under hope

"Dean, Experimental Subject β has been confirmed dead."

"Tsk, I get it."

The middle-aged man in a white coat frowned and walked quickly to the laboratory. This is the second month of the implementation of the"Origin Project". He has already suffered two failures. Does the mermaid really exist? He couldn't help but question, or maybe the scales that person gave him were fake, it was just a damn ordinary fish scale! He pushed open the heavy door angrily and came to the sample petri dish.

"You are here, Dean. Experimental subject β only survived for 38 minutes. The cause of death was severe lack of water."A researcher handed the experimental report to the man and opened the computer nearby.

"Are the gills not functioning properly?"The man rubbed his thumbs irritably. He was extremely tired of the"nobles" in the reports in front of him. The gill function could not operate, the ultrasound could not be generated , and the vocal cord function could not operate. The man threw the report aside. He had begun to feel bored and wanted to give up. A meaningless plan. Maybe the mermaid is just a legend, and the incident six years ago was just a hallucination of all the ship's crew!

"Take out the sample."The man ordered

"OK"The researcher immediately carefully took out the scales sealed in the transparent box from the cloning machine, and held them in front of the man with both hands.

The scales were oval-shaped, shining like a rainbow under the spotlight; the man picked up the box and placed it in front of the man. The angle under the light keeps changing, and the light shining on the scales also keeps changing.

"How about the hardness data from previous tests?"The man suddenly asked

"It has a hardness exceeding that of alloy, Dean."The researcher replied.

This is definitely not a fish scale that has been observed by humans, so what exactly is it? After testing, it has the same composition as normal fish scales, but it is many times harder than normal fish scales. , are they really the scales of a mermaid as the man said?

Six years ago, all kinds of strange monsters fell from the starry sky to this world, bringing devastating blows to all countries. He clearly remembered that during the ocean war, The mermaids who appeared with colorful lights from the ocean guided their fleet out of the dangerous sea of ​​mist. Later, those mermaids fought side by side with them, using ultrasonic waves to shoot down the winged giant snake. That war was undoubtedly very crucial. Yes, the fleet of the Eastern Continent Republic was almost undamaged with the help of the mermaids. After that battle, the mermaids disappeared. No one knew how to contact them, and no one could find them. Now, he thought Clone them. The ocean is full of mysterious mysteries. Since mermaids can hide at depths that human submarines cannot reach, they will definitely make a huge contribution to the exploration of the ocean! Thinking this way, he seemed to have some motivation. , however, the"Origin Project" will be put on hold for a while, and he needs to make a new theory.

He put the box back into the researcher's hands and waved to them. The researcher immediately understood and started to finish the work. He breathed a long sigh of relief and left the laboratory.

In the afternoon, he sat in his office and looked at the recent research results of the Academy of Sciences:

Minister Li of the Mechanical Department has perfected exoskeleton accessories and divided them into military and industrial uses. Military exoskeletons have better protection and greater flexibility for public use. Currently, a large number of them have been used. Investing in reconstruction work; the sand disease vaccine being researched by Minister Jia of the health department has entered the third phase and is currently undergoing a large number of physical trials.

Only the android department is left. They have not submitted a progress report. I don’t know what Minister Zhang is thinking. After closing the computer, he stood up and made himself a cup of coffee, ready to start rewriting the theory about mermaids. Just as he was about to start, the office door was pushed open.

"Dean! I have a new report!"A young guy walked in excitedly, holding a tablet with a worn-out screen.

"Tell us about your findings, Minister Zhang."He stopped what he was doing and looked at the excited young man in front of him with interest.

"Okay Dean, please wait a moment...just a moment."Minister Zhang was so excited that he was a little incoherent. He hurriedly connected his tablet to the main screen of the office. He cut through several screens and finally stopped in front of a design drawing with the words"C-Type Bionic Man" written on it. big character

"Dean, the B-type bionic humans we designed before have excellent performance in terms of emotion and motivation. They can talk and eat like normal people, and can even show various expressions and speak different intonations; but the only drawback is that, Their memory storage is one-time and only suitable for a small number of scenarios.……"

"but!"Minister Zhang suddenly raised his voice and pointed to the design drawing on the main screen."Our latest design of Type C has greatly increased the memory capacity and removed the eating function. It is powered by an Ethernet battery and has a battery life of up to half. About a month or so, the battery life is halved under continuous high-intensity work; we also changed the original artificial skeleton to alloy, further improving physical strength and reducing emotional stress.………"

"enough!"He sternly interrupted the young man in front of him who was talking incessantly. This made Minister Zhang stunned for a moment.

"Take a look at the things you design for yourself. What is the positioning of bionic humans? Minister Zhang?"

Faced with the dean's rhetorical question, Minister Zhang replied hesitantly:"It is...emotionally perfect, androids should be...closer to 'people' than to machines."

"What about what you did? I might as well take your current design to the mechanical department. Type C should be an upgraded version of Type B. The emotional system must be retained, and it can only be added, not subtracted!"

"Sorry, Dean, I will go back and redesign it right now. I made a mistake in positioning it."Minister Zhang apologized hurriedly and left the office dejectedly after getting the look from the dean. After this incident, he temporarily lost his mood. He simply turned off the computer and closed his eyes to rest.

