Beichen Sword Sect's Headmaster's Secret Records

Chapter 439 Virus
"dong dong dong"

"dong dong dong"

"dong dong dong"

"Stop knocking, stop knocking, who is it..."

A sleepy-eyed, unshaven young man opened the door, wiping his thick-rimmed glasses. He then stared blankly at the man in the black suit blocking the doorway, unable to make out his face at first… Oh, a Black man, well, never mind then…

"Kiryu Kazuya, Assistant Researcher at the BSL-4 Laboratory, Ashihara University."

Kiryu Kazuya swallowed hard.
"Yes, yes... but I've already been gone for a year."

The black man wearing sunglasses, Perlman, had a blank expression.

"Professor Ashiya Kaiyu was your mentor?"

"Yes... oh no, so I mean I've already..."

"Please come with us."

"Wait, wait for whoever you are!"

However, the protests were to no avail. Kiryu and Masashi were simply lifted up by burly men and thrown into a Land Cruiser with black-painted windows downstairs.

"I have a Bachelor of Science degree in Biosafety Engineering and a Master of Science degree in Virology from the Faculty of Medicine at Ashihara University. After graduation, I joined Doctors Without Borders’ Central Africa Ebola Response Team to participate in infectious disease prevention and control work. Later, I returned to Japan to get married and joined the BSL-4 Laboratory at Ashihara University as an assistant researcher."

Specializing in filovirus viral replication mechanisms and host immune responses. Proficient in BSL-4 laboratory procedures, virus isolation and sequencing techniques, and reverse genetics system construction. Has published a research paper on the function of the Ebola virus GP protein in the *Journal of Virology*…

Sandwiched between burly men, opposite him was a white man in a black suit, wearing sunglasses and an earpiece, who was also reading lines from a tablet with a blank expression.

"Are you Confederate agents?"

Kiryu Kazuya swallowed hard, realizing he might be in deep trouble. Sweating profusely, he tried his best to explain.

"I know virology sounds scary, and it is a bit scary, but I'm just a junior researcher. To put it bluntly, I'm just a janitor who does the cleaning and copying data!"

So if Professor Ashiya caused some kind of biohazard virus leak, that really has nothing to do with me! I resigned purely because my wife thought my researcher salary was too low and wanted a divorce!

But the men in black suits ignored his explanations. It was clear that Kiryu and Miyabi were the people they were looking for. So they drove in silence, the Land Cruiser roaring and speeding for about an hour before finally stopping. Then the men in black suits helped Kiryu out of the car.

Kiryu looked around and found that it seemed to be some kind of cave or tunnel. There were heavily armed Confederate military police all around. A sealed negative pressure isolation zone had been set up at the tunnel entrance not far away, with high-efficiency HEPA filters whirring and exhausting air. The changing area was full of orange-red protective suits.

Kiryu and Misaki immediately understood.

"Damn it, you guys really created a biohazard, and now you've sent me to clean up the mess..."

The man in the black suit didn't bother arguing with him. He simply signed the papers with the military police and handed Kiryu over, then drove off to arrest the next unlucky guy.

The military police, expressionless and holding their guns, escorted Kiryu and Masayu to the changing area to get dressed.

Kiryu Kazuya wasn't stupid, of course. He knew that when they set up such a formation, things were probably in serious trouble, and there was no reasoning with them. By all accounts, the Confederation's actions were quite civilized; they even gave him a protective suit. If it were those African warlords, they would have just surrounded the village and started shooting...

So Kiryu sighed and skillfully completed the routine of putting on Level 3 protective gear in the changing area. First, he put on the full-body protective suit, then an N95 mask and goggles, then put on rubber gloves and checked for airtightness, making sure all cuffs were sealed with tape to prevent contact with aerosols of deadly pathogens such as Ebola virus. Finally, under the escort of two military police officers who were also fully armed and wearing protective suits, he entered the contaminated area through multiple chemical showers and ultraviolet disinfection.

This place is probably the Confederate military base in Ashihara. Even Kiryu, an ordinary citizen who doesn't watch the news much, knows that the world situation has been tense recently, with frequent conflicts and terrorist attacks in various places, and more and more people are going crazy.

Considering this place is only an hour's drive from the city, Kiryu naturally understood how explosive the news of a virus leak and biohazard outbreak at a military base would be. The military police around him were definitely authorized to fire.

Kiryu wanted to live to see tomorrow's sun, so naturally he didn't dare to cause trouble. He followed the military police obediently like a quail, passing through multiple security gates, repeatedly going through armed isolation zones, warning zones, chemical showers, and disinfection, until he reached the laboratory on the bottom floor, where he saw the people busy in the laboratory.

