Chapter 117: The Origin of the End of the World (Part 2)...
Qin Yu brought Su Qing to an office building. After entering and going through a series of inspections, they finally stopped in front of a door.
He entered a complex password into the access control system and the door lock opened with a click.
When the door was opened, a large screen came into view. The picture on it was frozen on Daniel's face. There were several tables in the room, and more than a dozen people in military uniforms were sitting in front of computers, analyzing and recording frame by frame.
The air was filled with a tense and oppressive electronic hum.
Shen Kuo was standing by the table talking to an officer. When he heard the door open, he turned around and greeted with a smile, "Miss Su."
Qin Yu strode in and patted an officer on the shoulder. "Replay the video."
Then he picked up two chairs and placed them in place, motioning Su Qing to come and sit down.
The big screen went black for a moment, and Daniel appeared on the screen again. He was wearing a hospital gown and sitting on the hospital bed. His hands and feet were handcuffed to the railings on both sides. His face was extremely pale, and his eyes were bloodshot as he stared straight ahead.
Someone took the instrument and placed it on the table next to the bed, then attached many wires connected to the instrument to Daniel's body and both sides of his forehead. After doing this, another person pushed the machine over. He picked up the two wires with clips on the front and clamped them on the fingers of Daniel's two hands.
The interrogator's voice came from the loudspeaker, cold and sharp. "The electrodes on both sides of your temples will monitor the activity of your prefrontal cortex in real time. If any abnormal brain waves are detected, the machine will automatically flag them."
"Don't lie." The interrogator's voice suddenly approached. "The magnetoencephalogram will show the abnormal electrical fluctuations every time you lie, and the nanoconductors on your fingers will release high-level microcurrents directly into your pain-sensing nerves."
Daniel's pupils shrank slightly, and the electromyographic sensor attached to his body immediately captured the changes. The instrument alarm light began to flash, and his mood was not as calm as he looked.
"Below is your official profile. Daniel Lehmann, male, 58 years old, professor at the Medical School of Jin University in Country M. At only 30 years old, you became a leader in the field of gene therapy, leading your team in conquering human genetic diseases. Seven years ago, you unexpectedly entered into a strategic partnership with the biopharmaceutical giant Mena in Country M. You were subsequently assigned as a top-level expert to the Mena branch in China, and have been based in City H ever since."
58 years old? Su Qing was startled when she heard this. She didn't expect Daniel to be so old. "Looking at his appearance, I always thought he was only in his twenties. The difference is so big."
"You'll understand if you read on," Qin Yu said.
The interrogator in the video continued, "You have collaborated with the Chinese medical research team on numerous genetic research projects, several of which have already undergone clinical trials. The relevant results have not only been recognized by internationally recognized journals, but have also been widely used in patients."
"Before the zombie virus outbreak, you and your team were researching gene editing and cell reprogramming technologies, and you were recruiting volunteers for these research projects..."
As the interrogator spoke, the instrument sounded an alarm again. He glanced at the machine and said, "It seems you are very concerned about this matter. Let's start from here."
Daniel lowered his head and remained silent.
"You're 58 years old now, but you look and feel like you're in your twenties. Is it because your research was successful? It can reverse human aging, right?"
“Is the zombie virus also related to this research?”
After the interrogator asked this question, there was silence for a long time. Qin Yu raised his hand to signal the fast-forward progress bar.
As the progress bar moved forward, the screen went dark again. When Daniel appeared in the video again, he looked like he had suffered a serious injury, with a painful expression and sweat all over his forehead.
Daniel began to explain slowly in a weak and hoarse voice.
"I've spent half my life researching human genetics. My team and I have conquered the despair that genetic diseases bring to humanity, one by one. But gradually, I became dissatisfied with disease research. As I looked at those strings of genetic sequences, a deeper desire began to surge wildly in my mind. I began to pursue... immortality."
"So I began to advance my research in gene editing and cell reprogramming. I scoured all available resources on human immortality, including modern academic papers, cutting-edge research topics, and ancient historical texts. I later discovered that the term 'immortality' first appeared in China ten thousand years ago! Like me, they dedicated their lives to the pursuit of immortality... I found Mena and traveled to China under the guise of a partnership, beginning my quest for immortality."
"After arriving here, I noticed that Chinese scholars have a great interest in 'immortality'. They set up a state-of-the-art laboratory, and we've been researching step by step for nearly six years! But the key problem remains unsolved..."
"One day, someone suddenly approached me! He said his sister had a rare genetic disease, and I was his only hope. He would help me break through the bottleneck in my experiments. He then pointed out the abnormal data that had puzzled us for years. With his participation, our research made new progress."
