Solution

Thanks to Death Invitation Card for tipping 100 Qidian coins; thanks to Beiming Yaoyu for tipping 100 Qidian coins. Hearing Ye Siyu's threat, the Red Queen fell silent. She was an artificial intelligence system that made decisions according to the situation. Keeping certain things inside the Hive from leaking out was her main task, as well as her top priority.

Normally, she would never have obeyed Ye Siyu's orders, but he now held the switch for the discharge device. If he pressed it, her power would shut down, and everything he had shut down would be released. Her task would fail.

So she had no choice but to break the rules.

"Bzz!" Machinery whirred, and a holographic projection appeared before everyone. It showed a laboratory. In a cell, a bizarre creature was constantly slamming into the walls. It had no skin or hair, its eyes had degenerated, its thick finger joints had evolved into claws, its brain was exposed, and it had an extremely long mouthpart.

"What is that?!" Alice and the others cried out at the projection, frightened by the strange creature on the screen.

"Under confidentiality protocols, I will not tell you anything about this creature," the Red Queen replied.

"Damn it! What is that supposed to mean?! She only told us half of it!" Alice and the others looked furious at her answer. The Red Queen was like someone who stopped halfway through a story, leaving them frustrated and itching to know the rest.

"Let me tell you. This involves a virus the Umbrella Corporation is researching. The T in T-virus stands for 'Tyrant.' It's a new type of RNA virus and a major breakthrough in medical science. It can become an expensive military weapon..."

"Even after people die, their bodies are still alive. Their hair and nails keep growing, their cells continue to metabolize, and their brains operate on a faint electrical charge that doesn't disappear until months later. The T-virus can generate a powerful shockwave to sustain cell growth and provide energy through electrical impulses. Simply put, it brings corpses back to life."

Ye Siyu explained at a leisurely pace. Beside him, the Red Queen's projection looked at him with a remarkably human expression of surprise. After all, this was the Umbrella Corporation's most classified information; only a small number of its executives and researchers knew about it.

"Bring the dead back to life?" Alice and the other mercenaries looked surprised by Ye Siyu's explanation. None of them had expected the Umbrella Corporation to be researching such things.

"Not completely. They only have the most basic ability to move, possibly with a little memory, but in theory they possess no intelligence. They're driven by the most basic neural impulses and instinctive needs—that is, satisfying their appetite."

"As for the creature on the screen, it's a Licker, an unstable experimental specimen created by injecting the T-virus directly into a living subject. During cultivation, they're fed live DNA directly... Those containers in Dining Hall B are filled with these things," Ye Siyu continued calmly.

Everyone drew a sharp breath. They hadn't expected the strange Dining Hall B they had passed through to contain such creatures.

While everyone was still shaken by the thought of the Lickers in Dining Hall B, Ye Siyu ordered the Red Queen, "Inject all the Lickers with poison and kill them."

"That is against company regulations," the Red Queen refused without hesitation.

"If you don't kill them, I'll press the switch. Then they'll be released," Ye Siyu said coldly.

"All right." Hearing Ye Siyu threaten her with the switch again, the Red Queen fell silent for a moment before finally agreeing to his order.

The image on the projection changed to show green outlines of container after container,

Then the containers turned red one by one, showing that the Red Queen was killing the Lickers. Zheng Zha and the others watched Ye Siyu with admiration. It had never occurred to them to threaten the Red Queen into killing all the Lickers. Seeing what Ye Siyu had done, they greatly admired him, and their opinion of him also changed somewhat.

But then Ye Siyu said something that surprised everyone present.

"Do you think I'm an idiot? If you still won't eliminate those Lickers, I'll press the switch right now." Ye Siyu looked at the Red Queen, his expression still cold.

Under everyone's astonished gazes, the Red Queen fell silent. The containers on the screen turned green again, then disappeared one by one.

The Red Queen's actions proved that she had not eliminated the Lickers at first. She had merely been deceiving them.

"All Lickers have been dealt with." After the last container disappeared, the Red Queen's voice rang out again.

Hearing her answer, Ye Siyu nodded, then turned to the mercenaries. "I suppose you don't want to continue with this mission now, do you?"

All the mercenaries fell silent. Under normal circumstances, they would have completed their mission no matter what, but this situation was different from their previous missions.

After learning how terrifying the T-virus was, they didn't dare complete the mission. Their humanity also told them they shouldn't. If they took the Flame Queen's motherboard, the things inside would be released. Then those things inside would be released, and they might become sinners against the world.

"You don't have to be disappointed. Actually, it's not impossible to complete your mission." Just as the mercenaries decided to abandon it, Ye Siyu spoke again.

"You have a way?!" Everyone, including Zheng Zha and the other reincarnators, looked at Ye Siyu. They all wanted to know how he would solve the problem.

"It's simple. You just have to eliminate all the zombies," Ye Siyu said calmly.

"Huh?!" Everyone cried out. Wasn't Ye Siyu's solution a little too simple and brutal?

Ignoring their cries, Ye Siyu slowly explained his solution. "You just need the Red Queen to cooperate with you and lure the zombies in the Hive over so you can eliminate them. Then you can take the Red Queen's motherboard and leave."

The mercenaries' eyes lit up. It was just as Ye Siyu had said: they only had to eliminate all the zombies, and they could complete their mission while preventing the T-virus from leaking out.