Lu Xinghe carefully took the child out of the woman's arms. Just before letting go, the woman asked, "Sir, will things get better someday?"
Although the woman's eyes were on Lu Xinghe, it was as if she was looking through him at another place, a land of hope, a place where humans could live freely and children could grow up healthily.
Lu Xinghe fell silent. He looked at the baby in his arms and nodded firmly: "It will happen."
The woman seemed to believe her. She let go and let Lu Xinghe take the child away, but her eyes were blank and lifeless.
Lu Xinghe carried the child and walked out along the edge of the tent. Luo Ning followed closely behind. Once outside the tent, Lu Xinghe used his hand to pry open the baby's eyes, which were indeed ice blue. Then he pinched open the baby's mouth, and Luo Ning could clearly see that the baby's teeth had already grown in.
A child this age shouldn't have teeth, but the virus is causing him to evolve. If it weren't for his extremely weak body, he would be a cannibalistic monster by now.
"Wait for me here, don't follow me," Lu Xinghe said softly to Luo Ning, then turned and walked into the snowstorm.
Luo Ning knew he was going to deal with the mutant baby, which was a cruel thing to do. She watched his departing figure and silently found a quiet place to sit down.
Suddenly she felt like someone was watching her. She turned her head and saw An Xiaoruo looking at her from behind the tent. She immediately stood up and wanted to go over and talk to her, but the girl ran away immediately.
Luo Ning went over to take a look, but An Xiaoruo was nowhere to be seen. She guessed that it was inconvenient for An Xiaoruo to meet her because there were too many people around.
Meanwhile, An Xiaoruo was hiding behind another tent. She saw that Luo Ning was wearing Lu Xinghe's coat. It turned out that her uncle had hidden the experimental subject and even changed her eye color.
My uncle would do such a thing. Why would my uncle do such a thing? Why can't I bring myself to report him and even want to see him?
An Xiaoruo was a little confused. She returned to the tent with a heavy heart, but when she saw that Song Pei was already inside, she didn't want to go in. She had heard that the marriage department was interested in arranging for her to marry Song Pei.
While civilians can freely choose their marriages, military personnel must go through the marriage department's arrangements, supposedly for the purpose of genetic selection to produce a better next generation.
Although Song Pei was indeed outstanding and quite handsome, attracting many girls, she was somewhat afraid of him. He was her instructor, usually strict and ruthless towards her; she wondered how he would treat her if they became husband and wife.
She doesn't like men who lack charm; she prefers sunny, humorous, and handsome young men.
Song Pei saw An Xiaoruo outside the tent but she didn't come in for a long time. Just as he was about to go over and ask her, he saw An Xiaoruo run away. He was stunned for a moment and silently sat back down.
She did indeed hate him.
Luo Ning waited for about twenty minutes before Lu Xinghe finally returned. The infant mutant was gone, and she knew that the child had been eliminated.
He walked over and sat down beside her. A layer of snow had settled on his hat brim and eyelashes. Luo Ning was worried that he would catch a cold and wanted to return his clothes to him. Although she was also cold, she would not get sick, but he was a person of flesh and blood.
"No need, you can wear it," Lu Xinghe said softly, then stared silently into the hazy distance in the darkness.
Luo Ning could tell that he wanted some peace and quiet, so she curled up inside his clothes and stayed with him quietly. Gradually, she fell asleep against him, and in her hazy state, she seemed to hear him say, "Thank you for today."
But when she opened her eyes, it was already dawn, Lu Xinghe was no longer by her side, and the lava had completely subsided.
Although the area affected by the lava fracturing was not large, it damaged the core area of the base. The buildings of the Genetics Department, Medical Department, and Military Department were damaged to varying degrees. Fortunately, the buildings did not collapse, and various data and machines were preserved relatively well.
Temporary command post.
The higher-ups and various departments are holding meetings regarding this incident.
"According to monitoring data, there was a minor earthquake in the underground layer around 8 p.m. last night. Less than three minutes after the earthquake, the magma zone ruptured locally."
"The infrasound tower is operating normally, and no winged alien species have been observed intruding into our airspace."
"No infections have occurred in any area of the base, and no missing persons have been reported."
"No alien invasion was observed on the bridge; everything is normal."
"The prison was unaffected by the lava, no alien species escaped, and it is operating normally."
The reports from all departments were normal, and it looked like a simple earthquake-induced magma zone rupture event.
"Now that the earthquake has happened, it seems the evacuation plan needs to be moved up," someone said.
"It can't be moved ahead of schedule. The advance team has just found a location, and even if the location is suitable, various defensive facilities haven't been built yet. Moving them ahead of schedule would just be sending food to the aliens." Someone objected.
