Looking at the printing year on the banknote, Li Tongchen couldn’t help but frown.

’What is this?’

’A misprinted bill?’

Although he had never handled one, he had heard that misprinted banknotes were extremely valuable and cherished by many collectors.

’But why would the developer behind the True Apocalypse Game give me a misprinted banknote as a gift?’

Staring at the numbers "2025" on it, Li Tongchen’s expression was grim.

As a giant in the medical field, he had also dabbled in psychology in his spare time.

While playing the game, he had already sensed that the person who developed it wasn’t just doing it for fun. Many of the game’s missions had a clear selective bias.

They were selecting people who could save humanity at all costs.

Many of the moral dilemmas in the game were designed to probe the depths of a person’s soul.

Li Tongchen himself strongly agreed with many of the philosophies the developer revealed through the game.

Perhaps this was why he became one of the people who completed the game and received the vaccine formula.

Because of this, everything the developer did must have a reason.

’This banknote must have some hidden meaning.’

After staring at the banknote in his hand for a few minutes, Li Tongchen took out his phone and dialed a number.

It was his old classmate, Wang Aihua, who currently worked at the central bank as a high-ranking official in the currency printing department.

The call connected quickly, and a warm, familiar voice came through:

"Old Li, hahaha, you old dog, you’ve really done it! A Lasker Medical Award winner, and a Nobel Prize is probably right around the corner! A great hero! Hahahaha, you’re like an old tree blooming with new flowers! You’re always so swamped, how’d you find the time to call me? When are you coming to the Capital so I can congratulate you? No, wait, we should make you cough up some cash and treat us old buddies to a feast. I’m telling you, if there’s no Maotai, I’m not going!"

Hearing Wang Aihua’s words, Li Tongchen felt a warmth in his heart.

He and Wang Aihua were high school classmates from the same small county. They had supported and looked out for each other since they were young, and Wang Aihua was basically the person he trusted most.

"All you do is talk nonsense. What Nobel Prize? That’s still a long shot. If you want Maotai, we’ll drink Maotai. You think I’m scared of your low tolerance?" Li Tongchen said dismissively.

"Hahaha, good! And you can’t use some surgery as an excuse to get out of it this time. We’re not stopping until we’re drunk!" Wang Aihua joked. Then his voice turned serious. "So, what’s up? Is the sky falling?"

Joking aside, he naturally knew his old friend was an incredibly busy man now. If it wasn’t for something unexpected, he wouldn’t be calling.

"I have a banknote here I’d like you to look at for me. See if it’s a misprint," Li Tongchen said calmly. "I’ve gotten into collecting recently. How about this, I’ll just mail it to your house?"

Wang Aihua knew that the calmer his old friend sounded, the more serious the matter was. He didn’t press for details and just said, "No, mail it directly to my office. If you’re about to strike it rich, I want to be there to get a piece of the action."

"Okay," Li Tongchen said, then hung up the phone.

After a moment of thought, he put the hundred-yuan bill into an envelope, had his assistant call for a courier, and only relaxed after watching the package being bagged and taken away.

He didn’t return to his office. Instead, he took a taxi straight to Huashan Hospital to find an acquaintance of his, Deputy Director Lu Ran.

As fellow elites in the medical field, he and Lu Ran had only met a few times at academic conferences. They were merely acquaintances.

Lu Ran was among the thirteen people who had discovered the vaccine for the Petrification Disease virus.

Although Lu Ran had just made a major contribution, he was still seeing patients. When he saw Li Tongchen appear, he just gave a slight nod, as if he had been expecting him.

Li Tongchen wasn’t in a hurry. He sat down nearby and waited for Lu Ran to finish his consultations.

The nurses and doctors in the clinic all looked reverent and nervous when they saw Li Tongchen. They wanted to chat and greet him but didn’t dare.

Li Tongchen smiled, made some small talk with everyone, and accepted the tea they offered him. He didn’t look like a titan of the academic world at all, more like a friendly neighborhood grandpa there for a check-up.

It was already afternoon, and the consultation hours were soon over. However, Lu Ran was a sought-after specialist with many appointments, so it took a little longer.

