Millennium Witch.

Chapter 60 - 60 - Erosion of Seeds

After binding Hewlett tightly with her tentacle-like hair, Yvette did not kill him. Instead, she quickly left the highway and flew to a desolate suburban area.

She wasn't sure if Hewlett had any backup plans, or if staying too long would attract the armed forces of the Lintui Creatures, so she decided to find another place to question him.

After loosening the hair that was blocking his mouth, Yvette sighed inwardly at the thought that the guy might have smeared his saliva on her hair. She decided to go back and cut off the excess hair before saying, "Answer my question."

"Why...why should I answer your question? Can you guarantee you won't kill me?" Hewlett asked, his face pale, but he still stubbornly asked.

“I can guarantee you won’t be tortured before you die,” Yvette said. “Is that reason enough?”

"Um... can you really spare my life? I can assure you I know nothing..." Hewlett gave a fawning smile.

Yvette didn't speak; her puppet-like face was expressionless, but the meaning she conveyed was clear—you've seen my secret, and you still want to live? How could you have such a dream?

After thinking for a moment, she said, "I can give you the opportunity to leave your last words so you can send them to your family."

Hewlett's smile froze for a moment.

Yvette's lips curled into a slight smile. As an advisor to Lintui Biotechnology and a professor at Agathe University, she could retrieve much of Hewlett's information through hacking, which gave her a lot of room to exploit. She said, "I think you don't want to die without being able to leave a single word for your parents, wife, and children, do you? Your mother is probably looking forward to you sending her a goodnight message tonight, and your wife and daughter are waiting for you to come home this weekend and spend a wonderful weekend with them."

Hewlett fell silent. He wasn't an invincible man without any ties; on the contrary, like most 35-year-olds, he had many weaknesses, many of which were far more terrifying than death. Especially when his daughter was mentioned, although the other person didn't say much, it didn't stop him from thinking: if he didn't cooperate, would his daughter be harmed or retaliated against by the witch? So, in a deafening silence, after a long while, he finally seemed to make a decision, exhaling deeply and whispering, "Despicable witch... what do you want to know?"

“All the information you know about ‘Zero’ and ‘Number One’,” Yvette said.

“Well… if that’s the case, I don’t know enough about it either.” Hewlett shook his head. “All I know is that last year, an informant from Black Tower Pharmaceuticals passed on intelligence to the company. The information said that two highly classified experimental subjects escaped from Black Tower Pharmaceuticals’ Abyss Base. The codenames of the two experimental subjects were ‘Zero’ and ‘One’. And in terms of appearance, they should be a silver-haired girl and a blonde girl… around eight or nine years old.”

As he spoke, Hewlett glanced at Yvette: "Although you look a bit older, you do look extremely similar to that silver-haired little girl, almost exactly what she looks like when she grew up... Oh, by the way, according to the company's investigation over the past two years, the past identities of those two test subjects have also been confirmed. One of them is called 'Yvette Loshivia,' and the other is called 'Liana Renee.' Before becoming test subjects, they were both orphans from a welfare home sponsored by the Black Tower."

He paused, then said helplessly, "Now you know why I was so sure you were Zero right away, right? Even if it's a fake identity, your alias... the change was a bit too lazy..."

Yvette immediately fell into deep thought.

If Hewlett didn't intend to lie before he died, it would mean that "Zero" was definitively the original owner of this body, which was her. But she wasn't very familiar with Liana Renee. In her first dream long ago, she hadn't spent much time with the other genetically ill orphans from the Metamorphosis Project, only knowing that there seemed to be such a little girl.

The original owner and Liana were Zero and Number One, respectively, with an extremely high level of secrecy, clearly due to the "Immortality Project"...

She then asked, "Why do you say that I am not using human methods?"

"This is just a conjecture... Miss Zero, please allow me to address you this way. Do you know 'Erosion Seed'? Of course, this is a code name circulating within Lintui Biotechnology; perhaps it has another name at Black Tower Pharmaceuticals..."

Seed erosion?
Hearing this strange new word, Yvette was slightly taken aback, and another term immediately popped into her mind.

—Divine transformation!
A divine transformation that may be related to the origins of the apocalypse!

“Go on,” Yvette said noncommittally.

"The 'Erosion Seed' is a code name that came from who-knows-where. We know nothing about it. It might be a living thing, an inanimate object, a concept, or a relic... But many scholars within the company believe it truly exists. It might represent a technological legacy from outer space or a prehistoric civilization. The company obtained its theoretical support from this, which is why it entrusted us with the practical application..."

