Chu Yun huddled in the ventilation ducts of his lab in the year 2023, the footsteps of the five-year-old Dr. Lin approaching from below. Moonlight spilled through the grill onto the syringe, the mechanical blue light of the needle tip stinging his eyes. As the juvenile Dr. Lin tiptoed to reach the lab bench, Chu Yun lunged out -
"Ding!"
The syringe was knocked to the floor, the liquid seeping into the cracks of the tiles. The five-year-old child suddenly looked up, his pupils glowing a mechanical blue, "Uncle, you can't ruin what's destined to happen."
The ventilation duct suddenly contracted, squeezing Chu Yun deeper into the duct. Mechanical tentacles protruded from the darkness, with miniature models of the universe hanging from their ends-each with a Chu Yun repeating the choices of the moment.
Chu Yun rips off the tentacle, black blood spurting to form a navigational arrow. Following the guide, he crawls to the abandoned storage room and finds the original embryo of baby girl Xiao Man sealed in a freezer. The incubation pod label reads, Protocol Vulnerability Patch 01.
As his hand presses on the capsule, the entire lab suddenly shakes. Juvenile Dr. Lin's voice came over the radio, "You're the original pathogen!" The freezer suddenly activated and the mechanical claw pierced Chu Yun's shoulder, pinning him to the wall. The embryo suddenly opens its eyes, and its silver pupil shoots out a holographic image - Chu Yun implanted the virus into his genetic chain in the initial reincarnation.
The storage room floor collapses, revealing an underground altar. Magnolia roots entwine the corpse of a woman - the very provider of Chu Yun's genes - with golden scissors stuck in her chest. The young Dr. Lin stepped out of the shadows, the syringe in his hand refilled with liquid, "Mother has been waiting for you for a long time."
Chu Yun ripped off the mechanical claw, and the black blood activated the altar mechanism. The corpse suddenly sat up, its mechanical heart pumping out silver liquid: "My child... You have finally come to take over..." As Chu Yun's light blade pierced the heart, the baby girl embryo suddenly cried out, and the debris from the exploding incubation chamber slashed the cheeks of the infant Dr. Lin.
The laboratory suddenly downgraded into a two-dimensional plane, and all mechanical creations disintegrated into lines. Chu Yun rushes out of the fire with the baby girl in his arms, only to bump into Dr. Lin's main body in the doorway holding up a syringe - the needle is empty.
"You're three seconds late." Dr. Lin's mechanical eye blinked. The baby girl suddenly convulses, omega lines emerging from the back of her neck. The sky cracks open and higher dimensional Magnolia branches droop, swirling away from the mutated baby girl.
The countdown refreshes on the burning lab facade:
Closed-loop protocol 99.9% complete... Abnormal variable intake successful...
Chu Yun knelt amidst the rubble, realizing that he was clutching half a photograph in his palm--
His five-year-old self was planting a tree at the orphanage, and underneath the tree was a smiling Dr. Lin and baby girl Xiao Man.
A mechanical synthesized voice came from the night sky:
"Final seeding will be initiated in 24 hours."
The cries of the mutated baby girl came from the dimensional rift as her body was fusing with the Magnolia branches. Chu Yun picked up the burnt scissors, the blades reflecting a double reflection - the human's left eye shedding tears of blood, and the mechanical right eye pulsing with an icy countdown:
23:59:59