Chapter 93. When You’re Feeling Weak, Eel Rice Bowl (3)
“So that’s what happened.”
Nova muttered bitterly after hearing about what they had gone through in Gangwon Province.
“That’s why Victoria had such a hard time for a while. She blamed herself a lot.”
[The Doctor is usually overflowing with energy, so having her enter depressive mode was difficult for us as well.]
Yukgap and Robert quietly added to the explanation.
After hearing everything, Nova began to feel guilty.
“And I came here without knowing any of that and immediately asked Victoria to help me.”
“No, it couldn’t be helped. The situation is serious.”
Yukgap tried to reassure her.
Nova had come all the way here alone despite the danger of being assassinated by Abraxas.
That alone must have taken tremendous courage.
More importantly, she had managed to draw Victoria out of the laboratory.
For that, Yukgap was simply grateful.
Munch, munch, munch!
Victoria, who had finally come out of the lab, was now devouring food as though she intended to make up for every meal she had skipped.
Yukgap was starting to worry she might make herself sick.
“You okay?”
Victoria swallowed the food in her mouth and answered firmly,
“I have to be.”
“If I’m not, I’ll just end up standing there helplessly while people die in front of me again.”
Her expression hardened.
“I never want to see something like that again.”
“Fine, but eat slowly. You’re going to choke.”
“I need to build up as much energy as I can right now.”
Victoria kept shoveling Yukgap’s eel rice bowl into her mouth, burning with determination.
“Because I need enough strength to hit that obnoxious fat bastard where it hurts!”
“Sister Victoria! How long has it been?!”
Sister Olga broke into a huge smile the moment she saw Victoria and pulled her into a tight hug.
Victoria smiled just as brightly.
“Have you been well, Sister Olga?”
“You haven’t been taking care of yourself, have you?”
Olga looked her over worriedly.
“You seem thinner than the last time I saw you.”
“Hahaha. I did go on a bit of a diet.”
“By the way... this is a sacred convent.”
Olga glanced at Yukgap and Robert, who had followed Victoria inside.
“Who exactly are the gentlemen beside you?”
In a convent where men were normally forbidden, the two of them stood out enormously.
“I’m her bodyguard.”
Yukgap answered simply.
“We can’t risk another Abraxas attack like last time.”
[I am a golem. Unlike you lumps of flesh, I do not possess a sex. Do not judge me by flesh-based standards.]
Neither of them looked remotely willing to leave Victoria behind.
Nova, well aware of that, carefully stepped in.
“This is an emergency. Please make an exception.”
“If Sister Nova is asking too, I suppose we have no choice.”
Olga nodded.
“This isn’t the important issue right now anyway.”
With permission granted, Victoria strode toward the convent laboratory with Yukgap and Robert on either side of her.
Just like the last time, the nuns were busy at their individual research stations.
“So how far has the research progressed?”
Victoria asked.
Nova quickly explained the situation.
“We managed to isolate and culture the bacteria responsible for the bleeding.”
“Thanks to No. 11’s previous biological attacks, there are plenty of old research records to work from.”
“But the problem is that the bacteria mutate far too quickly.”
Sister Olga added,
“We’ve tried developing antibodies and turning them into a vaccine, but the bacteria mutate faster than we can keep up.”
“By the time we finish researching and producing an antibody, the bacteria have already changed into another strain.”
“That is why Sister Nova risked assassination to come find you.”
Victoria sharply asked,
“How long does it normally take to produce an antibody?”
Nova answered weakly,
“About a week.”
“And how quickly does the bacteria mutate?”
“About once every three days.”
Even if they successfully produced an antibody, the bacteria changed before they could use it.
Victoria quickly grasped the problem.
Then she suddenly stopped at one section of the laboratory.
It was where the dangerous bacteria were being cultured.
“This is the bacteria causing the outbreak, right?”
Victoria stared directly into the culture medium.
Nova answered without much thought.
“Yeah. Why?”
The moment she said it, Victoria pulled a syringe from her pocket.
Then she plunged it into the culture medium and filled it with bacteria.
“Hup!”
Without hesitation, she jammed the syringe into her own neck.
It happened so suddenly that no one had time to stop her.
“What are you doing?!”
Nova screamed in horror.
Victoria answered without the slightest hesitation.
“You said the mutation rate is too fast to make antibodies in time, right?”
“Then we use the fastest method.”
“If I make the antibodies directly inside my own body, five minutes will be enough!”
“B-But...!”
Nova was too shocked to finish.
Sure enough, blood immediately began pouring from Victoria’s nose and mouth.
“Ghk... cough! Kgh!”
Victoria began coughing up blood just like every other infected patient.
