The Genius of Cloning in the Academy City

Chapter 6: The Research Lab – Violet is an Adaptive Creature! (3)

I desperately wanted to eat the French fries that the girl-loving pig had graciously offered on the ground.

However, the fries, more precious than gold, were now in the hands of the girl-abusing ponytailed b****.

“Uh… my fries…!”

“Oh no~! Fast food is unhealthy. Let’s eat this instead!”

Hey, you ate it too! I can smell the grease wafting from your clothes!

When I reached out earnestly, the ponytail lifted her arm to avoid me.

As I stood and struggled to grab them, the ponytailed woman flung the fries behind her.

The airborne fries arced through the air, hit the wall, and bounced into the trash can.

Even the pig researcher seemed taken aback and muttered, “Uh, Doctor, I gave those to her…” but stepped back when the ponytail glared at him.

I almost dashed to the trash can.

I wanted them so badly!

But that ponytailed b**** blocked my path.

“Violet. I told you no, didn’t I?”

“Please… I just want to eat the fries…”

When I pleaded, the ponytail’s eyes briefly lost their sparkle before she pulled out the necklace switch from her lab coat pocket.

“I said no, didn’t I?”

She held the switch up for me to see.

I flinched and stepped back.

Only then did the ponytail smile, though her eyes remained lifeless.

“Violet, if you don’t listen to me, your big sister will turn into a bad person. Do you understand?”

“I’m sorry…”

‘Do you really hate giving it to me that much?’

“Good, now don’t turn your sister into a bad person again~ Instead, eat this and behave. Promise!”

She pulled out a plastic container from behind her back.

She shoved the cursed protein powder bottle in front of me.

I returned to my seat and sadly shoveled down the baby food.

The lingering aroma of fried food tormented me.

I called out to the names of the foods I missed.

Hamburger, pizza, chicken, ramen, pork cutlet, lasagna, pasta, tteokbokki, beer, a cold, tangy Screwdriver cocktail on my lips and down my throat, and then French fries, French fries, French fries…

“French fries! Hash browns!!”

What?

“Pancakes!! Bacon!! Fried eeeeggs!!!!”

-Thunk!

“Wh-What!”

“What’s going on?!”

The sudden roar and commotion left everyone—researchers, guards, and test subjects alike—bewildered.

Soon, the source of the noise became clear.

A burly, shirtless man had smashed through a glass partition and stormed in.

-Crash!

“Hey, you scumbags! How long are you going to serve this garbage as food?!”

The enraged muscleman threw a can of formula at one researcher’s face.

The hit researcher fell over with a yelp.

Ha, serves him right.

Still unsatisfied, the man slammed a nearby table with his hand, smashing it to pieces before huffing in fury.

A researcher, seemingly in charge, quickly followed him in.

“Stop it! 12-5-10! Surely, you’re not breaking the experiment contract, are you? You chose to come here!”

The muscleman glared at the researcher with fiery eyes.

“Shut up! No one told me you’d feed me crap even dogs wouldn’t touch! Give me real food now!”

“That’s a health food—”

The researcher’s excuse was cut off by the muscleman’s explosion of rage.

“Bullsh**! You eat that goat puke yourselves! Bring me steak! Or sushi!”

Yes, I agree!

I watched the scene unfold, quietly cheering for the muscleman in my heart.

The researcher, clearly flustered by the muscleman’s outburst, pulled out an electric collar switch.

“Hah, seems like words alone won’t work. 12-5-10, if you don’t step back, I’ll consider this crossing the line.”

“Oh yeah? You desk-jockey bastard. Do it! Go ahead and try!”

“You crossed the line.”

The researcher calmly activated the switch.

-Bzzzzzap!

“Arrrghhh!”

The high-voltage electricity slammed into the muscleman’s body, forcing him to his knees.

And just like that, the hero of the test subjects’ rights fell.

But astonishingly, he stood up again!

“Son of a b***h!!! Steaaaaak!!!”

“What? How?! It’s at maximum output!”

The lead researcher was aghast.

The other researchers watching also gawked in disbelief.

The muscleman, whose abilities focused on physical enhancement, emitted smoke from his body as he reached for the collar with both hands.

-Crack!

He broke the collar.

Moments later, an alarm blared throughout the corridor.

So, it also worked like an electronic anklet?

The lead researcher turned pale as he stared at the remains of the collar on the floor.

“W-What? W-Wait…! 12-5-10! T-There must be some misunderstanding!”

The researcher, trembling, tried to back away.

“Misunderstanding? What misunderstanding, you piece of sh**?!”

“Calm down..! We’re civilized people, right? Let’s solve this with words, with words…!”

