booktalesy Chapter 281 It Feels Like a Heartbeat
Chapter 281 It Feels Like a Heartbeat
As radiation continuously enters the body.
Lin Fan did not feel any discomfort at all; on the contrary, he felt as if he were eating or drinking.
No, it should be a feeling that's even more comfortable than eating or drinking.
He remained in his transformed form, standing in the center of the collapsed underground space, opening his mouth and beginning to inhale the surrounding radioactive particles.
This radiation is a deadly poison to the ecosystem around the nuclear power plant, but for him, it is a real energy boost.
Under the continuous influence of radiation, a faint blue luster began to appear on the surface of his scales.
Unlike the eerie blue light on that mountain of flesh just now.
The blue light emanating from him was purer, more refined, and more understated.
At the same time, the calamity power within him became even more active with the replenishment of radiation energy.
He could feel his power growing.
Although the increase is not large, it is indeed growing.
This is like how others eat to replenish their physical strength, while he eats radiation to replenish his combat power.
"Tsk, this feeling is really irresistible."
He absorbed the radiation as he moved toward reactor number two.
Ignoring all obstacles in his path, Lin Fan continued along the ruins.
Even when faced with insurmountable obstacles, he only needs to raise his tail, turn around, and sweep it to break through the ruins and rubble blocking his path.
After walking about two hundred meters, a huge sealed door appeared ahead.
The sign on the door reads:
Reactor No. 2 – Access is restricted to authorized personnel only.
Whether it was damaged by the previous mountain of flesh or something else, the sealed door was now half open and half closed.
Lin Fan was too lazy to open the door and just barged in headfirst.
In an instant, a huge, wide corridor, large enough for vehicles to drive on, appeared before him.
Although he is now quite large, he can still barely pass through this corridor.
As he walked through the enormous corridor, he noticed that the temperature around him began to rise as he went deeper.
As he passed through the corridor, the outer shell of reactor number two came into view.
However, the reactor's outer shell was now covered with a dense layer of black tissue.
Of course, now that the mountain of flesh is dead, these tissues have also died, but their hardened remains are still stuck in the pipes, preventing the cooling water from passing through.
Lin Fan glanced at the temperature indicator on the reactor shell.
The numbers have risen to the edge of the danger zone.
He stepped forward, raised his claws, and began to pull out the pieces of dead tissue clogging the pipes.
It's quite ironic, actually.
A person who has transformed into a monster works as a plumber at a nuclear power plant.
After working for about ten minutes, he had cleared most of the blockage in the main cooling circuit.
The cooling water started flowing again, making a gurgling sound.
The temperature gauge on the reactor casing began to slowly decrease.
Lin Fan looked at the number and a smile appeared on his lips.
Although he was not afraid of a nuclear explosion, Raccoon City was less than 300 kilometers away.
If it really explodes, the people over there won't be able to withstand it.
After fixing the pipes, he stood next to the reactor and continued to absorb the leaking radiation from the surrounding area.
After all this turmoil, the amount of radiation leaked from this nuclear power plant is quite considerable.
After all, this place isn't too far from Raccoon City, so we really can't just detonate and absorb it directly.
At this moment, he is a mobile radiation recycling station.
About twenty minutes later, the surrounding radiation concentration dropped to normal levels.
Lin Fan's body has accumulated a lot of energy again.
Seeing that the surrounding radiation had returned to normal, he slowly reverted to his transformed state.
"ha--"
He burped, then found a talkie and tried to make a call.
"Major Miller."
There was a moment of silence on the intercom, followed by Miller's slightly trembling voice.
"Mr. Lin... Mr. Lin Fan?"
"Um."
"You're still alive?"
"To live."
"That...that creature..."
"He's dead."
Upon hearing his answer, there was silence on the communicator.
Several seconds passed before Miller's voice came through:
"Our thermal imaging equipment detected a giant heat source signal inside the nuclear power plant twelve minutes ago."
"The height exceeds fifteen meters."
"Is that you?"
Lin Fan thought for a moment about how to answer the question.
I guess so.
With this answer, Lin Fan clearly heard whispers from the other soldiers on Miller's side.
"You don't need to explain."
After a long pause, Miller's voice came again, "I just want to know, is the nuclear power plant safe?"
"The reactor temperature is dropping, and the cooling circuit is back in operation. I've dealt with the radiation leak; you can send someone over to conduct follow-up inspections."
"You dealt with the radiation leak? How did you handle it?"
"I ate it." Lin Fan simply didn't hide it.
He felt that hiding it was pointless, and he needed these people anyway.
Or rather, they still need this nuclear power plant.
This was also a problem he had just thought of. After all, Raccoon City was still relying on diesel generators for electricity. What if he could restore the nuclear power plant to normal operation...?
However, this is a real problem for the US in its current situation.
But Lin Fan felt it shouldn't be a problem.
However, upon hearing him say that, the other end of the intercom went completely silent.
