Chapter 18
The iron door slammed shut behind him, shutting out the dim light and howling wind outside. Inside the door was a narrow, dim passage with rough, raw cement walls. A pitifully low-wattage incandescent light flickered overhead, casting a wavering shadow.
The air was filled with a dull smell mixed with disinfectant, sweat and a kind of rusty metal.
Two men in mixed uniforms, armed, blocked the passage, their eyes scanning Chen Mengzhou and the child in her arms as if they were examining cargo. Their equipment was more organized than that of the motley crew from the Gathering House and the Hounds. At least their uniforms were uniform, their weapons were in good repair, and they exuded a cold, hardened demeanor of someone trained.
"Name?" the scarred man on the left asked in a rough voice, the notebook and pen in his hand looked a little out of place.
"Chen Meng." Chen Mengzhou lowered his eyelashes, hiding the expression in his eyes, and gave a fake name, his voice deliberately weak, "This is my daughter, Niuniu."
"Where are you from?"
"To the east, the former Qinghe community... is completely destroyed. There are man-eating monsters and cracks in the ground everywhere..." She spoke slowly, her voice trembling with fear, but she described the common experience of most survivors, which was a mixture of truth and falsehood that was difficult to distinguish.
"How did you survive?"
"Hiding... always hiding... picking up some food left by others... later when there was really no way to survive, I ran out desperately..." Chen Mengzhou tightened his arms and buried Niuniu's face in his shoulders, making a protective gesture and avoiding the other party's overly scrutinizing gaze.
The scarred man quickly wrote down a few things, seemingly not doubting her story, or perhaps rather, not caring much. Every day, such survivors attempt to approach the fortress, but only one in ten survives, and even fewer make it this far.
The man on the right, who had been silent the whole time but had sharper eyes, suddenly spoke in a hoarse voice: "Put the child down and check him."
Chen Mengzhou's body tensed imperceptibly for a moment, then he obediently and carefully placed Niuniu on a clean-looking wooden box nearby. The little girl was still unconscious, her breathing weak.
The two men's gaze lingered on Niu Niu's pale little face for a moment, not noticing anything unusual, and then turned to Chen Mengzhou.
"Take out everything you have. Backpack, weapons, everything." the scarred man ordered.
Chen Mengzhou silently obeyed. She put down her backpack and opened it, revealing the few remaining compressed biscuits, mineral water, some medical supplies, and... that unremarkable metal box.
When he saw the metal box, the man with sharp eyes froze for a moment.
"What is this?" He took a step forward, picked up the box, and felt it sink slightly in his hand.
"I don't know... I found it and it looked pretty sturdy, so I kept it to hold some small things." Chen Mengzhou's tone was blank, with a bit of the smugness and ignorance of a petty citizen who had picked up a bargain.
The man tried to open the box, but the lock was broken, and the lid was firmly locked. He shook it, and a slight clattering sound came from inside. He glanced at Chen Mengzhou, who showed a hint of nervousness and reluctance at the right moment.
The sharp-eyed man didn't force the box open, but instead handed it to his companion and began to search Shen Mengzhou. His movements were rough but professional, and he quickly confirmed that she had no other weapons besides the multi-purpose saber.
The saber was confiscated.
"Keep the things here for the time being. Come with me." The scarred man took away Chen Mengzhou's backpack and metal box, locked them in an iron cabinet nearby, and then motioned Chen Mengzhou to pick up the child and follow him.
Chen Mengzhou picked up Niuniu and followed the two of them out of the passage with his head lowered.
The scene suddenly became clear, but also unexpectedly... depressing.
The fortress's interior wasn't the orderly refuge one might imagine, but more like a crowded, chaotic, and post-apocalyptic underclass community. The massive dome, seemingly a converted air-raid shelter, was supported by rusted metal supports. Below, a dense network of shacks, tents, and even shipping container-converted houses lay densely packed together. The light was dim, the air stagnant, and the residents, mostly sallow and thin, their eyes dull, were either busy at work or sitting in a corner.
Only a few people in uniform and carrying weapons moved around, maintaining a tense and uncomfortable order.
This place is far from a paradise, just another form of prison. But at least there are no wandering eclipse corpses, and there is no sky above your head that may crack at any time.
The two men led Chen Mengzhou through the crowded residential area, attracting many numb or curious stares. Finally, they arrived in front of a row of bungalows simply painted with lime water. A crooked wooden sign hung on the door with the words "Medical Affairs" written in red paint on it.
