Yaoguang Section, Office Thirteen.
Four men and three women, seven special operations personnel in total.
They sat in their chairs, anxiously yet patiently awaiting someone's arrival.
They knew one another, yet none of them had the slightest desire to talk.
Some looked tense, repeatedly clenching and releasing their hands in the air, seemingly training their forearm strength to distract themselves.
Some stared at their noses and contemplated their hearts, like old monks in meditation.
Some were drenched in sweat, their uniforms soaked through.
Others pretended to be calm, but their eyes darted everywhere, inadvertently revealing the anxiety and unease within.
These seven special operations personnel placed enormous importance on the BOSS who was about to arrive and offer guidance.
Though their outward reactions differed, their feelings were unexpectedly identical.
Tap, tap, tap...
Steady footsteps sounded outside.
At first, all seven thought it was an illusion born of excessive nervousness.
The footsteps gradually grew clearer, approaching from afar.
Closer...
Even closer!
The door was silently pushed open, and a slender young man in a white lab coat slowly strolled inside.
His features were picturesque, his lips red and teeth white. Handsome and refined, he possessed an airy, otherworldly temperament and a clean, refreshing appearance.
An identification badge hung from his chest, reading: Yaoguang Section—Special Operations Group 13 Leader—Yan Anqing—Serial Number 19S0A25.
The seven rose to their feet with a swish.
They looked restrained, not even knowing where to put their hands.
In truth, even without the identification badge, all seven recognized him.
"Yan God!" The youngest young man in the seven-person team could not suppress his excitement and blurted it out.
"Hello."
Yan Anqing nodded at him, then turned his gaze toward the others. "Although this is our first meeting, I've read all your files."
Special Operations Group 13 had eight members in total, including himself, its leader in name only. Most had been placed here by their families through various connections to polish their resumes. There were only one or two who genuinely worked hard.
Still, on the bright side, all of them had fully developed intelligence. They knew the level of their respective backgrounds, power, and positions, as well as what attitude they should adopt when facing different people.
People with disastrously low emotional intelligence who thought they were second only to heaven generally could not get jobs in Section Seventeen.
From Yan Anqing's observations over the past few months, Xie Zhe seemed to be the only exception.
In fact, with his current fame, he could not pretend to be weak and then stun everyone anyway.
No farcical showdowns occurred.
These special operations personnel were exceptionally obedient and well-behaved before Yan Anqing, like mice seeing a wildcat. They did not dare act recklessly at all.
"You, you, you..."
Yan Anqing held a stack of files and gave them a brief glance before pointing at six people.
The eyes of the selected men and women lit up.
The one overlooked was a middle-aged man.
The expression on his face instantly dimmed considerably.
"You lot, sit down."
After giving the order, Yan Anqing focused his attention on the middle-aged man. "Aspirer."
"The severity of the symptoms varies. Could it be... that you've been idle for too long? Do I need to arrange some work for you?"
"In my view, aside from Jia Yuanliang, everyone else can adjust their own condition."
Having said that, Yan Anqing beckoned to the standing middle-aged man.
Jia Yuanliang, a member of Yaoguang Special Operations Team 13.
Over the past half month, this man's food intake had tripled from what it used to be. At the same time, he had voluntarily increased his training volume, looking as though he would not rest until he had worked himself to death.
He was simply making things difficult for himself.
If Yan Anqing had not read his personnel file, he would have suspected that the man's genes contained a powerful self-destructive tendency to begin with.
"Tell me, what are you thinking?"
At Yan Anqing's words, a look of grief surfaced on the middle-aged man's chiseled face.
He clenched his teeth and fists, took a deep breath, and only then barely managed to compose himself.
"My mother... she's almost gone."
"From childhood until now, she's sacrificed so much for me."
"No matter what, I have to try everything I can!"
"I have to become a Silver-Eyed!"
As he spoke, the tall man's eyes reddened, and his voice began to choke up.
Yan Anqing nodded noncommittally.
He had specifically dug out and carefully read the man's file.
Jia Yuanliang's father had died young, and his mother had raised him by herself.
A single mother living in hardship, she had endured untold suffering and exhaustion over the years.
Years of relentless labor had utterly ruined her health.
As she grew older, all kinds of illnesses had surged in, eroding her health.
Jia Yuanliang's mother's life force was like a candle flickering in the wind, liable to go out at any moment. Yet due to liver and kidney failure, many medications could no longer be used.
There was a saying that severe illnesses required strong medicine, but that did not apply to patients at death's door.
Current medical methods could only barely buy time and slow the progression of her illness.
Her attending physician had determined that Jia Yuanliang's mother had only one or two months left to live...
Should he watch helplessly as she suffered and lingered on a hospital bed, or inject her with chemicals and let her die peacefully?
As her son, Jia Yuanliang could not make that choice.
Every day now, he lived in torment.
In Jia Yuanliang's eyes, the only hope of restoring his mother's health was the Limitless Cell.
Recently, Dr. Qu Li and Dr. Jiang Xinyue had both been researching allogeneic implantation of the Limitless Cell, but they had never been able to resolve the intermittent rejection reactions.
What was more, as the most precious rare research material, countless people eagerly awaited the chance for such a benefit to fall into their hands. There were too many competitors, so why should it be used on Jia Yuanliang's mother?
Neither he nor his mother had sufficient competitive advantage in that regard.
Other people wanted to become Silver-Eyed merely to satisfy their own fantasies, hoping for richer and more colorful lives.
But for Jia Yuanliang, becoming Silver-Eyed was an absolute necessity!
If the Limitless Cell in his body were transplanted into his mother, that would work, right?
And between parent and child, the rejection reaction should be much lower!
Bone marrow hematopoietic stem cell transplants, liver transplants, kidney transplants...
Though Jia Yuanliang did not understand these things very well, he felt there should be similarities.
"If binge-eating and self-harm could turn someone into a Silver-Eyed, would there even be such a thing as an Aspirer?"
Yan Anqing rebuked him. "If you ruin your body like this, what will happen to your mother? Who will take care of her?"
The vigorous, burly man was scolded a couple of times, and every hard facade he had maintained these past days shattered. Tears streamed down his face.
Jia Yuanliang cried like a child. "But I have no other way..."
After breaking through the man's mental defenses, Yan Anqing's voice suddenly became much hoarser and lower.
"Your name is Jia Yuanliang."
"An employee of Yaoguang Section, Special Operations Group 13."
"You are a filial son."
The middle-aged man wiped away his tears and nodded.
"You believe you have let your mother down."
"You failed to make something of yourself, failed to let her enjoy a peaceful old age and the happiness of family."
"You want to make it up to her."
The expression gradually vanished from Jia Yuanliang's face, and his eyes began to turn vacant.
"Yes."
"You believe that if you become Silver-Eyed, you can transplant your own Limitless Cell into your mother."
"Like donating bone marrow, or liver and kidney transplants."
"Blood relatives have a higher chance of successful matching."
Jia Yuanliang's gaze gradually dimmed. His expression turned lost, and his voice became hollow and ethereal, as though it were mechanically synthesized, yet also like he was muttering to himself. "That's right."
The young man who had called him Yan God earlier could not help letting out a low sigh. "Holy shit... hypnosis? That's incredible!"
The other six special operations personnel held their breaths and exchanged bewildered looks.
Yan Anqing was one of Mojuke's most prominent and sought-after Star Scientists lately.
But no one had ever heard that he knew hypnosis too...