*Knock knock*
“Young master, may I come in?”
As Long Tian was preparing to venture out to the Lab, a sweet voice rang from behind.
“Come in”
She entered with a dark chocolate cake in her hand, her cheeks flushed red in excitement as she joyfully exclaimed.
“Happy seventeenth birthday, Young master Long Tian.”
As soon as melodious voice reached his ears, his head began to throb with a deep ache that seemed to emanate from the depths of his subconscious, rising from his very soul. Blurry fragments of memories kept repeating, and soon, the surroundings transformed dramatically.
Before Long Tian knew it, he was standing in large white room. Behind him, a large humanoid body sat on a worktable, both of them improbably large.
A young boy with brown hair stood in front of the screen, with a cake in front of him.
Ria Ambert and Bella stood behind him. Leo looked at his father with a bit of complaint in his eyes, however, as usual, he couldn’t voice any of his complains.
““Happy birthday, Leo””
Long Tian looked at his melancholic son. He knew the reason. His face broke into a smile. As soon as he mentally willed it, a small bug appeared in front of him.
He whispered in a small voice.
“Now”
*Ting*
A large robot that seemed to have phased out of nowhere. Leo stared at the reddish-blue robot that was much bigger than him, his eyes full of excitement.
“Young master!”
A pair of hand shook him, bringing him out of his daze. Ying Mei kept staring at him, witnessing the line of tears falling from his left cheek. She had never seen Long Tian cry before.
Long Tian did not know the reason behind the abyss of sadness he felt within his soul. Just watching the scene filled him with a indescribable pain. Wiping his tear, he went forward to grab himself a piece of cake.
However, Mei Ying quicky stopped him.
“Please wait, young master”
She put on some candles on the cake, lighting them up one by one. The breezy air from outside kept turning them off, prompting a cute frown on her forehead.
Long Tian watched as Mei Ying pouted in anger. After what it felt like dozens of retries, she finally gave up and stopped the air currents with her Qi.
“Young master, please come fast.”
“Alright”
As he blew on the candles, Mei Ying started to clap and sing
“Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday, Dear young master! Happy birthday to you!”
Long Tian felt his head throb again. He quickly cut a couple pieces and brought it to his mouth. The sweetness of caramel and the bitterness of dark chocolate perfectly balanced out each other, bringing a sense of harmony.
“This is really good. Thank you so much, MeiMei.”
As the sense of déjà vu continued to increase, Long Tian quickly escaped the scene. Ying Mei blushed red at the compliment; a happy smile pasting on her cherry lips.
**
Rushing inside the lab, Long Tian called out loudly.
“Haider, how far are you on the gel electrophoresis?”
“Sir Long, Haider has gone out for a bit, but I can assist you in his place.”
Long Tian tilted his head at hearing the feminine voice behind him. He wondered if he had started hallucinating even during the daytime.
Turning around, he found a curious young face staring at him.
“How did you get in?”
“Sir, I applied for a thesis under your supervision a year ago. It was approved a while ago but I had gotten a bit busy due to some personal stuff.”
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
Long Tian relaxed, remembering that there was indeed such a case. It confused him when he received a letter of internship, and even more so when Academy approved of it.
“Riam Lan, right? You have changed a lot.”
Riam laughed embarrassedly at Long Tian’s remark. She remembered how she looked a year ago. Unlike the neat Riam Lin of before, current her had a full head of unkept curly hair and a thick glass, making her look completely nerdy.
"Yes, sir, some stuff happened.”
“Unfortunately for you, I might be leaving Naqueser within this week.”
Riam’s face crumpled at the remark, and she complained loudly as she tugged on her hair.
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA. Why am always I so unlucky?”
Long Tian gazed at Riam, whose hair had turned even more disheveled.
“Stop shouting within the lab premises. You can familiarize yourself with our lab work within this week. If you do well, I will write you a recommendation letter for Madame Lin.”
Riam’s face recovered a bit, but she still looked a bit disappointed at his words. She stared at him with a bit if expectation in her eyes.
“Sir Long, when will you come back? I can wait a while. I still have a couple of years left before graduation.”
Long Tian sighed, looking uncertain as he replied.
“I do not know.”
Riam’s expression dimmed again.
“Alright. Enough chitchat. Did Haider familiarize you with the lab?”
“Yes, sir”
“Bring me sample no 1 and 7 from the 3rd refrigerator. Make sure to follow the proper Lab protocols, or I will not be recommending you”
“Yes, sir!”
Long Tian walked towards the room in the middle. A large, 2-meter-tall microscope stood in place.