"But if there is another major earthquake, the people here will all die in the lava."
"That's still better than being eaten by some alien species."
The atmosphere suddenly became intense. Some people wanted to leave the base to find a new way to make a living, while others wanted to stick to the present.
Lu Xinghe didn't want to listen to these meaningless arguments, so he went out through the back door to get some fresh air, only to find that there were already people there.
"Why are you out here too?" Du Lu asked, a cigarette dangling from his lips.
"Get some fresh air." Lu Xinghe said, glancing at his gloves: "There's blood on your gloves."
"Hmm, there's a misfit that's being disobedient." Du Lu exhaled a puff of smoke.
Lu Xinghe recalled Luo Ning saying he was going to cut off the tongue of test subject number eleven: "What did you do to that test subject?"
Du Lu tilted his head and looked at him with an ambiguous smile in his eyes: "Why are you so interested in my affairs? You don't like me, do you? Sorry, I only like women."
Lu Xinghe snorted coldly, too lazy to pay him any attention.
Du Lu was silent for a moment, then asked, "I heard that you kissed Subject Seventeen the first time you met her?"
"Yes," Lu Xinghe readily admitted.
"What does that feel like?" Du Lu asked again.
Lu Xinghe looked him up and down: "Why are you asking this?"
Du Lu said nonchalantly, "Nothing, I just wanted to know what it feels like to kiss a different species. Are her teeth sharp? Does she taste blood in her mouth? Does she try to bite you? How does she compare to an ordinary woman?"
Lu Xinghe couldn't help but recall that Luo Ning's teeth weren't sharp, there was no bloody taste in her mouth, and she hadn't bitten him. He hadn't kissed any other women, so he couldn't make a comparison.
But he didn't want to tell Du Lu these things: "I advise you not to try. Although you have some grudges with Subject Eleven, I want to remind you not to take it too seriously, and don't do anything to her out of curiosity. Once she is discovered, she will be executed, and you will suffer the same fate as Zhuang Yu."
"Hahaha." Du Lu couldn't help but laugh: "Major Lu, you're overthinking it. How could I possibly have anything going on with a female mutant? She's so disgusting and filthy, I'd have nightmares if I even looked at her."
"That would be best." Lu Xinghe was also a little annoyed, because he was not much better off than Du Lu now. Once his affair with Luo Ning was discovered, the outcome would be the same.
When the two returned to the conference room, the debate between the relocation faction and the conservative faction had just ended. The upper echelons ultimately decided to remain at the base for the time being, while all departments temporarily moved to Sector 22, the area where the alien prison was located. It was close to the canyon and far from the lava zone, so it was relatively safe for the time being.
After the meeting, Lu Xinghe checked his communicator. Luo Ning was still at Hill 8. He was about to go find her, but Shen Ni took him there instead.
The geological monitoring department felt that the earthquake was not a natural occurrence, so the military wanted to send people to escort the monitoring department personnel to investigate underground. This task was assigned to Hongmen, and Shen Ni arranged for twenty security officers, led by Lu Xinghe, to set off at noon.
"Could we leave An Xiaoruo and Su Ling here? They're still too young for this kind of mission," Lu Xinghe asked Shen Ni.
Shen Ni replied, "We don't have enough manpower right now. The higher-ups just transferred a group of people out, and there's been an accident at the mine. The rare earth can't be transported back."
"Okay, I understand." Lu Xinghe didn't say anything more and went directly to the Eighth Hill to gather the people.
When Luo Ning heard that they were going underground, she gestured to Lu Xinghe that she wanted to go with them.
“No, you’ll be easily exposed if you go.” Lu Xinghe refused. After last night, he believed that she wanted to help humanity, but everyone going knew each other, and if she went along, her identity would definitely be exposed.
Luo Ning said that she would secretly follow him and would not appear in front of others on her own initiative. Then she pointed to the positioning bracelet on her wrist and said that if she found anything, she could use the bracelet to contact him.
Considering the gravity of the matter, Lu Xinghe finally agreed. With her there, if the shallow earthquake was indeed caused by an alien species, it could be detected in time.
At noon, the group set off underground with dry food and water. Luo Ning also changed into a black long-sleeved shirt and trousers, put on a mask, and followed at a distance.
Near the fractured magma zone was a large crack more than two meters wide. Lu Xinghe chose to enter the underground from here. They secured ropes at the edge of the crack and descended in an orderly manner, quickly disappearing into the deep crack.
Luo Ning found a secluded spot, tied the rope to a tree, and descended. The wind howled through the crevice, carrying the smell of sulfur. After about ten minutes, she finally reached the bottom. In the darkness, she looked around and quickly spotted the light of a flashlight ahead. Lu Xinghe and the others had already come down.
