Chapter 277 Separate Actions
Xiaoling suddenly said, "What if the Weaver wants to mess up the timeline, and the Time Observer won't let him?"
She pointed at Su Wanqing's bracelet and said, "This bracelet of yours might be a tool they gave you."
Lu Zhao nodded. "That makes sense. It's like giving ants a lever and letting them pry a rock themselves."
Xiao Ran drew three circles on the map, "Main beacon, antidote, find a time observer."
He poked the first circle, "It's in the center of the dungeon, but it's definitely heavily guarded now."
Lu Zhao turned the tablet towards everyone and said, "Xiao Ling's blood can neutralize the mutation factor. We can make the inhibitor, but we have to wait for the antidote." He glanced at Xiao Ling and said, "Thank you for your blood."
Xiao Ling looked down at the silver substance on her wrist and said, "I should be thanking you. If it weren't for you, I would have been infected long ago."
The door creaked open. Lin Che stood there, holding onto the doorframe. The blue lines had faded, revealing the normal skin beneath.
He walked up to the map and pointed at a small dot in the deepest part of the dungeon. "It's not the main beacon."
Everyone gathered around. It was as small as a sesame seed, labeled "Backup Energy Station."
"The time anchor point," Lin Che said, "is the core of the fixed time gate. If you blow it up, the gate won't open properly." His voice was stronger than when he was in the medical room. "The Weaver is afraid this secret will be discovered."
"How do you know?" Xiao Ran asked.
Lin Che touched his temple. "Their collective consciousness. I can hear it."
The corridor outside the medical room was crowded with seven or eight people. A middle-aged man in a plaid shirt clutched the straps of his backpack. "I'd say we should leave now. Running to the mountains is better than waiting to die."
"Run?" The young man in work clothes next to him sneered, "The road is full of infected people. You'll be eaten if you run a few steps."
"That's better than being cannon fodder here!" The middle-aged man's neck turned red.
A white-haired old man stood up from the crowd, his back slightly hunched. "I teach history."
His voice was quiet, but it silenced the clamor. "Humanity has survived the Black Death and nuclear winter. In each case, wasn't it the perseverance of a few that gave the majority a chance to survive?"
He glanced at the crowd, "Look outside—" he pointed out the window, "Those guys are repairing the wall, and that girl is distributing medicine. They didn't run away, so why should we?"
The middle-aged man's grip on the backpack strap loosened. The young man in overalls scratched his head and said, "I'll go move the sandbags."
The crowd slowly dispersed. A woman holding a child caught up with Lu Zhao and stuffed a glass jar into his arms. "Alcohol. The last half bottle at home." She bent down and kissed the child's forehead. "Use it if you can make medicine."
The wind was strong on the top floor of the fortress late at night. Lin Che leaned on the railing and looked up at the stars.
Xiaoling brought a coat over and put it on him.
"I can hear them talking," Lin Che said suddenly. "The history of the weavers, their hatred, their homesickness."
He turned to look at Xiaoling, "Sometimes I can't tell which ones are my thoughts."
Xiao Ling didn't say anything, but held his hand. His fingertips were still cold, just like when they were in the warehouse.
“If one day I become like them,” Lin Che lowered his voice, “you have to help me.”
Xiao Ling clenched his hand. "No." She pointed to her wrist, the silver substance gleaming in the moonlight. "I've changed too. But I'm still me, right?"
Lin Che looked down at their clasped hands and said, "We'll take action tomorrow."
"Yeah." Xiaoling said, "The last battle."
The wind lifted the hems of their clothes. In the distance, the city glowed blue, like a sea about to burn.
In the predawn preparation room, fluorescent lights hummed on the ceiling.
Su Wanqing squatted in front of the tactical backpack and stuffed the sonic jammer into the side pocket, and the metal shell made a crisp sound when it hit the ground.
Xiao Ran turned his back to her and pointed at the dungeon map spread out on the wall. "The density of cameras in the main passage is too high." He tapped the maintenance passage marker in the southeast area. "Go this way, it connects to the underground water system."
Su Wanqing looked up at him, "Weak security?"
"There are few surveillance cameras, and the mechanical guards aren't deployed." Xiao Ran turned around, the buckle of his tactical vest still unfastened. "But beware of traps. The Weaver's subtle tactics are more effective than the direct ones."
