Chapter 36 - The Hole In His Brain

Looking at Monday, Shu Jun suddenly thought of a dog wailing at the gate of a pet hospital.

With him staring intently at it, Monday didn’t dare to attack Ai Xiaoxiao. It attempted to flee in another way — Monday absorbed water again, crawled away from the cloth and twisted itself into a slippery lump, firmly clinging to the floor.

During the whole process, its harsh scream never stopped. Not deterred by the noise at all, Ai Xiaoxiao snorted, took a shovel from the tool cabinet and quickly scooped Monday up.

“Your sword has quite a personality.” She commented in a manner that was neither too dispassionate nor too eager while stuffing Monday into an incubation tank.

Knowing that his weeping and screaming were ineffective, Monday quivered in the tank and bumped violently onto the walls, to the point that the tank on the floor started to crack dangerously.

Shu Jun: “……” Why is there a shovel in a consulting room anyway? But seeing Ai Xiaoxiao dance with the shovel so dexterously, he didn’t dare to ask.

The underground space was much larger than that above ground. It was just that the lighting was too blue and a tad frightening. Ai Xiaoxiao poured some liquid into three empty tanks and turned to Shu Jun and Zhu Yanchen: “Take it off.” 

Shu Jun: “?!”

“You can leave a piece of underwear on. There’s isolation liquid inside, which won’t mix with the erosive substance, so it’ll be convenient for body scanning.” Ai Xiaoxiao glanced at Shu Jun, lifted the incubation tank and poured Monday into one of the liquid tanks. Monday tried hard to stick to the tank wall, but unluckily, the inside of the isolation tank was so smooth that Monday could only loathfully sink into the liquid.

Just after it fell into the liquid tank, several metal arms stretched out, forcibly twisting it back into the shape of a sword and gluing it to the bottom of the liquid tank. Monday looked like it really wanted to curse, but only a string of thin bubbles came out. Ai Xiaoxiao put a lid on the liquid tank, leaving Monday to wriggle inside however it liked.

“Erm……” Shu Jun was a little lost for words. Whether in his so-called ‘real world’ or this world, the game only matched the combatants with doctors of the same sex before.

A person of the same age yet opposite sex was standing in front of him. He wasn’t feeling super shy, but there was still a hint of embarrassment.

“Don’t mind me, I’m a doctor at any rate — from eight to eighty years old, I’ve seen a lot.” Ai Xiaoxiao seemed to see his concerns, waved her hand indifferently and looked at Zhu Yanchen. “Mr. Zhu, what’s the matter with you? I’ve chopped your internal organs a hundred times, just quickly take it off.”

Oh right, there’s someone experienced here. Bro, you and I are in this together. If I can drag on for another second, let’s do it. Shu Jun hurriedly moved his gaze over while standing completely still, with a serious ‘I’ll follow exactly what you do’ look on his face.

Zhu Yanchen cast a vague glance at Shu Jun, walked to the side of the liquid tank and took off the pieces of clothing on him one by one.

Indeed, the Marshal was worthy of being a marshal, for even when he was taking off his clothes, he still looked so formal. Most of the time, this person covered himself so tightly, and even the top button of his pyjamas had to be fastened. Zhu Yanchen’s body had been exposed once before, but at that time, Shu Jun was trying to save his life and was in a completely dazed state, not even able to count how many heads the person actually had.

Without the dense scars that used to be all over his skin, his trained muscles were all revealed. Zhu Yanchen had an advantage over Shu Jun in terms of height, and his waist was also slightly firmer. With his pale skin and sharp eyebrows, he now looked like a marble statue that carried the warmth of a human being.

Good shape. Shu Jun’s occupational habit surged up a bit — after all these issues had been resolved, perhaps they should engage in some close combat.

My heartbeat seems to be a tad too fast; this excitement must be because of my occupational habit. Shu Jun withdrew his gaze and looked at Ai Xiaoxiao again.

