Chapter 50-I Clean Up Garbage in a Wasteland World
Chapter 50 The Bizarre Aquarium-7
Cleaning Center Hall.Xuan Qing: "Her protective suit is damaged."
This was a very direct statement, cold and ruthless. It sounded devoid of any emotion, as if she didn't care at all whether Zhu Ning would be contaminated.
Lu Qiqin said, "It looks like she hasn't been contaminated for now."
Under normal circumstances, if Demon Hunters or Cleaners were infected, they would form a new Source of Contamination and then become a contaminant. People with high Sanity values could even create powerful contaminated zones.
1200—such a high Sanity value. Once contaminated, the resulting contaminated zone would be more than just B-level.
At that time, their Technology Department would detect a peak value. Zhu Ning would become their new enemy; she would be more terrifying than the Mechanical Jellyfish or the mermaids. Of course, it was also possible that Zhu Ning was contaminated but having a delayed reaction.
Lu Qiqin tsked twice: "This mission isn't simple, huh."
There was meaning in his words. Of course it wasn't simple. A mission that coincidentally appeared near the Eternal Pharma Foundation event site couldn't possibly be a simple mission.
Although it was only rated as a B-level contaminated zone, it was a mixed bag and very troublesome.
There were too many people fishing in troubled waters and trying to stir up trouble inside. Zhu Ning hadn't just walked into a B-level contaminated zone; she had walked into Xuan Qing's trap. The upcoming Mechanical Jellyfish Pavilion was the real trouble.
Lu Qiqin tilted his head to glance at Xuan Qing. This capable woman with silver-white hair had shown very few expressions from beginning to end.
Lu Qiqin worked with Xuan Qing year-round and was very slick. Some jokingly called him the eunuch beside Xuan Qing because Lu Qiqin could almost always guess what Xuan Qing wanted to do.
She wanted to see if Zhu Ning would use extra abilities, such as superpowers, when facing the extreme limit of life and death.
...
"Your protective suit is torn?"
Seeing Zhu Ning for the first time, Xu Meng immediately noticed the many patches on her, like some beggar-style fashion. One on the left thigh, one on the back shoulder, two on the lower back. One tear was understandable, but so many tears—she might have already been contaminated.
Zhu Ning didn't really understand everyone's attitude towards her and silently took half a step back. "How about you guys stay away from me?"
Li Nianchuan just frowned and didn't express any opinion. "No need. Hurry up and work; let's get out early."
Xu Meng was only surprised initially. "Work first. Go to the Medical Department after we finish."
Xu Meng and Li Nianchuan had a conditioned reflex; their first reaction upon seeing contamination spores was to take out their containment tools. They really were going to work.
"..." Zhu Ning asked, "Are you not afraid I'm infected?"
Xu Meng: "You don't look like it to me."
Except for Zhu Ning, the rest were veteran employees. They had seen what infected people looked like. The consequences of infection by contamination spores were very uncertain. Some people turned into contaminants after infection, while others awakened superpowers instead.
Xu Meng paused. "We face the possibility of colleagues being infected every moment. Don't take it too seriously."
Although it wasn't written in the employee handbook, this was the survival guide for Cleaners.
Don't be overly paranoid. Don't take whether someone is infected to heart, because the problem others face today might be the problem you face tomorrow.
The veteran employees of the Cleaning Center had always had a very casual attitude towards infection.
No wonder Li Nianchuan told her to calm down when she suspected he was infected in the sewer. It was different from Zhu Ning's world. In her zombie world, once you suspected someone was infected by a zombie, you killed them on the principle of "better to kill the wrong person than let one go."
Xu Meng: "If you mutate into a Source of Contamination, none of us can run away."
Zhu Ning: "...Huh?"
Chu Ling, who was very experienced, chimed in from the side: "The consequences of a person with high Sanity becoming a Source of Contamination are hard to predict. With your Sanity, if you become a Source, this place might become an S-level contaminated zone. At that point, it wouldn't be a problem for the three of us; it would probably require sending additional Demon Hunter teams to settle it. By the time they get in, we'd probably be cold."
Zhu Ning: "..."
The attitude of these three was only a bit tense at the beginning, but later they took it lightly because it was meaningless. If she was infected, the three of them would definitely die. If she wasn't infected, they couldn't just shoot her, so they could only leave Zhu Ning be for now.
