After dinner, it was already dark.
The mountain of documents hadn't been checked, but everyone had given up. Cellphone batteries needed to be used sparingly, so they'd have to wait until tomorrow to continue.
However, Ke Xun and Wei Dong still managed to find a few old-fashioned flashlights in the warehouse and distributed them to everyone. Perhaps because the batteries had been stored for too long, the flashlight beams were as dim as cell phone lights.
The group entered the underground experimental area, and with some time before 11 PM, they used their flashlights to search every corner of the basement again.
"Maybe one of the bricks in this basement is movable, like it's connected to a mechanism or something," Li Yaqing said, looking at the wall where the plaster had peeled off, revealing the bricks underneath.
"Yes, maybe that's possible. Don't novels and TV shows often use that kind of setup?" Zhang Hanrui nodded quickly, looking expectantly at Ke Xun along with Li Yaqing, hoping for his approval.
"Then let's check each brick one by one," Ke Xun nodded as expected, leading the two to start checking from the very edge of the wall.
"What about the bricks on the higher up?" Zhang Hanrui pointed upwards.
Ke Xun squatted down by the wall, patting his shoulder with his other hand. "Come on, step on me, hold onto the wall, I'll slowly stand up, and you can reach up and check."
"Can you do it?" Zhang Hanrui hesitated, looking him over.
"...Girl, do you even know how to talk?" Ke Xun said coldly, "Never question a man's 'ability,' understand? Hurry up and get on."
"Okay, okay." Zhang Hanrui quickly and carefully stepped onto Ke Xun's shoulder, not daring to say that she was looking at him like a submissive.
Ke Xun lifted the slender Zhang Hanrui without much effort, and the three of them checked each brick little by little.
Meanwhile, Mu Yiran continued to review documents in the D-sector laboratory with a flashlight.
Qin Ci glanced at the documents in his hand, which seemed to be a stack of personnel files, and asked, "Do you have any ideas now?"
Mu Yiran didn't look up, continuing to examine the documents as he spoke, "Since this research institute has its experimental area underground, it means that its experiments here are not authorized by official departments, or it may be using the guise of legitimate research to secretly conduct these inhumane and illegal experiments. In that case, these experiments must be kept confidential. Not every person working at the institute can access core secrets, which raises a question,"
he said, looking up at Qin Ci, "How did the artist of this painting know that this institute was researching these projects?"
Qin Ci's eyes flashed: "That's right! Unless someone leaked the secret and made it public."
"The issues involved in this research institute are both significant and sensitive," Mu Yiran said, "In the context of that era, even if there was a leak, it would be suppressed by the relevant departments to prevent the situation from spreading and causing a public uproar. So even if there was a leak, the public wouldn't know too many details. But judging from the content of this painting, the artist knows the details of the experiments very well, which means that the artist is very likely an insider at the institute."
"That's right—and he'll probably be a core member," Qin Ci nodded. "He knows the details of the four experimental projects, so he's not just a core member, but possibly a leader at some level."
"I remember seeing the artist's name before he entered the painting; it was Kang Lai," Zhu Haowen suddenly interjected. "Is he famous in the art world?"
Mu Yiran flipped through the personnel file in his hand: "The Fanghezi Art Museum was only established two years ago. The museum's main collection only has one or two paintings by famous artists. The rest of the paintings were purchased cheaply from novice or unknown painters. So this Kang Lai isn't famous in the industry; at least I've never heard of him. If he really was an insider at this research institute, you could easily mistake him for an amateur art enthusiast."
"Then isn't he a very contradictory person?" Zhu Haowen said. "On one hand, he's a core member participating in or managing research, and on the other hand, he's painting these inside stories to criticize them."
Qin Ci's mind raced: "This behavior seems a bit split. Could he have a split personality?"
"It's also possible that he only felt guilty about his past actions in his later years," Zhu Haowen said coldly, "so he confessed everything he had participated in as a form of repentance."
"That's quite possible," Qin Ci walked over and flipped through the files with Mu Yiran. "In any case, let's find this person's work records first; maybe we can get some clues."
They flipped through the files until after 10 p.m.
"Let's stop here for today," Qin Ci said slowly, looking at Mu Yiran. "Xiao Mu, do you have any suggestions about Laboratory D?"
Mu Yiran lowered his eyes and pondered for a moment: "Cai Xiaoyan fainted last night. I wonder if that's why she escaped unscathed. If you're willing to try this method, I can help you knock her out."
Not everyone dares to be knocked out in this situation, because it's equivalent to having no defenses or self-protection measures, exposing their most vulnerable and helpless self to danger.
Qin Ci hesitated for a long time before finally nodding with some difficulty: "What's meant to happen will happen. Whether I faint or not, it'll find me eventually. Why not give it a try?"
