As soon as An Yu entered the door, all the freaks froze almost at the same time.
No matter what they were doing, they all stopped what they were doing and looked around with vigilance and confusion, as if they were timidly looking for something.
The human children under supervision were unconscious and continued to eat in silence.
"Sure enough." Qin Zhilu said in the earphone: "Chen Nian didn't lie. All deformed people can feel the huge and frightening existence, and it is difficult to connect you with it just from the appearance. .”
"If they keep looking around like now, sooner or later they will find that the feeling comes from me." An Yu whispered: "We must find Jianxing quickly."
"Yeah. Look at your ten o'clock direction, in the corner. If I'm not mistaken, that's the star."
Qin Zhilu paused as he spoke, "That... little boy with white hair."
An Yu raised his eyes and happened to look at Jian Xing who had inadvertently raised his head for a moment.
At that moment, Jianxing looked away expressionlessly, but An Yu was stunned.
At first glance, Jian Xing did not have any abnormal features, and was no different from the most ordinary human children in the orphanage.
But his face was extremely pale, as if he was suffering from extremely severe malnutrition, and his white hair was disheveled covering his face. Under the broken hair, the dark circles under the eyes were deep, making the golden eyes look very hollow.
He sat in the corner silently chewing compressed biscuits, with countless threads hanging down from the large orphanage uniform he wore.
"It's very similar to you." Qin Zhilu paused, "Although I don't know what you were like before you were eight years old, but... very similar."
Except for hair color and eye color, his and An Yu's facial features are actually not similar. What brings that strong sense of déjà vu is their temperament.
The kind of person who is extremely lonely, with blank but focused eyes, and a desperate temperament like a little animal.
If we really want to talk about the difference, An Yu's eyes are more like a piece of white paper, while Jian Xing is like a piece of paper rolled into dust and stained with some haze.
Qin Zhilu said: "The freaks really keep a distance from him."
"Well..." An Yu's eyes fell to his side, "Except for that person."
The cafeteria was overcrowded, and there were only a few empty tables around Jianxing. The only one who wanted to be next to him was another boy who looked about the same age as him. He sat at the table to his right and broke off most of his cookies. On the table where I see the stars.
Seeing Xing frown and push away, he pushed back again. The two of them pushed back and forth for a long time, and Jianxing threw the biscuit away irritably.
The boy ran over and picked up the biscuit good-naturedly, rubbed it twice with his hands, and stuffed it into his mouth.
When he turned around, An Yu saw the mark on the back of his clothes: 21370226, Ah Yue.
"Your guess seems to be completely valid." Qin Zhilu said.
An Yu frowned and said, "But sir, he is just like Chen Nian. I can't see any signs of abnormality in him."
Just as he was talking, Xing Xing had already stood up and walked towards the recycling area with the tray.
Upon seeing this, Ah Yue quickly poured the remaining half bowl of nutritious soup into her mouth and chased after him.
All the freaks passing by made way for him silently, and Jianxing looked gloomy as he walked quickly through the crowd.
Passing by the bathroom door, An Yu suddenly realized something was wrong.
There was no window or light in the bathroom, and the open door was dark.
But when Jianxing passed by the door, the place suddenly lit up, and as Jianxing's figure passed by, the light slowly shrank until it disappeared.
Everyone in the canteen seemed to be familiar with it. When they left, everyone put away their eyes and continued eating.
An Yu said blankly: "This is..."
"Another material fusion aberration." Qin Zhilu said softly, thoughtfully, "It seems that what he fused is... a lamp?"
An Yu was frozen in place and speechless.
If Jian Xing himself is the lamp, then the protective mechanism exerted on him by the mirror will never be broken - even if he goes to the dark underground like Chen Nian.
There is no way to kill Jian Xing.
Chapter 43 Orphanage with High Deformation Risk·43
There was no one in the cafeteria anymore.
An Yu sat on the seat where Jian Xing had sat, and summarized what he had just discovered with Feng Jian who came to meet him.
Kazama also pushed the compressed cookie he received to him, "Actually, this is not a complete dead end. The key depends on how strong the mirror's protective mechanism is."
An Yu looked at him in confusion while chewing a biscuit.
"I can lock the blood." Kazama explained: "For example, if the blood line is set at 5%, no matter how fast the mirror kills people, my ability will be triggered the moment the target's health drops below 5%, and it will be pulled back to 5%. If the mirror only launches a fatal attack on the target, then my ability is enough to withstand it. But if it continues to attack until the target is dead, then I can't withstand it."
