Cellular Decay

Here.

Now that Mobius was in a good mood, she could not help but start lecturing Xu Ziling:

"Listen, Little Mouse. Although this was Elysia's responsibility, your guard was far too low. You need to watch out for that woman from now on. You promised me that you'd take responsibility for me. You can't let her eat you up before I do, understand?"

Xu Ziling rested his chin on one hand. After thinking for a moment, he said:

"Um... Doctor, I really was only helping Miss Elysia make breakfast just now."

"Yeah, yeah, sure."

Mobius could not be bothered to argue with Xu Ziling. She grabbed his right hand, pointed at the tightly covered doors and windows inside the house, and said:

"You had to block the doors and windows just to cook? Otherwise, the pots, bowls, and pans would explode when exposed to sunlight... right? Heh, I'm far too familiar with Elysia's little tricks for fooling people."

"Mm..."

Xu Ziling fell into deep thought. He had no idea whether pots, bowls, and pans would explode when exposed to sunlight, but he knew for certain that he could not see sunlight. Even looking at it for one moment longer would make his body explode.

"Still, in a way, you've had it rough. You only just woke up and immediately ran into a dangerous woman like Elysia."

Mobius stopped beside the bed in the little building and said,

"You don't have to listen to everything she says. Just use your own judgment and do what you think is right. Based on your behavior, I can basically conclude that the 'Previous Civilization era' you lived in shared a highly similar culture with our era...

"To put it in terms you can understand, the cultural knowledge from your Previous Civilization world can also be applied to our era. After all, the laws of physics and biology won't vanish just because a civilization has perished. What do you think, Little Mouse?"

As she spoke, as if to prove that "objects exposed to sunlight wouldn't explode," Mobius casually pulled aside the curtain beside the bed.

"??!"

No, Doctor! You were talking just fine—why did you suddenly pull open the curtain?! I... damn it!!

Mobius did not notice Xu Ziling's reaction at first and continued speaking to herself:

"So, Little Mouse, you see for yourself... Hmm?"

The morning sunlight, no longer blocked by the heavy curtain, shone through the glass without restraint and flooded the three-story building beside the school district. Mobius, who spent all year in the research facility, saw sunlight for the first time in ages. On top of that, she had just beaten Elysia, so she was in an exceptionally good mood.

But the golden-haired beauty beside her clearly did not feel the same way.

The instant Xu Ziling's body touched the sunlight, his eyes filled with blood vessels. Those sinister veins seemed to wash away the green in his eyes, transforming them into a terrifying and demonic red.

His body trembled uncontrollably. This body, capable of tearing apart a Honkai Beast with its bare hands, was now experiencing a tremor from the depths of its bloodline.

Mobius was not stupid. Once she realized that the situation seemed to be slipping out of control, her first thought—apart from surprise—was to restore the room to its previous state and see whether Xu Ziling would return to normal with it.

Only after the doors and windows had been covered again did the trembling terror in Xu Ziling's heart gradually fade. He let out a long breath, twisted his somewhat stiff and sluggish body, and said,

"Phew... Doctor, don't joke like that next time. You almost got me killed."

"Hm?"

Mobius slightly furrowed her brows. Out of professional habit, Blanca took out her notebook and began recording.

After recalling what had just happened, Mobius looked at Xu Ziling and asked tentatively:

"So... Elysia arranged the room like this because you're afraid of sunlight? But... something as serious as a biological defect like fear of sunlight—why didn't you tell me sooner?"

"Doctor... I only discovered it just now."

Xu Ziling helplessly spread his hands and said,

"I was actually thinking about how to tell you about it more naturally... I just didn't expect you to pull open the curtain before I had the chance to say anything."

As she absorbed the sparse but absolutely earth-shattering information Xu Ziling had conveyed, Mobius fell into brief contemplation.

Actually, for a creature that had been buried underground for who knew how many tens of thousands of years, suddenly seeing sunlight could naturally cause some stress reactions. It was like dragging a night owl who stayed home and pulled all-nighters outside during the day. They would feel uncomfortable, along with some mental stinging.

But Xu Ziling's condition... His pain had clearly shifted from mental stinging to physical trembling. Mobius had no doubt that if she had left the curtain open for even a little longer, she would have been attending her Little Mouse's funeral tomorrow.

But... a person who could rely on his own strength to break through the stone statue's seal from at least fifty thousand years ago, unleash strength and speed more terrifying than the Fire Moth world champion, and possess a body with both power and speed rated A or even S, was afraid of sunlight... Saying that aloud sounded almost like a joke.

Mobius did not believe in gods, so she naturally did not believe that vampires or zombies existed in this world. She only believed in the research data in her hands.

UV intolerance? Self-hypnosis of the mind? Or would Xu Ziling's skin tissue undergo a chemical reaction under sunlight?

For a moment, countless professional terms flashed through Mobius's mind, but none seemed to match Xu Ziling's symptoms.

Moreover, Mobius realized that no matter how much she speculated, it would be more practical to simply ask Xu Ziling, the person involved. Thus, she turned directly toward him and asked,

"Little Mouse, I need to understand what's going on. This fear of sunlight... is it merely a psychological reaction, or will your body truly undergo some immeasurable change when exposed to sunlight?"

