Unit 3

This is Research Institute No. 30, one of the many research institutes of Prometheus. Zhu Ning took a second to receive the information from the institute.

After her lower limbs were sent inside the wall, a secret plan was launched. She actually knew the person in charge, Zhu Ning. He was used to wearing a white suit, all in white. He looked more like a product manager than a scientist.

Xie Zhen once represented the Cleaning Center Headquarters to recruit Zhu Ning before the God descended to Area 103, and gave him a free pass.

Before the Kingdom of God fell, he had already sensed the danger. Before Prometheus lost, he abandoned the progress of the experiment and hid in the shelter under the laboratory. Zhu Ning had no interest in paying attention to him. He was not as good as Chu Qing in getting her to look at him more.

She was more interested in the research direction that Xie Zhen had been in charge of. When 0056 cut Zhu Ning in half, the black mucus concentrated upwards and settled in the heart of Zhu Ning, so they only got the useless half of Zhu Ning.

Zhu Ning's body regenerated its lower limbs, but they could not regenerate on their own. They only used genetic cloning technology to give this body the upper half.

They studied their battle records with No. 0056, hoping to make up for the defects of the experimental subject, but soon found that it was meaningless. The bodies they restored were no different from ordinary robots and could not gain the devouring ability at all.

The experiment then entered its second phase. Xie Zhen, a product manager rather than a researcher, was more daring in his thinking. He proposed another plan, which was called the Chip God-making Plan in his research log.

This theory is not uncommon. Someone proposed it in the past. To use the most common analogy, the human body is regarded as a "game console", and the superpowers are concentrated into the chip, and different superpowers are obtained by switching different chips.

In addition to swallowing the opponent, another feature of Zhu Ning's devouring ability is that he can switch abilities at any time. For example, water and fire cannot coexist in an ordinary psychic, but they can in Zhu Ning.

Xie Zhen's idea was very difficult to implement. Before this, it had only been successful among the chip people. The highest record was only switching five chips, and the span was not large. It was simply incompatible with opposing abilities such as fire and water, and the switched abilities were not strong.

This is easy to understand. Complex systems require good hardware support, but technology has not developed the corresponding hardware.

The chip-based god-making plan led by Xie Zhen has many loopholes. When they tried it on other experimental subjects, ordinary bodies could not withstand it and easily disintegrated.

They had never practiced on Zhu Ning's body. According to Prometheus's precise calculations, even if Zhu Ning could be used, its lifespan would be as short as only three hours, so Prometheus had never thought of using Zhu Ning's body to hunt down Zhu Ning himself outside the wall.

Just like when a fake meets the genuine product, all the flaws will be magnified.

Low life expectancy, unbearable conditions and lack of energy are all real difficulties.

There is only one genius, Zhu Yao, and Zhu Yao has not solved all the problems. Even if Prometheus can make a breakthrough in the future, it will take several years or even decades.

It was too late for Prometheus, as Zhu Ning quickly found his host and devoured him at the cost of his freedom.

Zhu Ning glanced over and saw rows of chips displayed on the wall. This was the real arsenal.

The researchers in white coats were preparing to evacuate. They immediately stopped what they were doing and cursed under their breath when they thought that the "project manager" Xie Zhen had already run away.

He activated the safety mode and closed the doors of other laboratories. Not wanting to cause a second accident, he quickly pressed something with his fingers. The researcher's physical fitness was always poor, and the security team had already run away. Logically, he should have saved himself immediately, but his eyes stayed on a certain place and his pupils suddenly contracted.

Black mycelium spread out from behind the transparent glass door. He recognized the laboratory. Zhu Ning's body was placed inside. The experimental plan had reached a bottleneck. They could not give the experimental subject a soul, so they had to suspend it.

But now the screen inside the laboratory suddenly lit up, and black mycelium seeped out from the ceiling, as if a piece of pure white paper was splashed with ink, and the black color condensed inside the laboratory.

His heart almost stopped and his pupils dilated immediately. Having dealt with pollutants for many years, he knew that the best thing to do at this time was to close his eyes, but he simply couldn't do it.