Although Kazama has not yet demonstrated his ability to lock blood, his capable and sincere eyes are particularly trustworthy.
An Yu thought for a while, "If that's the case, wouldn't it be safer to set the blood line at 90%?"
Kazama lowered his head and smiled, "There is no difference in the outcome, but the higher the threshold is set, the greater the consumption will be on me, so it's best not to do it."
An Yu nodded and thought to himself, nannies really care about the loss of ability.
No one has ever confronted a mirror head-on. The people who kill the mirror have to use their lives to test how strong the mechanism of the mirror is, and they must do it neatly.
Fengjian looked at the snow outside the window, as if he was distracted, and after a moment he whispered softly: "Seeing the star, he should have retained the human will."
"Not sure." An Yu shook his head honestly, "But there is a possibility. He does look more humane than a freak."
Kazama smiled bitterly, "In that case, attacking him would be a difficult threshold to cross... Where's the law?"
"Well..." An Yu raised his hand and rubbed his throat gently, "It's nearby."
Fengjian turned around and looked around, "Nearby?"
"right."
An Yu ate the last bite of the biscuit, "By the way, do you think I'm different now than usual?"
Kazama nodded, "Of course. It is recorded on the ladder panel that your ability is 'Advent State', but I didn't expect it to be so powerful. Frankly speaking, I instinctively resisted every step I took towards you. It's like... ..." His eyes paused slightly and he lowered his eyes to the ground, "I am approaching an existence that cannot be approached or looked directly at."
An Yu didn't respond. He stood up, packed the tray, and walked to the recycling area.
Kazama misunderstood that this was not an advent state, but a strange phenomenon that only occurred when the commander was close enough to him, and neither he nor the commander noticed it.
In the earphones, Qin Zhilu said: "Although it is very mysterious, it is at least a way to cover up your attraction to abnormal species and prevent those things from approaching."
"Um."
Slade opened the team channel, "Jianxing and Ah Yue returned to the activity room together after leaving the cafeteria. It seemed that a quarrel broke out. Ah Yue came out alone, and Pat and I were following him."
"Then Fengjian and I will go to the activity room." An Yu asked, "Where did Ah Yue go?"
Pat replied: "He went back to the sleeping nest to get a bag of things, which should be food and water, and planned to go back to the activity room to find Xingxing."
Jiang Xiao also joined in, "Everyone, I just returned to the first floor and found the archives room."
While flipping through the information, he said: "Sure enough, all the information about Xingxing before the accident is stored here. Wait a minute... His records are very thick..."
"21371115, Jianxing. His father is a very rare aberration with a long incubation period -" Jiang Xiao quickly refined the information in the document, "In 2135, he was exposed to infectious fungi in the wild. During the three-month observation period, There was no internal distortion and he was released home. But two years later, he suddenly turned on the fungal distortion. His body was unable to withstand the gene fusion and he died during the distortion process. The next month, his mother suffered the same fate. He was connected when he saw the star. The orphanage."
An Yu recalled the common knowledge about distortions that Ling Qiu had taught him, "People who live together have concealed their distortions for two years. It's impossible to hide from them when they see the stars."
"Not necessarily." Qin Zhilu said in the private channel.
Jiang Xiao said "Hmm" and said, "The people at the orphanage probably made the same judgment. They probably expected that he would be deformed and dealt with soon, and they didn't even fill in the containment plan. When he was first admitted to the hospital, the physical examination was done three times a day, which was very difficult. Exaggeration, here are all his inspection records.”
The sound of turning pages suddenly stopped.
"What's wrong?" An Yu asked.
Jiang Xiao hesitated and said: "Nothing, I just saw the photo..."
He paused for a moment and then continued: "His profile is full of nude photos taken every day, close-ups of various body parts from various angles. Physical examination will inevitably cause some surface trauma, and normal children will be cured every other week. , but the injuries on his body are getting more and more intensive."
Fengjian sighed: "It's a bit pitiful."
Jiang Xiao said, "I remember there was a proposal many years ago to ask Black Tower to fund the implantation of lawful chips for children in orphanages to dynamically monitor genetic entropy and eliminate the need for physical examinations. But at that time, something had happened to the orphanage. There was no response to Black Tower’s proposal.”
The channel fell into silence, with only the sound of Jiang Xiao turning pages.
When he spoke again, his tone suddenly turned cold, "Three months later, Jian Xing still showed no signs of deformation. The people at the orphanage used radical methods to test him for risky genes."
Risk gene testing is an unfamiliar term to An Yu. Although he had been in the orphanage for eight years, he had never heard of it.