The muscleman strode up, grabbed the lead researcher by both arms, and growled.

“Words? Sure, physical words, you bastard!!!”

Then, an incredible scene unfolded.

-Squish!

“Oh my God?! Aaaagh!!!”

The muscleman twisted the researcher’s arms as if wringing out a wet rag!

Human arms shouldn’t bend like that—it was grotesque and bizarre!

He then punted the screaming researcher, who crashed through multiple glass partitions and disappeared beyond.

“This is justice, you f***ing bastards!”

The other researchers and test subjects, realizing the situation had gone completely sideways, screamed and scattered.

Sensing the escalating chaos, I quickly hid behind a wall to watch.

“Emergency! Emergency! Zone 2! Subject violence incident in progress!”

Guards quickly arrived in the corridor and pointed their guns at the muscleman.

-Ratatatatata!

Bullets from pistols, shotguns, and rifles rained down on him.

He howled in pain.

“Arghhh! I’ll kill you too!!”

But even in the face of this brutal assault, he didn’t fall.

The shimmering glow of ether around his body deflected weaker threats like handgun bullets.

As expected of an awakened being, a few bullets weren’t enough to kill him.

‘I knew you could do it!’

In the blink of an eye, the muscleman charged at the guards.

-Wham! Whoosh! Thud!

His punches and kicks rained down, leaving the guards no time to aim properly.

Hmm, could this be the end of the lab?

That would be great for me—riots!

Chaos!

Destruction!

But then, the atmosphere changed.

A heavy thud resonated, followed by a deep vibration that shook the floor.

A towering figure, wearing a helmet that completely covered its face and wielding a massive sledgehammer, appeared at the corridor’s corner.

It was the black-uniformed guard, the ogre I had seen that morning.

“Everyone, stand back.”

The other guards quickly retreated behind the ogre, leaving the muscleman to face him one-on-one.

“And who the hell are you?!”

The muscleman charged at the ogre.

His ether-infused fists cut through the air and landed multiple clean strikes on the ogre’s chest.

-Thud! Bam! Bam! Bam!

The muscleman stepped back, bewildered.

The ogre stood completely unscathed.

The only damage was a slight scratch on his black vest.

“What… are you?”

The muscleman’s eyes widened in disbelief.

“You, surrender.”

“You f***er!!!”

After glancing back momentarily, the muscleman gritted his teeth and swung his fist again.

At that moment—

-Boom!

I blinked and was stunned by what I saw next.

“Ugh…!”

The spot where the muscleman had stood was now a crimson explosion.

‘He’s been crushed!’

The floor, walls, and ceiling were splattered with blood and bits of what used to be a person.

A mangled torso and legs briefly stood before collapsing.

“Clean it up.”

The ogre uttered those words and left.

Guards scrambled to clean up the injured and the dead.

Researchers peeked out of their hiding spots one by one.

Eventually, the situation was roughly resolved.

Watching the guards mop the bloodied floor, I thought to myself: I won’t forget that giant with the sledgehammer anytime soon.

‘Ah, that’s right!’

I suddenly remembered what I had forgotten and quickly checked the trash can.

‘The fries… are gone?’

They’re gone..!

The trash can had been knocked over during the muscle man’s earlier rampage, scattering its contents everywhere.

It’s really gone.

I wanted to eat it…

“Violet, are you okay?”

Wait, when did that ponytailed woman run away?

With a heavy heart, I quickly sucked on my index finger when she wasn’t looking.

I could barely taste faint traces of oil and salt.

Feeling dejected, I was dragged to the next part of the schedule.

Despite the earlier commotion, the post-lunch activities for the test subjects proceeded smoothly.

If they made us brawl in the morning, then in the afternoon, we did something resembling studying.

A kind of work-by-day-study-by-night routine.

Of course, experiments were also conducted.

During this time, they gathered us in a room with a blackboard, along with the kids I had seen earlier, for group activities.

They mainly conducted psychological tests.

They gave us multiple-choice questions to check off, intending to gauge our mental state.

I stared at the monitor of the tablet PC.

The psychological survey questions seemed strangely familiar.

Honestly, this part worried me.

What if the results of the psychological or intelligence tests came out good?

What if my clumsy act of pretending to be a fool to hide my possession was exposed here?

Would the slicked-back-haired guy or ponytail suspect me?

Unlike muscle man earlier, I didn’t have any body-strengthening skills to endure electric shocks. If I broke the electric collar, an alarm would definitely go off.

I had only one thing to rely on.

I racked my brain, recalling the shallow psychology knowledge I had learned during my major.

Help me, long-term memory!

Of course, I didn’t forget to recall fries and electric shocks for the sake of my psychological state.

