Mental Illness Evolution Manual - Chapter 47

With Yan Xianchuan’s keen eyesight, she couldn’t find any trace of surveillance cameras. She didn’t dare to appear in the open, so she took Lu Mingqiu to the edge of the forest, peering through the gaps between the trees at the town below.

They were traveling light, carrying no firearms, but Lu Mingqiu had a small backpack with her, containing various emergency supplies, like a lighter, rope, and of course, painkillers.

Without water, she swallowed a pill dry.

Although they were out of range of the sonic expulsion, the damage it had done to her body was irreversible.

The medicine took effect, the pain in her body disappeared, Lu Mingqiu’s expression cleared, she said, “Don’t worry, the organization will send people to find us, we just need to hide for a few days.”

Yan Xianchuan just looked at her, and didn’t say anything.

When she didn’t care about other people’s lives, she could spit out ten thousand sweet nothings woven from lies, but now that she was really worried, she became tongue-tied, she couldn’t squeeze out a single word.

Minute by minute, the sun climbed higher, baking the dry air until it felt crisp and brittle, like potato chips, evaporating every trace of moisture.

Suddenly, a scream broke the silence, it was so sharp, it was a decibel that ordinary people couldn’t reach, the drone captured it and faithfully transmitted it through the earpiece, but Yan Xianchuan’s ears, besides hearing the sound in the earpiece, could also clearly hear the sharp cry, it was coming from the town far away.

A normal person’s voice couldn’t travel that far.

The scream was like a switch, as if something had changed, the town, which had been silent, suddenly became noisy, the people who had been staying in their houses rushed out, like a swarm of bees that had been smoked out, they scattered in a panic, some were too hasty, they jumped directly out of the windows, some unlucky ones landed headfirst, they flapped a few times and then stopped moving.

Their bodies were an abnormal blue-red, their skin was bulging, as if something was swimming inside. Everyone’s eyes were bloodshot, their pupils were filled with twisted madness, when they saw another person, they swung their fists and charged straight at them.

All the streets with people were in chaos, people gathered in groups of two, three, five, they fought each other, as if they were enemies with a blood feud, they used their hands, their feet, their teeth… they used everything they could use as weapons, they fought until their heads were broken and their bones were broken, they wouldn’t retreat a single step.

Some were fighting, dissatisfied with mere fisticuffs; they actually spat fire from their mouths. Clearly psionic, yet purposeless, driven only by instinct, they sprayed fire wildly, even igniting their own bodies. Unable to extinguish the flames, they burned themselves alive.

Yan Xianchuan looked at the picture transmitted back by the drone, she couldn’t help but click her tongue, “They’re much crazier than me.”

“Did the church go to all this trouble just to make these people fight?”

“No.” Lu Mingqiu shook her head, “I suspect this is a test site for artificial psionic awakening.”

Lu Mingqiu’s gaze became even more serious, she said in a deep voice, “Psionic awakening is completely random, but humans love to eliminate the unknown, to make everything traceable. The church has been researching how to artificially create psionics, a large part of the human laboratories that the organization has destroyed were used to conduct this research.”

“Some experimental bases believe that mental stimulation is the key to psionic awakening, so they came up with countless ways to torture people, making them wander between endless fear and hatred, while other laboratories believe that as long as people have the abilities of certain animals, they can also become psionics. They would modify the people they captured, they would splice their organs with those of other animals.”

“When you asked me before, I didn’t say much. It’s because they can no longer be called human beings, a snake’s tail, half a spider, an octopus’s tentacles… I’ve also seen a person, her whole body was covered in transparent mucus, she was like a slug, she was wriggling in the observation room.”

She closed her eyes, “She had no consciousness left, in the repeated modification experiments, she had either actively or passively given up her independent thinking.”

“I’ve never imagined the church as a peaceful and loving organization, but I still underestimated their cruelty, they’re actually so inhumane that they confine an entire town to do experiments.”

Her expression was a complex mixture of shock, hatred, and disgust. Seeing this, Yan Xianchuan put away the look of amusement on her face, she also said indignantly, “They’re so vicious!”

“The church is really trash!”

Lu Mingqiu took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. Forget it, she really couldn’t argue with a mental patient too much.

The chaos spread. After the initial frenzy of fighting subsided, those who remained alive gradually regained their senses. One by one, they fled the scene; some sought refuge in their homes, others slipped out of town, disappearing into the overgrown fields and towards the forest.

They wanted to escape Walnut Town, but they didn’t know that the church had already taken precautions, they wouldn’t let any of the test subjects leave.

The large area enclosed by the expulsion weapon was the church’s arena.

There were four or five people coming towards this direction, “We have to take their clothes off.” Yan Xianchuan said.

Their clothes were nothing special in the outside world, but in this town that had been isolated from the world for an unknown amount of time, they were as obvious as ink dots on white paper.

Most of the people here were wearing clothes that were probably uniformly distributed by the church, many of them were wearing the same thing—light blue short sleeves, light blue pants, they looked like they had just run out of a hospital bed.

Lu Mingqiu nodded.

Yan Xianchuan said again, “You hide here, I’ll be back soon.”

She stood up from behind the rock where she was hiding, she added worriedly, “Don’t use your psionic ability.”

She was always the one giving orders, but now she was being repeatedly told, and she was being cared for by this person who was always unreliable. Lu Mingqiu’s heart stirred slightly, she said softly, “Okay, I won’t.”

