Su Mo sat beside the corpse and opened the first page. There were many academic terms, but it was evident from the pictures that it dealt with how to blend animal genes with human genes to induce evolution.
With each page she turned, her heart grew more perturbed. She saw the milky-white structure of worms, how pythons were grafted with fish gills, and various creatures mutating, ending with human integration. But the pages in that section had been torn off deliberately, and were stained with a large amount of blood. Clearly, there was something suspicious.
"There’s a situation!"
It was a shout from Lu Jin’s side.
Su Mo discreetly tossed the report into the System Bag, patted her trousers, and stood up. Lu Chen was also looking for her and, seeing her stand up, waved to her.
It was a glass-doored surgical laboratory inside. There was only one surgical chair, with its restraining straps burst open. The entire glass wall was splattered with blood, and one side had been shattered, as if something had been smashed through it.
The Spiritual Superpower User next to Lu Jin shook his head at him.
"Spiritual Ability has failed, and we didn’t find the documents,"
At that moment, Lu Jin’s demeanor grew increasingly agitated, and the thick, fetid smell of blood made him twist his neck. He unbuttoned two buttons at his neck, exposing his slender throat, and popped a couple of pills into his mouth.
Su Mo’s ears twitched, and she immediately turned her head down towards the tiled floor, and said to the whispering superpower users, "Shut up!"
A group of grown men, momentarily subdued by her solemn tone, went silent.
The laboratory quieted down, Su Mo pricked up her ears and listened carefully. There were two more faint sounds.
She quickly walked to the glass surgical room, with Lu Chen right behind her. He lowered his head and gazed at her, "What did you hear?"
"The sound of dripping water," Su Mo replied and bent over to crawl through the broken glass wall.
Inside was a pungent smell of blood mixed with a distinct salty, fishy odor of the sea.
Turning her head, she saw a whole wall of blood. She touched the wall with her finger, and the thick blood stretched out long and stringy between the walls, "This looks like it was sprayed out not long ago."
As if responding to her voice, another thud sounded from the area under her feet.
These two sounds were very clear, and Lu Chen heard them too. He bent down, walked around the chair, and finally found a camera integrated into the top of the wall and the white ceiling, "Who are you?"
Su Mo followed his gaze, and if not for the blinking red light, she wouldn’t have noticed it.
Inside Dr. Shuo’s laboratory, a hidden speaker emitted a burst of harsh static before a voice emerged, muffled as if coming from within a belly, "Hello, you all."
Everyone tensed at the sound of this talking voice.
Lu Jin’s gaze fixed on the camera, thoughtful.
"I am Dr. Jiang Zhou, the lead scientist at Southern Island Laboratory,"
A soldier asked, "Did you send out the distress signal?"
"Yes, it was me. Are you here to rescue me?" The voice from the speaker sounded hopeful, but to Su Mo, the tone was unnervingly greasy, and the discomfort she felt inside grew stronger.
"Where are the documents?" Lu Chen asked bluntly.
They were all there for the legendary data purported to rejuvenate humanity.
There was a brief silence from the speaker, followed by a strange, cackling laugh, "It’s with me, but who should I tell with so many of you here? Information that can evolve mere humans shouldn’t be known by everyone."
Almost as soon as he finished speaking, Lu Jin had already launched an attack towards Lu Chen.
Su Mo was shoved by Lu Chen onto the surgical chair, the man quickly dodged an opening torn in space by smashing through the reinforced glass.
Lu Jin had initiated combat. In the vast laboratory, superpowers flew in all directions.
Su Mo looked up, her face alone meeting the camera.
The ’person’ in the underground emitted a strange sound, "Huh?"
"Why does it look so similar?"
He controlled his tentacle-like hands to operate on the keyboard for a while. Su Mo’s face was enlarged on his screen, and a row of data appeared next to a photograph that was singled out.
"Interesting, it’s actually Su Yao’s daughter."
The tentacle pressed on a red dot on the side.
Just as Su Mo was about to climb down the chair to help, the floor of the small lab within the glass suddenly gave way, starting a rapid descent.
She instinctively gripped the chair, the intense disarray in her heart making her extremely uncomfortable.
This turned out to be an elevator.
Su Mo’s shouting immediately attracted Lu Chen’s attention. Lu Jin found his opportunity, and the air around him warped.
A force tore off a large chunk of flesh from Lu Chen’s arm, causing him to retreat swiftly. The realization that Su Mo was falling made him frantically mad.
His deep blue eyes were bloodshot, and his entire body was covered with frost as if he could not feel the pain in his arm, charging straight toward the elevator.
In front of him was a deadly trap set by the air-distorting Lu Jin, yet he charged towards it as if he saw nothing, conjuring a huge ice shield in front of him.
Jianxiong tossed aside a superpower user, spotting Su Mo descending from afar. He felt the overwhelming aura from Lu Jin, stronger than the boss’s.
Seeing Lu Chen recklessly seeking death, Jianxiong quickly rushed over and intercepted him, both tumbling to the side: "Boss! Are you trying to get yourself killed? Let’s deal with them first! The girl might have gone to get the data first!"
Whenever Su Mo was involved, Lu Chen acted even more insanely. Although Jianxiong was also in a hurry, risking their lives was not an option.
The ice shield conjured by Lu Chen was directly shattered into pieces in front of that spatial crack.
Lu Jin glanced at him, a bloodthirsty smile appearing: "It seems the data is mine."
Perfect, he could go down and taste the sweet and tangy blood from cutting open Su Mo’s neck.
That intoxicating flavor had captivated him for several days and nights.
He unconsciously licked the corner of his mouth and swooped toward the descending elevator shaft.
Lu Chen, using brute force, overturned Jianxiong and charged towards Lu Jin again...
Su Mo fell onto the chair, and it took about two minutes before she reached the underground.
Dust filled the air. She stood up from the chair, and ahead was a straight path.
There stood a person, but it was too dark to see clearly; even with her night vision, she could only make out a silhouette: "Who is it?"
The silhouette disappeared around the corner. She jumped off the chair, gripping the Tang Blade, and cautiously stepped off the elevator onto a metal floor.
There was a heavy salty and fishy smell.
Su Mo frowned and stepped further inside, her feet stepping on a sticky liquid that stretched into threads as she lifted her foot.
She edged closer to the place where the shadow had disappeared, lowering her voice, "Dr. Jiang?"
Only the sound of water dripping echoed in the distance, very far away.