pipe distribution map in his hands.
The night before, Li Xiaoxiao had retrieved the underground water pipe distribution map of Kangding Garden from the database. These pipes were responsible for supplying water to two nearby residential areas. The underground water network was dense and intricate, forming a vast and developed web.
At this moment, they were heading west, having reached the area near the pharmaceutical company’s laboratory.
This was where Subject 004 had been discovered.
With Zhao Hen absent, Wang Tao turned to the other third-level users. His gaze was sharp as a hawk as he issued his command, “Follow me closely.”
The next moment, five senior users, clad in thick protective gear and fully prepared, followed Wang Tao’s lead and stepped into the factory gates of Meijia Pharmaceuticals.
Beneath the soil lay many pieces of garbage.
Wang Tao did not rush to excavate any specially shaped objects they discovered. Instead, he patiently searched through the Meijia Pharmaceuticals factory. Only after all underground objects had been detected did he instruct his team to operate the excavators and dig up the underground items they had found.
This time, Wang Tao stood by, his muscles tensed, ready to spring into action at the slightest disturbance.
However, three hours later, all eight unusual items buried beneath the Meijia Pharmaceuticals factory were excavated.
“Captain, it’s all useless trash,” reported one of the team members.
Wang Tao fell silent for a moment before saying, “Search the neighboring factories.”
The fact that the mysterious object was not found beneath Meijia Pharmaceuticals was a good sign. This place was the “hometown” of Subject 004. If there were any dangerous pollutants hidden here, potentially linked to 004, the situation would only become more perilous.
However, upon leaving Meijia Pharmaceuticals, Wang Tao remained cautious. He continued to move in coordination with his team, with everyone dispersing around him as the center. They dared not stray too far from Wang Tao, stopping immediately once they reached a distance of fifty meters.
The cold gradually crept in, and without notice, a fierce wind began to whip up the dust from the ground.
Wang Tao looked up.
A thick, heavy blanket of leaden clouds drifted from the east, crossing the boundary between Haidu City and Zhongdu, hanging over the Bishan area.
“Captain! I found something strange!” came the frightened voice of a young team member.
Wang Tao’s heart tightened. His subordinates were always composed and never panicked. “What is it?!”
The young team member looked up, his eyes filled with terror and fear, visible through the transparent protective shield, as he gazed at his captain. His lips quivered, and his hand holding the anomaly detector trembled uncontrollably.
A sense of alarm struck Wang Tao. He snatched the detector from the team member’s hand and looked down.
In the next second, the man’s gaze froze.
On the detector’s flickering screen, a green fluorescent number reading “-12.3 meters” was displayed on the left, with a flashing red exclamation mark on the right. In the center of the screen, a pentagon-shaped object, like a maggot buried deep in the soil, was slowly moving. It shifted slightly, moving half a meter to the left, then suddenly stopped; moved another half meter, and stopped again.
—As if its range of movement was confined to this small space.
“Cap-Captain…”
“What is this?!”
“It’s moving, it’s actually moving!”
…
“It’s a person!!!”
Wang Tao looked up sharply. “Bring in an excavator, I’ll operate it myself. Also, find an infrared thermal imager, quickly!”
***
The massive excavator relentlessly dug through the damp soil, sending clouds of dust into the air.
Wang Tao, dressed in protective gear, checked the images displayed on the thermal imager while operating the huge bucket of the excavator. He dug through the earth, shovel by shovel, heading towards the humanoid entity squirming deep underground.
When they reached 11.5 meters underground, just as Wang Tao was about to dig further, a pale, withered hand burst through the soil.
“Captain!”
Wang Tao, agile in his movements, leaped out of the cabin.
The dry, white hand punched through the soil covering it, and a series of pained and piercing “ah-ah” sounds resonated dully in a blink. The noise was eerily distorted as if muffled by a drum skin or submerged underwater, heavy and dull. The next second, four twisted, shriveled limbs crawled out from the dark mud!
With a buzzing sound, the soil broke apart, revealing a grotesquely large head on a shriveled body.
The smooth, pallid skin stretched tightly over the enormous skull, and similarly, the skin on the limbs and torso clung tautly to each bone. It was so emaciated that the head appeared monstrously large in comparison, like a skeletal dwarf.
However, Wang Tao wasn’t focused on the “person’s” gaunt and eerie body.
His eyes widened, fixated on the smooth skin of its face.
“Ah-ah…”
The sound seemed to emanate from where the mouth should be, but…
There was only smooth skin there!
Where the eyes should be, it was flat.
No eyes, no nose, no mouth, no ears!
It cried out pitifully and desperately, “Ah-ah,” its snow-white skin wrapping a small humanoid skeleton, writhing madly on the ground.
“Be careful!”
A team member noticed the creature suddenly charging towards him and shouted a warning, a purple light shooting out from his broken neck. But the purple light blade was swallowed halfway by a raging inferno. The team member’s neck returned to normal, and he exclaimed in surprise, “Captain?”
“Boom!”
Wang Tao stomped his foot onto the writhing white figure, causing it to scream in agony. Unfazed, Wang Tao firmly held it down.
“This is not a polluter!”
Wang Tao’s expression turned cold instantly as he pointed to the rusty intravenous needle still attached to the white figure’s arm. “Polluters, at the moment of contamination, are already dead, leaving behind nothing but a walking corpse. Have you ever seen a dead person needing nutrient solutions to sustain their life, struggling to survive?
“… He is a living person!”
The author has something to say:
I’m reminded of two things.
First, even before the chapter where 004 told our little goldfish that little piggy had dropped in rank, I had been thinking about having 004 directly tell the little goldfish that A54 Piggy Shampoo had died. But when I got to writing that chapter, I thought, why should the novel be so brutally realistic? Everyone wants to read something cheerful, so why not give the child a way out? That’s why the little piggy has managed to survive until now.
Second, what do you think… Can I update twice tomorrow~~?
The translator has something to say:
It turns out the author did not update twice that day (this is going off of the time stamps from jjwxc lol)
She was already working super speed tho, like updating once a day (that’s crazy, I could never)
Poor Piggy! 😰
So os there a skill that steals people’s faces and through it a part of their ability or something? Super confused
Thank you for the chapter! <3
Haha “a way out”…. I hope it’s a good thing, poor shampoo piggy
…that ways piggy??? I thought about it, and then thought it wasn’t possible bc of how randomly the occasions started. poor kid