CHAPTER 262: CHAPTER 262: I UNDERSTAND IT’S PSYCHOLOGICAL NOW

Yu Song nodded grimly. "Would’ve succeeded too if he hadn’t made that sound."

Meng Nian ran a hand through his hair. "We beat the shit out of him. But he just kept laughing."

"He said someone told him to do it," Ruihuang added. "Someone watching from above."

Qingran didn’t respond immediately. She stepped past them and looked down at Wei Sheng, now trembling and huddled in the corner like a scared animal.

She turned back to the others.

"Does anyone else know?"

"No.." Meng Nian said. "We kept it inside."

"Keep it that way."

They all stared at her.

"If word spreads through the bunker that one of us snapped and attacked someone, there’ll be panic. People are already sleeping with one eye open. This will break them."

"But what if he tries again?" Yu Song said tightly.

"He won’t.." she said. "He won’t get the chance."

They carried Wei Sheng out and locked him in a small maintenance room two doors down.

It had no windows, no equipment, only a single metal bedframe bolted to the floor.

They left him tied up.

Back in the hallway, Qingran pressed her palm against the wall and exhaled.

"Lingquan.." she whispered.

[Here.]

"...What happened to him?"

A pause.

Then a faint reply.

[I have no idea..]

-_-

She gritted her teeth slightly, he was of no use right now.

Inside the maintenance room, Wei Sheng writhed.

His breath came in sharp, uneven bursts, hands twitching where they were bound. His shoulders knocked into the metal bedframe again and again, a low whimper caught between every ragged sob.

"No... no... don’t make me again," he muttered, head jerking as if resisting an invisible hand. "I didn’t want to—he was right there—please, no more..."

The light above him flickered.

Then he laughed.

It came out of nowhere, a dry, broken laughter that rasped through his cracked lips.

His body trembled with it, like he couldn’t stop. Then just as suddenly, he began crying again, thick sobs muffled as he pressed his face against the mattress.

Something was inside him.

And that wasn’t Boran’s doing.

Not entirely.

Far beneath the surface of that scrambled mind, deeper than the conditioning Boran had embedded, another voice had carved itself in, a whisper with teeth, cold and wet and clinging.

Moli hadn’t resisted the chance when Boran brought Wei Sheng in, limp and open to manipulation.

While Boran had been focused on obedience, on utility, Moli had reached deeper.

She had her own urges to feed. So she layered her own voice beneath the other.

She gave him a taste of blood.

And made him crave it.

What Boran didn’t know was that Wei Sheng was no longer just a tool. He was a vessel now, twisting in torment, gnawed on from both sides, screaming inside himself.

"Thirsty..." he whispered, licking his dry lips. "So thirsty..."

His eyes rolled back. His breath caught.

"Red... the red one tastes better than the rest... I want it, just a sip, just let me—let me have it, just one—just one—!"

His teeth clacked together, hard enough to draw blood from his tongue.

In the hallway, Qingran didn’t flinch as a dull thud echoed from behind the door. Probably him slamming into the wall again.

She leaned back against the opposite wall, arms folded, expression locked in hard suspicion.

Yu Song lingered nearby, nursing the bruises on his knuckles.

"He’s still talking.." he muttered. "Screaming sometimes. Crying like he’s seven. Laughing like he’s lost his mind."

"He has.." Ruihuang said quietly. "Or he’s close to it."

Meng Nian didn’t speak. He just leaned there, tense, his eyes staring past them toward the locked door.

"Qingran.." Xu Tianming rasped, his voice hoarse from earlier.

"We can’t keep him here. Not like that. He’s dangerous."

"I know.." she said, not looking at him.

"Then what do we do?"

Qingran didn’t say anything for a while, she wanted to keep watching him, he was after something and she wanted to know why.

"We’ll keep him locked for now, then have him released in the morning. We can’t risk a panic neither can we let him run loose. I still need to watch him for a while before I decide to kill him.."

A sharp thump came again from the door.

Followed by a broken whisper.

"She’s coming for me..." Wei Sheng said through the crack, voice high and breathless. "She’s got needles... and she wants my tongue... I can’t stop her—I can’t stop—"

Then a loud bang.

Something hit the wall hard.

Xu Tianming took an instinctive step back.

"Don’t listen to him.." Qingran said tightly.

"I understand now that it’s psychological.."

"...What does that mean?" Meng Nian asked.

She didn’t answer.

Instead, she reached up and rubbed her temple.

"Lingquan."

[Still here.]

"Can you read his brainwaves?"

A pause.

[Not clearly. There are many interference and alot of frequencies overlapping.]

She frowned. "Alot?"

[Yes.]

She turned to the men around her. "Its a battle of minds now, Wei Sheng is no longer in his right mind, that’s why he’s calm one second and violent the next.."

She clasped her hands together.

"We can’t get out with his hands tied. So let’s get some sleep and remove from this room by morning before anyone notices."

No one replied to that. They were too exhausted to argue.

Ruihuang gave a curt nod and turned away. Yu Song followed, still muttering under his breath, but he didn’t object.

Meng Nian stayed a second longer, eyes lingering on the door, before sighing and walking off.

That left Qingran standing alone in the corridor, the silence pressing in on her like a weight.

She didn’t move for a long while.

Behind the door, Wei Sheng’s voice had gone quiet.

No more cries. No more laughter. Just the occasional rustle, the kind that made her wonder whether he was still awake... or if something else had taken his place entirely.

When she finally turned away, her footsteps were measured and precise.

There was still work to be done.