When he opened his eyes again, it was already At 20 o'clock in the evening, he gently rubbed his eyes, completely unaware that a red-haired man was standing in his office playing with the box containing the scales.

"You disappoint me, Dean Lin."

The man's voice startled him, and for a moment he already wanted to pull out the stun gun on his waist.

"when did you come?"He wiped the cold sweat from his forehead and stood up from the chair.

"just arrived."The man looked at him with a half-smile, and his sharp eyes made him shudder every time.

"Dean Lin, your research results are a failure and your direction is wrong."The transparent box was turning in the man's hand, and various lights flashed in front of his eyes.

"I'm coming up with new theories that won't fail next time."He turned on the computer and prepared to start writing

"No, you don't understand what I mean."The man scratched the monitor's connecting cable with his long fingers, which immediately aroused his strong dissatisfaction.

"what you do!"He stood up angrily and stared fiercely into the man's scarlet eyes. The man's face was extremely pale, with almost no blood at all, and the darkness hidden deep in the scarlet pupils began to stir under his gaze, as if To swallow him whole.

He took a deep breath, looked away, and sat back on the chair."Where did I go wrong?"He still compromised. The man's identity was very mysterious. No matter how many security measures he took, the man could still appear in front of him quietly, or even disappear in an instant. He was afraid of this red-haired man from the bottom of his heart.

"Mermaids are dependents, creatures created by gods that can reproduce independently. And what do you define as a mermaid?"The man placed the box heavily on the desk, waiting for Dean Lin's answer.

"God? Family members? What are you talking about, that only exists in legends."He was a little dumbfounded by the man's remarks.

"Is that what you think even after the Strange War?"The man asked with a smile.

"I……"He hesitated

"hehe……"The man stretched out his long nails and cut his wrist in front of him. Bright red blood dripped on the desk and soon flowed along the table to the ground. Immediately afterwards, the man's right hand glowed with dark red light, and all the blood that flowed out quickly condensed into a dagger in his astonished expression, as if responding to a call.

"As you can see, I'm a vampire."The man picked up the dagger and cut off the jade statue with a single swing.

"It's just a trick."Although his heart has been shaken a little, he still refuses to believe that everything in front of him is real.

"Forget it, you will always come into contact with it in the future."The man crushed the dagger with a slight exertion. The blood returned to the ground and evaporated immediately. He noticed that the man's wrist was intact as before.

"Mermaids are members of the family, and humans are also members of the family. As long as you pray to the God who created the mermaid, He will grant your wish."I don't know when, but suddenly there was a stone statue on the man's hand, with seaweed on it.

"You want me, a scientist, to pray to God and worship Buddha?"He looked at the man with incredible eyes.

"Your world is just an inconspicuous speck in the vast universe, and to you,"those" are indeed gods."The man smiled and placed the stone sculpture on his desk.

"So what should I offer?"he asked

"You are not worthy of giving them gifts, they will take them themselves. For your wishes."The man moved behind him like a ghost at some point, and said close to his ear.

His hair stood up and goosebumps appeared all over his body. When he turned his head, the man was no longer in the office. He turned back again Looking at the stone statue - the carving looks like a thick human being, but the lower body is a snake's tail; the wavy lines of different lengths on the body seem to represent that the body is covered with scales; the part called the head is chiseled There were six small holes of different sizes, which seemed to be the eyes of the statue.

He wanted to look away, but found that he could not move his head at all. He could only stare at the eyes of the stone statue and watch it light up little by little. The light started to shine. He felt a little frightened in his heart and turned his head with all his strength. He did look away, but he saw himself. He magically entered a third perspective and looked at his hand slowly Slowly reaching towards the stone statue, the stone statue also shows its color bit by bit in the light.

""Click"

A crisp sound attracted him. He turned his head and found that there were cracks on the window, and outside the window was the rough sea."What is it?"!"He instinctively wanted to shout, but couldn't make any sound.

"There was a muffled sound, and the window was blown open by the sea water. The black sea water poured into his office wantonly, submerging himself, the stone statue, and his perspective in the dark sea water.

"Didi didi."

The electronic ringing woke him up, and he suddenly woke up and found that he had fallen asleep on the table, and there was no sign of the stone statue on the table.

"Dream?" He was thinking this, and suddenly felt funny. Did he actually have such a dream because he was angry?

He rubbed his face, and when he was about to stand up, he suddenly found something on his legs. When he looked down, there was something there. It was a shell as big as a washbasin. He couldn't believe his eyes, it must be an illusion! He rubbed his eyes and reached out to touch the shell.

It felt! Is it true!?

He tremblingly moved the shell to the table , carefully opened it - it was a corpse, a curled-up corpse, a headless corpse with a fish tail and a human body. There was still a large amount of cyan liquid in the shell, which might be blood, proving that this mermaid had just He died not long ago, and the stone statue was lying peacefully next to the body.

The gods fulfilled his wish, which was undoubtedly a miracle! But what did the gods take from him? He was a little scared, but he was soon given it again Covered by the joy of the corpse.

The stone statue lying next to the corpse seemed to have become completely new.