Chapter 72. Huang Junding trembled all over...

Huang Junding shuddered. Ying Shixue looked at him and said, "You won the gold medal in the competition, and you consider yourself to be intelligent and gifted. After looking at the ingredient list and doing some information research, you actually wanted to make some medicine yourself to ease the burden. Without experimental equipment and materials, you sneaked into the school's laboratory."

"This is absolutely against the rules. You can't let anyone find out, but you're feeling guilty. It was fine at first, but then you got impatient and gradually increased the dosage. Without any safety measures, a single careless mistake led to a series of reactions that caused an explosion, almost killing the teacher on duty."

“After this incident, you face dismissal and criminal charges, and your aunt is still in the hospital waiting for her life.”

"When they had nowhere else to turn, Sheng'an found you and promised that as long as you participated in the project and reached a certain level, they would give you money."

"Stop talking!" Huang Jun interrupted him sharply, his words trembling uncontrollably, his face turning a purplish-red.

Ying Shixue didn't stop at all: "After that, you disappeared for eight years. It wasn't until the tenth year that you reappeared at Tianzhe Medical Equipment and started working there. You changed your name from Huang Kangshun to Huang Junding, and you became even more cautious and avoided conflict whenever possible."

Huang Jun stared at him through gritted teeth, time seemed to stretch out indefinitely, and Ying Shixue's face was as cold as ice: "Do you want me to continue? That medical staff member from Tianzhe Medical Equipment who keeps getting into conflicts with people, named Lin Kaile."

"I don't know how you escaped or what methods you used to make them think you were dead. The fire burned your skin. Later, you had plastic surgery. While you were desperately trying to erase your relationship with Sheng An from those years, you were also working diligently as a business manager. Ten years ago, you married a wife."

"As for why you're suddenly in such a hurry to get rid of it..." Ying Shixue paused, looking at him:

"Because they found you, right?"

"You're afraid of being killed to silence you."

The moment Lin Kaile's name was mentioned, Huang Junding's body visibly trembled.

"Lin Kaile is taciturn and thin. He has traces of a previous leg fracture. Although he can walk without major problems after treatment, a closer look reveals that he takes small steps and always steps up the stairs with his left foot first."

“It’s not just him. Your monthly salary plus your private income is quite substantial, but you still live in a two-bedroom apartment in Van City. The money you send to is mostly sent to various orphanages in Deen State. Coincidentally, these orphanages are the same places where displaced orphans were placed in a fire case. You’re doing this even at the risk of being discovered. You’ve never been able to get over your conscience, have you?”

Huang Jun gritted his teeth and remained silent.

Ying Shixue's gaze slowly swept around the room, finally settling on the faceless photo frame on the table. Like all happy families in the park, the photo showed a simple yet kind husband, a wife who wasn't particularly beautiful but was gentle, and a lovely daughter holding a lollipop.

Huang Junding noticed his gaze and immediately lunged to snatch the photo frame back. Song Mingli, confused and thinking he was about to suddenly attack, tightened his grip on Huang Junding's hand. Veins bulged on Huang Junding's forehead, and he finally roared, "What do you want to do?! What exactly do you want to do?! I didn't know things would turn out like this back then. I haven't been able to eat or sleep properly all these years, and I've suffered enough torment, trying to atone for my sins. Yes, I'm a coward, I'm a wimp, I'm guilty. I've been pretending to be a good person for twenty years, but what did my wife and children do wrong? They know nothing about this. Are you even human?!"

Ying Shixue's brow twitched, and she took the photo album. Huang Junding became even more excited:

"Do you think I haven't thought about fighting back? The Sheng'an Xi family, such a big family, could ruin my reputation and kick me out of Liancheng with just a flick of their finger. Sue them? I have no money and no evidence, what am I supposed to use to sue them!"

"You criticize others from such a high and mighty position, you and—" The angry shouting stopped abruptly as something cold pressed against his chest.

Ying Shixue placed the photo frame on his chest. When she removed her hand, the frame naturally tilted backward, revealing her wife's shy and gentle eyebrows and her child's innocent and carefree smile.

Huang Jun looked down at the two people in the photo frame, and a tear fell onto the glass.

"I never intended to threaten you or order you around."

Ying Shixue looked at him calmly: "I want the truth."

"Who is Xi Yan? What role did she play in this? What are the backgrounds and consequences of this laboratory and this project?"

Huang Junding's face still had a lingering flush. Generally speaking, people with single eyelids and a higher weight do not easily develop wrinkles as they age. However, when this man, who was not yet fifty years old, raised his eyes, wrinkles had already appeared on his forehead, revealing an uncontrollable sense of decay and dejection.

His small eyes were fixed on the young, seemingly energetic man, whose long, gray-white stubble had sprouted around his ears from not having cut his hair for a long time.

He vaguely remembered that there was a time when a child, beaten like a dead dog, lay unconscious on the ground. He was so tormented that he was completely indifferent and walked past without even glancing at him.

After a long pause, he confirmed something: "You want revenge."

