Chapter 134-I Clean Up Garbage in a Wasteland World
Chapter 134 The Company You Can't Leave (XII)
Bang!
Wang Qinqian slammed the door shut. Pounding erupted from the other side, walls trembling with each impact. The Contamination Zone's logic still held—this was the Outstanding Employees Only passage. Both Zhu Ning and Wang Qinqian qualified.
But how long the door would hold was anyone's guess. There had to be other Outstanding Employees, and the Contamination Zone might eventually abandon logic entirely.
Wang Qinqian turned to face a sea of red.
Staring at the pool sent tremors through her heart. Too red. The surging blood seemed capable of extending tentacles and crawling out. Stare long enough and red became the only color in the world—those threads of blood would creep into your eyeballs.
Fragments of machinery and human skulls drifted in the blood pool, like one stage of an assembly line. On the far right was a square-shaped exit.
Quite a few of those in the pool were her former superiors—people who had once warmly clasped her hand, posed for photos with her, and called her the hope of the future.
Now these leaders were mired in the pool, as if trapped in a swamp made of human bodies and machine parts.
After Zhu Ning and Wang Qinqian entered, the blood-red swamp suddenly came alive. It expanded and grew rapidly, coalescing into a single mass that took the shape of an enormous monster—a full fifty meters tall, its head scraping the factory ceiling.
Its head was a massive goat skull, crowned with black goat horns. Its body was composed of countless employees. The company itself had always been built from its workers—now those workers had reassembled into a colossal Sheep-Head.
Some employees formed the arms. Others formed the torso.
Zhu Ning recognized some of their faces—Hope, Brightness, Happy, Win-win. Judging by codenames alone, this giant Sheep-Head was constructed from the most beautiful words in the world.
Embedded in the giant Sheep-Head's chest, where the heart should be, was a crystal. It looked like an ugly external heart, pulsing frantically.
"For the great cause."
"For the company's future."
Voices cried out ceaselessly. The chairman and other executives had been completely warped—their faces no longer recognizable as any shape—yet they still screamed: "Future. Future."
The company's employees had fused into one. They could no longer tell each other's heads apart. The New Energy had become its beating heart. The employees were truly, completely united.
Before the fifty-meter giant Sheep-Head, Zhu Ning and Wang Qinqian looked infinitely small.
Merely being near it made you tremble. Fear closed in from all directions.
Anyone who touched the New Energy would have their organs corroded. This Contamination Zone trapped you and then corroded you—forcing you to watch yourself melt into a figure of blood.
This was the price of defiance.
Wang Qinqian herself had never seen anything like this. Having come this far, she didn't know how to proceed.
Wang Qinqian was still in shock. Seeing the giant Sheep-Head made the feeling even more concrete—she had betrayed it.
I betrayed the collective.
Wang Qinqian was supposed to belong to this Contamination Zone. She had her own logic to follow—she had to die over and over yet never truly die. She had to guide every person who entered the Contamination Zone toward suicide.
That was her fate.
This time she'd broken the pattern. She'd followed Zhu Ning, the villain, and begun to resist. The Contamination Zone was attacking her too.
A sweet, metallic taste welled up in her mouth—a deeply familiar flavor. First came the blood, then someday chunks of flesh. Eventually her heart, liver, spleen, and lungs would dissolve. Wang Qinqian had truly experienced the process of decay before.
The Contamination Zone was threatening her. Resist, and this would be her fate. Return to the collective and she'd be safe.
She wouldn't need to think. Just become part of the group. Surrender herself completely.
But this time, Wang Qinqian wasn't the least bit afraid. She didn't even feel much pain. She thought she'd lost her mind. She actually felt exhilarated.
Zhu Ning had never been in a Contamination Zone like this. The psychic collapse here wasn't Wang Qinqian's alone—countless employees had shattered too, interconnected into a network. How could she break through?
The root of everything was the so-called Core Energy.
The origin of the nightmare was this processing plant. Every employee had been irradiated here. The entire company had gone mad over the New Energy.
Now the processing floor had revealed its true form—like a treasure in a novel that everyone fought over, drawing out humanity's deepest desires.
Zhu Ning even suspected that the New Energy served as a power source for the Contamination Zone itself, binding the entire company together.
If you truly had to identify a Contamination Source for this place, the origin of everything was it.
Zhu Ning's reason for coming here was simple: destroy it. Cut off the company at its source.
Zhu Ning looked at Wang Qinqian. "If I take care of this place, you might die."
It was the energy that held these employees together, which was why Wang Qinqian could retain part of her own consciousness. If Zhu Ning severed the energy, the connected employees would likely scatter immediately.
At that point, killing Wang Qinqian would mean she wouldn't be reset. Or rather, she would reach her own ending—countless deaths would finally culminate in a true death.
