Lin Ye crawled swiftly through the ventilation ducts. Although the orderlies didn't conduct random headcounts of patients, they did register each patient's number when they left the activity room, so he had to return to the activity room before lunch began.

'Activity room... corridor... medication room... ward...'

Lin Ye quickly reached the vicinity of the wards. Turning left from the wards led to the cafeteria, while turning right led to an unknown area. That morning, the orderlies had likely pushed the nursing beds into the corridor on the right.

'If all those people are dead, that area might be where they dispose of corpses. If some kind of experiment is being conducted here, that's probably the experimental zone.'

Lin Ye moved in that direction. After passing through several ventilation ducts, a strange passage suddenly appeared ahead.

That passage was covered in thick red fuzz, and the fuzz was constantly wriggling.

'What is this? Some kind of protective measure? Or some type of mold that grew from long-term lack of cleaning?'

Lin Ye hesitated for a moment, but ultimately decided not to approach the strange passage.

'Forget it, I'll go check the medication room first. I can come back here later.'

Lin Ye turned back and crawled toward the medication room. If possible, he wanted to take some medications from there for backup.

The source of those medications also concerned him. If they came from outside, they might be able to escape through the medication supply channel. If they originated from this mental hospital, he wanted to examine the drug formulas—that might help him understand what was happening in that world.

Lin Ye quickly reached the area above the medication room. Through the ventilation grate, he could clearly observe the interior layout.

'No orderlies, just two nurses. The capsules are in boxes, not much stock—they probably deliver the day's medications daily...'

The screws on the ventilation grate were already loose. Lin Ye could open it with his bare hands. The two nurses weren't particularly robust, and he was confident he could knock them out before they made any noise.

But Lin Ye didn't do this.

Going down now would only get him a small amount of medication. If medications went missing, the asylum would definitely conduct thorough inspections of the activity room and investigate who stole the drugs. At that point, the secret passage would certainly be exposed, and they would definitely be caught.

"This batch of materials has good quality—more than half actually lasted until the second day."

The older nurse suddenly spoke.

"Indeed, none of these people are ordinary. Except for those fools who only got the blue powder, the others have already started forming teams to exchange medications."

The younger nurse replied.

"It's useless. The effects of the blue powder will gradually weaken. They'll eventually be discovered by those monsters, and then they'll become new materials."

The older nurse made a gleeful sound.

"Sis, what exactly are we producing here? I've never seen those monsters. You've been to the testing area—can you tell me about it?"

The younger nurse suddenly asked in a low voice.

"If you don't want to become material yourself, you'd better not ask about such things... I haven't been to the testing area, I've only received medications in the buffer zone."

The older nurse glared at the younger nurse and said.

"Understood, I was just curious about what's inside."

The younger nurse quickly replied.

Seeing that the nurses below had stopped talking, Lin Ye found his direction and crawled toward an unknown area. If Lin Ye wasn't mistaken, that should be the buffer zone the nurse mentioned.

This was probably another route to the testing area. The ward side supplied 'materials' to the testing area, while this side supplied medications to the medication room.

Soon Lin Ye found the buffer zone. The buffer zone was an empty area, with decontamination passages connected on both sides. Different from the ward side, the ventilation ducts here were sealed shut and couldn't proceed further.

The final ventilation grate was above the buffer zone. Lin Ye lay on the grate observing the situation below—orderlies were patrolling both inside and outside the buffer zone.

After observing the buffer zone's structure, Lin Ye retraced his route, quickly crawling back to the secret passage in the activity room. With Jessica and Caroline's help, he slipped into the activity room while the orderlies weren't paying attention.

Lin Ye made almost no sound. The orderlies indeed didn't notice Lin Ye, but some patients noticed their movements.

Those patients gathered around the trio, wanting to check the secret passage that Jessica was blocking with her body.

"Is there a passage there? He wasn't here before—I've been watching you all along!"

Patient 14 excitedly tried to push Jessica aside to check the secret passage.

Smack!

Jessica directly slapped away Patient 14's right hand, then delivered a heavy punch to his abdomen.

Patient 14 fell to the ground, clutching his stomach and dry heaving, almost vomiting up his breakfast.

Seeing Jessica take action, the other surrounding patients also prepared to fight. One patient even pulled out a sharp spoon from his clothes and waved it around.

"Do you want the orderlies to know about this secret passage too?"

Lin Ye didn't want to fight here. After all, the secret passage was right behind them. Even if they won the fight, those patients wouldn't let it go, and there might even be patients who would report them to the orderlies.

"What do you want to do?"

The surrounding patients stopped advancing, and one of them spoke up.

"I just came out from inside. I can tell you what's in there. If you don't believe me, you can go in and see for yourselves. Our goal is the same—to leave this damned place. There's no need for conflict."

Although Lin Ye didn't want more teammates, they couldn't monopolize the secret passage now and had to share it with the other patients.

"Fine, but you'd better not lie to us."

The patients exchanged glances and finally agreed to Lin Ye's proposal.

"The secret passage connects to the ventilation duct system here. The structure inside is very complex. You can go take a look, but it's better not to go too far, and don't think about escaping the activity room through the passage. That won't get you out—it will only expose the passage's location."

Lin Ye moved aside from the secret passage entrance with Jessica and Caroline, distancing themselves from those patients.

"Why give them the secret passage?"

Jessica frowned and asked.

"Even if you beat them all up, you can't monopolize the secret passage. They'll just think you're hoarding the only exit, so it's better to let them see for themselves."

Lin Ye understood clearly what would happen if they tried to keep the passage to themselves.

"What if they mess around in the secret passage and expose its location?"

Caroline worriedly glanced at those patients.

"Then that proves they're useless teammates who can't be utilized, and we won't need to negotiate with them. If they can suppress their urge to escape, then we might consider adding them to the escape plan."

Lin Ye replied.

"Escape plan?"

Jessica didn't remember them having such a plan.

"I just thought of it. The entire plan isn't complete yet due to lack of necessary information."

Lin Ye looked at the patient who had just emerged from the secret passage and said with a smile.