Mu Yiran didn't say much. Seeing Ke Xun bringing in Zhang Hanrui, who was crying from fear as the terrifying night deepened, he asked Zhang Hanrui if she wanted to faint manually too. Zhang Hanrui, with a bitter face, sobbed, "I don't know... maybe it won't work for me... I have a special constitution; it's hard for me to lose consciousness even with anesthesia. Even last night... I couldn't faint. I don't know... sob sob... why did I have to have this constitution? I'd rather faint and die unconscious than be tortured to death..."
The veteran members tacitly remained silent, not pointing out that even if she could faint, she might still be woken up and tortured to death.
Regardless, Zhang Hanrui ultimately decided to try, just in case.
As Ke Xun was about to leave Lab D, Zhang Hanrui couldn't help but chase after him and grab him, saying, "Brother Ke... if I die, you... you take my phone back to my parents. I wrote something on it, please show it to them, it's my... last words. The unlock password is XXXXXX, please."
"Okay, don't worry, I've got it." Ke Xun patted her shoulder, turned and walked out, but turned back at the door and said to her, "Hanrui, don't be afraid."
Zhang Hanrui nodded, tears streaming down her face, her voice choked with sobs.
After knocking Qin Ci and Zhang Hanrui unconscious, Mu Yiran placed them in a corner of the lab, closed the door behind her, and went to Lab B with Ke Xun.
Wei Dong and Zhu Haowen didn't hesitate about artificially inducing unconsciousness, so Mu Yiran did the same.
Finally, the two went to Lab A and asked Xu Zhenqi, Qiang, and Huang Pi if they wanted to try this method as well.
Huang Pi remained silent. He was a man of few words, having barely uttered a few words since entering the painting. Qi Qiang also cautiously refused to speak. Only Xu Zhen hesitated before asking, "Even if you faint, will you be woken up by the kind of ear-piercing noise you mentioned?"
"To be honest," Ke Xun said, "I think it's very possible. However, even if you faint, you won't face a greater danger than the noise. At least nothing touched us last night; it was just a noise attack."
Xu Zhen thought for a moment, "Okay, I've prepared some things to plug my ears. After I've plugged them, you can knock me out, put me in the corner, and cover my head with the blankets from the crib."
Ke Xun looked at her with a complicated expression, "Are you sure you want to use the crib stuff?"
"I've already used it," Xu Zhen said coldly, showing Ke Xun the cotton wool she was holding. "This was taken from the blankets."
She mixed it with sticky rice from the porridge, crumpled the cotton wool into a ball, stuffed it into her ears, covered them with mud, and then tightly wrapped both ears with several layers of wide cloth strips. Finally, she wrapped a small cotton blanket around her head before giving Mu Yiran an OK sign.
Mu Yiran knocked her out and placed her in the corner of the lab. Just as she was about to wrap her in the crib blankets as instructed, Qi Qiang snatched them away and covered his own head with them.
Mu Yiran and Ke Xun said nothing and turned to leave Lab A.
Even if they forcibly took it back from Qi Qiang and wrapped it up for Xu Zhen, Qi Qiang could still snatch it back after they left. Moreover, it might even anger Qi Qiang, who might take advantage of Xu Zhen's unconsciousness to harm her.
Back in the C-area laboratory, Li Yaqing and Cai Xiaoyan were huddled together, trembling with tears in their eyes. Seeing the two enter, Li Yaqing cried hoarsely to Ke Xun, "Brother Ke, what do we do? I don't want to die! I don't want to die! Waaah..."
Ke Xun shone his flashlight on the ground and saw the bodies of Deng Guang and Zhao Youyi, who had died in the room the previous night, still lying in the corner. They had been moved this morning, their faces covered with their own clothes, only stiff, cold corpses visible.
Ke Xun asked Li Yaqing, "Last night, after you felt the electric current pass through your palm, how long did you hold on before letting go?"
Li Yaqing burst into tears, "I don't know... I don't know... It hurt so much, really, so much. I felt like I was going to die. I just couldn't hold onto that wire... I really tried my best, I tried so hard to endure it... but I just couldn't hold on any longer, I let go... I didn't... I really didn't want Youyi to die..."
"Don't cry, don't cry, it's not your fault, you don't need to blame yourself," Ke Xun quickly comforted her. "I think anyone else would have had the same result. The pain 'Painting' inflicts is unbearable under normal circumstances. This isn't your fault, it's 'Painting's' malice."
Li Yaqing looked at the three of them through tears, choking back sobs, "Then what about tonight... I'm afraid I'll hurt you again... and I don't want to die either..."
Ke Xun had no solution.
The nature of the experiments in Laboratory C meant that two people would indirectly kill each other. Humanity and willpower would be put to the most brutal test here, and even he himself didn't know if he could survive this round.
After thinking for a moment, he suddenly smiled and said, "How about we go all in?"
Seeing that all three of them were looking at him, Ke Xun turned on his phone, activated the stopwatch function, and placed it in front of them: "I'll put the phone in constant-on mode and then place it in front of the machine. After the current is applied, everyone will watch the stopwatch together, and every five seconds, everyone will release it together—what do you think will happen then?"