Plague Doctor

Chapter 150: Inside of the Scalp

R’lyeh—Gu Jun’s instinct had gleaned that as the name of a location. Currently, that mysterious cult, currently dubbed the ‘R’lyeh Cult’ by Phecda, was led by an old male, the Deep Mountain Shaman. The cult worshipped the stone statue and believed a strong and ancient presence was slumbering somewhere. Gu Jun believed that somewhere was R’lyeh. A few centuries ago, the cult kidnapped many toddlers and babies from Guang Ting City. It was unknown whether they had carried out the same crime at any other locations, and their purpose was still mostly unknown.

Based on known information, one of their purposes was to make use of the children’s ESP to ‘listen to the voice from their dreams’. Over the past two days, the people at Eastern State and the headquarters, the members of the Investigation Department, and Elder Tong had brief discussions about this, coming up with various hypotheses. Could the ‘voice from their dreams’ refer to the calling from R’yleh? Was it some kind of electronic signal? A signal that could only be received by people with ESP and high spirituality in their dreams? Elder Tong was leaning toward this hypothesis because, in the information that was forced into his mind by those children, he swore he could see images of the deep ocean. Assuming R’yleh existed somewhere on Earth and the talk of Great Old Ones was not some cultish mumblings, then...

“R’yleh could be spreading the signals subconsciously,” Elder Tong offered his opinion. “And the signals thus have no purpose.”

If the signals had clear content like scripts for a strong spell or the exact location of R’yleh, then the cult would not have done research on it for so many years. But due to their relentless research, it also meant that the cult had indeed found something that they could work on from the signals that they had ‘heard’.

The R’yleh Cult eventually crossed paths with Lai Sheng Company because the children still failed to satisfy the cult’s requirements, and the cult needed a new breakthrough. And thus, Gu Jun was born from this union, a Spirit Child who was cultivated specifically for this purpose before he was even born. A Spirit Child like Gu Jun was expected to satisfy both Lai Sheng Company’s intention and the R’yleh Cult’s desire to tune into more voices.

“For all we know, they’d already come up with something back then,” Prof Shen said. “There are still too many mysteries surrounding Ah Jun’s childhood. He said that his parents might have hidden some results and taken some documents away with them, and their last voyage was probably to search for this R’yleh.”

But R’yleh was probably not at Longkan Seabelt. Many strange reports had been received about Longkan Seabelt early this year. Passing boats had seen strange lights and so on. Even though the place was in international waters, when Phecda received this news, they could have hurried over to inspect it, but there had been too many such reports all over the world in this past year. It was hard to tell which was real and which was fake. Longkan Seabelt was too far from China and thus was not given much focus by Phecda.

That was how the news travelled to Lee Yuerui’s ears. Looking back, if Lee Yuerui and his friends did not run into Gu Jun, nothing might ever have happened to them. No one knew how the abnormal energy at Longkan Seabelt was triggered, but they guessed it had plenty to do with Gu Jun’s presence. Since then, no reports of anything strange had come from Longkan Seabelt. Phecda had sent a Special Mobile Force unit to investigate, but they had come up with nothing.

Longkan Seabelt was not R’yleh, and the sudden disappearance of the Seagull was still a mystery. But its disappearance probably hampered the cult’s progress. Therefore, the cult went into hibernation for another eleven years until the Nightmare Illness started to surface at Eastern State. R’yleh Cult had surfaced alongside it because they believed the zombies could provide them with another method to hear the voices.

“Zombies can create illusions, summon psychic monsters, and invade people’s dreams. These are the abilities of the zombie cult.” Elder Tong believed from what happened to the Phoenix unit, they could be certain that the R’yleh Cult had some mastery of illusory creation of a certain level as well. Perhaps they were triggered by the children with ESP, but in terms of dream invasion, the R’yleh Cult might be lacking compared to the zombie cult, and that was why they were after the zombies themselves.

This hypothesis was mainly based on the Gu Jun’s team report. Chen Defa had shown clear disdain and derision toward the R’yleh Cult, and Gu Jun directly suspected Ol’ Uncle Dog was forced against his will to stay on the isolated island. Could the hatred shown by Chen Defa originate from the R’yleh Cult’s oppression toward the zombies?

Was the Nightmare Illness created by the zombie cult, or was it because the zombie cult was forced to do so under the order of the R’yleh Cult? Gu Jun and Elder Tong believed it was the latter. The R’yleh Cult was using the Nightmare Illness to suck away the patients’ mental power and use that to awaken the ancient being. However, this was merely a hypothesis, one that was filled with many guesses and suppositions. They lacked concrete evidence.

Other than the Carlot dissecting scissors that Gu Jun ‘found’, the members of the Investigation Department had found nothing else inside the cave. The sweep of the area outside the cave found nothing either. The research into the cave paintings was moving slowly. This meant that everyone moved their hope to the morgue. Perhaps the corpse could provide the breakthrough that they needed. Even though Gu Jun, forensic doctors, and autopsy experts were part of the team... they could not do anything if the zombie was unyielding with the information.

Back inside the morgue, Gu Jun, Uncle Dan, and the rest were focused on dissecting the zombie’s canine face. Its teeth, gums, and lower jaw had confirmed the X-ray result. The mutated bone protrusion was extremely hard. Gu Jun had to use a bone saw and the dissecting scissors before he could make headway into cracking it open. The sound of sawing filled the room. A strange feeling overwhelmed Gu Jun. On the one hand, his mind felt refreshed, but on the other hand, he could sense the chaotic illusions creeping toward him. He could not tell whether the rejuvenation had intensified the feeling of illusions or helped suppressed it. In any case, from his past experience, he had learned to let go and allowed the feelings to wash over him.

When he cut off the zombie’s strange, sharp cuspids, even Wang Ruoxiang felt lightheaded. People with high spirituality appeared to be affected by these mutated teeth.

Before they entered the morgue, the team was briefed that they needed to speak up should they feel anything off, so that was what Wang Ruoxiang did.

“Just focus and don’t think too much of it,” Gu Jun told her, but he knew that this was a sign that they were close to a discovery. This feeling would only occur when they were close to a breakthrough. After who knew how long, they successfully completed the dissection of the zombie’s face. Then they continued to the cranium. Gu Jun was still the one overseeing the operation. He decided their first step would be to saw off the scalp. After the galea aponeurotica and periosteum, the bone saw buzzed again. This was the first time Gu Jun had done a craniotomy, but he showed no sign of hesitation. If anything, this was much easier than the lobotomies that required a much steadier hand. Finally, with a pop, the mutated scalp popped off like a bottle cap!

“Hold this.” Gu Jun handed the scalp over to Cai Zixuan. “Just put it aside for now.”

“Hmm?” Cai Zixuan glanced at the scalp as it was passed over to him, and he gasped in shock. “The inside of this scalp...”

Cai Zixuan showed it to the rest of the group. Gu Jun’s brows creased with a heavy frown, and his eyes squinted in focus.

In the headquarters’ conference room, people like Xiao Huiwen jumped up from their seats. Even Elder Tong, Prof Shen, and the members of the Investigation Team rushed over to witness this strange discovery.

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