She followed the light, passed through a crack, and entered a tunnel. The tunnel walls were covered with black, fluffy substances, but they felt hard to the touch. After walking for about half an hour, she suddenly stepped on something sticky. Looking down, she saw that it was the corpse of a multi-legged insect more than ten meters long. Luo Ning was so frightened by just one glance that she jumped onto the tunnel wall and clung to it like a gecko. She wasn't afraid of insects, but she was afraid of insects with many legs.
This is a mutant insect, which is why it has evolved to such a large size. The insect's body is covered in charred parts, indicating that it crawled over from the lava zone last night and died here.
Screams came from ahead, indicating that insect corpses had also been discovered there. She slowly approached and, sure enough, saw several large insects on the ground, their bodies charred.
"As expected, the earthquake wasn't caused by nature, but by these insects," said a member of the geological monitoring department.
"But where did these insects come from? The base has always had biological monitoring, so it's impossible that they didn't find such a large centipede."
Luo Ning thought so too. Even without biological monitoring, she should have been able to sense the presence of the alien species. However, she didn't sense anything last night, so these insects didn't come down from the ground but came all the way from underground, which is why she couldn't detect or sense them.
"It came from underground. There should be an entrance nearby. Everyone, split up and search in pairs, immediately." Lu Xinghe's voice came, and it sounded urgent.
Luo Ning moved over and saw Lu Xinghe and the monitors using instruments to probe. Ten minutes later, everyone returned the way they came, but they did not find the cave entrance.
"The cave entrance was probably sealed by lava, which is why these insects couldn't escape and died here," Song Pei's voice came.
“But animal species, especially arthropods, don’t have thoughts. Why would they suddenly burrow into the magma zone? Shouldn’t they instinctively avoid magma?” This was An Xiaoruo’s voice.
Lu Xinghe said, "Someone must have lured them here. Let's check for any other suspicious items, such as human bones."
His words sent chills down everyone's spines. Indeed, the only thing that could draw brainless arthropods close to the scorching lava flow is humans, who can arouse their appetite.
Luo Ning also started searching, and then she found a rope that only humans would use on the insect's antennae. The rope had been burned through, so she didn't know what was tied to the other end of the rope.
But this reminded her of a story: to prevent donkeys from slacking off while pulling a millstone, humans tied a carrot in front of them. The donkey would follow the carrot and keep walking, but it could never reach the carrot.
At this moment, Lu Xinghe also saw the rope on the antennae of the insect over there. On the rope, he could also see the charred remains of a human. He understood how these insects had gotten there.
It seems the mutants are already eyeing the base; they want to destroy the core area and paralyze the entire base, but they underestimated the damage the magma belt can inflict on the insects.
After returning to the ground, the genetic department collected some specimens, and then the military dropped white phosphorus bombs to burn all the alien insect corpses to ashes and fill the cracks.
The people from each department stood solemnly at the edge of the crack. One sentient mutant is more terrifying than a million mindless mutants, but judging from this sneaky behavior, the mutant must know that it cannot break through the human-defended bridge, so the ground is currently safe.
The drone also captured images of the area surrounding the base. Although many alien species were still gathered there, they were too afraid of the lava field to move forward. Some alien species tried to jump off the cliff and climb back up to the base, but they were either swept away by the rushing river or crashed on the riverbank and were smashed to pieces.
To ensure safety, fighter jets dropped white phosphorus bombs along the perimeter of the base. The gathered aliens immediately scattered and fled with various screams and howls. However, the white phosphorus bombs would continue to burn until they were exhausted, so any aliens that came into contact with the bomb powder would not survive.
Looking at the tragic scene opposite her, Luo Ning realized that humans and animals used to live in harmony, but now it had become a situation where it was either you die or I live.
She sighed deeply. Even if the alien species were to be contained according to the ending of the novel, the war between humans and alien species would not end as long as the virus did not disappear.
That evening, she followed Lu Xinghe to the East District and was surprised to find that the military's temporary dormitory was not far from the alien prison. She had been thinking about how to meet Wen Xi, but now it was like finding a needle in a haystack.
However, she still didn't know the young officer's name. But she saw that the officer went to the command post early this morning and hadn't left yet, so he probably didn't have time to hurt Wenxi.
Lu Xinghe moved all his belongings into the room. The room here was bigger than the previous one. When the logistics department let him choose a room today, he chose this one without hesitation, so that two people could stay in it.
Although the room is now larger, he is still a single person, and the bed is already a single bed. Moreover, he has no legitimate reason to apply for a bed, so in the end, Luo Ning still has to sleep in the closet.
However, Luo Ning didn't care about this. She just wanted to find out Lu Xinghe's name before the officer went back, and then tell Wen Xi.
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