From the moment she walked out of the nanoinjection operating room until now, including the frantic data search and hunt for the target, ten minutes had already ticked by—time was running short.
As a department head, leaving a mere farm manager cooling his heels in the operating room while you handle urgent business hardly counts as a scandal. I mean, it’s just DiCaprio—lock him up on the surgical table, and let him stew until you’re in the mood to let him out. That’s how it goes in most places, right?
But this isn’t most places. This is Tiberius Laboratory.
According to the info Jill Young just dug up, twenty minutes after the nanoinjection, the control center immediately starts calibrating the visual monitoring signal. Whether the farm manager opens his eyes or not, the calibration runs on its own frequency—no human intervention needed. The smart system handles everything, so there’s no "Oops, I forgot" or "I’ll update later, too busy right now" kind of slacking off.
If the smart system can’t tune the signal, or just can’t find a new source, it’ll slap a yellow alert up on the central control screen. Then, two supervisors will show up right away to check the nanoinjection with Angelina. And if they open the door and see the original Angelina locked to the operating table in her underwear, that yellow alert instantly flips to red.
Maybe the tech here doesn’t look all that flashy, but it’s silent thunder—black as midnight, you can’t see your own hand. Near-total surveillance and a 24/7 hyper-alert smart system make Jill Young’s stealth ops a major headache.
Thinking fast, Jill knows she’s got to move quick but not tip off the cameras. So, weaving through the multi-level, wide-open lab, she can’t just sprint like a superhero—she has to take the elevator like a regular person. Even when every second drags by waiting for the lift, she has to keep her cool, not fidget like she’s going through menopause.
Oh, wait, actually, menopause is fine—Angelina’s real age is pretty close anyway. Besides, sometimes life just forces you to hit menopause early.
For example, when Jill finally gets the elevator, feeling that drop in her stomach as it speeds down, she can’t help but breathe a sigh of relief. The elevator here is fast—at last, she’s on the express route from B1 to B7 (they count the floors in reverse here). But as soon as she’s gone one floor, the elevator slows! Ding—the doors open, and there’s a bored-looking guy with glasses, jabbing the down button over and over, the beeping getting on everyone’s nerves.
Jill’s eyes go wide, and the guy’s finger freezes mid-air, hovering over the button.
At a time when every second counts, this guy’s still making things worse! Forget stealth missions—I’d lose it if I ran into this on my way to work. Jill’s face twisted into a fierce scowl: "Which floor you going to?"
The glasses guy stammered, "F-f-five..."
If it was the same floor, fine. But five? Who has time to waste a few more seconds on the fifth floor!
"Take the stairs!" Before he could finish, Jill slammed the elevator door shut—more menopausal than menopause itself. She really earned her nickname ‘Old Menopause’ this time.
Beep—Angelina’s suspiciousness rating ticked up a tiny bit in the smart system, but nowhere near alert level.
By now, Jill Young had reached B7. As the doors opened, Supervisor Jill marched forward—striding like a boss, lab coat flapping with wind and thunder, daring anyone to block her way. Everyone she passed instinctively stepped aside; Jill was unstoppable.
Beep—ten minutes and thirty-three seconds, Supervisor Jill swiped herself into the R&D department.
Clack—ten minutes and thirty-four seconds, her heels hit the big R&D office floor. In less than a tenth of a second, she scanned the massive room—her target wasn’t here. So, at ten minutes thirty-five seconds, Jill, wild-eyed and ready to pick a fight, barked, "Where’s James? Get him here! Now—three seconds or less!"
Her voice boomed, shaking the whole office. Everyone looked up, then quickly looked down, not daring to meet the gaze of Jill the Inspector. She was infamous, and nobody wanted to mess with her.
But there’s always someone who’ll "step up"—and waste even more precious time.