Were they working with Zhu Ning with an attitude of viewing death as a return home?
Xu Meng: "Work first."
Xu Meng and Li Nianchuan were already in working mode; only Zhu Ning was still slacking off.
"Oh," Zhu Ning responded, taking the containment tools out of her Sanitation Backpack.
Chu Ling watched from the sidelines. She used to only fight monsters on missions. In her previous impression, Cleaners were just trash sweepers. She never paid attention to subsequent developments. This seemed to be the first time she watched a Cleaner team work up close.
Chu Ling asked, "How long do you have to contain?"
Xu Meng scanned the area. "Three-person team. If we're fast, less than half an hour."
In the previous D-level contaminated zone, Cleaners could contain slowly, but the real Source of Contamination in the Oceanarium hadn't been purified yet. They had to hurry and not delay progress. Every minute spent in the contaminated zone meant an extra minute of danger.
Priority was given to containing contamination spores. The carrion would be cleaned up together after the other Source was purified. Assuming they only contained spores and didn't clean the carrion, twenty minutes should be enough.
Chu Ling thought it was quite interesting and asked, "Need help?"
Thanks to this Cleaning Center employee training, she had taken Cleaner courses, but she hadn't practiced in a real contaminated zone and was itching to try.
Li Nianchuan instinctively wanted to refuse when Chu Ling asked. Having Chu Ling protect them was trouble enough; there was no reason to ask her to help with the work too.
Zhu Ning was never polite. As soon as Chu Ling finished speaking, she shoved her own tool directly into Chu Ling's arms. "Been waiting for you to say that."
Chu Ling: "..."
You aren't even going to be polite with me?
Cleaners carried multiple containment tools. Giving one to Chu Ling, Zhu Ning still had another.
Chu Ling tried containing. For the first time, she felt it was really quite interesting, just a bit boring after doing it for a while. Containing contamination spores tested one's patience greatly. Demon Hunters were all about fighting and killing, using heavy firearms; doing this kind of detailed work actually felt very uncomfortable.
After working for a few minutes, Chu Ling knew she wasn't very suitable to be a Cleaner. She thought anyone could do a Cleaner's job, but now it seemed really quite difficult.
Chu Ling glanced at Zhu Ning. She entered the working state very quickly. A rare talent who could be both a Demon Hunter and a Cleaner.
Chu Ling asked, "How did you purify the Mermaid Pavilion?"
Zhu Ning roughly told her what happened. She spoke in a straightforward manner, just summarizing the events.
But the calmer she was, the less calm Li Nianchuan became. He kept sucking in cold breaths throughout. "You were almost taken away by the mermaid to breed?"
Zhu Ning: "If I hadn't purified the contaminated zone, you would have been taken away to breed too."
At that time, hair had already wrapped around Li Nianchuan, happening simultaneously with her situation.
Li Nianchuan: "...Um, I'm a man, how do I breed?"
Chu Ling answered faintly, "Men can breed too. Mermaids aren't picky about gender. They will..."
"Don't say it," Li Nianchuan closed his eyes, looking despairing. "Don't tell me."
Zhu Ning couldn't help but want to laugh. Beside them, Xu Meng kept frowning; she didn't seem happy listening to this. No wonder Zhu Ning's protective suit was damaged and she was covered in injuries.
Xu Meng asked, "How are the injuries?"
Zhu Ning: "I took a HealStim, nothing serious."
Apart from the possibility of infection, she looked very healthy. Prometheus's detection showed no issues either.
Chu Ling exchanged details with Zhu Ning again. Chu Ling was a Demon Hunter, so her perspective was more professional. Zhu Ning's approach was similar to her own presumption, using a flashlight.
But sometimes Zhu Ning didn't care about her life. Even if she might be sliced into fragments by hair, she wanted to kill the opposing mermaid. Terrifying spiritual power. A normal Demon Hunter wouldn't be this desperate; they would be more seasoned and roundabout.
Putting herself in those shoes, if Chu Ling were caught, she was confident she could kill the mermaid too, but she might not have done it so beautifully.
Chu Ling: "The Mermaid Pavilion should be a clue."
Zhu Ning immediately said, "I think so too."
Double Sources of Contamination don't form casually. For example, if one Source says east and the other says west, the two Sources might fight internally. Mermaids had the conditions to form a Source of Contamination because they possessed "spiritual power."
