I Explore Urban Legends - Chapter 117: Don’t Participate in Medical Experiments Lightly (Patreon)

At Balankov’s bar, everyone carried Leslie into a back room, laid him on a sofa, and gathered around to discuss his condition.

Liam spoke first.

“I’ve encountered Blood Servants before. I think they had the same strange smell.”

Balankov shook his head.

“No. He isn’t a Blood Servant. I can sense it. There’s no mark of the Blood Clan inside his body.”

Leslie suddenly cut in.

“Mr. Liam, could you help me out? Everything looks a little dizzy from this angle.”

Liam had assumed Leslie should have been dead by now. Since he was somehow still alive, Liam reached over and straightened his head.

“Snap!”

Once his head was back in place, Leslie sat upright.

Then his head flopped forward again, forcing him to hold it up with one hand.

Seeing this, Evan glanced at his two female classmates. Neither of them looked particularly well either.

He finally worked up the courage to ask,

“Liam, should we step outside? It sounds like you’re about to discuss something confidential.”

Liam turned toward Evan and the others and said solemnly,

“You’re free to leave, of course, if you can’t bear the weight of the truth.”

Evan took a deep breath.

He understood what Liam meant.

Every truth came with a price. Whether he could bear that price would determine whether he was capable of becoming a real journalist.

And becoming a journalist was exactly why he had joined the TV station.

He took another deep breath and prepared himself to learn the truth.

Balankov glanced at Evan.

They didn’t particularly care whether their identities were exposed.

Given their current circumstances, it was honestly hard to say which identity was more dangerous, mob boss or Vampire.

Their attention returned to Leslie.

Liam thought they should focus on his unusual body first.

“When did you first realize that injuries couldn’t kill you?”

“Ever since I decided I wanted to become a serial killer.”

“And when did you start wanting to become a serial killer?”

At that question, Leslie’s eyes went vacant as he struggled to remember.

A long time passed before he finally spoke.

“I think I remember something. Yeah... I remember now. I started having these thoughts after I volunteered to test some drugs for a company.”

“What company?”

“Abraham Biotech.”

Them again?

Liam immediately remembered the Reptilian laboratory.

After that night, he had passed by the laboratory several times and found it completely abandoned. Even the sign had been removed.

He had originally assumed the lab mainly existed to cultivate Reptilians and synthetic beasts.

Apparently, they had quite a few other research projects as well.

“Can you tell me what kind of trial you participated in?”

“But I signed a non-disclosure agreement. If I reveal anything without permission, I’ll have to pay damages.”

“That company already shut down.”

“What? They never even paid me the rest of my money. Those bastards!”

Leslie immediately sank into despair.

Only then was he finally willing to explain the trial.

“They told me the pills were just a new kind of cold medicine with no side effects.

“I was short on money at the time, so I asked whether they had any drugs that paid more. They told me they followed humanitarian principles and would never test drugs with serious side effects on humans.”

They even cheated people out of money like that.

Liam sighed inwardly.

Still, with things already this far along, all he could do was keep asking questions.

“Did anyone from the company tell you anything else?”

Leslie shook his head.

“At first, I went back regularly to report on my physical condition. But after a few days, I just forgot all about it.”

So that was it.

The drug seemed to affect the brain, rapidly degrading his memory.

“Balankov, the drug came from a company jointly operated by Reptilians and Vampires. I think you should examine him.”

Balankov immediately frowned.

He hadn’t expected this to actually involve Vampires.

He reached toward Leslie’s chest and pushed.

His entire hand sank straight into Leslie’s body.

Leslie stared wide-eyed as the large hand moved around inside him before reaching up toward his neck.

“Snap!”

“I fixed your neck.”

Balankov spoke without the slightest change in expression.

Leslie hurriedly shook his head.

Sure enough, it was fine now.

“Thank you so much. I didn’t expect you to be such a good person.”

“If you think I’m a good person, buy a copy of my War Thunder cartridge.”

After finishing his sales pitch, Balankov turned toward Liam.

“He really is a Blood Servant. But how did this happen?”

Liam thought about it for a moment but came up with nothing.

So he stopped trying.

“Do you have anyone here with a background in biology or medicine? They might know more.”

Balankov understood immediately.

He walked over to the telephone in the corner, picked up the receiver, and began making calls.

“Sergei, you have medical experience, right? Good. Come over here. I know you’re driving a taxi right now, but this is important.”

“Oleg, I remember you have a degree in biology. Yes, I know you have a PhD. You don’t need to remind me. Put the cooking job on hold and come here. I need your expertise.”

After finishing the calls, Balankov let out a long breath.

Then he turned and found everyone staring at him.

“What are you looking at? Nobody here recognizes our qualifications. We have to make a living somehow.”

Everyone remained silent.

Half an hour later, two Eastern European men walked in.

“Is there a patient? Let me make one thing clear first. If we get arrested, don’t mention my name.”

Balankov shook his head and pointed at Leslie.

“If it were something that minor, I wouldn’t have called you. Sergei, go examine him.”

Sergei gave Balankov a puzzled look, then walked over to Leslie.

The moment he got close, his expression changed.

“You planning to expand your territory here? You’re even recruiting local subordinates now?

“Wait. No. He has no master!”

Liam added,

“He became like this after taking some drugs.”

That immediately drew Oleg over as well.

The two of them began thoroughly examining Leslie.

Leslie looked nervous, but there was nothing he could do.

Even he understood by now that something had been very wrong with those pills.

If he wanted to stay alive, he had no choice but to let these men examine him however they pleased.

After a while, Sergei stood up, his expression grave.

“He really is a Blood Servant. But he formed naturally.”

Balankov immediately stared at him in disbelief.

“That doesn’t make sense. Aren’t Blood Servants created through the power of blood energy?”

Sergei nodded.

“You’re talking about the traditional method. That transformation causes irreversible changes to the Blood Servant’s organs so the body can adapt.

“But his body has undergone those same changes on its own, without any help from blood energy.”

Oleg continued,

“In other words, the drug he took can directly transform an ordinary human into a Blood Servant.”

Balankov stared at them in disbelief after hearing the horrifying conclusion.

“What the hell are they trying to do?”