"Supervisor Angelina," a researcher stepped up, adjusting his glasses and squaring his shoulders. This was the R&D department, not Angelina’s private playground. As a member of R&D, he had to remind the newcomer who really held power here! He put on a tough face: "You barging in and shouting—is it because..."
"Classified. No comment!" Jill’s sharp gaze shut him up instantly. She wasn’t here for small talk—just find the old guy, pronto!
These underground researchers were all tech nerds, and even this office-bound glasses guy was no exception. Jill’s glare melted his bravado in a flash. He shrank back, but seeing all his colleagues sneak glances, he felt too awkward to back down.
Just then, the tech nerd cocked his head, as if listening to something. Jill’s ears also twitched—she caught a voice in his earpiece. It was Supervisor Spear from the tech department. Clearly, Jill’s outburst had gotten the boss’s attention.
"James is useless, and that crazy woman’s a pain. If she wants James, let her have him—no need to stick your neck out for that old waste."
Looks like the old priest’s situation in the tech department is pretty bleak—which is perfect! If the Zade Family treated him like royalty, he’d be harder to flip. The more down-and-out he is, the more rebellious he’ll be, and the easier it’ll be to hypnotize him with the Nine Yin Soul Technique and get him to spill secrets.
"Got it." The tech nerd nodded, now much more respectful to Supervisor Jill. "James is in Zone B12. I’ll go get him."
"Zone B12?" After her frantic research earlier, Jill now understood the Tiberius Lab layout. The core was the office area, where all admin departments gathered. The "petals" spreading out were the real research frontiers—the actual labs.
Zone B12 was pretty far—a trip by underground rail. Jill did a quick time check and her heart sank. If she waited for the old priest to come, she’d be out of time. Thinking fast, she decided, "No need. You take me to B12 to find him."
"But Zone B12 still..."
"Doesn’t matter. I want to see him—now! Three seconds, tops!"
"O-okay... I get it..."
The ninth underground level of the core zone was the lab’s main transit hub—like a luxury subway station, with a sprawling, complex network. A capsule-shaped rail car, about as long as a stretch Lincoln, slid out and accelerated along a milky-white tunnel.
The capsule car was super smooth, its streamlined design cutting down air resistance—felt almost like a top-tier sightseeing ride. Sitting inside, Jill Young finally felt herself calm down.
Time might run out—but so what?
Honestly, she never expected to get out smoothly anyway.
After thinking through all of Tiberius’s surveillance, Jill felt lucky. Good thing the nano-visual monitoring system wasn’t everywhere yet—otherwise, sneaking in would be impossible. Well, except for the girl beside her, who’s practically a quantum ghost. Making it this far, swapping places with Angelina, and actually getting a clue—felt like divine intervention.
She’d been worrying about that "twenty minutes" like seeing a green light up ahead and rushing to beat it. But if time was always too tight, no point overthinking—sometimes you just have to adapt and improvise.
Whoosh—the capsule car stopped, and with a hiss, the doors slid open to a platform-like area.
"Supervisor Angelina, this is Zone B12." The tech nerd instinctively pinched his nose, dodging away. "I-I won’t go in. James is inside, you’ll find him right away. I’m leaving."
"Mm." Fine, go—there were more capsule cars parked anyway, and Jill already knew how to use them. She strode off confidently.
"Ms. Angelina," the tech nerd added before the doors shut, "the test results are fine, but you really should get out of here fast. Nobody knows what kind of stuff they’re researching in there..." Before Jill could respond, he zoomed off, like he was fleeing a monster.
Huh? Jill didn’t look back, but she understood.
"Earlier, Angelina mentioned something about a ‘leak in Zone Twelve’—guess she meant here." With nobody else around, Dream finally spoke up. Her eyes glowed as she scanned the area, then confirmed, "There’s a lot of yin energy here."
"A biotech lab that doesn’t care about human life? Of course there’s yin energy." Jill led the way. "Let’s go. Even if we can’t get everything, we’ve got to find James Cameron before the twenty minutes are up."