After parking the car in the open space in front of the rangerâs cabin, Everly skillfully climbed in through the window, unlocked the tightly shut door from the inside, and entered the dust-covered cabin together with Misha.
In theory, since this location was part of a horror film that had already concluded, the cabin should have become completely safe after the girlsâ lingering spirits dissipated.
However, just to be cautious, Everly and Misha still inspected every roomâincluding the basementâmaking sure there were no hidden dangers.
That search brought an unexpected surpriseâthere was a diesel generator in the storage room. The fuel tank was still more than half full, and it was fully functional!
After a bit of effort, they got the generator running and turned on the lights. The dim cabin immediately brightened up, and even charging their phones and other electronic devices was no longer a problem.
Taking advantage of how remote the place was, they kept the lights on and thoroughly cleaned the living room and one bedroom. By dusk, having worked together to tidy up what would be their future residence, the two girls finally had some free time and began preparing dinner in the kitchen with their newly purchased stove.
Worried that the water outside might be contaminated, they used bottled mineral water. Of course, considering that SSU had already spread into the United States for nearly half a year, even mineral water wasnât guaranteed to be completely safe. So before cooking their instant noodles, they first poured the water into a pot and boiled it. Only after it had been bubbling vigorously for several minutes did they add the noodles, sausages, and other small ingredients.
Most parasites are afraid of high temperatures. Thoroughly cooking food and water at high heat before consuming it can greatly reduce the risk of infection.
After dinner and washing the dishes, the two of them turned on their phones and began catching up on the news online.
That afternoon, shortly after Gracie died in public on the field, police and medical personnel arrived at the scene and sent everyoneâincluding Gracieâs body and all the injured who claimed they had been attacked by white ribbonsâto the hospital.
At present, the police are still investigating the cause of the incident and the true nature of the white ribbons, and are unable to disclose any details to the public. The hospital that admitted the patients has also gone into lockdown, refusing all interviews and visitations.
Although the police have revealed nothing, after an afternoon of rapid online spread, all kinds of speculation about Gracieâs death have already emerged across the internet.
Some suspect the video was made with special effectsâa âfake newsâ stunt by a film company trying to attract attention. Others have proposed the old clichĂ© of a cult sacrifice, believing that some evil force was backing Gracie with the goal of destroying the world. Some are convinced that aliens had parasitized her body, intending to use her as a medium to invade EarthâŠ
Of course, there are also more knowledgeable individuals who enlarged the white ribbon in the video countless times, recognized that it resembled a tapeworm, and thus speculated that a tapeworm inside Gracie had mutated for some reason and crawled out to attack people.
From Everlyâs perspective, this netizenâs guess was actually extremely close to the truth. Unfortunately, there are plenty of fools onlineâand even more who think theyâre clever.
When people saw that âtapeworm theory,â most responded with âhaha,â assuming the person was joking. Some were more harshârelying on a bit of biological knowledge, they pointed out differences between real-world tapeworms and the one in the video, and mocked the user relentlessly in the replies.
Everly had no intention of going online to reveal anything.
Based on experience, when something involves large corporations, itâs best not to get involved unless your own interests are directly affected. The power of capital is immenseâjust a slight push, and the lever of fairness and justice tilts toward those in power. If a pharmaceutical company were to sue her for infringement or defamation over her online statements, wouldnât she just be asking for trouble?
Besides, even if she revealed the truth, who would believe her? The last person who claimed the white ribbons were mutated tapeworms had already been flamed into silenceâshe had no desire to humiliate herself the same way.
After looking for quite a while and finding nothing useful, Everly simply tossed her phone aside and sat down next to Misha. She watched as Misha patiently messaged each of her close friends one by one, earnestly warning them to be careful about what they consumed, to guard against parasites, andâif possibleâto stock up on some black pillsâŠ
Out of concerns similar to Everlyâs, Misha didnât dare to be too explicit. As a result, most of her friends probably wouldnât take her advice seriously. Still, thereâs a difference between trying and doing nothing at all.
And not everyone dismissed herâafter receiving Mishaâs message, Orff immediately replied with a âGot it,â and about ten minutes later messaged again to say he had already ordered an electric kettle and a few black pills online, asking if Misha needed any.
This guy⊠he really gets it.
Thinking of Orffâs hidden identity, Everlyâs eyes shifted as she suddenly came up with a good idea.
She nudged Mishaâs side with her elbow. âHey, Mishaâtell Orff to secretly look into the investigation progress on Gracieâs case, both from the police and from Rakucho Pharmaceuticals.â
âGot it.â Misha responded crisply, her fingers tapping rapidly on the screen.
Orff replied as quickly as ever: [Got it, Iâll get back to you in 20 minutes! (smiley face) (smiley face)]
In the end, it didnât even take 20 minutes before Misha received confidential information Orff had obtained through illegal channels.
The police investigation was progressing rather slowly.
They had performed an autopsy on Gracieâs body and found that she was severely malnourished. Despite her young age, her body seemed completely drained. In her intestines, the forensic team also discovered a dense mass of unhatched eggs.
