37: Chapter 37 Forced Silence and Living Controllers

Chen Duo's fingers gripped the metal grate of the maintenance hatch, three of his fingernails peeling off as blood trailed dark red finger marks across the rust-stained metal surface, like some primitive counting symbols. Protocol 07's homing protocol burned in his spinal cord, as if someone were tightening a rusty mainspring deep within his brainstem, forcing this unconscious body to crawl toward the underground in an anti-joint posture. His spinal vertebrae made a clicking sound of dislocation, and his knees ground bloody marks into the concrete.

Lin Yuan crouched in the shadows of the lead-plate isolation zone. The alloy wires on his right hand had already spread to his shoulder, weaving into a fine silver spiderweb at his collarbone, pulsing slightly with his heartbeat. The colossal entity underground was emitting infrasonic summons through the Protocol 07 interface on the back of Chen Duo's neck, making the lead-plate tent hum and vibrate.

"He's leaking intelligence," Lin Yuan's voice was soft, yet it overpowered the low-frequency vibrations coming from underground. "Every second, his nerves are broadcasting our location, equipment parameters, THRONE-00's energy readings, and even the page numbers in Rat Eye's notebook to ARK-PROTO-00."

Rat Eye huddled in the corner, clutching that worn-out notebook bound with iron wire. His knuckles were deathly white from overexertion, and his gaze darted frantically between the writhing metal wires on Lin Yuan's right hand and Chen Duo's crawling, insect-like body. Sweat slid down his filthy sideburns, soaking into dark circular spots on the lead-plate floor.

"Cut it off," Rat Eye said, his voice sounding like sandpaper rubbing against rusted sheet metal, carrying the cruel pragmatism unique to wasteland scavengers. "Like cutting off a rotting limb. You said efficiency is the priority. He's already a leak, and leaks must be—"

"I've changed my mind."

Lin Yuan stood up, his right palm facing upward. Silver liquid flowed and gathered like mercury beads beneath his skin, casting a cold light between his veins. That was the Bio-STC interface, a gift bestowed by the underground entity, and also a curse that was slowly digesting his memories.

He walked toward Chen Duo. Chen Duo's body was attempting to squeeze into a forty-centimeter diameter maintenance hatch, his waist suspended in the air and his spine arched at an impossible angle, like a broken puppet suspended by invisible strings. The Protocol 07 interface on the back of his neck flickered with a ghostly green fluorescence in sync with his breathing.

"What are you going to do?" Rat Eye's voice was so sharp it cracked. His back hit the lead-plate wall, shaking the tent's frame.

Lin Yuan knelt, his right hand hovering five centimeters above the back of Chen Duo's neck. The Protocol 07 interface was right there; biological tissue had already grown around the edges of the protruding metal ring, the central slot glowed with a sickly phosphorescence, and nano-scale tentacles could be seen writhing inside.

"Take over."

Five metal tentacles shot out from Lin Yuan's fingertips, burrowing into the Protocol 07 interface like silver snakes.

A blue-white electric arc exploded, emitting the smell of ozone and scorched protein. Chen Duo's body suddenly jerked straight like a fish out of water, letting out a groan that didn't sound human—a wheezing sound squeezed from deep within his abdominal cavity. His fingers scraped against the grate with a tooth-aching noise, and his remaining fingernails all folded back and snapped.

Lin Yuan's vision was violently torn apart.

He was forced to look directly at Chen Duo's neural map: Protocol 07 was a scarlet tumor core perched in the medulla oblongata, sending homing commands to the limbs through tens of thousands of neural synapses, the pulse signals surging like a tide of blood. Deeper down, a pitch-black thread connected to the underground—that was ARK-PROTO-00's tentacle, its surface covered with suction-cup-like data interfaces, gently and continuously pulling this body downward.

"Disconnect," Lin Yuan commanded in his consciousness, his voice echoing inside his own skull.

The alloy wires on his right hand proliferated wildly, surging like a silver flood against the neural current and into Chen Duo's sympathetic nervous system. Silver nanomachines submerged the scarlet core, violently hijacking every neural node and forcibly rewriting Protocol 07's pulses. Lin Yuan felt Protocol 07 let out a high-frequency scream that scraped directly against his temporal cortex, leaving a burning sensation of pain.

