"Do you really think relying on researchers can defeat those increasingly powerful and bizarre supernatural entities?" The smile on the humanoid projection's face slightly faded, asking in a serious tone to Sun Hang.

"I don't know, I'm just a Hunter. This kind of question is not something I need to consider." Sun Hang shrugged off the burden instantly.

"When I was young, I always believed that as long as our technology developed fast enough, those incomprehensible things would eventually be scientifically explained, and all tricky issues would be resolved with the progress of civilization... I witnessed the emergence of generation after generation of geniuses, each of them was extraordinarily talented, their research achievements would be enough to win Nobel Prizes in the past... With their efforts, we have gained more understanding of supernatural entities. We classified various supernatural entities, decoded many meme fragments... even applied them... But what was the outcome?"

"But what was the outcome?" Sun Hang took a sip of cola and followed up with the question.

"The range of human activity continues to shrink... I once witnessed the fall of the Yundian Region, tens of thousands of refugees flowing into Shuzhou; on the eastern side of the federation map, the boundary line symbolizing safe waters shrinks towards the continent every year; and now, Shuzhou is completely engulfed in darkness and cold... Sometimes, I wonder if everything we've done over the years has really been meaningful?"

"If we do nothing, human civilization would have perished long ago, right?" Sun Hang glanced at the humanoid projection, "Even struggling to survive requires effort. Moreover, if you look away from the border regions, people's lives seem to be pretty good... At least much better than during the era of the grand battles."

"The public indeed can look away from the border regions, but we cannot." The humanoid projection sighed, "Below the room we are in now is buried the most powerful supercomputer in human history. Dubhe Tower once spent four years using this supercomputer to establish a mathematical model - if we want to maintain the status quo, we must increase the speed of technological development more than twentyfold."

"Twentyfold? To be honest, I can understand the beverage capacity increasing by twentyfold, but the speed of technological development increasing by twentyfold... this idea is somewhat abstract." Sun Hang said, "If we could really achieve that, humans would probably have abandoned the Earth long ago, colonizing space; why bother staying on the ground fighting those supernatural entities?"

"There's something you might not know... of course, most people don't know either." The humanoid shadow said, "After years of observation and calculation, we discovered that supernatural entities don't only exist on Earth."

"Supernatural entities exist in the universe too?"

"They do." The other party nodded, "So, escaping is not a solution."

"Then according to what you just said, increasing the speed of technological development twentyfold... can it be done?" Sun Hang asked again.

"It can't." The humanoid shadow regretfully shook its head, "Since the technological explosion at the end of last century, until now, our development speed has hit a bottleneck... We tried to use supernatural entity research as a new breakthrough point, but the progress is extremely slow, and the biggest problem is... many of these research results can't be directly applied in combat."

Sun Hang couldn't help but remember Mr. Deng's earlier boasting at the press conference about those "Meme Bullets."

"Against supernatural entities, apart from the armies and weapons of the old era, there's only you Mysterious Creature Hunters as the main force... By comparison, neither Dubhe Tower nor the research institutes of various city-states have produced anything research-wise that substantially aids this war between humans and supernatural entities."

"It seems that's really the case." Sun Hang thoughtfully nodded, "Those research institutes... rather than being research institutions, I actually think they're more like management institutions."

"So, what we need now is not researchers, but..." The humanoid shadow paused, then continued, "Strong enough combat power."

"Is this like giving up?" Sun Hang couldn't help but secretly ridicule.

Can't understand the research, so simply stop researching. As long as you can harness the power of the supernatural entities, there's no need to consider those unimportant things... Sun Hang couldn't quite grasp how such a simple and crude idea would appear in the mind of the top person at Dubhe Tower?

Thinking it over, he could only conclude that these researchers studied for most of their lives, only to break themselves, fragment their moral consciousness... Just like the dangerous knowledge in the Cthulhu Mythos, the more you research, the easier you are to plunge into madness. Sometimes, it's those who kick open doors and sweep with guns who manage to survive till the end.

"Do you think I'm one of those... 'decisive forces' capable of turning the tide?" Sun Hang spit the still half-melted ice block back into the empty cup, and the mechanical arm beside him quickly refilled him another drink, "I doubt it, I can't even beat that big guy standing guard outside, not to mention, he ranked eleventh, and there are ten others stronger than him... no matter how you calculate it, it's not my turn?"

"But your growth rate is very fast." The humanoid shadow said solemnly, "From when you were infected, to passing the test and registering as a Hunter, it has only been a little over a month, yet you're already able to fight 'Iron Arm' on equal terms. This says a lot."

"Perhaps it's just my good luck."

Sun Hang did not mention in his submitted report that he had memories related to Nameless Island Research Institute in his mind, and the fishermen and Shino rescued later seemed to have memory loss, completely forgetting things related to "Anna"... After seeing the reports they submitted, Sun Hang realized his "heavily edited" version of the report was actually the most detailed among the reports from the only three survivors.

He didn't know if "Anna" erased their memories, or if the three monkeys intervened... But what puzzled Sun Hang most was the nametag engraved with "Anna Demosheva" that he brought from the research institute, had disappeared without a trace at some unknown time.

Sun Hang checked his pockets several times, a waterproof zippered sealed pocket specifically for Hunters to store important items, with no holes inside or outside, and the waterproof zipper intact, yet the nametag placed in the pocket had vanished without a trace.

Sun Hang remembered very clearly that when he sat in the landing craft delivered by Yamata Orochi back to Nameless Island beach, he specifically pressed this pocket to confirm the nametag was inside and hadn't been lost in the sea.

But when he was transported back to the warship, this pocket turned into an empty one...

Not only that, he asked the officers on the warship, and they stated they did receive several drones carrying distress signals, but the content only mentioned the Trialists were attacked by supernatural entities... The name Yamata Orochi was also "erased" from the distress signals.

The only certainty was the "curse" on Nameless Island was truly lifted, and many people landed on the island to start excavating the research institute ruins... But in Sun Hang's view, what these people were doing was undoubtedly futile.

Even if there really is important information in the ruins, it would probably be like Anna's nametag, erased by that invisible force.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.