Chapter 88: Finally, Sang Zhitao and her group were brought in...
Sang Zhitao and her group walked through the pipe for a long time without encountering any obstacles or forks in the road.
The ever-impatient Touqing couldn't help but ask curiously, "Huh, there isn't a single fork in the road."
Touhui nodded, then, considering the darkness inside the pipes and the possibility that the other party might not be able to see clearly, he said, "The Starry District is different from other places; all underground pipe systems are exclusive to each residence."
"Why is that?" Touqing asked, even more curious.
Touhuang chimed in, "It's probably to prevent people from entering or leaving the mansion through the pipes."
"But can't we come in through the private pipes?" Touqing replied subconsciously.
Tou Lan twitched her lips: "There are Mirror Clan divine patterns on it. How could we have gotten in if we hadn't brought a priest with us?"
"Ah..." Touqing paused for a moment, still looking somewhat bewildered.
Tou Lü interjected helplessly: "Our Mirror Clan used to be a priestly clan that served the royal family. Our status was that of a top-tier noble family, especially the priests who possessed bloodline power. Every one of them was admired by thousands. Why would we study other people's underground pipes?"
Tou Qing nodded thoughtfully, then looked at Sang Zhitao as if she had suddenly thought of something: "Will Lan Xing change this after he ascends the throne? After all... the Mirror Clan is gone now, and who knows how many of the priests with bloodline power escaped back then, or how many of them were able to awaken."
Sang Zhitao was surprised that someone who was always reckless and hot-blooded, someone who always thought of using his brain to gain strength, would think of this, and couldn't help but glance at him in surprise.
Before she could even speak, Tou Lü suddenly exclaimed in surprise, "You actually used your brain!"
Upon hearing this, Sang Zhitao was speechless.
The others were taken aback at first, then burst into laughter.
Touqing was taken aback by the question and couldn't help but look up and tap Toulu on the head: "What are you saying?!"
Tou Lü made a face, dodging Tou Qing's punches, and ran behind Tou Huang, grabbing his collar and shouting, "That's right! You said before that you wouldn't be bothered with anything that requires thinking."
"Hey!" Tou Qing was furious and was about to raise his hand to hit him again.
Suddenly, Tou Lan raised her hand and shouted, "Quiet! Someone's coming!"
The scene fell silent instantly. They listened intently and, sure enough, heard faint footsteps behind them.
The group exchanged glances, their brows furrowed.
Sang Zhitao looked around and shook her head at Tou Lan.
Tou Lan understood that she meant there was no suitable place to hide nearby. She pursed her lips and lowered her head to think.
Before he could figure it out, Sang Zhitao lowered her voice and said, "Those who came from behind must have gotten in the same way as us. Let's ignore them for now and just keep going forward."
After thinking for a moment, Tou Lan nodded in agreement with her idea.
After all, they were much faster than the people behind them in terms of speed, so they shouldn't bump into each other.
Seeing that they had determined a solution, the others did not delay any longer and silently quickened their pace to move forward.
Following the footsteps that were neither too close nor too far behind them, the group walked straight, turned, went uphill, or went downhill, sometimes passing through narrow passages and sometimes traversing wide open spaces.
After walking for about three or four hours, a familiar ladder and manhole cover appeared before them.
Tou Lan glanced behind her subconsciously, but the footsteps continued to approach at a steady pace.
Sang Zhitao had no interest in paying attention to the people behind her, and only looked at Tou Qing, who was skilled in martial arts, and gestured to him.
Touqing nodded silently, his expression serious. He carefully climbed the ladder, slightly raised one foot, and relaxed a robot the size of a fingernail.
Touhuang also took out the controller to observe it, but after a moment he nodded to Sang Zhitao.
Seeing this, Touqing lifted the manhole cover in one breath and nimbly climbed up.
A moment later, three knocking sounds came from the manhole cover.
Seeing this, the others did not delay and quickly climbed out of the pipe.
Upon exiting, I discovered that the manhole cover had been placed in the kitchen area.
After careful investigation, Sang Zhitao and the others discovered that the manhole cover was cleverly positioned, partially obscured by the kitchen wall, and surrounded by several trees, creating a blind spot.
"How do we get in?" Tou Qing asked in a low voice, looking down.
Sang Zhitao approached the wall and cautiously glanced out from the corner. Finding no one around, she quickly slipped into the kitchen.
A knocking sound came from the wall, and the others quickly slipped inside.
Once everyone had arrived, Sang Zhitao pointed to the pipes above.
Everyone immediately understood. Touhui and Touqing immediately reached out and built a ladder, sending the group into the ventilation duct above.
After climbing along the ventilation ducts for a while, they finally reached their destination: the Dark Duke's bedroom.
Looking at the floor-to-ceiling painting opposite the luxurious king-size bed in the bedroom, Sang Zhitao couldn't help but feel grateful that she was too young and ignorant back then. Her impression of a mansion was that it was a huge single-story villa with a huge area, so they could directly enter the bedroom through the pipes and then enter the underground research institute.
Transparent Yellow carefully released several miniature robots, which slowly made their way along the European-style carvings on the ceiling to the monitoring equipment.
Just like we did at the mine, we took a picture and replaced it.
After everything was completed, he nodded to everyone.
First came the translucent blue, then the translucent gray, then the translucent blue, and finally the sisters Sang Zhitao and Jingqian.
“Transparent gray,” Sang Zhitao called out to him.
Touhui nodded, walked straight up, touched the painting for a while until he felt a bump and pressed it.
With a crisp click, the painting bounced slightly outward, revealing an entrance from one side.
