404: Chapter 404 My Cousin is Very Strong, Biological Samples from the Glacier

Ripples spread in waves, and the gray fog surged violently.

——

A black line cut across the canvas like a sharp blade, rapidly tearing and expanding to both sides.

In the blink of an eye, that opening quickly formed a constantly rotating pitch-black vortex.

Detecting the spatial fluctuations, Fang Cheng had already clenched his fists, assumed an offensive stance, and stood in strict readiness.

His gaze was firmly locked on the center of the vortex.

There, starlike points of light flickered vaguely, as if something was rapidly approaching.

A heart-palpitating gravitational pull distorted the light, tearing at the surrounding air and emitting a faint, sharp ringing sound.

Before Officer Zhou Liang and the others could react—

The vortex suddenly shuddered, as if letting out a burp, and "spat" things out from inside.

Two figures stumbled out, heavily crashing onto the cold floor.

No, it should be three people.

A woman wearing a researcher's uniform with messy long hair struggled to get up, her eyes full of lingering fear.

A handsome young man was kneeling on one knee at the moment, panting heavily, sweat soaking the strands of hair in front of his forehead.

And another, who had been forcefully thrown aside by the young man before falling out, was a stark-naked, muscular brawny man.

Only his eyes were tightly closed at this moment, unconscious.

The black vortex rapidly shrank accordingly, finally reducing to a single point and disappearing.

Only a trace of faint fluctuation remained in the air, which was soon swallowed by the re-diffusing gray fog.

The office lobby once again fell into an eerie silence.

Everyone's gaze focused on these three uninvited guests who appeared out of thin air.

At this moment, all of them had faces full of disbelief, and a thought simultaneously rose in their hearts:

How is there still an expert?

"Who are you..."

Officer Zhou Liang instinctively raised his gun to aim, but as soon as the words left his mouth, he froze entirely.

His gaze fell on the face of the panting young man, his pupils contracting slightly.

This face... he was too familiar with it; it was clearly identical to a certain big star on television and posters.

Isn't this Cheng Jiashu?

The man Captain Gao called the "Smiling Demon", who reached a cooperation with the Special Investigation Team and also held the codename "White Owl"!

A-Li also saw clearly at this time, his brain completely crashing.

Looking at the man wearing the ghost mask and soaring with Evil Qi, and then looking at this newly appeared, genuine Cheng Jiashu.

His lips trembled as he asked stutteringly:

"Did... did my eyes deceive me? Really... really another White Owl came?"

Officer Zhou Liang's heart shook violently.

The previous guess was not wrong; the identity of "White Owl" actually represented two people.

He involuntarily cast his gaze toward the man wearing the ghost mask.

Perhaps this guy who tore monsters apart with his bare hands and treated killing like child's play was the true murderer who gave both the Noah Organization and the Special Investigation Team a headache.

Perhaps Captain Gao had found the wrong collaboration target from the very beginning...

In an instant, the cold sweat on Officer Zhou Liang's back broke out even more fiercely.

On the other side, Fang Cheng furrowed his brows slightly.

Just before the moment the vortex appeared earlier, he suddenly felt a familiar consciousness forcibly establish a connection with his Memory Palace.

That feeling was like being in an endless ocean, where he, acting as a lighthouse, was locked onto as a navigational marker by a lost ship.

Looking at Cheng Jiashu appearing here at this moment, Fang Cheng already had some guesses in his heart, but more doubts also surfaced.

"So you really are Cheng Jiashu!"

Xiao Jie's surprised voice broke the deadlock first, and then realizing the occasion was wrong, he quickly changed his words:

"No, no, now is the period of executing a mission, I should call you White Owl... No, that's not right, it should be the Smiling Demon."

"Why did you appear here? Where is Captain Gao? Can you get in touch with him?"

He asked endlessly like a star-chaser, a fan's light flickering in his eyes upon seeing an idol.

"Mr. Cheng Jiashu, I really like listening to your songs. When is the new album coming out?"

"Xiao Jie!"

Officer Zhou Liang low-voicedly stopped his loss of composure.

Cheng Jiashu slowly stood up, wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand, and raised his hand to touch his cheek, but touched nothing.

That iconic mask used for disguise had long shattered in the previous fierce battle with Minister Luo Lie.

He helplessly showed a wry smile, simply facing everyone openly with his true face.

When his gaze swept across the masked Fang Cheng, his eyes paused slightly, and then he looked at those hesitant and suspicious Special Investigation Team members.

"Are you people from the Special Investigation Team?"

"Report, sir!"

Officer Zhou Liang immediately stepped forward, stood at attention, and quickly pulled out his credentials from his bosom:

"I am Officer Zhou Liang, a second-class official of the Dongdu City Detective Detachment, and also the leader of this Night Owl operation team."

