Chapter 286 Labs
Making her way to where the base should be, she would look down on her scanner to make sure that she was on the right track.
One she was around 100 meters away from the base, she put the scanner away and grinned.
"Welp, time to do this." She muttered.
Threading nanobots through the ground, she dug out small cavities so that she wouldn't reappear in the middle of the earth and suffocate. Plus, she didn't want to see what would happen should there be no spaces for her to reappear in.
Rotating between using rift walker and nanobots, she was able to steadily approach the base without anyone noticing above ground.
'Hm… it should be just in front of me now.' She thought to herself and made a small drone with her nanobots.
She couldn't just appear using rift walker since it may trigger a few alarms and that was not what she wanted. This was supposed to be an assassination and reconnaissance after all.
Putting on a pair of glasses so that she could see what the drone sees, she found that she was just behind one of the offices and that there was a scientist performing some surgery on a child's body.
'Tch.' Clicking her tongue, she narrowed her eyes dangerously.
'Since he's in the middle of a surgery, that means that he should be in the middle of his shift. The time I need to search through the base for the research volume is to- wait a moment. Can't I just disguise his death as a violent combustion of nanobots?' Shiro widened her eyes in realisation.
While there were plenty of subjects who died due to the nanobots consuming them, the scientists weren't spared either. There were situations where the nanobots would expand and consume everything around them, thus killing the scientists.
This wasn't exactly a rare situation either since nanobots are highly volatile if not under control.
'Plus, if I was to disguise several deaths under a nanobot explosion, I should put the blame on bad research and push their experiments back by a few days.'
In addition to this, she could also use this moment to bring the children away and remove the nanobots from inside them. That way, they'll be able to live their life without the threat of being consumed.
Finalising her plans, she phased into the room and grabbed the scientist's head.
"Wah!"
Before he could even react, a violent surge of nanobots was injected into his body, shredding through everything in its path while Shiro made sure that he felt everything and more.
"GA-MNNNNNNN!!!!!"
His scream was cut off short when nanobots exploded out from his throat and started to wrap around his head.
Looking over at the young boy who laid motionlessly on the table with his eyes open, Shiro shook her head in pity.
"Do you want to live?" She asked as he looked over.
Tears started to flow out as he shook his head.
"It hurts… It hurts a lot… make it end please…" He squeezed out weakly.
Feeling a pang of heartbreak, Shiro stroked his hair gently. As he is in a similar situation to her, she understood how difficult it was for him to hold on to his life.
"Don't worry. I'll make the pain end and you'll feel much better ok? Don't give up on life." Shiro smiled softly and placed her hand over his chest.
Closing her eyes, she commanded her nanobots to override the ones in his body.
"Sss!!" Feeling the pain of having foreign nanobots flow into her body while being converted, Shiro gritted her teeth and focused on exerting her control over them.
"ARG!!!" The boy cried out in pain. The feeling of having nanobots extracted from him was akin to pulling out his veins.
"Resist! It's almost over. Once I get these out of you, I can heal you for good." Shiro encouraged.
Honestly, she had underestimated how volatile the nanobots were. It was a miracle that the boy could even respond while feeling the pain of having his insides chewed by the nanobots.
Increasing her pace, she quickly extracted all of the nanobots in his body and coated him with her Life Fire.
For the first time in a long time, the boy was finally able to be relieved from the pain and even feel a comfortable warmth from the fire.
Carrying the boy in her hands, she looked over at the twitching corpse of the scientists and frowned.
'I let him off too easily…' She thought before stomping down with her foot.
Allowing her nanobots to run berserk, she quickly phased out of the room and made her way to the surface. She couldn't possibly carry around a boy while trying to assassinate them now could she?
*BOOM!!!!!
Just as she had left the room, the nanobots exploded out and started to spread throughout the base. Alarms were triggered as scientists paused in shock before running away from the nanobots. They had to wait for reinforcements so that they could carry out procedures.
While they were trying to run away, Shiro had already arrived back at the surface with the boy.
"How are you feeling now?" Shiro asked with a smile.
"Mn, I don't feel pain anymore." The boy responded slowly while looking down at his hands.
Pinching his skin to make sure that this was real, he started to wipe away at his eyes so that he wouldn't show Shiro that he's crying.
"That's good. I want you to hide here for a while. I'll be trying to save some other kids so you behave yourself ok?" She asked while setting up a small formation in the nearby bushes for him.
Nodding his head obediently, the boy did as he was told.
Giving him a small wave, Shiro flickered towards the base while glancing at her system screen.
[Nanobot Enhancement 1%]
'So it turns out that absorbing his volatile nanobots had actually enhanced mine.' She thought to herself in surprise.
{Perhaps this trial focuses on enhancing the quality of which you're lacking?} Nimue suggested.
'Maybe… After all, in terms of development and evolution, my Nanomancer Class hasn't changed at all. It stayed the same.' Shiro nodded her head at the plausibility of the situation.
'If that's the case, then it's highly likely that the rest of the girls and Chen Yu would have received the same trial then don't you think?'
{Perhaps. Though I consider your situation a little more… special? Especially since your class is manmade. Plus, we're reliving your memories in a way so that's also something to think about.}
'True…'
Shaking her head slightly, she decided that she'll ask them later when she leaves the trial. But right now, she has children to save and scientists to kill.
Making herself a pair of glasses, she could see her swarm of berserk nanobots making their way through the base. Naturally, she had set it to only attack members of staff.
That way, she could avoid having the nanobots accidentally harm the children or consume any doc.u.ments that she may need.
Using Rift Walker to flicker through the base, she absorbed as many nanobots as she could while healing the test subjects.
/p>
Repeating this process, she was able to save 60 of them before the reinforcements had arrived and started to control the situation.
During this, she had made sure to look at all the doc.u.ments in the room.
While she didn't find the full copies of the volumes, she was able to find fragments.
In the end, she had found 5 out of 10 fragments for volume 1 and 3 out of 10 fragments for volume 2. As for 3 and 4, she didn't find anything for that unfortunately.
Narrowing her eyes, Shiro wondered if she should set up some more detonation points so that they would be distracted for longer. That way, she could save more subjects while keeping an eye out for the volume fragments.
However, she decided against that since it would be too suspicious. She had already saved 60 subjects and didn't want to push her luck too much.
Bringing the last subject she had collected back to the surface, she had everyone move quietly and quickly.
By the time they arrived back at the city, it was almost nightfall.
Handing the guards all of their crystals, Shiro led them towards her house. She hadn't gotten any signs of the defence crystals breaking so she wasn't too worried.
Sending them down the elevator in small groups, she kept an eye on her status board.
In a single day, she had enhanced her Nanobots by 53%. If she was to continue this pace, tomorrow, she should be able to fully upgrade her nanobots.
Thinking about the possibilities, Shiro smiled in anticipation.