Volume 4: Shadows Under the Neon Lights Chapter 205 Explosion, Dilution, and Evaporation
Victoria was completely stunned. She looked at Ke Lan with blank eyes and pulled the trigger again unconsciously. The bullet flew less than ten centimeters away from Ke Lan's eyes and hit the floor in the distance.
"What happened…it…it exploded?"
"It seems so." Ke Lan wiped the blood off his face and raised his hand to take a look. He was shocked to find that the plasma from the monster seemed to be "diluting itself" - a drop of thick and sticky plasma was on Ke Lan's fingertips and slowly slid down his fingers . When it slid to the base of the fingers, it had turned into a clear liquid like serum, and when it reached the palm of his hand, it looked no different from a drop of clear water.
Ke Lan stretched out his hand and wiped his face again, and all the smelly and sticky pus and blood disappeared, and even the clear water-like liquid evaporated quickly.
The monster disappeared completely, as if it had never existed in this world.
Is this the effect of the "Holy Word"...that gaze...could it really come from the "great god" mentioned by the Alpha civilization?
Ke Lan suddenly remembered something. He touched his face for the third time and rubbed his cheeks vigorously. His palms felt smooth and full. Not only did he not lose any flesh, he didn't even have any wrinkles.
He took out the lens from his pocket and looked at his face in the mirror. Although he looked a little disheveled, there was no sign of aging at all.
However, doesn't using the "Holy Word" require sacrificing one's own vitality?
If what you "pay" is not vitality, then what is it?
Just as Ke Lan was staring at the mirror in a daze, Victoria walked towards Ke Lan. She held the gun in both hands, aiming the muzzle at Ke Lan for a while, then at the ground, and kept The corners of her eyes kept twitching slightly, and her eyes were full of doubt... After brewing for a long time, she squeezed out half a sentence: "You...what did you do?"
"I don't know." Ke Lan shook his head and said.
"Did you just...read that prayer?"
"Yes... but for some reason, I didn't turn into a black skeleton..." Ke Lan said as he took off the protective armor on his body, then took off his coat and the shirt underneath, lowered his head, and carefully examined his body.
There was nothing unusual. Apart from some bruises and scrapes, he didn't have a single serious injury on his body, and he didn't feel any discomfort.
Seeing that there was no change in Ke Lan, the suspicion in Victoria's eyes gradually faded away.
"Maybe... this thing disintegrated on its own and has nothing to do with you..." Victoria thought for a while and finally came to this conclusion.
"The genetic sequences of these artificially created monsters are extremely unstable and there is a risk of collapse at any time... I have seen similar experiments in the research institute. It is not uncommon for ."
"Disintegrate on its own..." Ke Lan did not refute Victoria's guess, because even he himself could not explain what had just happened... That sight, that consciousness... Looking back now, it seemed like just an illusion in the mind, and only some fleeting and vague fragments remained in his memory.
"It's a pity that the wreckage has evaporated... otherwise we could send the samples to the research institute for analysis." Victoria looked at the two "Bloodhound" mechas that were destroyed by the monsters. Even the corrosive liquids generated in the monsters' bodies had completely disappeared at this moment, without leaving any residue.
"Oh, right." Victoria suddenly turned her head and stared at Ke Lan. "Why can you recite those prayers?"
"Huh?" Facing Victoria's sudden questioning, Ke Lan was speechless for a moment... If he hadn't thought that both of them were dead, he wouldn't have made such a choice. But now that the crisis is over, there is no way to get away with this matter...
"Besides, let's not talk about why I didn't hear the specific content of the prayer in that voice... you were standing less than ten meters away from me just now, why didn't I hear anything when you recited that prayer? What exactly did you recite just now... and what language did you use?"
"...the content is about praying to the great gods for blessings and the like. Any follower of a heretical sect can easily say a lot of this kind of 'doctrine'. As for the language, I used my native Chinese. I don't know why you couldn't hear it at all when you were so close...but I can assure you that when I recited this prayer, I used a normal volume." Ke Lan said.
"If it is something that any believer can master, then why is it that only the man in black robe turned into a black skeleton after chanting? Why don't other believers have this ability?" Victoria asked relentlessly.
"How should I know? Besides, I read it, but nothing happened, didn't I?... In my opinion, this may just be a symbolic ritual. The black-robed man's body must have undergone some kind of transformation or there is something inside him that turned him into a black skeleton... just like a container for the Seed of Corrosion." Ke Lan said, and quickly walked in front of Victoria, pointing at the gun in her hand -
"If you think there's something wrong with me, you can kill me right here... Of course, if you don't plan to shoot me, I think we have to hurry up." Ke Lan continued, "Just now, Arasaka Yui said in person, 'The Great Ceremony has been completed'... Although I don't know what this great ceremony refers to, I don't think it will be a good thing."
"You're right. Perhaps killing you directly is the best option." Victoria raised her gun and pointed it at Ke Lan's head... but after two seconds, she lowered her arm again. "Go back to the blockade and take the intelligence here out. Let the troops outside take action quickly... I can handle the next mission alone."
"I refuse." Ke Lan would of course not tell Victoria that the reason he chose to enter the East 9th District was because he heard a call from the depths of his mind, but no matter what, he had to find a convincing reason, "They captured my teammate. Although Arasaka Yui said that he has become a consumable in the experiment, I want to see him alive or dead... If he has also become a monster, I will free him myself."
