"You can't mark me absent! When I got downstairs, I was clearly ten minutes early, but the elevators were backed up..." Wei Yuan explained meekly to the stern middle-aged woman before him.
The woman gently adjusted her thin gold-rimmed glasses, eyes narrowing slightly. Her words came rapid-fire, precise, and devoid of emotion. "The elevators have been backed up for ages. Did you only find out today? If you knew they were backed up, shouldn't you have arrived twenty minutes early? And let me repeat our corporate culture one last time: no excuses, only results!"
"Understood. I'll make sure of it next time."
"There won't be a next time! Company policy states that three unexcused absences result in dismissal. Since your probationary internship isn't over yet, that limit is two. Now get out. Your work assignments are already in your email."
Wei Yuan wiped cold sweat from his forehead and stepped out of the office. Relying on muscle memory, his body automatically carried him forward toward his cubicle.
His workstation wasn't large. The vast open-plan office was dead silent; everyone spoke in hushed tones on the phone, and at times the only sound was the dense clatter of keyboards.
Wei Yuan booted up his computer with practiced ease, verified his biometric data—fingerprints and retinas—and logged smoothly into the corporate network. After a dazzling splash screen, the workspace interface popped up.
Wei Yuan immediately opened his calendar and began reading the work emails automatically routed to him by the system. He skillfully tagged each one and slotted them into different time blocks, preparing to tackle them on schedule.
This workflow system could automatically monitor procedures, specific details, and real-time progress. It could even determine whether an employee was thinking or daydreaming based on keystroke intervals and eye-tracking, and it automated the vast majority of performance tracking, analysis, and appraisal.
Supposedly, the company had spent an astronomical sum procuring the system—more than the total annual payroll of every employee combined, though of course excluding the CEO's compensation package.
Wei Yuan browsed swiftly, the contents of each email feeling both alien and familiar.
"Brown Bear Laboratory Leak Incident Report Revision"—right, this needed polishing to ensure the tone sounded serious and professional while never actually addressing the core issue. Simple enough.
"April Department Performance Summary"—this was the most important task; if he wrote it poorly, that old woman would chew him out again.
"Bay Shore City Super-Lifeform Sighting Report"—another polishing job; there definitely wouldn't be any classified details inside.
"Employee Comprehensive Competency Enhancement Plan"—this was the director's job, but Wei Yuan had to write it.
Suddenly, a new email popped up before Wei Yuan. The subject line read: "Advanced Adaptive Supervirus Project Proposal."
Wei Yuan was shocked. Viruses were the company's most sensitive, core secret. Judging by the title alone, this project was the core of cores.
How could such a major project end up in the inbox of an intern like him?
Wei Yuan clicked open the email and saw that it had already been forwarded through numerous tiers. It had originated from the Corporate Strategy Committee, then passed down layer by layer through Executive Vice Presidents, Business Cluster Presidents, and Business Unit Heads, until it finally trickled all the way down to Wei Yuan.
Since the work had been assigned, whether he could handle it or not, Wei Yuan had to charge ahead. The company listened to no excuses, only results. Failing to complete the task meant incompetence, and no explanation would help.
Looking at the workflow diagram again, Wei Yuan realized that his station was the very end of the line. There was no subsequent node below him to forward it to. Unsurprising, really—what intern had subordinates to pass the blame to?
Resigned, Wei Yuan had no choice but to open the proposal and review the specific requirements.
The project proposal was exceedingly long, easily over a hundred pages. A glance at the table of contents and page numbers told Wei Yuan there was no way he could finish reading it that morning. But he had a workaround: he opened his AI office assistant, fed the document into it, and moments later received an outline alongside an extraordinarily intricate genetic structure diagram.
After scanning the outline, Wei Yuan grasped the specifics and background of the project. Put simply, someone had witnessed the activities of an individual with superpowers. Umbrella Company had immediately dispatched covert forces to capture them, but due to violent resistance, they had been forced to eliminate the target. Subsequent tests revealed unprecedented, mysterious segments within the individual's genome, with a complexity far surpassing normal human genetics.
Umbrella Company treated it as a priceless treasure, isolating a segment from the mysterious genome suitable for viral engineering. They intended to use it as a foundation to develop an unprecedented supervirus.
It would be an enemy's worst nightmare and the finest service tool humanity had ever known.
Once gathered in sufficient numbers, its collective could achieve sentience and understand human commands. It could substitute for any human cell and fulfill all its functions, making it the nemesis of countless terminal illnesses. At the same time, it could grant humans unprecedented capabilities—if the company wished, they could churn out endless superheroes.
This functional overview left Wei Yuan utterly dumbfounded. It was so overpowered that it defied common sense. If this actually came to pass, the world wouldn't even need governments anymore; the corporation would be enough.
And a clump of viruses thinking on their own? If that were possible, the world would have been ruled by influenza long ago.
