Chapter 94
Hilde Brand remains the most rebellious person in White Sands, despite Feng Ran's lack of oversight except for ordering him around. As the former leader, he is still unconvinced. He has always considered White Sands his home and his brothers and sisters his family. Suddenly, Fran brought back a father figure for everyone, and the others accepted it readily. Don't you think that's strange?
Although with Feng Ran's support, they no longer needed to strategize and act cautiously as before, in his view, this was still a privileged class, simply taking advantage of others' privileges for their own use.
It wasn't until Feng Ran initiated a poll in the group about whether to save Franklin Star that Hilde realized what was happening.
Oh, so she could see the suffering of ordinary people in her eyes too. So she couldn't be a purely evil person like Feng Ran said.
The increased sense of identification fosters trust and loyalty, but this feeling had barely formed when Hilde received a message from Fengran.
[Would you be willing to test the drugs under development for infected patients?]
Hilde considered himself to be just a little more conscientious than the noble lords of the Empire, but not stupid. He knew that since the plan was agreed to be a secret relief measure, they would not receive any benefits. This caused him to struggle with a difficult and conflicted decision for a long time when he voted because he felt uneasy about it.
But he knew what the others in the group thought, because most of the people in White Sand were not bad people. They were forced by life and homeless people to follow him on this path. They may hate the Empire for various reasons, but they do not hate the poor people like them.
Because of this initial intention, Hilde decided to take the lead and cast her vote with gritted teeth, but she never expected that the boomerang would hit her instead.
Nobody told him that choosing to save people meant he'd also be responsible for testing drugs for them!
Seeing Hilde's awkward and embarrassed expression, as if she had something to say but couldn't say it, Feng Ran felt all the fatigue and frustration he had accumulated over this period of time vanish.
Feng Ran looked at him with a smile: "What's wrong? You don't want to?"
It would be a miracle if he wanted to! But to go back on his word after putting on airs would be incredibly degrading, turning him into the hypocrite he despises most, which is worse than being killed.
The resentment in Hilde's eyes was almost tangible. Finally, she sighed and irritably rubbed her hair: "No, the fact that I'm here means I'm prepared."
Feng Ran turned his head to look at Orville, who had become noticeably quieter since arriving: "So you're ready too, are you?"
Orville couldn't tell if he was dejected or motivated; he just stared intently at Feng Ran: "You can save them, right?"
Feng Ran spoke languidly, his words carrying a hidden meaning: "After all, some people have risked everything to beg me. If I refuse, wouldn't they seem even more pitiful?"
She snapped her fingers, ending the pre-show chat.
"Instead of all that, shall we focus on the experiment now?"
The assistant robot led the two people into two temporary observation rooms. Various medicines and materials were laid out on Feng Ran's experimental table. It was a pity that there were too few test subjects and she had to be careful not to kill them. Otherwise, she really wanted to let them try each one to see what the reaction would be.
Of course, the experimental plans she designed for the two people were different. Orville needed to be infected with the virus first because he was simulating a patient, while Hilde was simulating the immune response of a normal person who was reconstructing the energy system, and needed to be exposed to the virus after the modification was stabilized.
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Just as Feng Ran envisioned, the strength and stability of cells are regulated by mental power, and the S-level, as the dividing line between ordinary people and geniuses, is more significantly affected by mental power.
The infection with the alien virus has an incubation period. Before the symptoms appear and the infection begins to weaken, Feng Ran injects Orville with improved mental and breakthrough drugs every day. Even though the impact of the energy reaction is deliberately weakened, the mental energy required to stabilize the cell morphology is still a terrifying amount. As a result, not long after the experiment started, Orville suffered from severe neuropathic pain. He scratched everything he could in the observation room until it was covered in blood, which made Ting Yun sigh with pity.
However, precisely because of this deliberate increase in physical strength and energy circulation, the virus, which should have started to spread and cause damage after the incubation period ended and the patient entered a period of exhaustion, progressed very slowly in Orville's body, and even the viral activity and concentration were very low.
Of course, before letting Orville test it, Fengran also injected Xiao Jiu with the virus, even the original dose that was not diluted. However, it showed no abnormalities at all, and its reaction was not as strong as when someone punched it.
The virus was sliced and sampled for testing. It was as if the injected virus had been eaten out of thin air, making Fengran really want to dissect it to see which organ or tissue was exerting the force.
The strength of the main body and the individual function of the tentacle slices are two different modes. If only a single tentacle is infected with the virus, the lectin molecules inside the tentacle will play an immune function to guide immune cells to attack the virus, which is very similar to normal organisms. However, it also has the ability to edit genetic material. Ordinary organisms can produce proteins with different functions by editing sequences, while Xiao Jiu produces complex complexes. When these complexes come into contact with the virus, they will in turn absorb its energy, destroy the viral shell, and absorb genetic material. It is a kind of genetic survival of the fittest.
