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Chapter 47: They cut open her belly like a ripe fig
Shen Ti’s words caused a brief shift in An Wujiu’s state.
The feeling was uncomfortable, like a hand gripping the heart valve, forcefully stripping away half of it, and tossing the remaining incomplete half back to him.
“Complicit in misdeeds?”
When An Wujiu repeated these words, his expression appeared slightly confused.
So, Shen Ti was the first to notice that his state had changed.
But in the next moment, An Wujiu laughed, and the curve of his lips sent a chill down one’s spine involuntarily. He lowered his head, speaking while opening the game panel.
“You’re right. I’m not that stingy. The pleasure of chaos is not much fun when enjoyed alone.”
After buying bullets, he grabbed them with his right hand, swiftly and skillfully reloading while still smiling at Shen Ti. “But, you know, I don’t really like guys like you who have a probing tendency.”
“There is no end.”
As he spoke, An Wujiu raised his gun and, bypassing Shen Ti’s body shot a monster that had just respawned.
Shen Ti was not sure if An Wujiu’s last words were directed at the monsters behind him or at him.
But these words inevitably had an impact on him.
How about trying a straightforward strategy?
“It’s happening again.” Wu You looked at those monsters, then exchanged a weapon from his own panel, the machine gun that An Wujiu had previously suggested.
The flames that had burned for a while seemed to be extinguished by an invisible wet cloth. The twisted monsters’ charred shells burst open, giving birth to countless tender tentacles. Each tentacle’s tip was a mouth full of sharp teeth, and when opened, viscous fluid overflowed from the gaps between the teeth, emitting a sharp scream.
The sound was like viscous syrup, sticking in the throat, making it impossible to discern its content, like a repeated language unfamiliar to them.
Wu You was somewhat unfamiliar with the machine gun and not very skilled in using it, and his accuracy was lacking. This was the first time in his short life that he had killed something. As the monsters fell, the splattering slime made him nauseous.
Tentacles continued to spawn forward faster than they had imagined. Shen Ti threw the unused incendiary bomb to create a precise wall of fire.
The opportunity had come.
An Wujiu needed a continuously firing weapon. He yelled at Wu You, “Give me the gun!”
Wu You was about to throw the gun over when a thick, slippery tentacle pierced through the fire wall and swiftly stabbed toward the sidestepping An Wujiu.
“Watch out!”
An Wujiu turned his head just in time. One second before the giant tentacle attacked him, a shimmering golden sword appeared and sliced off the tip of the tentacle.
It was Nan Shan’s sword.
Nan Shan formed hand seals to control the sword; his lips were extremely pale. “You go to the other side; I’ll cover the rear!”
Retreating wasn’t an option.
An Wujiu frowned. This floor was different from the previous two. It wasn’t a circular corridor; even if they retreated, it would lead to a dead end.
Did they really have to eliminate these monsters to open the door leading to the central room?
“What did you find on that side?” An Wujiu asked Josh.
Josh answered somewhat flustered, “I only found a ball, made of metal, very small; it’s with Nan Shan.”
“A metal ball?”
It wasn’t the previous kind of puzzle clue.
Wu You speculated that these monsters were supernatural creations, and only Nan Shan could contend with them. His peach wood sword could ward off evil; perhaps it was genuinely useful.
However, he was now worried about Nan Shan’s stamina. If using Zhong Yirou as a reference, Nan Shan should be completely unconscious by now. He was forcibly depleting his energy using charms.
The peach wood sword was indeed effective in slaying monsters now, but without Nan Shan, it was just a fake sword that couldn’t even cut grass.
As Wu You had thought, Nan Shan clearly felt physically drained. The power of his spells dispersed when he chanted, unable to concentrate. And the cut tentacles on the ground sprouted many new ones, seemingly endless.
An Wujiu continued to aim his gun, wanting to know where the monsters’ weak points were.
The head?
But even when shot in the head, they could still move.
The tentacles weren’t vulnerable either.
The wall of fire blocked the monsters and also disrupted his line of sight.
“Wujiu!” Josh grabbed him and pulled him backward. “Quick, let’s go! They’re coming!”
“You can’t hold on!” Wu You refused to leave, holding the machine gun and firing at the monsters beyond the firewall.
“Don’t worry about me.” Nan Shan’s face was pale, and his trembling hands formed seals in front of his chest. “Children should not risk their lives…”
He didn’t finish his sentence, as if unable to resist a force, he took a half step back. The peach wood sword in mid-air also stagnated for a few seconds, ultimately not recovering. The golden light instantly extinguished, and the wooden sword fell straight towards the ground.
But it didn’t truly land.
With a flick of a toe, the peach wood sword rebounded and ascended, eventually being grasped by a hand wearing black gloves.
“Nan Shan, let me borrow this.”
Holding the hilt in his palm, Shen Ti felt a tremendous resistance transmitting from the wooden sword to his body. He could even sense that resonance in his blood.
Incompatible, yet can be subdued.
But soon, the resonance was interrupted, and a new force flowed back into the sword along the handle.
“Watch out for the tentacle!”
