You, a living person, are telling me I've served in the underworld for ten years?

The internal structure of the enormous warehouse rapidly took shape in my mind.

The towering automated shelving areas, the temperature- and humidity-controlled special storage areas, the automated sorting lines, the aisle signs for each area, the coverage angles and blind spots of the surveillance cameras, the managers with name tags patrolling around and the actual security personnel... all these details have been meticulously recorded.

He saw a higher-level packaging room hidden deep at the end of the conveyor belt, and occasionally saw people wearing white coats who didn't look like workers going in and out of specific small passageway elevators.

They also noticed that even a seasoned slacker like Li would inexplicably curb his lazy demeanor when working in certain areas, and would even stop smoking.

Sweat dried and then soaked again, soaking and then drying again, leaving a layer of white, alkaline residue on the back of the work clothes. At six o'clock in the evening, the shrill sound of the end-of-get off work bell rang throughout the warehouse area, and the huge space, which had been noisy all day, seemed to breathe a sigh of relief.

Exhausted, I followed the flow of people, swiped my work badge, handed in my equipment, and underwent a simple scan to leave my post. Stepping out of the huge, iron-gray gate, the hustle and bustle, mixed with the smell of sweat and dust, was left behind.

Chen Yang did not immediately wait for the company's temporary worker shuttle bus. Instead, he took the opportunity to stroll leisurely in the huge parking lot outside the warehouse area while waiting for the bus. His gaze, however, was fixed on the outline of Warehouse No. 7, which resembled a huge fortress, as if it were a scanner.

He confirmed the external locations of the special passageways he had observed during the day, the window layout, and the shift change times and routes of the security guard posts corresponding to the core area.

Night is the best camouflage.

……

Midnight.

The daytime hustle and bustle completely subsided, with only the giant lights on the perimeter of the warehouse emitting pale beams of light that pierced the heavy night.

The massive building, like a lurking steel behemoth, exudes a cold, wary aura.

A figure, almost blending into the shadows, moved like a ghost, bypassing the regularly spaced beams of searchlights and avoiding the infrared sensor triggers, silently traversing the blind spots of the surveillance cameras. The movements were precise, swift, and stealthy, each step landing precisely on the gaps in the electronic defense array.

Dressed in dark work clothes resembling night clothes, with a special mask covering his face to block all infrared signatures, Chen Yang slipped into the interior of Warehouse No. 7 like a gentle breeze through a huge exhaust vent.

The warehouse wasn't pitch black; the tall safety indicator lights and emergency lights in the distance emitted a faint glow, outlining the blurry silhouettes of the massive shelving, making the space feel even more empty and eerie.

The air still carried the scent of dust from the day and a faint smell of engine oil.

The three-dimensional map he had meticulously memorized during the day unfolded clearly in his mind.

Silently navigating the maze of shadows created by the massive shelving, avoiding the few but very well-hidden night-vision rotating cameras.

His perception was heightened to the extreme, and he could clearly distinguish any faint aura or the "heartbeat" of electronic devices within a dozen meters around him.

After nearly twenty minutes of navigating around all the security checkpoints, Chen Yang finally arrived at the administrative office area located in a corner of the warehouse's top floor.

The office area was eerily quiet.

The first thing he pried open was the door to the administrative director's office. The interior was so clean it was almost monotonous; apart from office supplies, there were almost no personal belongings. The computer was a bastion host with biometric authentication and multi-factor authentication, and the safe was a specially made military-grade device; forcibly opening it would inevitably trigger a chain of alarms.

He quickly scanned the area, including the drawer compartments, the back of the filing cabinet, the wall paintings, the sofa cushions... he even carefully examined the air conditioner vents—they were as clean as if they had been washed, with no valuable documents, record cards, or USB drives.

Even the trash cans are electronic sensor bins that are emptied daily.

I visited the offices of four or five key middle management positions: the CTO's office, the scheduling supervisor's office, the HR manager's office… and the situation was identical! Clean, standardized, electronically digitized, and physically spotless. It was as if everything that might leave a trace had been strictly confiscated or restricted from storage here.

If it weren't for the faint smell in the air, a mixture of printer toner and coffee, unique to office areas, Chen Yang would almost have suspected he was in the wrong place.

"There's a problem...it's too clean."