"Later, we developed the first batch of reagents, but they needed to undergo human testing, so we recruited volunteers from the public for a phase of clinical trials. He was among them... His sister was too young to tolerate the drug, so as a blood relative, he was the most suitable person to test the drug."
Daniel's eyes danced with near-manic excitement. He suddenly brightened, his cheeks flushing a sickly red with excitement. "Zero, my experiment zero! He's truly perfect. Most of the other subjects couldn't even make it through the first round of the drug, but he was the only one! His exceptional physique allowed him to endure the drug's side effects time and time again. He's the reason the test product ultimately worked, and I saved his sister, just as he said."
"Since you said the test kit was complete and successfully saved people, then why did the zombie virus appear later?" The interrogator tapped the table with his fingertips. "Are you still hiding something?"
Daniel's momentum instantly crumbled. He struggled but was handcuffed and unable to move. "I don't know what went wrong... Everything was so perfect. I saved people and restored their youth. I don't know why so many man-eating monsters appeared! I don't know! This is impossible! This is impossible! There's nothing wrong with my experiment!"
Daniel's emotions suddenly got out of control. Several military doctors in white coats quickly stepped forward to control him. Someone gave him an injection of sedative, and he soon calmed down.
Daniel paused and began again, "That little girl, Zero's sister Luo Xinxin, is very dangerous! Did you know? She's even scarier than her brother! The apocalypse arrived suddenly. At first, my siblings and I, along with other researchers, were waiting in the lab for rescue. Then, the number of people in the lab slowly began to disappear... We all thought they were scared and secretly left."
"Until one day, I saw it..." The device connected to Daniel's body began to emit a strong alarm again. "I saw that little girl. She was half-crouching on the ground, holding a smashed head in her hands, sucking the brain matter inside with a look of enjoyment on her face..."
"I was terrified and ran away when they weren't paying attention. I wandered all the way and ran into people from the Dawn Base. There, I met Professor Gu. I gradually revealed some of my data to him, hoping that he could end this nightmare as soon as possible."
"In other words, the zombie virus might have been spread by this brother and sister?"
"I don't know... I really don't know what went wrong!" Daniel's emotions began to get out of control again. He pulled hard at the handcuffs on his hands and feet, and then began to twitch all over.
The video ends here.
Su Qing frowned and seemed to be thinking, but he was actually chatting with the system in his mind.
"You told me that a time traveler maliciously caused the end of this world. Could this time traveler be the Zero Daniel mentioned, the zombie leader I met before?"
"At this point, it's very likely."
"But what about his sister?"
"Su Qing?"
Qin Yu's voice interrupted her conversation with the system. Su Qing came back to her senses and looked to the side in confusion.
"This is all the information we know at the moment. Daniel's current physical condition is not suitable for further interrogation. The information about Luo Xinxin and the zombie leader should be the key to the zombie virus." Qin Yu said solemnly.
Su Qing nodded. "Luo Xinxin may have disappeared while looking for her brother, and that zombie leader...it should have some connection with G City." She remembered the last time she went to the G City base to rescue and discovered zombies.
"By the way, is there any progress with Professor Gu?"
"Most of the data from the damaged machine has been extracted. Professor Gu has analyzed and calculated the data again, but the results are not yet out."
"After studying the remaining zombie corpses, we found that the virus they were infected with was different from the existing zombie virus sequence. Professor Gu believes that this is the virus evolving again. They are no longer mindless walking corpses, but are becoming more and more human-like."
No wonder! Why didn't the system detect it at first? As they expected, the current virus is completely different from the initial sample data. It has been constantly changing since the end of the world.
"It seems that Professor Gu will not leave here before the data comes out?" Su Qing asked.
"yes."
Su Qing thought about the video she had just watched and expressed her doubts. "I always feel that these things are not as simple as Daniel said... Is there really nothing wrong with him in this?"
Chen Kuo chuckled faintly, "He certainly hasn't confessed completely, but as long as he's in our hands, we'll make him confess sooner or later! The people in this room are analyzing the information in the video. It's a bit difficult to find out what happened before the apocalypse under the current circumstances, but at least we have a direction and an understanding of the origin of the apocalypse."
"We are leaving the capital to investigate City G in the next few days. You must be careful in the base. Since there are zombies that cannot be identified, it is inevitable that something else will sneak into the base. And there is Luo Xinxin. No one knows her background now, so you must be cautious." Qin Yu said to Su Qing as if giving instructions.
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The author has something to say: The above genetic directions are all fictitious, please do not associate them with reality!
Any similarity is purely coincidental.
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