Mermaid Effect 《人鱼效应》 Chinese BL Translation by: 黑猫白袜子

Chapter 19

Chapter 19

In fact, the first person to realize that something was happening is Ryan.

They were conducting a few necessary investigations in Area #3 (although in reality, all investigations are necessary). At Ryan's request, Simon had no choice but to transfer out some of the finished goods of the projects that had been conducted here to put on display for Ryan to take a look, a few of the post-transformed marine life, dolphins, tiger sharks and tuna.

Siren cells possess an ability that seems to have been blessed by God and their cleverness makes people feel a sense of dread. It is simply just like possessing a kind of intelligence that can remold itself to adapt to any environment. Every single person in the SIREN-II Laboratory is desiring this ability like addicts desiring drugs. As expected, a large number of experiments have brought about countless grotesque creatures that don't fall in line with the rules of this world.

For example, dolphins with hardened scales or the mini tiger shark with a body size of only 30 centimeters... The most shocking thing is the tuna, which was as flat as a slab, looks as if someone kneaded a crude human face on plasticine.

"For God's sake," Simon dragged its petri dish out of the thermostatic chamber, he showed a disgusted expression after looking at the other party, "I don't think I'll be able to eat tuna sushi ever again."

Of course, the animals that are still left here up until now are just some "little playthings". The forms that have real research value have already been transported to other secret laboratories along with the evacuees beforehand. This is also the reason why Simon is so straightforward. These are all the result of the successful fusion of a common species and Siren cells, but they don't have the slightest significance for practical purposes.

Meaningless is directly equivalent to harmlessness and rendering the Siren Project's results to be harmless has always been the impression that the Deep White Corporation attempted to give to the government. This is a somewhat self-contradictory decision for a company that develops secret biological weapons— but Simon never felt like reflecting on these things. The current him simply wishes that Ryan will wrap up this meaningless investigation quicker and then fuck off back to Washington.

Ryan approached the human-faced tuna, his fingers lightly skimmed across the glass wall.

The fish turned his face sluggishly, it's vacuous gaze would make one feel frightened, especially when it has a flattened grotesque and botched human face grown on it. The Uncanny Valley Effect seemed to have been infinitely amplified.

(TN: The Uncanny Valley is a hypothesized relationship between the degree of an object's resemblance to a human being and the emotional response to such an object. E.g. the more human something looks the creepier it is to humans. Just like how some people are afraid of life-like dolls or robots.)

Simon walked over and shot it a glance, pursing his brows and muttering something to himself with some perplexion.

"Oh, it..."

"What happened?"

Ryan vigilantly looked up at Simon and the latter shrugged his shoulders at him.

"It's nothing, I just think that the state of a few of these little guys is a little dispirited, it's not a huge issue or anything... I don't believe those who were left behind to handle things are careful people. I think I'll go check the constitution of the culture solution later. There may be an issue there..."

A sudden wave of nausea hit Ryan's stomach like a hammer right at that time. His knees lost all their strength in that split-second and his whole body leaned to the side, his shoulder knocked against the Petri dish of the human-faced fish.