Even as Wei Yuan griped inwardly, he carefully cross-referenced the context and pulled up the original document to examine it further. Only then did he realize that massive pile of text wasn't a feature description at all. In corporate speak, this was called a "vision."
Visions were easy to pitch; making them happen was in the hands of fate.
Wei Yuan rolled his eyes and opened the genetic structure diagram. He studied it intently, his expression growing graver by the second.
This was no ordinary schematic; it was an authentic structural image captured via electron microscope! The image contained an immense amount of data—what the screen displayed was barely a thousandth of the whole.
A thought floated into Wei Yuan's mind: *Once I advance another stage, I should be able to see this without an electron microscope.* Immediately after, he felt puzzled. *Advance a stage? Advance what stage? A promotion and a raise?* But that was still far off. His grueling five-year internship was only half over; he still had more than two years of walking on eggshells ahead of him.
Wei Yuan stared at the genetic structure diagram for a long time, trying to commit every detail to memory. This genetic map alone was of immeasurable value. If he took it outside to sell, Wei Yuan estimated it could fetch at least several million taels of immortal silver...
At that moment, Wei Yuan's mind stuttered, glitching for an instant, before his train of thought resumed: *...at least several million Umbrella coins.*
Of course, Wei Yuan was only daydreaming. Umbrella had the power to issue global currency and possessed its own private security firm, which was effectively a paramilitary force. If he dared leak corporate secrets, Wei Yuan wouldn't even know how he died.
Still, after staring at the diagram for ages, Wei Yuan's near-zero knowledge of genetics and biological science naturally yielded nothing.
Just then, a beautiful woman popped onto the screen, reminding him in a sweet voice, "Zoning out during work hours is not permitted!"
Wei Yuan jumped in fright and quickly switched screens. He stopped staring fixedly at one spot, instead glancing around different areas of the monitor from time to time, constantly knitting his brows, sighing, and resting his chin in his hand to look deep in thought. Sure enough, no further slacking alerts popped up.
After studying the genetic diagram a bit longer, the workflow system warned him that his allotted time was running low.
Wei Yuan had no choice but to save the diagram and focus entirely on processing the dozens of emails he had scheduled earlier. His efficiency that morning was off the charts: he smoothly completed over twenty tasks and drafted more than a hundred slides of PowerPoint presentations, finally carving out an extra half-hour for the Advanced Virus Project.
Just then, someone appeared beside Wei Yuan and patted his shoulder. "Time's up. Let's grab lunch first."
Wei Yuan looked up, recognized the person's face, and blurted out subconsciously, "Kongque? Why are you everywhere?!"
Kongque retorted, "What kind of talk is that?! Without me, how would you have ever gotten hired here?"
Countless details about Xiao Kongque instantly flooded Wei Yuan's mind. Kongque had graduated from the same school as Wei Yuan, just a few classes ahead of him. He was now the head of a technical project team, leading several dozen team members. It was thanks to his recommendation that Wei Yuan had landed a spot at the company, and his annual performance reviews had been consistently stellar.
Wei Yuan said, "I just got handed a new assignment on genetic design. I've never touched this stuff before! There's a meeting this afternoon, so I need to make the most of lunch and review it a few more times. I won't go to the cafeteria—I'll just chew on a few slices of bread."
"Oh, that supervirus project? Our team got assigned a piece of it too. Don't sweat it. The project is just kicking off. This afternoon's meeting is an 'Enablement Mobilization Conference' hosted by Mike, the Business Cluster Vice President, and everyone involved has to attend. Don't you know Mike by now? For a two-hour meeting, he'll drone on for two and a half hours, then leave five minutes for everyone to pledge their loyalty. Come on, let's eat. My treat."
Wei Yuan had no choice but to follow him to the cafeteria. The company cafeteria was exceedingly lavish, offering delicacies from all across the globe, which was the thing that pleased Wei Yuan most about the job. On top of that, it operated around the clock and the space was fully oxygenated; even when working all night, there was always food available, and eating left one revitalized and sharp.
As they ate, Wei Yuan's mind remained occupied by that complex map—one that definitely did not belong to humans, yet could seamlessly integrate into the human genome.
"What, still brooding over your project?"
Wei Yuan swallowed his food without even chewing and replied, "I was wondering if Mike will explain the overall approach to the viral design this afternoon. Right now, I don't have the faintest clue."
"He'll explain it? In your dreams! Mike comes from management, not tech. What does he know about genetic design?"
"That works?" Wei Yuan was dumbfounded. Heading a viral design project without knowing genetics seemed utterly absurd.
"Whether leadership understands doesn't matter; the people beneath them just need to know. Look at me—I don't know genetic engineering either, yet here I am managing several teams. Keep eating; I'm going to grab some fruit."
Kongque stood up and was about to leave the table when he suddenly glanced at Wei Yuan's plate. Looking somewhat surprised, he asked, "Why are you only eating steamed buns?"
Chapter 780