Chapter 530 - For Salvation (2/2)

After Jiang Baimian familiarized herself with the buttons, Phocas’s voice sounded from the walkie-talkie. “You can wake the captive up and begin questioning him. I’ll stop him once he uses his abilities.”

Phocas had completely hidden his consciousness. Even if Khal woke up and launched an area-of-effect attack, it wouldn’t affect him because he wasn’t included in the target group.

This didn’t surprise Jiang Baimian. She immediately took out a medical kit from her tactical backpack, attached a new needle, and injected its load into the target’s body.

After waiting for a while, her and Bai Chen’s eyelids suddenly drooped, and their bodies collapsed to the ground.

But in the blink of an eye, Khal—who had pretended not to wake up and secretly used Forced Sleep—fainted again.

Right on the heels of that, intense music sounded in the room, waking Jiang Baimian and Bai Chen from their reverie.

After a few more similar cycles, Khal finally realized that he couldn’t escape for the time being. He couldn’t find the fellow who had made him unconscious and couldn’t use his abilities on him.

“What do you want to ask?” Khal gave up his futile attempts and looked up at Jiang Baimian and Bai Chen.

Jiang Baimian went straight to the point. “Why do you and the organization behind you stop others from investigating the reason for the Old World’s destruction?”

Khal raised his chin and said, “To prevent this world from being destroyed again.”

He had a proud attitude, one with obvious pride.

“What?” Jiang Baimian didn’t expect such an answer.

Bai Chen carefully observed Khal’s microexpressions, wanting to figure out if he was lying.

Khal spoke with an attitude as though they were a bunch of ignoramuses. “An investigation of the cause of the Old World’s destruction will trigger something, causing the world—which has finally recovered from the disaster—to be destroyed again.

“We humans used decades to reduce the effects of the Heartless disease and the environmental pollution bit by bit. With a relatively stable source of food, we established a preliminary order that allows for civilization to continue. How can we destroy it? All of this is still so fragile that it can’t withstand any setbacks.”

“Therefore, you don’t mind killing a large number of innocent people without batting an eyelid?” Jiang Baimian didn’t directly ask what the trigger was and raised a new indirect question.

Khal scoffed. “Most of them aren’t innocent. They are people who ignore the continued existence of human civilization by investigating the cause of the Old World’s destruction for their curiosity or some kind of benefit. The rest can only blame it on their bad luck—they happened to know a secret they shouldn’t know or appear in places they shouldn’t be.

“Compared to the entire Ashlands and human civilization, it doesn’t matter if a few dozen or a few hundred people die. Once disaster strikes again and order disappears once more, how many people will die? When the time comes, humans might not be able to have civilization continue.”

Although she knew that the other party was being unreasonable, Jiang Baimian had to admit that these people had their own beliefs. In a sense, the logic behind their actions was also valid.

Of course, combined with the information provided by Avia, such an explanation might’ve been used to brainwash the captive in front of them. It might not be true.

First City’s former emperor, Oray Ubis, had said: Some people from the Eighth Research Institute might still be alive, but a terrifying development had already happened. They were reduced to traitors that hide in the darkness, people that others needed to be wary of.

At the same time, the Third Research Institute’s former Chief Scientist believed that the fellows from the Eighth Research Institute had caused a disaster.

From his appearance and age, this person was likely born after the Old World was destroyed. He’s not one of the survivors of the Eighth Research Institute, so there’s a high chance that nothing terrifying has happened… He’s more like a hired thug that those people deliberately nurtured… Jiang Baimian fell silent for a few seconds before saying, “What you said is without basis. What can an investigation of the cause of the Old World’s destruction trigger?”

Khal scoffed again. “I had my doubts in the past as well. It was only ten years ago that a group of people made some progress in their investigation of the cause of the Old World’s destruction. They found a city in the north, and that city is a settlement independent of large factions. It has hundreds of thousands of people when including the population in the surrounding area. Many powerhouses control many resources that can be traded.

“In the end, the Heartless disease erupted again overnight. This city was destroyed and reduced to ruins. If not for our containment and the early quarantine, the entire Ashlands would’ve been affected.”

This made Jiang Baimian and Bai Chen subconsciously fall silent. They felt their hearts become heavy, and the air seemed to freeze.

After a while, Bai Chen blurted out, “Are you from the Eighth Research Institute?”

“Yes, I’m a commissioner of the Eighth Research Institute,” Khal admitted frankly. He seemed to be very proud of this identity.

As expected… Jiang Baimian slowly exhaled and directly changed the topic by deliberately asking unconventionally, “I know that before the Old World was destroyed, the various countries jointly established nine secret research institutes. Among them, the Third Research Institute’s focus was in the field of artificial intelligence. The other research institute is Eternals. Then, what is the Eighth Research Institution’s focus?”

Khal fell silent. He deliberated for a moment before saying, “Human Awakening.”