55: Chapter 55 Contaminated Samples

The black spot shrank in his palm, and Grey Pupil immediately told him to throw it into the fire.

"Burn it."

"Burn it now, don't take it back."

This sentence came quickly, and it was very grave.

Lu Jin lowered his head to look at the small sample in his palm, not moving.

However, Wu Fu spoke softly from the other end of the Sea of Consciousness.

"Don't burn it."

"Feed it to me."

Grey Pupil's grey eyes sank, and his voice turned cold.

"Can't you smell it?"

"There are whispers in this thing. It screams when pressed by fire, and it grows when fed to the pool. If you send it into the Brood Nursery Court, it's not certain whether what it produces later will still be yours."

Wu Fu stood by the side of the half-pool, her milky-white eyes watching that black spot quietly.

"It's dirty."

"But it has materials."

"The half-pool can eat one layer first, then slowly spit it out."

"If you burn it directly, nothing will be left."

Two sentences, two directions.

One wanted to destroy it immediately.

The other wanted to swallow it first.

Lu Jin still didn't speak; he just flipped over the black spot sample to take a look.

The outer shell was like scorched stone.

The black spot inside, however, was like living flesh; it bulged extremely slightly, then shrank back again.

This thing was indeed not clean.

But it was precisely because it wasn't clean that it was more valuable.

The competition officials sealing the field had already approached by this time.

Before the recorder in front could speak, a harder voice pressed over from behind.

"Lu Jin."

"Seal the sample in your hand first."

Instructor Gu Pingchuan walked over quickly from the other end, his expression not looking good.

Two people were following behind him.

One wore a white robe with black edges from the Temple, with a Clean Scale emblem hanging on his chest.

The other was a competition official, holding a sample sealing box in his hand.

Instructor Gu Pingchuan walked up close and didn't beat around the bush.

"The main mirror has already recorded the scene of you picking up the sample. Just now, the Military Court recorder also detected abnormal contamination fluctuations in the waste roots."

"The academy wants to file a record, and the Temple wants to seal the sample."

"Both of them have come to demand the item."

The white-robed Temple official glanced at Lu Jin's palm, his voice flat and cold.

"Abnormal contamination samples, according to federal competition regulations, must be handed over immediately for joint sealing."

"You are a contestant; you do not have the authority to keep it privately."

The competition official handed the sample sealing box forward.

"Hand it over first."

"As for how to test it later, the academy and the Temple will go through the process together."

Lu Jin looked at that box and finally spoke.

"I want to take a look inside first."

The white-robed official's brows furrowed on the spot.

"A contamination sample is not a prize."

"Once this thing activates, the first person to die will be the one holding it."

Instructor Gu Pingchuan didn't answer immediately, only looking at Lu Jin first.

"What do you want to do?"

Lu Jin pinched the black spot sample between his fingers, answering steadily.

"Take it apart first."

"If you burn it all, the lead will be broken. If you feed it directly, the risk is too high. Take it apart first; resources go to resources, intelligence goes to intelligence, and the dirty stuff gets sealed separately."

Upon hearing this, the Temple official's expression immediately darkened.

"What do you take contamination for?"

"This is something the Temple is going to take over, not a material for you to practice on."

Lu Jin raised his eyes and glanced at him.

"I didn't stop you from taking over."

"But I was the one who picked it up in the field. I want to know what it is first."

The white-robed official still wanted to push back.

However, Instructor Gu Pingchuan reached out first and pressed the sample sealing box back.

"Give him a quarter of an hour."

"I'll keep watch outside."

"After a quarter of an hour, no matter what is taken apart, the sample and the residue will be sealed together."

The Temple official's voice turned cold instantly.

"Instructor Gu, you are taking on the responsibility."

Instructor Gu Pingchuan didn't even look at him.

"My people from Zhuixing Academy, I will watch them myself."

"If you're worried, stand at the door now and don't take a single step away."

These words were very direct.

The Temple official stared at him for two breaths, but in the end, didn't push forward anymore.

"A quarter of an hour."

"When the time is up, open the door and hand over the sample."

After returning to the living quarters, the first thing Lu Jin did was seal the door.

The black silver team order was pressed onto the door, and Instructor Gu Pingchuan's people stood guard outside. The Temple official and the competition sample sealing box were also waiting in the outer corridor.

Only Lu Jin, Grey Pupil, Wu Fu, and that black spot sample placed in the center of the bone plate remained in the room.

The fire wasn't very big.

It only left a thin line of grey fire around the edge of the bone plate.

