Hunter of Mysterious Creature-Chapter 363 - 25: Forty-One Days (Part 2)
Humans are emotional creatures, and panic is the emotion that spreads fastest among them.
Sun Hang could already imagine the various chaotic phenomena in Chunming City’s streets after the Federation Government announced the massive evacuation.
Even if the public didn’t know the reason for the evacuation or its timing, as soon as someone began to suspect, the situation would only worsen.
"Actually, this matter is still being discussed," Yang Qi continued, "The Federation Council is currently divided into two factions, one firmly demanding the immediate evacuation of the public, directly abandoning Shuzhou; the other..."
Yang Qi didn’t finish, but Sun Hang could pretty much guess the unsaid part.
To put it bluntly, it meant making the military and civilians of Chunming City coexist with it through life and death.
This decision is very cold-blooded, but from another perspective, it’s also very rational.
The main goal of the massive evacuation plan is to preserve human resources, but based on the actual situation of Chunming City, even if the plan were implemented now, the resources preserved would still be very limited. Not only that, but it would also place an extremely serious burden on the surrounding areas, requiring the Federation Government to invest a large amount of human and material resources for the evacuation process.
Instead of depleting resources on this, it might be better to concentrate all forces and engage in a life-or-death struggle with the anomalies.
"Sometimes I think about one thing..." Sun Hang said, "Do you think those in power, when making such decisions, ever think that a single thought of theirs can determine the life and death of millions, even hundreds of millions of families? Or are those people and families just black numbers printed on white paper to them?"
"...I don’t know." Yang Qi shook her head, "I can only try my best to do what I can do well."
"It seems your ’Pesticide Plan’ is the last line of defense for Chunming City." Sun Hang gave her a glance, "The so-called nuclear strike is actually just mutual destruction."
Yang Qi hesitated for a few seconds, then slowly nodded.
"It’s not just me targeting the Chimera 17 operations," Yang Qi said, "There are several other operation plans being advanced in parallel, but the command groups for different plans are independent. Except when tasks overlap, where there’s dedicated contact and coordination, I’m completely unaware of the other plans."
"If you don’t know about the other plans, your mentor should know, right?" Sun Hang asked again.
"Well... Teacher told me that my plan already has the highest success rate." Yang Qi said.
"When do you plan to start the first step of the operation plan?" Sun Hang asked, "By the way, what’s the first step called again?"
"Collecting meme samples," Yang Qi replied, "To increase the success rate, we are actually deploying not one elite Hunter squad, but eight. The members of the first squad are you, Night Slayer, and Puppet Master. The second squad is led by Ye Jiu and Candle Dragon, while squads three to eight are led by renowned ranked Hunters..."
As Yang Qi spoke, she suddenly gave a self-mocking smile: "To be honest, being able to command so many ranked Hunters at once... it’s almost like a dream."
"Never fought such a well-fed battle, have you?" Sun Hang said.
"There’s no choice in this matter; the sample collection must succeed at once... only after retrieving the samples can inverse memetic engineering begin, and the first step is crucial." Yang Qi said seriously.
"When do we leave?"
"Tomorrow morning at ten."
Sun Hang checked his bracelet; it was exactly fourteen hours until departure.
"All intelligence about Chimera 17 has been disclosed to the Hunters involved in the action, you can directly view it in the internal archives... although it may not be of much use, it might help a little."
Yang Qi opened the small compartment’s door, intending to leave, but she happened upon Wang Xiyi and Zhong Ling standing outside.
"You... heard everything?" Yang Qi looked at them and asked softly.
"Heard it all from start to finish." Wang Xiyi nodded.
"About the evacuation..."
"What are you talking about? I didn’t understand a word," Wang Xiyi pretended to be clueless, "I only know that at ten tomorrow morning, we’re off on another risky mission again."
"...Get some rest, tomorrow’s work will be tough." Yang Qi nodded and walked briskly toward the other end of the corridor.
Sun Hang looked at Wang Xiyi, then Zhong Ling, and clapped: "Quite coincidentally, just the three of us in one team."
In the other teams, besides the leading ranked Hunters, there were five to eight elite Hunters with substantial experimental experience, while their first team had only three people — the rest of the slots were occupied by those anomalies controlled by Zhong Ling.
"I just checked the two investigation records on Chimera 17 from some time ago," Wang Xiyi said, "Chimera 17 will react to anyone approaching it, the more people, the stronger the reaction. Yang Qi splitting all Hunters into eight squads likely considered this."
"Is there a video?"
"There is."
"Send me a copy later," Sun Hang said and began walking towards the elevator.
"Where are you going?"
"Just going out for a stroll, to clear my mind," Sun Hang smiled, "It’s important to adjust the mood before a big battle."
"I’ll go with you," Wang Xiyi said.
"Are you worried I’ll disappear mysteriously like last time?"
Wang Xiyi nodded.
Zhong Ling didn’t say anything, but her actions of closely following Sun Hang expressed her intentions.
"Fair enough," Sun Hang didn’t refuse.
Since Anna didn’t want him to have contact with Chimera 17, if she could trick him once, she could do it again. Having Wang Xiyi and Zhong Ling around would at least somewhat reduce the chance of "accidents."
The only problem is it might drag both of them into trouble too.
The three took the elevator to the first floor, where several modular labs three stories high had been set up on the open ground outside the institute. The lab roofs had yet to be sealed, and two heavy cargo drones were slowly lowering, hoisting a piece of equipment with cables into the lab.
"What’s that thing?" Sun Hang pointed at the equipment hanging in the air, which looked somewhat like a popcorn machine magnified countless times.
"No idea," Wang Xiyi shrugged, "I just do the fighting, completely clueless about research stuff."
"It’s equipment used for inverse memetic engineering," Zhong Ling’s cool voice sounded beside Sun Hang, "I’ve seen this kind of equipment inside Dubhe Tower."
"It really is..." Sun Hang noted that both drones used for transporting equipment bore the Dubhe Tower insignia, as did the waterproof and dustproof cushion wrap covering the equipment, "Seems like this was brought over from Chunming City."
"The stability and quality of the Reverse Meme Potion are inversely proportional," Zhong Ling continued, "Single-digit units of Reverse Meme Potion can maintain stability for several hours, but as the quantity increases, the stability coefficient drastically drops."
"How do you know so much?" Sun Hang was somewhat curious, "You’re not a researcher either, right?"
Although Zhong Ling’s father was a researcher, his specialized field wasn’t "inverse memetic engineering," right?
"My aunt is a member of the inverse memetic engineering team," Zhong Ling said, "When I was little, dad was often busy, so I sometimes stayed at my aunt’s place... She should be here too."
"Yes, Ling’Er is right." Among the bustling white lab coats, a woman who looked barely in her early thirties, sporting a neat short haircut and wearing amber glasses, suddenly turned and walked toward them, "According to your proposed operation plan, the ’pesticide’ won’t remain stable for more than 0.1 seconds."
"Auntie," Zhong Ling obediently greeted the woman.
"Ling’Er, such a good girl." The woman smiled, rubbing Zhong Ling’s head, then turned to look at Sun Hang, the smile on her face instantly faded, "That means after the ’pesticide’ is created, you must instantly thrust it into the target’s ’heart’... Do you think you can do that?"
