CHAPTER 234: CHAPTER 234: THE BLOODLINE SECRET

The atmosphere inside the mansion within the bangle’s space was heavy, as if the walls themselves were waiting to hear the rest of Leng Pan and Lu Zhen’s story.

Everyone sat quietly, still reeling from the revelation of the storage dimension, but curiosity gnawed at them more than shock.

Leng Pan glanced at Lu Zhen, who gave a slight nod. She drew a long breath and continued, her voice calm but deliberate.

"Now that we are done with the secret of this place, it’s time to share what we found in that abandoned town Lu Tao found about." Leng Pan started.

Uncle Li Han frowned. "The town where you disappeared for nearly two days?"

"Yes," Lu Zhen replied. His tone was steady, but his dark eyes carried a weight that made everyone shift uncomfortably.

"That place is like a ghost town....no, not even a ghost town because I don’t think a ghost can be found there.

That town seemed to have been deliberately abandoned. In fact, swept clean to make it look like no human ever lived there."

"If not for the intact and collapsed buildings, destroyed roads and other amenities that are still running to date like water and electricity, we would have thought that was some unexplored land." Leng clasped her hands together and explained.

Gasps echoed around the sofas. Auntie Li’s hand went to her mouth. "Emptied? By who?"

"We don’t know that. We were hoping to get answers from Mom or uncle." Lu Zhen had a spirited attitude when he said this.

Leng Pan looked at this husband of hers who seemed to suffer from low EQ when it mattered and added, "We don’t know who. But the signs were clear. The buildings were intact, save for those that had collapsed due to being smashed by the falling meteorites.

There were no traces of a struggle. Instead, the streets were... clean. Too clean. Not clean as being swept but clean as in nothing suspicious could be seen.

As if something or someone had swept through and erased all signs of normal life."

Li Yunjia hugged her knees, suddenly feeling cold despite the warmth of what she believed to be air conditioning. "So... not zombies? Was it humans?" She asked in a whisper.

Lu Zhen’s expression darkened. " We are not sure what it was. But it should have happened decades ago so the current zombies couldn’t have done it.

When we discovered an underground lab that still had water running and electricity, we were surprised.

We encountered an evolved zombie but it was obvious that it had been produced in the lab. We had to join forces to take it down, so you can imagine how strong it was."

"Let me show you something else. Let’s go to the next room and you will see for yourselves." Leng Pan said as she got up and led the group to the conference room.

Leng Pan stood, walking toward the wide space at the center of the conference room. A pod made of transparent material like glass came into view of everyone.

The figure lying inside was visible to everyone.

Everyone immediately froze.

Inside the pod was a humanoid creature, its body slightly too long, its joints bent at wrong angles.

Pale bluish skin stretched tightly over thin muscle. Its eyelids were closed, but faint pulsations glimmered beneath the surface of its veins, like bioluminescence trapped under skin.

But even with all these flaws, the creature had an attractive face and even its body mostly resembled a human.

Auntie Li, the most timid among the family members, gave a strangled cry. "That...that thing.....what is it?"

Leng Pan rested her hand lightly against the pod. "This is what we found in the town. It was hidden in an underground facility, preserved in a stasis chamber. We only managed to bring one back because moving more would have been stupid and dangerous."

Li Han leaned forward, his voice low. "It’s not human."

Leng Pan nearly rolled her eyes when she heard that but then remembered that this was an elder and her uncle. She could not be disrespectful.

Taking a deep breath, she let her husband answer that.

"No," Lu Zhen agreed. "But it isn’t completely alien either. Its structure... there are similarities to us humans. Too many to ignore."

The family stood in stunned silence. The only sound was the faint sound coming from the pod’s systems, still alive after who knew how many years.

Leng Pan studied their expressions. "We’re telling you this because we need answers. Uncle Li, Mother, does this look familiar to you?"

Leng Pan didn’t know if her mother-in-law or uncle-in-law knew about their family’s involvement in that lab, but they were the best candidates to provide the answers they needed.

For a long moment, no one spoke. Then Lu Zhen’s mother, who had been quiet since they entered the space slowly exhaled.

Her voice trembled slightly as she said, "I... have seen something like this before."

Everyone turned to her in shock.

"When I was a girl, maybe twelve or thirteen, your grandfather took me on a trip to the old capital," she said, her eyes distant as if pulling memories from a fog.

"We stayed in the government quarter for a few days, and one night I got lost wandering the inner halls. I stumbled into a restricted wing, inside an office and I remember seeing... printed papers with images that resembled this thing.

Actually, not exactly like this. They were more monster-like shapes in glass tubes. That the memory still haunts me."

Lu Zhen’s jaw tightened. "Government experiments?"

"Maybe," she whispered. "But when my father found me, he was furious. He swore I had imagined it. Later, I began to think I truly had. Until now."

Leng Pan’s heart pounded. Pieces of the puzzle were aligning in ways she didn’t like. She turned to Uncle Li. "What about you, Uncle ? Do you recognize this?"

The old man’s brow was furrowed so tightly it seemed carved into stone. Finally, he said,