Lu Jin picked up the cold bone pliers and looked at Grey Pupil first.

"You speak first."

Grey Pupil stared at the sample, his grey eyes showing no signs of relaxing at all.

"Burn it."

"Burn it along with the plate, and bury it along with the ashes."

"This smell is very similar to the whispers in the lower part of the ritual furnace. It's not just dirty; it also looks for openings. If you dissect it now, it's equivalent to opening a crack in the door yourself."

Lu Jin looked at Wu Fu again.

Wu Fu stood by the side of the half-pool, her three strands of nest silk pulled taut.

"Feed it."

"But don't feed it as a whole piece."

"The outer shell is hard and can be ground into material. That layer of living black spot can be extracted. The core inside is the tightest and should have something in it."

"I will eat the layer of dirty meat on the outside first, then spit out the clean part."

Grey Pupil immediately followed up with a cold voice.

"If you swallow it and then spit it out, who can guarantee it will still be clean?"

Wu Fu didn't argue with him, only watching Lu Jin quietly.

Her meaning was very clear.

There is risk.

But there is also meat.

Lu Jin placed the bone pliers on the edge of the plate.

"Everyone stop for now."

"For this thing today, no one is burning the whole piece, and no one is feeding the whole piece."

"Take it apart first."

He raised his hand and tapped three times, setting up three small slots on the edge of the bone plate.

"Put materials on the left."

"Put intelligence in the middle."

"Put contaminants on the right."

"Peel it layer by layer. Keep what can be kept, burn what can be burned, and seal what can be sealed."

This was his algorithm.

He didn't blindly trust the Temple.

Nor did he believe that any dirty thing would turn into a benefit just by swallowing it.

Dissect it clearly first, then decide which part should be kept and which part should be destroyed.

Grey Pupil didn't try to persuade him again.

Wu Fu also went quiet.

Both sides understood that Lu Jin had made the final decision.

The grey fire line closed first.

Lu Jin used the cold bone pliers to clamp the small sample, and with his other hand, slowly pressed a bone needle into the crack of the outer shell.

Click.

The first layer of the outer shell cracked.

The crack wasn't big, but a faint black gas poured out first. As soon as that gas touched the grey fire line, it immediately emitted an extremely faint hissing sound, as if something had been scalded.

Grey Pupil's voice pressed down as well.

"Did you hear that?"

"It can scream."

Lu Jin didn't answer, only tightening the fire line inward by half an inch.

The outer shell was peeled open bit by bit.

What fell out first wasn't meat, nor was it bone.

It was a layer of grey-brown fine powder, mixed with extremely crushed root debris and mineral particles. It smelled like a very strange odor, as if the waste roots, gravel, and military training flag core shells from the Rift Valley Battlefield had been chewed up by something and pressed into a lump.

Wu Fu's nose twitched very lightly.

"This layer can be used."

"Wash it twice, sieve it, and it can be pressed into a small portion of dirty nourishing grey material. Feeding it to Work Rats for shell repair is a bit faster than ordinary grey bone powder."

Lu Jin directly pushed this layer of powder into the left slot.

With the first cut, the material was kept.

But the truly troublesome thing was only just being revealed.

Once the outer shell was gone, the black spot inside immediately bulged like a living creature.

It wasn't big.

Just that little bit in the center of a fingernail.

But it really looked like a drop of sticky black meat, with extremely fine threads extending from the edges, feeling its way out along the bone pliers.

The ritual staff in Grey Pupil's hand sank on the spot.

"Press it down."

The grey fire line suddenly tightened, trapping the black spot tightly in the middle.

But as the fire pressed down, the thing shrank even faster, as if it wanted to burrow deeper inside.

Wu Fu also whipped out her nest silk at the same time.

Three strands of white silk immediately wrapped around both sides of the sample, pinning it to the center of the bone plate, not giving it a chance to run around anymore.

Lu Jin looked at the black spot, his voice very low.

"Continue."

With the second cut, the black spot was finally sliced open.

There was no blood.

Only a thick, bitter black sludge slowly squeezed out from inside.

As soon as the black sludge hit the plate, the grey fire immediately crackled in a series. Deeper down, the ritual furnace in the depths of Lu Jin's Sea of Consciousness also vibrated slightly, as if it had smelled something familiar.

Grey Pupil's expression darkened even further.

"I said it before."

"This thing is related to the whispers."

Lu Jin heard it this time.

Not just heard it.

At that moment, he even actually heard a very faint movement.

