A Monster Unlike Anything Ever Heard Of
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Zhou Jiao’s back was suddenly drenched in a cold sweat.
She knew her speculation was most likely true—Jiang Lian’s attitude toward her before and after the parasitic infection was the best evidence.
—Before he was infected, her body hadn’t shown these strange reactions.
Could it be that the mutated worm the special agents extracted from his body was just a decoy? To make them think the source of contamination inside him had been eradicated?
Zhou Jiao didn’t dare to think further, nor did she have time to—the corpse was temporarily immobilized by the Taser’s dart, and she had to escape as quickly as possible.
The question was, should she take Jiang Lian with her?
If Jiang Lian wasn’t infected, wouldn’t leaving him behind mean letting him wait here for death?
That would be against protocol.
Zhou Jiao pressed her lips together, hesitating.
At the same time, although the corpse wasn’t advancing, the buzzing sound emitted by the “snake” grew increasingly sinister and frenzied, sending chills down her spine and making her entire body feel cold.
It was clear that if she didn’t make a decision soon, she would never get the chance to.
Forget it—innocent until proven guilty.
Once she made up her mind, Zhou Jiao pushed all her speculations aside and pressed the button to open the decontamination chamber door.
With a hiss of releasing air pressure, the airtight metal door slowly opened.
To her surprise, Jiang Lian was standing behind the door, his thin gold-rimmed glasses glinting faintly, as if he had been waiting there all along for her to open it.
Whether it was psychological or not, the moment she faced Jiang Lian, a sharp, piercing chill shot up the back of her neck.
Her heart raced, her breathing grew labored, and her throat tightened.
Slick, cold sweat seeped from her palms.
Like prey caught in the gaze of a venomous snake, every hair on her body stood on end, her limbs stiffened, and she dared not move a muscle.
…She didn’t know what she had been thinking before, actually believing this feeling was a sign of affection for him.
In the darkness, the corpse seemed to have broken free from the Taser’s electrodes and was staggering toward them.
The sound of dripping mucus echoed through the pitch-black laboratory, conjuring terrifying images and making her want to turn and run.
But she couldn’t run.
—Her legs were stiff and numb, immobile.
Zhou Jiao felt she might be going insane. In this dire situation, she actually felt a hint of unprecedented excitement.
Her life had been too peaceful.
In earlier years, she could still rely on dissecting mutated corpses to experience fear, but the senses are subject to diminishing returns. Over time, she looked at those corpses the same way she looked at frozen raw meat—no longer feeling that heart-pounding terror.
Though Jiang Lian was shrouded in layer upon layer of mystery, he had undeniably given her a thrill she had never experienced before.
Just then, Zhou Jiao suddenly realized she could move her limbs again.
In that moment, dozens of thoughts flashed through her mind, each one brimming with an ominous aura.
In the end, she followed her intuition, pressed the close-door button of the disinfection room, and raised her head to say to Jiang Lian, “Stay inside, don’t come out!”
Then, she decisively turned her head and ran.
How could she not run!
The biological instinct for survival was screaming danger. If she still couldn’t tell that Jiang Lian had a problem, then she was the one with a problem!
Liking excitement didn’t mean she was willing to die for it!
She didn’t know what was parasitizing Jiang Lian’s body, but anything that could disguise itself as a normal person for so long was definitely not an ordinary mutant species—according to what she knew, most high-level mutant species did not possess human-like thinking abilities.
Jiang Lian was very likely an X-type mutant species that had never been seen before.
Zhou Jiao didn’t dare to look back and almost used all her strength to run in Xie Yuezhe’s direction.
Ahead was pitch black; she couldn’t see anything. The unknown darkness triggered a physiological fear, and fear stimulated the imagination—so, even though she clearly didn’t see anything, Zhou Jiao inexplicably felt as if countless pairs of eyes were staring straight at her from within the darkness.
Fortunately, she was very familiar with the laboratory, so even in total darkness, she didn’t delay her escape. If this were an unfamiliar place, before she even started feeling her way forward, she might have been scared to death by her own imagination.
She didn’t know if it was just her illusion, but halfway through her run, she suddenly felt a cold breath, like a shadow following her closely, faintly spraying onto the back of her neck.
Her scalp tingled involuntarily.
…She had to find Xie Yuezhe as soon as possible!
This wasn’t because she thought Xie Yuezhe had the ability to help them escape their current predicament, but rather, it was an instinct of living beings when encountering danger.
—The instinct to reunite with one’s own kind.
The moment this thought flashed through her mind, her wrist was suddenly grasped by an ice-cold hand.
Zhou Jiao shuddered and almost screamed.
Luckily, her survival instincts were strong, and she forcibly swallowed back the frightened cry.