A tentacle surged directly toward the red dot on his forehead. Just before it was about to touch, Shen Ti severed it with the peach wood sword.
An Wujiu immediately frowned.
Why did the sword become effective in his hands?
Shen Ti wasn’t proficient in swordplay, but he had observed the moves of the peach wood sword operating autonomously in the air. He quickly imitated and reproduced them, slashing faster and more ruthlessly.
At the same time, the hand gripping the sword seemed to split like a wound, bleeding. Crimson blood flowed along the blade, reaching the tip.
The peach wood sword immediately emitted a glow, but it was not the golden light seen when Nan Shan controlled the sword. Instead, it was a crimson light mist.
The tentacles that had originally split immediately exploded upon touching the crimson mist, leaving only shattered tentacles and splattered slime.
At the moment of this turning point, Nan Shan’s consciousness gradually faded. Before he fell, his vision was only filled with a hazy red glow and the chaotic green of the slime.
Just as his body tilted, Wu You caught him from behind.
In that moment when Nan Shan collapsed, An Wujiu’s gaze caught a small ball gleaming with metallic luster falling from Nan Shan’s pocket, dropping to the ground, and then starting to roll.
An Wujiu tried to pick up the ball, but after following its trajectory for a long time…
He suddenly noticed a problem.
Josh was puzzled. An Wujiu clearly saw the metal ball, so why didn’t he pick it up?
“Wujiu?” He was about to bend down to pick it up himself.
“Wait a moment,” An Wujiu stopped him. “Don’t move.”
He stood there, watching as the ball rolled toward the order fulfillment service channel, getting farther and showing no signs of stopping.
“Wujiu, why don’t you pick it up?”
“Because this ball should have stopped.”
An Wujiu only gave him a cryptic answer.
What does that mean?
An Wujiu squatted down, one knee on the floor, his palm pressed against the ground, seemingly observing something.
“But it didn’t stop.”
The entire artificial surrogacy factory consisted of “birthing hives” and production assembly lines built against the walls. The various sections of the assembly line were interconnected like a small maze.
A pleasant piano melody played in the space. But to Yang Erci, it didn’t seem much different from when humans massage cows and play music to them to get tastier beef.
She looked upward but couldn’t find where the music was playing. Surprisingly, she also didn’t see any surveillance cameras.
[Providing you with the most private and secure services.]
During the middle of the piano piece, occasional voice announcements like this were inserted, probably the advertising slogan for this surrogacy factory, aimed at psychologically influencing the “customers” who came to place orders and tour the assembly line.
Yang Erci was currently at the starting point of the production assembly line, the centralized waiting area for conception.
It was a slow-moving conveyor belt, with robotic guards on the right and a long, clean counter on the left for transporting impregnated mothers.
However, it was separated by glass, and Yang Erci couldn’t touch it.
Each person stood on a circular platform on the conveyor belt, forming a single-file queue, and was transported to a large transparent pod with many operating mechanical arms inside.
From the instruments these arms were holding and their operating procedures, it seemed to be the place where the fertilized embryos were transplanted into their bodies.
Looking backward, Yang Erci noticed something unusual. The “birthing hives” that she thought would surround her without any gaps weren’t built densely. In the corner behind her, there was a blank wall.
No, not a blank wall.
She saw some English words on the wall, like a door sign.
There was an invisible door.
Squinting her eyes, Yang Erci tried to make out the English words.
Power distribution…
[Providing you with the most private and secure services.]
This voice appeared again, disrupting Yang Erci’s thoughts.
Looking into the distance, she turned her head.
In front and behind Yang Erci were different women, dressed in outdated clothes. Her own white coat seemed out of place. Although their faces were different, they all seemed soulless, neither speaking nor reacting.
Most of these women had Southeast Asian features and distinct facial characteristics. There were also many with Caucasian features and a relatively larger number of black individuals. East Asian faces were rare. So, Yang Erci immediately spotted Zhong Yirou’s figure. She was not far ahead, her disheveled black curls exuding untimely vitality in this place.
Like these women, Zhong Yirou seemed to be just a commodity for sale, but at least she hadn’t fainted. Yang Erci checked, and there were seven women between them.
Strangely, her neck was sore. Yang Erci reached up and touched it, her gaze also glancing at the neck of the woman in front of her.
Numbers.
There was a string of numbers on her neck, and even a slightly raised square.
Yang Erci touched it, and it felt like a chip.
At the same time, she noticed that every time they were transported about thirty centimeters, a horizontal red laser would appear in the sky, like a boundary or a door.
As they pierced through the laser, it also passed through their necks, scanning the chips on their necks.
[Information entering, total awaiting transplant: 54, pass count: 54, no omissions.]
Listening to this information, Yang Erci’s speculation was confirmed.
The conveyor belt continued slowly forward. Before long, Zhong Yirou in front of her would be sent into the embryo transplantation pod.
Yang Erci felt a bit anxious but she forced herself to calm down.
Once again, an advertising slogan was inserted into the piano melody.
[Providing you with the most private and secure services.]
If chips were used for recording, would these artificial intelligences have facial recognition and scanning functions?
She reached out and waved in front of the robot, but there was no interaction.