She lowered her head to examine the jade bracelet, a pale blue light flickering across her wrist. She had compared the data with Lin Che the night before, and the system had mostly recovered.
The holographic projection unfolded with a swish, and the diamond-shaped device rotated in the void. "The anchor core is at the deepest layer," she pointed to the groove at the bottom of the device. "We need to put the explosive bomb here."
A small black box suddenly appeared in his backpack. Xiao Ran bent down and picked it up. "What is this?"
"Lu Zhao's newly developed biological interference bomb." Su Wanqing stuffed the bomb into her side pocket. "It's made from Xiaoling's blood. It can break the Weaver's biological connection."
The door creaked open. Lin Che leaned against the doorframe, the blue lines receding to a faint trace at his wrist, but his eyes occasionally flashed with a blue light.
He walked over, holding a silver disk in his palm, "This is for you."
Su Wanqing took it and saw a tiny red dot appear on the surface of the disc. "Locator?"
"Sensing the Weaver's time energy." Lin Che tugged at his collar, his Adam's apple moving. "The Weaver Master... He's been haunting my mind lately."
He suddenly raised his eyes, "He pays special attention to you."
Xiao Ran put the tactical knife into his boot. "What do you mean?"
"He said you were a 'variable.'" Lin Che's fingers unconsciously rubbed the hem of his sleeve. "His exact words."
The lights in the preparation room suddenly flickered twice. Su Wanqing put the locator into her chest pocket. "Thanks."
Lin Che turned to leave, then stopped, "Be careful."
In the medical laboratory, Lu Zhao's white coat was stained with blood. He leaned in close to the microscope, his nose reddened by the pressure of the eyepiece. "Did you see that?"
He tapped the display, "The blue particles are hiding from your silver liquid."
Xiaoling sat in front of the operating table with a blood collection bandage loosely tied around her wrist, and a silver substance dripped through the catheter into the culture dish.
She leaned over to look. In the silver-blue solution, the broken DNA strands were slowly coiling. "Is this considered neutralization?"
"The inhibitory factor is working." Lu Zhao adjusted the parameters, and the liquid in the test tube began to bubble. "During that infection at the water plant, your genes triggered a resistance mechanism."
He straightened up. "The question is how to copy it."
Xiao Ling pinched the test tube and asked, "Why only me?"
"The genetic response is different." Lu Zhao took off his glasses and wiped them. "Just like some people are born immune to malaria."
Suddenly, an alarm blared. Doctor Zhang poked his head in. "The defense team needs weapons. Who of you two will go?"
"I." Xiaoling pulled off the blood collection tape. "Brother Lu will be watching the experiment."
When she came back with a box of stun guns, Lu Zhao was staring at the data screen and smiling.
"65%." He pointed to the success rate, "If it could reach 80%..."
"Can it be mass produced?" Xiaoling put the stun gun into the corner.
"Stabilize the patient first." Lu Zhao took out a small medicine bottle. "Doctor Zhang was distributing food. I saw Old Wang give the last half bag of salt to the medical team."
The wind from the abandoned tower blew up dust and sand. Lin Che sat cross-legged on the rooftop, a torn jacket spread across his knees to block the wind.
He closed his eyes, and his consciousness scattered in all directions - like casting a net into a pond, catching those vague waves.
Three hours passed, and the only sound was the distant roars of the infected. He took a deep breath, and the taste of rust on his tongue—the Weaver genes surging within him.
Suddenly, there was a slight tremor in the air, and a black shadow emerged from the wind and stood five steps away.
"Why didn't you stop it?" Lin Che opened his eyes.
The shadowy voice sounded like many people speaking at once, "Don't interfere with the timeline."
"What about Su Wanqing's bracelet?"
"The original agreement." The shadow paused. "She is a special case."
Lin Che tugged at her collar, "Where's the time gate?"
"It's both a threat and an opportunity." The shadow's outline began to blur. "The outcome is up to you."
"Wait!" Lin Che stood up. "Anchor point."
The shadow threw out a coordinate, "The Lord of Weaving has moved."
At sunset, the projection screen in the command room lit up. Su Wanqing placed the locator on the table. "The new coordinates are two kilometers northeast."
She pointed to the map and said, "The original planned route must be changed."
Xiao Ran swiped the tablet, "The garrison strength is unknown, we need to scout ahead."
