269: Welcome home for dinner

Chapter 269: Welcome Home for Dinner. The elevator was plummeting.

The lights inside the cabin flickered intermittently, like a strobe light with a loose connection.

The giant mirror had already been shattered by Chen Mo's punch.

Shards were scattered across the floor, each reflecting Chen Mo's ice-cold face and his mechanical left arm, which was still venting white smoke.

"That little girl..."

Haozi huddled in the corner, clutching his shotgun, the barrel trembling. "Is she really your sister?"

Chen Mo didn't say a word.

He just stared at the flickering red floor numbers.

B1.

B2.

"Whether it's real or fake."

Ruan Qiushui floated in mid-air, her red dress billowing. Her voice was soft, yet it carried a bone-chilling coldness. "To use the dead as a prop... I want to taste the souls of these people."

"You don't need to do anything."

Chen Mo spoke.

His voice was raspy, like sandpaper grinding against rust. "I'll do it myself."

Ding.

A crisp chime.

The elevator stopped.

The door didn't open immediately.

The sound of music drifted in from outside.

It wasn't an eerie horror score, but a warm, even slightly cheerful piano piece—'Für Elise.'

The kind schools often played when classes were dismissed.

"What... what kind of trick is this?"

Haozi swallowed hard and raised his gun. "Sugar-coated bullets?"

Click.

The elevator doors slowly slid open.

The aroma of a home-cooked meal wafted in.

Braised pork, sweet and sour ribs, crucian carp and tofu soup.

The scent was so familiar that Chen Mo's pupils constricted violently.

This was the last scent he had smelled at home five years ago, before the explosion.

Outside wasn't a dark corridor or a bloody operating room.

It was a living room.

The layout was almost identical to the home in Chen Mo's memory.

The old-fashioned fabric sofa, the landscape painting calendar on the wall, even the chipped ashtray on the coffee table was in its original spot.

And at the dining table in the center of the living room sat a 'family.'

'Dad' sat at the head of the table, holding a newspaper.

'Mom' was wearing an apron, walking out of the kitchen with a dish.

There was also a 'little boy' in a school uniform, hunched over the table doing homework.

Warm.

Beautiful.

If you ignored the surgical sutures and metal tubes on their bodies.

That 'Dad' only had half a head; the other half was patched with transparent plexiglass, revealing a flickering red electronic brain inside.

'Mom's' arms were a pair of spatula-shaped mechanical prosthetics, and what showed beneath her apron weren't legs, but tank treads.

As for the 'little boy.'

His back was plugged with data cables connected to a mainframe on the wall, and he was mechanically drawing black circles in a notebook.

"Officer Chen, welcome home."

The voice over the intercom became exceptionally gentle, with a sickening intimacy. "The food is getting cold, please sit down."

"A family should be together, whole and complete."

Watching this, Haozi's stomach churned. "Ugh... this is a family? This is a jigsaw puzzle!"

Chen Mo stood at the elevator entrance.

His gaze fell on the dining table.

That plate of braised pork was actually a pile of still-twitching meat.

That bowl of soup was yellow interstitial fluid.

"Is this your third trial?"

Chen Mo stepped into the fake living room.

"How is it? Touched?"

The voice on the intercom chuckled. "To recreate this scene, I extracted memory fragments from the deep hippocampus of your brain. It took quite a lot of effort."

'Dad' put down the newspaper.

His neck made a clicking sound of gears meshing as he turned his head, a stiff smile appearing on his half-face.

"Momo... wash hands... eat..."

His voice was synthesized through a vocalizer in his throat, accompanied by the crackle of static.

"Don't call me by that name."

Chen Mo walked to the dining table.

'Mom' slid over on her treads, her spatula prosthetics raised as if to serve Chen Mo rice.

"Good boy... eat more... grow big..."

Chen Mo raised his left hand and pressed it against 'Mom's' tin skull.

Cold.

Hard.

"You are not my family."

Chen Mo's voice was very soft. "You're just a pile of trash."

Boom!

The Miniature Electromagnetic Cannon in his palm fired without warning.

Zero range.

'Mom's' head instantly exploded into fragments, spraying parts and engine oil all over the table.

The warm dinner became a slaughterhouse.

"Ah—!!!"

The voice on the intercom screamed, full of rage. "You actually destroyed it! Do you know how expensive this model was?!"

"I'm going to kill you! I'll turn you into a new specimen!"

With that scream.

The 'Dad' sitting at the head of the table suddenly lunged.

He threw aside the newspaper, his chest cavity snapping open to reveal rotating meat grinder blades inside.

"Disobedient... break legs..."

The 'little boy' also yanked out the data cables from his back, opened his mouth, and spat out a barbed tongue, whipping it toward Chen Mo like a lash.

"Watch out!"

Haozi pulled the trigger.

Bang!

The buckshot hit 'Dad,' but it only sent up a few sparks without even scratching him.

"This thing is bulletproof!"

Haozi shouted.

Chen Mo didn't dodge.

He turned his body, allowing the barbed tongue to coil around his right arm.

Rip.

His clothes were torn, the barbs sank into his flesh, and blood seeped out.

But he didn't even flinch.

Instead, he flipped his wrist and grabbed the tongue.

He yanked hard.

"Get over here."

The 'little boy' was yanked toward him like a kite.

The Laser Blade on Chen Mo's left hand had already popped out, tracing a red semicircle in the air.

Swish.

The 'little boy' was cut in half at the waist in mid-air.

The two halves of the body fell to the floor, still desperately crawling toward Chen Mo.

"Rebellious son! Rebellious son!"

'Dad' rushed forward, the meat grinder blades in his chest emitting a piercing hum as they aimed for Chen Mo's face.

"Ruan Qiushui."

Chen Mo barked.

"There's a Living Soul inside this thing, locked up."

Ruan Qiushui dove from the ceiling, her hands plunging directly into 'Dad's' plexiglass skull. "Get the hell out!"

Sizzle!

'Dad's' movements suddenly froze.

The circuits in his body seemed to short, twitching frantically, the red light in his eyes flickering.

"Now!"

Chen Mo stepped forward, his mechanical left arm's power at full capacity.

The servo motor emitted an overburdened shriek.

One punch.

Right into the center of the rotating meat grinder core.

Clang!

The deafening metallic collision made Haozi's eardrums ache.

The high-speed rotating blades were actually forced to a stop by Chen Mo's punch.

Sparks flew everywhere.

Chen Mo's left hand firmly jammed the blades, the heat distorting the air around it.

"Goodbye."

Boom!

The electromagnetic cannon in his palm charged again, and blue light exploded within the meat grinder.

'Dad's' chest was blown open, leaving a gaping hole with a mess of wires and organs spilling out.

The massive body collapsed with a thud.

The living room was in shambles.

Only the song 'Für Elise' continued to play on loop, sounding exceptionally ironic.

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