Homo Sapiens

Inside the research base on Kalaqua Island.

Li Qingye, clad in a white lab coat, emotionlessly examined the unconscious members of the Sea Snake Gang. He first divided them into two groups based on their bone age.

One group consisted of those under 30, while the other was for those over 30.

The reason for this division was the side effects of genetic modification. If a subject was too old, their body might not withstand the corrosive effects, leading directly to organ failure and death.

This threshold was set at 30 years old, with an absolute maximum of 40.

According to the bone age analysis reports, of the 43 Sea Snake Gang members, 24 were under 30, 12 were between 30 and 40, and the remaining 7 were over 40.

Previously, Bafate and the other six had all been under forty.

This was actually quite normal. After all, the wealth gap in Luzon was extreme, so the lower and middle ranks of gangs were inevitably very young.

The logic was simple: poverty led to a low quality of life, and a low quality of life resulted in a low average life expectancy.

Gang life was a dangerous, high-risk profession, one that only the desperate poor would turn to.

After grouping the men, Li Qingye sent them into the genetic modification chamber. The chamber was now very different from before.

Previously, it could only modify one person at a time. But after upgrades, it could now modify five people simultaneously. More equipment had also been added, making the process smoother and further reducing the modification time.

With the improvements, each subject now required about six to seven days to complete the genetic modification.

Based on the bone age groups, he tried to include subjects of varying ages in each batch.

The first batch of subjects was sent into the modification chamber.

Li Qingye worked on other projects while continuously monitoring the modification progress.

Five days later, he stood frowning by a subject’s hospital bed. The subject on the bed had entered the final stages of uremia; both kidneys were completely necrotic.

He quickly dissected the subject. The organs showed severe lesions. After comparing the length of the chromosome telomeres before and after, he shook his head and sighed.

’Age really is a problem.’

This dead subject was the only one in this batch over 40. Even at just 42 years old, he still couldn’t withstand the backlash from the genetic modification.

He readjusted the modification plan. To reduce the physical burden on the subjects, he removed the gene sequences related to physical enhancement from the three sequences used in the procedure.

Soon, the experiment on the second batch began.

This time, the modification period was shortened again, taking only about five days to complete. Furthermore, the subjects’ physical conditions were somewhat better than the previous batch.

One of the subjects, a 45-year-old, actually survived. According to telomere analysis and a physical examination, he had a remaining lifespan of about 15 years. He was just barely usable.

He made incremental adjustments to the genetic modification experiments, also taking the time to implant the subjects with bio-chips.

「Time flew by.」

The complete process of modification, interrogation, testing, and training took Li Qingye another two months.

But now, Li Qingye had 41 new, fiercely loyal subordinates under his command.

He inserted 20 of them, both overtly and covertly, into the Homo Sapiens Company. The remaining 21 established the Luzon Intelligence Station, currently headquartered in Dart Port, with a focus on infiltrating the slums of Manila.

During this time, Li Qingye was not content with the status quo. His various biotechnologies were constantly advancing—after all, he had traded decades of his lifespan for his super-brain.

In the field of bio-chip technology, aside from producing higher-performance bio-chips, he also created a bio-computer that integrated various biological devices: the [Fuxi 1.0].

The Fuxi 1.0 bio-computer, unlike an electronic computer, was a computer that could be implanted into a living organism.

Of course, this computer could also be disguised as a regular smartphone or laptop.

To complement the bio-computer, Li Qingye also successively developed various biological functional devices.

He developed the Fuxi computer for two reasons. First, he didn’t trust the commercial electronic computer equipment on the market. Second, it would make it easier to infiltrate enemy territory.

After all, when entering territory controlled by a hostile power, they certainly wouldn’t allow phones and computers in easily. Even if they were permitted, they would be inspected.

This was where the bio-computer had a huge advantage: it could be implanted inside the body.

Currently, Li Qingye had designed two implantation methods: one involved fusing the bio-computer into the skull, and the other involved reshaping it into the form of a rib bone.

Both methods could deceive standard inspections. They were indistinguishable even with hospital-grade MRIs, X-rays, and the like.

They would be very difficult to detect without high-precision, lab-grade equipment.

And under normal circumstances, even places like America’s Fort Detrick Laboratory wouldn’t casually use high-precision equipment to screen unimportant individuals. After all, powering on such devices costs money every time.

As for the powers in Southeast Asia, it wasn’t that Li Qingye looked down on them, but simply that their overall capabilities wouldn’t allow for it.

Of course, another use for the bio-computer was to coordinate with other biotechnologies.

For example, Li Qingye had already developed the [Fuxi 1.0 Computer - Pheromone Hive Type]. This specialized model of the bio-computer was designed specifically to facilitate control over other genetically modified organisms.

The Fuxi 1.0 Computer - Pheromone Hive Type was equipped with biological components capable of producing various pheromones. By adjusting the concentration of these pheromones, it could already achieve crude control over genetically modified insects.

This was a huge breakthrough.

After all, the previously developed [Gu Insect - Malaria Parasite] and [Gu Insect - Coma Mosquito] were very difficult to control and could even endanger the user if one wasn’t careful.

Now, with the Pheromone Hive, he could exert crude control over the genetically modified insects via pheromones.

This would be a tremendous help for intelligence gathering, infiltration, assassination, and the like.

The advances in bio-computers prompted Li Qingye to create a new series of genetically modified organisms.

Through recombinant DNA technology, in addition to the initial [Gu Insect - Malaria Parasite] and [Gu Insect - Coma Mosquito], many new types of genetically modified organisms were successively born within the Kalaqua Island research base.

Although many of these genetically modified organisms were not yet mature, as more and more were created, a number of relatively stable strains began to emerge.

Moreover, Li Qingye’s technological progress was incredibly fast. This was the terrifying aspect of biotechnology.

Achieving exponential growth in production and R&D for the mechanical and chemical industries is extremely difficult.

But biotechnology was different. Especially after mastering recombinant DNA technology, one could, for example, directly modify microorganisms for hormone production. By harnessing the terrifying speed of microbial division, exponential growth could be achieved in a matter of days.

Similarly, the more genetically modified organisms he created, the more data Li Qingye could observe, which in turn would further accelerate his technological upgrades and refinements.

However, he remained quite restrained in his modification of bacteria and viruses.

After all, the mutation rate of microorganisms was too fast. If he accidentally created a super-virus and it leaked, humanity would be rolling out the red carpet for a zombie apocalypse.