This Spiritual Energy is Lethal!-Chapter 198 - Ash
Chapter 198: Chapter 198 Ash
Chapter 198: Chapter 198 Ash
Chen Ke held the gun, aiming at the heart of this female nurse.
She was an African Federation citizen, with short black hair, standing at roughly one meter sixty, possibly over 40 years old.
At first glance, Chen Ke had thought she was a nurse, but upon closer inspection, he now felt that this woman might be a chief physician.
The woman wasn’t panicked by having a gun pointed at her, and seemed even calmer than him.
As Chen Ke sized her up, she was doing the same to him. The indifference and composure in her eyes seemed to tell Chen Ke that she had seen this kind of situation before.
“Give me your hand,” the woman said coolly.
“Huh?” Chen Ke raised an eyebrow, puzzled by the woman’s strange request.
Before Chen Ke could react, she grabbed the hand that he was holding the gun with and pulled out a gun-shaped syringe from her pocket.
“Wait a minute! Wait a minute! What are you doing?” Chen Ke shook off her hand.
“Hey, let him go.” At that moment, Sam came out from behind Chen Ke from the elevator, looking to subdue the woman before them.
“Hold on, Sam, she means no harm.” Chen Ke stopped Sam; he didn’t sense any murderous intent from the woman, she had no ill will.
“Let’s all put down our guns, okay? It doesn’t hurt to talk things over like civilized people, right?” Chen Ke said, and slowly lowered the muzzle of his gun.
Sam wasn’t sure why Chen Ke was so quick to determine that the woman was no threat, but based on Chen Ke’s previous actions, he too lowered his gun.
The woman curiously looked into Chen Ke’s eyes, released his hand, and tucked the syringe back into her pocket.
“Where are you guys from? Are there others above?” asked the woman.
“Answer my question first, ma’am. Who are you?” Chen Ke wiggled his index finger.
“You can call me Dr. Jiu Lin, a medical doctor. Where do you come from? Are there others in the city?” Dr. Jiu Lin asked, her tone emotionless as if inquiring about the result of some experiment.
“We came from…” Sam was about to speak when Chen Ke nudged him. Sam understood Chen Ke’s hint and immediately shut up.
“What happened to Carefree City?” Chen Ke countered.
“Answering a question with a question? You won’t get any answers that way,” Dr. Jiu Lin shook her head.
“There are supposed to be people in the city, but we haven’t encountered them… Okay, now it’s your turn to answer me, what happened to Carefree City?” Chen Ke frowned.
“Okay, I understand.” Dr. Jiu Lin lowered her head in thought for two seconds, then turned and walked into the darkness of the passage.
“Hey, hey! You haven’t answered my question!” Chen Ke called out after her retreating figure.
“Follow me, and you will get your answers,” Dr. Jiu Lin looked back and said, then turned again and walked at a steady pace toward the end of the passage.
Sam looked at Chen Ke, unsure whether to follow. Chen Ke, without a second word, shouldered his gun and followed.
The two of them followed Dr. Jiu Lin, silently walking a few minutes at a distance of about five meters.
This hospital underground actually had such a long passage; both sides were lined with hospital rooms. Chen Ke scanned the rooms with his Spiritual Vision, and most of them had patients lying motionless on the beds, as if they were dead.
The rooms were all dark, with only a small office at the end of the corridor showing a faint light. Dr. Jiu Lin pushed open the door and stood in the doorway waiting for Chen Ke and Sam.
“Come in,” Dr. Jiu Lin said, turning to enter the office.
The two followed her into the office, where there was a folding bed, a pile of canned food and other foodstuffs in the corner.
There were four computers on the desk, and on another table, there was a multitude of high-tech experimental tools, whose names Chen Ke couldn’t recall.
“Alright, give me your hands. Both of you.” Dr. Jiu Lin brought out the gun-shaped syringe once again.
“What for?” Chen Ke was puzzled.
“I just want to see how much longer you’ve got to live,” Dr. Jiu Lin said coldly.
Chen Ke laughed and glanced at the life countdown at the corner of his eye, nineteen hours remaining.
“Why not make things clear?” Sam said, dissatisfied.
“I want to draw some blood, to see if there is any Grey Element in your blood,” Dr. Jiu Lin shook her head.
Foll𝑜w current novels on fɾēewebnσveℓ.com.
“What?” Chen Ke had never heard this word before and didn’t know what it meant.
