NABC Chapter 31 Symbiotic Trap
Chapter 31 Symbiotic Trap
The air in the basement seemed to freeze.
The red countdown numbers danced on the projection wall, glaringly bright like a pool of blood about to dry. [00 hours and 15 minutes remaining until nerve death]
"Lin Yu, there's no time left." Acha's voice trembled slightly as she looked at Su Ya and Lin Mo, whose faces were ashen, on the hospital bed. "If we don't synchronize their neural pathways, they really will die."
Lin Yu clenched his fists, his knuckles turning white. He knew how crazy this decision was. Neural connection surgery was extremely risky; the slightest mistake could lead to brain death, let alone for two experimental subjects who had been implanted with the virus.
"Do it." Lin Mo suddenly spoke, his voice hoarse and weak, but his eyes were unusually firm. "Don't hesitate."
Although Suya was in too much pain to speak, she looked into her brother's eyes and nodded gently.
Lin Yu took a deep breath and nodded heavily: "Let's begin."
The operating room doors slowly closed.
As the instrument hummed, their consciousnesses were forcibly pulled into a hazy virtual space—their shared neural network world.
There is no light, no sound, only a desolate ruin.
Suya stood blankly in the ruins, surrounded by broken glass and cold metal walls. She felt a strange fear, as if something extremely terrible had happened here.
"Brother?" she called out tentatively.
"I'm here."
Lin Mo emerged from the shadows, but he looked different than usual. His eyes were vacant, and his face wore a chilling numbness.
"Where is this?" Suya asked, trembling.
"This is...our memories," Lin Mo said softly, his gaze falling on a pool of dark red blood in the center of the ruins. "It's also our hell."
Suddenly, the surrounding scenery began to distort.
The once desolate ruins suddenly came alive. Blinding operating lights flashed, and sirens blared. A group of figures in white coats ran frantically around, their faces etched with fear.
"Quick! B-01 and B-02 are out of control!"
"Inject a sedative! Quickly!"
Suya stared in horror at the scene before her. She found herself and Lin Mo standing in front of a huge incubation chamber. The chamber door was open, revealing several children of similar age lying inside, their bodies covered in tubes, their eyes vacant.
"No...this isn't real..." Suya covered her ears, trying to escape.
But Lin Mo grabbed her; his hand was as cold as a stone.
"Watch," Lin Mo's voice was cold and devoid of any emotion. "This is our forgotten past."
The video sped up again.
Young Lin Mo and Su Ya, each holding a sharp scalpel, walked expressionlessly toward their "brothers and sisters" lying in the incubation chambers.
"Kill them."
"For survival."
The cold, mechanical sound echoed in the space of consciousness.
"No! Don't!" the adult Suya screamed, trying to stop her younger self.
But nothing can be changed.
Young Lin Mo plunged a knife into a boy's chest, and blood gushed out instantly.
The young Suya slashed the knife across a girl's throat, leaving the girl unable to even scream.
One by one.
One after another.
Those children who were once locked in cages just like them, those "brothers and sisters" with the same tragic fate, were wiped out like ants in their hands.
massacre.
A brutal and inhumane massacre.
In the end, only Lin Mo and Su Ya remained in the entire laboratory. They were covered in blood, standing amidst the pile of corpses, their eyes devoid of sorrow, only empty.
"Why..." Suya slumped to the ground, tears blurring her vision. "Why did we do this..."
Lin Mo looked at his hands and could almost feel the sensation of the blade piercing his flesh back then.
"Because of 'Doctor'," Lin Mo's voice was terrifyingly low, "this is the 'graduation exam.' Only those who survive are qualified to leave that hell. If we don't act, we'll be the ones who die."
"No... I don't believe it..." Suya clutched her head in anguish, a flood of memories overwhelming her reason.
Just then, the surrounding scenery suddenly shattered.
The two were forcibly ejected from the neural network and returned to the real world.
"Cough cough—!"
Suya suddenly opened her eyes, gasping for breath, her back soaked in cold sweat. She turned her head and looked at Lin Mo, who had also just woken up; their eyes met in mid-air.
That gaze no longer held simple familial affection, but was mixed with endless fear, guilt, and... disgust.
"Brother..." Suya reached out her hand, trembling, wanting to touch him.
Lin Mo instinctively shrank back.
"Don't touch me." Lin Mo turned his head away, not daring to look her in the eye. "My hands... are covered in their blood."
This is the scene that Lin Yu and Acha saw when they rushed into the ward.
Although the brother and sister were physically close, their hearts seemed to be separated by an insurmountable chasm.
"How is it? Did the synchronization go smoothly?" Lin Yu asked eagerly.
Looking at the stable waveform on the monitor screen, Acha breathed a sigh of relief: "The virus synchronization was successful, they are safe for now."
But Lin Yu keenly sensed that something was wrong with the atmosphere. Looking at Su Ya and Lin Mo's pale faces and the undisguised despair in their eyes, he felt a sense of foreboding.
"What...did you see?" Lin Yu asked in a deep voice.
Suya lowered her head, tears falling onto the pristine white sheets.
Lin Mo kept his eyes tightly closed and uttered two words in a hoarse voice:
"Butcher."
These two words were like a heavy hammer, striking everyone's heart hard.
It turns out that their perceived status as "victims" was nothing but a false pretense. Before the fire, they had already become executioners, personally slaughtering their comrades, under the control of "The Doctor."
This memory is a curse more terrifying than any virus.
Lin Yu clenched his fists as he looked at the tormented brother and sister. He knew that to completely destroy the "Phoenix" organization, they must first overcome the demons within themselves.