"These people are all my team members, A-Yang, A-Li, and Xiao Jie."

As he spoke, he actively introduced them, closing the distance.

His tone exuded a shrewdness, actively elevating Cheng Jiashu to the position of "sir".

The intention was obvious: to win him over into their camp.

If that unfathomable White Owl beside them harbored killing intent toward them, at least they would have one more fraction of resistance power.

Fang Cheng glanced at the Special Investigation Team enforcement badge in Officer Zhou Liang's hand.

The familiar emblem of a golden shield crossed with a blade made the corners of his mouth twitch slightly behind the mask.

This kid actually changed into a new credential.

"Looks like I came just in time."

Cheng Jiashu patted the dust off his body, his voice carrying a trace of post-catastrophe exhaustion and self-mockery.

He glanced at the twisted monster remains all over the floor, then cast his gaze at Fang Cheng wearing the ghost mask, and said in a relaxed tone:

"Thanks, if it weren't for you being here, I'm afraid I would have had to explain my life in that ghost place."

Officer Zhou Liang was stunned upon hearing this:

"Sir Cheng, so you guys know each other?"

A-Li's already chaotic brain was an even more complete mush at this moment, staring blankly at the two "White Owls".

"That's right."

Cheng Jiashu shrugged and pointed frankly at Fang Cheng:

"Let me introduce you, this is my distant cousin; our Family shares a close Bloodline and our minds are linked."

"An ability user like me is extremely prone to losing direction in such spatially unstable places. There must be someone closely related by blood to act as an 'anchor point' in order to precisely locate and complete spatial jumps."

This explanation was reasonable and logical. Officer Zhou Liang remembered what Captain Gao had mentioned.

When the Smiling Demon used his ability, he needed a living person as a coordinate.

At this moment, his cousin dressed in a similar appearance and appearing here could barely make sense.

"Therefore, you don't need to be nervous. For this operation, he is just here to help out with a small matter."

Cheng Jiashu seemed to have perceived the tense atmosphere of the scene through his earlier glance, and deliberately added.

As he spoke, he turned to look at Fang Cheng with a smile on his face:

"Cousin, don't you think so?"

Just helping with a small matter?

A-Li and the others recalled the berserk appearance of this "cousin" rushing into the monster crowd and starting a massacre just now; no matter how they looked at it, it didn't look like "helping".

That looked more like a slaughter purely enjoyed, or to use the young people's fashionable words, farming monsters to level up.

Fang Cheng just quietly looked at Cheng Jiashu, the crimson gaze behind the mask flickering slightly.

Knowing that Cheng Jiashu should have already recognized him.

At this moment, his glib tongue was both rescuing the situation for both sides and conveniently explaining to himself why he had suddenly established a mental connection with him.

Although there were still many doubts in his heart, Fang Cheng did not expose it.

He just gently let out an "hmm" through his nostrils, considered as cooperating with his performance.

Under Cheng Jiashu's brief explanation, the tense atmosphere at the scene finally eased down.

Since they were all "one of us", things would be much easier to handle.

"Then... Sir Cheng, was your mission successful? Did you get your hands on the secret data..."

Seeing this, A-Li couldn't help asking.

Cheng Jiashu took a military encrypted USB flash drive from Choi Suyoung and casually tossed it to Officer Zhou Liang.

"This is the experimental data you wanted. Inside are all the incriminating evidences of human experiments conducted by the Noah Organization since World War II."

Officer Zhou Liang instinctively caught the USB flash drive, feeling cold in his hand.

He tightly clutched this small thing related to the lives of countless people and the honor of the Special Investigation Team, feeling somewhat dazed for a moment.

"People, I have also brought them to you."

After Cheng Jiashu finished speaking, he pointed back at the two burdens behind him:

"Next is to consider how to safely leave this building."

Fang Cheng's gaze fell on Choi Suyoung behind Cheng Jiashu, and the unconscious Majima Goro.

In his mind, scenes of his hearty duel with Majima Goro in the courtyard half a year ago involuntarily surfaced.

At that time, how high-spirited this Karate expert was, regarded by himself as a formidable enemy seen only once in a lifetime.

Now, he had turned into this weak appearance, neither human nor ghost.

Fang Cheng couldn't help shaking his head inwardly.

Thoughts returned to the note passed out through Xiaosa earlier, and Choi Suyoung's response:

"After Mr. Majima left the hospital, he continued treatment here and will participate in a life-threatening major surgery tonight."

This clever woman obviously guessed something from that probe.

Being able to ask Choi Suyoung such words as "Where is Majima Goro"...