After the patients, doctors, and nurses had all left, Li Tongchen gently closed and locked the door, then turned to Lu Ran and asked:

"Doctor Lu, are you a Player?"

Lu Ran had clearly anticipated this question. He nodded and said calmly:

"Yes. We should all be Disciples. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have been able to get the vaccine formula."

Then, Lu Ran continued:

"Doctor Li, it was a bit reckless of you to come directly to me. Although the developer hasn’t said anything, the fact that he used a game to notify us means he’s wary of something. Perhaps the person he’s wary of is hidden among us." 𝓯𝙧𝓮𝓮𝒘𝓮𝙗𝙣𝒐𝒗𝒆𝓵.𝓬𝓸𝒎

Li Tongchen smiled and shook his head. "I might not be able to trust the others, but I can trust you, Doctor Lu. I’ve seen your record. You were also on the front lines during the SARS epidemic."

If you can’t trust someone who risked their life to save others on the front lines of a major epidemic, then it’s hard to find anyone trustworthy.

Lu Ran also smiled slightly and nodded. "So you’ve noticed it too..."

"Of course. Aren’t people like us exactly who the developer was looking for with all the tests and trials he set up? Besides, he’s not afraid of being found, because he’s confident that no one can find him..." Li Tongchen said slowly.

The developer doesn’t care.

"But why is he doing this? Why tell us the vaccine formula this way? A player organization? Is he trying to build his own organization? Just based on a single Petrification Disease pandemic? It doesn’t make any sense... unless..."

Lu Ran lit a cigarette, took a drag, and finished Li Tongchen’s thought:

"Unless he’ll still need us in the future. And events similar to the Petrification Disease outbreak will happen again..."

The two looked at each other, their expressions turning grim. The cloud of smoke Lu Ran exhaled seemed like a thick fog, shrouding everything in uncertainty...

Similar scenes were playing out among all thirteen of the chosen medical titans.

All the Disciples were wondering, who was it that had summoned them?

And for what purpose?

But despite their confusion, they all adhered to one rule: never reveal any information about the True Apocalypse Game to anyone who wasn’t a Disciple.

Not even other Players.

Even though the developer didn’t seem to care.

They had all dabbled in psychology to some extent, and a suspicion was faintly forming in their minds, but it was a thought they were unwilling to believe.

Because if their suspicion was true, the implications were far too terrifying...

...

「Silver Spring, Maryland, Eagle Country. The headquarters of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).」

As the director’s assistant, Edith stood by the floor-to-ceiling windows of his office, lost in thought as he watched the storm rage outside.

The administration’s Gulfstream jet should have already taken off to track the hurricane, but his heart was in the depths of despair.

Although the vaccine was eventually developed and administered through timely mandatory injections, controlling the spread of the Petrification Disease, it had still been too late for some.

Including Jason, the captain of the Oceanus exploration team, half of the team members had become almost completely petrified and ultimately could not be saved, dying from organ failure.

Many of his colleagues at the agency were also left disabled due to the early symptoms of petrification.

The cause of all this was their secret salvage operation at the ruins cordoned off by the Hua Country scientific expedition team. They had dredged up a large number of prehistoric statues that were like viral bombs.

And he had been the one to push for this operation against all opposition. It was fair to say he was inextricably to blame for all these terrible consequences.

But now, his memory was hazy. He could no longer clearly remember why he had been so obsessed with those ruins, even secretly reporting it to the highest levels and lobbying intensely to obtain the authority for a forced excavation.

’Did I do the wrong thing?’

’I just didn’t want my country to miss this opportunity. Or rather, I didn’t want my team to miss it...’

’Perhaps...’

’Looking back now, why was I so convinced back then that those ruins contained something that could determine the fate of our nation?’

Just then, the phone on his desk rang.

Edith picked up the receiver. A burst of white noise came through, followed by a low, muffled thud, as if a human heart was being squeezed.

Immediately after, a slightly hoarse whisper began:

"...Go die... atone for your sins... die... I forgive you... you just need to die... forgive you... die..."

Edith’s eyes went vacant. He hung up the phone, opened his desk drawer, and pulled out a revolver, pressing it against his own chin.

"BANG!"