Qi Wu stared at the patterns on the surface of those soft-bodied creatures for a few seconds: although the color of their skin was gradually fading, he still felt a wave of daze and dizziness.
It was as if an icy finger had reached into his brain, gently stirring his thoughts and affecting his perception.
His brain was trying to tell Qi Wu that what he was seeing was nothing more than a flat bedsheet, rather than two limp, black-and-red corpses.
Qi Wu was familiar with this feeling.
He also knew what was going on.
Once, when he was still very weak, he had used the same method to deceive the headhunting woman who was chasing them at the time.
It was a survival instinct that arose naturally without any guidance, a kind of innate mimicry.
Although the soft-bodied creatures now growing on the corpses appeared quite weak, Qi Wu could feel that they shared the same origin as himself. Or rather, this was the most primitive and basic type of “monster.” And perhaps because they had no other means of attack, these “sea anemones” had an incredibly strong camouflage ability. They could even mask the stench of the rotting corpses through their own reproduction, and the patterns on their skin nearly perfectly disrupted the visual perception of others… If it weren’t for the twisted bottle of perfume distorting the reflection of the patterns, Qi Wu might never have noticed that there were two corpses lying on the bed just a wall away.
This unexpected discovery caused Qi Wu’s heartbeat to race.
He felt a surge of anxiety.
The clothes on the corpses had long been soaked in corpse water, but Qi Wu could tell that the deceased were two middle-aged humans, a man and a woman.
The size of their clothes matched exactly with those stored in the wardrobe.
These were Xie Xishu’s parents.
Qi Wu was sure of this.
And in his mind, Xie Xishu’s face from when he had mentioned that his parents were still abroad, a face full of both relief and fear, surfaced.
The bodies had decayed significantly, and with no signs of other monsters having invaded this place, Qi Wu even felt that they might have died before the mutations began—no, it couldn’t be. If that were the case, Xie Xishu would have noticed it.
Did Xie Xishu know that his parents were dead?
And should he tell the young man this terrible news?
…
Countless thoughts chaotically flashed through Qi Wu’s mind, leaving him confused and disoriented.
He had long lost his fear of corpses after the mutations, but these two on the bed still made Qi Wu feel a sense of dread. He had an inexplicable feeling that he had noticed something unusual, some uncomfortable truth.
But when it came to explaining where this eerie sense of unease came from, he couldn’t find the words.
Qi Wu couldn’t help but lean forward slightly, trying to get a clearer view of the Xie couple’s corpses… and then he saw the phone that had been soaked in corpse water.
Originally, the phone should have been held in the palms of the deceased’s overlapping hands, but now, due to the severe decomposition of the bodies, it had fallen inside one of the skeletons, covered in some semi-dissolved internal organ fluid.
When he took it out, Qi Wu had no hope that the phone would still turn on.
He just hastily wiped off the mysterious fluid with the bedsheet, then cautiously pressed the power button. To his complete surprise, the screen of the phone actually lit up.
After several black screens, the phone finally stabilized just enough. Qi Wu discovered that all the internal programs of the phone had been wiped clean. Only one prominent video file remained on the desktop.
Qi Wu hesitated for a moment and carefully opened it.
The phone screen flickered a few times, and then a woman appeared on the screen.
There was no doubt that Xie Xishu inherited this woman’s delicate eyebrows and eyes. Even though she had a high school-aged child now, she was undeniably still quite beautiful… However, she looked strangely off in the video, in a way that was hard to describe.
Her eyes were deeply sunken in their sockets, but the light in her pupils was unusually bright. When she spoke, a vein in her neck pulsed with every beat, and she appeared so agitated and excited that Qi Wu didn’t immediately realize he was actually watching this woman’s last words.
“We made a mistake.”
“A serious mistake.”
These were the first words the woman said into the camera.
“First, the extinction of various species—plants, animals, even insects—every day, at an alarming rate, disappearing from Earth. Then, ocean pollution, nuclear wastewater, chemical agents, microplastics… these things continuously enter the oceans, affecting the ocean’s water cycle. The changes in the oceans led to unstable temperatures, and extreme weather records are being broken every year…”
“Since the fifteenth, the global warning system has been relentlessly sending us alerts. Based on the continuous meteorological and biological data from around the world, nearly all large AI systems have clearly determined that humanity will face an irreversible extinction within the next thirty years.”
At this point, the woman took a deep breath.
“I cannot accept it.”
She murmured.
“I cannot accept that my child will die painfully in some future food crisis or weather disaster. I cannot tolerate that such an intelligent species as humanity quietly disappears from the course of history. So, when my husband discovered the high-radiation, low-temperature lava from deep within the Earth, we chose to use it to give humanity, to give my child, a chance at survival.”
“Once exposed to that lava, mammals undergo very obvious evolution. They become more energetic, develop stronger vitality, and their absorption and digestion rates for nutrients increase to an astonishing degree…”
“This kind of evolutionary direction would be humanity’s only hope for survival in the extreme natural environments of the future.”
As she spoke of the benefits of the so-called Earth’s molten lava, the woman grabbed a handful of her hair. Yet, she showed no excitement; instead, a trace of fear appeared on her pale, neurotic face.
“At least, that’s what we thought at the time.”
The woman whispered hoarsely.
“My colleagues and I worked for many years, conducting numerous experiments, and finally, we figured out the safest irradiation frequency.”