Lu Zhao pushed over an insulated box. "The prototype antidote has a 78% success rate."
He lifted the lid, "It's enough for 50 people for now."
Xiaoling added, "There's no problem stabilizing the condition."
Lin Che leaned against the window. "The time observer said that the time gate has a dual nature."
He looked at Su Wanqing, "They proposed the original agreement."
The conference room fell silent. Doctor Zhang poked his head in from the door. "Dinner will be in the cafeteria."
No one moved. Xiao Ran touched the holster on his waist. "This time tomorrow."
"Either stop the doomsday, or the doomsday begins." Su Wanqing took it and looked down at the jade bracelet.
Lin Che walked to the window. The blue light of the city in the distance looked like a rising sea.
He touched the locator in his pocket. "The energy is gathering faster."
Late at night, on the rooftop of the fortress, the wind swirled haystacks. Su Wanqing leaned against the railing, Xiao Ran standing beside her, their shadows overlapping on the ground.
"If it works," Xiao Ran suddenly said, "what do you want to do?"
"Reconstruction." Su Wanqing looked into the distance, "Help the survivors make a living."
She turned around and smiled, "Maybe we can find a place to settle down."
Xiao Ran rolled up his sleeves, the veins on his arms gleaming faintly. "My transformation is irreversible."
Su Wanqing held his hand and said, "Humanity is not in our DNA."
Xiao Ran looked down at their clasped hands and said, "Come back alive."
"It's a deal."
The lights in the lab were still on. Xiao Ling came in with a cup of coffee. Lu Zhao was staring at the microscope and rubbing his eyes.
She put the coffee next to him and asked, "Is this possible?"
Lu Zhao took off his glasses and said, "The scientific probability is not high." He pointed to the photo on the wall, "But we have to try."
Xiao Ling looked at the woman and child in the photo and asked, "Can we still find them?"
"At first, I looked for it every day." Lu Zhao touched the photo. "Later... But I had to try."
Xiao Ling tugged at her sleeves and said, "My parents died in the first wave."
She smiled, "Only after meeting you did I realize that loss is not the end."
Lu Zhao looked up and asked, "Continue?"
"continue."
The moonlight from outside the window came in and illuminated the silver-blue solution on the laboratory table.
At three o'clock in the morning, the foul smell from the sewer penetrated into the breathing valve of the fully sealed protective suit.
Su Wanqing bent down and passed through a pipe with a diameter of less than one meter. Her helmet hit the pipe wall, making a dull sound.
Xiao Ran was in front, flashing a flashlight, the beam sweeping across the mossy cracks in the bricks. "Go to the third branch on the left. Lin Che said it's in the northeast area. It used to be the military's underground command center."
The joints of their protective suits creaked as they crawled for twenty minutes before finally squeezing into a massive drainage chamber.
The cement slab overhead cracked, letting in a few rays of moonlight. Su Wanqing pulled out the detector Lin Che had given her. A red dot flickered wildly on the screen. "The signal is 50% stronger than expected."
She tapped the instrument. "The anchor may have activated."
Xiao Ran's flashlight swept across the wall. They both stopped at the same time—the gray brick wall was engraved with fine patterns, exactly the same as the carvings on the jade bracelet on Su Wanqing's wrist.
"It's too quiet." Xiao Ran put the tactical knife on his waist. "It's impossible for the Lord of Weaving to be defenseless."
Before he finished speaking, a "crack" sound came from the corridor ahead. Su Wanqing grabbed Xiao Ran by the back of his collar, and the ground collapsed, revealing a pool of swirling blue slime below.
The slime splattered against the wall, corroding it and emitting a sizzling white smoke. Xiao Ran picked up a piece of gravel with the tip of his knife and threw it in. In the blink of an eye, the gravel turned to foam. "Organic corrosive fluid, can dissolve biological tissue."
Su Wanqing activated the jade bracelet, and a light blue light film spread out at the collapsed area.
As the two men walked over on the light film, a yellow-green gas suddenly spurted out from above their heads.
Xiao Ran grabbed Su Wanqing and ran back, and the filter of the gas mask turned black instantly.
"Inductive poison gas." Su Wanqing wiped her mask, "It's waiting for us to reach the center of the trap."
Further ahead was a sloping corridor. As Xiao Ran stepped onto it, the ground suddenly flipped and turned into a vertical wall.