Actually, there was no need to act.

I really wanted fries… That grudge will never fade!

I have many friends: Yes / No

I am happy: Yes / No

I know over 100 types of Skulkits: Yes / No

……..

When the test ended, they showed us a bunch of random videos.

For example, PR videos about Laplaxia Corporation’s social contributions or footage of hunters—yes, the same hunters from hunter novels—fighting monsters.

The other test subject kids stared blankly at their tablets.

The atmosphere was so dull it felt like my brain was becoming mush, too.

With a beep, the monitor turned off.

Study time was over.

Thankfully, the researchers didn’t run us ragged all day.

They all seemed to clock out before late evening.

When the day’s schedule ended, the researchers led the test subjects to the showers.

Laplaxia prided itself on being a biotech company, so they seemed to value hygiene.

And since they cherished valuable test subjects, they didn’t disguise a gas chamber as a shower room, thankfully!

Truly a relief.

We undressed and shuffled in like zombies, along with the other teenage test subjects.

“Ugh! It’s cold!”

Though they called it a shower room, it was more like a car wash without hot water.

A quick rinse with water, a layer of soap suds midway, and then another rinse to finish.

As I silently endured the cold water, the scars on the kids’ backs caught my eye.

Some had scars running from the back of their heads to their foreheads.

What kind of experiments had they undergone?

As we left the shower area, strong winds blasted at us. Then we each grabbed a worn-out towel to dry ourselves.

After completing this process, we exited and changed into new patient gowns and underwear.

We returned to our dormitories.

Inside, there were bottles of formula.

I gulped mine down hastily and sat at the desk with nothing to do.

How much time had passed?

The sound of a music box echoed through the speakers.

It was an announcement telling the test subjects to stop thinking and just sleep.

‘I survived another day.’

I had repeated this routine dozens of times, far more than I could count.

It felt just like the monotonous training schedule from my past life in the military.

Yes, today was the first time I had encountered incidents like the ogre guard crushing a rebellious person with a sledgehammer or meeting a fry-hoarding, mischief-loving girl.

And leveling up and gaining new skills were definitely noteworthy developments.

Yes, I could clearly see the path ahead.

A way to escape the powerless existence of a girl.

But regardless of the progress, if I didn’t break out of this routine soon, I’d go mad.

Exhausted, I collapsed onto the bed. But I quickly sat back up.

The reason lay in my chest.

‘This is uncomfortable…’

The full and bouncy chest was truly beautiful, even from my perspective.

It was amazing how it maintained its elasticity and size despite being fed only baby formula so far.

Moreover, it was so soft that touching it felt nice.

Not in a weird way!

I sometimes touched it at night when I felt down, so I knew.

It wasn’t anything strange.

But it was heavy and clumsy.

There was also a major issue.

When I lay on my stomach like now, my chest was squashed, making it hard to breathe.

When I switched to lying on my back, my chest wobbled under its own weight and spread out gently.

It was like two elastic puddings on a shaking plate, quivering at the slightest movement.

I kept adjusting my position and eventually settled on lying on my side.

This had been the most comfortable sleeping posture since I became a woman.

I lay down and pulled the blanket over myself.

Now that I wasn’t busy during the day, thoughts that had been dormant in my mind bubbled to the surface.

Sleep eluded me.

‘What should I do next?’

The scary thing about military life is that no matter how shocking it is at first, you eventually adapt.

And I was adapting to this bizarre research facility world.

Electric shocks burning my neck, people dying or becoming bloodied, fighting strange monsters, and being harassed by weird middle-aged women—all of it had become familiar.

I had become buried in the daily routine.

‘And sometimes, I become strange, almost like a manic patient.’

Even though this body was clearly female, I had once lived decades as a man.

That’s why going to the bathroom still felt awkward.

But lately, I found myself doing bizarre things, like muttering, ‘I’m a beautiful girl,’ to myself.

It felt like my mood swings were becoming more extreme.

Was it a hormonal change? Or was there someone else inside my head?

The original owner of this body? Or just psychological confusion?

No, let’s not overthink it.

If I went that far, I’d have to discuss dualism, the existence of the soul, and the truth of dimension travel.

There’s no answer to that.

It was more important to focus on what I needed to do.

I memorized everything I had seen today.

The electric collar, muscle man, ogre, siren, and even my grudges…

I pulled the blanket over my head and closed my eyes.

The sound of the patrolling guard’s footsteps faded down the corridor.

Thus, another day in the research facility came to an end.

“Alright, they must be gone by now.”

The research facility’s day had ended, and now my night had begun.

There was a lot to do starting today.

“Operation Violet Escape begins now!”