Lu Xinghe's room was a standard room with only one room and one bathroom. Given his contributions to the base over the past five years, he could have had a larger and better room, but he was prone to insomnia in such a room. Instead, he slept more soundly in this small room.
But this means Luo Ning will have nowhere to sleep tonight.
Lu Xinghe looked at Luo Ning, who was standing barefoot on the ground. An Xiaoruo was not as tall as her, so her skirt, which should have been knee-length, was now shorter, revealing part of her thighs.
But Luo Ning didn't realize this. She had worn even shorter skirts in her own world before, and in the apocalypse, having clothes to wear was already a blessing, so why bother about length or age?
Lu Xinghe hastily looked away, opened the cabinet door, and said in a slightly hoarse voice, "You'll sleep here tonight."
Luo Ning had just been hiding in here. Lu Xinghe didn't have many clothes, and they were all neatly hung up. There was enough space below for her to lie down. Although she might have to curl up her legs, it was much better than the wind and snow outside.
Then she lay down; it was a bit hard and a bit cold, after all, it was winter, and her skirt wasn't warm.
Lu Xinghe tossed her a blanket, which conveniently covered her fair legs. She smiled at him again to express her gratitude, but seeing his cold expression, she realized he didn't seem to appreciate it.
She remembered how sensible he used to be. Even though he always seemed aloof, he would give her his bed and blankets.
She spread half of the blanket on the wooden board and used the other half to cover herself. Just as she lay down, everything went dark—the power was out. She knew that power outages were common; electricity was always prioritized for the genetics department, the medical department, and the military, and then for civilian use.
In the darkness, she sensed Lu Xinghe walking towards her, and subconsciously leaned closer to the cabinet. She vividly remembered how he had treated her in the laboratory.
She soon realized she was overthinking things; Lu Xinghe had only come to get his clothes and hadn't even glanced at him.
The sound of water in the bathroom made Luo Ning feel a little uncomfortable. In the past, she wouldn't have thought there was anything wrong with being in the same room like this. Back then, she was a different species and he was human. She always thought there was a huge gap between them that was insurmountable. In addition, he was not very old at the time, so she never thought about a romantic relationship.
But now, a breeding experiment has made the ravine disappear, and he is no longer the boy who was always on guard against her. He has grown to the point where he can accurately track her whereabouts and silently attack her most vulnerable spot in the dark.
He could even kiss her, this alien, after receiving an order from the base. If she hadn't cried so much that day, he wouldn't know if he would have continued.
So, in reality, the pure friendship between her and him can no longer be the same as before. Now, they are a man and a woman who have had intimate physical contact.
Realizing this, she became somewhat nervous, worried that he might do something to her again. If he were just a stranger, she might have succumbed to his good looks and indulged in his advances, given her current loneliness and lack of hope. But she had once treated him like a younger brother, and she couldn't suddenly accept a relationship that went beyond siblinghood.
He probably felt the same way. He kissed her only because of the mission, not because he liked her, and he didn't even remember her anymore.
After thinking about it this way, she calmed down a lot, closed her eyes and prepared to sleep. She hadn't slept well for the past five days. As for what exactly happened, she would figure it out after she woke up tomorrow.
However, not long after she closed her eyes, Lu Xinghe came out. He came to her and took something out of the cabinet. His legs swung in front of her, and small water droplets fell on her face.
In the end, he didn't take anything out, or perhaps he couldn't find anything, and then he lay down on the bed with his back to her and fell asleep.
He didn't tie her hands and feet, and Luo Ning felt that he must have forgotten.
She fell asleep, but Lu Xinghe couldn't sleep. He listened to her even breathing and kept asking himself what was wrong. This confusion wasn't just because he had hidden her in his closet, but also because he had been thinking about her the whole time in the bathroom.
It was the scent she left in the bathroom, her rosy face, her slender waist, and her long legs.
Even worse, he wanted to tear her dress and pin her against the wall.
At this moment, he was no longer the soldier who fought "for the survival of humanity," but a demon with deep desires, who even had inappropriate thoughts about this female alien without orders or coercion.
The helicopters continued to circle over the base, and for many, tonight was going to be a sleepless night.
Lu Xinghe woke up before six o'clock. He hadn't slept much last night. Every time he closed his eyes, all sorts of unbearable images flashed before his eyes. Sometimes it was her in the closet with her gaping maw coming to devour him, and sometimes it was her straddling his waist and gently licking and biting his throat. He even saw a soft white patch at her tailbone, like a rabbit's tail.
