Secret (Bonus Update for Featured Promotion)

Thus, led by Bandu, Zhou Bai entered the laboratory with him. Bandu looked at his own body in the cultivation tank, with only its upper half remaining, and said coldly, "That was me before.

"To cultivate the power of the Primordial Spirit, one must breathe in and out Spiritual Machine. But now that the Heavenly Dao has been twisted, Spiritual Machine has been contaminated. As long as you breathe in and out Spiritual Machine and align yourself with Heaven, you will gradually synchronize with the twisted Heavenly Dao. If your will is not firm enough, you may become like that..."

"I see." Christina said, "No wonder you're fine, Zhou Bai. Your Primordial Spirit power was directly added by the system, not cultivated by yourself."

Zhou Bai curled his lip and watched Bandu beside him warily. The situation was impossible to predict now. Later, he should add some Primordial Spirit Value first, just to calm his nerves.

"The teacher cut away the intact part and copied a new me." Bandu glanced several times at the deformity in the cultivation tank, sighed, and turned to Zhou Bai.

He suddenly stopped halfway through, staring blankly at Zhou Bai lying on the floor. His tone was strange. "What are you doing?"

Zhou Bai said casually, "Nothing. I'm tired, so I'm resting for a bit. Don't mind me. Go on."

"Looks like you're about to go mad too..." Bandu shook his head. "The price of Primordial Spirit power is too great."

As he spoke, he walked to a wall and directly opened a hidden door. "When the teacher cut me apart, he never expected that I still retained a sliver of conscious will. I also saw the secret he had gone to such lengths to hide."

As the hidden door opened, Zhou Bai's gaze suddenly sharpened.

Before his eyes, corpses packed the secret chamber from wall to wall.

The bodies of children had been piled neatly throughout the chamber.

Zhou Bai could even see several corpses of Elsa, Alice, and Bandu.

Bandu said faintly, "The teacher had always been secretly using us to experiment with cultivating Primordial Spirit power.

"In Demonology Class, without our knowledge, he made us face the incomparably dangerous twisted Heavenly Dao. Those statues created from the twisted, evil, fallen information of the Heavenly Dao would make one unconsciously begin cultivating merely through prolonged contact.

"And once a mutation appeared, he would cut off the intact portion, use that intact portion to cultivate a new clone, and have it inherit the memories from before the mutation."

"But is the copied me still me?"

"Zhou Bai, come with Alice and me. Staying here means certain death."

Zhou Bai stared at everything in the secret chamber in shock. Countless clues linked together in his mind.

The mad ravings in the diary before... what the doctor called madness... and Bandu's condition.

Christina also said that cultivating recklessly could turn someone into a madman. Was this what she meant?

Christina stirred restlessly in Zhou Bai's mind. "I think Bandu is telling the truth. Let's get out of here! That Dr. Zhuang has death written all over his face. He definitely isn't a good person."

Seeing Zhou Bai still lying on the ground and hesitating, Bandu said, "Whether you leave or not is up to you. But I'm definitely taking Alice with me. I won't let her continue living in this hellish world."

Just then, screams came from the corridor. Bandu and Zhou Bai's expressions changed at the same time, and they ran toward it.

In the corridor, beneath flickering lights, the children's bodies lay in pools of blood, without a trace of breath left in them.

Alice stood trembling in the middle of the corridor. Looking at Bandu and Zhou Bai rushing over, she pressed her little lips tightly together, holding back her tears. Fear showed on her face.

"Alice!" Bandu reached out, and Primordial Spirit power suddenly erupted.

But before his Primordial Spirit power could sweep over Alice's body, he saw her expression freeze. Her head thudded to the floor.

"Ah!!" Bandu roared and charged forward.

A little boy walked up to a crying little girl with black hair. "My name is Bandu. What's your name?"

The black-haired little girl wiped the tears from her face and said through sobs, "My name is Alice... I'm so hungry..."

Bandu pulled out a compressed biscuit from his clothes. "Here, you can have this." Seeing her wolf it down, Bandu said, "Don't cry. From now on, I'll share some of my food with you every day."

"Really? Then what about you?"

"I'm grown up already, so I don't need to eat much. And the base will definitely get better and better. I'll lead everyone out to find food. In the future, no one will have to go hungry anymore."

Alice said, "Really? You're amazing!"

In the darkness, an invisible blade swept past. Bandu had already turned into an indistinct mass of flesh and blood, splattering before Alice.

A slick, slithering hiss echoed through the darkness.

Zhou Bai watched this scene in shock. Primordial Spirit power rapidly wrapped around his body, then spread outward.

His Primordial Spirit power swept over corpse after corpse on the floor.

Bandu, Alice, Elsa... familiar children lay one after another in pools of blood.

Only after it passed over every corpse did Zhou Bai's Primordial Spirit power touch something hard, cold, and slick.

Hiss~ Hiss~

From the darkness, a monster crawled out. It was like a Snake Monster crawling on the ground, its entire body wrapped in faint black smoke. Its yellow snake eyes looked at Zhou Bai as it said curiously, "Hiss~ Hiss~ There's actually a child with somewhat high Primordial Spirit Value? This trip wasn't in vain after all."

Zhou Bai looked at the Snake Monster with a trembling body and said coldly, "What are you?"

"A rescue team. I'm the rescue team, the rescue team~~ Didn't you call us here?" The Snake Monster curiously examined Zhou Bai. The black smoke around it churned without end. "Are you angry? Or afraid? Since your aptitude is decent, I can let you say a few more words."

"Run!" Christina screamed wildly in Zhou Bai's mind. "A Heavenly Demon! It's a Heavenly Demon! I remember now! Run, quickly! You can't beat it!"

Zhou Bai gave a bitter smile. The other party's body completely blocked the door and the ventilation duct. Even if he wanted to run, he could not escape.

"You're a Heavenly Demon?" Zhou Bai tried to stall for time. "Why did you kill them?"

"Does killing people... need a reason?" The Snake Monster laughed. "They're just a bunch of swine. Kill them, and they're dead. You too—you're only a pig. Why am I even talking to you?"

Whoosh!

The black mist turned into countless blades and swords, stabbing toward Zhou Bai.

Primordial Spirit power erupted to its peak in an instant, forming a shield before Zhou Bai.

Amid a barrage of crackling explosions, Zhou Bai's body, together with his Primordial Spirit power, was blasted away. Then it shattered into pieces and fell to the ground.

Zhou Bai's eyes were wide open as he watched the world grow darker and darker, until all breath gradually left him.

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Survivors: 1