Chapter 191 – Underground Laboratory (1)
Xu Bingli’s steps noticeably faltered as he approached Yang Hao, then quickened, betraying a hint of impatience.
Tu Ran keenly noticed this.
Xu Bingli lifted one end of the blanket covering Yang Hao and slipped his hand underneath, positioning it just right to block Tu Ran’s view.
Tu Ran was certain he was checking for a wound on the back of Yang Hao’s neck.
Xu Bingli didn’t know she had an inner core and assumed she was ignorant of everything, which was why he so casually concealed his actions.
In reality, the wound on the back of Yang Hao’s neck was her doing.
Tu Ran was puzzled by one thing: the Threshold gate had opened several days ago, and Yang Hao should have returned from within by now, but based on Xu Bingli’s behavior, he seemed unaware of Yang Hao’s existence.
So, from the time the Threshold gate opened until now, in whose hands had the unconscious Yang Hao been?
Xu Bingli was the chief doctor of the Medical Department and also the deputy director.
If the force behind Xu Bingli was responsible, it wouldn’t make sense for them not to inform him about this matter.
There was only one possibility—another force was involved.
Another force was also searching for the inner core.
And who was the representative of this other force within the Medical Department?
Tu Ran thought of Xie Xinyu.
Xie… His surname was Xie.
Tu Ran couldn’t help but wonder if he was connected to one of the three major financial conglomerates—the Xie family.
But if the force behind Xie Xinyu was indeed the Xie family, and the force behind Xu Bingli was not aligned with them, then why would Xu Bingli place Xi Chunzhi under Xie Xinyu’s supervision?
The relationships were complex and intertwined.
Tu Ran suddenly realized that each of them had a force backing them.
To thrive and endure in the Federation, it was essential to be entangled with the three major financial conglomerate families.
Especially since Xu Bingli was an outsider.
Xu Bingli had already placed the pure white blanket back over Yang Hao, his expressionless face showing no emotion as he covered him up again, and then he walked over to Xi Chunzhi’s bedside.
He observed Xi Chunzhi’s condition and adjusted the data on the instruments, his fingers swiftly manipulating the various colored buttons, while chaotic lines surged across the electronic screen.
His actions appeared highly professional, but Tu Ran, a half-trained medical student, couldn’t make sense of it.
However, she was certain that Xu Bingli was just putting on a show—he was trying to fool her.
What she couldn’t understand was why he would waste time deceiving her instead of having the force behind him hide Xi Chunzhi from the start, making it impossible for her to find her.
Perhaps the [Future Prediction] ability had come into play, or maybe she was just too cautious—she constantly had the feeling that a gun was aimed at her from behind.
At some point in the future, the person holding the gun would pull the trigger, aiming directly at her.
Tu Ran shook her head, trying to dismiss this vague sense of impending danger.
Right now, her primary goal was to make contact with Xu Bingli.
As long as she could access his memories, she would have the clues she needed.
Tu Ran slowly moved closer to Xu Bingli.
He was facing away from her, still adjusting the instruments.
A summer breeze blew in through the window, causing the sheer white curtains to flutter in the wind.
In her mind, Tu Ran was concocting a reasonable excuse to touch him.
“Clink!”
A narrow-necked vase sitting on the windowsill was knocked over by the curtain and fell to the floor with a crisp sound. It didn’t break but rolled a few times until it stopped at Xu Bingli’s feet.
The artificial light-pink lily that had been in the vase also fell to the ground.
Xu Bingli glanced at it, paused what he was doing, bent down to pick up the vase, and then reached for the lily, which was two steps away from him.
Tu Ran quickly reacted and reached for the lily as well.
Inevitably, their hands touched.
“Sorry,” Tu Ran said, retracting her hand first.
Xu Bingli responded that it was no problem, picked up the flower, placed it back in the vase, and returned it to the windowsill before continuing to adjust the instrument’s data.
Tu Ran stood by the window, feeling unusually cold as the wind blew against her.
In that brief moment, she had seen so much.
Xi Chunzhi was being wheeled onto an operating table, surrounded by three doctors wearing white coats, masks, and holding scalpels.
Under the bright surgical lights, they skillfully made an incision in the back of Xi Chunzhi’s neck, extracting the inner core hidden between two vertebrae. The inner core was smeared with sticky blood, but its glow remained undiminished, as did the excitement in the eyes of the surgeon holding the scalpel.
After the wound was stitched up, Xi Chunzhi was transferred to another enclosed room.
Where was that room? Tu Ran couldn’t tell.
In Xu Bingli’s memory, the place was square and windowless, with walls on all sides. The ceiling was lined with long strip lights, illuminating the entire room.
The walls were stark white, and four beds were arranged side by side, separated by gray-black curtains. Besides Xi Chunzhi’s bed, which was placed against the wall, the other three beds also had people lying in them, motionless.
Tu Ran couldn’t help but wonder if the other three people had also had their inner cores removed, just like Xi Chunzhi.
When she had exited the Threshold gate this time, she had only noticed abilities in Zhao Yan, meaning that in the entire team of pioneers, only the two of them possessed inner cores.
Previously, she had assumed that the other pioneers simply hadn’t noticed the inner cores. But now, it seemed that it wasn’t a matter of not noticing—the pioneers with inner cores had been secretly detained by the Federal Government.
A chill ran down Tu Ran’s spine.
How did the Federal Government identify who had an inner core and who didn’t?
If they had a reliable method of detection, did that mean they had already discovered that she had an inner core as well?
But judging by Xie Xu’s reaction, he didn’t seem to know that the Federation had such a capability.
There were two possibilities: either Xie Xu’s clearance level wasn’t high enough to access such highly classified information, or she was overthinking things, and the Federation didn’t have such a method of identification.
Tu Ran personally leaned more towards the former possibility.
Xu Bingli only visited that prison-like room occasionally, and each time, he accompanied other people.
It was a tour.
These people were highly cautious, always donning protective suits that completely covered their bodies, leaving only their eyes exposed.
Xu Bingli couldn’t see their faces, and she couldn’t identify who they were either.
But it was clear that they were different individuals.
They would collect five to seven vials of blood from each of the four people lying on the beds. Sometimes, they would wheel one of the individuals away.
Where they took them, Tu Ran didn’t know, as Xu Bingli didn’t follow.
But it was highly likely that they were being taken to a laboratory for more “in-depth” research.
With each visit Xu Bingli made, one person would disappear from the square room, until only Xi Chunzhi remained.
As for where the other three went, Tu Ran didn’t need to think hard to figure it out.
Fortunately, Xi Chunzhi was spared from being taken to the lab.
The last time Xu Bingli entered that square room, it was to wheel Xi Chunzhi out.
He avoided the Medical Department staff, took the elevator, and brought her back to the nutrient pod, submerging her in the nutrient solution again to erase any traces of needle marks on her body. Afterward, she was transferred to the bright, spacious ward where she now lay.
Throughout this entire process, everything Xu Bingli did was carried out under the instructions he received from a private communicator.