“Take a look at this.” Jiu Lin held up the notebook and passed it to Chen Ke and Sam.
They took the notebook and saw the surveillance footage of dozens of hospital rooms, the green night-vision images paired with the patients lying silently in their beds, which was eerily unsettling.
“What illness do they have…? Some beds are empty, why are they under surveillance?” Chen Ke scrolled through the touchpad, switching between rooms.
“They aren’t empty, but rather, they’ve turned to ash.” Jiu Lin said indifferently.
Upon hearing the words “turned to ash”, for a brief moment, Chen Ke’s mind went blank.
“What does ‘turned to ash’ mean? They…” Sam also couldn’t comprehend the statement.
“It means that one second they are people, and the next second they turn into red dust. That’s why I need to draw your blood to see, it’s very important for you.” Jiu Lin said coldly.
“I don’t understand…” Chen Ke was in disbelief, unsure whether Jiu Lin had omitted some details, making the statement sound absurd.
“I’m surprised, have you really never seen this before? I thought it was a global catastrophe.” Jiu Lin looked at Chen Ke questioningly.
Chen Ke didn’t say anything, but he picked up on an important message from Jiu Lin’s words — based on what she said and the current situation, could it be that humanity was doomed?
“Where did you come from? Could something have an observational blind spot…?” Jiu Lin pondered while asking.
“What kind of thing… We’re completely confused right now, we have no idea what you’re talking about.” Chen Ke spread his hands.
“Let’s draw blood first.” Jiu Lin said.
She grabbed Chen Ke’s wrist and pressed the syringe-like injector against his vein, then pressed a button. Chen Ke felt only a minor pinch, like an ant bite, and in a brief two seconds, the blood draw was over.
“Press your thumb on the wound and keep it there for five minutes.” Jiu Lin instructed, removing a capsule-sized glass vial from the syringe’s handle, containing a few milliliters of Chen Ke’s blood.
Motherfu***, I hope they don’t find anything… Chen Ke worried, but then thought, it didn’t matter since this wasn’t the real world.
Jiu Lin placed the small vial into the high-tech lab equipment on the table beside her and waited for the results.
“Is this a disease? What do you mean by observational blind spot?” Chen Ke asked, pressing his wrist.
Jiu Lin, standing in front of the table looking at Chen Ke, realized he truly didn’t know anything and let out a long sigh as she began to explain.
“That day, certain things appeared out of nowhere in the world, they were enormous, numerous and reached a height of 2 million meters…” Jiu Lin said.
“2 million meters… Dr. Jiu Lin… Did you make a mistake?” Sam was startled by the exaggerated figure.
“I don’t make mistakes in numbers.” Jiu Lin said coldly.
What did 2 million meters signify? Chen Ke knew of only two things that came close to such a number.
One was the Earth telescope project conducted by the Soviet Union, which drilled the deepest hole in human history, reaching a depth of 2 million meters, while the deepest ocean trench was only 15,000 meters.
The other was artificial satellites, with the highest orbits about 36,000 kilometers; meanwhile, 2 million meters was 2,000 kilometers, and one could imagine the absurdity of this height with a bit of brainpower.
“Deserts, oceans, cities… The landing spots of those things now seem meticulously designed. Their only purpose was to make sure everyone on Earth could see them… However, there are still theoretical blind spots…” Jiu Lin said slowly.
“And after seeing them…?” Chen Ke asked.
“That’s a meme suggestion, most people who saw them were implanted with a strong psychological implication, believing they are dust.” Jiu Lin said.
“Fuck…” Chen Ke muttered.
“Once infected by the meme, the composition of your body begins to slowly change, with the rate of change varying among individuals. But initially, a new element appears in the blood, the Ash Element.” Jiu Lin continued.
Chen Ke and Sam didn’t speak; it seemed they had both seen that thing… Chen Ke even filmed it for a long time and showed it to Diana for a while…
“When the Ash Element reaches a certain threshold, a person will suddenly turn to dust. Some turn to ash with just one glance, others might live a bit longer…” Jiu Lin explained.
This world was empty because most people had turned into red ashes…
Chen Ke couldn’t help but imagine such a scene, a gentleman just biting into a hamburger, a lady just starting her car, an old lady walking her dog in the street…
Without a sound, they all turned to ash…
“That thing you’re talking about, does it look like two huge pillars…?” Chen Ke asked, hoping against hope.
At that moment, the machine made a beeping sound, Jiu Lin turned to look, and the blood test results were out.
