"Related to mysterious creatures?!" Yang Lian was suddenly stunned.

She instinctively covered her abdomen and took two steps back.

This suspicious action immediately made the surrounding guards alert, and two guards at a slightly farther distance had already raised their weapons, aiming at her.

"Ma'am! Please do not make any resistant movements! Keep your hands where we can see them!" a guard shouted loudly, then turned his head to his colleague, "Quick, contact the Field Operations Department and have them send someone over!"

Looking at the dark muzzle of the gun, Yang Lian felt she had lost her ability to organize words—she had no idea what to say until two guards in full protective gear behind her roughly tackled her to the ground. She then panickedly shouted, "No, don't! Don't press on my stomach!"

...

...

Celestial City Mysterious Creature Research Institute, Eternal Night Aftermath Work Office.

Yang Qi had just torn open a packet of instant coffee when the phone on the table rang.

"Huh?"

Yang Qi glanced at the caller ID. It was a leader from the Field Operations Department. She looked again at the several phones on the table, feeling somewhat puzzled.

This leader had no personal interactions with Yang Qi. If it were work-related, it was her working hours, so the other party could easily reach her through internal lines without the need to call her private number...

But if it's not work-related... what on earth could the other party want with her?

With this doubt, Yang Qi picked up the phone, and after a second of hesitation, pressed the answer button.

"Hello? ...Hello?"

After connecting the call, the other side remained silent for a little while, seemingly choosing words carefully, and only when Yang Qi asked "Hello" for the second time did the other party softly say, "...Mr. Yang, there's something to inform you about. Your sister is now in Lab 4."

"Lab 4?" Yang Qi was slightly stunned. As a staff member of the institute, she of course knew what this Lab 4 was for.

It's a place used for temporarily "storing" newly contained mysterious creatures.

"What's going on?" Yang Qi's tone suddenly became heavy, "What happened to Yang Lian?"

"We found something highly suspected to be a mysterious entity inside her."

"Inside her?"

"...In her uterus," the other party said, "It's an embryo with a mimetic response of a mysterious creature."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes, and after comparing the mimetic frequencies, we found..." The other party suddenly lowered their voice, "the embryo's mimesis is 99.827% similar to Chimera 17."

"..."

"In addition, we also found a metal nameplate in Yang Lian's residence, which we have confirmed belongs to one of the institute's containment items, but we've reviewed all the surveillance footage and haven't found how Yang Lian stole this nameplate."

"Nameplate? What nameplate?"

"Previously, when Night Slayer, Candle Dragon, and others went to the Surrendered Area to search for the missing Sun Hang, they brought it back. It's said this nameplate has the power to control metal to create giant mysterious entities, and since then, it has been stored in the institute's underground ice vault, under twenty-four-hour surveillance..."

"Are you talking about the nameplate engraved with the Russian name 'Elena Demoshena'?" Yang Qi forced herself to calm down and asked in the calmest tone possible.

"Yes."

"Surveillance didn't capture anything?"

"Besides the underground ice vault's surveillance, we also pulled all the footage of Yang Lian from the past month and a half. According to expert analysis, Yang Lian didn't seem to have the opportunity to get close to the underground ice vault, let alone steal the nameplate."

"So there are only two possibilities, it's either someone else... or something not human that stole the nameplate and placed it in Yang Lian's room, or the nameplate sought her out by itself. By the way, is the nameplate still in the underground ice vault? If it disappeared into thin air, why didn't the alarm trigger?"

"The nameplate in the underground ice vault is still there, but it's turned into a blank nameplate, with the writing on it having disappeared and reappeared on the nameplate found at Yang Lian's residence." 𝘧𝘳𝘦ℯ𝓌𝘦𝒷𝘯𝑜𝑣𝘦𝓁.𝒸𝘰𝓂

"...Is that nameplate carrying a mysterious entity's mimesis? Have you compared the frequencies?"

"They are identical."

"Have those people in Lab 4 wait," Yang Qi said sternly, "I'll be there right away."

...

...

Depths of the Baikal Remains, an unknown street.

"Keep going forward, keep going forward... twenty-five meters, twenty-six meters..." Yan Yu'an muttered while trudging forward, suddenly making a ninety-degree turn, heading straight toward the wall beside the street.

Just as she was about to bump into the wall, it retracted into the ground like an automated sliding door, revealing a new passage originally hidden behind.

"Hurry, according to the dynamic model's calculations, this path exists for only fifteen seconds!" Yan Yu'an immediately quickened her pace, and Sun Hang and Wang Xiyi also started running, while Zhong Ling was once again carried by the mysterious remains. The group quickly traversed the narrow passage and entered a vast plaza.

"All these winding paths are making my head spin," Wang Xiyi couldn't help but complain, "Can this Liu Li's dynamic model be trusted at all?"

"It should be reliable," Sun Hang said, "Haven't you noticed we're getting closer and closer to the central area of the Baikal Remains now?"