180: What kind of ghost wardrobe is this?

Gurgle.

Finally, Chen Mo's feet touched solid ground.

This was a corridor paved entirely in metal, blindingly bright.

The floor wasn't made of ordinary steel plates, but some kind of aerospace-grade composite material; there wasn't a sound when stepping on it.

"Oh, my goodness..."

Old Ghost jumped down, clutching his knees as he gasped for air, and as soon as he looked up, he was stunned by the sight before him.

"Is this a tomb? This is basically an intensive care unit in a top-tier hospital!"

The sides of the corridor were lined with tempered glass walls.

Behind the glass, there weren't burial gold and jewelry, but rows of instruments flashing with blue light.

On the left were constant-temperature incubators, where some kind of grey-white tissue was densely arranged Li Ke mushrooms.

On the right were giant liquid nitrogen tanks, still emitting wisps of white vapor.

"Is this... stem cell culture medium?"

Old Ghost pressed his face against the glass, his eyes nearly popping out, "With this scale, all the hospitals in Jiangcheng combined don't have as much as this place! What is he raising?"

"Raising parts."

Chen Mo walked to an electronic door, his fingertips lightly brushing the access panel.

"Parts?" Ninth Master didn't understand.

"When a car breaks, you change the axle; when a computer breaks, you change the graphics card."

Chen Mo turned back, his calm, ripple-less eyes looking at everyone, "When a person breaks, naturally, you have to change the parts."

"Open the door."

He once again imitated that emotionless voice: "Prometheus, access permission confirmed."

Click.

The sound of an air pressure valve releasing air rang out, and the heavy metal door slid open to both sides.

A gust of cold wind rushed toward them.

This time, it wasn't the smell of preservatives, but a thick, fresh scent of blood.

Li Ke poked his head in to look and immediately covered his mouth, dry-heaving.

"Ugh—is this... is this a slaughterhouse?!"

The space behind the door was a huge circular hall.

In the center of the hall stood dozens of transparent cylindrical containers, filled with pale yellow liquid.

In each container, a body was suspended.

Not a dead person.

Because Chen Mo could hear their heartbeats.

Thump, thump, thump...

Although weak, although slow, they were indeed alive.

These people—or rather, these "things"—were all in a state of deep coma, with tubes inserted all over their bodies.

The most hair-raising part was that they all looked different; some were fat, some thin, some old, some young.

But they all had one thing in common.

Each of them was missing a part.

"Tank number three, missing the left kidney."

Old Ghost pointed a trembling hand at the middle-aged man closest to him, "The incision is very neat; it's the handiwork of a top-tier surgeon."

"Tank number seven, missing half a liver."

"Tank number eleven... My god, his eyeballs were removed."

The more Old Ghost looked, the more frightened he became; the anger stemming from his professional instinct made him tremble all over, "What does this bastard take living people for? A spare parts warehouse?!"

"This is the price of 'immortality'."

Chen Mo walked to the very center of the hall.

There was equipment similar to an operating table, connected to an extremely complex life-support system beside it.

Lines of data were still jumping on the screen.

【Recipient: Wang Daoming (Current Version 4.0)】

【Rejection Reaction Monitoring: Left arm implant (Source ID 092) Fusion rate 97%.】

【Cornea replacement countdown: 72 hours.】

"Version 4.0..."

Li Ke huddled in the corner clutching the urn, looking at the data on the screen, "Is this guy a soft-body organism? Can he even be updated and iterated?"

"ship of theseus."

Ninth Master put down the dog on his back and pulled out the already polished, razor-sharp butcher knife from his waist.

"That broken ship story from Ancient Greece. If you replace the planks of a ship one by one until none of the original planks remain, is it still the original ship?"

"This bastard Wang Daoming is fixing his own body Li Ke a ship."

Ninth Master spat, "Right now, I bet that apart from his brain, everything else belongs to someone else."

"The brain?"

Chen Mo sneered.

He reached out and pressed a few keys on the console, pulling up a Core Log.

The screen image shifted.

A tomography scan of a brain appeared.

In the image, most of the brain tissue was grey, with only a small area in the Core District flashing red light.

And around that small patch of red light, countless tiny crystal chips were densely implanted, Li Ke a spider web, locked tightly onto the cerebral cortex.

"That's a brain-computer interface."

Li Ke was a hacker, after all, and recognized it at a glance, "And it's military-grade! This density... is this attempting to digitize consciousness?"

"No."

Chen Mo stared at the red dot, "It's using crystal chips to forcibly suppress the rejection reaction."

"A person's consciousness relies on the brain's neural network. When the body is constantly replaced, the signals received by the brain will become chaotic."

"You will feel that you are not yourself."

"You will go crazy."

Chen Mo pointed to a line of red warnings on the edge of the screen:

【Mental stability: 12% (Extremely dangerous)】

【Suggestion: Replace with a new brain carrier immediately.】

"Replace... the brain?" Old Ghost gasped, "Can the brain be replaced too?"

"That is why he needs 'Zero', why he needs so many clones."

Chen Mo turned around, looking at the people floating in the tanks.

"He is not just changing parts; he is also looking for that perfect shell."

"A brand new shell that can carry his crazy consciousness."

Just then.

The Golden Retriever, which had been lying on the ground, suddenly started barking wildly.

"Woof! Woof woof!"

It roared frantically at a black iron door deep in the hall, its front paws scratching harsh sounds onto the smooth floor.

"Something is there."

Chen Mo's ears pricked up sharply.

This time, it wasn't a mechanical sound.

Nor was it that slow heartbeat.

But a rapid, beast-Li Ke panting sound.

Huff... huff...

Accompanied by the clanking sound of iron chains dragging across the ground.

"What's behind that door?" Ninth Master gripped the hilt of his knife, his muscles tensed.

"I don't know."

Chen Mo stared at that door, his pupils constricted, "But the heartbeat is very fast, 180 beats per minute."

"Not only fast, but... there are two heartbeats."

"Two?" Old Ghost was stunned.

Before everyone could react.

That black iron door suddenly made a huge noise.

Thump!

As if hit by some heavy truck, the thick metal door actually bulged out.

"Alert! Alert!"

The originally quiet hall suddenly rang with a harsh buzzing sound.

The red warning lights began to spin frantically.

A cold, electronically synthesized voice rang out overhead:

【Unauthorized intrusion detected.】

【Biological characteristics mismatch detected.】

【Initiating highest-level security protocol: Cleanse.】

Click.

The deformed iron door slowly rose.

In the darkness, two blood-red "lanterns" lit up.

Following that, a huge black shadow walked out from the shadows.

"Holy shit..."

The urn in Li Ke's hand fell to the ground with a thud, shattering into pieces.

The ashes inside spilled all over the floor, but he couldn't even bother to look at them.

Because the thing in front of him really challenged the bottom line of human cognition.