It didn't sound like a person talking.

It sounded more like something was licking the door, over and over again, from very, very far away.

The feeling was very light.

But it was disgusting enough.

Lu Jin's hand didn't shake; he directly pushed the black sludge into the right slot, then pressed the grey fire onto it, sealing it off separately first.

With the second cut, the dirty stuff was separated.

Only the last layer of the core remained.

After the outer shell was peeled off and the black sludge was cut open, the hardest part in the center of the sample was finally revealed.

It was a dark red fragment the length of a finger joint.

The edges were severely worn, as if it had been buried in the ground for many years. The surface was still stuck with a bit of undissolved black stain, but the old fire pattern in the middle was very eye-catching.

The moment Lu Jin saw that pattern, his eyes changed.

He had seen this pattern before.

Not at the academy, not in the competition area.

It was beside that old coordinate fragment of his father's.

That was the pattern of the Military Court's old fire stele.

The fire stele was very easy to recognize.

In previous years, the Pioneering Military Court often used it to carve war zone coordinates, camp numbers, and dispatch punctuation. Later, when the new system was changed, the old fire stele gradually retired. Now, among young students, there aren't many people who recognize this thing.

Lu Jin's fingertips tightened, and he picked up the fragment from the bone plate.

Once Grey Pupil saw that old fire pattern, he also paused.

"Something from the Military Court?"

Lu Jin didn't answer, first flipping the fragment over.

Once the layer of black stain on the back fell off, a string of broken old numbers underneath was finally revealed.

The first half was worn away.

But the second half was still there.

Lu Jin only took one look, and his breathing deepened slightly.

This string of numbers could mesh with the prefix left by his father.

It wasn't the front segment.

Nor was it the tail segment.

It was stuck right in the middle.

The room went quiet instantly.

Outside, the Temple official had already started knocking on the door.

"Time is up."

"Lu Jin, open the door and hand over the sample."

Instructor Gu Pingchuan's voice also came in.

"What did you take apart?"

Lu Jin lowered his head to look at the old fire stele fragment in his hand, his eyes sinking to the bottom bit by bit.

In the left slot was the dirty nourishing grey material that could be washed and used.

In the right slot was the black sludge that would attract whispers and had to be sealed off.

The piece in the middle was intelligence.

And it was the kind of intelligence he was currently most lacking.

His father's coordinate had finally been filled in a segment.

Lu Jin tucked the old fire stele fragment into the thin box in his sleeve, pushed the left and right slots back to the center of the bone plate, and only then raised his hand to open the door.

As soon as the door opened, the Temple official stared at the bone plate first.

"Where is the sample?"

Lu Jin pushed the plate forward, his voice very flat.

"The outer shell turned to powder, the inner layer turned to sludge."

"I didn't touch the dirty layer; it's all inside. Test it if you can."

The Temple official stared at the black sludge sealed by the grey fire, his expression changing noticeably.

Instructor Gu Pingchuan also saw the layer of grey powder in the left slot.

"You've already separated it?"

"Yes," Lu Jin answered steadily, "Materials and contamination are not the same thing. If I hand it over as a whole, the final result of the test will only be 'contamination sample.' By taking it apart first, and then sealing and recording what needs to be, we won't have wasted the effort of finding it."

The Temple official stared at him, his tone stiff with coldness.

"You are very bold."

Lu Jin looked at him, not raising his voice in response.

"I just don't want to hand things over blindly, and I don't want to eat things blindly."

This sentence was very flat.

But after hearing it, Instructor Gu Pingchuan didn't ask anything else.

Because he had already understood.

What Lu Jin obtained today wasn't just a sample.

He had also obtained a lead that could be followed in the future.

The Temple and competition officials quickly sealed the bone plate into a black box.

Grey Pupil stood in the Sea of Consciousness, his grey eyes still dark.

"That black sludge, it still needs to be burned later."

Wu Fu gently touched the edge of the half-pool.

"I can eat that layer of grey material in the left slot."

"It will be safer to eat after washing."

Lu Jin didn't rush to answer them.

He just touched the thin box in his sleeve, turned and walked back into the room, and closed the door again.

The footsteps outside gradually faded away.

The silence inside the room, however, was heavier than before.

The old fire stele fragment was placed back on the table by him.

Under the light of the grey fire, the broken numbers on it were immediately clearer.

Lu Jin stared at that string of numbers, piece by piece matching it with the front segment of the coordinate left by his father in his memory.

The prefix could mesh.

The break could be continued.

The middle segment had really been filled in.