"This..."

Prompted by Mobius, Xu Ziling also realized that after being exposed to sunlight, he had only felt a sense of dejection from the depths of his heart. There did not seem to be any direct physical harm.

Having an idea without testing it was a bad habit. Even if the possibility was extremely low, Xu Ziling had never said he himself had to stand in the sunlight.

Xu Ziling tugged at the golden strands of hair hanging to his waist. He had intended to pull one out casually as an experimental sample, but this body seemed to take better care of its hair than he had imagined. After scratching at it for a long while without losing a single strand, he had no choice but to yank one out with force before handing it to Mobius.

Mobius understood immediately. She took the brilliant golden strand Xu Ziling handed her, returned to the window, and pulled back one corner of the curtain.

The brilliant golden strand glittered beneath the sunlight, like Golden Thread carefully drawn by a craftsman. With just a little more processing, it could be transformed into an artwork worth millions.

...At least, that was what Mobius had thought at first.

"Whoosh!"

"?! Ah!"

Mobius suddenly cried out. An unmistakable smell of blood instantly spread through the room. After Xu Ziling's fingers trembled slightly, he flashed forward and caught Mobius as she was about to fall.

Up close, Xu Ziling could clearly see an extremely fine wound had appeared out of nowhere on Mobius's right wrist. It seemed to have cut through a blood vessel, and blood continued to flow without stopping.

Seeing this, Xu Ziling tightly furrowed his brows. As the blood flowed before his eyes, a strange restlessness rose within him.

He abruptly shook his head, casting away those distracting thoughts. Then he looked toward Blanca, who had been startled as well, and urged her:

"Senior Blanca... gauze!"

With Xu Ziling's reminder, Blanca came back to her senses. Some fear showed in her eyes as she hurriedly backed away several steps, then covered her mouth with her left hand while pointing in one direction with her still-trembling right hand.

Seeing this, the strange agitation in Xu Ziling's heart intensified. When he looked at the suddenly injured Mobius again, he saw that her eyes were wide open as well. A trace of fear flashed through her aquamarine eyes before an unprecedented excitement swept away every other emotion.

"Doctor, your injury..."

"Shh! Little Mouse, look!"

The corners of Mobius's mouth lifted slightly. She quickly covered Xu Ziling's mouth with her hand, then pointed at the patch of sunlight falling in the distance.

There was nothing else there.

Except for one bloodstained strand of "Golden Thread."

There was no doubt about it. The strand Xu Ziling had just pulled from his own body had become the "culprit" that injured Mobius.

Now that it had left Xu Ziling's body and was bathing in sunlight, it seemed to have "come alive," twisting strangely like a swimming snake.

The roughly half-meter-long golden strand seemed to want to escape this sunlit place of trouble, yet it seemed reluctant to leave. After all, some of the blood from its recent "attack" on Mobius remained there.

"It" spread through the bloodstains and twisted, constantly twitching the body formed from a single strand of hair. At times it folded into a square; at times it bent into a triangle... but its movements grew weaker and weaker.

In the end, the strand of hair straightened its body beneath the sunlight and stiffened into an extremely slender "stone spike."

Mobius blinked, then hurriedly leaned forward to examine the "stone spike" formed from the strand of hair at close range. She then looked at the thin, terrifying marks whipped into the surroundings by the twisting strand. The smile in her eyes grew broader as she murmured to herself:

"So that's it... So that's how it is... Tsk, tsk, tsk..."

On the other side, Xu Ziling stared at the still-bleeding wound on Mobius's right hand. The restlessness he had suppressed earlier once again surged strangely in his heart.

No... My personality isn't like this. I wasn't even this restless when my old boss withheld my pay... The problem is this body?

Whether it was that strand of hair earlier or my body now... they both seem to have some inexplicable longing for 'blood.'

Have I really become a vampire?

But if I really had become one of those things, shouldn't I have massacred the research facility back in Monkey King's Birth in the very first chapter?

Why can I still retain my sanity? Why does my body crave blood while only eating human food?

Looking at the blood that had dripped from Mobius's wrist onto the floor, Xu Ziling crouched down as if possessed and reached out a finger to touch it.

In an instant, Xu Ziling felt as though an electric arc flashed through his mind. By the time he realized what was happening, he had already put his bloodstained finger into his mouth.

Elsewhere.

"Doctor, the bandages..."

Blanca hurriedly retrieved bandages from the medical kit in the room and handed the late-arriving bandages to Mobius, asking,

"Do you need me to wrap it for you?"

"Tsk, it's only a minor injury..."

Mobius clicked her tongue softly. She took the bandages, simply wrapped them around her injured right wrist a few times, then turned to Xu Ziling and said,

"Heh-heh... Little Mouse, your symptoms aren't a UV allergy. They're..."

"Cellular Decay?"

Xu Ziling answered directly. His crisp response left even Mobius stunned.

After a moment, Mobius came back to herself and looked at Xu Ziling suspiciously.

"Little Mouse, you... where did you hear that term? It shouldn't have... been coined in my mind as a descriptive term only two minutes ago, should it?"

Xu Ziling was stunned as well.