But he had never seen her with animal features, so why would he make such an association?
And what she asked him yesterday, "Don't you remember me?" Could it be that he and she had actually met before? He had killed quite a few mutants in the past five years, and perhaps she was one of those that escaped from him. Otherwise, how could he have any connection with her?
He looked toward the cabinet. Behind the half-open cabinet door, she was fast asleep, wrapped in a blanket, completely unguarded. How could she trust a man she had only met three times?
Knock, knock, knock! A knock suddenly sounded at the door, and An Xiaoruo's voice came through: "Uncle, open the door."
Lu Xinghe's heart sank. Luo Ning also woke up from her dream. She sat up, wrapped in the quilt, and looked at Lu Xinghe questioningly.
"What's wrong?" Lu Xinghe asked.
“Uncle, you’re back! I thought you were out looking for that mutant. It’s nothing, I just came to check on you. Why did you lock the door? Open it, it’s so cold outside,” An Xiaoruo replied.
Lu Xinghe said, "If you feel cold, go back to your own room."
"But my coat is still with you, let me get it." An Xiaoru stamped her feet at the door, clearly feeling very cold.
Lu Xinghe looked around and found An Xiaoruo's coat by the bed. Since she could come and go from his room at will, she must have forgotten the coat here yesterday. He wanted to take back her key.
He picked up An Xiaoruo's coat and walked towards the door. He saw her in the closet, also looking nervously at the door, her eyes brimming with tears.
He slammed the cabinet door shut, blocking her view.
After opening the door, he handed his coat to An Xiaoruo, but showed no intention of letting her in.
An Xiaoruo smelled the warm, fragrant scent in the room, and after taking a sniff, her eyes widened: "You brought a woman back to spend the night?"
Lu Xinghe was surprised by her keen sense of smell: "What nonsense are you talking about? It's just me."
"Really?" An Xiaoruo wanted to go in and take a look. She liked the fragrance. She often came to Lu Xinghe's place, and she could smell other people's scents as soon as she entered.
Lu Xinghe grabbed her: "You're fifteen years old now, don't just go into other people's rooms. Give me back the key."
“You’re not just anyone, you’re my uncle,” An Xiaoruo said with a sweet smile.
Lu Xinghe took the key out of her pocket and said, "If you come into my room again without permission, I won't stop the marriage and childbirth department from letting you get married."
"No, no, no, I'll leave right away." An Xiaoruo was already certain there was a woman in the room, otherwise her uncle wouldn't be so nervous. Did he think that just because he took her key, she couldn't get in? He underestimated her too much. She would find another time to sneak back in.
After An Xiaoruo left, Lu Xinghe reopened the closet door and saw her hugging the quilt, looking dejected.
His communicator vibrated; it was a message from the military, ordering him to come immediately. He grabbed a hemp rope and tied Luo Ning's hands and feet, warning her, "Don't even think about going out to harm people, or I have a hundred ways to make you regret it."
Luo Ning nodded weakly, but she was really hungry. She hadn't eaten her fill in the past few days, and she had used up a lot of energy last night, so she wanted to eat something.
When Lu Xinghe arrived at the military headquarters, in addition to Dai Wanglin and Shen Ni, there were also two people from the upper command. There had been cases of mutants escaping before, but it had never been as serious as today. Had something else happened?
He sat down in the chair and looked at them calmly.
Dai Wanglin took out a white stone: "Did you give this to test subject number seventeen?"
Lu Xinghe paused for a moment after seeing the stone: "It was given to me."
He didn't involve An Xiaoruo, and he had already guessed that the female mutant's escape was related to this stone.
After exchanging a glance with the person from the upper echelons, Dai Wanglin continued, "Why give her this?"
“She resists me, and I don’t like her either. Minister Dai, you asked me to improve my relationship with her, so I gave her the crystal.” He replied logically.
That's exactly what Dai Wanglin said, and he couldn't refute it: "Then why give stones instead of anything else?"
Lu Xinghe replied, "The crystal is pretty but not valuable, and it's not easily damaged, so I gave it to you."
"Didn't you consider that she might use this stone to escape?" the person above asked coldly.
Lu Xinghe truly hadn't expected that he would always make mistakes in front of that woman.
“It was my negligence, and I am willing to accept any punishment from the higher authorities,” he replied.