Chen Duo's body convulsed violently, saliva mixed with foam flowing out. His eyes snapped open, but his pupils were dilated to the edges, his whites filled with burst blood vessels, and his eyeballs trembled at a frequency of three times per second.

Memories began to drain away.

The knowledge in Lin Yuan's mind regarding the disassembly of a standard laser pistol was snatched away by an invisible hand: the weight of the stock against his palm, the temperature of the heat sink in the wasteland noon, the elastic resistance of the energy cell latch, and the muscle memory of the recoil transferring to his shoulder during firing. Those skills that once felt as natural as breathing became a blank, leaving only the stinging sensation of neural pathways being forcibly emptied.

"No..." Lin Yuan gritted his teeth, blood seeping from between his gums.

The second memory tax. He felt the process of losing his laser pistol disassembly skills with total clarity, like witnessing his library turn to ashes in a fire while being powerless to save it.

The alloy wires formed a silver bridge under Chen Duo's skin through the connection point, wrapping Protocol 07 into a cocoon. Chen Duo's convulsions stopped abruptly, and his body slumped to the ground like limp mud. The scarlet light of Protocol 07 was completely extinguished, suppressed deep within the spinal cord by the silver network.

The black thread connecting to the underground was not broken, but merely isolated by a shielding layer woven from alloy wires. Like a venomous snake trapped in a glass jar, it continued to strike frantically against the barrier.

Lin Yuan pulled out his right hand, and the metal tentacles retracted into his palm, leaving a ring of solid alloy residue on the back of Chen Duo's neck. It glinted with a cold silver light, forming a bizarre contrast with Chen Duo's pale skin.

Chen Duo fell into a deep coma, or rather, a Forced Silence. His breathing was shallow and fast, and his body temperature soared to forty-two degrees Celsius.

"What did you do to him?" Rat Eye's voice trembled, a mix of fearful greed and survivalist desperation. His fingers had already touched the fragmentation grenade at his waist.

Lin Yuan turned his head, a fine silver ring at the edge of his right pupil contracting and expanding like a mechanical aperture. "Saved his life," Lin Yuan stood up, the alloy wires on his right hand looming under his sleeve, their spreading patterns having already climbed up the side of his neck. "And saved our intelligence. ARK-PROTO-00 can only hear static noise now."

Rat Eye's gaze fell on that ring of silver residue, then moved back to the notebook, his Adam's apple bobbing. "You've been corrupted," he said, his voice low like a pronouncement. "Those tentacles, that metal... you're not saving him, you're making a puppet. Next, it'll be you pinning me to the ground and shoving tubes into my brain."

Lin Yuan did not deny it. He walked toward the exit. The lead-plate door slid open, revealing the blood-colored sky of the wasteland twilight. The screech of mutant vultures echoed from the distance.

"You have three seconds. Stay, or go."

Rat Eye clutched his notebook tightly. Inside were recorded the timestamps of Lin Yuan's transactions with the underground entity, sketches of the mutations in his right hand, and the records of the two memory tax payments. In the wasteland, this intelligence was hard currency, enough to trade for a seat among the Anvil King's remnants, or even a still-functional Plasma Pistol.

"I've made my decision."

Rat Eye rushed toward the ventilation duct on the other side of the tent. His thin body squeezed into the narrow metal passage like a rat. The wire mesh tore his coat, but he didn't pause, disappearing into the twilight toward the direction of the Anvil King's remnants to the north.

Lin Yuan didn't look back, only listening to the receding sound of crawling in the ventilation duct.

The team had gone from three people and one machine to two people and one machine. The ground intelligence network was completely lost.

Lin Yuan walked out of the isolation zone. THRONE-00 was kneeling outside the door, its optical sensors glowing with an unstable dark red light—a signature characteristic of 15% contaminated energy, like a gangrenous wound. Chaotic code from ARK-PROTO-00 flowed through the machine spirit's logic circuits.

"Initiate short-range EMP," Lin Yuan ordered, his voice raspy. "Target: the sensor network on the perimeter of the Defense Line 08. Power cap: all 15%. Execute immediately."

THRONE-00's machine spirit shuddered violently, its metal skeleton letting out an unnatural groan. Contamination flowed through its logic circuits, making it see things that weren't there. The ruins and rubble five hundred meters ahead turned into a grand Imperial Cathedral, its golden spires piercing the radiation clouds. The icon of the emperor looked down from the top, its lips moving to recite holy words in high gothic, while hymns flowed into its visual cortex in the form of binary code.

