"None of us expected the Radiation Laboratory had been secretly developing C1 Mutagen. Absolutely unconscionable." Gao Jinyue's voice carried a deep, festering hatred.

"What exactly is C1 Mutagen?" Shen Cong asked.

"A compound that induces mutation. Inject it into an ordinary person and they undergo something resembling natural mutation. The laboratory called the result an 'artificial mutation human' — a milestone achievement that would transform humanity's situation, they said. But the raw materials required extracting lymphatic fluid from people like us — the lymph-laggards — plus cerebrospinal fluid from the brainless, plus some kind of material from ratmen..."

Gao Jinyue's voice hardened. "A lot of people opposed it. So the Radiation Laboratory went behind everyone's backs and administered C1 Mutagen to several of the Command's senior leadership. About a week later, those leaders started experiencing systemic organ failure. The only way to manage it was continued C1 injections."

The mutagen had transformed the entire Eastern Theater Command from within.

The injected leadership established the rat-catching units — officially framed as capturing ratmen for material extraction and continued mutation research. In practice, the units weren't only hunting ratmen. They were killing lymph-laggards and the brainless, covertly producing C1 Mutagen to supply the leadership and their inner circle.

Fearing exposure, these individuals began pulling more of the Command's middle and upper management into the scheme — spreading complicity, building a network too large to easily dismantle.

By the time the jin people, iron people, and uninjected human leaders realized what was happening, the problem had grown beyond easy containment. A Command-wide meeting was convened. Strict prohibitions were issued against extracting anti-mutation lymph fluid or cerebrospinal fluid from human patients — only extraction from mutated creatures was to be permitted.

It changed nothing. C1 Mutagen demand outpaced supply. The killings continued.

Among the ordinary survivors in the settlement, the injected group acquired a name: death-eaters. They consumed materials taken from dead and dying people. They caused the deaths of large numbers of their own kind. The death-eaters themselves preferred a different term — super humans.

This state of affairs had reached an uneasy…