161: Evolution

"I have a preliminary plan."

Inside the medical center, Eve's voice carried a hint of fatigue, but even more of the confidence belonging to a top scientist. She pointed at the dark spiral structure on the light screen that radiated an eerie beauty.

"Based on preliminary sampling, the essence of this 'infection' is a forced assimilation of low-dimensional matter by high-dimensional energy. Although its structure is stable, it extremely rejects our existing energy systems. Therefore, resistance won't work; we can only suppress it."

She looked at Chen Feng: "I need authorization to mobilize the base's energy reserves and synthesize a high-concentration 'energy inhibitor'."

"To suppress its activity?" Chen Feng asked.

"Yes, just like cooling down an overactive engine. As long as we can reduce its activity to a safe threshold, Reno's own vitality will have a chance to repair the damage," Eve explained, her logic clear and unquestionable.

"Authorized." Chen Feng's answer was as concise as ever.

The first pale blue inhibitor was injected into Reno's body under Eve's personal supervision.

Everyone held their breath.

However, in the next second, a piercing alarm suddenly tore through the silence of the medical center!

"Warning! Vital signs are dropping rapidly! Detected disordered proliferation of the energy field within the target's body!" The medical AI's cold electronic voice sounded like a death sentence.

On the light screen, Reno's physical data map was instantly covered by Avalanche-like red warnings. Those ice-crystal-like patterns on his skin were spreading frantically at a speed visible to the naked eye, as if a flower of death was blooming brilliantly upon him.

"How can this be..." The confidence on Eve's face instantly collapsed, turning deathly pale. She rushed to the console, her hands moving like afterimages on the light screen, trying to salvage the situation.

"Increase the neutralizer dosage! No! Switch to the physical isolation field! Damn it! Its reaction pattern is completely illogical!"

The chaos lasted for a full ten minutes.

When everything finally returned to calm, Reno's vital signs were barely stabilized at a level even more dangerous than before. The crack on the core crystal shield of that exorbitantly expensive sampling device widened slightly more.

Eve stood there in a daze, like a statue whose soul had been extracted.

Chen Feng walked to her side and looked at her with a calm gaze, without a hint of blame, simply asking: "What's the situation now?"

Eve's lips moved, seemingly wanting to say some complex theory, but in the end, all her pride and confidence shattered. She lowered her eyes and whispered three words in a barely audible voice.

"I... don't know."

This was the first time in her life she had said those three words regarding a technical problem. It made her feel more shame and despair than any failure ever had.

For the next three days, Eve locked herself in the data analysis room.

She went without sleep or rest, her eyes bloodshot, and the nutrient fluid in front of her remained untouched.

"Simulation No. 274, start. Protocol: 'String Theory Induced Decay'... Failed. Target structure underwent entropic explosion."

"Simulation No. 315, start. Protocol: 'Quantum Foam Isolation'... Failed. Isolation field was instantly assimilated."

"Simulation No. 401... Failed."

"Failed..."

"Why... Why..."

Hundreds of theoretical models, exhausting her entire knowledge base, pointed to the same result without exception: any form of resistance, suppression, or even induction would only accelerate the collapse of Reno's body. That high-dimensional law was like a ruthless monarch; any challenge to its authority would invite an even more violent backlash.

She had hit a cold and hopeless wall built of higher-level physical rules.

On the evening of the fourth day, a physically and mentally exhausted Eve walked unconsciously into the cafeteria.

Carrying a portion of nutrient paste that hadn't even been opened, she sat down blankly, staring vacantly at the metal tabletop in front of her.

"Clack."

A meal tray was gently placed across from her.

Eve looked up and saw Su Li's face, cold as always.

The atmosphere instantly became awkward and heavy. Since the last meeting, the relationship between the two had dropped to freezing point.

Eve expected an inevitable taunt, but Su Li said nothing. She just silently ate her food, then pushed a high-energy nutrient bar—clearly a private stash from her own tray—in front of Eve.

Eve was stunned.

"What do you mean?" Her voice was hoarse and dry.

"My chief scientist cannot collapse before my budget report turns into a deficit." Su Li didn't even look up, her tone as cold as the winter wind of Ashen Earth Star. "That would seriously affect my cost accounting."

"..." Eve looked at the nutrient bar, then at Su Li. She wanted to say something, but found her throat seemingly blocked.

"Also," Su Li finally looked up, her sharp eyes staring directly at Eve, "I don't understand technology. I only know that I personally approved the budget for the 'Seed Project.' I do not accept it becoming a bad debt."

With that, she picked up her tray and left directly, without sparing Eve another glance.

Eve sat there in silence for a long time. She slowly picked up the nutrient bar, peeled off the wrapper, and took a mechanical bite. A surge of pure energy and a long-lost sweetness dissolved in her mouth, like a warm current flowing into her nearly exhausted body and spirit.

She suddenly stood up and walked quickly back to the data analysis room.

This time, she didn't construct any more "treatment" models. She stood before the massive data light screen, looking at the fatal dark spiral, Su Li's cold words echoing in her mind.

"What if... I've been wrong all along?" Eve muttered to herself. "What if I'm not a doctor, and I'm not facing a disease?"

Her fingers slid rapidly across the console.

"What if... this is a construction process?"

A crazy thought, like a bolt of lightning, split open her deadlocked thinking.

"What if... I am an architect?"

She switched to a completely new simulation perspective, abandoning all "resistance" and "suppression" parameters, and setting all variables to "supply" and "assistance."

*Hum—*

The new simulation began.

On the light screen, the high-dimensional law was no longer a violent intruder. It became an engineer with perfect design blueprints, and Reno's cells were its building materials.

The simulation results were staggering.

The law was like an invisible giant hand, attempting to transform Reno's carbon-based cells into a never-before-seen, more efficient, and more stable energy-conducting structure—a semi-energy, semi-matter crystalline life form.

However, the low-dimensional cells were like poor-quality bricks, completely unable to withstand this precision modification at the atomic level. They constantly shattered and disintegrated during the transformation process, releasing disordered energy; this was the true cause of Reno's critical condition!

The essence of the infection... was not destruction.

It was a forced, incompatible "evolution"!

Eve's breathing became rapid, her chest heaving violently, and an unprecedented light burst from her eyes. She found it! She had found the key!

She immediately rushed back to the medical center and restarted the nearly scrapped sampling device, performing a very shallow scan on Reno to verify her theory.

A stream of data flooded into her mind.

Energy conversion model... cell collapse rate... structural reorganization pattern... everything aligned perfectly with her new theory!

Just then, a flash of inspiration struck her mind.

This energy conversion model... this massive loss and dissipation of energy during the conversion process due to "incompatible laws"... why... why was it so startlingly similar to the energy block mass production problem regarding "Dimensional Reduction Adaptation Technology" in her mind?!

Two seemingly unrelated problems, their core energy loss patterns actually pointed to the same root!

An idea even crazier and bolder than the "Forced Theory of Evolution" boomed and sprouted in her mind.

"My God..."

Eve covered her mouth with her hand, her body trembling slightly due to extreme excitement.

"Chen Feng... Su Li... come to the conference room at once! Immediately!"

With a trembling voice, she sent out an emergency communication to the highest level of the entire base.