His heart seemed to be gripped tightly by some unknown existence, and he couldn't even breathe. Oxygen could only seep in through the crack in his throat.

The lights inside the laboratory flickered, on and off. He switched rapidly between light and darkness for a moment, his brain filled with fear, his fingers trembling but unable to react.

He stared at the interior of the laboratory. The black mycelium grew more and more and had already touched Zhu Ning's body.

With a click, the light above his head suddenly went out. His eyes stung, probably from tears or scarlet blood. What he witnessed was definitely a spiritual pollution.

The lights went out and never came back on, leaving him surrounded by darkness. Only the laboratory was still lit, as if it was the only beacon in the dark world.

Suddenly, a person sat up in the laboratory. His scalp was numb and he almost lost his mind. His body was wet and nutrient solution was dripping from the ends of his hair. His eyes were black vortexes, as if something was flowing inside.

In his extreme fear, he actually regained some rationality and couldn't help but glance at the data table outside the laboratory. The green numbers jumped step by step, faster and faster, spitting out a long string of papers.

The mechanical heart requires energy, and they didn't connect it to Zhu Ning's body at all, which means that the thing is just a piece of scrap metal.

But now Zhu Ning is back to life.

Not only did she sit up with her upper body, but the data showed that she was "reborn".

Her body was stiff, as if a puppet suddenly tilted its head and stared at herself.

His teeth were chattering, and because he hadn't been able to breathe naturally for a long time, his lungs felt like they were exploding, but the pain was not as severe as the pain in his brain.

In a polluted world, ignorance is a gift and he shouldn't know too much.

But now he could no longer refuse. He saw the black mycelium drilling into Zhu Ning's body, and the test meter outside the door suddenly showed that it was running. No matter what that black thing was, it injected energy into Zhu Ning's body.

Her mechanical heart was beating, and black mycelium was flowing on the surface of the machine, caressing the precise gears and injecting into the heart.

Combination of biology and mechanics.

The researchers seemed to wake up suddenly, and the knowledge in their brains began to explain everything in front of them. Their experiment encountered a bottleneck and they were unable to give it energy and soul. Now that existence was solving the problem.

What lies in the nutrient pool is no longer a body, but an experimental subject with individual consciousness.

She climbed out of the coffin, her pale feet touching the experimental floor, soaking a ball of sticky nutrient solution.

She was so confused, like a newborn baby looking at the world.

She saw a panicked man in a white coat, his face pale and as if he couldn't breathe. He was pulled away by his returning companions and ran away with staggering steps.

Her eyes wandered, and she realized that she was probably lying inside a laboratory.

She instinctively looked at her waistline. There was a clear seam line on her waist, as if it had been cut and then sewn together. Her hands were no different. The strange thing was that there was a row of chip slots on the inside of her arms.

Corresponding to the row of chips on the wall, which should be the location for the chips, she looks like an unassembled game console.

"I'm Zhu Ning." She heard a cold voice, like a divine instruction, "I'm your system."

The gears in her brain turned with a loud bang, and memories came flooding back. She was last reborn in the garbage dump of Area 103, and the time before that she was reborn in the Red House Orphanage. This was her third rebirth.

Now she has the memories of two generations superimposed on each other. She floats in the ocean of consciousness, her fingertips skimming through countless memories, including the people she has met: Shen Xingqiao, Ye Fei, Xu Meng, Li Nianchuan...

Every team she joined, every teammate, and every enemy she encountered is vivid in her mind.

She remembered making a bet with Shen Xingqiao, and she also remembered asking questions to Xu Meng. She remembered everything that happened in the Noble Queen Store, and she also remembered the team outside the wall.

She had a splitting headache, as if her brain was experiencing a cosmic explosion, her personality was split, the world collapsed and quickly rebuilt, and for a moment she was both her and herself.

Zhu Ning of the previous generation said it was his own system.

In order to save Area 103, the first generation Zhu Ning destroyed his individual consciousness, and his soul was forever integrated into the long river of history.

The second generation Zhu Ning entered the Far North, her soul was imprisoned at the end of the world, and she became the new world itself.