"If it were anyone else, I would have really punished them." The person in the upper section angrily slammed his pen on the table, but Lu Xinghe currently had no one to replace him.
“The mutants have been on the run for so long without being caught, and everyone is in a state of panic. We’ve brought everyone back from the outside, and Lu Xinghe will be in charge of the secret manhunt. We’ll announce to the outside world that the mutants have been captured,” another person said.
Lu Xinghe: "I'm going to the mine with the mining team in two days. Please find someone else to be in charge."
Shen Ni said, "You don't need to worry about the mining team. Just follow the instructions from above to search for the experimental subjects, whether they live or die."
"No, no, no, we need them alive." Dai Wanglin interrupted, "It's too rare to find a mutant with such a high genetic match. We need them alive. Lu Xinghe, don't actually kill them."
But Shen Ni disagreed, and the two sides argued. In the end, it was the people from the upper class who persuaded them to separate: "This escaped alien species must not be kept, no matter how high the compatibility is. The fact that we haven't caught her yet proves that she is very smart. We must not leave behind a smart predator."
Lu Xinghe listened to all of this in silence, thinking about what the female mutant had written to him last night. She said she had never hurt anyone.
He rubbed his forehead, feeling a bit of a headache. After the meeting, Dai Wanglin took him to the laboratory where Luo Ning had escaped. After watching the surveillance footage, Lu Xinghe admitted that she was indeed very smart and patient. She was able to spend three days observing and planning, and her technique of using the crystal to open the mechanical arm switch was also quite precise.
However, she did not kill anyone. The lab staff are all still alive, and she did not attack him last night; she just slept there quietly.
“Look how human she is, it would be such a waste to kill her,” Dai Wanglin remarked from the side.
Lu Xinghe found Dai Wanglin very strange. Dai Wanglin used to never leave any aliens alive. Could it be that his personality changed after entering the Gene Department?
There were three test subjects in the laboratory, two female mutants and one male mutant. Lu Xinghe went to see them as well. The two female mutants were also beautiful, but he felt murderous intent after just one glance. Unlike when he first saw the woman in the cabinet, he did not want to kiss her, nor did he have any physical desire.
As he was leaving, Dai Wanglin pulled him aside and said, "Major Lu, you really can't kill Subject Seventeen, at least not this month. For the sake of the time I saved you, please buy me a month."
Lu Xinghe looked at him in confusion: "Why a month?"
Dai Wanglin replied, "Do you know about a medicine called Gaia II?"
Lu Xinghe shook his head. He had never heard of it, but he knew about Gaia No. 1. It was this drug that caused the human mutation and the apocalypse. This Gaia No. 2 didn't sound like a good thing.
“Gaia II is a drug that promotes fertility in mutants. We’ve already injected her with it, and she should see results this month,” Dai Wanglin explained.
"What will be the reaction?" Lu Xinghe asked.
Dai Wanglin patted his shoulder and laughed, "It's just a matter between a man and a woman, but it's none of your business now, so don't kill her immediately after you catch her. I'll send someone else."
He phrased it euphemistically, but Lu Xinghe still picked up on the underlying meaning. However, it was indeed none of his business anymore; he would find an opportunity to send that female mutant away in the next few days.
After leaving the laboratory building, he assigned tasks and spent a day searching the base before returning to his dormitory. The first thing he saw when he opened the door was the cabinet, where he saw hemp rope scattered all over the floor, and she was nowhere to be seen.
He sneered; how dare she lie to him.
Just as he was about to go out to look for her, he suddenly heard a sound coming from the bathroom. When he went over, he found her wearing one of his white shirts, holding a book and fanning the pink dress he had given her. When he returned, she immediately lowered her head in embarrassment, her face and ears turning bright red.
He thought she was shy.
Luo Ning was indeed shy because she couldn't move after he tied her hands and feet. But even animals have to relieve themselves, and she struggled to untie the ropes. However, she was running too fast and kicked over a basin of water, getting all her clothes wet.
She had no choice but to change into his clothes and then wash the skirt. To make it dry faster, she had been fanning it with a book for two hours, but the skirt was still wet.
The man's shirt on the woman's body made Lu Xinghe even more uneasy than the pink dress.
Beneath the loose collar lay her snow-white skin and subtle curves; the hem of the top was shorter than the skirt, revealing even more of her figure.
But he masked his turmoil with anger and coldly asked, "Who told you to wear this?"
