Chapter 650: Conclusion

This was the first time Yu Sheng had ever seen such vivid, undisguised rage on Luo's face — and also the first time he'd witnessed the unique expletives of Algren. Even without knowing what the so-called 'Usobu Bug Nest' meant, he could feel a shocking force from that line on the screen. How to put it... let's just say this lady had some real power when she cursed, and she was far more cultured than Aileen.

Besides that, he deeply understood her anger in that moment.

"At first, the Hidden Society discovered the Zolda Blackstone, but they didn't tell me what it really was. They just gave me some intelligence," lines of text scrolled continuously across the screen, occasionally punctuated by garbled symbols. "They asked me to recommend a researcher with the most compatible spiritual talent to make contact with that 'stone' — they hadn't told me about 'Eden' yet at that time, they just offered a very high price, and I had no reason to refuse..."

Luo's eyes turned icy. "So you 'recommended' me, right?"

"I have the psychic data and... biological samples of many people stored here. Your data was the best, and your nerve specimens showed extremely high activity in response to the Zolda Blackstone," the brain in the tank twitched and writhed slightly, bubbles gurgling up in the biomass solution. "So it wasn't me who chose you — it was the Zolda Blackstone that chose you. And you chose that 'stone' too."

Luo took a deep breath.

Yu Sheng stared at the words on the screen, but his mind involuntarily recalled what he had seen in the contaminated Blackstone space station back then — inside the Zolda Blackstone's pollution field, Luo's 'spirit body' had stood quietly in the laboratory, while the souls of everyone around her had been twisted and penetrated by the power of the Dim Angel. Only her figure had remained clear and stable...

Now everything had an explanation.

Aileen stood up from Yu Sheng's shoulder, stretched hard, and patted one of the mechanical limbs behind Luo. There was a rare note of sympathy in the little doll's voice. "You're kind of unlucky there."

Luo's mechanical limb twitched involuntarily — whether from a PTSD reaction to the 'red-eyed evil little runt's' touch or not, Aileen didn't react. The little doll thought for a moment and then changed the subject. "But on the bright side, if this hadn't happened, you'd still be a Black Spot warlord. You wouldn't have had this chance to switch sides from darkness to even deeper darkness, right..."

Luo clenched her teeth. "...So I should thank you — and your 'Bridge.'"

Aileen: "You're welcome! We're sisters!"

Yu Sheng coughed dryly from the side and interrupted their meaningless exchange. "Ask this brain how much more intelligence he has on the Hidden Society besides the 'trade agent' and a 'delivery location' he's been dealing with — especially the cultists' hideouts."

Luo nodded immediately and turned to continue communicating with the brain in the tank.

Yu Sheng took this time to further confirm the situation of the entire 'Deeprock Fortress.' Through the blood connection, he carefully examined the structure of the entire facility.

To his disappointment, the fortress seemed to have little value for him — it was a pure 'hideout,' or to put it another way, a 'freak's home.' Most of the fortress's areas were Old Joe's living and 'leisure' spaces. Warehouses and 'exhibition halls' were everywhere, mostly just to satisfy his twisted and cruel hobbies. As for production and research facilities... Yu Sheng couldn't make heads or tails of them either.

But that was normal. After all, no matter how large this secret hideout was, it was only a 'rat hole' dug out of a small asteroid, and the local planetary system was even more barren and desolate than Luo's territory. Its only merits were that it was far from all shipping lanes and surrounded by dangerous gravitational faults — safe and hidden enough.

Most of Old Joe's assets — including factories, mines, trading posts, and the accompanying security forces — were definitely elsewhere.

He would leave that part to Luo for now. As a Black Spot warlord, she should be very familiar with that internal corporate culture of eating up and cleaning out the competition.

Another hour passed. Luo finally finished her 'interrogation' — under the extreme nothingness brought by sensory deprivation, the prolonged torment of distorted time, and increasing pressure from fear, the brain soaking in the tank showed a high degree of cooperation. During the process, Old Joe even began to show signs of personality collapse. His former arrogance and bluster had all turned into weakness and pleading; his will to resist had vanished without a trace.

"I've told you everything I know," green text scrolled line by line on the simple display screen. Yu Sheng noticed that the garbled symbols at the ends of the lines were even more numerous than before, the flickering pixels as if displaying an avalanche happening at the level of consciousness. "Luo, have mercy, let me out of here... I can be your servitor! Even a wetware host! Luo? Luo, are you listening?"

Luo interrupted his nonstop chatter. "One last question."

A reply appeared on the screen almost instantly. "Okay, I'll answer, I'll definitely answer!"

