Chapter 257: Ice Age

After letting Muke sleep for two or three hours, both of them woke up with a strong sense of self-management.

Liu Jiayi is rubbing her eyes as she sits on the edge of the bed putting on her shoes, while Bai Liu is fitting her with a better-fitting rash jacket.

Her previous dress had been soiled with blood, so Bai Liu found a smaller size for Liu Jiayi and helped her put it on.

Liu Jiayi's right hand goes through the sleeve of Bai Liu's shirt, while the other throws back the long hair pinned at the back of her neck and jumps under the bed with her jacket in her arm, landing firmly on the ground.

Bai Liu loosens his grip on Liu Jiayi's jacket, and his eyes fall on the consolidated fax record Muke hands him, glancing at it in ten lines.

His gaze paused for a moment on the five words Muke had marked in his translation, and then continued reading as if he hadn't seen anything.

"Looks like the boss we're fighting this time is this scientist named Edmond." Bai Liu handed the file to Tang Erda next to him, and turned to Xiang Muke, "What about the lab report and the diary? Did you filter out any valuable information?"

Muke's face was full of shame: "I'm sorry, I've only roughly understood the contents of these lab reports and diaries, but I'm not sure what they do yet."

"It doesn't matter." Bai Liu said, "What's the lab report about?"

Muke looked up: "The main part of the experiment report is in two sections, the first is the temperature measurements, which are daily temperatures at various Antarctic surface sites and in the marine domain, recorded up to the last month."

Muke rubbed the corner of his forehead in pain: "- the accumulated data is a rather large number, and I have no way of identifying what is useful at the moment."

Bai Liu looked through the section on temperature statistics, which was full of figures and histograms, pie charts and histograms based on the figures, all of which were so long that they had to be assembled in 26 letters in one go, and the graphs and charts were so big that they made one's head spin.

Muke stares helplessly and impotently at the thick pile of charts.

Even though he has a good memory, he still struggles to read this kind of in-depth research on a scientific field - after just one day and one night, he felt like he was dropping 60 mental points.

" Edmond Observatory has flown a large number of weather balloons in the Antarctic interior to monitor temperatures, and has placed a number of positioning buoys in the surrounding waters to measure water temperatures."

Muke rubbed his face and let out a long breath: "Because the construction of future weather models based on overall temperature data is Edmond's speciality, the experimental data is particularly extensive, with nearly six hundred sites deployed for temperature measurements throughout the Antarctic."

" Edmond believes that these six hundred loci are key to the Antarctic's changing world climate, reflecting the effects of ocean currents, stratosphere, solar insolation and crustal movements on temperature, and need to be carefully observed and fed back in time, so these six hundred loci were measured on average three to five times a day from thirty-three years ago to a year and a half ago."

Muke eyed the thick pile of information in Bai Liu's hand with resignation, "-it's just too much, so I haven't finished reading it."

Mu Sicheng listened in disbelief from the sidelines.

Thirty-three years of material, which only Muke, a hard-headed man, would have forced himself to read in one day.

Give him thirty-three years and he won't even finish reading it.

Bai Liu skipped over the topic and asked, " What is Edmond's lab report for the second panel?"

Muke looked straight: "It's biochemical experimental data on the unknown creature X. It lasted from August 7th of the previous year until December, and the experimental records on this section were briefly interrupted during the first two weeks of October, but then it intensified."

"Look here." Muke leans forward to help Bai Liu turn to the lab diary from early October.

"The temperature records were as usual, but the biological experiment records were blank, the media were not photographed and recorded, they were not placed in the culture room for constant temperature incubation, and the growth status of these biological tissues was not recorded, it was in a completely abandoned state."

Muke's finger slides down the report: "But by November, the number of cultures and small tubes had increased dramatically from ten to 300, and cells from other organisms, such as emperor penguins, seals, whales and other creatures, were constantly being called in to mix."

"And - " Muke's finger rests on one of the columns of the table to add cells, his eyes complex, " - 67 human cells. "

Bai Liu looked at the column, "This would be the cells of those researchers at Tarzan Station."

Nodding, Muke slid his thumbnail across the report and explained to Bai Liu in a clear and structured way against the English on this prong.

" - Yes, Edmond used these monsters, grown from human cells, to first carry out part of the basic exploratory experiments, such as division and reproduction, tissue cutting and reculturing, death and destruction conditions, etc - "

Muke is sharp-eyed: "Having established that these monsters have strong learning properties and a tendency to diverge from humans, Edmond reported this fact to the Observatory's political and military controllers in early October, demanding that the research be stopped on the grounds that such experiments were unethical."

"But the other side, in the name of developing military industry, forced Edmond to continue his experiments and demanded that he develop a way to reproduce in large numbers and control these monsters, and they gave Edmond a direction for his research - undead soldiers who could be completely controlled and superb in combat. "

" Edmond put up a fierce resistance and denunciation, scratching his hands and choosing to go on strike."