"Hey, Heya. Long time no see."

A young man came out, completed the handover, chased away the military police, and greeted them cheerfully.

"...Shuzaburo? What are you doing here? Where's the professor?"

Kiryu was momentarily puzzled. He naturally recognized this classmate, Hidesaburo, from the same school, class, and dormitory—after all, he had helped Hidesaburo write his graduation thesis. This guy was also an Ashiya, but the son of Professor Ashiya, a young master who returned home to inherit the hospital after graduation. Logically speaking, it was impossible for him to be on the front lines wearing protective gear.

Shuzaburo smiled wryly, led Kiryu into the laboratory, and pointed to the orange-red solution being extracted into a biological culture dish by a micropipette inside the negative pressure biosafety cabinet.

"Here it is."

"..."

"I don't know the details, but I know that a major incident happened at the research institute a couple of days ago, and everyone was dead."

As you know, my dad gave me all sorts of titles and honors to make me look good.

As a result, I've become the only remaining virologist in Ashihara now, and there's no escaping it... sigh..."

Kiryu glanced at him sideways.

"You didn't send them to arrest me, did you?"

Shuzaburo pouted.

"Is that possible? If my words carried that much weight, I would have fled the country long ago. Don't even think about it. This project is now being watched by the Confederate Presidential Office. Everyone in Ashihara with relevant experience has been brought in to work. You have real skills, do you really think you can escape?"

Kiryu sighed, watching the video playing repeatedly on the side of him, showing the researchers being silently melted into a bloody swamp of flesh.

"So what exactly is this? Is it really an infectious disease? It can't be Ebola, this thing looks like something out of a horror movie..."

Hidezoku shrugged.

"You're asking me? Who should I ask? But things are relatively stable for now, at least I haven't completely fallen out with my dad yet, have I? Okay, okay, don't worry, for now I'm barely holding onto the title of academician, in charge of on-site management."

As classmates, we won't assign you to collect samples in heavily polluted areas. Just stay in the lab and do data analysis.

"...Thank you."

Kiryu finally breathed a sigh of relief. After all, although the indescribable virus was terrifying, he was already used to working in the laboratory.

Previously, his core work at the BSL-4 laboratory focused on the processing and analysis of highly pathogenic virus samples. This military base, however, seemed to have always been a high-standard laboratory, and now with the Confederacy constantly sending in various equipment and instruments, it was practically a testing center in all its name.

So Kiryu, without needing any instructions, skillfully began his daily routine. Since no one knew what it was, they treated it as a virus: sampling RNA for real-time quantitative PCR, using Ct values ​​to determine viral load changes, obtaining raw data such as viral growth curves and electron micrographs, and instantly uploading all experimental data to the lab's cloud system. He also regularly reported the results of the virus stability experiments he was responsible for…

Hmm... but you know what, it does look a bit like a filovirus...

Although most researchers are currently investigating the possibility of nuclear radiation, Kiryu himself believes, based on his professional experience, that it could very well be a filamentous virus.

Filoviruses belong to the family Filoviridae, order Single-stranded Antisense RNA Viri. They are viruses that infect vertebrates, with the virus particles enclosed in a mantle membrane. As the name suggests, viruses are filamentous in shape, or branched polymorphically, or U-shaped, 6-shaped, or round, with nodular protrusions on the surface, and are scattered within a lipid bilayer membrane.

Filoviruses infect vascular endothelial cells directly through their surface glycoproteins, leading to cell structure damage and functional disorder. Endothelial cell damage increases vascular permeability, causing plasma extravasation, resulting in tissue edema and hypotension.

Viral infection triggers a coagulation cascade, leading to a massive consumption of platelets and coagulation factors, while the fibrinolytic system is overactivated, resulting in widespread bleeding.

Bleeding occurs through multiple mechanisms, including direct damage to the vascular endothelium, activation of the coagulation system, triggering an excessive immune response, and multiple organ failure. These processes are interconnected, ultimately resulting in severe hemorrhagic symptoms and a high mortality rate.

These symptoms are indeed very similar to the situation currently occurring in the base. However, the speed and severity of the hemorrhage in the base are simply too exaggerated. The human body is like a balloon that bursts as soon as it is punctured.

Moreover, the most crucial factor is not just the symptoms, but the virus itself. Through virus-cell colocalization images captured by laser confocal microscopy, Kiryu also discovered residual virus samples in the collected residual samples, although they were no longer 'filamentous' but 'character'-shaped.

