PTYS Chapter 139

Seeing this, Shen Qingqiu frowned. “What should we do? Once the power goes out now, it’s almost impossible for it to come back. But what about your email?”

Xiao Muyu shook her head. “Forget it, we’ll find another way. I just wanted to give that email a try. Even if there’s electricity in the apocalypse, the internet might not hold up. And as for logging into the email, I’m not sure if I can crack the password like I did back in reality.” That’s why she had placed checking the email after finding the target.

However, Xiao Muyu was a bit troubled. “Without electricity, the night will be very troublesome, so we need to find some lighting devices. But for now, let’s not worry about that and see if there is any information that might be insignificant to them but crucial for us.”

After saying this, Xiao Muyu couldn’t help but think about the password. She had looked closely just now, and the password lock hadn’t been damaged. It was a bit dirty, but under the light, she could see many random fingerprints.

This kind of password lock wouldn’t leave wear marks, and since someone had tampered with it before, it was impossible to judge the length or digits of the password from the marks.

In an apocalyptic environment like this, it would be impossible to find the door password without any clues.

“We might still need to find the door’s password,” Xiao Muyu leaned against the desk, scanning the room, deep in thought.

“There’s absolutely no way to figure it out without any hints. Is the system joking?” Zuo Tiantian couldn’t understand.

Xiao Muyu also frowned, but after hearing Zuo Tiantian’s words, a thought suddenly popped into her mind. She muttered, “Yes, if this door is very important, the system would create conditions for us to open it, whether difficult or easy, it wouldn’t leave us completely helpless.

No matter how realistic or complex, it’s still a game. In reality, there are countless possibilities, but in a game, there are only two—find the clues to pass, or fail without finding them. It won’t just leave us staring at it. Let’s search again.”

Sun Qinian was the head of the research institute, and with such a high level of secrecy, he must know the password, or he might even have created it.

If the system is set up for them to open the door, the clues wouldn’t be aimless. Otherwise, the hints in the three-story research institute would be pointless. Therefore, the most likely place to find it would be in Sun Qinian’s office.

“Carefully check Sun Qinian’s office,” Xiao Muyu’s eyes fixed on the office, examining it closely.

Although Sun Qinian’s office was messy, the cabinets and bookshelves behind him were mostly intact.

Zuo Tiantian and Shen Qingqiu had already started searching around. Xiao Muyu’s eyes involuntarily fell on the desk, where several books were casually placed.

There were many books on the desk, mostly professional biology books. However, Xiao Muyu noticed a few that seemed more worn, indicating they had been read more frequently.

Xiao Muyu picked one up and saw it was “The Eighth Day of Genesis.” She had heard of it but never read it in detail.

She quickly glanced through the table of contents. The book was divided into three sections with ten chapters, from the first chapter “He was an extraordinary man, unprecedented and unparalleled,” to the tenth chapter “I discovered the second secret of life.”

It covered three indispensable aspects of genetics: DNA, RNA, and protein structure and function.

At first glance, you might think it’s a serious biological science book, but in fact, it detailed the history of biological development, listing many famous biologists and significant research. It was odd that someone as accomplished as Sun Qinian would still be reading a biological history book published more than a decade ago.

Xiao Muyu flipped through the book, noticing that the part about proteins had obvious reading marks, just in the chapter on proteins. Flipping through, she saw various prominent biologists in the protein field, many of whom were unheard of.

Meanwhile, Shen Qingqiu and Zuo Tiantian discovered something. On the left wall of Sun Qinian’s office was a small whiteboard. The writing had been erased, but faintly visible at the top were the words “The Code of Life” written in marker.

“Muyu,” Shen Qingqiu suddenly called out to Xiao Muyu.

Just as Shen Qingqiu reached out to touch the whiteboard, those words triggered something in her mind. The whiteboard was oddly installed, with protruding edges that seemed unreasonable.

She felt around the edges and discovered a slot behind the whiteboard, which allowed it to be lifted.

Once lifted, there was nothing special behind it, just a picture. Anyone with basic biological knowledge would recognize it as a DNA sequence transcribing into messenger RNA and then synthesizing a polypeptide chain.

