Mobile Shelter

Chapter 58 The Source of the Mutation

After several more battles, Dong Qi and his men finally got their shift change.

At this point, not to mention the members of the investigation team who had already experienced many battles, even Dong Qi, a substitute who joined later and had only participated in a few battles, was exhausted.

Because everyone was quite tired, they didn't care much about formalities and all scrambled into Dong Qi's car, heading towards the dormitory area under Dong Hao's direction.

Since most of the investigation team members present had arrived in Dong Qi's personal car, they immediately noticed the anomaly when they re-entered the back of the vehicle.

The carriage, which was very cramped when they first arrived, became surprisingly spacious when they re-entered this time.

However, they weren't exactly busybodies, so even though they noticed the anomaly, they didn't immediately ask Dong Qi anything.

The dormitory area was not far from the coastal battlefield. In fact, the so-called dormitory was just a simple house made from a shipping container. Apart from a few bunk beds, there was no other furniture inside.

Before Dong Qi could even get out of the car, Dong Hao had already rushed into the dormitory and then took out an oversized military backpack.

Seeing the tautness of the shoulder straps when Dong Hao lifted his backpack, Dong Qi knew that it contained a considerable amount of supplies.

After all the other members of the investigation team in the back of the vehicle had disembarked, Dong Qi opened his backpack to check the supplies inside.

The backpack contained mostly standard individual rations, along with some canned fruit and canned meat.

The supplies in the backpack, even before the natural disaster, would have cost a considerable amount of money to buy, let alone now.

Not to mention that at this time, the value of these supplies has increased several times over.

Judging from the supplies the other party provided, it was clear that Captain Gao hadn't tricked him into coming here as cannon fodder; he genuinely cared about him.

After Dong Qi finished checking the supplies in his backpack and zipped it up again, Dong Hao asked with a curious expression:

"Could you share what happened to you after we parted ways? It looks like your car has undergone quite a few modifications."

Compared to the brief introduction last time, since there were only two of them, Dong Qi told Dong Hao in detail about his experiences during this period.

After listening to Dong Qi's story, Dong Hao was at a loss for words.

To be honest, after hearing Dong Qi's story, Dong Hao's desire to become an Awakened became even stronger.

Although I had met Awakened Ones before, I only had a general understanding of their situation, so while I wanted to awaken and gain superpowers, I wasn't in a great hurry.

But after listening to Dong Qi's experience, this longing reached its peak instantly.

At this moment, Dong Hao also recalled that when they first set off from Pengcheng, Captain Gao had a private chat with him and Dong Hao.

The research institute here is trying to analyze the physical forms of those mutated marine creatures to determine the cause of their mutations, and then conduct experiments using prisoners in the prison to try to develop an awakening potion that can grant superpowers after consumption.

And most importantly, before we arrived, Captain Gao had already mentioned that the research institute seemed to have found clues about the mutations of those marine creatures and was now trying to replicate them.

Although the specific source of the mutation has not yet been determined, attempts are being made to see if a similar approach can be used to induce mutations in terrestrial organisms.

If the experiment is successful, then the experiment will skip the primate experiments and proceed directly to the experiments on prisoners in the prison.

Because of the simultaneous failure of electrical equipment some time ago, many people thought that social order had collapsed and the imperial court had lost control over various regions, and many ambitious people couldn't help but jump out.

But those people never expected the imperial court to react so quickly. Even though they had awakened and gained superpowers, they had no ability to resist the court's suppression.

Although weapons of mass destruction are temporarily unavailable, firearms and most individual weapons remain unaffected.

Furthermore, although those people awakened and gained superpowers, in a short period of time, most of them could only reach the level of being able to defeat ten people, or at most a hundred.

Even if they fought back desperately against the encirclement and suppression by regular troops, they could only cause some casualties to the encircling troops, and the final result would not change much.

This is why prisons are now full of prisoners, including all kinds of people, from ordinary citizens to awakened individuals.

This is why prisoners are now frequently used as guinea pigs in experiments.

After all, during this special period, stability is of paramount importance to the imperial court.

And those newly arrested prisoners are all sources of instability.

Furthermore, at this time, food has become a very valuable commodity.

Therefore, the research institute quickly found the final destination of the newly captured prisoners.

In fact, much of the knowledge about the human body that modern people know was acquired through a rather inhumane process.

For example, the fact that the human body is 70% water was obtained and verified by many lives.

The weight of the soul in a romantic confession between lovers is also the result of countless lives being spent to arrive at the specific number of 21 grams.

It was thanks to the "selfless dedication" of so many prisoners that the research institute made great progress in studying the mutations of those marine organisms.

The current general conclusion is that the mutations in those marine organisms were caused by excessive radiation in the seawater, which absorbed extraterrestrial viruses brought by meteorites, resulting in mutations in the marine organisms.

More specific mutation conditions cannot be verified at present due to limitations of the equipment.

However, after reaching this conclusion, the top officials of the court first confirmed one thing: that not only would near-shore organisms mutate, but deep-sea organisms would also mutate.

More importantly, given this situation, not only would isolated islands in the ocean be unable to withstand the frequent invasions of large numbers of mutated marine life for long, but most coastal areas as well would likely not be able to hold out for long.

According to studies of the ocean conducted by various countries before the natural disaster, the number of organisms living in the ocean far exceeds the number of organisms living on land.

Furthermore, the fertility rate and survival rate of offspring of most marine organisms far exceed those of terrestrial organisms.

So even though it seems easy to defend against the invasion of those mutated marine creatures now, it will inevitably fall after a while unless domestic industry fully recovers.

Only when domestic industry has fully recovered will there be a possibility of retaking the coastal areas.