Desperate people, accept the seed of my soul!

Room 101.

Wen Yan, who was resting with his eyes closed, suddenly pressed his hand to his chest.

It was a thrill I had never felt before.

Through the soul connection, he clearly sensed the intense fluctuations coming from Xu Suyuan's end.

If the previous fluctuations were like "birds escaping their cages," then now, those fluctuations have become like "venomous snakes coiled on tombstones."

"Different aspirations are leading the seeds toward different paths of differentiation..."

Wen Yan opened his eyes, looked at the dark night sky outside the window, and a look of realization flashed in his eyes.

"Simply seeking survival can only bring about 'travel,' but what new abilities will hatred directed towards 'punishment' and 'destruction' give rise to?"

------

8 PM.

Police Station of the Eighth District, Chenxi City.

The blue and white police lights flashed in the night, a symbol of order and law.

Xu Suyuan stood in the shadows opposite the police station, her mind in turmoil.

Before she passed away, her grandmother always taught her: "Yuanyuan, we must be law-abiding citizens. If you have any difficulties, go to the police."

This sentence, like a deep-rooted instinct, drove her here.

"Call the police...let the law punish them..."

A faint voice inside me is calling out.

But another voice—the screams she had heard countless days and nights in the laboratory, Dr. Lin's indifferent gaze as if looking at ants—was frantically screaming danger.

"They can build such a huge underground laboratory, and they can kidnap people in broad daylight... Can the police really do anything about it?"

Xu Suyuan's fingernails dug deeply into her palm.

Ultimately, she did not choose to walk directly through that door.

She was terrified.

I'm afraid that once I go in, I'll be hooded again and sent back to that hell.

She looked around and walked to a public phone booth a few dozen meters away from the police station entrance.

She's going to take one last gamble.

I'm betting that there's still a glimmer of light left in this world.

With trembling hands, she tossed in the last coin and dialed the police.

"Hello, this is the Morning Light City Police Command Center. How can I help you?" the operator's voice came through.

Xu Suyuan took a deep breath, her voice low and rapid:

"I want to report this to the police."

"I am Heo So-won, a news anchor who went missing in the Fifth District a month ago."

"I was imprisoned in the underground laboratory of 'Dawn Biomedicine', located in the old industrial area on the outskirts of the city, on the third basement level of the former Wei's Chemical Plant."

"They are conducting illegal human experiments! There are many people being held there!"

"Please...save me, save them!"

……

The phone receiver was busy.

The operator's words, "Please keep your phone accessible. We have notified the local police to verify the situation. Please go to the nearest police station to wait," still echoed in my ears.

Xu Suyuan hung up the phone, her palms sweating profusely.

Instead of heeding the operator's advice, she crossed the street and went into a 24-hour convenience store across from the police station.

Welcome!

As the electronic sound rang, the shop assistant scrolled through his phone without even looking up.

Xu Suyuan bought the cheapest bottle of mineral water and sat on a high stool by the window.

There was a thin layer of glass here, which kept out the cold wind from outside and gave her a kind of illusory sense of security.

From here, you can see the imposing gate of the Eighth District Police Station diagonally opposite.

Time passed by, second by second.

The clock on the wall pointed to 8:15.

Xu Suyuan stared intently at the gate, hoping to see the blue and white police cars rush out, hoping that the sword of justice would be drawn and pointed directly at that evil chemical plant.

However, the entrance was eerily silent.

Police officers occasionally come and go, but they just chat and laugh, and some even carry freshly bought late-night snacks.

There was no sign of an emergency assembly, nor any indication of police being dispatched.

"Maybe...maybe they're mobilizing manpower? Maybe they're holding a meeting to assess the situation?"

Xu Suyuan desperately tried to find excuses for the police in her mind, attempting to suppress the growing unease in her heart.

……

At the same time.

Inside a black minivan speeding through the city center at dawn.