Xiao Muyu walked over with the book, staring intently at the whiteboard.

Zuo Tiantian, not having studied biology in depth, was puzzled.

However, she recognized the DNA fragments. The DNA strands were separating, with one strand pairing to form another single strand.

At the paired sections, red circles highlighted the bases, showing letters on both strands. Zuo Tiantian noticed the DNA fragments had four letters: A, T, C, G, which paired with U, A, G, C in RNA—A pairs with U, T pairs with U, G pairs with C, C pairs with G.

On the right side, there was a table listing codons, sets of three uppercase letters corresponding to amino acids. For example, GCG, GCA for alanine; UGC, UGA for cysteine; GAC, GAU for aspartic acid; UUC for phenylalanine; CGA for arginine; GGA for glycine; AUG for methionine (start codon); UAG for stop.

After much effort, Zuo Tiantian grasped the concept but was still confused.

However, Shen Qingqiu and Xiao Muyu were very familiar with this—the basics of genetic expression in biology, transcription, and translation.

The table on the right was called the codon table in biology, showing which codon corresponded to which amino acid.

With this table, given a DNA base sequence (composed of ATCG), one could determine the RNA sequence and which amino acids could be synthesized.

Xiao Muyu’s mind was swirling with information from the book, the whiteboard, the picture, and the letters, “the code of life,” all coalescing into a chaotic mess in her brain.

Gradually, Xiao Muyu’s eyes became more focused, with the scattered information slowly settling in her mind.

Shen Qingqiu could see that Xiao Muyu had figured something out, as a fascinated, dazzling light shone in her eyes.

After calling her, Shen Qingqiu said nothing more, just focused on Xiao Muyu, her affection unmistakable.

“Qingqiu, Xiao Zuo, quickly look for his books, notebooks, papers, anything. See if you can find a DNA sequence,” Xiao Muyu instructed while rapidly flipping through the book.

Every page was filled with complex content, clean with no marks. After flipping through again, she found nothing.

“Congratulations on entering the Noru Biopharmaceutical Research Institute. The system has detected that player Xiao Muyu’s team has successfully activated this exploration mission.

A friendly reminder from the system: You have ten minutes. If you do not enter the secret room within ten minutes, all information will be destroyed, and the danger will be unpredictable!”

“Heh, it seems Muyu, you were right. You’re about to solve it, so it’s getting impatient,” Shen Qingqiu remarked while quickly flipping through the book.

The three of them searched but found no useful information. Xiao Muyu grew anxious. “No, no, besides the DNA sequence, there must be a password book. The password is numbers, not amino acids. Something’s missing.”

“What connection could amino acids have with numbers?” Shen Qingqiu pondered while searching, her eyes falling on the book in Xiao Muyu’s hand.

“Muyu, why did you choose this book?”

Xiao Muyu paused, looking at the book. “Because it has been read often. And as a leading figure in biology, I couldn’t understand why he’d read such a basic biology book.”

She couldn’t help but flip through it again. As she closed the book, she noticed the table of contents again and the title of the tenth chapter.

She quickly checked the page number and turned to the chapter’s title. Page 384 was unremarkable, with no relevant content about amino acids or proteins.

On page 386, she found the names of the amino acids depicted in the picture on the right, and on the far left, she saw three numbers, 1, 2, 3, lightly penciled in, starting from the second paragraph.

“There are numbers here, but what do they mean? Line numbers?”

Xiao Muyu muttered to herself when Shen Qingqiu spoke again, “Muyu, there are two pieces of paper here.”

Shen Qingqiu had found two sheets of paper wedged between the desk and cabinet. Smiling, she handed over one with a series of letters written in red pen.

Zuo Tiantian eagerly looked at it: CGT, TAC, CGC, ACG, CCT, GCT, CCT, ATC, TAC;

“Should we use the pairing principles from the picture to write out the corresponding RNA sequence?” Zuo Tiantian asked excitedly.

Shen Qingqiu nodded. “Yes.”