“Uhm, the recovery is very good, and the blood indicators all seem okay. I will look at your bones and internal organs later.” Ai Xiaoxiao’s reaction was extremely casual, as if the person standing opposite her was just a sack of meat.

With someone else taking the lead, Shu Jun could relax a little. He stripped himself as fast as he could and lay down in the liquid tank, splashing a lot of water.

The liquid in the tank was cold and viscous, like iced oil. But at least, the treatment they got was much better than Monday, for they could poke half of their heads out, thus their hearing and speaking weren’t affected at all. The two men just lay side by side, as though they were two human specimens.

“It’s not only about your immunity against erosive substance.” Ai Xiaoxiao looked at Zhu Yanchen’s real-time scan, and her tone was very low, as if she was talking to herself. “Last month, I cut off the infected parts in your liver, so you should only have a quarter of your liver left. Yet now, it has fully grown back.”

She pondered for a moment, her eyes beaming brightly.

“The internal organs and bones are both normal, and there aren’t even any traces of previous operations. Not bad. Remember to give me some tissue samples later… Wait, your heartbeat is a little fast. Are you nervous? Mr. Shu’s heart beating fast is understandable, but you, it isn’t the first time you’ve been here.”

Shu Jun subconsciously tilted his head and glanced at his friend Mr. Zhu, who was only a hand’s length from him.

“How come it’s beating even faster? Alright, Mr. Zhu, you can come out. When I’m done with checking Mr. Shu, I’ll check your heart.”

“So fast?” Shu Jun asked hopefully. This liquid was freezing him.

“He’s a human, but you aren’t. You need at least two hours, so hurry up and look over here.” Ai Xiaoxiao threw a large towel at Zhu Yanchen. “Wipe yourself, then go outside and wait. You standing here will get in the way.” 

After saying that, she cast a thoughtful look at the old man next to her.

The old man cleared his throat. Zhu Yanchen changed his clothes and walked to Shu Jun’s liquid tank, then he said with a serious tone: “I’ll wait for you outside, don’t worry.”

“I’ll try my best.” Shu Jun responded dryly, but looking at Ai Xiaoxiao happily wiping a huge pair of pliers, he really felt a little weak at the knees.

“Lao Dong, let’s go.” As soon as he turned to talk to another person, Zhu Yanchen’s tone became apparently flatter.

“Finally it’s quiet.” Ai Xiaoxiao breathed out when the two left the room. “Next, I need to ask you some questions, you have to answer me truthfully, understand?”

It seemed that this woman deliberately separated the two of them. But she was right; doing inquiries one-on-one was the least likely to be disturbed.

“Your physical condition is almost the same as I thought — the Erosion Marsh inside you is now stable, with a high degree of integration and no adverse reactions. You don’t need to worry about any health problems. There’s just one thing that really piques my attention.”

She knocked on the machine on her side and a screen popped into Shu Jun’s face: “This is your brain.”

Shu Jun looked at the scanned image in confusion.

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“Before Zhu Yanchen brought you to communicate with other Erosion Marshes, did he do anything to you?”

Well, he did a lot of things. Shu Jun recalled the oral examination, the intimidation and the handcuffs right on their first encounter. But since the doctor specifically asked about his brain, Shu Jun could guess the answer she wanted: “He tried to trigger my brain?”

“Tell me how it happened.”

“At that time, he should be talking about the truths surrounding this world, but I completely forgot them the next second. It sort of felt like I had one too many drinks. After that, he gave me a few injections, we went to the corpse disposal site, then he triggered my brain again…”

“Anything else? Any details are fine.”

“How should I say this, I just have this kind of strange feeling. Being with him, I always feel that a lot of things seem familiar — I can’t help but trust him and want to protect him.” Zhu Yanchen wasn’t here, so Shu Jun simply didn’t hold back. He said whatever was on his mind.

“Sometimes, I also think of things ‘in the past’. But I don’t have the slightest impression of those things before. I have no idea why I could think about them.”

