Chapter 73 Live-Fish Farm - Turmoil

Bai Xiao froze at the words, but only for a split second. She immediately regained her composure, turned towards the Administrator pointing at her door, and said, 'I was just thinking about why there have been so many Breakers these past couple of days. I got distracted for a moment.'

The other person also expressed understanding. 'It is indeed a bit unusual. Normally, we only see a few cases every one or two months. Today, three suddenly appeared.'

'Exactly,' Bai Xiao replied.

As they spoke, the two passed each other and returned to their respective rooms.

The Administrator dormitory was completely different from the prisoner quarters. One room was partitioned into six small cubicles. Each cubicle contained only a narrow bed, a rudimentary bathroom, and a small bedside cabinet holding a set of clean uniforms.

Bai Xiao hadn't expected the Administrators' living conditions to be so poor. It seemed the status of the Purple-Bloods wasn't much higher either.

She didn't know what time at night the blood livestock would be taken for blood drawing. After returning to the cubicle marked with her number, she first changed into the clean clothes from the bedside cabinet, then simply lay on the bed, listening intently for any movement outside.

About an hour later, a rustling sound came from the doorway, followed by an electronic voice suddenly echoing within the room.

Bai Xiao followed the sound and saw several inconspicuous mesh-covered holes beside the door—the source of the voice.

'All Administrators, assemble in the corridor immediately.'

The Administrators gathered in the corridor and were then led outside the building to the large iron gate.

It turned out there was a small shed next to the large iron gate outside the building. Inside were parked two-person trolleys designed to be pushed side-by-side. These trolleys were specially designed with electric assist for climbing stairs. Each Administrator was responsible for three to four rooms, transporting the sleeping individuals in trips to the trucks parked outside. To minimize handling frequency, the trolleys' wheels and legs could automatically retract when pushed onto the trucks, greatly saving space.

Both the trolleys and the transport vehicles were designed for high efficiency. Everyone moved in an orderly manner. This entire procedure was clearly a long-established system. Once everyone was loaded onto the trucks, the Administrators uniformly boarded a bus that followed the transport vehicles.

The park outside the iron gate was far larger than imagined. The building they had left was merely the tip of the iceberg.

Bai Xiao saw a plaque on the iron gate of her building clearly marked 【D Zone, Building 5】. Ahead and behind stood several other buildings of identical structure.

To put it bluntly, this was practically a large-scale breeding farm, and her building was just one ordinary unit among many!

Dozens of vehicles were moving along the entire road. After about a five-minute drive, they arrived at the much larger C Zone.

Bai Xiao finally understood: C Zone was the blood extraction area, which meant D Zone was the breeding area.

Leaving the park was even more complicated than she'd thought. The park was unimaginably vast, stretching beyond sight. Besides C and D Zones, there must be several other zones. The ultimate mission was, of course, to find the park's exit. But before that, she had to understand the park's zoning and routes, and she absolutely needed a legitimate identity to leave D Zone.

Otherwise, relying solely on stealth and her own two feet to investigate within the park—the place was simply too big. Sneaking around, who knew how many years it would take to uncover anything.

Each building in D Zone had a designated drop-off point in C Zone. Bai Xiao silently followed the actions of the other Administrators from her building.

After settling all the unconscious individuals, the Administrators from each building were instructed to return to their respective buses.

Under the vast, dim night sky, the park's streetlights illuminated only limited areas. Bai Xiao desperately wanted to look around her surroundings, but getting off the bus required the Team Leader's permission. Unable to think of another reason on the spot, she could only claim she urgently needed to use the restroom.

The Team Leader stared at her through his hood for a moment before finally saying, 'Administrator 23, is this your first day on the job? Low-level zones have low clearance. Moving about during external tasks is not permitted, and cross-zone movement is strictly forbidden!'

Bai Xiao failed to get off the bus, but she at least learned that D Zone was a low-level zone. Low clearance meant greater restrictions for the staff within.

She didn't know what level C Zone counted as, but based on current observations, it was at least a mid-level zone. That implied B Zone and A Zone included at least one high-level zone. The higher the zone, the greater the clearance. It seemed that to gain more freedom within the park, she could only aim to rise to a higher zone.

By the time the blood drawing was complete and they had returned to D Zone to settle everyone back, it was already the dead of night. The bus was crowded, offering no chance to slip away. Bai Xiao could only wait for the next outing, hoping to find an opportunity during the transport process to C Zone.

...

The next day, life continued entirely from the Administrator's perspective. The work was tiring, but opportunities to slack off could also be found.

Just as she had observed herself, these Administrators did not view the imprisoned individuals as human at all. In their eyes, these people were merely livestock for blood extraction. They didn't even believe these individuals possessed human intelligence, thinking they were born dull-witted, timid, and obedient, hence the lax management.

Guard duty at the iron gate was often dozed through. After everyone was asleep at night, they only patrolled once. Some broken door locks in the dormitories went unrepaired. The building doors only had symbolic locks. Only the key to the main iron gate was considered important, held by the Team Leader.

That day after lunch, as per regulations, the occupants of the two-person and four-person rooms were having their free activity period. This was also the meal time for all Administrators.

The Administrators' meals weren't pre-prepared. They had the clearance to serve themselves, and seating wasn't fixed.

After getting her portion, Bai Xiao found a seat by the window and ate slowly.

As she ate, she watched out the window. Since the physical education period, she had sensed something slightly off about a few individuals. Now, in a remote corner of the playground, small groups of three to five people had gathered, about three or four clusters in total, engaged in some unknown activity. This had never happened before.

In places she couldn't see, the doors of several six-person and eight-person rooms had been violently forced open. Several groups of people gathered in the corridors, discussing something.

Bai Xiao suspected that more than just three people had awakened yesterday. Others might have awakened too but were smarter, not revealing it. Perhaps more had awakened today. The gathering crowds were likely the awakeners from these past two days.

She mentally noted this, reminding herself to be extra vigilant going forward.

Sure enough, during dinner, these individuals began their riot. Both dining halls had rioters, and their numbers were greater than she had imagined—roughly one-third of the total population.

They had clearly planned this in advance, coordinating to simultaneously throw their meal trays at nearby Administrators. Bai Xiao, already on guard, wasn't hit.

The rioters were numerous, outnumbering the Administrators in the dining hall. After their first wave of tray attacks, they immediately followed up by throwing the stools they'd been sitting on. Many Administrators cried out in pain from the hits; several struck in the head had already lost the ability to move.

The dining hall for the two-person and four-person rooms had fewer people, but it was adjacent to the kitchen. After two waves of attacks, the rioters immediately surged into the kitchen. The kitchen staff were also caught off guard by the sudden chaos. The rioters took advantage of the confusion to seize many tools from the kitchen: metal ladles, kitchen knives, cleavers, rolling pins, iron pots, and more.

Wielding the tools they had grabbed, these people attacked all the Administrators and kitchen staff with frenzied abandon.

The situation in the other dining hall was even more brutal. That hall housed the six-person and eight-person room occupants, with a higher number of awakeners—about twice the number of Administrators. They fought almost two against one, engaging in close-quarters combat.