Chapter 86-I Clean Up Garbage in a Wasteland World
Chapter 86 The Notebook
Zhu Ning left. She fastened her black helmet, swung onto her vehicle, and rode away. Pei Shu could only see Zhu Ning's back.
Pei Shu had now seen Zhu Ning's back twice. In The Ant Nest, she had ditched him the same way.
Pei Shu leaned against the wrecked car, watching the direction Zhu Ning had gone. He had a cigarette between his lips but hadn't moved at all.
Not until Zhu Ning's figure could no longer be seen did the cigarette ash accumulate into a long column and, like a broken stick of incense, drop to the ground with a soft pat.
Only then did Pei Shu narrow his eyes. He stubbed out the cigarette and didn't light a new one.
He had said he would kill Zhu Ning. That was a form of intimidation from a great plutocrat toward an ordinary person—don't provoke things you can't afford to provoke, or you might end up dead.
So be a good girl. Best to put away your little schemes and hide your sharp fangs.
This kind of intimidation was generally very effective—because it really was effective. In the end, Pei Shu would kill these people. He meant what he said. But he still remembered how Zhu Ning had responded.
Zhu Ning had looked at him very calmly and said, "Then you'd better act fast. I'll grow stronger, Teacher Pei."
She didn't fear the Lu family, nor would she hide her edge. She could even state her ambition to Pei Shu's face with complete composure.
Even if one day they truly reached that point, Zhu Ning would not back down. But Pei Shu had better act fast—because once Zhu Ning grew to a certain level, it would be difficult for him to make his move.
Pei Shu's words were intimidation and a threat, but Zhu Ning had provoked him right back.
He thought he understood why this kind of person would attract Eternal Pharma's attention. He also understood why so many gazes were fixed on her—probing, hostile, puzzled.
She was like an anomaly that had appeared in this world. Pei Shu laughed. Zhu Ning was so full of herself.
...
By the time Zhu Ning got home, it was dawn.
The Dignified Queen was the safest place Zhu Ning had found. Here, she could be sure Eternal Pharma wasn't monitoring her.
If going to Liu Niannian's home made those gazes automatically retreat, then entering the Dignified Queen was more like a barrier—it cut off the outside world's surveillance, forming its own self-contained space.
The back door was open. It happened to be closing time for the Dignified Queen's hosts. They clocked out through the back door like office workers.
After parking, Zhu Ning paused oddly, feeling her biological clock was off. She had nearly adapted to the Dignified Queen's nightlife schedule.
A handsome young man spotted Zhu Ning and nudged his companion, whispering, "Isn't she the one who's keeping Boss Song?"
"Seems like it." The other person looked at Zhu Ning with an expression of deep admiration.
Respect. That was respect for a senior.
Zhu Ning: "..."
So in the employees' eyes, Zhu Ning was keeping Song Zhizhang? That actually sounded pretty cool?
Returning to the Dignified Queen felt like coming home. The neon lights were off. People were cleaning inside. When they saw Zhu Ning, they all greeted her, making her feel like she was the real boss here.
Zhu Ning headed to the basement. The holographic stripper in the hallway was still dancing. The thing never got tired. It had just gotten to the part where the pants came off.
The first time Zhu Ning saw him, she had felt a bit uncomfortable. Now she actually found it endearing.
She figured if she lived in this brothel for two more years, her entire aesthetic sense would be warped.
It was now six in the morning. Zhu Ning pushed open the door at the end of the hallway. The moment she got home, she heard sounds from the bathroom. A toothbrush was floating in mid-air.
Lin Xiaofeng was up. She was brushing her teeth.
For a moment, Zhu Ning felt as if she had gone to another world. She had only been away for one night. The day before, she had been brushing her teeth here with Lin Xiaofeng. Now that felt so far away.
When Lin Xiaofeng saw Zhu Ning, she put down the toothbrush. Then, realizing Zhu Ning couldn't see her once she put it down, she picked up a red hat and put it on.
The red hat floated over to Zhu Ning. Zhu Ning asked, "You're up this early?"
Lin Xiaofeng's reply was muffled. "My family didn't let me sleep in."
Zhu Ning had grown up under Zhu Yao's laissez-faire parenting and found such rules utterly inhumane.
"From now on, sleep as long as you want," Zhu Ning said.
Lin Xiaofeng nodded and asked, "Are you hurt?"
Zhu Ning still had the high-efficiency healing patch on her forehead. After peeling it off, the wound had already healed, not even leaving a scar. As expected of the Lu family's black tech—healing and scar removal, all in one.
Zhu Ning: "No, I'm fine."
Lin Xiaofeng gave a soft "oh." She didn't know what Zhu Ning had been through or where she had gone. From Lin Xiaofeng's perspective, Zhu Ning had been there when she went to sleep, and was there again when she woke up.
But she always felt Zhu Ning seemed very tired. She asked, "Do you want to rest?"
Zhu Ning had specifically cleaned herself up before leaving Liu Niannian's place. There was no blood on her, and she had changed into clean clothes. But Lin Xiaofeng was very perceptive. She could sense Zhu Ning's emotions.
