Chapter 825 - 1: Type II Gene Modification Potion (Defensive)

Chapter 825: Chapter 1: Type II Gene Modification Potion (Defensive)

It’s been decades since Lai Fu departed, and in all this long time, Chen Zhou feels he can no longer mourn it.

Colorful life, endless tasks, tight challenges, hustling for survival...

These things have filled his heart, including Paul and Bi Kai.

Until his partners left, and he became a loner once again.

When Chen Zhou sits in the wilderness, lights a bonfire, and after so long, roasts a perfectly delicious duck with the simplest seasonings.

Taking a bite and staring at the delicacy skewered on a stick, he feels as though the past is yesterday, as if he’s back on that island for so many nights, inhaling the scent of burning wood and charcoal, and that unique, sun-warmed dog smell.

Then and there, just like now.

Tiger Third can’t understand the Leader’s words, but it can sense Chen Zhou’s mood.

It nudges Chen Zhou with its big head, then stretches its tongue out to lick Chen Zhou’s face.

Eating meat all day, Saw-toothed Tiger’s saliva naturally carries a whiff of stench.

For the scent-sensitive Chen Zhou, this smell has always been his least favorite, but this time, he doesn’t push Tiger Third away, doesn’t refuse.

Once it’s shown affection, Tiger Third sprawls out, lying on its side next to Chen Zhou, showing its belly.

Chen Zhou grins, throws himself onto Tiger Third, gives the big warm fuzzy guy a good rub, wrestles with it for a while, then finally gets up and opens the red box.

...

The two potions and the contract inside are now in view, and Chen Zhou’s smile disappears as he first picks up the instruction manual for the golden potion to read through.

"Type II Gene Modification Potion (Defensive)

Main Features:

1. Enhance tissue toughness, increase the tear resistance, puncture resistance, and impact resistance of skin, muscles, fascia, tendons, ligaments, blood vessels, and organ membranes.

2. Increase bone density, improve bones’ ability to resist bending and fracture.

3. Accelerated injury repair, mainly speeding up and improving the process of blood clotting, inflammation control, and regeneration of tissues (skin, muscle, bone, nerve, vessel) after physical damage.

4. Increased pain tolerance, boost the nervous system’s perception of pain signals, raise the threshold of pain response, suppress some pain transmission.

5. Optimize energy reserves and metabolic capacity, to make better use of energy during recovery, faster metabolism of internal waste.

6. Improve body structure (joints, fascia layers, etc.), enhance cushioning and dispersing of impact forces."

"Precautions:

1. Before injection, please make sure to inject ’STITCHRΙ’ type gene editing potion in advance.

This genetic modification potion can prevent severe rejection reactions after injection.

2. Side effect explanation:

This potion comes with potentially serious side effects.

Systemic, multi-gene modifications have effects that are extremely complex and unpredictable, with high risk; the Rift Tribunal cannot guarantee successful gene modification after injection.

Injections should be performed with full consciousness and completely voluntary behavior. If an accident occurs, the Rift Tribunal bears no responsibility.

Note that the possible side effects after injection may include—

1. Cancer.

2. Loss of key gene functions leading to certain organ failure or metabolic diseases.

3. Unpredictable developmental or physiological abnormalities.

4. Targeting effect abnormalities.

5. Overexpression—even if the editing result is correct, excessive gene expression may cause excessive tissue fibrosis, hardening, and so on.

6. Expression at the wrong location—genes activated in tissues or cell types where they shouldn’t be, possibly leading to ectopic soft tissue ossification.

7, 8, 9, 10..."

"15. Changes in pain threshold may cause the recipient to ignore serious injuries, delaying treatment.

16. Increased metabolic burden: Maintaining high-intensity tissue and accelerated repair requires more energy and nutrition, which could lead to metabolic strain.

17. Ethical issues: Gene editing effects are permanent; after injection, the individual’s health, aging speed, offspring will all be affected, possibly leading to ethical and cognitive concerns.

..."

Compared to the advantages, the side effects outnumber them several times over.

Starting with the notorious cancer, to social ethical issues, social equality concerns, and natural human identity problems—a densely packed list runs down the page.