He quickly brought out the rectangular quartz, dropping 1ML of the red liquid in a test tube full of water. The white water in the test tube turned into a much thinner shade of red compared to the original liquid in the quartz.
Then, he took a drop of the water from that diluted test tube, once again, repeating the process over and over until he reached 10 tubes. The last test tube looked nearly white.
“Serial dilution!”
A surprised female voice sounded from behind him.
“Yes.”
Long Tian nodded.
“Wait! Why do you sound surprised after seeing such a simple technique?”
He looked suspiciously at the Riam. Riam flinched at the stare, biting her tongue.
"Sorry, sir, I am just a bit excited.”
Long Tian gave her a deadpan look as he turned around.
“Right. Give me the samples.”
Long Tian took some cells from the tubes named “Xian” and “Tian”, diving them in different microscope rectangular slides. Taking a drop of liquid from test-tube no. 10, he dropped a millimeter of it on each of the slides.
Riam watched eagerly from beside him.
“No change”
Long Tian stared for any changes, however, nothing happened. Long Tian moved onto the next slides.
Slide 9.1/2
“No change”
Slide 8.1/2
“No change”
…
Slide 4.1/2
“No change”
.
.
The gleam in Long Tian’s eye got fainter with each failure.
Slide 3.1/2
“Serial dilution!?!”
Another surprised voice rang out from behind, causing the veins of Long Tian’s forehead to rise.
“Why the heck are you surprised too, Haider?!”
“Hehe”
Haider laughed at the question, scratching his bald head.
“Young master Long, it’s been a while since I saw you using such a simple technique.”
After staring speechlessly at Haider for a while. Looking into the Slide No. 3.1 again, his eye finally regained some of its luster.
“At least it showed some response in 100 dilutions.”
As expected, the red liquid itself is in a very diluted form. If it was a million times more concentrated, maybe it could help me awaken.
Long tian sighed
No response in cells of Xian’er
“Ready the incubator”
“Yes sir”
**********
*Thud*
Haider watched the squirming mass of cells in front of him that was growing bigger.
“Another homunculus, heh.”
“Torch it”
A serious Long Tian looked at the growing homunculus.
*ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ*
Haider used a flamethrower to burn all the squirming cells, However, some of them survived, squirming in patches as they grew back.
*ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ*
Haider grinned widely as he continued his onslaught.
“Alright, that’s enough. It’s been 3 minutes. It’s done for.”
“Tch”
Haider clicked his tongue, looking a bit regretful.
“………”
You are having too much fun killing what are essentially my clones!
Long Tian stared at Haider speechlessly. Bringing out his lab diary from his pockets, he took notes.
> 22nd February
>
> Huaxia calendar year 9302
>
> *Incubation 09*
>
> * Sample: Long Tian
> * Type: Skeletal muscle cell. {Brachioradialis(forearm)}
> * Media: Liquid culture media, prepared with standard ratio of sodium, glucose, buffer, serum and growth factors.
> * pH: <7.3
>
> When mixed with a 10 dilution of the red liquid and cultured, the cells undergo rapid cell division through an uncontrolled re-production of mitochondria and P53 activation. If incubated for more than 3 hours, some of the cells evolve into different types of tissues, acting like stem cells.
>
> Some of them even form nerve and bone tissues. That should be theoretically impossible. If I let it incubate for long enough, would it grow into another Long Tian? If it does, this Long Tian would probably be able to cultivate from day one. Although weather it will be human or not is up to debate.
“Young master Long, this is getting quite dangerous. We might not be able to contain it safely next time.”
“Don’t worry. That was the final one. We are not doing this on germ or stem cells.”
“Phew”
Haider sighed in relief.
As they came out of the sealed room, a curious Riam Lin stared at them. She stared at the duo in full body protection armor, looking like they had gone to war. Haider even had a flamethrower on his back.
Haider gave a wide smile as he gestured a thumbs up at Riam Lin, causing her to tilt her head in confusion.
“Haider, prepare the thermal cycler.”
“Yes, sir”
***
“How far are we on the polymerase chain reaction?”
“Sir, the cells were too burned to extract enough DNA, so we have to do more than 40 cycles to get enough sample. Currently, we are on the 22nd cycle. We should be done in about 8–9 hours.”
“Let Riam handle it, you can go ahead and prepare for the gel electrophoresis again.”
“Uh-, I”
Haider pointed at the listless girl who was sweating.
“Her?”
Long Tian looked at Riam Lin and forced a smile.
“Continue”
Long Tian went out of the controlled zone and took a black marker, staring at the board in front of him.
*Screech*
A small screeching noise resounded throughout the room as complex calculations filled the board in minutes.