The two fell into the protective membrane, and Su Wanqing touched the protruding metal piece on the wall: "Gravity reversal device."
She called up the jade bracelet's energy readings. "The triggering logic of these traps is completely consistent with human attack habits."
When passing through the laser grid, Xiao Ran's protective suit was scratched and sparks flew.
By the time the two men rushed into the circular hall, their backs were soaked with sweat. The surveillance screens on the wall were lit, displaying real-time images of various areas on the ground - the blue infected area was expanding at a speed visible to the naked eye.
Xiao Ran leaned closer to the screen and said, "It only covered the northern district yesterday, and now even the old city in the east is blue."
At the end of the hall was an elevator. Su Wanqing tried to crack the program three times, but the interface always displayed "Insufficient Permissions."
Xiao Ran pulled off his protective gloves and pressed his palm on the identification panel: "The modified genes of the Leopard Project overlap with the Weaver technology."
The veins in his arms shimmered, and the panel suddenly lit up green.
The elevator took an absurdly long time to descend. Su Wanqing stared at the depth gauge. When the number jumped to -800 meters, the door dinged open.
The spherical space was larger than a basketball court. A diamond-shaped device hovered in the center, its blue light blinding anyone.
Silver tubes were wrapped around the device, extending in all directions like blood vessels.
"This isn't an anchor point." Su Wanqing held up the detector. "It's a miniature time gate. The Master Weaver has already been establishing the connection."
Xiao Ran took out a bomb from his backpack: "It's still not too late to blow it up now."
As he pressed the bomb onto the base of the device, a red light suddenly lit up above his head.
A mechanical voice echoed in the space: "External energy interference detected."
Su Wanqing's jade bracelet suddenly felt hot. As the pale blue cocoon of light enveloped the two of them, the countdown for the explosive bomb reached zero.
The blast of air hit the light cocoon, and the diamond-shaped device burst into countless blue fragments.
The entire space began to shake and pieces of cement fell from the ceiling.
In the chaos, Su Wanqing caught a glimpse of a dark figure standing in the corner - it was the Time Observer, who was watching everything quietly.
At the same time, dense roars were heard outside the fortress. He turned around and shouted: "Xiao Ling! Has the antidote been distributed to each group?"
Xiao Ling stuffed the last tube of potion into the hands of the defense team member and knocked over a chair as she turned around. "Just finished distributing it! But there are only twenty tubes!" She grabbed the stun gun and ran out the door. "Lin Che is on the top floor!"
Lin Che stood on the roof of the fortress, the wind lifting the corners of his clothes. His eyes turned completely blue, and he could clearly sense the location of each mutant - three on the left rushing towards the wall, and seven on the right heading towards the medical area.
The Lord of Weaving is holding us back. He said to Lu Zhao who had caught up with him, "He knows we're going to blow up the anchor point."
The mutant in front pounced on the fence. Lin Che took a deep breath, a low humming sound coming from his throat.
Ten mutants suddenly froze in place, their claws suspended in mid-air. "These... still have some consciousness left."
"He held onto the railing and gasped," I can control it for now."
When Xiaoling rushed over, she just saw a mutant trembling after being hit by an electric baton.
She chased after it and stabbed it in the neck with a syringe. The mutant's blue scales began to fade, and a mumbled word emanated from its throat: "Family." Xiao Ling called out to Lu Zhao: "It works! The antidote really works!"
Lin Che suddenly covered his head. Blue energy burst from his fingertips, burning scorch marks on the ground. "The anchor point exploded."
"He looked up to the northeast," but the real time gate is in the main facility. Su Wanqing and Xiao Ran were fooled. "
Lu Zhao grabbed his arm: "Where are you going?"
"Main facilities." Lin Che shook off his hand. "We have to stop it."
"He looked at the mutants he controlled," They follow me."
Xiao Ling took out a stabilizer from her waist and said, "I'll go too. My blood might be useful."
Lin Che stared at her: "This is courting death."
"It's better than waiting to die." Xiao Ling stuffed the stabilizer into his hand, "Let's go."
The mutants seemed to understand and spontaneously gathered around the two. Lin Che took one last look in the direction of the fortress and turned to head towards the underground passage.
The moonlight stretched their shadows very long, mixed with the mutants' growls, and disappeared into the night.
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