Chen Yang stood in the shadows of the empty corridor, his brow furrowed. No ordinary company could achieve this level of efficiency, unless all substantial information wasn't stored in the physical space, or… the true core wasn't even on this floor!
His gaze fell on the large office at the end of the corridor, which was almost twice as wide as the other offices, with heavy double solid wood doors and an elegant carpet at the entrance—the general manager's office.

The door has a dual structure of electronic lock and mechanical combination lock.

Without hesitation, Chen Yang took out a specially made electronic decoder and an ultra-thin metal wire. The electronic decoder flashed a green light for a few seconds, silently breaking through the electromagnetic barrier of the electronic lock.

Meanwhile, his ear was pressed against the cold lock cylinder, the metal wire at his fingertips vibrating at an extremely high frequency and with an extremely subtle amplitude, as if engaging in a silent communication with the lock's internal structure, a communication beyond human comprehension. Click!
With a barely audible click, both locks opened simultaneously.

I pushed open the door and slipped inside. A faint, luxurious scent of cigar smoke mingled with the aroma of some kind of high-end leather conditioner wafted out. The office was furnished in a lavish yet stark manner, with a massive mahogany desk behind a floor-to-ceiling electronic monitoring screen that offered a panoramic view of most of Warehouse No. 7's operations.

A huge leather executive chair, surrounded by bookshelves displaying hardcover business books with gold-embossed covers and several artistic modern ceramic pieces.

Chen Yang moved even faster.

He was no longer confined to drawers and cabinets; he lifted the huge desk a small inch off the carpet to examine the hidden compartments beneath it; every tiny crevice of the inlaid bookshelves was explored with his sharp senses and fingertips.
The exquisite abstract paintings were lifted to inspect the walls; every access panel in the ceiling was opened for examination; even the gaps in the executive chairs, the bottom of the sofas, and the hidden internal support columns of the leather chair legs were explored…

Still spotless! The computer, too, was a heavily encrypted bastion host. The safe was embedded in the thick bookshelf wall behind the boss's chair; judging by its materials and lock, it was several orders of magnitude higher than those in the directors' offices. The risk of forcibly opening it was exponentially higher. His last glance fell on the relatively ordinary-looking internal telephone on the boss's desk, and an exquisite brass globe pen holder. A careful examination yielded nothing.

He dared not touch those pottery pieces lightly, for fear they might be some kind of trigger-type alchemical artifacts.

Nothing was gained!
Standing in the center of the spacious, cold office, Chen Yang surveyed the luxurious yet empty surroundings, a wave of suffocating frustration washing over him. Had the trail gone cold? Had he gone in the wrong direction? Was this really just an overly pristine logistics center?
wrong!

The white coats seen during the day, the feeling that even seasoned veterans would restrain themselves in certain areas, and the abnormal energy protective layer nested inside the electronic fence!
These are all extraordinary!
There must be something deeper, something that is carefully hidden!
He forced himself to calm down and suppress the surging agitation.

Since there are no flaws in the "respectable" places above ground, let's go to those "dark corners" that can't see the light of day!
He quietly left the general manager's office and put the door lock back on.

This time, his target was no longer the glamorous office, but the security patrol team dressed in plain clothes, with sharp eyes, equipped with lightweight alloy stab-proof vests and tactical flashlights that were clearly not those of ordinary logistics security guards, and with non-standard short-sheathed weapons on their waists!

These are the real "night watchmen"!
Their footprints may point to the core.

Chen Yang, like a persistent carbuncle, silently followed behind a three-person patrol team that had just finished technical maintenance in front of the elevator door.

These people were extremely vigilant, their formation was loose yet subtly coordinated within the coverage area, their walkie-talkies remained silent, and their patrol routes were not simple horizontal loops, but rather vertical passages covering multiple warehouses at different levels.

Chen Yang had to devote most of his attention to concealing himself and anticipating gaps in their cover, making the tracking extremely difficult.

After pressing the signal feedback buttons at several key warehouse nodes, the team did not head towards the elevator leading to the core office area or the main passage. Instead, they bypassed several huge container yards and went to a rather secluded corner against the wall, which was usually used to store pallets and expired packaging materials.

In the corner was an inconspicuous fire safety door, painted the same gray-white as the walls.

The sign on the door reads "Old Equipment Area, Entry Strictly Prohibited".

The squad leader held his walkie-talkie close to an inconspicuous, old-fashioned socket on the access control system. The screen flashed red, then briefly switched to green to scan the squad leader's iris.

Without a sound, the fire door slid open slightly, just wide enough for one person to pass through, revealing a dark space behind it.