Originally, Chen Zhou thought this thing only had perks and no downsides; after reading it, he hesitated—

"Fuck, is the Space-Time Administration Bureau giving me a reward or treating me like a guinea pig?

Completely voluntary?

Sounds nice!

If I don’t want to get injected, then send me home! Instead they’re playing the saint, doing something dirty but pretending it’s all voluntary—fuck them!"

He cursed a few times in his heart, wishing he could snap the potion in half and throw it on the ground.

But rationality still rules his body; no matter how much he hates the Space-Time Administration Bureau, or rather the so-called Rift Tribunal, he could never destroy the potion—after all, it’s his only hope for getting home.

After injection, he’ll head for "Ambrose." Even if he doesn’t complete the contract mission, staying there for ten years or so is better than lingering on this prehistoric wasteland—at least he’ll find people he can communicate with.

Here, his closest companion is just the Three-headed Saw-toothed Tiger.

He sighs, puts back the golden potion, then takes out the azure-blue potion.

Just like the Type II Gene Modification Potion, this one also belongs to the II series, but its function is to boost responsiveness.

The manual for this potion is equally packed with various effects and precautions, and same as the defensive type, the reactive potion needs at least a week, sometimes up to half a month, to take effect.

If you’re hoping for a movie-style, one-injection-and-you-turn-superhuman transformation, think again.

Looking up at the sky, then down at the red box for a while, Chen Zhou knows he has no way out.

But before injection and signing the contract, he carefully takes out the contract and examines his own "indenture."

Unfortunately, the Rift Tribunal doesn’t provide much information in the contract.

In the potion manuals, they’re meticulous, but when it comes to Ambrose and the killer family haunting it, they suddenly go stingy—no mention of the era, Ambrose’s location, killer family numbers, military setup, not even the details of family members.

You could say, once the contract is signed and he sets off, he’ll have to probe out intelligence alone and unaided.

And judging from the place name, he’ll most likely end up in a Western country.

In a land full of white and black people, suddenly popping up with an unfamiliar Asian face—he’s bound to attract a ton of unnecessary trouble, and it’s easier for the killer family to notice him.

Clenching his teeth, Chen Zhou feels through the sheepskin paper the Rift Tribunal’s overwhelming malice toward him.

"Shit, worst case, I’m just gonna hole up there and do nothing. The contract doesn’t specify a deadline, so unless the killers come after me, how long the mission lasts is none of my business..."

Knowing full well that the Rift Tribunal wouldn’t leave loopholes for him, Chen Zhou still comforts himself in classic A-Q fashion, finding solace in his misfortune.

Putting down the contract, he rubs Tiger Third’s belly again, then decisively grabs the potions and injects them, gold first, then blue.

As the metallic-glimmering liquid in the syringe disappears, Chen Zhou feels a chill streak through his veins, spreading all over his body.

This cold is nowhere near minus sixty-five degrees, but it shakes him more fiercely than the outdoor extreme freeze, to the point that he can’t stop his teeth from chattering and shivering.

Wave after wave of pain, along with bone-freezing cold, sweeps over every inch of skin, every cell in his body.

Chen Zhou collapses by the bonfire. His mind still clear, but everything before his eyes grows hazier and hazier.

The dancing flames seem to brush up against a vortex at the bottom of the sea, spiraling as the red spreads and devours the world.

In an instant, the vast snowy grassland and the glow of the fire vanish; in their place are dense plants, an uneven asphalt road, and a metal road sign shrouded in night—

The sign’s paint is long gone, crookedly stuck by the roadside. On it, rusted Arabic numerals and a few English letters can barely be seen: "Route 66."

Insect chirping erupts, dragging Chen Zhou from the dead of winter into midsummer. The asphalt is releasing all the heat it absorbed during the day, but still, it can’t dispel the chill he feels.

Clenching his jaw and steadying himself against a nearby tree, Chen Zhou faces this unfamiliar territory but dares not step onto the road.

He’s now in the gene modification phase, his combat power nearly drained, and if he runs into the killer family now, he’s liable to die. For now, he’d better hide and wait for his body to recover a bit before scouting out intel.