He murmured, seemingly oblivious to his surroundings, "I knew it... I knew it..."

Suddenly he looked up sharply: "You came to see me because you want me to testify in court? I know you must have some evidence..."

The scene in the dim light was bizarre. Time seemed to rewind and shift like the changing light and shadow. The person lying on the ground grew tall and strong and became a handsome young man standing upright, while the old man with graying temples was pressed here, like a belated but finally arrived retribution.

In the dim light of day, he saw Ying Shixue shake her head. The arc of her eyelashes appeared almost transparent, and the curve of her drooping eyelashes did not change at all.

"I don't need anyone to testify in court."

Huang Junding's lips trembled slightly as he replied to Ying Shixue, "I will not harm your wife and children, nor will I do anything to you."

"I want the truth."

Time passed by, second by second, seemingly endless.

Finally, Huang Junding slumped backward and began to speak intermittently.

In fact, he was completely tricked into going there. Not only him, but almost everyone in the lab had something on them. There was no communication, no entertainment, and no one he knew there. Just when Huang Jun was about to fall into despair, he suddenly saw a familiar figure in the lab one day.

Xi Yan.

She was only nineteen or twenty years old at the time, still quite young. She was also wearing a white lab coat, but it was clear that the people around her treated her with great respect. However, this respect was mixed with a subtle sense of contempt and sarcasm. Unfortunately, he was too anxious to realize this at the time.

He learned from the progress of the experiment that this was obviously not a project that started from scratch without warning, but rather that there had been prior research, mainly on a certain extremely rare blood genetic disease. It seemed to be a private, non-governmental laboratory working for private purposes, but for some reason it was eventually shelved and terminated, and remained shelved for more than a decade.

The data from that year had already been either scrambled or destroyed, and progress was slow at first, but Xi Yan was different.

She probably also suffers from some incurable disease and has an awkward position in the Xi family. She was probably controlled by others from a young age, or forced to work for others for some unavoidable reason.

In some ways, she was probably no different from those who were abducted and used as experimental subjects in terms of imprisonment. Her story is shrouded in mystery, and he only gradually came to understand it after combining and thinking about it later. But one thing is beyond doubt.

That is, she is a genius.

With her innate sensitivity and talent in biochemistry, she was in charge of driving and controlling the progress of the entire project for a long time, and that went on for seven or eight years.

During these same years, Xi Zongbo found the test subject from the previous generation's experiment and, with ill intentions, forced her into marriage with Song Qi, who was only in his twenties, and she became pregnant.

The newly formed family was beginning to show warmth, a rare moment of peace in Mingwei's life. However, as her due date approached, she suddenly coughed up blood in the bathroom one day.

Through the cold, spotless mirror on the washstand, she clearly saw her ashen face.

Sure enough, a few months later, when her due date arrived, Mrs. Song suffered a severe hemorrhage and died in childbirth. The family, which was originally joyfully preparing to welcome the newborn, was once again shrouded in darkness.

For thirty years, this dark cloud has never dissipated for a moment, and everyone knows that things have completely changed.

Medical projects, eager for significant progress, soon found that animal experiments alone were no longer sufficient. They turned their attention to humans, using the guise of charity and health checkups to collect orphaned children of the same blood type from various regions who were entirely on the margins of society.

It was cruel, but it did achieve real results. A batch of new drugs developed were quickly released to the market, but the audience for such drugs was ultimately limited.

Perhaps the previous generation realized how cruel it would be to make such a project progress, and how human nature would choose between one's own life and the lives of others, so they finally stopped it.

Even more terrifying is the enormous and lawless stimulation generated by such experiments. In the same year, Xi Zongbo began to make contact with the political circles, establish connections, and collude with others to fabricate, sell, and trade organs on the black market.

During this period, she was subjected to several reform investigations by higher authorities, which created a climate of fear. She was forced to relocate the laboratory from its original site. During this process, Xi Yan probably finally found an opportunity or learned some truth. The person who could restrain her disappeared. Finally, in a hot and humid summer, she set fire to all the data and traces, and she herself perished in the fire.

Ying Shixue stood right in front of him, without saying a word the entire time.

After Huang Junding finished speaking, it was as if he had finally gotten rid of a burden that was hard to shake off after many years. Song Mingli had released his grip on Huang Junding's hand at some point and stood silently next to Ying Shixue.

He looked ten years older in the photo of himself holding his wife and children.

The voice that came out was hoarse and weary: "I've told you everything I need to say. Are you going to take me to court, or what? Don't hurt them, I've already..."

He swallowed hard. "I accept it all."

However, after saying these words, Ying Shixue didn't even raise an eyebrow. Only Song Mingli knew that, hidden by the dim light and the sleeves of her trench coat, Ying Shixue's fingers were gripping his hand extremely tightly, as if to comfort him but unable to hold on any longer. The force was so great that even he could feel the pain of his bones being crushed, a pain that pierced his heart.

Song Mingli's expression remained unchanged as he firmly gripped his hand in return.