"Detecting Chen Hongjuan's memetic frequency is changing rapidly... her memes are disintegrating, dying! It..." A researcher staring at the equipment shouted urgently.

In fact, there was no need for him to speak; everyone present could see that Chen Hongjuan was heading toward death... Her body began to dissolve, blood and flesh turning into pus, bubbles constantly emerging from within the tissue and then bursting with a "pop," leaving crater-like pits of varying sizes on the surface.

The remaining shell of memes is already at its limit, unable to maintain this incomplete body any longer.

"Sun Hang?! Did you kill her?" Yang Qi asked in astonishment.

"No... it wasn't Sun Hang," another researcher immediately defended Sun Hang. "It's the entity's meme that is naturally dying off..."

"Naturally dying off..." Yang Qi tightened his lips, staring with a frown at Chen Hongjuan, who was transforming into a puddle of pus.

There is precedent for the natural self-destruction of such entities; on the contrary, many known entities, especially those without physical form—rule-based entities and phenomenon-based entities—were not eliminated by humans but rather self-destructed.

From a certain perspective, entities also have something akin to "lifespan."

Just as human lifespan depends on telomere length, entity memes likely contain something that determines their existence duration. When this thing is "depleted," the memes of entities start to naturally decline.

However, this notion remains in the theoretical stage. There is still no reliable evidence to prove the existence of "telomere-like" structures in entity memes. Considering the current level of human equipment and technology, it's challenging to conduct more detailed analyses on those meme fragments.

"Forget it, Sun Hang, you can come out now," Yang Qi said, rubbing his brow, using a tone of exasperation.

...

"By the way, is this one-way glass some kind of high tech?" Sun Hang walked into the outer section of the laboratory, somewhat curiously approaching the one-way glass—meanwhile, several researchers in protective suits were cleaning up Chen Hongjuan's "remaining traces" in the inner section.

The isolation effect between the inner and outer sections of the laboratory was excellent; even with Sun Hang's perceptive abilities, he couldn't detect Chen Hongjuan's memetic anomalies from outside, only feeling something was off.

It wasn't until he pushed open the heavy gate that he noticed a significant change in Chen Hongjuan's memes compared to his first encounter with her.

This was precisely the reason Sun Hang directly released her from those restraints.

He wanted to test whether Chen Hongjuan was intentionally showing weakness to the enemy or truly was strong outwardly but weak internally.

The subsequent actions of Chen Hongjuan proved Sun Hang's conjecture entirely correct.

"The key isn't in the glass, but in the layer within the glass," Yang Qi explained. "The glass layer contains a type of currently classified as high safety level entity, 'barrier liquid crystal.' The main characteristic of this entity is that, as long as there is sufficient electricity supply, it can isolate the scent of the entity... Not just this glass; most containers and wall layers in the containment area have added such type entities."

"Can this stuff be mass-produced?" Sun Hang asked.

The underground containment area of Tianshu City Research Institute isn't small. If every wall is filled with barrier liquid crystal, the total amount of this substance would be enormous—moreover, even a borderland research institute like Tianshu City has access to such treatment; similar designs surely exist in other city-state research institutes and the Dubhe Tower of the Federation with the highest quantity of contained entities.

"Yes." Yang Qi nodded. "It just needs to extract its memes and implant them into a liquid crystal with a specific formula, then the memes will self-replicate, turning that liquid crystal 'infected' into barrier liquid crystal... During the construction of this containment area, the usage of barrier liquid crystal was about fifteen tons. If it couldn't be mass-produced, we couldn't afford it."

"So this should be considered an industrial product... isn't it a bit unfair to call it an entity?" Sun Hang wondered. "It's obviously beneficial and harmless..."

"Entities aren't necessarily harmful things; this is a consensus within academia." Yang Qi gave Sun Hang an eye roll, seemingly wanting to mock Sun Hang's shallow understanding of entities. "The distinguishing factor of whether something is an entity is if there's a presence of entity memes within it... As to whether it benefits or harms humans, that's not the focus."

"So, good entities do exist?"

"From your understanding, you could say that," Yang Qi shrugged. "But those that severely impair human life tend more easily to catch public attention."

The term "entity" comes from something strange and unusual—a neutral term without inherent positive or negative connotation.

Whenever this term is applied to specific things, public perceptions of the term will change accordingly.

Just like when "nuclear" comes up, most people's immediate thought is not the nuclear fuel, which has become the major energy source for human societies, but rather the two mushroom clouds rising over the island nation east of Xiazhou.

But returning to the topic, there indeed are some commonalities between these two things—like lethality, contagion... and the vast amount of knowledge still beyond human understanding.

"By the way, how are you planning to report this incident?" Sun Hang asked.

"What else can I do? Report it honestly," Yang Qi shrugged. "Entities naturally dying off belong to an uncontrollable force, so we don't need to take responsibility... As for these remaining pus and blood, they would likely be divided into two portions: one kept as specimens, and the other sent to Dubhe Tower."

"Does this stuff have research value?"

"It does, but not much," Yang Qi said. "After meme demise, it's just a puddle of rotting pus and blood, only worthy of studying the changes in human body tissue post-entity transformation.

"Are you not studying it?"

"I have a pile of more important tasks... Thanks to you," Yang Qi sighed. "Can you guess who's in charge of Phoenix Factory's underground research right now?"

"Such important work and that old man in the wheelchair isn't in charge?" Sun Hang questioned.

"The teacher said he's old now; the future is for us youngsters, so it's time for our generation to take the lead. Then he hung up on me..." Yang Qi explained. "He's probably hiding in some corner secretly drinking and smoking now... I'm too tired to care."

"Congratulations, congratulations!" Sun Hang immediately offered congratulations to Yang Qi.

"Congratulate what?"

"We shouldn't call you Mr. Yang anymore; we should call you Mr. Director."

"Get lost."

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