"Iron Hand" pressed the Bluetooth headset, his face suddenly turning gloomy.

"Received. Understood."

He hung up the call, slammed the steering wheel, and the car screeched as it made a sharp U-turn on the road.

"Captain, what's wrong?" the team member in the back seat asked.

"That stupid woman called the police." Iron Hand's voice was as cold as ice. "But she doesn't know that the deputy director of the emergency call center just received a villa from the boss last week."

He floored the accelerator, and the engine roared like a beast.

"The boss gave a direct order: no more staking out the old house. The target is near the Eighth District Police Station. Intercept her before the police discover her and file a case."

"If we let her into the interrogation room and take a statement, things will get complicated."

"yes!"

……

In the convenience store, the bottled water in Xu Suyuan's hand was already deformed from being squeezed.

Twenty minutes have passed.

No police cars were dispatched.

Conversely, a black sedan without license plates, like a silent ghost, slowly came to a stop beside the gate of the police station.

The car did not park in the police station compound, but instead parked in the shadows where the surveillance cameras could not reach.

The car door opened.

Two men wearing dark jackets came down.

Their eyes were as sharp as eagles', quickly scanning the shops and dark corners on both sides of the street.

Xu Suyuan was all too familiar with that look in her eyes.

That's the look in a hunter's eyes when he's looking for his prey.

When Xu Suyuan saw the profile of one of the men, she felt her blood freeze instantly.

The man wore wire-rimmed glasses, was well-mannered, and looked like a harmless white-collar worker.

Li Wei.

The man who called himself a "top agent" promised her a future, but instead pushed her into hell with his own hands.

Why is he here?

Why did he appear at the police station entrance less than twenty minutes after I called the police?

The answer exploded in her mind like a thunderclap, shattering her remaining naiveté.

There was no rescue.

There is no justice.

Her emergency call didn't become a bullet aimed at evil; instead, it became a signal to lure the hunters to her door.

The police station...are they also among them?

Or perhaps their hands have grown so long that they can easily block out the sky?

Xu Suyuan looked at Li Wei.

The man was taking out a photo and seemed to be asking something to the owner of a shop on the side of the road.

He was still smiling.

That smile was exactly the same as the one he gave her when he tricked her into signing the contract in the coffee shop that day—gentle, sincere, yet concealing a man-eating fang.

Xu Suyuan slowly slid down from the high stool, her body trembling uncontrollably.

It's not because of fear.

Instead, it was an unprecedented anger and hatred that seemed to burn away the very core of one's being.

Grandma died.

In this cold city, her only relative died all alone.

And she, like a fool, was deceived, imprisoned, and used as a guinea pig.

Having finally escaped, she pleaded with the power of light for help, full of hope, only to be met with a demon that pushed her into the abyss.

"So... this is what the world is like."

Xu Suyuan lowered her head, her hair obscuring her eyes.

Since the light doesn't reach here.

Since the rules can't protect me.

Since you evil spirits can trample on life with impunity and cover up the sky with your own hands.

So...

Xu Suyuan slowly backed away, exiting the brightly lit area of ​​the convenience store.

She stopped trembling.

The last glimmer of hope she had for seeking refuge through the rules of the "normal world" was completely extinguished.

Instead, there was a despair deeper than the night and a murderous intent hotter than magma.

She stared intently at Li Wei, who was looking around in the distance, her thoughts clearer than ever before—

I want you to experience what it's like to be imprisoned.

I want you all to be paralyzed, watching death descend in despair, just like I was in that laboratory, just like my grandmother was in her hospital bed!

I'm going to...lock you all up!

The instant this thought arose, the "seed" deep within her soul sensed this emotion powerful enough to distort reality.

That was a despair for "freedom" that transformed into a mad desire to "imprison" the enemy.

Om-!

The bluish-purple light that originally represented [void travel] was suddenly swallowed up by a black torrent, and then burst forth with a chilling dark light.

The seed split.