My Cell Prison - Chapter 1

Chapter 1: Chapter 1 – A Mysterious Prison

Translator: Exodus Tales

Editor: Exodus Tales

Sewage water dirtied with bacteria sloshed and flowed. Deep in a disused prison cell…

*SMACK*

A mass of cells wrapped in a membrane of plasma detached itself from a certain corpse.

This mass of cells was no larger than the size of a human index finger, looking no different to a blob of mucus and snot, and yet it seemed to be capable of independent thought and movement.

But because its nervous system was not fully developed, it lacked any of the five senses.

However, when the mass of cells came into contact with foreign objects, it could obtain basic information of the object through its special technique: intercellular signal transmission.

The mass of cells that separated did not stop for long as it began moving.

To put it simply, this movement could be achieved through actin production.

This mass of cells that was no bigger than a finger began carrying out its extremely slow ‘migration’, its speed similar to that of a snail.

“No… It’s not sufficiently ideal, and it’s not what I want either.”

It was as if the mass of cells consciously abandoned the seemingly fit and intact corpse, before continuing in its search through the prison…

If there was a bundle of torches that could provide lighting, you would have discovered that in this huge prison, there were almost a hundred corpses that had been abandoned by the mass of cells.

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The mass of cells was not autonomously formed.

It had a name: Han Dong.

He was an overseas Chinese associate professor from the School of Life Sciences at the University of Florence before he turned 31 and found himself condensed into this mass of cells.

It was the 21st of July, 2018 when he had died of lung cancer in the Florence Central Hospital.

The ward he was in was filled with fresh flowers, and they had all come from his students, none from his family.

The moment before he died, as the pain and suffering from his condition disappeared, all Han Dong felt was a sense of relief.

There was no heading to the gates of heaven or being banished to hell. There was also no drinking of the Five-Flavored Tea of Forgetfulness or walking across the Naihe bridge to experience the so-called reincarnation. All that greeted him was just endless darkness.

Nevertheless, he maintained his consciousness throughout this process.

“Am I dead or alive?! When humans die, their brains would continue to remain active for five minutes… But I’ve already been dead for a whole hour by now, right?”

Han Dong’s sense of time was extremely strong, so he was very certain just how long it had been since his death seeing as he was conscious the entire time.

He slowly tried to become aware of his ‘body’, but who would have guessed that the image of a mass of cells floated into his consciousness.

There were only two things that could do this.

Firstly, it was through the ‘intercellular signal transmission’ that he could sense the information of the objects that he came into contact with.

Secondly, it was through the actin production that gave it the capacity to move.

And in that first instance of Han Dong generated actin within his cells, when he performed a relevant activity, a burst of system alerts echoed in his mind.

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Please choose an appropriate carrier from inside this Prison. The maximum load value you have is [100].

If you are unhappy with your selection, you may send it to the Processing Chamber and go through the cellular separation process.

Unless you are in your cellular form, you will not be able to move or transfer to other prisoner corpses.

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A floor plan of the prison also surfaced in Han Dong’s consciousness.

It consisted of a single level, with a total of 204 jail cells.

The floor plan even had points that were lit up with annotations, with each cell marking the corresponding prisoner, with a simple single worded note next to them: [Deceased].

Furthermore, the center of the entire prison had a red marked door called ‘Management Office’, which was locked.

Han Dong was currently in the room called ‘Processing Chamber’.

“Is this a foreign prison? Resurrection after death? Just what exactly am I?”

These questions did not bother Han Dong for too long, however.

As someone who had been on the cutting edges of sciences for a long time, his ability to accept new circumstances and concepts was very strong.

He had very quickly processed the fact that he was an independent mass of cells within a protective membrane, even though he was uncertain just how a mass of cells would be able to possess independent thought or bear consciousness.

Cells were the basic building blocks in biological life, and that was proof enough that he was still alive.

“Did the so-called death transmigration happen to me? Plus, I transmigrated into a mass of cells? How ironic.”

Han Dong had dedicated his life toward the research and study of cellular biology, and he had even published an article on cells in a top international journal, about activating and controlling the effect of cell regulation through genetic coding half a year ago 

It was because of that article that Han Dong got his post as an associate professor, and it was also how he detected his late stage lung cancer during the school physical examination… Afflicted by the heartless assault from the cancer cells, his bright future was cut short.