The transparent yellow screen was sent into the robot as usual, the display was changed, and then the group went in.
Inside is an elevator, and the transparent yellow device is directly connected to the elevator control panel. They started hacking into the system with the equipment.
After a while, an alarm suddenly sounded overhead, startling everyone. Fortunately, the alarm stopped in less than two seconds.
"How is it?" Sang Zhitao looked at Touhuang with concern.
Touhuang smiled and said, "Don't worry, it's all taken care of."
He typed a few words on the computer, and the elevator began to shake and descend.
In no time, the silvery-white elevator wall became a transparent wall.
"Won't we be discovered?" Sang Zhitao asked instinctively.
Touhuang shook his head and smiled reassuringly, "Don't worry, it's a one-way mirror, they can't spot us from the outside."
Hearing this, Sang Zhitao felt relieved, and the others finally relaxed their tense nerves as well.
"That's where we're being held." As the elevator descended, they saw many different scenes.
The first floor is the display area, where lab technicians are busy arranging samples.
The second floor is a rest area, where the lab technicians are eating and chatting.
The third floor is the testing area, where experimenters are hurrying around recording data and analyzing the reactions of the test samples in front of them.
The elevator reached the sixth floor, and Tou Hui pointed to the rows of transparent rooms, his expression somewhat grim.
The others looked over as he did so, and their expressions also turned sour.
Almost all of those rooms were empty.
"Where is he?!" Sang Zhitao asked, frowning.
With a pale face, Touhui shook his head.
"Crack." The elevator shook for a moment and then came to a stop.
"We have to leave. The elevator will sound an alarm if it stays idle for too long," Touhuang said, glancing down at his computer.
Sang Zhitao nodded, indicating that everyone should first hide in the ventilation ducts on this floor.
The others didn't waste any time either; they pulled and tugged at each other and finally managed to hide.
Fearing that they would be discovered if they spoke, the group could only communicate by handwriting on their translucent computer screens for the time being.
"Is it possible in the experimental zone?" Touhuang thought for a moment and wrote.
"No, there weren't that many people being tested in the experimental area we just passed," the sharp-eyed Tou Dian quickly denied.
"Could it be in another district?" Touqing wrote in a quick note.
The group frowned. If they were all in other districts, wouldn't they have made a wasted trip?
Sang Zhitao rubbed her fingertips together for a while before finally writing a single word: "Wait!"
They knew that Sang Zhitao meant to wait until their rest time in the evening to see what would happen, and after thinking about it, they realized there was really no good solution at the moment, so they could only nod in agreement.
"How should we get people out of here?" Touhui thought for a moment before writing down this sentence.
Recalling the original plot she had read, Sang Zhitao wrote on her computer: "A group of rebels will attack this place tomorrow. We'll use the chaos tomorrow as an excuse to leave."
"Is the information reliable?" Tou Lan glanced at her in surprise.
Sang Zhitao nodded.
Seeing this, the others said nothing more.
After a long while, he finally wrote down a sentence: "It's okay, as long as people are still alive, even if they can't be saved tomorrow, there will be a future."
These words eased the pressure on everyone somewhat, since their initial goal was to destroy the weapons and potions researched by the Dark Duke.
"Test subject number 773, received 3 ml of blood from subject number zero, is not in good condition." Two researchers happened to walk by below, and the group immediately quieted down.
"The quality of these batches of experimental samples is too poor; they can't even withstand three milliliters." One of the researchers, who was a bit overweight, sighed as he looked through the data.
The thin researcher nodded: "There's no other way. We can't test the previous batches of Mirror Clan members anymore. The commoners are no match for these Mirror Clan members who possess bloodline power."
“There’s nothing we can do; they’re a priestly clan,” the chubby researcher agreed.
With his hands clenched tightly in gray, he stared fiercely at the two people below.
Translucent yellow sighed softly, placing her hand on the back of translucent gray's hand.
Tou Hui closed his eyes, suppressed his anger, and loosened his grip on her hand.
The two researchers didn't go far, remaining about ten meters away, and their conversation could still be clearly heard by the group.
"Huh? This test subject number 323 is actually reacting quite well." The voice belonged to the thin researcher.
"It's definitely because of different bloodlines." That was the fat researcher's voice.
"He... is a nobleman?" the thin researcher asked, somewhat surprised.
Then came a soft laugh, which sounded like the fat researcher. He laughed a few times before saying, "Not just nobles, but royalty."
"..." The thin researcher remained silent for a moment before speaking with some difficulty, "Is...is this alright?"
The fat researcher's voice carried a hint of arrogance: "So what? Once you're here, even the Empress is just a test subject for us. Otherwise, what do you think Test Subject Zero is?"
Before the thin researcher could speak, the fat researcher said with a hint of smugness, "That was a big shot. You'd never guess who it was. If I didn't have a friend over there watching over things, I would never have imagined that someone like that would be cut into millions of pieces after death and used as a test subject."
“Could it be…?” The thin researcher’s voice was filled with fear.
Then came a few pats on the shoulder, and the fat researcher's voice continued: "Just like you guessed, so what does royalty matter?"
Then his voice continued: "Alright, the experiment records are finished, let's go."
After everyone left, they looked at Sang Zhitao.
Sang Zhitao pursed her lips and looked at them: "I think the researcher Zero he mentioned is the person you're thinking of."
For a moment, no one knew what to say. After a long while, Tou Lan managed to squeeze out a few words through gritted teeth: "They...they..."
Sang Zhitao didn't say anything, only looking at the empty corridor below: "Therefore, we must organize the Moonlight Ceremony."
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