“If there’s any danger, call me, I’ll be back soon.” Yan Xianchuan reminded her again before leaving, then she jumped off the rock that was used to hide her figure, her feet sank into the soft dead leaves, she didn’t stay for half a second, she rushed towards the panicked townspeople.

This fiancée of hers, who she couldn’t understand, had a violent strength comparable to that of a modified human, Lu Mingqiu knew this very well, but in her daily life, she had never accidentally broken anything, even when she was under the control of drugs and her mind was unclear, she had never lost control of her strength.

To be honest, Lu Mingqiu had actually prepared herself to break a few bones at that time, because a person who was not in control of her mind would first indulge her body.

Her figure could almost be described as thin, Lu Mingqiu had squeezed her arm, climbed over her back, just looking at her appearance, she couldn’t imagine that such a body could contain such enormous energy.

She moved through the forest, her speed was also very fast, she could even see her afterimage, in the blink of an eye, she reached the edge of the forest, she used a thick tree to hide herself.

That speed was also the first time Lu Mingqiu had ever seen it.

Yan Xianchuan leaned against the tree trunk, she didn’t need to stick her head out to observe the target’s movements, she could tell where they were just by listening to the sounds.

There were three people who had come in, they must have known each other, they were not far apart, but no one spoke, only their light breathing could be heard.

Yan Xianchuan patiently hid behind the tree, when they got within two meters, she suddenly leaped out, like a leopard, she controlled her strength, she used her hand knife to accurately strike the nearest person on the back of the neck, then she twisted her foot and knocked out the middle person.

The person furthest away was like a startled rabbit, a frightened mouse, his face was still wet with sweat and blood, the cold sweat that broke out on his forehead washed them all away.

Her entire attack was lightning fast, by the time the person reacted, his two companions had already fallen to the ground, their lives unknown. He turned and ran on the spot, he even swallowed his scream back down his throat.

He ran fast enough, but he was in a panic and tripped over a tree root, his limbs immediately flailed around like an overturned goose, he scrambled to his feet, he didn’t even look back, he ran away faster than if he had a wolf chasing him.

Yan Xianchuan only needed the clothes of two people, she didn’t intend to attack him.

She watched his back for a while, then she lost interest and retracted her gaze, she squatted down and started to strip the clothes off the two people by her feet.

The two of them were a man and a woman, they were both local, their skin was a pale white from not seeing the sun for a long time. They weren’t in good shape, they had more or less bloodstains on them, their noses were bruised and swollen, the man’s wrist was twisted unnaturally, it was obviously broken.

They were still alive, Yan Xianchuan had held back, she knew that Lu Mingqiu wouldn’t want to see her kill these innocent and pitiful ordinary people.

The clothes were all very loose, they were probably one size fits all. She picked up two sets of identity documents, she rushed back to Lu Mingqiu’s side with the same speed as she had come.

The other party was still hiding behind the rock, she quickly scanned her, there was no problem.

Yan Xianchuan handed her the woman’s set, it was a little cleaner, it didn’t have as many bloodstains, and it wasn’t damaged.

“Change here.” Lu Mingqiu said as she took the clothes, she wasn’t embarrassed or awkward, she took off her top and pants and put on the blue suit that was still stained with blood.

She had turned her back, Yan Xianchuan also turned her back, but before she turned around, she couldn’t help but pause for a moment, she was half a beat late, she saw the other party’s white back, and… her gaze fell, there was a brown mole on her tailbone.

The peeping person almost panicked and turned her head, she lowered her head and unbuttoned her collar, but it was as if a new layer had been pasted on her eyes, the picture she had just seen lingered.

She put on the dirty clothes in a daze, she completely forgot to be disgusted, it was Lu Mingqiu’s voice that brought her back to her senses.

“I’m done.”

Yan Xianchuan secretly bit her cheek, when she faced the other party again, her expression was normal, “Then let’s go.”

“I knocked out the owners of these two sets of clothes, they’ll wake up in a while.” She simply told her what had just happened, as if she was changing the subject, and as if she was boasting.

“Okay.” Lu Mingqiu’s voice was gentle.

Being looked at by such a gaze, Yan Xianchuan suddenly felt a surge of desire to perform, she clenched her fist, she wanted to destroy something, to show off her abilities.

“I will definitely protect you.” she said seriously.

“Yes, I believe you.” Lu Mingqiu replied, in her usual soft voice.

On the way back to the town, there were no problems. There were always people escaping the melee, and there were also people joining in.

The people who chose to escape into the forest wouldn’t actively start conflicts with others, they were scared, their first reaction when they saw people was to run.

The two of them imitated their state, they sneaked into the town in a sneaky way.

They chose a residential building on the outermost edge, Yan Xianchuan went into the open hallway first, there was no one there, the building was very quiet.

The elevator was out of service, they could only go up the stairs, the steps were covered in a thick layer of dust, there were many footprints piled on top of each other.

When they reached the second floor, Lu Mingqiu gestured to her, telling her to turn in.

There were three households on this floor, two doors were closed, and one door was wide open. The two of them entered the open room, they were surprised to find that the furnishings were still quite complete, there was a sofa, a TV, and a carpet on the floor, there wasn’t much dust, it looked quite clean, it seemed like someone had been living here.

Yan Xianchuan closed the door, she looked around each room, “No one.”

It was then that she noticed the details of the room, the yellow wallpaper that looked like it had been torn by a sharp object, the dark brown marks left on the floor, the various bits and pieces that had been knocked over, all indicated that something had happened in this room.

“There’s a diary here.” Lu Mingqiu’s voice came from the bedroom.