In the chaos, she saw a blurry figure. The other person was so cold and expressionless. He looked at her as if she was an ant. She had a face exactly like hers.

What is worth noting is the huge shadow behind her, the shadow of the giantess is following her, making her look like an ancient god.

There seemed to be some... data inside her brain?

Unlike traditional game system panels, everything there is very abstract. For example, she knows that her life span is only 48 hours, and she is a short-lived person. If she moves without authorization, her life span will be consumed faster.

This wasn't a very difficult piece of information to accept; it was surprisingly familiar.

In the past, her lifespan was only one year, but just like a short-lived ghost created another short-lived ghost, her lifespan will only get shorter and shorter.

She was even more confused before, but now she seems to have opened up an omniscient perspective. She shares the same brain with the second-generation Zhu Ning, but there are subtle differences. Does she have her own soul?

She can sense joy, anger, sorrow, and happiness. She feels sad when she recalls the death of her teammates, and she feels happy when she knows she will be reborn.

She could sense Zhu Ning's loss.

To put it in another way, she is a part of Zhu Ning, or an existence differentiated from Zhu Ning himself.

Their memories diverge at the Far North, and she is Zhu Ning who has not been deprived of her emotions.

The sticky floor beneath her feet and the chill of the lab's wind canisters proved she had her own temperature sense.

She was only wearing a hospital gown and instinctively wanted to find something to keep warm. She subconsciously wanted to break the glass and take out the spare protective suit that was for researchers.

But before she could do anything, the glass window opened by itself, and the person in her mind solved some problems for her.

The Zhu Ning in his mind only said that one sentence, as if giving himself time to react, without giving too much explanation.

Her fingers were trembling, and when she first woke up, she lacked control over her muscles, as if she was a patient who had been lying in bed for years and was walking for the first time.

She wanted to put on the protective suit, but it was a bit difficult because she had to find a bathroom to wash off the clear slime on her body.

As a newborn individual, her habits come from humans and she has a need for cleanliness.

Suddenly, the fire protection device on the ceiling opened, like a sprinkler system, and water dripped down on her.

Zhu Ning, who controlled everything, read her heart like a god and sent down a gentle rain.

Zhu Ning opened his mouth and tasted the water. Perhaps the pipes were a bit old, so the water had a hint of rust.

Slightly cold water droplets fell along the bridge of the nose and chin, slid over the beating heart, and flowed through the chip slot on the arm. A hazy rain mist rose in the room and gathered into dirty water at the feet.

She breathed and pressed her heart, which was beating in the mucus.

This heart no longer came from Zhu Yao, but was a brand new heart she created herself.

She saw her current miserable appearance in the reflected light from the glass. When Prometheus brought her back, she still had long hair, so the researchers restored her long hair. However, Zhu Ning, who had reached the Far North, had cut her hair short. Now her hair was stuck together, entwined around her like a water snake, forming a sharp contrast with the short-haired Zhu Ning at the end of the world.

They are clearly identical, yet they look completely different.

She wiped the glass window to see herself better, and the black goo flipped to the back of her eyeballs, revealing her eyes, which were a pair of mechanical eyes.

She saw herself in the glass window, and at the same time she saw another Zhu Ning.

"Hello, Unit 3."

She called herself... Unit 3?

The Alpha series, from the first generation to the second, and from the second to the third, is like a product update and iteration.

But Zhu Ning’s creator is Zhu Yao, and now she creates herself.

Accompanied by a cold voice, like a power-on instruction, Unit 3's dazed vision gradually focused, and the glass reflected the short-haired face of Zhu Ning.

The two scenes merged like two layers superimposed. This is both a laboratory, the birthplace of Unit 03, and the end of the world, the cage of the second-generation Zhu Ning.

The two Zhu Nings stared at each other from a distance, one with eyes filled with hatred, the other with eyes cold and indifferent. They were one, and from their gaze they understood each other's intentions. Their lips moved, and they said in unison: "Kill Su He."

They have to carry out a mission that even the first generation Zhu Ning couldn't complete, which is to kill Su He.