"On the 3rd of October, Edmond was discovered stealing the chest for the first time, and the superiors placed him under severe punishment; they were not convinced of the danger of the experiment as Edmond had stated, and contemptuously demanded, that you should be so afraid as to think that this thing would lead to the extinction of mankind, then prove it to us yourself."

Muke took a deep breath, "The next day they forced Edmond to eat the biological tissues he had cultivated himself, even though they had already differentiated into their human form, or rather, the form of a human infant."

" Edmond began to experience severe psychological trauma and I found him in the infirmary to begin a large number of, frequent requests for his doctor to prescribe him antidepressant medication for his visit records and, according to his doctor's diagnosis, Edmond was suffering from severe symptoms of drug dependency while his experiments progressed by leaps and bounds as his drug intake intensified. "

"On October 15, Edmond tried a second time to steal the case, but the man in charge of the joint, his pupil, betrayed him."

"So once again he was discovered and thrown upon the sentries for punishment by his furious superiors, for his body was no longer considered human, and so the superiors ordered - [No need to harbour useless mercy for him towards humans, torture him in his favourite way of biological experimentation! ."

Muke speaks quickly: "The ordeal seems to have spurred him on and on 28 October Edmond was [acquitted] from two weeks of torture."

"On October 29, Edmond's antidepressant medication became heavier and heavier after a long, closed-door conversation between his superiors and Edmond."

"According to the infirmary's diagnosis, he seemed to be showing certain schizophrenic symptoms and multiple personality disorder, and would pull on the doctor in a neurotic fantasy that he was from Tarzan Station, occasionally howling and begging for someone from Tarzan Station to come and rescue him, hissing that he didn't belong in this sinful, observatory named after him."

"But it seems he figured it out and began to obey the instructions of his superiors, and he began to work out how to make these monsters that were produced obey the leader and at the same time be brave enough to charge on the battlefield."

"- this is the result of Edmond's research - the memory hypnosis experiment." Muke said, pointing to a file stamped with a bright red, top secret, double-stamped header.

He looked to Bai Liu: "Take a look, this experiment is the most valuable information I think."

Bai Liu looks down at the document Xiang Muke is pointing at.

The memory hypnosis experiment was based on one of Edmond's early paper deductions - what is the difference between humans and other humanoid intelligence species?

In the long, 300 million year history of human development, why have only humans developed to such a scale, and why have other species with the same potential for development not been able to survive on Earth in the same highly intelligent state as humans?

Why did these species go extinct? And why did humans survive?

And if there is a species that is not extinct, that has the same, if not more, superior intelligence than humans, that has developed in the shadows, what exactly is the difference between them and humans?

Edmond's answer is that humans have a tendency towards civilization and community.

-- [It is the fear and reverence we feel for the lives of those who have also passed away in our tribe, the compassion we feel for those who share our group fate and struggle to survive, and the ability to help each other and keep each other warm that has kept us alive to this day].

[We have been given by God the subconscious to create civilization in our survival instincts].

This theory was the conclusion of a long-ago paper by Edmond, and in this experiment Edmond adds the second half of the sentence to that conclusion -

[I apologise for my previous rash conclusion that our survival instincts also have the subconscious to destroy civilisation].

[Unfortunately, this awareness is far stronger than the other.]

[I will use the method of hypnosis to endow these newborn humans with both subconscious minds].

[But if these two subconscious existences are not carried in a rational, realistic memory framework, these newly born children (kids) will go mad with self-contradiction, for they are "born" to create and then destroy, and no creature but man exists for such a frivolous purpose. The]

[My leader told me that if I could produce the cutting-edge soldiers he wanted, he would meet all my demands, including letting me obtain all the memories of a person's life and input them into the brains of these monsters, then using all kinds of information to induce them to think that they were a "man" defending their country, so that they would spend their lives fighting for so-called justice fighting for so-called justice.

[This reminds me of my friend].

It was only then that I awoke to the fact that my friend, who had died in agony and repentance all my life, had been one of the subjects of the experiments of these high and mighty men, and that I was about to become what he hated most - to lead a group of innocent "human beings" who thought they were creating the future, to the abyss called destruction. "to the abyss called destruction."]

The back of the experiment report details how the memories of these people were injected into the monster's brain, and most importantly -

"These monsters are not cognizant that they are monsters." Muke smiled bitterly, "That's why we don't have a way to get at you, Bai Liu, because we're not sure if we're really monsters or not."

Mu Sicheng hugged his shivering self: "No, how did they get our memories?!"

