Setting aside Jiang Youwei's self-doubt, the financial situation of this family of three was far from devastating enough to require them to rely on synthetic food. In fact, they still had a modest fortune. While not as much as the boss of a large company, they were able to afford food and clothing.
"The neighborhood committee has posted a notice saying that every household should stock up on supplies for half a month," said Jiang Wenwu, the father who had just returned from grocery shopping.
"What happened?" Huang Xiaohong asked.
"I don't know, but there are rumors that the whole world has been a little nervous in the past week, and countries seem to be covering up something." Jiang Wenwu spread his hands. He often watches short videos.
"Is fighting going to start again? If fighting starts, there will be no way for Xiao Heizi to find a job in Nanzhou." Huang Xiaohong said hurriedly.
"I don't know. We'll know in two days whether it can be opened or not. There's no point in being anxious now." Jiang Wenwu took off the plastic bag in his hand and said perfunctorily.
Huang Xiaohong was a strong-willed housewife, so she naturally wouldn't agree to her husband's perfunctory response. She first asked around in her various groups, then grabbed Jiang Wenwu and went out again.
Locked in his room, Jiang Youwei felt like his head was about to explode. His mind, flooded with new knowledge these past few days, was already shattered. Everything seemed familiar, yet nothing matched his memory. "Man is the sum of all social relations," he recalled a famous philosophical quote. "Am I still myself? No, in this world, I am just an alien, resembling a human."
Jiang Youwei was truly an outlier, everywhere. Or rather, he always considered himself an outlier. He couldn't fit in with any group, and found it difficult to communicate with others. Inevitably, he also found it difficult to express his true feelings to others. "If there were an AT perspective, I'd probably be an apostle," he thought.
He is too kind and always tortures himself like this.
At this moment, he looked at the "water drop" on the table again. The soft and warm afternoon sunlight was making it shine.
Curiosity comes from the desire to survive and is an instinct of any living thing.
He reached out and grabbed a life-saving straw like an unlucky person who fell into the water.
. . . . . .
The gears of the world began to turn.
. . . . . .
Jiang Youwei regretted grabbing the crystal the moment he grasped it. It didn't react at all through his gloves, but upon contact with his skin, it burned like a branding iron. The skin on the contact surface quickly reddened, blistered, and peeled, exposing the fat and blood vessels beneath. Blood clung to the surface of the "water drop" and was instantly absorbed. The color of the "water drop" then turned from blue to yellow, and finally to a pale gold. "Oh my god! It hurts!" Jiang Youwei tried to shake the "water drop" off, but it stuck firmly to his palm.
Jiang Youwei couldn't think of anything else. He could only feel tiny insects slowly crawling from his palms to his entire body. He saw veins bulging on his arms, black lines spreading out in a radiating pattern. He tried to pry the "water drop" apart with his other hand, but the moment his fingers touched, the same thing happened as described earlier. "Am I a hairy crab?" the thought drowned in the sea of pain.
This feeling of burrowing insects lasted for about half an hour. Just when the fat man thought it was over, his entire body convulsed, followed by an increasingly intense tingling, itching, and stinging pain. "This is ten thousand times worse than a gout attack!" The guy lay on the floor, struggling. The excruciating pain made it difficult for him to even breathe, and due to the stress reaction, he not only had tears streaming down his face, but also had diarrhea and urination all over the floor.
With a ripping sound, Jiang Youwei's clothes were torn apart by his body. The few remaining hairs on his head quickly fell away, along with the hair on his body. Then, his skin cracked, revealing the bright red muscle fibers underneath. The process was accompanied by the crackling sound of bones growing. In the face of pain, all beings are equal. In this state, Jiang Youwei naturally had no ability to resist. After only half a minute, he had lost even the courage to struggle.
Fortunately, no one at home witnessed this spectacle. Within minutes, a dissected "cadaver" appeared on the ground. Scattered around it were various fragments of hairy skin, shattered muscle tissue, and some organ fragments. Oh, yes, that thing had also fallen, flattened by the hip muscles of this "humanoid." Jiang Youwei felt as if he had entered a mysterious space. "Am I a ghost? Why do I feel like I'm still lying on the ground?" He felt his body and felt an eerie sensation, as if his head was placed on his buttocks. "What the hell?" He felt as if his mind and body were misaligned.
As if sensing this will, the "corpse" on the ground changed again. The most obvious thing was the rapid increase in body length and the rapid proliferation of dark red muscles. In less than ten seconds, this body had grown to more than three meters, so that its head was touching the wall of the room. The body size was also increasing, and it was mainly supported by muscles. However, it did not have the muscle mass of a dragon as imagined, but was relatively slender. Two chitinous "horns" broke through the muscle layer of the forehead and were distributed symmetrically on both sides. A pair of arms extended from the lower back of the torso, gradually lengthening, and eventually exceeding the original length of the arms. A bloody tail stretched out from near the tail vertebrae, gradually lengthening, and finally becoming the same length as the legs. During this process, Jiang Youwei felt no pain at all, he just felt as if something had been added to his body.
After this stage, the body doesn't change much. A small amount of fat covers the surface, and once the muscle fiber bundles are no longer visible, the skin begins to recover layer by layer. Meanwhile, the "water droplet" previously in the palm of the hand is pushed by the surrounding muscles, moving through the arm and shoulder, all the way to the center of the chest.
As the dark skin grew all over the body, the body gradually stopped changing. As if sensing something, the body slowly rose from the ground in a prone position. At the same time, the light near the body distorted, creating a bubble-like film of light. The body hovered two meters above the ground, then silently flipped its angle until its feet touched the ground. Only then did Jiang Youwei regain full control of this body. "Something's wrong, completely wrong." He seemed to have lost his eyes and mouth, and even his ears, but he could still sense every tiny movement around him.
"Have I really turned into a monster?" Jiang Youwei carefully felt the strange sensation on his body. If he couldn't see anything at all, what would he do? And how would he explain it to his adoptive parents when they returned? It would be a blessing if he wasn't frightening people to death. If he caused a commotion, it might alert the armed police, who in this ghost world were equipped with exoskeleton armor. The thought of his own tragic fate, of being sliced and diced by the research institute, sent a chill down his spine.
Perhaps his attention had been diverted, but Jiang Youwei suddenly felt his body relax, as if he had been immersed in a hot spring. His entire body felt warm, accompanied by the crackling sound of something vaporizing. His body gradually shrank, and the extra parts withered and disappeared, leaving a 5-foot-5 girl standing in the room.
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