The Underground Research Institute had an extremely complex layout. Without a map, they could only rely on directions from the supervisor over their headsets.
"First, go to the experimental area on level minus seven and retrieve the research data."
"The elevator isn't safe. Take the emergency exit."
Following the Captain's instructions, Lin Ye and the other two wound their way around for ages, passing through several security checkpoints before finally opening the door to the emergency exit.
Is there really any point in having an emergency exit like this?
Lin Ye knew little about research institutes, so he had no idea whether the emergency exits in other institutes were like this too.
Entering the emergency exit, the three followed the stairs down and soon reached the entrance to underground level seven.
After passing through several security checkpoints into underground level seven, they found corridors branching off like tree limbs, with all kinds of laboratories lining both sides. Through the glass windows, Lin Ye could see the interiors, which were in complete disarray, as though a storm had swept through them.
The access controls hadn't failed, so there was no telling how the place had ended up like this.
Following the Captain's instructions, the three reached the depths of the experimental area. After passing through a stretch of corridor with no laboratories, only security checkpoints, they finally arrived at the laboratory they were looking for.
The laboratory wasn't large. There was no research equipment inside, only a few laptops and a cold storage room for important specimens.
Most importantly, there was actually a female researcher inside.
She was the first living person they had encountered since entering this place. Of course, she might not be alive.
Lin Ye didn't enter the laboratory rashly. Instead, he waited for the Captain's instructions. The Captain should know who she was.
"Huh, Dr. Caroline is still alive. Number One, give Dr. Caroline your helmet."
Hans hurriedly took off his helmet, knocked on the laboratory's glass door, and said loudly:
"Dr. Caroline! The Captain told me to give you this helmet!"
Caroline watched them warily, like a terrified squirrel.
"Shh! Keep your voice down. It'll hear you."
Dr. Caroline spoke nervously, hesitating before finally opening the laboratory's glass door.
After taking the helmet, Dr. Caroline hurriedly shut the glass door and quickly hid behind a desk.
"We're not going to have to take her out with us, are we? What a pain."
Perhaps because he wasn't wearing his helmet, Hans had become quite casual about what he said, but he might not have considered that Lin Ye and Neil still had theirs on.
After a while, Dr. Caroline began working on a computer. Finally, she unplugged something resembling a USB drive, then took some specimens from cold storage and put them in her backpack.
"Bring... Doctor... here..."
The Captain issued a new order, but the transmission kept cutting out before finally falling completely silent.
They had lost contact with the surface, a hundred meters underground.
Snap!
The lights went out, plunging the entire institute into darkness, but they soon came back on. The backup power had probably kicked in.
Faint tremors came from the distance, as though hundreds or thousands of people were running through the corridors.
"What's going on? Why did the lights go out? What's that sound? What did the Captain say?"
Hans had probably guessed what had happened, but he was unwilling to face reality.
Lin Ye took off his helmet and tossed it onto the floor, strode over, pushed through the door into the laboratory, and pulled the trembling Dr. Caroline out from under the desk.
"Doctor, a huge pack of mutated creatures is already on its way. We don't have a map of the institute, so we need you to lead us out, and we'll keep you safe. Of course, you can choose to go back under the desk... never mind. To spare you the suffering later, I'll help you end it all."
As he spoke, Lin Ye drew his pistol and pressed it against the doctor's forehead, waiting for her to choose.
To live in pain or die quickly-that was the question.
Dr. Caroline trembled as she grabbed Lin Ye's wrist. She was afraid, scared to death, but she didn't want to die.
She was only in her twenties. There were still many things she wanted to research, many things she wanted to try.
Lin Ye grabbed Caroline by the collar and hauled her to her feet, looking into her eyes as he said:
"Made up your mind?"
A mass of footsteps drew closer. The nearest mutated creatures were only a few corridors away from the laboratory.
"Follow me! We'll get out through the ventilation system!"
Dr. Caroline had thought it through too. Rather than wait to die, she might as well risk her life fighting for a chance.
Under Dr. Caroline's direction, Lin Ye quickly opened the laboratory's ventilation duct.
The four climbed into the vent in turn: Lin Ye first, Dr. Caroline second, Hans third, and Neil bringing up the rear.
By the time Neil climbed into the ventilation duct, a mass of mutated corpses was about to charge into the laboratory.
The power outage seemed to have damaged the institute's access control system. The glass doors couldn't withstand the savage strength of those mutated creatures at all.
"The laboratory's ventilation system is divided into sections. We can't get straight out through it, but we can reach other laboratories."
Dr. Caroline knew the institute's layout very well and quickly pointed Lin Ye in the right direction.
"Hurry! There's movement behind us! They've climbed up!"
Neil shouted urgently.
Lin Ye crawled fast. Following Dr. Caroline's directions, he rounded several bends and soon reached another laboratory.
Neil had barely jumped down from the vent when a blood corpse dropped out right behind him.
Lin Ye drove his blade into the blood corpse's mutation organ and destroyed it, but more blood corpses dropped from the vent like dumplings being tipped into a pot.
"Go! Lead the way. I'll deal with the ones behind us!"
Lin Ye put away his long blade, drew two pistols, and fired as he retreated, aiming every bullet at the blood corpses' mutation organs.
Bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang!
Just as its description said, the K1 Pistol was a high-quality gunpowder weapon. It was powerful enough to kill a blood corpse with a single shot to its mutation organ, its recoil was manageable for Lin Ye, and reloading was quick and easy.
If they hadn't had only thirty magazines between them, Lin Ye felt he could have killed every blood corpse in the institute.
Killing as he retreated, Lin Ye soon finished off all the blood corpses that had come out of the vent. Before he could catch his breath, gunfire rang out at the front of the group, and the other three retreated back toward him.
Bang bang bang bang bang!
"Fuck! There are too many monsters! They're everywhere. We can't break through!"
Hans shouted as he fired.
"Then we won't break through. Let's find somewhere to kill all these monsters. I'll kill them, and you help me reload."
Lin Ye pushed down Hans's right hand as it pulled the trigger. The idiot wasn't aiming at the blood corpses' weak points at all. He was just wasting ammunition.
"I know a good place!"
Dr. Caroline led them to a laboratory with its own cell. They rushed into the cell, locked its door, and began dealing with the monsters that had followed them.
Bang bang bang! Bang bang bang! Bang bang bang!
Lin Ye killed a blood corpse with almost every shot. For some reason, none of the blood corpses here were particularly strong, as though they had been screened.
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