Kaidan Game Train: Abide Rule or Die!
Chapter 1152: Unearthly Affairs of the Special Defense Department

Chapter 1152: Chapter 1152: Unearthly Affairs of the Special Defense Department

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Yan Jiayu and the Stone Lion caught up, and Da Mao, who had been slacking off, received a blow to the rear that immediately directed all his anger toward the player he was pursuing. With snarling bites and tearing claws, the Player was forced to retreat step by step.

"Use the vase’s function!" The pursuing Player threw a mat on the ground, and Da Mao, in his rush, slipped on it, getting one of his paws stuck to the floor.

However, this was of little use, as the Stone Lion simply dug a hole in the ground. It didn’t matter if it couldn’t free itself from the mat; it could just carry the floor along as it ran.

Da Mao was struggling to cope, and Xu Huo, along with Yan Jiayu, were not faring much better. Yan Jiayu fought in close quarters, while Xu Huo, when not using props for support, would unexpectedly launch an attack as well. After three minutes of combat, both sides had sustained injuries.

*

The beating came so swiftly that the young man realized he might lose his life if he didn’t speak up. He rapidly disclosed several room numbers – in several buildings, including the one where Xu Family lived.

Xu Huo knocked the man out cold and left him by the landscaping near the building’s entrance, then proceeded to do the same and brought down five others from the nearby buildings. Uprooting these people unearthed more information, and soon, they locked down three more individuals. This time it was a bit more troublesome, but it didn’t take too long.

In total, nine people were lined up and given injections one by one.

"This is a muscle relaxant used by the Special Defense Department. I’ve heard it’s quite effective, so I got a few to try out. You’re the first group of testers."

"If you’re going to kill us, just do it. If we are suffering an unmerited failure, it’s our bad luck!" spat one of the injured Players bitterly: "Such is fate! But the Special Defense Department won’t get away with their atrocities forever—they will face retribution someday!"

"What exactly has the Special Defense Department done?" Xu Huo fetched a stool and sat down. "Tell me, I’m curious. What excuse do you have for harming ordinary people without any scruples?"

Although their facial muscles had become sluggish due to the drug, their attitudes showed not the slightest remorse. The same Player who had spoken earlier even said, "Those are imbeciles brainwashed by the Special Defense Department. Whatever the Special Defense Department says is absolute truth to them. They obey the Special Defense Department, which doesn’t even treat them as human beings, and instead turn to denounce us, the clear-minded ones. Don’t such people deserve to die?"

Xu Huo’s eyebrows lowered. "Get to the point."

The drug was beginning to take effect, and the man’s tongue was not very cooperative. However, since the dosage was not high, he could still speak incoherently: "Don’t you know? When checking the identities of residents in the safe zones, the Special Defense Department collected blood samples. They have the technology to detect which individuals have a higher chance of successfully evolving. Those selected by the Department are initially coaxed to try evolving; if they consent, all is well. But for those with high potential who refuse... the Department secretly forces them to undergo the transformation!"

"You are a Player, don’t you understand the risks of evolution?"

"Not everyone can successfully evolve. Those who naturally evolved at the start of the game had the highest success rates. As for those undertaking evolution using Evolver’s Blood later on, it’s uncertain if even half could succeed. Many don’t even get the chance to be on the preliminary selection train; they regress during the initial stages of evolution. Some unsuitable for evolution might swiftly fall ill and die, or even turn into Aliens! When they die, not even their bodies can be found!"

Xu Huo fell silent, "Is there tangible evidence?"

"My smartphone..." The man’s eyeballs glanced downward.

Using a thread of kite string, Xu Huo fetched the smartphone from his pocket and found a video that had been frantically recorded—it was of a woman.

"Big brother... I might be dying..." She was scratching her skin while speaking: "Many times, I’m not quite lucid... Just now, I took advantage of the researcher’s inattention to steal his phone..."

"...I didn’t choose to evolve willingly... There are many others here against their will... Don’t ever trust the words of the Special Defense Department... The success rate of evolution after injecting Evolver’s Blood is very low... Every day, I can see many dead bodies... I’ve also turned into this inhuman, ghostly figure..."

"...Little sister must be thinking of becoming a Player... Don’t let her sign up..."

"I’ll probably never see you again... I have so much regret... I shouldn’t have drunk that cup of tea... When I tasted it, it felt wrong..."

At the end of the video, the person’s expressions became disorderly, her gaze gradually empty, with the final shot showing her biting the phone until it shattered.

Xu Huo remained silent, well aware that since the beginning of the universal Player transformation, the Special Defense Department and the government had deliberately obscured something—that the rate of evolution failure was never disclosed, nor was the public led to believe that those who didn’t return from it were simply unsuitable for the preliminary selection.

This was actually not hard to comprehend. To expedite the process of Player transformation, sacrifices were to be made. If the failure rates had been publicized initially, far fewer ordinary people would have volunteered for it, something evident from the contrasting scenarios he observed in his previous and recent returns. In the past visit, there were many people queueing outside institutions like the Special Defense Department to sign up; now, there were almost none.

It could be due to two reasons: either most of the courageous volunteers had already signed up, or people had begun to recognize the risks of evolution. Even without knowing the actual failure rates, the absence of Players who didn’t return from the process must have started to make sense to the populace.

But Xu Huo believed that currently, Country X’s Player count should be the highest in Zone 014, having recruited a sufficient number of Players. Whether selection and forced evolution proceeded as suggested remained to be corroborated.

"From her last words, you deduce that the Special Defense Department tampered with her?" He looked back at the man.

"Not just from this single video!" the man exclaimed, "There are those who succeeded in evolving and later claimed their mutation was triggered under strange circumstances, recalling consuming something with an unusual flavor..."

Xu Huo raised his hand to interrupt him, "If the Special Defense Department needs to use such tactics to increase the Player population, direct injection would be simpler. Tampering with food and drink is time-consuming and labor-intensive, yet the Special Defense Department has enough people to carry out such tasks stealthily, without alerting suspicion."

"Would they dare?" The man seemed to have considered this earlier, and sneered bitterly: "How could ordinary people control Players while risking handing the Players such incriminating evidence?"

"Moreover, if Players realized the Special Defense Department held such disregard for human life, would they continue to loyally serve them? Everyone has family; no one can be sure when their own loved ones might become targets of the Special Defense Department!"

"Such arguments alone aren’t enough to convince me," Xu Huo said. "Country X already has a surplus of Players, so many that it would be impossible to manage and control them for a long time. According to you, is the Special Defense Department seeking to further destabilize their own foundation by manipulating lives with such vile methods?"

The situation in Country X had already reached a point where the Special Defense Department had to engage in combat with civilian Players to determine who held the power of speech. The Special Defense Department