"Initially, all of this was just speculation, even a joke. But later, we heard similar rumors circulating within Black Tower Pharmaceuticals, and our academic circle began to truly believe it, to believe that Black Tower and Lin Tui were special, that our new technology did not come from research and development, but from some special acquisition, or even inheritance..."

“And you, Miss Zero,” Hewlett said, “you and Number One, as escaped experimental subjects, are under extremely high secrecy within the Black Tower. You must be related to an important and powerful new technology, or even to that elusive ‘Erosion Seed.’ This is why the company is paying extra attention to you, hoping to obtain the Black Tower’s secrets from you.”

"As for myself, the reason I didn't report directly to the company and chose to come to you secretly, besides wanting to take all the credit, was also because I had a selfish motive. I hoped to get an answer from you, an answer that everyone in my academic circle was waiting for..."

"Miss Zero, before I die, can you tell me—does the 'Erosion Seed,' or a similar technological source, truly exist?"

After giving Hewlett a positive answer, Yvette saw a complex shift in emotions on Hewlett's face, and finally he let out a sigh of relief, as if he had finally achieved some kind of satisfaction.

After he tearfully sent voice messages to his parents, wife, and children, saying goodnight, Yvette ended his life, using earth magic to make a simple little box.

He will send this small urn to his wife anonymously in the future, which was one of his dying requests.

Standing on a large rock in the suburban wilderness, Yvette's gaze fell on the city center of Agash in the distance. The veil of night could not cover this neon-lit city, and dazzling holographic advertisements soared into the sky, as if to show off its prosperity to the whole universe.

She recalled the seeker's gaze Hewlett had given her earlier and guessed that there was something he hadn't said: "Was the Origin Civilization really created by their own hands?"
Is the original civilization merely a child standing on the shoulders of giants, yet still complacent about its own height?
This is a difficult question to answer. Fortunately, I am just a time traveler. Whether I am or not, it will not shake my inner pride...

Yvette thought to herself, and then immediately thought of the remaining six companies: Black Tide Company, Spirit Vine Company, Gravity Group, Ember Scar Chemical, Sky Dome Technology, and Rift Group.

The Black Tower has a "divine transformation," and the Qilin's transformation has a "seed-eating" process. This may be the core reason why these two super companies chose to pursue pharmaceutical and biological businesses.

What about the other six mega-companies?

Is their technology related to something similar?
Or is it a mixed bag, with both normal and abnormal elements?

Regardless, tonight's gains have been quite substantial. The werewolf killer problem has been solved, and the mystery surrounding the original owner's identity has been unraveled...

Thinking of this, Yvette suddenly remembered something and felt a pang of regret.

She had previously used Hewlett's magical terminal to hack away at much of her own information. While this didn't prevent the Scaled Creatures from noticing her, it bought her a lot of time.

then……

She forgot to ask Hewlett for money.

She originally intended to extort money; even if it wasn't a hundred million, getting twenty or thirty million to spend shouldn't have been a problem. But when Hewlett called her family to say goodnight, the scene was a bit sentimental, and she felt embarrassed to do such a thing. Later, during her execution, she was in a rather solemn mood and completely forgot about it.

Fortunately, some equipment dropped: a military terminal with 10 rune points, a semi-liquid bio-engineered suit, and some bio-prosthetic bodies fused with the body.

Among them, biological prosthetics are out of the question. These are roughly part of the body, have genetic locks, and cannot be used even if transplanted.

Active rune sets are not unrecyclable, but collecting blood to refine them is too evil and too troublesome.

The bio-suit is usable, but Hewlett has worn it every day, so it's become stale. Once activated, the fully enclosed armor will even hinder her from using her tentacles... She plans to sell it on the black market, estimating it can fetch at least two or three million.

The only usable magic terminal is the one with 10 rune points of cache. It's at least better than her civilian-grade one with 6 rune points, and it's a military-grade product that's fetching over 80 rune points on the black market...

After calculating her gains, Yvette thought it over and felt it was time to go back and meet up with Miss Eileen to collect the bounty for the werewolf killer.

Tonight's Aberration Magic used up nearly 1000 points, which is outrageous. She'd have to devour an entire district's worth of Aberrations to regain them. But thankfully, the rewards were pretty good: intelligence, equipment, and bounty.

So she opened the message interface, responded to Miss Eileen's message, first letting her know she was safe, and then asking Eileen to take Tennyson to wait outside the police station so she could collect the reward quickly.

Then, unexpectedly, a long-lost little red dot caught her attention.

She switched over and saw a private message from the Firebearer. After more than half a month, the Civilization Survival Association had finally replied.

(End of this chapter)