Drifting, weightless.
Consciousness gradually awakened from the void of chaos. It was pitch-black around; not a ray of light could be seen, not a sound could be heard.
No complex thinking was needed. Emotions of doubt, fear, and panic arose spontaneously.
Consciousness randomly chose a direction and rushed upward, like a drowning person desperately swimming towards the surface of the water.
BUZZ!
It was like the primordial chaos was being unraveled.
The ascending consciousness reconnected to the body, and through closed eyelids, sensed the light.
mory and personality ca back online, and the existence known as Li Ang finally awoke.
Where am I?
Li Ang tried to open his eyes but found himself as if in the grip of sleep paralysis, completely unable to control his eyelids, let alone stand up.
He could only feel as though he was lying on a bed, with a bright light shining down on him from above, his arms and legs feeling sowhat cold.
The ringing in his ears was severe. It took a while before it gradually eased. Li Ang struggled to discern the noisy voices around him.
"...surgery record... at the palmar side of the distal radius, the radial wrist flexor tendon surface incised 8 cm of skin, exposing the radial wrist flexor tendon... discovered Elental Material fused with the bone..."
"...through experints, tal elents have an attraction to the Elental Material inside the patient’s body, such as silver, gold, polonium, tungsten, uranium, plutonium, etc. The level of attraction seems to have no direct correlation with atomic weight or radioactivity..."
"...considering the patient’s condition, we decided to induce so Elental Material with gold to separate from the patient’s body, then perform cutting with lasers, stripping it for laboratory analysis..."
Were his arms and legs restrained, a breathing mask attached to his face, and was he currently lying on an experintal table?
The last scene in his mory was him sitting in an SAT armored vehicle, headed to the so-called Police Headquarters Seventh Headquarters. During the journey, he received a call from his country’s embassy in Japan, and then he had passed out.
The voices around him were all in Japanese, not a word in Chinese. Had the SAT people tricked him?
Terms like ’experintal subject’ and ’lab rat’ surfaced in his mind. Worse yet, the gas supplied by the respirator and the drugs from the IV lines in his arms seed to have anesthetic properties. His consciousness, so recently regained, was already growing groggy again.
This isn’t the ti to sleep!
Li Ang desperately used his consciousness to batter against the invisible walls confining it, trying to awaken his body.
"Everyone, please stop!"
A stern voice ca from a speaker in an upper corner of the room. It seed that outside Li Ang’s operating room, there was another, separate observation room.
Through the speaker, the sounds from the observation room could be heard. A man entered that room and said in Japanese, "Stop the research now. The Aricans are already on their way here; we need to hand over the abnormal individual to them."
"What?!"
An elderly voice said in disbelief, "Wasn’t it said that the research was to be completely led internally by Japan?"
The man said reluctantly, "The situation has changed. The US found out about what is happening here through so ans and made a request to the cabinet."
The room fell silent. The so-called "making a request" was just a euphemism for "exerting pressure."
Japan’s political upper echelons had been infiltrated by the United States for decades, leaving them with no resistance to US coercion.
"But," the elderly voice said unwillingly, "the Elental Material is the key to the future! If you feed it gold and silver, it will increase in volu and mass. If you let it touch so rare elents like rhodonium, Lead, Flerovium, Astatine, or Og, it will take on so of their features. Over ti, it will tend to stabilize, exhibiting unique physical and chemical properties.
This ans we can use it to achieve countless scientific breakthroughs! Toward a future of unparalleled brightness! Superheavy Elents, Stable Superheavy Elents, Elent 0, Anti-elent, tallic Hydrogen, Room Temperature Superconductor, room temperature and pressure superconduction, even Controlled Nuclear Fusion... This is the wealth of Japan and all humankind!"
The observation room was in complete silence; no one spoke. If the subject were handed over to the US, they would transfer it to the United States imdiately.
At that ti, all research results would have nothing to do with Japan.
The man said helplessly, "Dr. Suzuki, I know what you’re thinking, but this is also the Pri Minister’s intention. The representatives from the US military will be at the door soon."
Dr. Suzuki said, "...Then, please separate the subject’s radius."
The man asked, "What?"
Dr. Suzuki explained, "Please separate the radius of the subject’s right arm. The US only knows two things: that we have captured the subject, and that the subject’s body hosts the Elental Material. We can completely strip off the radius, which has the highest concentration of Elental Material, and then tell the US that the subject’s original radius has been completely eroded by it."
Dr. Suzuki’s voice, now seeming closer to the microphone, bood towards the operating room, "What are you waiting for? Start imdiately! The next hundred years of Japan’s national fortune depend on this!"
The doctors beside Li Ang, evidently holding Dr. Suzuki in high regard, hesitated for only a mont before gathering around again. Using tweezers, they grasped the edges of the incision on Li Ang’s arm and slowly pulled the skin apart.
Pain pierced through his brain, and a chill surged through his body. The Elental Material, sensing Li Ang’s emotional fluctuations, spread along his spine, reactivating his relaxed skeletal muscles.
His right thumb twitched slightly. The doctor who was about to separate the radius noticed it. His face instantly filled with terror, and he shouted, "Increase the anesthetic..."
Li Ang suddenly opened his eyes. Aided by the bright light from the overhead lamp, he saw everything clearly.
His wrists and ankles were firmly bound to the operating table. His body was covered only by a green sterile cloth. His right arm bore a narrow incision extending from the base of his thumb to his elbow. Through it, the surging black Elental Material could be seen.
The doctors and nurses in isolation suits were startled by his sudden awakening and instinctively stepped back half a step.
Anesthetic gas with an aromatic scent poured from the breathing mask. Li Ang clenched his mouth shut, stopped breathing, and pulled hard with his left hand, attempting to break free from the restraints.
SNAP!
The restraint did not budge. Li Ang’s physical condition was only that of an ordinary person, especially now while still under the influence of the anesthetic.
He tried to pull the restraints a second ti, still without success.
The black substance, sensing his movent, flowed into his bones and muscles like rainwater seeping into soil, rging with the nerve fibers.
SNAP!
On his third attempt, the restraints broke as easily as if they were made of paper. Li Ang quickly ripped the breathing mask from his face and pulled out the IV needles from his body.
BANG—
The operating room door was violently pushed open from the outside. Four fully ard soldiers disregarded the isolation procedure and charged in, the long barrels of their anesthetic guns aid at Li Ang.
They pulled the triggers, and the anesthetic needles spun towards him.
So slow.
The trajectory of the anesthetic needles seed like slow motion in a movie, clearly visible. Li Ang instinctively raised his palm, caught two anesthetic needles, then grabbed a nearby doctor and used him as a shield, letting the remaining two needles stab into the doctor.
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