As the scalpel sliced through, blood spurted onto his goggles.

"Hiss... There's actually an artery hidden here... Is it supplying the tumor... Hand me the hemostats."

"Push the lens in two more centimeters, don't worry about the proliferated tissue, we're going to cut it out anyway."

"Monitor the patient's heartbeat... Two units of adrenaline, push it in.

"Bring the tray over..." The lead surgeon extracted a mass of bloody tissue from Jiang Yu's chest cavity and then said, "The lung and bronchi have been removed, it's your turn."

"Oh." Sun Hang immediately inserted the already prepared lobes into the chest cavity, and then dozens of hyphae extended out like a woven net, connecting the trachea, nerves, and blood vessels with Jiang Yu's original body.

"Are these hyphae controlled by you?" The lead surgeon couldn't help but ask as he looked at the almost perfectly joined blood vessels and nerves.

"Sort of..."

"How could you possibly ensure that each nerve and vessel connects correctly?" The lead surgeon questioned, "You mentioned earlier... you haven't studied medicine, right?"

"Uh... although I'm controlling it, this thing is actually semi-automatic." Sun Hang brushed it off, "I only made this thing, the connections and such, it handles them on its own... To be honest, for things like supernatural phenomena and mimetic concepts, even the people at Dubhe Tower might not explain them clearly."

Sun Hang thought to himself, I can't exactly tell you I'm using my 'wish fulfillment' ability, can I?

Initially, he planned to use this ability to replace all of Jiang Yu's cancerous tissues at once, but right after the thought came to him, he envisioned a monster that was human yet not human hovering before his eyes—Yang Qi wasn't wrong when she said that if the Theriomorphic tissue exceeded a certain ratio, what would come off the operating table would no longer be a patient, but a supernatural entity.

"Indeed..." The lead surgeon exhaled deeply, "Sometimes, I feel like so-called modern medicine is truly powerless in this era..."

"No need to say that." Sun Hang hurried to interject, "This thing can't cure illnesses, for regular aches and fevers, you still need a doctor… Surely, we can't rely on the abilities of infected individuals to treat every sickness, right?"

"No, that's not what I mean." The lead surgeon shook his head, "I just have a sentiment that in the face of these unbelievable powers, various common ailments and medical procedures seem more like a children's game within some framework… Whether it's supernatural entities or you infected ones, you exist outside of that framework… Sometimes I wonder if hunters who can maintain their sanity are the direction for humanity's future evolution."

"Uh, to be honest, that line of thinking is quite dangerous," Sun Hang said, "I've encountered cult members who revere supernatural beings, and they think along similar lines."

"It's just a hypothesis." With the lung transplantation successfully completed, the lead surgeon picked up the scalpel again, "Let's stop chatting; there are still many parts that need 'replacing.' This surgery probably won't be over in five or six hours."

...

...

As it turned out, the experienced lead surgeon still had a thing or two. By the time the last bit of cancerous tissue inside Jiang Yu was excised and replaced with Theriomorphic tissue, five hours had passed since the surgery began.

"You two, start suturing the incision." The lead surgeon's voice was filled with exhaustion, "Constantly monitor the patient's vital signs... and as for the other side of things, we'll leave it to the research institute folks."

By 'the other side of things,' he naturally referred to the implanted Theriomorphic organs inside Jiang Yu—apart from the physiological monitoring equipment, machines for detecting supernatural mimetics were also activated. Song Yarong and others were nervously watching the data flashing across the screens.

"It's confirmed that Jiang Yu is infected with the Theriomorphic mimetic, and the infection is currently stable." Song Yarong said, "There are slight erosive developments at the juncture with the human body... but this is within the normal range, I checked myself before, mimetic erosion is normal...

"Over the next seventy-two hours, the Theriomorphic mimetic is expected to spread throughout her body. However, these mimetics will lie dormant in every corner of the body and will remain active only within the replaced tissues unless awakened."

"Don't be blindly optimistic." Yang Qi frowned, "Her situation is different from yours; she has too many replacements."

Hearing this, Sun Hang glanced at the table full of trays. These trays were filled with indescribably twisted flesh, all 'excavated' from the gaunt body of Jiang Yu—besides organs, even several bones had been sawed off, with the bone saw now hanging on a tool rack nearby.

The pile weighed at least twenty kilograms, while Jiang Yu, emaciated by cancer, weighed only forty-two kilograms before surgery.

At least half of her body had been replaced.

Sun Hang couldn't help but think of the 'Ship of Theseus' allegory.

If the ship in the allegory were replaced by a person, would there be a 'Person of Theseus'?

Suppose one periodically replaced a part of someone's body until every part was Theriomorphic tissue... would he/she still be the same person?

Or could he/she even still be called human?

The human body undergoes self-metabolism, renewing inside and out except for brain cells every so often... but Theriomorphic tissue doesn't, though it mimics cell apoptosis and division. However, the cells it mimics hold not the host's DNA, but the Theriomorphic's own mimetics.

Even though the host's DNA, like 'memories,' is stored within the mimetic information, it constitutes only a very small part of the overall information carried by the mimetics.

Sun Hang raised his hand and closely examined it... He was unsure whether his body's makeup was truly 'Sun Hang' or some semblance of human cells.

Could his whole body be composed of such mimetic cells...

Had 'Sun Hang' ever truly existed?

Or was it merely a supernatural entity resembling a human, who simply named itself like this?

"For god's sake... if I'm a supernatural entity, why would I blend into human society? To slave away in a 9-to-9-6 job? I'd have to be crazy!"

While Sun Hang was lost in rambling thoughts, the final suturing on the operating table was complete. The doctors and researchers involved in the surgery exchanged words of hard work, while the tall lead surgeon approached the rest area, removing his blood-stained rubber gloves.

His hands were swollen from being soaked in sweat, with impressions left by the gloves at his wrists.

"Good job, good job." Sun Hang handed over a bottle of water, and in a daze, he seemed to see something white crouched outside the operating room window.

"Is that thing back?!"

Sun Hang shuddered, turning his head sharply.

Outside on the windowsill sat Anna, twisting her body and looking at Sun Hang with a half-smile.

In the blink of an eye, she vanished without a trace.

Just like Ling Xiao's experience in the ruins last time.

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