After passing through several thirty-centimeter laser lines continuously, the next one was approaching. Seeing herself about to move to the red laser, Yang Erci thought for a moment, stepped back, and got off the circular platform.
The red laser scanned the circular platform and emitted a buzzing alarm. The robot beside her also began to act. It lifted an arm, and the mechanical fingers emitted a blue laser, seemingly tracking the position of the chip.
Yang Erci felt something was wrong and took a step forward, just barely. The emitted blue laser almost pierced through her body. Fortunately, she dodged in time, and the laser missed its target, ultimately hitting the glass barrier on Yang Erci’s left side.
The glass barrier shattered.
The red laser above once again scanned Yang Erci’s body. The buzzing stopped, and the robot retracted its arm.
After scanning the remaining few people consecutively:
[Information entering, total awaiting transplant: 50, pass count: 50, no omissions.]
Yang Erci understood what the terms “private” and “secure” in the advertising slogan truly meant.
Because there would be no footage from this surrogacy factory exposed to the world.
They deliberately only adopted chip recording for numbering and information, without artificial intelligence for monitoring and visual scanning.
There’s no wall in the world that doesn’t let the wind through, unless the wall itself doesn’t exist.
She took a deep breath, her eyes fixed on Zhong Yirou’s figure not far away. Then, just like before, with the premise of knowing that the robot would take action, she left the circular platform, taking two steps back.
As expected, the robot tracked the movement of the chip and raised its hand to attack. A second before the blue light appeared, Yang Erci returned to the circular platform. Like before, the blue light hit the glass, causing it to crack but not shatter.
In the moment after passing the red line position detection, Yang Erci lifted her leg and fiercely kicked the crack on the glass barrier. The glass instantly shattered.
The next red line was close.
She quickly picked up the nearest shard and tightly gripped it in her hand.
After passing through the red line, she reached behind and used the shard to cut her neck along the raised line. Blood flowed down her fingers, dripping onto the clean and orderly conveyor belt.
Being continuously transported forward, Yang Erci kept seeing new scenes.
In the transparent transplantation pods, a petite woman was transplanted with a total of five embryos. This was their method to ensure the survival rate of the embryos. Before birth, they would cut and discard the other unnecessary embryos.
In another production pod, the top of a mechanical arm with a sharp surgical knife split open a woman’s abdomen smoothly, seemingly without resistance.
Like cutting into a cake with a surprise or slicing open a ripe fig.
Yang Erci let go of her right hand, and the glass piece fell with a sound. She pressed the wound on the back of her neck, bent down, and the blood-soaked hand moved to her mouth, imitating the prayer method her father had taught her. She kissed the chip.
She was very devout, constantly praying for luck to come to someone.
But she wasn’t devout enough, because her eyes were always fixed on Zhong Yirou’s figure.
Zhong Yirou was less than two meters away from the embryo transplantation pod.
She was about to be sent into it, a long needle piercing through the mucosa and muscles, entering the uterus…
Time was running out.
The elegant piano melody floated above the orderly factory. The only disrupter was now running toward the white, invisible door under the scrutiny of artificial intelligence.
The blood-stained chip took her place on the circular platform, waiting for scanning.
As for Zhong Yirou, who had lost self-awareness, she entered the pod, awaiting conception.
Following the metal ball, An Wujiu ran toward the depths of the corridor. Eventually, the metal ball seemed to be caught by an invisible line on the ground and suddenly stopped.
Josh and Wu You followed, supporting the unconscious Nan Shan. “Wujiu.”
An Wujiu didn’t want to hear him ask questions, so he spoke up himself. “The floor here is not level. It’s imperceptible to the naked eye, but for this metal ball, such a subtle slope is enough to resist friction, causing it to continuously roll forward.”
He had just finished speaking when, as if to validate the answer, the invisible line became visible, turning into a line made of blood, like a boundary separating life and death.
An Wujiu looked in the direction they came from and didn’t see Shen Ti’s figure.
“Where is he?”
He found it strange that he asked such a question.
Josh also looked back, “Shen Ti just said for us to go first, follow you, and he would stay behind.”
What was the point of showing off heroism at this moment?
“Whatever.”
An Wujiu bent down and picked up the motionless metal ball from the ground. In an instant, the smooth sphere emitted several green lasers, intersecting and forming four lines—up, down, left, and right—to create a rectangle.
The door opened.
Perhaps out of familiarity or some kind of guidance from the unseen, the moment the door opened, An Wujiu saw directly through the production line to the transparent, circular pod.
He also saw Zhong Yirou lying inside the pod. One mechanical arm was peeling off her clothes, while the tip of another arm was connecting to a long needle about to pierce into her body.
Almost uncontrollably, a part of An Wujiu’s body woke up, a force compelling him to rush in.
Save her, quickly.
Hurry, she’s my friend!
An Wujiu’s head throbbed painfully, feeling that his body was not under his current control.
In the next moment, goodwill broke through the restraint, and he finally rushed in.
However—
[Providing you with the most private, the most—]
The piano melody abruptly stopped.
Everything in the bright and clean surrogacy factory came to an instant halt, plunging into a silent darkness.
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