Ai Xiaoxiao stood up, circled a few times around the liquid tank and glanced at Shu Jun’s brain scan from time to time.

“In your memory, what is the relationship between the two of you?”

“…Friends?” Probably, since my memories regarding this aspect haven’t been restored.

“You don’t seem to be just ordinary friends.” Ai Xiaoxiao came to a halt and put both hands on the edge of the tank. “Previously, I indeed thought it was very strange. Why did he specially trigger your brain twice? But now I understand.”

Immediately, Shu Jun became excited: “Why so?” 

Zhu Yanchen never explained this to him. After all, after both their bodies got better, their relationship eased up and he wasn’t bothered by that any more.

“Do you see it, there’s a hole in your brain, which is slowly healing now.”

Ai Xiaoxiao pointed to the image on the screen.

“Let me think, how should I put it, do you know that when the brain faces unmanageable pain, it may choose to block certain memories?”

“Uhm.”

“In order to prevent ‘synthesised humans’ like you from knowing the truth, your brain is implanted with fragments of a foreign brain… Once the fragments recognise specific information, they’ll immediately stimulate a defense mechanism and force you to forget. This is probably the main principle.”

“So?” Shu Jun heard it, but he didn’t quite comprehend.

“If it’s me, I’ll take you directly to the corpse disposal site and never mention the truths about this world. In that case, the Erosion Marsh in your body will treat the foreign brain as a part of ‘you’, then it’ll start strengthening and protecting that brain…”

“Then your memories will be buried forever and you’ll never know the truth. Considering Zhu Yanchen’s style, doing it that way will save a lot more time and effort, and it’ll make it more convenient to control you. But, he chose to trigger your brain instead.”

Shu Jun stared at Ai Xiaoxiao with confusion.

Ai Xiaoxiao narrowed her eyes: “Let’s put it this way, he gave you an injection in advance — Once the trigger to your brain makes you feel painful, the Erosion Marsh will decide that those specific foreign brain fragments are ‘harmful’. It will no longer protect those tissues, rather, it will erode them right away. If he does it again during the process of you integrating with the Erosion Marsh, the effect will be even better… You were in a special situation, it was already lucky enough that your life was saved, yet he still had to care so much.”

Shu Jun was in a complicated mood, not knowing what to say.

“In short, without the influence of these foreign brain fragments, your brain will slowly return to its natural state. During this process, occasional headaches or remembering those suppressed memories are normal.”

Ai Xiaoxiao continued, sounding as though she was in a good mood: “Interesting. When he talked about this before, I thought about using surgical methods and never considered doing it through the Erosion Marsh… Indeed, what a beautiful idea.”

“Is there a way to remember everything earlier?”

“What?”

“A way to let me remember the past earlier.” Shu Jun said as he stared at the dim ceiling.

“I don’t know. Zhu Yanchen is better than me in this regard. Later, I’ll give him the results of the check.” After getting the answer she wanted, Ai Xiaoxiao’s tone became flat again. “You turn over first, let me look at your spine.”

Outside the door.

“That’s Shu Jun?” In front of Zhu Yanchen, Xia Liang didn’t hide her voice anymore. A clear female voice came out of the old man’s mouth, which made quite a strange scene.

“Yes.”

Xia Liang let out a thoughtful “uhm” and changed the subject: “You asked Ai Xiaoxiao to give me a chip, I’ve looked through it. The programme in that chip has been put inside the Headquarters —  As long as I coordinate with you from outside, you’re in full control of the alarm system for three hours.”

“Uhm.”

“But after the trip to the Headquarters, I found something interesting. The captain of the Groundwater team, Luo Duan, remember? He’s now recovering from his injuries at the Headquarters. If Ai Xiao Xiao’s report was correct, he applied for an indoor training room that hadn’t been touched for thousands of years and hurt himself.” 

Zhu Yanchen frowned, but he didn’t say anything.

“No matter what you want to do in the Headquarters, it’s best to be careful. It may not necessarily be only the two of you that want to do ‘something’ there.”

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