Chapter 151-I Clean Up Garbage in a Wasteland World
Chapter 151 Kill the VIP (VI)
District 103, western abandoned Garbage Dump.
A crumbling church stood here, half-buried in the dump. A pointed Gothic structure with an exaggerated spire.
If you looked closely, you could see tiny bumps covering the church's plaster walls. You might mistake them for decorations—only up close could you tell they were Barnacle shells.
Unfortunately, this area lacked the conditions for Barnacles to grow. As living organisms, they were prone to causing contamination, so the Barnacles here were simply fused into the concrete walls as a kind of ornament.
The church had been abandoned for years, but occasionally a light would flicker on at night, accompanied by eerie sounds—people praying or singing inside.
Rumor had it that everyone inside was insane.
The Garbage Dump was deserted. At most, a stray scavenging robot wandered through now and then. One look at the church and you could feel a sinister chill.
Some people had given in to the pull and walked inside, never to come out again.
Today the church was lit, its door slightly ajar.
Years without maintenance had left it with a persistent smell—the salty dampness of the ocean.
There were no visitors today. Only an old woman sat in the front row, her head tilted upward, gazing at the Idol in the center of the church.
The deity was enshrined on high. The sculptor had captured every detail, yet people tended to forget what it looked like even after seeing it many times—which was why no two Idols of it were ever quite the same.
Creeeeak—
Someone pushed through the door. A woman in a red coat, wearing a hat that concealed her face.
Upon entering the church, the woman first paid her respects to the Idol. She placed her right hand on her left shoulder and bowed deeply—a gesture of sincere devotion.
After the salute, she sat down beside the old woman and called him by name: "Bao Ruiming."
Since the Mechanical Oceanarium incident, Bao Ruiming had vanished completely. He'd switched to a new set of Cybernetic Implants. To avoid drawing attention, he'd chosen an old woman's shell this time—dressed in plain black, leaning on a darkened cane.
The only personal touch was a necklace made of Barnacle shells hanging around his neck.
The woman: "I have to say, you look like a cultist."
Bao Ruiming did look rather occultish—like someone who could set up a fortune-telling booth on the spot.
The gap between this and Bao Ruiming's former image—the suited, bow-tied elite—was staggering. Even the Sanitation Center's people would struggle to connect this figure to the director of the Mechanical Oceanarium.
Bao Ruiming spoke in an aged voice: "Is everything ready?"
The woman nodded. "No loose ends. It was done cleanly."
The Mechanical Oceanarium incident that day had seized the entire district's attention. By the time the Sanitation Center caught on, it was already too late.
They'd missed the most critical clues.
The incubation had been completed that day. Bao Ruiming's life mission had been fulfilled at the same time.
Bao Ruiming asked: "Is the date confirmed?"
He needed to verify the final date for the sacrificial ceremony.
The woman said: "Plan unchanged. Nine days from now."
They'd been planning for years. It would all come to fruition on that day.
Bao Ruiming nodded in acknowledgment. The woman asked: "Did you find out?"
Though they'd left no obvious trail, they could sense someone was doggedly pursuing them. On the day of the Eternal Pharma Foundation visit, someone's gaze had been detected.
They'd planted operatives inside both Eternal Pharma and the Sanitation Center. The covert lead was still Bao Ruiming.
Bao Ruiming handed her a slip of paper with several names. The woman glanced at it. "These are the ones?"
Bao Ruiming: "Some aren't confirmed. Better to wrongly kill than to let anyone slip through."
It was merely a suspect list, but Bao Ruiming was right—only nine days remained. There was no room for error.
As for the innocent names on the list, if they died, they were simply unlucky.
The woman committed the names to memory, then extended her hand. The slip of paper crumbled to dust—blown away by the wind without a trace.
She was an Ability User. She could pulverize anything she touched.
Nothing more needed to be said. The woman stood. "Mission on track."
She looked at the Idol. "Praise the great One."