The Mechanical Jellyfish and the Mermaid Pavilion were both creatures displayed in the Oceanarium, and both were artificial objects created from scratch. The reasons for becoming Sources of Contamination might be very similar.
Thinking of the bizarre performance program in the Mermaid Pavilion, Zhu Ning said, "I suspect the Director might be the problem. Can ordinary people modify creatures at will?"
Zhu Ning had just arrived in the Wasteland world and didn't understand the laws here very well. There were barely any normal creatures in the Oceanarium, and she didn't know if it was legal.
Chu Ling: "Generally, it requires approval from above. Ordinary citizens are strictly forbidden from biological modification experiments. Ordinary people lack the technology and can easily create contaminants. Once discovered privately modifying, they face life imprisonment."
Zhu Ning nodded. Chu Ling added, "Normally, the creatures in the Oceanarium all have permits."
Some creatures were harmless and could be exhibited to the public, but the procedures were very complicated. Without some connections, it was basically impossible to get approved.
"Are these things on file?" Zhu Ning asked.
It wasn't Chu Ling who answered her, but Prometheus: [Files are complete.]
Prometheus could connect to the internet outside and provide more accurate data. It was just that speaking up suddenly out of nowhere felt a bit annoying.
Zhu Ning wasn't quite used to Prometheus's existence. It was like someone was always eavesdropping. Every time she used Prometheus, she had to suppress her instinctive revulsion first. She paused before asking, "Is there information on the Director?"
Prometheus quickly found the Director's information. Besides the general official website introduction, there were interviews, social media information, and other people's evaluations of the Director.
Prometheus's algorithms integrated the information in just three seconds. Three seconds later, he synchronized the information with everyone.
The Director was named Bao Ruiming, a First-Class Citizen, a Natural, and a graduate of the First Military District University.
From any angle, he was a social elite. He had loved marine life since childhood, and many media outlets reported his deeds.
After the radiation, human civilization suffered heavy losses, and many marine creatures went extinct.
After graduating, Bao Ruiming didn't enter a big company to serve the conglomerates. Instead, he dedicated himself to protecting marine animals. He had many precious biological materials and even donated some marine animals to research institutions for free to facilitate follow-up research.
Initially, the scale of the Mechanical Oceanarium was very small, no different from a circus. It was under his leadership that it gradually moved towards glory.
Many marine creatures in his venue showed symptoms of contamination. Many people wanted to choose to kill the marine creatures to prevent future trouble—after all, treatment costs were too high—but he was different. He had been actively treating them.
Bao Ruiming specially hired a professional scientific research team to reduce the risks of contaminated marine creatures, making them as harmless as possible.
Even if contaminated, they didn't have to be deprived of life but could survive in another way. This concept made him very popular on the internet.
"This is a great philanthropist, right?" Li Nianchuan lamented.
Zhu Ning: "If I hadn't almost been killed just now, I would have believed it."
She had just personally experienced the perspective of the marine creatures in the Oceanarium. Honestly, it wasn't just physical torture but also mental torture.
Forcibly trapped inside a glass wall, forced to breed in front of a crowd. If they were creatures with no intelligence, the pain level might not be so high, but mermaids were highly anthropomorphic. They possessed wisdom. Zhu Ning still remembered that horror.
This Director had some problems.
Right, the Oceanarium suddenly suffered a large-scale contamination outbreak. Was the Director still inside the Oceanarium?
To this day, the identities of the victims in the Oceanarium hadn't been fully investigated. Even Prometheus couldn't answer this question for her.
Zhu Ning: "Go check the Director's Office later?"
The Director's Office should be upstairs. In aquariums, offices are generally located above. The Director's Office definitely had some documents.
As soon as Zhu Ning finished speaking, Li Nianchuan and Chu Ling immediately agreed, "Sure."
Xu Meng: "..." She remembered she was the captain of the cleaning team?
Zhu Ning: "This matter isn't simple. I think the other Demon Hunters need help."
Chu Ling: "I think so too."
Li Nianchuan: "Yes, we are all colleagues; we have to go help them."
Xu Meng: "..."
Why couldn't she see that the Demon Hunters needed their Cleaner help?
Also, Chu Ling, which team are you actually on?
Author's Note: Chu Ling has successfully changed sides.
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