’What is this?’

Li Tongchen frowned.

Although he was over fifty, he hadn’t lost touch with popular culture. He even played the occasional mobile game and had dealt with his fair share of spam.

’These game companies are getting more and more ridiculous. Forcibly installing an app on someone’s phone?’

He’d been in a foul mood for the past few days, so he didn’t even bother looking at it and just tossed the phone back into his pocket.

’Whatever the problem is, it can wait until I get home tonight.’

Right now, he had to review a file he had just received from the Polar Research Center.

To be precise, it was an email.

Li Tongchen went to his office, turned on his work computer, and cautiously downloaded a file from the internal system.

It had been just over two days since the disease first appeared and was diagnosed. The Ice Dragon Expedition Team’s research project had always been top secret, so he hadn’t been privy to much of the information at the beginning.

It wasn’t until reports of severe cases came from Eagle Country that the higher-ups at the Ocean Bureau, after weighing their options, decided to grant him access to this information.

And it had only reached him after passing through multiple layers of approval.

As the medical lead for this epidemic response, Li Tongchen understood this completely.

After all, even now, the expedition team members’ symptoms weren’t very severe—just some hardening and plaque-like formation of the skin.

Li Tongchen had been paying some attention to the Ice Dragon Expedition Team’s Arctic expedition and its major discoveries.

The discoveries from this expedition were significant enough to be ranked among the top ten scientific finds of the century.

He had expected further large-scale operations, but instead, the Ice Dragon Expedition Team had abruptly halted their activities and permanently sealed off the ruin site.

This letter, he was told, was the main reason the Ice Dragon Expedition Team had permanently sealed the ruins and ceased further exploration.

Even the decision to immediately lock down the entire Polar Center building and implement high-level quarantine measures after team members showed symptoms was because of this letter.

Li Tongchen opened the email, and a large block of text immediately appeared on the screen.

There was no formatting, no salutation—just a single line of text at the top:

"Report on the Effects of the Stone Statue Virus on Human Tissue"

It was an experimental report.

’Petrification Disease?’

’The name doesn’t seem as fitting as "self-limiting acute hemorrhagic-like syndrome."’

After all, the patients’ current symptoms were merely hardened, plaque-like skin and accompanying arthritis. That was a far cry from turning into a stone statue.

Li Tongchen’s brow furrowed slightly as he continued to read.

"...Analysis of the Stone Statue Virus from the ruins in the Arctic Ice Sheet shows that when temperatures rise, some of the remaining Stone Statue Virus will reactivate and spread through the air as an aerosol...

...The virus is extremely contagious. Once infected, an individual will continuously secrete viral aerosols while their body undergoes pathological changes...

Below are the recorded statuses of a patient who turned into a stone statue:

Day 1: Mild cough. No specific symptoms other than slight skin itchiness...

...

Day 9: Joints have begun to stiffen, accompanied by non-continuous popping sounds. Skin elasticity has decreased rapidly; indentations from pressure take about three hours to recover...

...

Day 19: Forcing movement causes skin to crack. Joints...

...

Day 23: Mobility is severely limited. The skin on the body’s surface has begun to show signs of petrification...

...

Day 30: Condition deteriorates rapidly! Within ten minutes, the remainder of the patient’s body completely petrifies. Loss of vital signs..."

The more Li Tongchen read, the colder he felt, his face turning pale.

In addition to the case record, the report contained detailed descriptions of the Stone Statue Virus. One part mentioned infected skin cells exhibiting an interwoven fibrous structure filled with a large amount of crystalline material—exactly what he had just seen under the microscope!

He had been pressing his contacts in Eagle Country for data on severe cases of "self-limiting acute hemorrhagic-like syndrome," but they had been evasive and uncooperative, providing no information at all.

Now, it seemed the condition of severely ill patients was just as this document described.

’If this is true, this virus is absolutely terrifying!’

No wonder the Polar Center had directly applied for the highest-level quarantine measures. They were clearly flying blind.