By protocol, Bao Ruiming should have echoed the phrase—it was their established ritual. But he managed only two words before correcting himself: "Praise— I need to go."
The woman frowned, only to see Bao Ruiming's pupils contract sharply.
His prosthetic body was impressively realistic. An old woman's eyes would normally be cloudy, but his pupils had shrunk to pinpoints, and cold lines of data began scrolling across them.
The woman immediately sensed something was wrong. She gripped Bao Ruiming's shoulder. His eyes were twitching. "Someone has entered my Consciousness Cloud."
Someone was closing in on him.
If they killed Bao Ruiming's Consciousness Body, he would permanently lose any chance of regeneration.
The woman froze, thinking she'd misheard. Someone had actually infiltrated Bao Ruiming's Consciousness Cloud.
So their instincts had been right—someone had been investigating in the shadows all along.
While they'd been deploying their plans, the other side hadn't been idle either. They'd gone straight for the jugular.
But who had the resources to bypass Creation Technology's Firewall?
"Don't worry," Bao Ruiming said. "They'll be contaminated."
The Consciousness Cloud was his domain. The world he'd built ran on a perfect food chain. The island was beautiful and harmonious, with an endless supply of nourishment flowing toward the church. It was his ideal homeland.
He wished the real world could run like Floating Sand Island.
Any invaders would either be devoured by the Human-Headed Fish or consumed by contamination. In all these years, Bao Ruiming had never worried about his Consciousness Body being overturned.
The worst-case scenario was that the Contamination Level exceeded the threshold and they all went down together.
Bao Ruiming still hoped the Eradication Protocol would activate. He wasn't afraid to die, but he wanted to attend the ceremony nine days from now.
Bao Ruiming's pupils went unfocused. The Chip slot at the back of his neck went dark. His entire body seemed to lose all life—slumping backward limply.
His neck rested against the back of a church pew. His mouth hung open involuntarily. His Consciousness Body had withdrawn all control from the Cybernetic Implants.
He had to deal with the intruders.
......
Creation Technology headquarters.
Below the eleventh sub-level, every floor housed Consciousness Body Mainframes. This was the single most heavily guarded area in the entire company—entry required layers upon layers of clearance.
Towering Mainframes stood in rows, like a forest—or a row of coffins.
On closer inspection, each was divided into countless compartments, and each compartment held a brain suspended in fluid, wired into the Mainframe.
Patrol inspectors performed routine data checks. These were all VIP Guests—their lives represented the company's assets. Not the slightest negligence was tolerable.
Each VIP Guest's Mainframe occupied a separate grid, and he served as their dedicated caretaker.
Normally, these clients were quiet. After all, the wealthy didn't carry the burdens of the poor—no survival stress, nothing worth a mental breakdown over.
Wasn't there a saying? The rich are always more "kind."
In theory, if some anti-social maniac wanted to wipe out every wealthy person in an instant, all they'd need to do was blow up this server room.
The inspector was making his routine rounds when a flashing red light caught his eye. He stopped.
Contamination Level: 1%.
The system generated the reading automatically. Why was there contamination here?
The inspector pulled up previous reports. All readings had been normal. This particular Consciousness Body had always been perfectly safe.
He immediately opened his tablet, connected a cable to the Mainframe, and initiated a diagnostic.
His fingers flew across the keyboard. Code was running. In just five minutes, the Contamination Level had risen again.
Contamination Level: 2%.
Though the number was minuscule—some low-grade areas like the Garbage Dump could hit thirty percent—this was the Consciousness Cloud. Here, even the tiniest anomaly demanded attention.
The inspector contacted the technical team immediately, citing the exact designation: "Hey, can someone check on V-563? Right, the client's name is Bao Ruiming. VIP Guest. Thanks."
......
BOOM—
Thunder crashed outside. Inside the church, that phrase kept repeating: "Can we take shelter?"
Liu Niannian's face was ashen. A bolt of lightning let her see the Congregants' faces clearly. Each forehead bore a tiny hole—and inside, nothing. Empty.