“My child, Xie Xishu, was on the brink of death due to a genetic disease. In order to save him, my husband and I were the first to use that substance on him. At first, the results were very good. Really good. That child escaped from the scythe of death with his own vitality. He became so lively, so cheerful, so adorable.”
“…But he was no longer my child.”
The woman spoke each word hoarsely, her voice barely audible.
“It wasn’t until that moment that I suddenly realized—we had been deceived. The ‘thing’ that crawled out of the hospital bed was not human at all, just like how the so-called molten lava from the Earth’s core was not ordinary lava… It was a brand new, unknown life form. It was too cunning, too insidious. It had been imprisoned deep in the Earth’s core for so long, yet we, the foolish ones, brought it to the surface, allowing it to grow and spread in places we were unaware of. And then, little by little, it took over my child’s body, disguising itself as human.”
“I don’t know who you are, the one watching this video—perhaps the world you live in has already been destroyed, or maybe you’re just investigating my death. But whatever the case, I want to warn you: do not trust it.”
“That thing… it can twist perception and memory, and even human will.”
“How ridiculous,” the woman’s expression began to distort as she pressed her hands to her temples, so forcefully that the whites of her eyes began to turn red. “…I, and he, both knew that child was no longer my child, yet we still couldn’t control ourselves, wanting to love him, wanting to raise him, wanting to provide everything he needed.”
“I couldn’t hurt it, even though I knew it would bring about humanity’s downfall.”
“Based on my calculations, I can say with certainty that it will soon enter the breeding season for its kind. It’s in heat, I know. I can feel the change; it’s more dangerous than before. To broaden its mating range, it will force all humans on Earth to transform into those… disgusting… maddened monsters… It will happen… it will definitely happen…”
“If you don’t believe me, look at me.”
The woman gave a miserable laugh and raised her face toward the camera.
Her once delicate features were now covered in cracks.
Inside each crack was a blood-red, wriggling eyeball.
Even though Qi Wu had grown accustomed to the strange and hideous appearances of monsters, at this moment, staring at the phone screen, his heart still tightened.
“It wants me to care for it more, hehe…” As she spoke, the woman turned her face in circles, her dozens of eyes moving erratically. Her voice was faint, as though she were crying or laughing. “It wants me to look at it more, and then I became like this.”
“How terrifying, but I almost feel like it doesn’t matter anymore. My sanity is being twisted. I am… I am becoming a monster.”
“I don’t know how much longer I can hold on, but I want to leave as a human, while I still have just a little… just a little bit of human will left.”
“The world I once knew is about to be destroyed. How ridiculous, to save humanity, my husband, my colleagues, and I opened Pandora’s box and completely ended the life of the human race.”
“I didn’t want this…”
At that moment, the sound of a door opening echoed in the video.
Then, a man’s voice was heard.
“Darling, what are you doing? Didn’t the doctor say you need to rest? I see you haven’t taken your anti-anxiety meds these past few days…” The man’s voice suddenly stopped, followed by a heart-wrenching scream.
The woman slightly tilted her head, then stared fixedly at the direction where the man had appeared.
Her expression became a little dazed. After a few seconds of stillness, she shakily stood up.
“I’m recording a video. I’m documenting the crimes we’ve committed.”
“Shh—shh—don’t be afraid, darling. It’s me. Let’s do it together, okay? Let’s go redeem ourselves.”
…
The phone’s stand shook and then toppled over.
The screen immediately turned black, but the video faithfully recorded the sounds that echoed throughout the room: the man’s desperate scream and struggling sounds, the woman’s incoherent mutterings, and then, the horrifying sound of skin and muscle being violently torn apart.
A while later, the phone was picked up again.
The woman’s clothes were drenched in blood.
Her lips were covered in blood.
And next to her, there was a faint red figure, lying motionless on the bed.
When she looked at the phone, the woman’s eyes showed a moment of confusion, as though she had completely forgotten what she had been doing and why the phone was standing there.
But eventually, she slowly sat back in front of the camera.
She trembled as she raised her blood-red hands, her breathing becoming rapid.
Murky tears slid down her already twisted and grotesque face. Her voice sounded like some monster wailing in despair.
“…Look, look at what I’ve done.”
“If anyone, if there are still normal people who see this, I hope you understand what really happened!”
As she spoke, the woman became more and more ferocious, more and more frantic.
“Kill it! Kill the thing called Xie Xishu! It’s not human, no matter how much it looks like one, it’s not human! It’s the source, the first parasite! It controls all the monsters, it will breed, it will keep breeding! It must be killed! It must—”
Just as her ramblings were about to turn into screams, the woman’s voice suddenly stopped. She pressed her hands tightly to the sides of her head. Her body swayed uncontrollably.
“No, no, no.”
She looked at the phone in despair.
Her lips slightly parted.
“I don’t have a child.”
She murmured.
“I shouldn’t have a child.”
“Where did it come from… where did it come from…”
“I can’t figure it out.”
“I… I’ve already…”
…
As she continued to press her hands, even through the screen, Qi Wu could vaguely hear a bone-crunching sound, as if bones were being dislocated.
…
“Qi Wu, what are you watching?”
At that moment, the bedroom door suddenly opened.
A slender figure appeared at the doorway and spoke to him.
Okay wow holy shit what a plot twist and WTF THATS SO SCARY LITERAL JUMP SCARE AT THE END OMGG
I’m scared🥲