It was nothing more than acquaintances who had intersected with Majima Goro in Dongdu before, or experts dispatched by the Majima Family coming from Dongying to search for the missing eldest son.

Therefore, her response was both testing his identity in turn and revealing key information to potential rescuers, counting as sending out a distress signal.

At this moment, Choi Suyoung also noticed Fang Cheng's gaze.

That ferocious mask made her feel fearful.

But for some reason, those crimson eyes gave her an indescribable sense of familiarity, as if she had seen them somewhere before.

"Sir Cheng, the situation on our side is very bad."

Officer Zhou Liang put away the USB flash drive and began to introduce the situation with a solemn expression:

"We are trapped. This building is like a ghost wall; no matter how we walk, we will return to the origin."

"It should be the Inner World."

The experienced A-Yang took over the conversation and added:

"I have encountered a similar situation in a mission before. This is an alternate dimension overlapping with reality, where the physical Law is distorted here."

"If we cannot find the correct way out, we will only be trapped in this building forever along with those monsters."

"Your guess is not wrong."

Cheng Jiashu nodded slightly in agreement, obviously already clear about this.

"We tried before, walking up the stairs of the safety passage, and we could only reach the 86th floor at most."

Officer Zhou Liang organized his words and continued:

"Further up is a sheet of gray fog and darkness. Continuing to pass through it brings us back to the 84th floor."

"But if we walk down, it seems to have no end. As time passes, the stairs of the building will deepen layer by layer, as if gradually leading into Hell."

"However, no matter what, we will eventually return to the 84th floor."

Seeing Officer Zhou Liang recount the Special Investigation Team's encounter, Fang Cheng considered it and then also began to introduce his own special experience:

"I climbed up from the exterior wall of the building. When climbing to the 83rd floor, I was swallowed by a gray fog spreading down, and then I kept spinning between the 83rd and 86th floors."

His words were simple and clear, but the information revealed made Officer Zhou Liang and the others' hearts chill.

Climbing a skyscraper of more than eighty floors with bare hands on a rainy night?

What level of monster is this person's physical fitness?

Fang Cheng ignored everyone's shock.

At this time, he looked calm on the surface, but his heart was somewhat anxious.

When observing the enemy situation outside the Noah Building, Fang Cheng had relied on Mind Resonance to sense the distress thoughts sent out by Xu Hao, who was participating in the Noah Organization meeting inside the building.

That thought was intermittent, very weak, filled with fear and despair.

Fang Cheng tried to establish a stable mental connection with him.

But the conscious signals that were once as swift as lightning were like falling into a quagmire, almost completely interrupted.

Until hearing A-Yang talk about the Inner World did Fang Cheng confirm that it must be this patch of gray fog that cut off perception.

How is Xu Hao? Is he still alive?

This thought kept spinning in Fang Cheng's mind.

You must know that the only condition Xu Hao agreed to become an inside man back then was to guarantee his life safety.

Fang Cheng also made a solemn oath for this.

As long as Xu Hao did not intentionally betray, yet fell into danger because of him, he would definitely save him with all his strength.

If he violated the oath, all his strength would be lost, and he would die a horrible death.

Fang Cheng didn't care whether the oath would actually come true.

What he cared about was that the promise he made must be fulfilled and honored!

Right now, dealing with the Noah Organization was secondary; saving people in the top-floor conference hall was Fang Cheng's primary purpose for this trip.

After listening, Cheng Jiashu nodded:

"Our situation is similar to yours. Escaping all the way from the laboratory, we also encountered the same gray mist."

"The 86th and 87th floors are the core experimental areas of Noah Pharmaceuticals."

Choi Suyoung's face was pale, and she interjected in a somewhat weak tone:

"Especially the 87th floor, which is the top-secret area where all human experiments are conducted."

"We... just escaped from there. Could this strange gray fog be related to the laboratory?"

Hearing this, Cheng Jiashu's face also immediately turned serious, as if recalling a shocking scene once more.

"I saw something in the deepest laboratory on the 87th floor."

"That was a huge red eyeball, soaked in a huge container. I suspect it is the source that forms this 'Inner World'."

As he spoke, he turned to look at Choi Suyoung standing behind him, his gaze carrying an inquisitive meaning:

"Miss Choi, do you have any information about this red eyeball that you can reveal?"

"Red eyeball..."

Choi Suyoung shook her head blankly:

"I didn't know there was such a thing, but I know that the secret project conducted in the laboratory behind that door was established about five months ago."

"And it was completely isolated. The only ones who could enter and leave there were the minister of our genetic engineering department, the chief researcher, and several mysterious big leaders."

"It is said that they were studying a... biological sample excavated from under the ice of the Himalayas."