"Old Zhou, there's a new guy here with a child who seems to be seriously ill." The scarred man shouted inside.
A middle-aged man wearing a white coat, a mask, and a tired look came out. He looked at Niuniu in Chen Mengzhou's arms and frowned: "Bring her in."
The interior of the clinic was cramped and shabby, filled with the even stronger smell of disinfectant and blood. Several makeshift beds were occupied by people groaning in pain.
The man called Lao Zhou checked Niu Niu's condition, flipped her eyelids, and listened to her heartbeat.
"High fever, dehydration, malnutrition, and some signs of internal bleeding... The situation is not good, but strangely, the vital signs are relatively stable..." Old Zhou muttered as he took notes. "Let's give her a nutritional injection and antibiotics first. Whether she can survive depends on luck. Put her on the empty bed."
He pointed to an empty bed in the corner covered with stained sheets.
Chen Mengzhou put Niuniu down. Lao Zhou brought the IV and started giving Niuniu an IV.
"You," the scarred man raised his chin towards Shen Mengzhou, "come with me to the registration office to record your details, and then we'll arrange your accommodation and work. We don't keep idle people in the fortress."
Chen Mengzhou glanced at the unconscious Niuniu and said hesitantly, "Can't I stay here with her?"
"With Lao Zhou watching over you, you won't die." The man said impatiently, "Hurry up, don't waste time."
Chen Mengzhou had no choice but to follow the man out of the clinic and to another bungalow next to it - the registration office.
The registration process was tedious and detailed. Besides basic information, it also included previous occupations, specialties, and any previous encounters with special monsters or unusual areas. Chen Mengzhou answered cautiously, concealing most of the information and using vague, real information for a small portion.
The person in charge of registration was a thin man wearing thick glasses. He pushed his glasses up from time to time while recording, and his eyes behind the lenses flashed with a kind of inquiring light.
"You said you came from the east, through Weeping Canyon?" He suddenly asked at the end of the registration, "Just you and your daughter?"
"Yeah." Chen Mengzhou nodded, his face showing sadness and fear at the right time. "Originally, there were a few people who escaped together... but they are all gone... Only the two of us were lucky..."
The bespectacled man paused, raised his eyelids, and gave her a deep look. "The Weeping Canyon has been quite unstable lately. I heard there's unusual energy activity there. You're really lucky to have made it through."
His tone was calm, but it made Shen Mengzhou's heart tremble slightly. This person seemed to know something.
After completing the registration, the scarred man took a form and looked at it. "No special skills... First, go to the logistics team and be responsible for clearing the waste in corridor 7 of area D. Accommodation will be arranged in Camp C, bunk 47."
He threw Chen Mengzhou a rough wooden plaque with the number "47" engraved on it, and a small, crumpled diagram of the interior area of the fortress.
"Work eight hours a day in exchange for a basic food quota. If you perform well or make special contributions, you can increase your quota or change your job. Follow the rules and don't cause trouble, otherwise you will be thrown out to feed the monsters." The man gave her instructions coldly and ignored her.
Chen Mengzhou walked out of the registration office with his head down, holding the wooden sign and the map.
She did not immediately go to the so-called No. 47 bunk in Camp C. Instead, she relied on the map and her extraordinary memory to quickly move around the lower level area of the fortress and familiarize herself with the environment.
The fortress's structure was more complex than she had imagined, divided into multiple levels: upper, middle, and lower. The bottom level (Zone D), where she was currently located, housed most of the ordinary survivors and those performing the lowest-level work, offering the worst conditions. The middle levels (Zones C and B) seemed to be the living and activity areas for management, technical personnel, and armed personnel, offering much better conditions. The entrances were guarded, and ordinary people were forbidden from entering. The upper level (Zone A), however, showed only a vague outline on the map, devoid of any markings, leaving it shrouded in mystery.
The entire fortress is like a strictly hierarchical beehive, operating in an oppressive and efficient manner.
When passing by a relatively remote supply storage area, she overheard the whispered conversation of two porters who were taking a break.
"...Have you heard? A new batch of 'hard goods' was shipped into Area A yesterday. They seem to be antiques dug out from deep in the ruins..." "...Shh! Keep your voice down! Don't you want to live? How dare you gossip about Area A?" "...What are you afraid of...I'm just curious, what's so valuable about those antiques that can't be eaten or drunk...It's better to exchange them for more food..." "...You know shit! Those are called 'relics'! It is said that they are related to things before the 'Great Cataclysm'...It seems that they are also related to 'energy blocks'...Anyway, it's not our place to inquire..."