Zhu Ning: "I'll go in a bit. Where's Song Zhizhang?"
She had barely finished speaking when Song Zhizhang came in pushing a food cart. He was still wearing the purple sweater Zhu Ning was familiar with.
This time, the breakfast prepared for Lin Xiaofeng was generous in portion. Not only that, there were also some NutriStims.
Song Zhizhang's first words upon seeing Zhu Ning were: "You reek of cigarette smoke."
Zhu Ning: "..."
Why did she feel like a cheating scumbag caught by the wife?
Song Zhizhang didn't ask where Zhu Ning had gone or what she had done. He asked, "Breakfast?"
Zhu Ning truly felt like she was home this time. Song Zhizhang was practically a walking warm blanket.
The three of them sat at the dining table. Before, it had been Song Zhizhang watching Zhu Ning eat. Now he sat down to eat as well, his movements completely natural, as if they were family.
Zhu Ning noticed Song Zhizhang had prepared NutriStims and asked, "For Xiaofeng?"
Song Zhizhang gave a soft "mm." "I ran some tests on her while you were away. Regular food is very inefficient at replenishing her nutrition. NutriStims provide more comprehensive supplementation. But I haven't cut off her normal diet either. Maintaining the act of chewing improves psychological well-being."
In this world, most people who could afford real grain and food would choose to eat normally rather than rely on NutriStims.
Eating more food kept you closer to natural human habits, which helped maintain psychological health.
People who subsisted on NutriStims for extended periods were prone to psychological depression, eventually leading to mental collapse and contamination. Song Zhizhang had even thought of that.
Song Zhizhang: "I'll adjust the formula again in a few days."
Lin Xiaofeng wasn't an ordinary human. The nutritional elements she needed differed from normal people's.
Zhu Ning: "..."
Her guilt intensified. While she was away, Song Zhizhang had figured out Lin Xiaofeng's dietary habits inside and out.
Zhu Ning ate breakfast but couldn't taste anything. She was just mechanically chewing food. Having reached a completely safe nest, the taut string loosened, leaving her not wanting to talk to anyone.
Song Zhizhang glanced at her. "People who regularly enter contaminated zones need to readjust their internal clock. You can easily lose your sense of time."
Because time flowed differently inside contaminated zones, and each zone's time flow was different too. In reality, you might have only been inside for an hour, but it felt like several days.
This intensity would gradually interfere with a person's cognition. That was why many Demon Hunters and Cleaners didn't live long.
Moreover, if one went on missions for extended periods, some changes to the body were nearly imperceptible. There had been a Demon Hunter who had always worked very efficiently, earned a lot of money, and was supposed to live out his later years in comfort.
But one day he suddenly went berserk at home and ended up killing his own family.
Investigation showed he hadn't encountered a Source of Contamination or been affected by Psychic Contamination. He had simply been worn down by the Demon Hunter profession, day after day, until he finally descended into madness.
The Sanitation Center's mandatory minimum seven-day leave after each mission was based on this consideration.
Song Zhizhang: "How long is your leave this time?"
Zhu Ning: "Eleven days."
The Mechanical Oceanarium had been a major mission with severe losses, so Zhu Ning's leave was longer.
Song Zhizhang: "You still have nine days to rest."
Zhu Ning had only used two days. She could take it slow.
Zhu Ning gave a soft "oh." After finishing breakfast, Song Zhizhang forced her to go to bed. His exact words were: "Don't contaminate my establishment."
If Zhu Ning's mental state was poor and she went berserk, the entire establishment would be in trouble.
Zhu Ning didn't resist. After breakfast, she lay down and fell asleep immediately. Her current psychological state wasn't suited for anything else—only sleeping.
Otherwise, before the enemy could kill her, she might die of exhaustion first.
Once she entered sleep mode, she was in koala mode—no one could wake her. Song Zhizhang prepared Sanity Healers and NutriStims for her so she could replenish during the intervals between sleep.
She woke up once in the middle. It was already 11 PM.
It was quiet outside. Song Zhizhang must have taken Lin Xiaofeng to bed. Zhu Ning realized her life had become disconnected from ordinary people's.
She had become like Zhu Yao, who always missed her child growing up. Zhu Yao had been this busy too. She would come home many times to find Zhu Ning already asleep. There was a period when they barely saw each other a few times a week.
Zhu Ning went back to sleep for a while longer, sleeping until 3 AM when she couldn't sleep anymore. By then, her mind felt a bit clearer.
Late night was the Dignified Queen's business hours. Song Zhizhang had gone upstairs to manage the establishment. The room had excellent soundproofing. Zhu Ning couldn't hear the noise from upstairs.
She stared at the ceiling for a good while as her brain slowly began to turn. She was reviewing the entire mission.
This mission had taught her much more. She had made contact with Creation Technology for the first time. As long as she brought it up with Liu Niannian, she should be able to find Bao Ruiming's whereabouts.
First contact with someone who had been outside the walls. Pei Shu had filled in some gaps in her knowledge.