Lin Fan didn't intend to explain further and continued, "What's the situation on your end? About the broadcast interference earlier—"
Miller's voice has recovered somewhat:
"Two soldiers were affected, but they were subdued and there were no casualties."
"After the broadcast stopped, they resumed it. They said they had no recollection of what they had done."
"Okay, that's good. I'll come find you later."
Lin Fan turned off the communicator and was about to leave when he suddenly remembered something.
Helen.
The woman who claimed to be a control room engineer.
Her voice never mingled with the voice of the Mountain of Flesh.
Those manipulative broadcasts... little girls, women, men, old people, even imitating his own voice, all came from the mental interference of the Mountain of Flesh.
But when Helen's voice came through, the information was specific and accurate.
She said she had closed some of the valves, and Lin Fan confirmed this while cleaning the pipes; indeed, several valves had been manually closed.
She said the cooling circuit was blocked by biological tissue, and the facts proved her right.
In other words, this Helen is very likely a real survivor.
If you want this nuclear power plant to resume production, you definitely need people like this.
He briefly recalled what the other person had said; it seemed she had said she was on the second basement floor of the administration building.
Lin Fan looked around and found a map of a nuclear power plant.
The administration building is located on the west side of the nuclear power plant, about 400 meters from his current location.
He memorized the map and then headed west without hesitation.
The environment along the way was much better than when we came.
After the Mountain of Flesh died, all the black tissues attached to the walls and pipes withered and fell off, turning into gray, dry shells that crunched when stepped on.
After walking for about five minutes, he arrived at the entrance of the administration building.
The door was locked.
But there was a combination lock on the door, and a note was stuck next to it.
The note had a string of numbers scrawled in English, followed by a sentence:
"If you are alive, please come in."
Lin Fan glanced at the string of numbers.
Then I looked at the few inconspicuous thin lines on the door frame.
"This female engineer is quite meticulous."
He stepped back, not rushing to enter the password, but knocking on the door instead.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
There was a long silence inside the door.
Then a hoarse female voice rang out.
Just like what I heard on the radio.
"Who are you?"
"A passing plumber."
"...What?"
"I just unclogged your drains and thought I'd drop by for a follow-up visit."
There was silence for a few more seconds inside the door.
Then came an uncertain voice.
"You are... the young man who spoke earlier??"
"If you're talking about someone else, then it's probably me."
"Great, you're finally here."
"Alright, then open the door."
"Answer me one question first."
"you say."
"Is that thing blocking the cooling system really dead?"
"He's really dead."
Upon hearing his reply, a long sigh came from inside the door, followed by the click of the combination lock.
The next moment, the door opened.
A blonde woman stood inside the door.
He was in his early thirties, wearing white overalls from a nuclear power plant, looking exhausted, with noticeable dark circles under his eyes.
She held a wrench in her left hand and a grenade with the pin pulled in her right.
After seeing Lin Fan, she stared at him for three seconds.
Then put the pin back on the grenade.
"You...you really killed that monster?"
Do you think I would need to lie to you?
Upon hearing Lin Fan's admission again, Helen could no longer support herself and leaned against the door frame, her legs buckling and almost slipping down.
Lin Fan caught her.
"How long have you been here?"
"Three days," Helen said, "from the first day that thing started spreading."
There were originally seven people in the control room. I was the only one who wasn't infected.
She looked up at Lin Fan, her eyes red-rimmed, but she didn't cry.
"The other six... I watched their bodies split open with my own eyes."
"The things that crawled out of there called my name in their voices."
Lin Fan remained silent.
Helen took a deep breath and pulled a USB flash drive from her pocket.
"This is all the monitoring records and system logs after the nuclear power plant accident."
"Including how that thing came to be."
Lin Fan took the USB drive.
"Did it come from the reactor?"
"No," Helen shook her head, "it came from underground. The reactor accident was a chain reaction that followed."
"The night it burrowed into the ground, seismometers on the third underground level of the nuclear power plant recorded an unusual tremor."
"Focal depth: zero."
Lin Fan frowned. "Zero?"
"Yes. It wasn't an earthquake. Something created a passage directly from inside the earth's crust."
She looked at Lin Fan.
"During our previous conversation, I realized it was just a separate entity; I can't even imagine how terrifying its true form must be..."
Lin Fan didn't respond to that, but instead put the USB drive in his pocket, intending to take it back later for someone to study.
However, at that moment, the intercom on the wall of the room suddenly rang.
It was Miller's voice, but this time it carried a distinct tension.
"Mr. Lin Fan, are you there? There's been a situation outside."
"What's wrong?"
"There's something glowing in the direction of the cooling tower."
Before Lin Fan could say anything, Helen stumbled over to a surveillance camera and pulled up footage from somewhere outside...
The next moment, on the monitor screen, the top of a towering cooling tower was emitting a pale blue light.
Although the light was not strong, it was very noticeable in the darkness.
And that light...
It is flashing rhythmically.
It's like a heartbeat.