A relic? A power-up? A pre-Cataclysm artifact?
Chen Mengzhou immediately recalled the sensation that had caused her metal box to heat up. Could it be that the items collected in Area A of the Fortress were related to the genetic medicine in her hand?
She left calmly, her thoughts racing.
For the next few days, like all the other newly arrived survivors, Chen Mengzhou numbly completed the extensive physical labor assigned to her—clearing blocked passages and carrying heavy waste. She deliberately tried not to stand out or fall behind, like a drop of water merging into the ocean, minimizing her presence.
After work every day, she would go to the clinic to visit Niu Niu. Niu Niu had been in a coma, but her vital signs had miraculously remained stable. Old Zhou was amazed, but he simply attributed it to the child's tenacious vitality.
Chen Mengzhou could sense that the immense spiritual energy within Niuniu was still slowly and autonomously repairing her body, producing an extremely subtle exchange with the faint spatial energy that occasionally seeped into the fortress. This exchange was so subtle that if Chen Mengzhou had not possessed the same special ability and was constantly paying attention, he would have been completely unnoticed.
This girl is indeed not simple.
During this period, she also tried to find out more about Area A, the "relics" and the "energy blocks", but the people at the bottom knew very little about it and were very secretive about it, as if talking about these things was some kind of taboo.
Until the afternoon of the third day.
Chen Mengzhou was cleaning the silt in an abandoned pipe when suddenly, a low and rapid alarm sounded throughout the fortress!
It was not a sharp alarm of foreign invasion, but some kind of internal warning!
All those who were working stopped and looked at each other with confusion and a hint of uneasiness on their faces.
"What's going on?" "I don't know..." "It seems to be coming from above?"
Immediately afterwards, a chaotic sound of footsteps and shouts came from the entrance to the middle level!
"Get out of the way! Get out of the way!" "Doctor! Ask the doctor to go to the entrance of Area A!" "Be careful! Don't touch him!"
Several people wearing the uniforms of Area A guards, but now their clothes were torn and covered in blood, rushed down carrying a stretcher. On the stretcher lay a man in a white researcher's coat. His entire right arm was in a strange state, as if it had been corroded by strong acid and then crystallized. It emitted a faint purple-black light and the man was unconscious!
Wherever the stretcher passed, it left behind bits of crystal debris emitting ominous energy.
The people around were so scared that they stepped back, trying to avoid it.
"It's energy pollution!" "Oh my god! What the hell did they pull out of Area A?!" "Stay away! You'll be in big trouble if you come across it!"
Chen Mengzhou's gaze suddenly fixed on the researcher's injured right arm and the scattered crystal fragments!
The spatial energy within her body unexpectedly resonated once again! It produced an extremely clear, homologous, yet even more violent and dangerous resonance with the crystal fragments and the strange energy remaining in the wounds of the wounded!
The texture of this energy... is extremely similar to the turbulent space-time energy she has absorbed, but it is more primitive, chaotic, and destructive!
What shocked her even more was——
As the stretcher was hurriedly carried to the mid-level medical clinic (which was obviously much better than the ground floor), she saw a pendant from the unconscious researcher's open collar. It was a small, special metal plate with an etched pattern on it...
It was a twisted bolt of lightning that ran through an irregular circle!
It’s exactly the same pattern as the one on her metal box!
Thunder logo!
Area A! Relics! Energy pollution! Thunder symbol!
All the clues suddenly connected at this moment!
Fortress Area A isn't just collecting so-called "relics," they're also researching them! This might even have caused an accident! And what they're researching is most likely related to "spacetime energy" and "genetic drugs"!
That metal box and the potion inside it might not be comparable to the defective products in the collection, but might come from a more advanced and secret source, and might even be related to Area A of the Fortress!
Chen Mengzhou's heart began to beat violently and uncontrollably.
She looked at the strictly blocked passage leading to the middle level, and a cluster of cold yet hot flames burned in the depths of her eyes.
There must be the answer she wants.
About superpowers, about potions, about this end of the world, and even about... the future she saw.
To enter Area A, you must find a way to enter Area A.
But how do you get into a place that is heavily guarded and hierarchical?
Her gaze, involuntarily, turned towards the medical clinic on the ground floor again.
The little girl who is still unconscious and has an unknown power dormant in her body - Niuniu.
Maybe... she will be an unexpected key.
Chen Mengzhou lowered his head and continued to clean the silt in the pipe, as if he didn't care about what had just happened.
Only the slightly pursed corners of his lips revealed a hint of cold calculation.
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