"Target confirmed..." THRONE-00's voice carried heavy static noise and a bizarre reverence. "The Emperor's... Sanctuary... needs purification..."

"Those are ruins. Execute the EMP."

Tactical misjudgment. The cognitive distortion caused by contamination was worsening.

THRONE-00's power claw clenched, and the energy core in its chest emitted an unstable high-frequency hum, like a star about to explode. Dark red light poured from its joints, converging into a pulse blast. The electromagnetic torrent swept through the ruins in a ring. The Pure-Blood Guards' sensor network on the perimeter of the Defense Line 08 instantly overloaded, bursting with a series of blue sparks. Hidden automatic turrets lowered their barrels like decapitated giant birds.

Lin Yuan didn't wait for THRONE-00 to recover from its hallucinations. He slung Chen Duo over his shoulder. The body was terrifyingly light; the biological battery conversion had caused muscle atrophy. His body temperature was scalding, and the silver residue on his neck pressed against Lin Yuan's shoulder, bringing a metallic chill. He rushed toward the gap in the defense line. THRONE-00 followed with erratic steps, occasionally stopping to take a defensive posture against thin air, its power claw slashing at non-existent demons.

They broke through the first layer of the defense line.

There were no signs of a firefight inside the defense line, only death.

Twelve corpses of Pure-Blood Guards were precisely arranged in a ten-meter diameter circle, heads facing out and feet facing in, as if performing some ancient sacrificial ritual. Their chests had been ritually cut open and their hearts removed; there was no blood at the wounds, which were in a dehydrated state like mummies. Each forehead was painted with the Mark of 08 in black biological pigment—a twisted pattern that resembled both an eye and a vortex, appearing to still be spinning in the twilight.

Su Wanqing's warning was proven true. Protocol 08 was here. It had modified these guards to perform a ritual, not for combat, but to mark its territory. Lin Yuan felt a stinging pain from the alloy wires in his chest. The underground entity transmitted a sense of joyful and hungry anticipation through the shielded Protocol 07, as if waiting for a feast.

"Energy dropped to 7%," THRONE-00 reported, its voice briefly regaining clarity, but the dark red light grew more intense, almost covering the entire sensor. "Suggest establishing a defensive position... or praying. The Emperor is listening."

Lin Yuan placed Chen Duo on a relatively intact concrete slab. The silver residue on the back of his neck had fused with the skin, becoming a clearly visible control mark, like a slave collar. Chen Duo would not wake up, at least not before the Forced Silence was lifted; his breathing was now synchronized with the pulse of Lin Yuan's right hand.

Lin Yuan took out a waterproof military logbook and recorded with his left hand using frozen fingers, his handwriting scrawled.

"Day 37, Ethical Transgression. Used bio-interface to forcibly control a human individual. Paid memory tax: laser pistol disassembly knowledge (confirmed permanent loss). Team reduction: Rat Eye defected toward the Anvil King with intelligence; expect enemy to learn of our connection with the ARK entity within seventy-two hours. Chen Duo status: Forced Silence, Protocol 07 locked, ARK-PROTO-00 indirect intervention confirmed, temperature 42 degrees, requires monitoring. THRONE-00 energy 7%, tactical misjudgment due to contamination (cathedral hallucination), suggest limiting independent combat authorization."

Closing the logbook, he looked toward the north. Dust rose at the horizon; Rat Eye's figure had already disappeared, heading toward the enemy's embrace with the notebook like a time bomb.

Lin Yuan was alone, with a partner turned into a living battery and a war machine that was going mad, standing in the center of Protocol 08's ritual site.

THRONE-00's sensors suddenly turned toward the west, making the dry friction sound of mechanical bearings.

"The Emperor is watching us," it said, its voice carrying a bizarre and pious tremble, its optical sensors focusing on the empty sky. "He is pleased. He has forgiven your heretical actions."

Lin Yuan did not answer. He checked Chen Duo's carotid artery, confirming that inhumanly synchronized pulse, then stood up. The silver liquid in his right palm gathered into tentacles once more, preparing to face the spire of the New Canaan Cathedral slowly appearing in the twilight, as well as the yet-to-be-triggered trap laid by Protocol 08.