Yes, perhaps those professors, doctoral supervisors, and academicians would say he's gone mad, but to Kiryu, this virus is simply like some kind of plague demon, using RNA to write a distorted Chinese character, and it's so distorted, like ancient seal script, a ghostly scribble, that it's really hard to tell the difference.

Kiryu then tried to find these 'words' one by one from the virus samples and then conduct focused culture experiments, but he fell into an even deeper mystery.

Contrary to his assumption, this is clearly not a pure filamentous virus; some of its characteristics are actually similar to those of a retrovirus.

On the one hand, it releases dissolving enzymes like a filovirus, damaging the integrity of the cell membrane, eroding the host's vascular system, and causing the cell membrane structure to collapse.

On the other hand, it is similar to a retrovirus, whose reverse transcriptase component converts viral RNA into DNA, embedding its own coding information into the host cell's DNA, thereby manipulating the cell's life cycle.

This dual invasion allows the virus to break through the traditional single infection mode of viruses, potentially completing a full penetration and invasion of the human circulatory system within hours, or even just minutes in high-concentration conditions.

When a virus invades an organism, its surface proteins bind to specific receptors on vascular endothelial cells, causing the cell membrane to dissolve. At the same time, the reverse transcriptase carried by the virus converts viral RNA into DNA, which is then integrated into the host cell's genome.

This integration not only allows the virus to remain dormant for a long time, but more importantly, it gives the virus the ability to precisely control the metabolic pathways of the host cell. It can even choose to disintegrate and regenerate on its own, and choose to reproduce or die depending on the nutritional status of the surrounding environment.

Yes, judging from the collected samples, this virus can actually decide for itself whether to live or die, almost as if it has some kind of self-awareness.

It may sense changes in temperature, pH, or mechanical pressure through some unknown environmental sensor. When the environment is harsh, it actively modifies the cell's apoptosis program, inducing the host cell to disintegrate under specific conditions.

In biological samples, the connection proteins in vascular endothelial cells are degraded, leading to a sharp increase in vascular permeability. Specific receptors on platelet and blood cell membranes are covered by viral proteins, causing these cells to lose their normal adhesion function. Finally, the virus releases a certain apoptosis-inducing factor, prompting the host cells to actively disintegrate.

However, this collapse state is not simply cell death, but rather a precise deconstruction of biological materials by the virus. Most cellular components remain active, but are temporarily separated from their original organizational framework and converted into energy reserves to reduce losses, ensuring that the core remains in a low-power state similar to hibernation.

Similarly, when a virus detects a nutrient-rich environment suitable for survival, it can trigger the cell's regeneration mechanism and reactivate a certain regeneration gene in the host cell, guiding the free blood cells and plasma components to rearrange.

This process is similar to the self-repair of liquid metal. Platelets form a temporary framework under the guidance of viral signals, and blood cells are attracted to specific locations like magnets, eventually restoring to a complete tissue morphology and forming a semi-fluid liquid polymer.

This is likely because the nutrients in this special solution mostly come from the human body, and it is rich in iron ions, which are used to synthesize hemoglobin and participate in energy synthesis in cellular mitochondria. Therefore, these samples, which are filled with biological cells and tissue fluid, look similar to viscous blood plasma.

But if we say that, could it be that if there is enough nutrition and the environment is suitable enough, could this blood plasma eventually coagulate and be reborn as a human?

That's so unscientific... uh, it actually seems quite scientific...

Of course, all of the above are just Kiryu's guesses, and he doesn't actually have any data to verify his guesses.

Because even Kiryu himself couldn't understand it, a considerable amount of information suddenly appeared in his mind when he was studying those 'words'.

It was as if, while he was staring at the experimental data, some unseen person was whispering in his ear in an inaudible language. They poured in all the principles and answers that other researchers, professors, and experts had pondered and struggled to understand, imprinting them into his mind.

Of course, Kiryu wouldn't question the source of this sudden knowledge or the authenticity of the information.

After all, what's there to question about something you came up with yourself?
This is his own 'conjecture,' the 'spark' of his own thinking.

Making bold hypotheses and carefully verifying them—that's the way researchers do things.

So Kiryu happily immersed himself in the ocean of knowledge, listening to the echoes in his mind, observing the blood-red words under the microscope, and using that self-evident, self-taught, and self-knowledgeable knowledge, he extracted each 'word', cultivated and arranged them together to form an unprecedented, original entity of life.

That's it.

Is this done?
Next, you just need to raise it to adulthood.

That's great, let's come up with a name.

茥.

What character is 茥?

The fruit of the raspberry is small, resembling a small strawberry.

Raspberries? That's a bit of a stretch, isn't it? Oh well, whatever.

I'll call you Xueyu.

(End of this chapter)