Chapter 62 Mountain Tunnel - 6 *** ……
***
In the dimly lit conference room, seven researchers in white lab coats sat on either side of a long table, watching a video recording on a large floating screen.
The video abruptly ended after the orc boy plunged a miniature military knife into the android's eye socket. The gloomy young man standing there turned around and pushed up his gold-rimmed glasses.
“As you can see, Tang Bufan is still alive, and he is still human.” The young man’s voice was deep and slow: “But he is currently in the air-raid shelter in the Greater Khingan Mountains, too far away from us.”
“Distance isn’t the problem; the problem is that Guo Wen is still using the air defense reconnaissance system.” An old man frowned and said, “Because of the traitor, Yuan Xiao can only provide him with the most advanced version of the dungeon, and he will be able to detect our aircraft.”
“So we can’t send a flying vehicle to pick him up for the time being,” the gloomy young man said, as photos of Lu Yi and Anderson popped up on the large floating screen behind him: “And he’s accompanied by these two high-level orcs.”
The advanced orcs are walking cutting-edge weapons; their beast-like bodies are impervious to bullets. The only way to deal with them is with regional missiles, but that would damage the Earth's environment.
Currently, all forces on Earth have tacitly agreed not to use polluting nuclear weapons anymore. Do they even exist? Everyone does. Who hasn't had some kind of foundation to survive the apocalypse? But everyone knows they can't use them.
The Greater Khingan Mountains are the best-restored area in eastern mainland China, except for Fujian. The pollution and radiation there have almost dropped to a level where humans can live there without protective clothing, so it absolutely cannot be bombed.
Their painstaking research into using poisonous humans to make weapons was also because it was "environmentally friendly." Even if those poisonous humans were killed by the orcs, their bodies, which were mixed with plant genes, would still serve as nutrients when buried in the ground.
Looking at the two young high-level orcs on the floating screen, the conference room fell into a brief silence. Then, a middle-aged woman frowned and spoke up: "Are we just going to give up on him like this?"
“Actually, the subsequent experiments can be conducted without him,” a man said.
"Even if he's not needed for subsequent experiments, he's still an important research subject!" the woman said in a deep voice. "Besides, he came into this world because of us! We can't be so irresponsible!"
“He might also reveal the matter of the crossing to the Eastern Federation,” an old man said.
"He may have already leaked it; we still haven't figured out how he got involved with Louis Smith."
A buzz of discussion broke out in the meeting room, until the young man suddenly slammed his hands on the table, not too hard, but not too soft either.
The conference room fell silent. The young man, leaning on the table, said calmly, "You know me. I always adhere to the principles of openness and transparency, so I've already released this video. Now everyone on the island knows that Tang Bufan is still alive. Our 'Reboot' plan has the support of 70% of the people because we never abandon humanity, and Tang Bufan is still human. He has suffered a lot in these five years, as you all saw in the video. He is determined, so... he must be saved, not only for the experiment, but also to stabilize people's hearts."
Their modification of poisonous people has already caused a lot of controversy on the island, with many believing it to be inhumane. If they give up on saving Tang Bufan, it will only expand the opposition of 30%.
The conference room fell silent. After a moment, the female researcher spoke up and asked, "How can we save him? He has two high-level orcs with him, and our aircraft cannot fly over there for the time being."
The young man thought for a moment, then raised his hand to push up his glasses, his eyes deep and serious: "Use the most powerful tool we have at our disposal now—the poison man."
***
Inside the air defense base, Lu Yi carried Anderson, whose body was red and who was having difficulty breathing, back to the RV, while Tang Bufan followed closely behind him.
Using Anthony's radar to confirm that there were no bat-winged poisoners around the RV, Lu Yi reached out and opened the heavy iron door. Kai Ge immediately opened the car door, and the three of them quickly went inside.
Lu Yi put Anderson on his bedding, while Tang Bufan walked to the corner of the carriage, quickly opened the medicine box, and began anxiously searching for medicine.
"Cough... looking for... looking for allergy medication." Lu Yi coughed, strode over, squatted down, and rummaged through the medicine box with Tang Bufan.
Both of them were wearing light screen glasses, and the AI helped scan and identify the medicine bottles. Soon, Tang Bufan saw that the glasses had locked onto a small white plastic medicine bottle, and a red circle was marked with a "beep beep beep".
He and Lu Yi reached out their hands at the same time, but Lu Yi was faster, grabbing the medicine bottle and quickly turning back to Anderson's side.
Tang Bufan quickly grabbed some anti-inflammatory medicine and disinfectant and followed.
Anderson's neck, where the poisoned blood had splattered, was swollen and red, covered with dense small blisters, making one feel physically uncomfortable. Tang Bufan wasn't a doctor and didn't know if he could apply disinfectant directly, so he squatted down next to Lu Yi, looking at him helplessly.
Lu Yi poured out five anti-allergy pills and put them into Anderson's mouth. Although Anderson was in pain, he was still conscious and swallowed them with great difficulty.
"Isn't that too much?" Tang Bufan was taken aback. How could someone eat five at once?
“We are beastmen, so we need to take two or three times the dosage of medicine as humans,” Lu Yi said, swallowing three pills himself to alleviate his symptoms.
Because of their different physical constitutions, humans cannot consume medicines specifically made for orcs; it would cause harm.
Tang Bufan understood. Although he had followed Uncle Wolf for four years, he had never seen Uncle Wolf get sick. The beastmen's physique was too strong.
"Then how should we treat these blisters?" Tang Bufan asked anxiously.
Lu Yi thought for a moment, then reached out and took the bandage from his hand, tore off a piece, poured disinfectant on it, and gently applied it to Anderson's swollen neck.