Zhu Ning couldn't prevent that. Some things had to be said clearly.
Wang Qinqian had her back against the door, which still thundered with pounding from behind.
Her hair hung loose. Blood stained the corners of her mouth. Her glasses had been lost somewhere. The world was blurry to her now—this underground factory was nothing but a smear of red.
She could barely make out Zhu Ning either—just a hazy bloody smile on a black helmet.
Hearing those words, Wang Qinqian showed no despair. Instead, she smiled at Zhu Ning—the most genuine smile Zhu Ning had seen since meeting her. When she smiled, her entire presence became gentle and warm.
Zhu Ning suspected the Contamination Zone hadn't truly attacked her yet because Wang Qinqian was still resisting.
Wang Qinqian said: "I'm fighting back to claim the right to die."
She was simply pursuing a right that every human being was born with.
To accept death. To let what should have happened long ago finally happen. Unmoved by any authority.
Human technology had advanced to this point, yet people had forgotten how to respect nature and life. As long as they had money, they could override life and death, creating all manner of experimental subjects and Synthetics.
They carelessly created new life, yet couldn't comprehend the passing of an individual one.
They were that arrogant—stripping away so easily, bestowing so lightly.
Wang Qinqian didn't want to go on anymore.
After saying all this, Wang Qinqian seemed uncertain. "Is that... is that weak of me?"
Zhu Ning didn't answer immediately. The plan might fail. If it did, Wang Qinqian's worry would be moot. Zhu Ning wanted to say that if she herself died in there, she might dissolve into blood and remain here forever.
But Zhu Ning didn't intend to share that with Wang Qinqian.
Today she'd cast herself as the madwoman of the Contamination Zone. A madwoman never imagined failure. In a madwoman's eyes, there was only success.
So Zhu Ning told Wang Qinqian: "No. It's not."
Wang Qinqian froze. She didn't know why, but without her glasses, she couldn't see Zhu Ning's face—only the smiley face on the helmet. And now, that smile no longer looked like a mocking clown's grin.
It was a gentle smile.
Zhu Ning embraced everything and would never mock anyone for being weak.
Wang Qinqian wanted to smile, but she quickly couldn't. Her lungs ached terribly. She couldn't hold out much longer on her own.
The blood-forged giant Sheep-Head monster was bending down toward them, about to devour Zhu Ning and Wang Qinqian—like disciplining two disobedient outsiders, forcing them into the collective.
Wang Qinqian trembled all over. She fought the urge to run, pressing hard against the door. She couldn't retreat.
"Zhu... Zhu Ning......"
She didn't know what calling Zhu Ning's name would accomplish—she didn't even know what Zhu Ning had come here to do when she'd brought her along.
Zhu Ning had been sitting in her wheelchair the entire time, like a paralyzed patient who needed someone to care for her. In truth, her stamina still hadn't fully recovered.
Her organs were all in agony. Her mouth was full of blood. She didn't have much time. At this rate of contamination, she might dissolve into blood in twenty minutes.
As the giant Sheep-Head bore down, a shadow engulfed them. Only up close could you see the details—employees fused into one body, dozens of people crammed onto a single finger.
But Zhu Ning still didn't move.
After Desolate Village, Zhu Ning's composure had grown even steadier. She'd inherited a certain spirit from Shengxin—the hunter's mentality.
The instant the black goat closed in, Zhu Ning finally acted. Her eyes snapped open, glowing blue, filled with scrolling data.
She was an experimental subject. Activating data mode was like switching on a computer—her movements became far more precise. This was her first time using this mode in combat.
She fired a shot first. The bullet embedded itself in the Sheep-Head's finger—a massive digit composed of an employee's skull.
The bullet only pierced the forehead. That employee's eyes closed, but the damage to the hand was negligible.
[Use Pigman's Guillotine?]
[Yes.]
A guillotine blade descended from above, spinning like a rolling cutter, slashing across the monster's arm and drawing a line of blood.
The severed arm crashed to the ground, scattering into a jumble of Sheep-Head corpses. But Zhu Ning had only cut through five of its hands. The Sheep-Head's arm was dozens of hands twisted into one. The guillotine's contamination concentration was too low—it couldn't even sever a single massive arm.
[Use Putrid Fish Head? This will consume 12 health.]
[Yes.]
Zhu Ning's speed surged. But affected by the Core Energy, her body was partially numb—the Putrid Fish Head's maximum speed boost was barely half as effective as before.
The giant Sheep-Head was composed of countless employees. A single arm alone was covered in innumerable hands.
After the speed boost, Zhu Ning leapt onto the Sheep-Head's arm, using it as a springboard. She kicked off hard with her back foot. Countless hands sprouted from the arm, grasping for her ankle.
