371: Chapter 371 Bloodbath in Jiangcheng

Chen Mo picked up the laminated document and placed it face down on the dusty edge of the workbench.

Outside the door, 404 swallowed hard, his Adam's apple bobbing visibly under the intense light.

"Brother Mo."

404 shuffled half a step forward, the rubber soles of his combat boots scraping a harsh, sharp sound against the concrete floor.

"What does it mean on there? Your dad is the big boss of Tartarus?"

Chen Mo didn't look back; he picked up the laminated document and placed it face down on the dusty edge of the workbench.

"The highest authority in Tartarus is called the Emperor."

Chen Mo's finger pressed against the edge of the document. His liquid metal left arm trembled continuously under the stimulation of the white light, each surge of the metallic texture carrying a searing heat.

"The Emperor is the symbol of power; the scribe is the one who sets the rules."

Nightingale stepped out from the shadows of the corridor, her tactical boots treading on the accumulated dust on the floor without making any unnecessary sound.

She glanced at the metal sphere emitting white light, the veins on the back of her right hand gripping the short blade bulging.

"There have always been rumors within the organization that the Emperor is just a blade, and the person who truly decides where the blade points is the scribe."

Nightingale sheathed the short blade back into its tactical scabbard at her waist, her gaze turning to Chen Mo's restless left arm.

"If your father was the last scribe, then by leaving this to you, he was declaring war on the current Emperor."

Chen Mo finally turned around, his black Asura-grade Prosthesis leaving an afterimage across his chest, his fingertips less than a centimeter away from the white metal sphere.

"He declared war twenty years ago."

The pad of Chen Mo's finger touched the pure white liquid surface.

A sensation that defied physical common sense shot straight through his nerve endings to his cerebral cortex. The thing was cold as ice, yet pulsed with the warmth of a living organism.

The moment his fingertip touched it, the glow on the surface of the white metal sphere flickered violently, then transformed into a liquid torrent that flowed upward along his fingertip.

"Back up."

Chen Mo retreated half a step, his back hitting the edge of the workbench, causing several rusted screws to roll off the table and onto the floor.

The pure white liquid metal coiled around his original black left arm like vines.

Two homologous substances of different colors fought, devoured, and restructured each other frantically within an extremely narrow space. The screeching sound of metal friction pierced the eardrums of everyone present.

404 covered his ears and retreated three steps, his head bumping against the doorframe, making him hiss in pain.

"What the hell is this thing!"

Nightingale reached out and grabbed 404's collar, forcibly dragging him from the secret room's entrance into the darkness of the corridor.

"It's a key."

Nightingale leaned against the wall, her eyes locked onto Chen Mo's left arm, which was undergoing a drastic transformation.

"A biological key that can open Tartarus's most core armory."

Chen Mo gritted his teeth, heavy gasps escaping from deep in his throat. He felt as if every bone in his left arm was being crushed inch by inch and then reassembled.

The temperature of the carbon-based nerve coupling fluid soared, and a burnt smell could even be detected through his skin.

[Warning]

[Ultra-high concentration Sin Aggregate intrusion detected]

[System underlying logic subjected to forced tampering]

[Sin Resonance function is undergoing a forced reset]

The long-lost system notification sound exploded in his mind, the blood-red characters flickering like bursting neon tubes.

Chen Mo gripped his left wrist tightly with his right hand, trying to alleviate the tearing pain.

The pure white metal finally seeped completely into his black prosthesis, leaving a white brand of three interlocking rings on the outside of his forearm.

The light faded, and the secret room went dark again.

Chen Mo leaned against the workbench, breathing in the stale underground air in large gulps, sweat dripping from his jawline onto the dusty floor.

"Brother Mo, are you okay?"

404 peeked half a head out from behind Nightingale, looking at Chen Mo's now-calm left arm and rubbing the goosebumps on his own arms with lingering fear.

"There was a memory hidden inside it."

Chen Mo stood up straight, his left arm hanging casually at his side. The heavy sluggishness had completely vanished, replaced by a lightness of absolute control.

He glanced at the striking white brand on his forearm.

"The Emperor hid something beneath Jiang City, and my father used his life to lock down the control of that thing."

Chen Mo tucked the 2TB hard drive from the box into the inner pocket of his jacket.

"He left the back door for unlocking it to me."

Nightingale's brow furrowed into a knot.

"The Emperor hasn't been able to find this key for twenty years. Carrying it on you now is equivalent to becoming a living target for the entire organization's hunt."

Chen Mo snapped the lid of the metal box shut with a dull thud.

"They'll have to survive in Jiang City first."

A burst of sharp static noise suddenly came through the bone conduction communicator, followed by Su Qingxue's slightly hurried breathing.

"Chen Mo, respond if you hear me."

Chen Mo raised his hand to press the receiver behind his ear.

"I'm here."

Su Qingxue's voice was mixed with strong wind, and in the background, Jiang Hong's angry cursing and the dull thud of a heavy object hitting water could be faintly heard.

"The blockade at the steel mill exit has been breached."

Chen Mo's knuckles instantly tightened.

"How many?"

The click of Su Qingxue changing a magazine came clearly into his ear.

"One."

She paused for a second and added a fatal detail.

"He's wearing a tactical vest identical to the Jiang City SWAT Officer and a gas mask. He just snapped Jiang Hong's short blade with his bare hands."

Nightingale, hearing the communication nearby, her face immediately darkened.

"It's a Scavenger."

She looked at Chen Mo, her speaking speed quickening significantly.

"Heavy firepower units specially used by Tartarus to deal with internal traitors and failed experimental subjects. They feel no pain."

Chen Mo glanced at the terminal screen on his wrist; the battery was at twenty percent, and the time showed 4:40 AM.

"404, how long to return the way we came?"

404 rapidly calculated the route.

"The electromagnetic generator is off, those Mimics have all turned into scrap metal. Going through the tunnel at full speed, we can reach the bottom of that shaft in fifteen minutes."

Chen Mo stepped over the threshold and turned to gently close the wooden door labeled 'Chen Residence'.

"Qingxue, retreat to a safe distance. Do not engage him in close quarters."

A loud crash of shattering glass came from Su Qingxue's end.

"Jiang Hong has already been forced to the edge of the abandoned blast furnace by him. This guy's bone density is not right."

Chen Mo quickened his pace, the hurried footsteps of the three echoing in the corridor.

"Hold him off for five minutes."

Chen Mo cut off the communication, his eyes cold.

"Nightingale, where is the Scavenger's weakness?"

Nightingale ran to Chen Mo's left, her breathing rhythm remaining as steady as a special forces soldier.

"There is a nerve suppressor between the third and fourth cervical vertebrae. Destroy that suppressor, and his central nervous system will completely overload and burn out."

She glanced sideways at the white brand on Chen Mo's left forearm.

"But their necks are covered with high-strength carbon fiber blast collars. Conventional blades can't cut through them at all."

Chen Mo asked no more. The group passed through the now-silent control room and re-entered that wide tunnel.

On both sides of the tunnel, those Mimics that had been emitting a greenish glow were now all collapsed on the ground.

Without the maintenance of the electromagnetic field, those liquid metals had lost their luster, turning into puddles of dark gray sludge, exposing the twisted and incomplete metal skeletons inside.

The leading Mimic, which had once tried to communicate with Chen Mo using Chen Changhe's face, was kneeling in the center of the tunnel, the metal sphere of its head completely deflated.

As Chen Mo passed by it, his gaze did not linger.

All sentimentality had come to an end in that secret room. What he needed to do now was to send those who tried to destroy everything to a true hell.

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