Feng Ran was amazed. If it weren't for the unresolved limitations on the fusion of genetic material between the alien species and humans, she could have immediately provided ten solutions to cure the alien virus.
But difficulties do not mean she will give up on this experiment. Apart from the daily routine of drug observation on Orville, Fengran spends the rest of her time collecting various tissue samples from Xiao Jiu and Hilde, trying to find a way to fuse them. At the same time, she relentlessly feeds Xiao Jiu the virus every day, trying to figure out which part of the organ or tissue can be compatible with the two different energy cycles between alien species and normal organisms.
She was immersed in the laboratory, her nerves were highly excited, and she could only sleep for three hours a day. Xing Tong's observations were recorded in the database. She didn't know whether this was a good thing or a bad thing. Although Feng Ran had previously suffered from poor sleep quality due to nerve damage, this time she was visibly thinner.
"Master, it has been twenty days since Orville Ceylanca was infected with the MCVI-1 virus. With the help of the new EN30 fluid resuscitation treatment, the internal environment is in a stable state, and the stability of the territory's self-regulation is enough to block the current virus invasion. There is no need for additional injections of the □□神药."
Feng Ran flipped through the twenty-day experimental records: "What about viral activity and immune response?"
Xing Tong: "Because there is no change compared to the initial virus concentration, it is speculated that the human immune system has not been effective. It is because the energy replenishment for twenty days has reached the standard of absorption required by the virus, so it has entered an inert and inactive state. It is unclear how long this state will last, but in short, there should be no danger of exhaustion in the short term."
On the twelfth day of the experiment, Orville's mental strength level had subtly increased to S+, and his physique was also steadily improving under the effects of energy replenishment and breakthrough drugs. After gradually getting used to the excruciating growing pains in the early stages, his condition improved day by day.
Hilde, who was in the control group, was not so lucky. The tissue sampling every few days felt like torture. At least Orville's daily injections had a fixed dosage and amount of medication, but not his. He was injected with a mixed biological tissue solution of Xiao Jiu every time, and then the fusion and rejection reactions were observed. Sometimes the side effects were so severe that he had to be given emergency medication to relieve them.
The biggest side effect of active heterologous tissue on the human body is that it extracts energy from the body, just like breakthrough drugs. This symptom can be easily solved with the new EN30 rehydration solution made by Fengran. However, if too much rehydration is used, Hilde will look even healthier than Fengran, with a plump and round appearance.
Feng Ran: "Okay, then stop it for him and change to Tissue Fluid 13."
The laboratory wasn't large, with two observation rooms facing each other. When Hilde heard that they were finally going to use that disgusting stuff on Orville, she cheered: "Ha, bro, let me tell you, it's the most disgusting thing of all tissue fluids."
Although Hilde and Orville rarely spoke to each other, they enjoyed each other's embarrassing moments when they were awake, which led to a camaraderie despite their delicate positions and the fact that they were in the same laboratory.
But it's clear that this mutual sympathy is just a matter of feeling sorry for oneself when seeing the miserable state of the other side.
Tissue Fluid No. 13 is Fengran's latest masterpiece. It uses Xiao Jiu's regenerative neurons as raw materials, activates them with a nutrient-rich conditioning solution, and then injects them into the biological cerebrospinal fluid in one go. It sounds scary, but in fact, the fusion effect is minimal. The side effect is only a temporary stroke caused by abnormal activation. It is not as scary as Hilde said.
Fengran is quite optimistic about Tissue Fluid 13. After all, the previous tissue fluids either had poor activity or caused exhaustion and backlash after activation, requiring EN30 fluid replenishment with heterogeneous crystal nuclei as the energy source to alleviate and remedy the situation. However, the side effects of Tissue Fluid 13 are only neurological disorders, which can be cured with human medical technology! How can they be compared?
Orville's face turned quite ugly after what he said, and then he heard Feng Ran point at Hilde and say, "Oh, you have to get that injection today too."
Orville: "Ha."
Hilde: You're getting ahead of yourself...
Tingyun chimed in, adding fuel to the fire: "Yeah, if you have another attack today to keep the tissue fluid active, you'll have to tough it out on your own."
Hilde's eyes widened in disbelief: "Really?"
Feng Ran nodded mechanically, devoid of any human warmth: "For an S-class, this is not considered irreversible damage."
Hilde gritted her teeth. Compared to Orville, it was definitely Tingyun, that sissy, who she couldn't get along with the most.
"Pooh!"
Tingyun was shocked by his accurate physical attacks and cursed in disbelief. She turned around and tried to find a syringe to inject him.
Feng Ran was puzzled by the weapon that made a loud thud, and turned to look at Hilde: "What did you just vomit?"
Hilde smacked her lips: "Talcum, I guess."
Feng Ran's expression hardened.
Xing Tong was the first to react. She quickly operated the robot to Ting Yun, accurately located and picked up the rice-grain-sized crystal, and then excitedly cursed, "Go to hell, you idiot! This is an energy crystal!!!"
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