Where their brains should have been, the space had been scooped out. They had willingly surrendered their brains, offering up their bodies as sacrifices.
Zhu Ning and Xu Meng's attention was fixed on the Idol at the center of the church. Tall and imposing, the snow-white sculpture radiated an aura of sanctity. The instant their eyes met it, something inside Zhu Ning's mind jerked violently.
This was the thing from Desolate Village.
Its appearance was somewhat different, but she was certain it was the same entity. The same aura.
It worked through repetition, deepening its imprint each time. One look, and your mind bore a brand that could never be washed away. Each additional glance drew you closer.
It felt like standing at the edge of a cliff—destruction or conversion. There was no turning back.
It was Liu Niannian's first time seeing the Idol. Terror invaded her to the marrow. She'd thought the Xenomorph incident was the most frightening thing she'd ever face.
She'd been naive. This was true terror. You had nowhere to run before it. It attacked your consciousness directly.
She felt an unprecedented wave of nausea, as though something had already grown into the inside of her skull—hard and intrusive.
The body's instinct was to vomit. Liu Niannian was already the most deeply affected. She retched, and something viscous and eager clawed its way up her throat. She could even feel it sliding across the surface of her tongue.
Fish eggs.
She vomited up a clump of fish eggs. A few were still wriggling inside her mouth, swimming between her teeth.
The contamination had invaded her consciousness. Liu Niannian was on the verge of being assimilated.
Liu Niannian's eyes went wide. The figures of Zhu Ning and Xu Meng blurred before her. She heard an ancient chant.
Black mist enveloped the church's interior, drowning everyone. It was as though she were the only person left.
"Niannian." Someone was calling her by her pet name.
Liu Niannian saw her mother, lying on a hospital bed. A beautiful face ravaged by illness. The white sheets beneath her were soaked in blood.
Blood gushed out without stopping. Eventually it covered her mother's hands.
Liu Niannian had once had siblings. From birth, they underwent Genetic Testing. Those with genetic defects were designated Defective—and it didn't even have to be a real defect. Simply not being perfect enough was sufficient.
Once you objectified people, they became products on an assembly line. The slightest flaw sent them to the disposal process.
They weren't even classified as Fifth-Class Citizens. They were simply executed. As a child, Liu Niannian constantly heard the cries of infants—the wailing of her brothers and sisters.
Her mother had given birth to six children. Only two were "qualified"—Lu Yao and Liu Niannian.
She could only watch helplessly as her own children were destroyed.
After the sixth child, their mother took her own life. Liu Niannian had seen the body. So much time had passed that she couldn't be sure anymore whether what she remembered was fact or imagination. But that scene would never leave her.
Her mother had been utterly resolute. She hadn't even chosen the more "elegant" method of slitting her wrists—she'd cut her own throat.
Scarlet blood sprayed everywhere, drenching the bedsheets and the walls. She'd slit her own throat the moment the servants were away.
Liu Niannian hadn't dreamed this nightmare in a long time. She stumbled to her mother's bedside and softly called out, "Mama."
No one answered. So she took her mother's hand—already cold and stiffening. Liu Niannian held on anyway, not knowing what the gesture meant.
She pressed her cheek against her mother's palm and felt the blood smearing across her face.
Mama.
Later, people swarmed in and took the body away. Officially, she had died of illness.
No one besides Liu Niannian cared that her real name had been Liu Yu. Not even her brother. They simply gave her a respectable funeral with lavish burial goods.
They already had the technology to upload consciousness to the Cloud, yet they'd put on a charade and given her the finest funeral.
Only Liu Niannian remembered her. Not just out of longing for her mother—but because Liu Yu's future was her own future.
Liu Niannian held her mother's hand. Her brain was screaming with pain. She wanted to scoop it out right now. The chanting wouldn't stop. She felt no anger—only pain. Pain that couldn't be halted, swimming through her mind like fish eggs.
She wanted to open her own brain.
Author's Note:
I'm here!
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