Underground Laboratory (Supplement I)

Xu Bingli's steps toward Yang Hao visibly faltered, then quickened with barely concealed eagerness.

Tu Ran caught the shift with sharp sensitivity.

Xu Bingli lifted one end of the blanket and slipped a hand inside, the height of his arm just enough to block Tu Ran's view.

Tu Ran was certain he was checking whether Yang Hao had a wound on the back of his neck.

He didn't know she had an inner core, assumed she was oblivious, and so he concealed his movements with this casual lack of effort.

In truth, the injury on Yang Hao's neck was her doing.

One thing puzzled Tu Ran: the Threshold had opened days ago, and Yang Hao should have returned from it several days back as well. But judging by Xu Bingli's reaction, he had no idea Yang Hao even existed.

So from the moment the Threshold opened up until today, who had been holding the unconscious Yang Hao?

Xu Bingli was the chief physician of the Medical Department and its deputy director.

If the force behind Xu Bingli were responsible, there was no reason not to tell him about it.

The only possibility was that another faction was at work.

Another faction was also searching for inner cores.

And who might be that faction's representative within the Medical Department?

Tu Ran thought of Xie Xinyu.

Xie. His surname was Xie.

It made Tu Ran wonder whether he belonged to the Xie family—one of the three great conglomerates.

But if Xie Xinyu's backing was the Xie family, and Xu Bingli's faction was at odds with them, why would Xu Bingli have placed Xi Chunzhi under Xie Xinyu's supervision?

The threads were tangled beyond measure.

Tu Ran suddenly realized that every one of them belonged to some faction.

To thrive in the Federation over the long haul, one inevitably became entangled with the three great conglomerate families.

Especially someone like Xu Bingli, who didn't even bear a major surname.

By now Xu Bingli had set down the pristine white blanket over Yang Hao, smoothed it expressionlessly back into place, and walked to Xi Chunzhi's bedside.

He examined Xi Chunzhi's condition, adjusted the data on the instruments, and his fingers flew over buttons of various colors while jagged lines surged across the electronic screen.

His movements looked highly professional; Tu Ran, a half-baked medical student, couldn't follow them.

But that didn't stop her from knowing full well that Xu Bingli was only putting on a show—he was stringing her along.

As for why he would waste time humoring her instead of having his faction hide Xi Chunzhi away where she could never find her—that, Tu Ran couldn't fathom.

Perhaps it was the "Future Prediction" ability at work, or perhaps she was simply too alert. Either way, she couldn't shake the feeling that a gun barrel was aimed at her back.

At some future moment, the one holding that gun would turn it on her and pull the trigger.

Tu Ran shook her head, casting off that intangible sense of danger.

Right now, her priority was to touch Xu Bingli.

If she could read his memories, everything she needed to know would begin to fall into place.

Tu Ran stepped toward him, one foot at a time.

He was facing away from her, adjusting the instruments.

A summer breeze drifted through the window, and the sheer white curtains danced in the wind.

In her mind, Tu Ran was fabricating a plausible excuse to touch him.

Crack.

A slender-mouthed vase perched on the windowsill was knocked over by the curtains, landing on the floor with a crisp sound. It didn't shatter, but rolled a few turns, coming to rest at Xu Bingli's feet.

The artificial pale-pink lily that had been in the vase tumbled out along with it.

Xu Bingli glanced at it, paused what he was doing, bent down to pick up the vase, then reached for the lily two steps away.

Seizing the moment, Tu Ran also bent to retrieve the flower.

Their hands inevitably touched.

"Sorry." Tu Ran withdrew first.

Xu Bingli said it was no matter, picked up the flower, placed it back in the vase, returned it to the windowsill, and went back to adjusting the instrument readings.

Tu Ran stood by the window, the wind making her feel exceptionally cold.

In that instant, she had seen so much.

Xi Chunzhi was pushed onto an operating table, surrounded by three doctors in white coats, masks, and scalpels in hand.

Beneath the bright surgical lights, they expertly sliced open the back of Xi Chunzhi's neck, extracting the inner core nestled between two cervical vertebrae. The core was slick with sticky blood, yet it couldn't dim its glow, nor the excitement in the surgeon's eyes.

Once the wound was sutured, Xi Chunzhi was transferred to another sealed room.

Where was that room? Tu Ran couldn't tell.

In Xu Bingli's field of vision, the place was square and windowless—four walls all around, with long strip lights covering the ceiling, illuminating the entire space.

The walls were a ghastly white. Four beds stood in a row, separated by gray-black curtains. Besides Xi Chunzhi's spot against the wall, three other occupied beds lay silent in their cubicles.

Tu Ran couldn't help but wonder whether those three had also had their inner cores carved out like Xi Chunzhi.

This time out of the Threshold, she'd only seen abilities on Zhao Yan—out of the entire Pioneer team, only the two of them had inner cores.

She'd previously thought the other Pioneers simply hadn't noticed the cores. Now it seemed they weren't oblivious—rather, the Federal Government had secretly locked away every Pioneer who possessed an inner core in that very place.

A chill ran down Tu Ran's spine.

How did the Federal Government tell who had an inner core and who didn't?

If they possessed a definitive standard, had they already figured out that she, too, had one?

But judging from Xie Xu's reaction, he didn't know the Federation possessed such a thing.

Two possibilities: either Xie Xu's clearance wasn't high enough to know about such an ultra-classified matter, or she was overthinking and the Federation had no such standard at all.

Tu Ran leaned toward the former.

Xu Bingli only occasionally visited that prison-like room, and always accompanying others.

They came to observe.

Those visitors were highly cautious, wrapping themselves in protective suits that covered their entire bodies, leaving only their eyes visible.

Xu Bingli couldn't see their faces, and neither could she identify them.

But she could tell they were different people.

They would draw five to seven vials of blood from the four people lying in bed, and sometimes wheel one of them away.

Where they took them, Tu Ran didn't know—Xu Bingli never followed.

But most likely, they were being brought to a lab for "deeper" research.

With each visit Xu Bingli made, the square room lost one occupant, until only Xi Chunzhi remained.

Where the other three went, Tu Ran didn't need to think to guess.

Fortunately for Xi Chunzhi, her fate wasn't to be wheeled into the lab.

The last time Xu Bingli entered that square room, it was to bring Xi Chunzhi out.

Avoiding the Medical Department's crowds, he took the elevator, returned her to the nutrient pod, and immersed her in nutrient fluid once more—this to erase any lingering needle marks from her body. Then she was moved to the bright, spacious ward she occupied now.

Throughout all of this, every action Xu Bingli took was dictated by instructions from a private communicator.