They caught nothing but air.
[Use Gravity Ignore? This will consume 30 health.]
[Yes.]
The instant the monster's extending hands were about to touch Zhu Ning, she became light as a feather. Gravity Ignore had an effective range of thirty meters. The Sheep-Head was roughly fifty meters tall. She was calculating the distance.
This was Zhu Ning's first time using the ability. Her first taste of weightlessness. At thirty meters up, you could go anywhere.
Giant monsters were always less agile. Before the Sheep-Head could react, she'd already vaulted to its heart. Zhu Ning whipped out a blade—something she'd just discovered in her Sanitation Backpack.
Prometheus had gifted her a new weapon. Very similar to Xu Meng's, but longer—designed specifically for hunting large monsters. When deployed, it instantly extended to two meters.
Squelch— The long blade plunged into the Sheep-Head's chest. Dozens of faces occupied that spot.
Zhu Ning drove the blade into one of their foreheads. Just one more step.
The pulsing Core Energy was right before her eyes. The Sheep-Head's reaction time was slower than Zhu Ning's. One more strike and everything would end.
She could walk out of the Contamination Zone. She could set Wang Qinqian free.
[Use Dentist's Drill? This will consume 20 health.]
A power drill appeared in Zhu Ning's hand. She drove it savagely into the Black Crystal. The drill whined as it spun, and the resistance was immense.
It was like trying to split a boulder by brute force.
Zhu Ning on the Sheep-Head's body was like a fly. Besides being more agile, she had no advantage. She had three minutes at most.
The Sheep-Head had caught on. When Zhu Ning pierced its heart, it let out a howl of pain. It raised a hand—a massive palm closing in to engulf Zhu Ning.
Once that hand came down, it would be like a mountain. Zhu Ning would be ground to paste in an instant.
Whirrrr—
The Dentist's Drill wasn't as tough as Zhu Ning had hoped. It managed to bore a single opening, then hit some kind of resistance and couldn't go any deeper.
[Dentist's Drill has been fully consumed.] The System's cold voice announced.
The drill in Zhu Ning's hand stopped spinning. It was already halfway in. Just one more step.
In that instant, Zhu Ning finally understood what drove this company to madness. Just one more step. Humans were terrifyingly susceptible to that feeling—so close, yet unable to let go.
The giant Sheep-Head's hand descended. Its severed wounds had already been patched by new employees. In this place, employees were an inexhaustible resource. Zhu Ning had no chance of winning a war of attrition.
Using Skin Hardening now would be unsustainable—full-body coverage required 100 health. She didn't have it, and even if she did, it would buy five minutes at most.
Using 3D Defense Space would only buy thirty minutes of breathing room.
Run? Buy herself some time and try again?
Or go all in?
Zhu Ning hung suspended in midair, drill in one hand. The Sheep-Head's hand was already coming down.
Wang Qinqian had been bracing against the door with all her might. She watched Zhu Ning execute a dizzying series of moves in mere moments—wearing that helmet with the bloody smile, wielding items Wang Qinqian had never seen before.
She looked like a character who'd stepped out of a comic book, sprinting across the body of a giant Sheep-Head like a true villain with only one goal in sight.
Wang Qinqian's heart hammered.
When Zhu Ning finally reached the "heart," Wang Qinqian even cracked a smile. For the first time, she was this close to success. Zhu Ning had accomplished what she herself never could.
But now her smile froze on her face.
The Sheep-Head had spotted Zhu Ning. A colossal hand pressed over its heart. From Wang Qinqian's vantage point, Zhu Ning's body looked impossibly tiny compared to that massive hand.
She would be crushed.
Like the difference between an ant and an elephant. When I want to crush you, it's effortless. All your resistance is futile.
Wang Qinqian stared blankly, oblivious to what was happening behind her. She let her arms drop. Was Zhu Ning... dead?
Was this the consequence of defiance?
Wang Qinqian went ice-cold. Despair enveloped her again. She couldn't bear to look at Zhu Ning's body.
Soon she'd hear a wet squelch—Zhu Ning being crushed to pieces. Wang Qinqian was powerless to stop it, just as she'd been powerless when facing Lin Fen's fate.
But the imagined sound of flesh exploding never came.
Suddenly, Wang Qinqian's pupils contracted sharply. From the giant Sheep-Head's clenched fist, a burst of light erupted—blazing through the gaps between its fingers, blindingly bright.
In the instant the Sheep-Head's hand had closed around her, Zhu Ning opened the System panel.
The System asked one final question: [Use K003 Explosive? Can demolish a thirty-story building within 15 seconds.]
[Use.]
She was going to blow up the company.
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