The woman’s hazel eyes narrowed at her companions’ gruesome carcasses.
Despite the organs littering the blood-soaked floor, she didn’t tremble, and her clear eyes showed no trace of fear. Instead, Adam’s brow rose as she pushed herself off her seat, a disturbing smile tugging at her lips.
"You look nothing like the man in the recordings." Her voice cut through the disgusting stench as she raised her hands in surrender. "Let’s say I believe you. What do you want me to do?"
Ignoring the woman’s unnatural stoicism, Adam pointed at the computers behind her, his firm voice leaving no place for negotiation.
"Delete any traces of Ignatius’ research and free all the test subjects, beasts included."
"Will you let me live if I do?" The woman leaned forward, smirking as she shook her head. "Of course you won’t. So here is my offer." She lowered her hands and shoved them inside her pockets nonchalantly. "I’ll release the subject. But deleting the files is impossible remotely."
He frowned but guessed why. After taking over Ignatius’ research, the scientists must have made backup copies to avoid similar troubles. And she confirmed it a second later.
"Here is my deal: I’ll guide you to the military facility housing our servers. You can blow them up for all I care, but here is the catch: you’ll need my biometrics to enter." She shrugged at the pierced wall, her gaze dominant. "You’re powerful, but not enough to break in."
He jumped on the table, rolling his eyes at her smug grin and use of weird words he didn’t know. Servers? Biometrics? Humph. He peered into her eyes and sneered.
"You can’t imagine how powerful I am, old witch. But I’ll need you to show me the facility. And you’re relying on that to either trap me or plead for survival."
An icy shiver ran down her spine as he shoved his finger at her forehead, pink energies dancing at its tip.
Before she could remind him of her importance, his sharp voice rumbled in her trembling mind as she felt her surroundings distort.
A second later, she felt a soft tug ruffle her lab coat. Gasping for air, she raised her head in panic, her hair dropping before her sleepy eyes as her dead colleague smiled at her.
"It’s so unlike you to sleep at work, Clarice, but I can understand with all the pressure from the government."
Her pupils constricted as she took a deep breath and massaged her temples.
"Sorry, Paul," she muttered, a feeling of wrongness washing over her. When did she fall asleep, and what was this absurd nightmare? She shuddered for a second before her rational mind regained control. There was no way a kid could wield such powers. Even the man caught in their CCTV footage three years ago wasn’t that horrifying.
After calming down, she sighed in relief—just a nightmare.
"Don’t mind it. This government doesn’t give us a second’s respite with its weird ideas." Paul pushed a tablet before her, an official document on its bright screen. "They want us to close the research complex and head to the main facility. I swear I’ll never understand them."
Dread icy fingers wrapped around her heart as she read the document. Those demands... They were the same ones made by the blue-haired kid from her dream. Was it a coincidence?
She shook her head, sighing as she looked at her worried colleague.
"I feel a bit off today. Please manage everything while I return first."
Without waiting for his answer, she walked to the exit, scanned her retina and badge to unlock the thick metallic doors, and stepped outside the underground complex.
The wind blew her gray hair, the comforting freshness of nature helping her chase her irrational thoughts away.
"It was just a dream." She looked back, noticing Paul supervising the evacuation in her stead with a smile. "I’m definitely asking for a one-week leave and resting with my daughter and her children."
"It will never happen."
Adam snapped his fingers beside her, yet she didn’t hear or see him. Even when space folded and tears rumbled open nearby, she only walked to one of the many buggies parked by the doors.
As she sat inside and retrieved her keys, Adam stared at the kids, scientists, wild beasts, and chimaeras in the making through the folded space.
With a disgusted click of his tongue, he hurled dozens of mana arrows, killing the inhuman bastards in the blink of an eye. His mana rumbled the next second, taking the shape of hundreds of firm hands. Under his control, they gripped the unfortunate souls trapped in this place and brought them before him.
He smiled at the trembling kids and ruffled the oldest’s hair.
"Care for your brothers and sisters and bring them to safety."
Then, he bit his lip as he placed his mana hands on the disgusting mishmash of insects’ body parts grafted onto a dozen comatose kids.
The unimaginable suffering they had endured caused his chest to tighten. But he would fix this injustice—he wouldn’t let another suffer Misha’s tragedy.
His bright green Qi encased the kids. With their organs and flesh stimulated, they convulsed madly, foaming at the mouth as their bodies rejected the grafted parts.
But he clenched his jaw as he cleaved the foreign parts with mana scalpels coated in Qi.
Even with his control, most were too far gone in the merger, making it impossible to dissociate the insect from the human anymore. Worse, the absence of mana in their limbs made him curse. After all, with his hands and eyes, he could have undone the transformation without trouble if it stemmed from a magical source.
While sweat dripped down his creased brows, the kids trembled at their comrades’ suffering—no one paying attention to the buggy’s rumbling engine or Clarice’s departure.
"Come on!" He slammed his hand on the ground, magic circles extending from his palms. "I can guide it if I can’t undo it!"