Chapter 28

The operating room fell silent again.

But the solemn, grave atmosphere of life-and-death farewells that had lingered in the operating room vanished completely after Jiang Qian's two phone calls...

"Worthy of being someone I picked out. Your arrangements are truly thorough." Holding his phone, Lan Junxian rose to his feet and stiffly walked toward the other side of the glass wall.

"Couldn't be helped. I had to settle the issue of supporting the elderly back home," Jiang Qian explained.

Though he was not entirely sure what the other man was upset about.

Just then, Dr. Cai returned to the operating room with her team, ready to officially begin the surgery. But when her gaze swept over Jiang Qian's ECG records, even the cool and aloof doctor paused in slight surprise.

Meanwhile, Lan Junxian, already outside the glass wall, still felt his blood pressure soaring.

After a long while, he pinched the bridge of his nose, turned around, and complained to Xiao Jing, who had just entered, "I've had enough... enough of watching a twenty-year-old kid make funeral arrangements!"

Xiao Jing remained unfazed. Holding a tablet, she raised an electronic report before Lan Junxian's eyes.

"Boss, there's a new development."

As Lan Junxian's personal assistant, Xiao Jing handled nearly everything, large and small, that came into Lan Junxian's orbit. She screened and organized it before reporting it to him.

"Go on." Lan Junxian was clearly in a foul mood.

Xiao Jing cleared her throat and reported at breakneck speed, "Peacock Spider traces were discovered at a farmers' market in the northern outskirts of Jintian City. A six-person field team encountered it and was nearly wiped out. Only one female License Holder escaped with her life and reported the situation."

"Apparently, they had been planning to ambush a group of smugglers working for the Black Alliance. After reaching their hideout, they stumbled into a chaotic fight. Before they could react, they came under attack. Based on the female License Holder's account, the head of Jintian City's Operations Department immediately relayed the full details of the case to us."

Lan Junxian frowned upon hearing this. "That demoness is continuing north..."

Jintian City lay north of Jinping.

Northern cities were vast and sparsely populated. Some cities and regions did not even have enough License Holders to assemble a team capable of facing a fully evolved Peacock Spider.

That meant if they missed this opportunity, future capture operations would only become more difficult.

"Boss, this is a once-in-a-lifetime chance to intercept and kill it." Ye Xiao Jing pressed both hands against the twin blades crossed at her waist, sharpness gleaming in her eyes. "Should we pursue?"

Not pursuing would mean letting the tiger return to the mountain, inviting endless trouble.

"Pursue!"

"Yes." The girl's figure flashed away.

Lan Junxian turned back toward the inside of the glass wall and continued watching the surgery's progress.

By then, medical staff had surrounded Jiang Qian. Sterile drapes covered his body, and the disinfection had been completed.

It had to be said that Dr. Cai's team had extensive surgical experience, making the entire procedure proceed very smoothly.

The incision began.

Skin and muscle were cut open, and a high-precision miniature instrument entered between the ribs.

The procedure was nothing unusual to the doctors, but for Jiang Qian himself, it was an experience he would never forget.

He could clearly sense the surgical instruments cutting through flesh. The pain did not currently make him anxious or unbearable, so he could still spare attention to experience the subtle changes in his bodily functions as blood drained away.

But the transfusion equipment on the other end quickly brought those changes to a new equilibrium.

"I see it..."

Amid the medical staff's exclamations, high-definition footage appeared on the monitor, gradually clarifying the pulsating image around Jiang Qian's heart.

The tiny Spider Cocoon was embedded in a web-like organic structure, adhered to the groove between the outside of the right atrium and right ventricle.

After magnifying the image several times, cold sweat began to form on Dr. Cai's forehead.

The web-like organic structure had already connected with the flesh on the surface of Jiang Qian's heart, like a living organism grown directly from it.

One could imagine the collateral damage Jiang Qian's body would suffer once she used the instrument to attack the Spider Cocoon.

She needed to see more clearly.

Dr. Cai closed her eyes. When her eyelids opened again, a rare pair of double pupils appeared in her eyes!

Her License Holder rank was Second State: Aberrant Organism, and her aberrant organ was her "eyes."

Whenever she drew upon this power, her pupils became as strange and terrifying as they were now.

But the benefit was that these double pupils could precisely identify and track toxins.

No matter how minute the movement or quantitative changes of a toxin, nothing could escape her double pupils.

At that moment, Dr. Cai saw something the others could not see through the imaging.

The tiny Spider Cocoon's core contained more than a hundred toxin units. As time passed, these toxin units continuously arranged and combined into new toxin compounds.

The entire process was random and disorderly. There was no time to calculate it, no solution to be found!

Dr. Cai forcibly suppressed her pessimism and operated the miniature surgical equipment.

Aside from her sharp gaze, her hands were exceptionally deft. She maneuvered the instrument as though remotely controlling a miniature drone, guiding it through the incision held open by the surgical frame and into the chest cavity.

Jintian City.

Clear Spring Villa District in the northern outskirts.