“…Xie Yuezhe?”
The other party paused for a few seconds. “It’s me.”
Zhou Jiao let out a sigh of relief. “Finally found you.”
Xie Yuezhe seemed to be sizing her up but didn’t speak.
He was very close to her, his icy breath pricking her face like needles, sending an unsettling tingle through her skin.
Wait.
Icy breath?
Zhou Jiao’s breath hitched, her heart thudding heavily twice in her chest. Without making a sound, she moved one hand behind her back, flipped her palm, and a sharp scalpel appeared in her grasp.
Clutching the scalpel, Zhou Jiao softly asked, “Xie Yuezhe, why aren’t you speaking?”
With every word she spoke, her body tensed a little more, like a fully drawn bow, ready to strike at any moment.
If Xie Yuezhe’s next words gave her even the slightest sense of unease, this knife would be plunged into him without hesitation.
But Xie Yuezhe’s reaction was completely beyond her expectations.
Only the faint rustling sound of fabric rubbing against fabric could be heard, followed by a crisp “click” as a burst of orange-red firelight illuminated their close-proximity faces.
Xie Yuezhe had lit a lighter.
Zhou Jiao met his gaze and was slightly startled—it was indeed Xie Yuezhe himself.
However, she did not put away the knife but continued asking, “Just now, were you the one following me?”
Her tone was cold, full of aggression, yet Xie Yuezhe did not get angry. He slowly nodded. “Yes.”
“Why were you following me?”
Xie Yuezhe pondered for a moment before slowly saying, “I wanted to know whether you are still Zhou Jiao.”
“What do you mean?” Zhou Jiao asked.
Xie Yuezhe said, “High-level mutant species have the ability to parasitize. I don’t believe it only parasitizes corpses and not living humans.”
Zhou Jiao’s expression turned a little strange. “It indeed does not only parasitize corpses.”
Xie Yuezhe paused. “Explain.”
Zhou Jiao voiced her speculation. “Jiang Lian has also been parasitized. Moreover, I suspect he has been parasitized for longer than the corpse. In fact, the corpse being parasitized might be because of him.”
A few seconds of silence passed.
Suddenly, Xie Yuezhe reached out, pinched her chin, and examined her face carefully under the firelight. “Is that why you didn’t seek his help—because he was parasitized?”
Zhou Jiao was momentarily stunned and frowned. “What?”
The firelight cast upon Xie Yuezhe’s face, yet it did not add the slightest warmth to his features.
On the contrary, his brow bones, nose bridge, and lip corners seemed shrouded in a layer of eerie shadows, creating a twisted and horrifying sense of distortion.
Xie Yuezhe stared at her unwaveringly. “When the elevator doors opened, I saw your lips pressed together. He was holding your chin just like this, receiving your scent information. Your relationship was so intimate—why didn’t you seek his help and instead came to me, an ‘outsider’?”
Zhou Jiao found his wording extremely bizarre. “I didn’t seek your help.”
“You did.” Xie Yuezhe’s face remained rigid and cold. His fingers tightened slightly, as if reminding her to look at him. “Your first reaction when facing danger was to come to me—do you like me? Admire me? Or do you also want to press your lips against mine?”
After hearing this, Zhou Jiao really wanted to slap him.
But very quickly, she realized something was off.
First, under normal circumstances, Xie Yuezhe would not ask such an offensive question.
Second, Xie Yuezhe would never describe a “kiss” as “lips pressed together” and “receiving your scent information.” Though the latter wording did stir a sense of shame in her, she did not believe a mentally sound adult would deliberately choose such an awkward way to phrase it just to make her feel embarrassed.
Only a mutant species completely unfamiliar with kissing would describe a “kiss” this way.
Lastly, the firelight betrayed him.
Even though all his questions revolved around her, his expression gradually turned cold and stiff, filled with an eerie inhumanity. By the time he asked the last sentence, his Adam’s apple uncontrollably bobbed as he swallowed a mouthful of saliva.
As if savoring something.
There was only one person who would stare at her with such an expression of reminiscence.
—Jiang Lian.
Only he could be this twisted.
Of course, she was now certain that he was an “it.”
Zhou Jiao couldn’t help but laugh.
She reached out and grasped “Xie Yuezhe’s” hand that was holding the lighter, her thumb gently rubbing against the finger he had pressed on the wheel. She softly said, “That’s right, I want to ‘press my lips against yours.’”
A strange spasm flickered across “Xie Yuezhe’s” face. His eyes moved, shifting to look at her thumb. “Why?”
Zhou Jiao also wanted to know—why did he care so much about whether she wanted to kiss Xie Yuezhe?
Who she kissed, what did that have to do with him?