He didn't dare to wipe it, afraid the blisters would break.
"Let's leave it like this for now." Lu sighed and was about to cover Anderson with a blanket.
"Wait!" Tang Bufan stopped him, remembering that Anderson had hugged the android while facing the flames, so he grabbed Anderson's hand and lifted it up to examine it carefully. Sure enough, there were signs of burns.
Fortunately, it wasn't too serious. There were no blisters or peeling, just some redness. I guess it was because I transformed into a beast that I wasn't burned.
"Don't worry about this injury, it'll be fine in a day or two. We have a fast metabolism," Lu Yi said, reaching out to cover Anderson with the worn-out blanket.
Anderson closed his eyes in pain. The swelling and redness on his neck made it difficult for him to breathe, and his chest heaved violently, so Lu kept the blanket up to his stomach.
Tang Bufan felt terrible seeing him like this. Although Anderson was usually cheeky and had a sharp tongue, Tang Bufan had come to regard him as a companion after knowing him for so long.
Lu Yi was still injured, and Tang Bufan's gaze quickly fell on his blood-stained chest.
"How's your chest?" Tang Bufan reached out to lift Lu Yi's tattered V-neck sweater.
Lu Yi thought that his sweater was torn, so he simply took it off, revealing his strong and muscular upper body. A knife wound more than ten centimeters long was seen diagonally across his chest.
Tang Bufan examined it carefully and found that only the deepest part of his right pectoral muscle was still bleeding, while the bleeding in other areas had stopped.
"The wound isn't deep. I dodged back a bit, and most of it was covered by my sweater." Lu Yi looked down and touched his right pectoral muscle with his finger. He felt that it still needed a few stitches, so he instructed Tang Bufan, "Teacher, please get me the needle and thread."
Tang Bufan immediately turned around and walked towards the medicine box. He quickly came back with the suture needle and thread, but before he could reach Lu Yi's side, his legs suddenly gave way and he fell heavily forward.
Lu Yi quickly reached out and caught it, a look of panic flashing in his eyes: "You're injured?"
Then, after thinking quickly for a moment, she went to pour out the allergy medicine: "Take one too!"
"I'm fine." Tang Bufan didn't think he had an allergic reaction. He reassured the flustered Lu Yi, "It's just that the wolf skin was too heavy, and I lost my balance."
After he finished speaking, he sat down on the cold floor of the carriage and, with trembling hands, handed the needle and thread to Lu Yi: "You should quickly treat your wound."
His hands were completely powerless, and Lu Yi had to sew it up himself... Tang Bufan hated himself for being so useless, so much so that he wanted to chop off his own hands.
Seeing that his face was still pale and there was no redness from an allergic reaction, Lu Yi felt relieved and tightened the bottle cap, then put it aside and began to treat her own knife wound.
Tang Bufan watched as he inserted the hook-shaped suture needle into his own flesh, the bloody thread pulling at the cut muscle tissue... He bit his lip, feeling distressed, and finally, unable to bear it any longer, he lowered his head and looked down.
Reaching out to touch his thin, stick-like feet through his tattered cotton trousers, Tang Bufan thought... he might not be able to stand up again soon.
As he lost weight, his muscle tissue also atrophied little by little.
Tang Bufan raised his hand to wipe his burning eyes, feeling like crying.
Although Lu Yi was stitching himself up, he noticed Tang Bufan's unusual behavior, so he comforted him, "I'll go down with you again later, and we'll look for something on the third basement level."
"No rush, you rest first." Tang Bufan felt he should be strong. Anderson and Lu Yi were both injured, and now he was the only one who could take care of them. So he forced himself to suppress his sadness and stood up on his thin legs.
"I'll go cook for you." Tang Bufan walked towards the kitchen. Orcs have big appetites, and Lu Yi and Anderson also need to replenish their energy.
“No need to fry ours, just defrost the meat,” Lu Yi said to Tang Bufan, removing the needles from his bloodied chest. “Let’s conserve electricity.”
Currently, RVs rely on gasoline for electricity, and there's only one can of gasoline left.
"Okay," Tang Bufan replied, his voice betraying his disappointment.
Anderson fell asleep, probably due to the effects of the five allergy pills. Lu Yi also looked exhausted, but he ate some meat with Tang Bufan.
To avoid disturbing Anderson, Tang Bufan boiled the meat in plain water, making it very dry, but five years of living in the apocalypse had made him less picky about food.
"Why don't you go get some sleep too?" Tang Bufan said to Lu Yi in a low voice across the small folding table.
Looking at his gaunt appearance, Lu Yi felt a pang of heartache: "Stay with me."
Tang Bufan looked at him, his eyes slightly red, and couldn't help but chuckle: "You're such a grown man, do you still need your teacher to sleep with you?"
"Yes, I will." Lu Yi smiled, but thinking of Tang Bufan's excited conversation with the android, and his determination to leave... he felt a pang of sadness in his heart.
"Then finish eating the meat," Tang Bufan said.
"good."
The two quieted down and continued eating, listening intently to Anderson's labored breathing, which was incredibly clear in the dimly lit RV.
It's so depressing.
“I still think we should enjoy life while we can.” Lu Yi suddenly spoke, his voice filled with resentment as he looked at Tang Bufan with his golden-green beast eyes: “I clearly like you, teacher, and you like me too.”
He wanted to be with Tang Bufan, to hold him, to kiss him, and to have no regrets.
Tang Bufan met his gaze quietly, then smiled bitterly and shook his head.
“No, Lu Yi,” Tang Bufan said in a hoarse voice, “My mind isn’t on you.”
Lu Yi's eyelashes trembled slightly, her heart sank, and she fell completely speechless.
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