First encounter with High-Level Xenomorphs. She had learned more about Contaminants.
First time learning about the Sanitation Center's mysterious department, the Abnormal Incident Investigation Team. Although she hadn't interacted with them, Zhu Ning's instincts told her it was best not to.
And her greatest gain was Gao Zijian's father's notebook.
[Notebook successfully released] The System notification sounded.
A notebook appeared in Zhu Ning's hand. When she had encountered the Xenomorphs earlier, she hadn't had time to look at it and had immediately stored it in a Blank Card.
Zhu Ning turned on the bedside lamp and, leaning against the headboard, carefully studied it under the warm orange light.
The notebook had a black leather cover, very old. The edges had curled up, and the leather surface was starting to peel, leaving black flakes on her hand.
On the notebook's cover was a yellowed label. The handwriting on the label was very faded, but she could barely make out a name.
Gao Yingcheng.
Was this Gao Zijian's father's name? Zhu Ning memorized it. She could look up information about this researcher when investigating Eternal Pharma in the future.
This was the truth. The information Prometheus wanted to tell her—information he wanted Zhu Ning to know even at the cost of alerting the Abnormal Incident Investigation Team.
Zhu Ning took a deep breath and opened the notebook. Then she froze.
After all, it was a researcher's notebook. She had expected to see research data, or professional knowledge incomprehensible to laypeople, or even more headache-inducing encrypted text.
She had prepared herself for the information inside to be extremely complex and difficult to understand, possibly requiring some means to decipher.
But she hadn't expected the contents to be so straightforward—so straightforward that even a three-year-old could understand.
The notebook's contents were pencil sketches.
The first page was a brain. Zhu Ning was very familiar with it, because she had just had this examination done. She and Dr. Fu had studied it very carefully. But the brain scan taken at the Sanitation Center's Medical Department had been completely normal—just an ordinary brain.
What she now held in her hands was a brain drawn with a black sketching pencil.
Zhu Ning frowned. The brain's structure was complex. She had rarely seen anyone draw a brain. A brain drawn by a professional was very accurate, but at this moment, the brain with all its folds and grooves looked somewhat horrifying.
Because at the center of the brain, there was a cubic shadow.
Second page—brain.
Third page—brain.
Fourth page—brain...
As she flipped through, the cubic shadow grew larger and larger, from the initial size of a sesame seed to the size of a thumbnail.
One cubic centimeter, two cubic centimeters, three cubic centimeters... Finally, the black cubic shadow consumed the entire brain. Black lines filled the entire page.
The entire notebook was nothing but this.
The repeating black brains now felt like Psychic Contamination. Even with her eyes closed, Zhu Ning could see the black cubic shadow, as if what was being consumed wasn't just the notebook but Zhu Ning herself.
She could imagine Gao Yingcheng in the dark, oppressive Ant Nest, sitting at that old desk, his back to his son. No matter how Gao Zijian called out to him, he wouldn't turn around. He drew like a madman in the notebook.
His pen depicted only one thing—the brain. And his strokes grew heavier and heavier, the force of his drawing increasing. Where the pen tip passed, it was like a scalpel slicing through paper.
He traced the cubic shadow in the center with force—darkening, darkening, thickening—until the paper tore through.
The pages seemed to retain Gao Yingcheng's presence—frantic, desperate, ultimately driving himself to a dead end.
So this was... the thing inside her brain?
This was the System's true form?
Zhu Ning had been examined before and was mentally prepared. But at this moment, it felt as if she had suffered a bout of Psychic Contamination. Even though she had drunk the Lu family's high-efficiency Sanity Healer, the wounds in her brain that had been soothed began to ache faintly.
She felt a strange sensation emanating from within her brain. Not painful, but stuffy and swollen.
As if... something was growing.
She didn't know if it was the notebook's influence or a side effect of Psychic Contamination, but she had the illusion that the thing inside her brain was growing.
It was frantically expanding its territory, slowly extending tendrils, its shadow growing ever larger.
That thing would eventually consume her brain, just as the notebook described.
Pfft—
The sketching pencil had punctured through the paper. That thing would also pierce through her skull.
Zhu Ning felt a chill run down her spine. She had never been this terrified before—she meant that kind of terror from the inside out. Her hands trembled as she turned to the last page of the notebook.
This time there was no brain. The last page was very dirty. The pen marks from the previous page had bled through to the back. It was covered in impressions left by the pen tip, as if a knife had gone on a rampage here, leaving terrifying wound-like marks.
The last page had only one sentence—a sentence Zhu Ning was very familiar with:
The end is nigh, we are all but ants.
TN:
As you've all noticed, we've recently started translating two new novels.
One is the latest work from the author of The Manga Pariah's Guide to Self-Salvation, which is still ongoing.
The other is a new title chosen by our newest team member.
You can head over to NovelsUpdates novel page to check out the synopsis and see if it's the kind of story you enjoy:
We'll continue to focus on translating female lead no-CP (non-romantic pairing) works.
We'd really appreciate it if everyone could add our new works to your reading lists and leave reviews — it means a lot to us!
Thank you for your continued support!
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