A white Maserati roared into its private courtyard.

The garage door rose. A young married woman in a flesh-pink knit dress stepped out from the driver's seat, her exquisite peep-toe heels clicking as she hurried around to the other side to lift her younger son from his child seat.

"We're home, sweetheart!"

But just as she was about to pull open the door, her delicate figure abruptly froze.

Her son stared with wide, curious eyes, his little mouth hanging open.

The car's curved glass reflected a row of cage-like vertical bars, positioned symmetrically on either side of her.

One, two, three, four... four on each side.

Just as the young woman instinctively counted the bars, those bars on both sides... moved.

They bent down at the same time. A massive, plump gourd-shaped shadow slowly emerged in the curved car window, completely obscuring the young woman's reflection.

Her expensive handbag fell to the ground with a thud.

"—Ah!!!"

The young woman collapsed against the car and lost consciousness.

The enormous spider lifted the young woman, jumped onto the car, and with astonishing speed turned her into a cocoon, hanging her upside down from the garage ceiling.

It then curled into a ball and dissolved into a puddle of red-and-pink intertwined slime...

Then another figure rose from the viscous liquid, identical in appearance and dress to the collapsed young woman.

The little boy inside the car sat frozen in shock.

Watching as "Mom" sauntered away and the garage door slowly descended, he stared blankly in the darkness for a long time before suddenly bursting into tears.

Safe House operating room.

The monitoring instruments updated their readings at regular intervals, showing that all vital signs were stable.

"Dr. Cai?"

During the operation, Jiang Qian looked toward Dr. Cai's face, beaded with fine sweat.

It was the first time Jiang Qian had spoken since the operation began, immediately drawing everyone's attention.

Dr. Cai snapped back to herself and hurriedly asked, "What is it? Does it hurt?"

"Not very much. But you've been distracted for a long time."

"...Sorry. It'll be over soon."

Dr. Cai hesitated because she had all but concluded that the instant Jiang Qian tried to take control of the Spider Cocoon, his life would end.

She had no better solution.

At the same time, Dr. Cai's apology somewhat surprised the medical staff present.

Even Lan Junxian outside the glass wall sensed that something was wrong. "What's going on?"

Dr. Cai sighed and explained, "The Spider Cocoon's active toxins have complex components and unstable properties. They're extremely dangerous. Using poison to counter poison may not work."

"What do you suggest?" Lan Junxian asked, brows drawn tight.

"This is beyond my area of expertise. I'm sorry."

This was the second time Dr. Cai had apologized today. The medical staff were already deeply shocked. At the same time, they realized that the surgery's difficulty and risks were far greater than anticipated.

Both Dr. Cai and Lan Junxian were anxious.

Then Jiang Qian, lying on the operating table, calmly said to Dr. Cai, "If there's no better way, proceed according to the original plan. A knife is a knife, whether you stick out your head or pull it back."

"Alright..."

Dr. Cai's feelings were complicated. She respected and admired Jiang Qian's courage.

Then, the instant the baton of the surgery passed to Jiang Qian, an earth-shaking change occurred within the vision of her aberrant double pupils.

Inside Jiang Qian's body, which had originally been functioning normally, toxins suddenly surged from every part of his body. With the heart as the core, from far to near, the toxin concentration and flow rate in his bloodstream rapidly increased!

Like an army that had been meticulously deployed.

While it remained still, all was calm. But once the horn of war sounded, it could instantly stir up a storm of blood and carnage.

Dr. Cai's double pupils contracted continuously, and the shock in her heart was beyond words.

Ayiguli did not like living in neat, orderly villas.

Compared to that, she preferred the unrestrained fields and mountains.

But she did not have many conditions to be picky about now.

After leaving the homeowner's garage, she made her way into the large house and headed straight for the kitchen.

The double-door smart refrigerator was filled with fresh food: fruit, toast, fresh fish steaks, and more. She piled all the ingredients onto the dining table in one go.

Wearing the young woman's appearance, she reclined sideways on the dining table, filling her stomach while video-calling one of her best friends.

"...Is this what it feels like to fall in love? Wanting to cling to him, bully him, take root in his heart, make it so he can neither escape nor forget me, ah ha~"

A shy smile rippled across Ayiguli's face.

As though she were deeply in love, sharing romantic escapades with a close girlfriend.

"No, no, I can't tell you yet! What if you set your sights on him? Hahaha... Besides, he doesn't seem very obedient. In the blink of an eye, he went over to the authorities, leaving me lovesick..."

She popped a grape into her cherry-red mouth, juice splashing between the "young woman's" lips and teeth.

"Come to think of it, Jiao Jiao, wasn't your man quite close to the authorities before?"

"Haha, cut it out, you stinking fox. I'm not interested in your man! The brother I have my eye on is far more impressive than your man."

"Only he is worthy of my careful training~"

The "young woman" lying flat on the dining table was smiling with affectionate sweetness.

Then a glimmer flashed in her eyes, and her smile slowly faded.

"I'm done talking... My brother is suddenly getting a little restless. I need to play with him first."