In the private channel, Qin Zhilu explained: "It is a kind of test rarely used in orphanages. It can be considered as an induction test for a specific suspected genotype. The principle is similar, but the intensity is very low. Judging from the energy settings, the degree of pain It’s about one percent of what it was in an induction trial.”
An Yu suddenly recalled the heart-wrenching pain.
Energy can be discounted, but one percent pain is hard to imagine.
Jiang Xiao continued: "The risk gene test was conducted once a week for six months, and there were no abnormalities. Because Jianxing had a very serious sensory reaction, the orphanage finally put him on the normal monitoring list in the spring of 2138. Use any extra-standard means again.”
An Yu murmured and repeated: "Sensory reaction..."
In a daze, he suddenly remembered that rainy night in Area 53, in the dark room of the resource station - "Induction experiments can cause strong neurological sequelae, insomnia and nightmares are the most common" - Qin Zhilu was standing at the door like this at that time reminded him.
An Yu underwent an induction test with a complete genetic sequence. Yan Xi said that it was the cruelest of cruelties, but fortunately, he did not suffer any sequelae.
Qin Zhilu connected to the public channel and asked: "What are his symptoms?"
"Insomnia." Jiang Xiao slowed down in turning the pages and looked at the words carefully. "It is said that he would repeatedly replay the pain of genetic testing in his dreams. At first, he could sleep about four hours a night, but later it was shortened to two hours. Until he couldn't sleep at all. Nervous sedatives briefly helped him relieve his symptoms, but they soon became ineffective. He resisted entering the sleeping nest and could only shrink himself in a storage room. The most serious one was that he kept sleeping for ten consecutive times. He didn't sleep for six days, which caused organ failure and almost didn't save him."
"The serious accident occurred in June 2138. His critical condition and coma allowed him to briefly recuperate. After he woke up, the orphanage began to provide him with psychological treatment. The rest are all psychological consultation records -" Jiang Xiao The speed of flipping through the information became faster again, "Jianxing cooperated very well with the psychological consultation. The counselor commented that he was a child with a gentle nature, patience, and strong empathy. He did not have any resentment towards the genetic experiment in the orphanage, but It is therefore particularly difficult to cure.”
"He quickly established trust with the counselor, but the counselor could only use hypnosis and drugs to make him sleep for a short time, but he never really got over the trauma."
The channel was depressingly quiet.
An Yu recalled the meeting he had just seen. He was not as gentle as described in the record. On the contrary, he looked gloomy and behaved erratically.
"Yes." Jiang Xiao pointed at the information, "In August 2138, Ah Yue, an orphan in District D, and Li Yin, the co-teacher, were transferred to District B at the same time. According to the consultant's records, Ah Yue was a person with abundant inner energy. , a child with a giving personality, he was very fond of Jianxing and quickly became Jianxing’s first friend in the orphanage in the past year. Li Yin is a woman in her thirties. Before she came to work in the orphanage, She is a music teacher. She can sing and play the harmonica. Oh, she was Bai Jing's co-teacher when she was in District D. Bai Jing applied to stay in the hospital as a co-teacher, and she also made a recommendation guarantee. Just when she was transferred to It didn’t take long for Bai Jing to stay in the hospital in Area B and it was approved.”
Jiang Xiao read the consultant's evaluation word by word, "Perhaps because Li Yin's age and temperament are similar to Jian Xing's late mother, her piano sound played an incredible role in Jian Xing. After continuously listening to her playing harmonica Three days later, Jianxing fell asleep on his own for the first time in the activity room, sleeping for 48 minutes. The next day, he fell asleep on his own again for 76 minutes."
He quickly skimmed through the long descriptions, "82 minutes, 74 minutes, 90 minutes... 132, 162, 148... Jianxing's self-help sleep time fluctuated and increased. After almost a month, he was able to sleep stably for about four hours. He would initially wake up from nightmares, and Ah Yue would be with him when he woke up. Later, his sleeping time became longer and the frequency of nightmares decreased, but Ah Yue had moved into the activity room and slept with him every night. When I wake up, it can be said that we are inseparable.”
Pat sighed, "Is this kid lucky or unlucky?"
An Yu couldn't understand the pain of insomnia. It was even hard for him to understand that there were people who couldn't sleep.
But from Jiang Xiao's almost stereotyped reading, he vaguely captured the despair of a little boy with white hair and golden eyes like him in that closed storage room more than ten years ago.
"You're still lucky." He replied as if he was talking to himself.