"Mental suggestion and hypnosis." Bai Liu flexed his fingers and tapped on the paper, dropping his eyes, his eyes obscure Buming, "It is likely that we were unconsciously ingested memories when we came into contact with this monster Edmond, which is most likely the skill of this monster called Edmond."

Mu Sicheng is confused: "But we haven't seen this Edmond monster from the beginning to the end, have we? My monster book didn't light up a new page either-"

"--fuck when did it light up?!" Mu Sicheng stunned, "I swear I just saw my monster book all still dark! How come it's lit up now when I open it."

Muke also quickly opened his monster book and blushed when he saw it, "Mine lit up with a new page too, and its skills are really mental suggestion and hypnosis."

"Guess we'll have to realize it ourselves to break this guy's hypnosis." Bai Liu gave Mu Sicheng a faint look, "And, while it's true that we haven't met this mysterious Edmond-sensei, did you forget that the monsters here can shape-shift on their own?"

Mu Sicheng was stunned and muttered a question, "Yes oh, it will transform, who will he become ......"

Bai Liu looks at the document in his hand and picks up the tip of his pen and scratches on it.

"I think there is another strange point in this experiment, the human cell suspension X cells started to be cultured in November, Edmond station should be heavily guarded at that time, Edmond was imprisoned in the basement all day to do experiments, it is difficult to access the personnel of Tarzan station, how did he get these cells from the Tarzan station team and then take them back to do experiments? "

Muke didn't think twice: "Could it be that someone on the Tarzan side of the station is secretly meeting Edmond and stealing the cells from him?"

Bai Liu shook his head thoughtfully, "There should be someone on this side of Tarzan Station to meet him, but stealing the cells over, I don't think it's likely."

" - a group where there is betrayal is like a stained white cloth in Edmond's eyes, which doesn't fit Edmond's group aesthetic of helping each other trust each other."

"If Tarzan Station did have an inside man stealing cells for him, Edmond might instead have just killed everyone at Tarzan Station, rather than choosing to preserve them as the spark of human continuity."

Muke frowned: "But how could Edmond have easily taken the cells of everyone at Tarzan Station without the cooperation of someone on his side?"

"Is it possible that Edmond transformed into someone from the Tarzan station who infiltrated the observatory and took advantage of the opportunity to get the others' cells?" Liu Jiayi, next to him, opened his mouth and asked.

"I had the idea." Bai Liu mused, "but by that time, the men of Tarzan Station had been stuck in the polar regions for a year and a half, dozens of them facing each other night and day in a confined field, and were so familiar with each other that it was obvious who had shaved a day less."

"Even if Edmond turned out to be someone, without the appropriate day-to-day memories, it would be difficult to muddle through on the basis that the Tarzan Observatory team knew by fax that Edmond was conducting some sort of bionic human experiment."

Bai Liu said softly, "Unless he had made a fused memory, a perfect [Tarzan Station crew], to help him blend in back in November."

Liu Jiayi's expression is also cold - Bai Liu is indeed right.

She frowned and retorted, "But the timing is wrong, according to the lab report, it takes at least a month to grow a mature body Edmond made the first completed body with human memories in December, and all the experiments before the end of October were destroyed by him."

Bai Liu flipped forward two pages of the lab report, his eyes settled on a particular page and narrowed, "There's still a monster he hasn't destroyed."

Thinking he had missed it, Muke subconsciously asked, "- which one?"

Bai Liu raised his eyes, "Himself."

"I suspect that Edmond began fusing his memories to himself as well in early October, which is why he started having mental problems around that time, and by November, when the fusion was largely complete, his psychotic symptoms were getting worse, which is why the doctors diagnosed him with multiple personality disorder."

"- not actually multiple personalities, but memories of two people existed in his brain and he couldn't tell who he really was." Bai Liu said calmly, "And Edmond used these fused memories to morph into someone from Tarzan Station and managed to infiltrate the station and steal the cells from the rest of the team."

"And Edmond used this to his advantage, hiding inside this team member's body, silently engaging with us, hypnotising and psychologically implicating us, taking away our memories and swiftly carrying out the next experiments."

Bai Liu intones, "What a highly capable researcher."

Mu Sicheng gulped nervously, "So who did he turn out to be?"

Bai Liu looked at him lightly, "Isn't the answer obvious? Isn't there only one person at Tarzan who has been in contact with both you and us?"

Liu Jiayi recalled with a jolt the overly enthusiastic and excited graduate student who said, "Fang Xiaoxiao ?" when they arrived.

--------

Outside Tarzan Station in a snowstorm.

Fang Xiaoxiao's face was one of great age and change. He glanced away from the brightly lit observation room, and in the next moment these expressions faded away again to a clean and clear one.

He looked behind him in the snow and wind at the crippled Tarzan Station crew, muddy and painfully hot tears welling up in his eyes as he led the hapless group of test subjects deeper into the ice fields.

The polar night is coming.