Chapter 682 — The Soul of Shadow

Amber turned to look at Gao Yang as well. After a brief silence and a moment's thought, she turned back to Verodai. "How many such 'embryos' were created in total?"

"One hundred and twenty-six survived to the end," Verodai said. "That was the report I received at the time."

"Then why was the project abandoned?" Gao Yang asked at once. "Did it have some hidden danger?"

What concerned him most now was the reason the project had been abandoned, for it bore directly on whether those "homunculus embryos" carried some latent peril. Amber had already grown up healthy and sound for several decades, but who could guarantee that one day in the future she would not run into trouble?

Verodai's gaze swept between Gao Yang and Amber. After a few seconds of recollection, she said softly, "The homunculi themselves had no hidden danger, if they survived. But the project itself ran into trouble."

"After the experiment entered the embryonic cultivation stage, the entire Shadow Fortress—even the sub-space rift in which the research team was situated—fell into an unstable state. Extra energy flows of unknown origin appeared in the fortress's power circuits. Mysterious, fleeting echoes surfaced frequently in the communications system. The projections of shadow dwellers wandered through the buildings. In the later period, some rooms simply vanished into thin air, and strange extra branches appeared in certain corridors.

"As anomalies spread through the fortress, the project's core personnel began to be plagued by frequent hallucinations and phantom sounds. Many reported hearing the embryos still in their cultivation pods speaking—hearing them converse with one another in a hoarse, rasping noise. Yet none of the monitoring equipment found any evidence of it. And when the project struggled onward to the point where those embryos gradually grew into juveniles, these uncanny phenomena only intensified. The hallucinations of sight and sound began to spread to rooms beyond the central zone. The researchers found it ever harder to tell where reality ended, and the entire Shadow Fortress began to exhibit a state of 'fractured reality.'

"We tried various extraordinary countermeasures, all of which ended in failure. The risk assessment department concluded that the experiments in the Shadow Fortress might already have pried open the 'boundary of domains' beyond the Shadow Realm and the real world. To keep the project from breaching the safety barrier and drawing the gaze of the gods, I had no choice but to order the termination of the entire 'Shadow Project.' The Shadow Fortress was abandoned along with it."

Such was the end of the Shadow Fortress.

Pi Yun looked into Verodai's eyes and asked slowly, "And after that? Those embryos—were they simply left in the fortress?"

"By then the embryos had grown into juveniles, but all were in an inactive state. I ordered them destroyed—before they opened their eyes," Verodai said. "The project was already out of control. Nothing could be left behind. Better that those experimental subjects vanish before gaining a will of their own than that they be born only to face death."

Amber drew a soft breath. "All of them destroyed?" she asked in a low voice.

"All of them. At least, that is what the report I received said."

"But one was actually left behind." Amber fixed her eyes on Verodai and spoke word by word.

Verodai raised her eyebrows slightly, but did not speak. She only met Amber's gaze.

Amber pointed at herself, her tone calm. "I am Homunculus No. 36."

"Ah," Villedieu said softly, though there was little surprise in it. "So that is how it is..."

Gao Yang looked at her. "What do you mean? Could you have known all along...?"

"No, I did not recognize her before," Villedieu shook her head. "But after all the questions you asked, how hard is the truth to guess?"

As she spoke, she studied Amber at length, with a touch of wonder. "So... this is what you are like, once grown."

Amber could not help stepping forward. "Is there nothing else you want to say?"

"In a thousand years, few things have surprised or moved me, and what happened today has finally caught me off guard... I know that is not what you want to hear, but it is my truest thought at this moment," Villedieu answered Amber's gaze without flinching, though in her calm expression there was truly little to see of any surprise or feeling. "I do not know how you survived—perhaps it had something to do with the illusionary phenomenon that shrouded the entire Shadow Fortress at the time—but your survival is a joy to me, and I am glad to see you standing here so healthy."

"Oh? Not regret that you did not destroy me back then?" Amber stared at Villedieu. "Am I not a hidden danger to you?"

Villedieu's reply was utterly calm and composed. "You have grown safely to this day. You are a hidden danger no longer."

Gao Song's gaze shifted between Amber and Villedieu. He had expected Amber's reaction to be fierce, but after a few seconds of silence, she merely shook her head. "Then let it be so."

Her figure gradually faded into the air, and a receding voice drifted softly back. "I am going out to get some air."