The three entered in single file, and as soon as the last person entered, the fire door closed instantly, sealing it perfectly.

Chen Yang's pupils contracted slightly! It wasn't the equipment area! The sensor light behind the door revealed a fleeting glimpse of light as the door opened and closed—it was clearly an extremely clean passageway leading underground, with steel grating steps! The extremely faint yet familiar smell in the air—a mixture of disinfectant and some kind of chemical agent!

The basement! The underground of Warehouse No. 7 is indeed a hidden world!
Those white coats... elevator technicians... the core secrets must be hidden underneath!
In the blink of an eye, Chen Yang's body moved like a boneless gecko, swiftly swimming upwards along the wall, avoiding the gaze of the only rotating camera that might have swept over this corner.

Then, he glided upside down to the main entrance of the huge ventilation duct.

The ventilation ducts here are so large that an adult can crawl around in them.

He reached his hands onto the cold alloy mesh cover, releasing a slight burst of internal energy. After a few extremely subtle, crisp sounds, the alloy rivets securing the inner corners of the mesh cover snapped off at the internal break.

He carefully removed the heavy blast-proof mesh cover, which was strong enough to withstand gunfire, slipped into a huge, dark ventilation duct filled with dust and the metallic smell of machine oil, and then gently tucked the mesh cover back into place.

In the darkness, like the most astute predator, he moved precisely downwards through the complex network of interconnected pipes towards the area below where the "safety door" had been. The smells in the air below grew increasingly distinct—disinfectant, cold metal, and… a lingering, strange medicinal aroma, a mixture of exotic herbs, blood, and decay!
After crawling for about five minutes, a steady rumbling sound, the sound of water circulating, and faint human voices finally came from below. Light shone through a ventilation grille below.

Chen Yang quietly approached the mesh and looked down.

The sight made his heart sink!
The vast underground space was brightly lit, and its height was more than ten meters higher than any single warehouse above ground! Countless huge reaction vessels gleaming with cold metallic light, towering separation towers, and sophisticated equipment with conduits and monitoring lines of various colors densely packed like a spider web were humming and turning in the central area!

Technicians dressed in full-body off-white protective suits and wearing full-coverage breathing masks were busy on an operating platform that resembled an operating table.

The highly automated robotic arm precisely grasped the raw materials on the tray—materials that made Chen Yang's gaze suddenly narrow.

Some were dark green gel-like substances dug out of giant conch-shaped shells, exuding a strong sense of life and fishiness; some were mineral powders in lead cans, emitting a stinging sensation on the skin; and some were distorted and twisted remains of biological organs sealed and soaked in huge glass jars!

Countless pipes transport these processed raw materials into a huge stirred reactor, where they undergo a series of complex and incomprehensible reactions, eventually producing liquid or semi-solid products of different colors and viscosities!
These products are transported to the side canning and packaging area, where another automated production line fills them into containers of various shapes and unknown materials or injection equipment!

The finished products were carefully transferred to a temperature-controlled chamber, and then transported by forklifts operated by workers wearing protective suits to the side rooms, which were tightly isolated and whose locks were shimmering with complex runes!

This is no ordinary illegal chemical plant! It is a highly professional and large-scale underground bio-alchemy base that uses various bizarre raw materials to produce special agents! The complexity of its processes, the sophistication of its equipment, and the tightness of its security measures far exceed our imagination!
Chen Yang's heart sank, and his eyes became extremely solemn.

The products produced here are far from ordinary medicines.

It would absolutely never be supplied to the black market!
He keenly sensed that although the mixed gases in the air had undergone powerful filtration and purification, the lingering smell that leaked out carried an extremely frenzied, aggressive, yet strangely fused will that was replenished by some kind of life force!

The unnatural power fluctuations emanating from the black-clad elites he had fought, as well as the peculiar killing intent emanating from their weapons, all vaguely shared a similar origin!
This is a special "power potion"! A "magic potion" that can forcibly enhance an individual's abilities for a short period of time!
The problem is that the group of men in black who attacked the workers in Warehouse No. 7 last night and injured Uncle Li, as well as the powerful figure Chen Yang encountered at the mountain gate, all had drugs that seemed to be more efficient and direct in stimulating life potential and even triggering unknown mutations!

The medicine produced here seems to be a lower-spec, more stable "civilian-grade" or "mass-produced consumable." (End of Chapter)