The autopsy image was particularly disturbing. Inside the opened intestines were clusters of tiny white granules, packed together like grains of rice. They clung to every fold of the intestinal lining, smooth and glossyâjust a single glance was enough to make oneâs skin crawl.
After examining the eggs under a microscope, the forensic examiner concluded that they belonged to tapeworms. The white ribbon-like creatures that had burrowed into the bodies of people at the scene were also confirmed to be a mutated form of tapeworm.
However, where exactly these tapeworms came from, and why they had taken up residence inside Gracie, remained unclear to the police.
Compared to the slow progress of the police, Rakucho Pharmaceuticalsâthe very source of the chaosâwas able to provide more useful information.
After successfully launching its product in the United States, Rakucho Pharmaceuticals had established a branch there. As soon as Gracieâs video began spreading online, the branch quickly sensed that something was wrong and quietly initiated an internal investigation.
According to their findings, Gracie first came into contact with SSU capsules at the end of December last year. From December through May of this year, she strictly followed the instructions, regularly purchasing and taking the pink capsules.
However, in early May, due to financial difficulties, Gracie briefly stopped taking the pink capsules. Later, after feeling unwell, she resumed regular useâand in one go ordered 12 pink capsules and 1 white capsule from the official website.
âYes, thatâs right. The $2000 Misha lent to Gracie was not used to purchase the 10 pink capsules and 1 black capsule needed to complete the treatment cycle for the month. Instead, it was spent on 12 pink capsules and an additional white capsule!
No one knows why Gracie did this. Perhaps her fear of gaining weight ran too deep. Perhaps she thought it didnât matter if she skipped the black capsule that was meant to eliminate the ânanobots.â Or perhaps there was some other reasonâbut instead of buying the black capsule, she used the money to purchase a second white capsule.
So, without taking the black capsule to eliminate the parasites, she consumed a second capsule containing eggs? Could this be the reason why so many mutated tapeworms suddenly emerged from her body? But even so, there were far too many tapeworms inside her. Could others who had taken the white capsule be experiencing the same thing?
With a head full of questions, Everly kept reading.
Gracieâs abnormal condition was clearly something even the pharmaceutical company itself hadnât anticipated. After the situation was reported to the R&D department, the researchers requested samples of the eggs or tapeworms from Gracieâs body for detailed study. At present, the companyâs management was trying to contact the police and hospitals in Dalami City, planning to use certain means to obtain research samples.
The information available within Rakucho Pharmaceuticals ended thereâfor more of the truth, they would have to wait until they got their hands on those samples.
Orff: [No wonder you told me to watch out for parasites and stock up on black pills, Mishaâyouâre so kind and thoughtful!]
Orff: [(Thanks) (Thanks) (Thanks)]
Scrolling further, the rest was just Orff showering her with all kinds of praise and gratitude. Everly couldnât stand to look at it anymore and quickly stuffed the phone back into Mishaâs handsâout of sight, out of mind.
âŠ
After spending the night in the cabin, Everly woke up the next day to shocking newsâmore people had died in the same gruesome way as Gracie, their bodies hollowed out by parasites.
This time, the victims were those who had been infected by the tapeworms from Gracie the previous dayânot just one, but six people.
A total of 29 injured individuals had been admitted to Dalami Central Hospital the day before. Among them, 11 had been hospitalized due to trampling, falls, and similar incidents, suffering only minor external injuriesâthey were treated and discharged shortly after. The remaining 18, however, had been parasitized by the mutated tapeworms that emerged from Gracie and were placed in special wards.
Because there were too few doctors and not enough understanding of the mutated tapewormsâ behavior, there were concerns that administering medication or performing surgery might provoke the parasites and cause irreversible consequences. As a result, the 18 infected patients received no treatment after being admitted and remained under observation.
By evening, the 18 patients showed two completely different conditions: 12 of them had only minor scratches in the esophagus and felt unusually hungry, but otherwise showed no abnormalities for the time being. The other 6, however, began experiencing abdominal bloating and pain, with some suffering from persistent nausea and dry heaving.
Doctors conducted examinations on those six patients and concluded that the parasites inside them might not yet have adapted to the new environment, which was causing the symptoms. They believed the condition would resolve on its own once the parasites adapted. So they gave the six patients painkillers, and after the patients fell asleep, no further action was taken.
During the night, nurses made several rounds of checks, going from room to room, and found nothing unusual.
But in the early hours of the morning, a piercing scream suddenly came from one of the wards.
When the on-duty nurses and police officers outside heard the cry and rushed into the room, it was like a replay of what had happened on the field the previous afternoon. On the hospital bed, a patient was convulsing, eyes wide open, mouth stretched wide as she vomited blood in large amounts.
A mutated tapeworm as thick as a wrist was forcing her mouth open, wriggling its way out from her throat.
The lower half of the patientâs body had already soaked the thin bedsheet with blood. Beneath the blanket, aside from the outline of her legs, something else could be seen writhing beneath the fabric.
Clearly, it wasnât just from her mouthâtapeworms were emerging from another part of her body as well.