Chapter 1811: Clues Provided by Dr. Deng
Seeing that he was using a written record instead of a video recording, Xu Huo knew he was still trying to hide more, so he asked directly, "What's the deal with the pregnant xenomorphs? They also degenerated from Zone 010 people."
Here he deliberately blurred the concept of xenomorphs, although he wasn't sure if the xenomorph he saw upon arrival was a Zone 010 person, and he had only seen one such pregnant xenomorph.
This time, what was sent wasn't a message, but an item that could communicate across zones, marked "for loan."
Xu Huo took it out and opened it. After nearly half a minute of waiting, the situation at Rose Castle was projected in front of him.
Dr. Deng's condition was hardly enviable. He was forcibly fixed to a metal chair. Apart from his hands, his legs, feet, neck, chest, and abdomen were all bound by metal bars, each place leaving him only a tiny gap for movement, essentially negligible. And hanging above his head was a water balloon that occasionally dropped down—not particularly harmful, but rather insulting.
The person holding the balloon string wasn't in the frame, but after being thumped once, Dr. Deng said with a belly full of resentment, "How would I know how xenomorphs get pregnant? You should go ask a biologist!"
Xu Huo sympathized with his mood of being toyed with, so he said, "You don't have to talk if you don't want to. But if I can't clear the instance, I'll definitely inform Mr. Dong to sell the lab first. Maintaining the castle costs a fortune every year. He'd certainly be happy to oblige."
Mr. Dong flashed into the frame and politely asked Dr. Deng if he wanted to terminate the communication.
Dr. Deng gritted his teeth in anger, shot Mr. Dong a vicious glare, and then said, "It's true that some xenomorphs are degenerated from humans, but that ratio won't exceed one-third. People who become xenomorphs usually can't reproduce the next generation because the bodily mutations cause most of them to lose sexual drive. The rare exceptions often lack the conditions for reproduction. So the probability of a Zone 010 person degenerating into a xenomorph and then getting pregnant is close to zero."
"I know your tricks. Either you're lying, or the pregnant xenomorph you saw was just an ordinary mutant animal."
"Next time you make up a lie, consult the game data first!"
"Then what is Stellar Pharmaceuticals doing?" Xu Huo interrupted him. "They can't really just be looking for the cause, can they?"
Even just to verify that Black Thorn Disease could completely strip Zone 010 people of their fertility, Stellar Pharmaceuticals would choose different targets for experiments—newly symptomatic people, severely ill people, degenerated people, and even xenomorphs wouldn't be impossible.
"Did the degenerated Zone 010 people undergo other changes in their physiology?"
Dr. Deng's expression gradually calmed. "You're really a devil."
After a pause, he continued, "Back then, someone in the team did propose using normal people and degenerated Zone 010 people for sperm-egg interaction, but that plan wasn't approved. Because judging by the implantation rate of fertilized eggs at the time, even if both parents were relatively healthy people who had only recently fallen ill, the chance of success was extremely slim, let alone degenerated people whose physical condition was even worse."
"Moreover, in the eyes of many medical researchers, although degenerated people can no longer be considered human, they can't be completely treated as animals either. And whether they are human or beast, using normal people to breed with them is a completely bottomless act. No normal person should have such an idea, let alone someone in the pharmaceutical industry."
"Breaking the bottom line is a very dangerous thing."
The game world is full of danger. Unacceptable tragedies might be happening every moment. But on the surface, rules and bottom lines must be observed. Some things can be ambiguous, while others are absolutely forbidden. This is something everyone must abide by. Once the bottom line is openly broken, the civilized order of this world will collapse at the fastest speed—because in many zones, law and morality can no longer maintain social stability. Order is maintained by the strong, and if the collapse of people's moral bottom line cannot be condemned and besieged by a group of equally strong individuals, the last cornerstone of society will shatter.
Xu Huo didn't deny Dr. Deng's words, but after listening, he still asked, "Someone broke this bottom line, didn't they?"
Dr. Deng's face twisted in an instant. No answer was the best answer. Xu Huo ignored his complicated feelings. "Is the friend who gave you the potion still in Zone 010?"
Dr. Deng let out a cold laugh. "He died long ago..."
But before he could finish, Xu Huo pressed on with questions: "Are you sure? When? When was the last time you contacted him? Where?"
"Turn it off! Turn it off!" Dr. Deng immediately called out to Mr. Dong. "I don't want the lab anymore! I will never betray my friend's reputation for personal gain!"
The water balloon dropped onto his head with a splat, and the ice water inside doused the rest of his words.
"Thank you," Xu Huo said to the person not visible in the frame, then addressed Dr. Deng again. "I don't need your friend's privacy, not even his name. Just tell me where the research was done. Also, I can guarantee to keep your friend's information confidential."
Seeing Dr. Deng clamp his mouth shut in a defiant posture, he added, "You should understand that just because no one knows about it doesn't mean he didn't do it, right?"
"When he took action, he had one of two mindsets: either he didn't care about his reputation at all, or he was betting everything on a last-ditch effort, hoping to use the success of this matter to redeem everything."
"His actions can be seen as indirectly confirming your words. The bottom line indeed cannot be broken."
Dr. Deng instantly deflated like a punctured balloon, his spirit and temper shriveling together.
"I won't judge his actions. As a friend, I should be honest and trustworthy."
"But he really should be dead. No contact for the past three years."
"He's dead, and the situation in Zone 010 hasn't changed, proving he failed."
"As for his location, he only mentioned it once. He said he met a player with a black snake tattoo on his face and followed him to his safe zone. That player was willing to support his experiments."
"As for the rest, investigate yourself. I don't know."
"No need to be so regretful," Xu Huo said. "Since he gave you the potion, he probably already found a direction. It might just not have been perfected. Maybe when I get there, I'll find a pile of potions he already prepared."
Dr. Deng snorted and said sarcastically, "Good luck to you."
After Xu Huo hung up, he first searched for relevant information under Dimension. When there were no results, he posted a bounty on the D and C-level player panels seeking traces of a player with a black snake tattoo on his face.
Similarly, he asked the Ying brothers if they had seen such a person. The Ying brothers did give him a clue. Three years ago, when they had just become players, they heard a player passing through CK12 mention such a person, saying he fought fiercely with players from other zones and was eventually driven to the north.
"There aren't many safe zones left in the north," Ying Hai suggested. "You can try looking near Daye Mountain first."
Some people are dead, but not completely dead...