The Tentacle Monster I Brought Home Always Says It Wants to Fix My Bones at Night - Chapter 7

Chapter 7

Motiao and I circled around through the maintenance corridor on the other side of the showroom.

That passage led to the underground experimental floor rented by Deep Tide Biotech.

I had assumed a place this important would be heavily guarded, but when I stepped inside, I was met with rows of eerily quiet glass chambers.

People were lying inside every single one of them.

Young, old, men, and women.

Lines were connected to their arms, their eyes were tightly shut, and monitoring patches were stuck to their foreheads.

The screens beside them recorded various types of data.

Pain Index, Stress Threshold, Compliance, Emotional Volatility.

The most glaring entry was the very last column.

“Productivity Conversion Value.”

My stomach churned, and I could barely keep my footing.

This wasn’t a medical lab at all.

This was a factory for turning human beings into batteries.

As if sensing my loss of control, Motiao immediately wrapped its tentacles tightly around my fingers.

It was a light touch, yet steady.

Right then, I saw someone in the innermost chamber suddenly move.

It was a young man in his early twenties. His name tag read “Project Intern.”

His eyelids cracked open just a sliver. When he saw me, his lips moved.

I leaned in close to hear him.

“Don’t… trust them…”

The next second, an alarm blared.

Red lights flooded the entire floor.

Su Jingyao’s voice rang out over the intercom, sounding so calm it was hair-raising.

“Shuwan, I’ve always thought you were a smart person.”

“Unfortunately, the mistake smart people make most easily is thinking they can be a savior.”

As his voice trailed off, the fire doors all around us slammed shut.

The passage was completely sealed.

My heart sank.

However, the door at the very end of the hall slowly opened.

Su Jingyao stood inside, with the entire main control server array behind him.

He had taken off his jacket and rolled up the sleeves of his white shirt, as if he finally couldn’t be bothered to keep up the act.

“You wanted to see the truth? I’ll let you see it.”

He reached out and pressed a button.

The data on the glass chambers jumped simultaneously. I watched helplessly as the intern who had just woken up began to convulse violently.

Muffled screams escaped his throat as his fingernails screeched against the glass walls.

“Stop it!”

I rushed forward, but the door was locked tight.

Su Jingyao stood behind the console, watching me as if he were admiring a performance.

“Han Shuwan, do you know why I wanted you specifically?”

“Because you’re different from these test subjects. Your neural tolerance is incredibly high. Your emotions have been in a compressed state for a long time, yet you haven’t completely broken down.”

“Someone like you is the perfect candidate to become a Stable Host.”

The blood in my veins turned to ice instantly.

From the very beginning, he hadn’t just been targeting Motiao.

He was targeting me, too.

“That employee psychological assessment your company did? We embedded a sampling program into it.”

“Your data was breathtakingly beautiful.”

“Pei Yuming only turned against me early because he discovered I had marked you as a candidate for the next batch.”

I whipped my head around to look at Motiao.

Its entire body was tensed up, as if its most painful secret had finally been exposed.

So, it hadn’t appeared by my side by accident.

It had escaped to find me from the very start.

It wasn’t there to eat me.

It was there to take me away before they could.

This realization was like a knife stabbing deep into my heart, yet it left me trembling with heat.

Su Jingyao continued, “Shuwan, I truly admire you. Someone with your natural capacity for endurance is best suited to be a vessel-and best suited to be carved into a perfect product.”

I stared at him and suddenly laughed.

“Admire my ass.”

“You just think someone like me is the easiest to ignore. You think if I go missing, it won’t cause a ripple.”

His expression shifted slightly.

I grabbed a metal instrument from a nearby sterilization tray and slammed it hard against the nearest monitor.

Glass shattered.

Red lights flickered wildly.

“Too bad for you, you miscalculated.”

“Today, I’m not just going to cause a ripple. I’m going to wreck your entire livelihood.”