Yet, he who should have completely lost all sense of consciousness when he died his mortal death had instead been rebirthed into a living mass of cells.

————————————

Not hesitating for long, Han Dong considered the fact that even a mass of cells needed to replenish its energy in order to remain active, his most important job at the moment was to follow that mysterious system’s instruction and search for a ‘suitable carrier.

Going by what was written on the map, Han Dong used the extremely slow ‘crawl’ it had to head toward the nearest prison cell.

With a movement speed that was akin to a snail’s pace, he wasted a whole day accomplishing this.

By pairing with the map inside his consciousness, using the shiny dot that represented himself, Han Dong plotted the shortest possible route to the nearest prison cell, and that was the first time that he came in contact with the prisoner’s corpse inside.

“It’s a good thing I’ve got a map indicator, otherwise I would be in real trouble considering how I’ve lost all five senses…”

The instant that he came into contact with the corpse, the image of a complete human body was immediately displayed in Han Dong’s sea of consciousness, accompanied by a detailed text annotation that he could view and read up on at the same time

***************************

Frank Campbell (An Underworld Brawler in his previous life)

[Head] Inferior quality, load requirement: 5

[Left Arm] Normal quality, load requirement: 11

[Right Arm] High quality, equipped with the Rapid Punches technique, load requirement: 23

[Torso] Normal quality, load requirement: 13

[Left Leg] Normal quality, load requirement: 11

[Right Leg] Normal quality, load requirement: 14}

***************************

This series of information was fed into Han Dong’s consciousness.

“The prisoner seemed to have undergone ‘special treatment’ before he died, thus his corpse has not rotted yet, which allows me to occupy and assume control. The previous prompt I got mentioned that if I was unhappy with the carrier, I could return to the Processing Chamber and discard it, choosing another carrier again. There are still plenty of alternative choices abound, so it’s necessary to use one of these to better understand my present circumstances.”

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Please confirm that you would like to obtain Frank Cambell’s complete body. The required load value is 77.

***************************

Confirm!

In an instant, the mass of cells melded on the surface of the prisoner’s corpse and entered the body, and Han Dong was shortly integrated into it, restoring vitality to the once dead corpse.

First was the tinnitus that reverberated in his mind.

Then right after, it was the sensation of the ice cold stone slab that his entire body was touching… This meant that his nervous system was completely intact.

The simple prison cell he was in, made out of black rock and steel, came into view. His vision was restored.

Just as Han Dong planned to investigate and properly analyze this mysterious prison he was in, to infer just how he had been reborn, and just what sort of secret was hidden inside this strange and curious place, he felt his head buzz as his entire person suddenly froze.

Han Dong propped himself up against the wall for support with one hand, gritted his teeth, and let loose an angry roar!

“THIS GUY IS INTELLECTUALLY HANDICAPPED!”

Han Dong felt extremely uncomfortable after he completely took over Frank Campbell’s body. Because his five senses had recovered and he was able to garner information from his surroundings, he realized that something was wrong the moment he took a step out and wanted to use his brain and engage in some complex mental processing. This was a huge problem!

Han Dong’s consciousness was of the youngest associate professor in the School of Life Sciences from a renowned university, an existence who was acknowledged as a dominating force in the world of knowledge and learning.

Yet his consciousness remained just that. When he needed to collect the necessary data through his senses and formulate the relevant mental processes, there was a huge problem when he handed it over to his brain to go about this undertaking!

It was akin to buying the prodigal 2080ti graphics card but installing that top level graphics card to a computer that hosted an old i3 processor model.

And to make things worse, it was like this processor had been submerged in water!

His system nearly collapsed due to the large amount of data that was being introduced.

Han Dong could only shut his eyes and mutter the Incantation of Great Mercy, trying his best to minimize the information that he was drawing from the world around him as best as he could, emptying out his mind as much as possible!

Otherwise, the mentally handicapped brain might very well be burnt out and ‘crash’ overworking itself as a result of the huge amounts of data being fed to it.