My pale face was reflected in the cold medical cabin wall, and the golden lines on the back of my neck undulated under the skin like a living thing.

Wen Shifei's fingers fluttered like butterflies on the virtual keyboard, and her lazy cat's eyes reflected the encrypted data stream pouring down like a waterfall.

"Don't be nervous, poor thing," she said without raising her head, a sharp arc on the corner of her lips, "I'm just helping the 'high-dimensional tenant' in your body to temporarily... turn off the alarm."

Outside the cabin, in the dark deep water, dozens of mechanical tentacles were silently wrapping around the submarine's hull.

"Shen Si's mechanical water ghost is here." Wen Shifei's voice trembled with excitement. "It's just right. Let's try out my new 'neural pulse' fireworks."

Jiang Li suddenly pulled out his pulse pistol: "Did you know he would come?!"

"Of course," Wen Shifei pressed the scarlet start button, a cold light flashing in his eyes, "Otherwise, how can it be called... counterattack?"

Cold.

The pervasive coldness, with the scent of deep-sea salt and metallic rust, was the only feeling when consciousness returned.

Like millions of fine steel needles, they pierced my skin, bored into my bone marrow, and froze every nerve ending. Every weak heartbeat sent a piercing pain through my entire body, especially the area at the back of my neck, which felt like it was being repeatedly burned by a branding iron. It felt like something cold and heavy was embedded there, fused to my bones and nerves.

"Ugh..." A broken groan squeezed out uncontrollably from the depths of his throat, dry and hoarse like sandpaper rubbing against his face. His heavy eyelids seemed to be welded shut, and with great difficulty, he could barely pry them open.

The blurry vision gradually came into focus.

The first thing that caught my eye was the cold, matte metallic gray of the dome. Its smooth surface reflected the pale light, and... a face so strange and frail it was completely unfamiliar—sunken eyes, a pale complexion, cracked lips, and strands of soaked black hair clinging to its bloodless cheeks and forehead. At the back of his neck, the eerie golden lines were clearly visible in the pale light, like a living electrical circuit totem, running down the spine and disappearing beneath the thin blanket covering his body. Within the lines, a faint yet remarkably clear stream of golden light flowed silently beneath his skin, like the cold blood of a sleeping beast, flowing and undulating in a slow, rhythmic rhythm.

Is this me?

A huge sense of absurdity and deep-rooted fear instantly gripped me.

"Vital signs monitoring…stable. Neurosuppressant…maintaining effective dosage. Carrier core temperature…below the threshold of 0.3°C…initiating auxiliary warming…" A flat, electronically precise female synthesized voice echoed through the small space, coldly relaying the data. The source of the voice was several miniature speakers fixed to the metal dome overhead.

I moved my eyes with difficulty, trying to see my surroundings clearly.

This was an extremely narrow, futuristic, cylindrical space—the medical cabin. I lay in a cool, ergonomic metal recliner, covered in a thin layer of insulation. Several flexible tubes of different colors extended from the edge of the recliner, connecting to bioelectrode patches on my arms, chest, and temples. The cabin walls were transparent, but now covered with a frosted white film, blocking out any outside view. Directly ahead, a suspended, translucent data panel radiated a faint blue light, cascading across it a complex cascade of heart rate, blood pressure, and brainwave activity, along with a flurry of incomprehensible physiological parameters and chemical symbols. One flashing red box stood out: [Logic Core Sealing Status: Stable (Carrier Compatibility: 98.1%)].

"Entropy"...it's still there! Is it just...sleeping? Like a time bomb buried in my spine!

"Awake? 7 minutes and 42 seconds earlier than expected. Good willpower, poor little thing." A lazy, slightly hoarse female voice suddenly sounded, breaking the cold silence in the medical cabin.

The sound came from outside the cabin.

The frosted film in front rippled like water waves and became transparent in an instant.

Outside the cabin is a larger, more open space filled with sophisticated instruments and cold blue light - the control center of the submarine.

A figure sat in a suspended, rotating control chair, her back to me. She wore a slim-fitting, dark gray jumpsuit, her features defined by sharp, powerful lines. Her long, slightly curly, seaweed-like dark brown hair was casually tied back, a few unruly strands cascading down her smooth neck. Her head tilted slightly, revealing a graceful jawline. Her fingers danced across a vast virtual keyboard composed of countless holographic dots, so fast they practically left afterimages. The faint blue dots seemed to come alive beneath her fingertips, coalescing into a torrent of data that poured, collided, and reassembled frantically across a massive, curved main screen further ahead! On the screen, in addition to the waterfall-like encrypted data stream, there was also an extremely complex, constantly rotating three-dimensional model composed of countless geometric nodes and energy paths. At the center of the model was an enlarged human spine structure outlined with golden lines. At the core, a constantly pulsating golden light spot was tightly entangled by dense, thorny dark red logical chains!

That's... the "entropy" in my body?!

"Wen... Shi Fei?" I uttered the name with difficulty, my throat burning. In Jiang Li's vague description, this name represented an extremely dangerous technological ghost, both friend and foe.

The control chair silently spun 180 degrees.

A very impactful face came into view.

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