After being tempered by various large-scale epidemics, everyone in the nation had a natural vigilance. The prevailing attitude was to err on the side of caution.

Li Tongchen thought for a moment, then picked up the secure-line phone on his desk and dialed the number for the highest level of the medical system. 𝒻𝑟𝘦𝘦𝘸ℯ𝒷𝑛𝘰𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝘤𝘰𝘮

After quickly reporting the situation, he directly requested more personnel and stricter quarantine measures.

He then called the senior management at the Polar Center to ask about the source of the file.

However, the person on the other end just told him with a wry smile that the email had suddenly appeared in the Polar Center’s internal network system, and no one knew where it came from.

There was nothing besides the case reports and experimental data inside; it was like a sudden prank.

At first, the email really was almost dismissed as a prank. However, the Stone Statue Virus it described was too terrifying and closely matched the characteristics of the virus they had extracted from the stone statues. The expedition’s accompanying biologist realized the severity of the situation, explained the stakes, and they immediately implemented the lockdown and quarantine.

Unexpectedly, they were still too late. Many people had already been infected.

"Old Li, it’s all up to you now... The Ice Dragon Expedition Team is the nation’s top research team. Every member is a huge investment to train. Losing even one is an immense loss," the voice on the other end said with a wry laugh. It sounded like he twisted his neck, and a series of sharp CRACKS followed.

Li Tongchen agreed verbally, but after hanging up the phone, his expression was terrifyingly grim.

He felt as if a mountain had been pressed down on his heart.

He now understood the virus’s characteristics from his own tests and the report. If this data was real, then even the highest-level quarantine measures would be useless.

The virus could penetrate protective suits! Even suits with excellent aerosol-blocking capabilities were useless.

Protective suits effective against the Ebola virus were like being naked in the face of the Stone Statue Virus.

At the same time, the Stone Statue Virus was extremely resilient, a fact made clear by the discovery of live viruses on a polar stone statue hundreds of thousands of years old.

And it only took a minuscule amount of the virus to cause infection.

If the document’s descriptions were accurate, this was likely the most terrifying virus he had ever encountered.

The fatality rate was basically one hundred percent. It had a long incubation period, was extremely contagious, showed no specific early symptoms, and didn’t even cause particularly severe harm to the body until the mid-stages.

Not until the final, explosive outbreak!

Even the Black Death of human history seemed like a common cold virus in comparison.

Time... there was simply not enough time to develop a vaccine, unless they could get their hands on the vaccine’s components immediately.

’Oh, good God...’

Li Tongchen’s body trembled slightly. Most people had yet to realize the horror of the Petrification Disease, but he understood it completely.

The deeper his medical expertise and the richer his experience, the more clearly he understood what kind of monster the Stone Statue Virus truly was.

There was hardly anyone he could even turn to for help.

He was already the most authoritative doctor in the field...

He couldn’t help but recall his time as a young attending physician on the front lines, fighting SARS.

Back then, even though many treatments had severe side effects, they could at least save the patients’ lives. It wasn’t a situation of complete, helpless despair.

But now... he could only pray that the information in that file was wrong, that it was all just someone’s twisted prank.

Yet his professional knowledge as a doctor told him it was no prank. All of it was real.

Tugging open his collar, Li Tongchen took a few deep breaths to steady his emotions and looked at the file again.

He needed to read it over several times, check for any missed details, and see if there were any clues within.

To his disappointment, when he reached the end again, it was still the same as before.

The tone of the person who wrote the report was also steeped in deep despair, as if they understood that the situation was hopeless.

He had now scrolled to the very bottom of the file, but there was still nothing new.

Suddenly, Li Tongchen’s eyes swept over a small icon in the bottom corner of the file, and he shuddered.

It was a blood-red eye, seemingly an insignia left by the sender.

He scrambled frantically to the coat rack, fumbled for his phone in his pocket, and turned it on.

The blood-red eye icon immediately appeared before him, identical to the one in the file.

The eye seemed to hold a mischievous glint, waiting for him to click it.

True Apocalypse Game.

Welcome.