Seeing that he was very angry, Luo Ning remembered that he was a little bit of a germaphobe. But she really had no clothes to wear. Since he disliked her so much, she could just throw away her clothes from now on.
She took a pen and paper and wrote: "I got my clothes dirty, so I'm borrowing yours."
"How did you untie the rope?" Lu Xinghe asked again.
She wrote, "Pry it open little by little with your teeth."
Lu Xinghe was speechless, because the alien's teeth were indeed very powerful.
Luo Ning used a book to fan her skirt, while Lu Xinghe sat at the table wanting to write today's report but couldn't bring himself to write it.
Outside, there were footsteps coming and going. No one knew that the man in the base who hated mutants the most had hidden a beautiful female mutant in the room.
Luo Ning finally couldn't resist her hunger. She pitifully walked to Lu Xinghe's side, pointed to her stomach, and indicated that she was hungry. She had really been enduring it for a whole day, and she was afraid that she would succumb to her appetite if she didn't eat.
Everything in the base is rationed, even the animal flesh and blood fed to the alien species in the laboratory. If he wanted to feed her, he would have to hunt wild animals near the canyon, but the time was not right.
He thought for a moment and went out for a while. When he came back, he was carrying a fat rabbit, which was obviously fed by someone.
Luo Ning ate cautiously, hiding behind the bathroom vent. Lu Xinghe turned the ventilation up to the maximum to prevent the smell of blood from being detected.
A while later, An Xiaoruo called: "Uncle, my little white dog suddenly disappeared. I'm so sad."
"It probably ran away when you weren't looking. I'll catch another one for you next time," he replied without batting an eye.
“But I’ve raised it for five months, and I’ve grown attached to it,” An Xiaoruo sobbed.
Lu Xinghe: "So those things you ate before also had feelings?"
An Xiaoru chuckled twice: "That's true. I'll find some time to make it myself, so I won't trouble you, Uncle."
"Okay." Lu Xinghe hung up the communicator.
After finishing her meal, Luo Ning finally regained some strength. She washed the blood off her hands and mouth and looked at herself in the mirror. She wondered if she would ever be able to return to being a real human being, or if she would have to live like this forever.
Lu Xinghe didn't see her come out for a long time, so he pushed the door open and saw her sitting on the cold ground, looking dejected.
"Aren't you full?" he asked.
She shook her head and stood up, but slipped and fell into Lu Xinghe's arms. She smelled his pleasant woody scent, like the winter sun or the cold pine in the forest, so pleasant that she didn't want to leave his embrace.
It's strange. I never noticed that he smelled like this when I lived with him before. He used to be clean and comfortable, without any smell.
Lu Xinghe hadn't expected her to throw herself into his arms like that. In an instant, he felt a wave of warmth and fragrance over his chest, his body stiffened, and his heart raced. Moreover, when he instinctively supported her, his hand touched something soft on her tailbone.
He immediately thought of the dream he had last night, in which she had a white rabbit tail, and now it seemed like she really did.
Luo Ning's tail was her most sensitive spot. When Lu Xinghe touched it, she immediately snapped out of her daze from the scent on his body, blushed, pushed him away, and fled into the closet.
Her body throbbed uncontrollably, and her originally fair skin flushed a faint pink. She wasn't usually this reserved; being touched was nothing to her, but a sense of fear arose within her, as if something uncontrollable would happen if he continued to touch her like that.
Lu Xinghe stared blankly at his hands, then slowly clenched them. He walked out of the bathroom and saw her sitting in the cabinet with her knees drawn up to her chest. When she saw him come out, she immediately lowered her head, looking both timid and pitiful.
He knew that animal characteristics were a sensitive area for humanoid aliens, but he didn't expect her to be this sensitive.
So what animal's genes did she interact with? That short, soft tail reminded him of the rabbit he had just stolen from An Xiaoruo.
The room went dark; the power had gone out again.
Lu Xinghe drew back the curtains, and the lights from the Gene Department building across the street dimly illuminated the room. He opened the window to let the cold air in, and his mind finally cleared up a bit.
Luo Ning gradually calmed down, and the throbbing in her body subsided, but her heart was still unsettled. He had seen her just now and might have misunderstood that she had some indescribable thoughts about him.
Lu Xinghe closed the window again. In the darkness, he walked up to Luo Ning. Luo Ning thought he was going to get her clothes again, but he leaned down closer to her.
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