Chapter 2107: Quo Laboratories

The laboratory in this town was far larger than the one in Tarron Village.

If that one looked like a small room the size of two conference rooms, this was as big as two basketball courts with that ceiling height.

They forced Plai to sign an oath of cooperation and non-betrayal. The oath he had in the town before apparently had a loophole—his oath was to assist the Lord with the activities and projects he wanted to start.

But if he was ill, what project could he start? Further, Plai wasn’t the one who caused him to be ill; it was Vairoz’s people, exempting him from punishment.

There were a lot of victims inside, so they could not just barge through and attack recklessly. If they used the same model as Tarron Village—that was to say, weakening the subjects first—then the victims were even more vulnerable.

Attacking recklessly would cause a lot of unnecessary deaths and tragedy. Those people had suffered enough.

They decided to sneak Althea in again. Garan was naturally uncomfortable, but he didn’t stop her from doing what she wanted to do.

As for why neither Garan nor Virion was sent out, it was because the two men were too intimidating to be believed to be hostages, and people just had a bias against women, making it easier for Althea to move instead.

While Plai was getting dragged forward, he kept wondering why no one had emerged at all. After all, he had sent a lot of messages to them! Even if they were late, they should’ve at least reacted to his letters! Why did it feel like there had been no movements at all recently?

Being held hostage like this was infuriating, and he wanted to yell their plans to his allies. Unfortunately for him, he couldn’t say anything now that he had made an additional oath.

It was a short-term oath, which ironically allowed for it to be extremely detailed and flawless.

When Plai found out that none of his desperate letters went through, the expression on his face would probably be hilariously dynamic.

Either way, Plai could only cooperate. He looked arrogantly at the guard who opened up the door, showing the blindfolded woman next to him.

He looked at Althea’s form, eyes fiery with vindictiveness. Maybe they could make her suffer!

"Here’s a new elementalist—the triple elementalist one!!" Plai said, grinning. "Treat her well!"

...

The scientists gaped and watched as the new subject entered the room. She was really beautiful!

"I have never handled a dual elementalist before, but now I’m handling a triple elementalist!" one of the scientists—a level 26 human—said excitedly. "Good job capturing such a fine specimen! It’s wasted on a woman, but then again, isn’t that why she was easily captured?"

Plai’s eyes twitched, but the punishment for the oaths was harsh; he dared not reveal any more clues.

The oath would only last one day, which was the shortest duration an oath could last. However, this short duration allowed for very specific instructions and punishments. It could be said that Althea and Garan were also determined to experiment on the limits of this kind of oath.

The requirement was to act completely as an ally within the day, and the punishment for going against the expected behavior pattern could range from losing gold to losing his innate ability.

Don’t look at him appearing to dislike his ability; actually losing it was a matter of losing an appendage—one might dislike the shape of his hand, but they would still live with it rather than cut it off.

It was why he was not planning on sending out clues at all today.

What could happen within a day, anyway?

As for what would happen after the oath expired, he was determined to get his revenge!

At this time, Althea’s head was down, looking like a meek quail, shivering a bit as the blindfold over her eyes was removed and she saw she was surrounded by several men.

Now, Althea’s acting skills were not the best, but it was enough to deal with prideful, misogynistic men.

Plai left them alone, and he went out, this time to guide Garan’s group to another laboratory.

To avoid conflicts and breaking of the status quo, the experiments on humans and half-orcs and the experiment on orcs were in different places.

After all, they were convincing the in-the-know orcs and half-orcs that they were taking things from humans. Seeing orcs get experimented on to enhance humans did not fit in that vision.

Althea studied the bastards. It seemed like the main powerhouses remaining were in the other laboratory, which was somewhat understandable. Those here were a few humans and half-orcs around level 20, with a few assistants below that.

The strongest one was the level 22 half-orc—equivalent to a human with a far higher level—and the level 26 middle-aged scientist.

"Where...where am I?" She asked, asking between gritted teeth. She thought about the things she learned growing up, as well as some advice from Mathilda when encountering situations like this.

To loosen a person’s lips, if not by fear, use his ego.

"I...I was just passing by...can’t you let me go? I swear, I swear I will never go against you! I didn’t see anything, anyway! I’m afraid of pain, good sirs, please let me go!"

This enticed the men’s pleased laughter, loving her current ’weak’ facade, relishing the feeling of others completely dependent on him. "Well, don’t be scared, woman. Think of it as your contribution to humankind."

"But..." she paused, looking at the few humans on the tables as well as half-orcs. The scale here was three to four times that of Tarron village, with two operating rooms that could be used simultaneously.

"What...what are you going to do?" she asked. "My body is weak, my organs is nothing special—"

"Your abilities are special," one of the scientists cut her off. "I’ve always been curious what the cores of multi-elementalists look like."

She pursed her lips. "Can we not do it?" she asked, looking very pretty. Sadly, the scientists had long prioritized the experiments.

Even if some were lustful...they weren’t against doing it after the experiments.

When Althea realized this—judging by some stares she had received—her stomach flopped in disgust. Not only were they open to violating people to the worst degree, but they were also willing to violate their corpses.

Althea, looking listless, appeared to have succumbed to her fate. The guards were prepared to go rough on her, possibly punch her body a few times to make her ’behave’, but because she was cooperative, none of this actually happened.

Some especially-perverted guards even looked disappointed at this development.

Althea allowed herself to be escorted to the hospital bed, her sleeves folded up, as they were about to inject something into her bloodstream.

Althea allowed them, though in reality she was subtly keeping the new liquid in place, preventing them from entering an important organ.

The actions were very subtle, so even if someone was sensitive to aether in the room, they wouldn’t notice it—especially not when there were other elementalists there, with powers erratic due to the experiments.

The scientists knew that Althea was a water elementalist, but their knowledge about elementals was limited. Many of Althea’s techniques certainly went beyond the imagination of many.

She could even manipulate the water blood on her face, making her look paler. "What...what is happening?" she asked, weakly, looking like she was both confused while also succumbing to fate. "Why...are you doing this? Can’t you tell me?"

She needed them to lower their guards as much as possible, all while gaining some insights about the workings of this evil group of people.

The two old men laughed at her, their lips definitely loosening. "Well, poor girl, we’ll tell you." The words "Since you’re going to die anyway" were left unsaid.

By this time, only the three scientists were left behind. The guards went out to guard the entrance again. The scientists abhorred the guards’ presence during the operations. Not only were guards annoying, but they also had a distracting aura. Further, it felt offensive because it meant they did not trust their especially formulated weakness potions.

"As you can see, we’re experimenting on how to create elementalists."

Althea wanted to ask how it was ’creation’ when they were essentially killing a ’working’ one to make a ’lacking’ one.

"You’re lucky," the old scientist said. "I happen to have been part of this venture for a while, so I know quite a bit."

"You see, we started our studies a few years ago in Crystal City. Someone discovered it, and the research started developing in secret.

"I don’t know who the people who discovered it were, but the genius captured a lot of subjects to study, eventually finding a way to extract the cores, keep them working outside the body, and then transfer them to another."

How many people were lost to figure this out was none of their concerns. The pursuit of power was only natural, the scientists believed. There was nothing wrong with what they were doing!