Zuo Tiantian quickly matched each one to the picture, but still seemed puzzled. “Captain Xiao, that’s alanine, methionine, alanine, cysteine, glycine, arginine. This is the stop codon, so we don’t need the glycine that follows, right?”

Xiao Muyu nodded at the second point, “Methionine is the initiation codon, meaning it’s the signal to start synthesizing the peptide chain. The preceding alanine needs to be removed.”

After saying this, she began flipping through the book in her hand, looking at each page one by one. “Now I think the amino acids should correspond to the lines on this page. According to this code, alanine is on line 4, methionine on line 6… arginine on line 13. Following this sequence, the password is 628913.”

As soon as she finished speaking, Xiao Muyu quickly checked the time; there were only 2 minutes and 21 seconds left. Shen Qingqiu glanced at another piece of paper in her hand, her expression darkening slightly, and she temporarily put it away.

The three hurried upstairs. Xiao Muyu took a deep breath, raised her hand and pressed the code: 628913. There was a beep, but the password was incorrect.

Xiao Muyu’s face changed, and Zuo Tiantian also became anxious. At this moment, Shen Qingqiu stood behind Xiao Muyu and placed her hand on hers, speaking gently and calmly, “Try entering it backwards.”

Xiao Muyu hesitated for a moment, took a deep breath, and entered the code backwards. The green light above lit up, followed by a clattering sound as the heavy door in front of them slowly opened, revealing the hidden world beyond.

The corridor inside was covered with notices, each one containing detailed and stringent warnings, indicating the high danger level of the research conducted here.

“No wonder they bought so many protective suits and biosafety cabinets; they were originally kept here,” Shen Qingqiu said with a furrowed brow.

“For biological virus research of this level, it has to be a standalone building. Here, maintaining negative pressure and strict air filtration is necessary. They are really bold,” Xiao Muyu said hesitantly. Logically, everything should have been evacuated, and the viruses should not remain inside.

But better safe than sorry. She couldn’t help but think of the half-zombie she had encountered earlier, making her even more nervous.

“Quickly change into protective suits. Remember not to touch anything here. This is a buffer zone, so it should be safe. Afterward, go directly to the disinfection room in your clothes and take a shower before leaving.”

After the three changed their clothes, they didn’t rush into the inner area where there was another layer of doors that they couldn’t open.

Between the buffer zone and the normal rest area, they found a large room with a password at the entrance. Xiao Muyu tried the same code as the main door.

Upon entering, the four beds at the entrance immediately caught their attention. Each bed was equipped with restraints on hands and feet, clearly not ordinary beds, indicating their purpose at a glance.

In the back, there were four cabinets labeled A, B, C, and D. Xiao Muyu and the others exchanged glances and immediately thought of the identifier ‘B’ on the zombie’s body. The cabinets were also locked with a password, a four-digit number.

“9527,” Xiao Muyu whispered softly. Shen Qingqiu adjusted it accordingly, and with a click, the cabinet opened.

Inside was a thick logbook, documenting the daily conditions of a subject identified as ‘B9527’. Initially, this ‘9527’ had a name, Chu Ping, with entries like “April 16th, Subject 9527 Chu Ping.”

“Injection dose 5 ml. Subject’s mental state good today, temperature 36.3°C, blood pressure 114/79, basal metabolic rate…”

“At first, these seem to be normal experiments, with the subject’s signature.” Zuo Tiantian looked at it, feeling indescribable, because from April 20th onwards, the records began to show issues. Chu Ping began experiencing abnormal brain discharges, severe dehydration, temperature recorded up to 39.2°C, and declining blood pressure, worsening as time went on.

One page noted on April 23rd, with the records now written in pen by someone new.

“We can’t control it anymore. B9527 has become bloodthirsty, nails growing rapidly, consciousness zombie-like, severe dehydration and loss of skin elasticity. Our experiment has failed! Cancer cells were killed, but people can’t survive this.”

Author’s note: The biological transcription and translation in this chapter do not strictly follow scientific principles. The sequence of experiments has been rearranged in translation, which might confuse non-science readers. Let’s consider it a direct translation; technical terms are from Baidu.