Luo took a soft breath and typed her question into the interactive system one word at a time, as if turning those characters into awls to nail them one by one into Old Joe's brain: "The things you took from me back then — where are they now?"

Another large patch of garbled symbols appeared on the screen before Old Joe's response emerged — his fear and caution seemed steeped in every line. "Your spine... it's on rack 127 in this room. The skin... that piece of skin wasn't preserved properly, so I threw it into the recycling furnace later. The internal organs I cut out, the organs..."

Luo's face was ashen. "Where are they?"

Suddenly, a large number of bubbles rose in the tank. The surface of the brain pulsed violently, as if reason were making its final struggle. But emptiness and pain soon overwhelmed reason. Old Joe's memories broke through the barrier built by fear and caution and turned into words on the screen. "...I fed them to that assistant named Su. I know she once helped you. On the day I learned you had been 'promoted' from Ursula's lab, I tricked her into eating your heart and liver."

Luo's breath clearly stopped for a moment. The mechanical limbs behind her twitched slightly, and tiny electric sparks appeared on their surfaces. "...Where is Su?"

"Dead... It was an accident! A real accident!" Every character on the screen trembled violently, garbled symbols scrolling wildly at the end of the paragraphs. "I sent her to repair the reactor..."

Strangely, at that moment, Luo's expression became extremely calm.

She just stood there quietly, her face as still as water as she stared at the wrinkled brain soaking in the tank, letting time pass.

Tiny electric sparks appeared on her mechanical limbs and then traveled along connecting cables into the tank, jumping and dancing between the electrodes and nerve bundles.

A few minutes later, the display next to the tank began to refresh faster and faster, lines of text appearing, mixed with a large amount of garbled code. The broken words and phrases were full of pleading.

A few more minutes passed. The words could barely form sentences anymore. Garbled symbols occupied almost the entire screen. Brief curses and sleep-talking babbling appeared among the pleas, along with a large number of meaningless repeated single characters.

The biomass solution in the tank had taken on a pink tint. Bubbles surged wildly as if boiling.

The words on the display disappeared, leaving only a few occasional error symbols. The consciousness in the tank had shattered, leaving only murmurs on the verge of death, floating like ghosts in the temporary circuit composed of chips and brain nerves.

Luo slowly turned her head. Her eyes, bright as stars, shimmered with light as she looked at Yu Sheng. "Boss, I... I want to handle the cleanup myself..."

"Fine," Yu Sheng nodded before she could finish. "Then we'll wait outside for a bit."

"...Thank you." Luo nodded lightly.

Yu Sheng grunted in acknowledgment, but just before leaving with the others, he suddenly stopped as if remembering something and reminded her, "Oh, by the way, clean it up nicely. Also, don't take too long — Long Hair is waiting for you to come back and roast mushrooms together."

"Okay."

Yu Sheng then took Hu Li and the others and left the hall. They stayed outside for a while until Luo sent them a message, and then they came back.

The tank was empty. A pungent burnt smell lingered in the air.

Old Joe's last cell had already disappeared from this world.

Yu Sheng looked at the now-empty tank, then at the golden-haired elf beside him who seemed to have calmed down. He rubbed his chin. "You didn't eat it, did you?"

Luo had been looking thoughtful and composed, but upon hearing that, she almost choked. Her eyes widened as she stared at Yu Sheng. "How could I! I'm not a freak —"

Before she could finish, Aileen shook her head and interrupted, "But Yu Sheng often picks up stuff to eat outside."

Luo: "...?!"

Yu Sheng quickly waved his hands. "No, no, no, I've never done anything that messed up — at most I've eaten entities, and I always try to cook them when possible. Luo, if you..."

"I burned it! I burned that thing!" Luo finally couldn't hold it in. Her eyes were wide open, her neck a little red, and then her expression became strained. "You guys, no, you can't do this. My, my emotional flow is all broken..."

But Yu Sheng just let out a soft breath and quietly looked into the eyes of the Algren elf before him. Only when she began to avoid his gaze uncomfortably did he slowly say, "That's precisely why you can't let your emotions flow smoothly right now — one Old Joe is already trouble enough."

"I..."

Luo paused, as if only then belatedly realizing something.

Only then did the mechanical limbs behind her, which had been twitching restlessly, gradually calm down. The fine electric sparks crawling across the surface of the living metal slowly dissipated — accompanied by a soft creaking of metal deformation, they gradually retracted into Luo's body and re-formed a patch of silver 'skin' on her back, extending from the nape of her neck all the way to her waist.

"Thank you," she said softly.

"You're welcome. We're friends."