Her body convulsed, and she collapsed to the floor.
Yukgap and Robert immediately rushed to support her.
“Victoria!”
[Doctor!]
Victoria convulsed several more times while coughing up blood.
Yukgap shouted at her, his face pale.
“Are you insane?!”
“What if you die before you even get the chance to help anyone?!”
“Don’t worry... ngh... cough...”
Victoria struggled even to hold herself upright, yet she still forced a smile to reassure him.
“S-Something like this... won’t kill me.”
“You know that too, don’t you?”
Yukgap had seen Victoria swallow dangerous chemicals and immediately create antidotes inside her body before.
But he had never imagined she would use the same reckless method here.
“That doesn’t mean you can just inject the disease straight into yourself!”
“Do you even think before you act?!”
Nova was furious too.
Victoria remained absurdly confident.
“A woman... cough... needs at least this much courage if she wants to accomplish something big.”
She coughed again.
“Right?”
She was still making jokes in this condition.
Nova looked ready to lose her mind.
“...Whew.”
After a moment, Victoria staggered back to her feet.
She breathed heavily and wiped the blood from her mouth and nose with her sleeve.
Then she grinned.
“See?”
“T-The antibodies... are finished.”
Sure enough, she was no longer vomiting blood or convulsing.
Apparently, in those few minutes, her body had successfully produced the necessary antibodies.
“I’ve spent my life as a servant of the Lord and thought I had done my fair share of reckless things.”
Sister Olga stared at Victoria in shock.
“But I don’t think I’ll ever catch up to you, Sister Victoria.”
Victoria immediately gave her an order.
“Gather the sisters.”
“Now it’s our turn to fight back.”
“As everyone knows, there are two main kinds of vaccines.”
Victoria calmly explained to everyone gathered in the Herrington Order.
“First, there are inactivated vaccines, where the bacteria are neutralized before being administered.”
“They’re safer, but there’s a disadvantage.”
“You need multiple doses before the body develops sufficient immunity.”
She pointed toward the research data.
“At the current rate this bacteria is spreading, an inactivated vaccine won’t be nearly fast enough.”
“Another mutation will appear before immunity can fully develop.”
The bacteria Abraxas had released were mutating roughly once every three days.
At that speed, an inactivated vaccine could never catch up.
“More importantly, administering that kind of vaccine requires infrastructure and cooperation.”
“We would have to gather people and vaccinate them one by one.”
Victoria’s expression hardened.
“And there’s no way Abraxas will simply watch us do that.”
“They’ll interfere.”
Abraxas had already proven it was willing to commit massacres just to monopolize medicine.
If they learned that the Herrington Order was cooperating with health authorities and vaccinating people in gyms or similar facilities, they would undoubtedly intervene somehow.
“So the answer I found is a live vaccine.”
Victoria moved on to the next plan.
“Just like the name suggests, it uses living bacteria.”
“But the bacteria are weakened with antibody treatment, so the symptoms are extremely mild.”
“Anyone who receives the live vaccine may feel a little sick, but they’ll develop immunity.”
Then she emphasized the most important point.
“More importantly, because it contains living bacteria, we don’t need to inject every single person manually.”
That was the key to overturning the entire situation.
“If the first recipients move around and spread the weakened bacteria, the people they infect will naturally develop immunity.”
“Once someone gains immunity, they can withstand the original bacteria even if they’re infected later.”
Sister Olga immediately understood what Victoria meant.
“If we use that method, Abraxas will have a much harder time tracking the vaccination effort.”
“Exactly.”
Victoria nodded.
“If random people who received the live vaccine move through different places and spread the weakened bacteria, even Abraxas will have trouble figuring out where it started.”
“We’ll be using the massive infectious power they’re so proud of against them.”
“Then only one thing remains.”
Sister Olga rolled up her sleeve.
The other nuns beside her did the same.
Apparently, they had all come to the same conclusion.
“We will gladly become the first recipients of the live vaccine.”
“So please administer it.”
“Thank you, everyone.”
“We are servants of the Lord.”
Olga smiled warmly, just as she always did.
“A servant asks for nothing and finds joy in serving their master.”
“There is no need to thank us.”
Victoria had already seen how these women faced the cruelty of Abraxas before.
Each of them was clearly willing to offer even their own bodies if it meant saving others.
Watching them, Victoria felt a kind of nobility that transcended religion itself.
“You may develop symptoms after receiving the live vaccine.”
Victoria warned them repeatedly as she administered each injection.
“And depending on your condition, those symptoms could get worse.”
“If anything happens, you have to tell me immediately!”
The greatest disadvantage of a live vaccine was the risk.
Everyone’s immune system was different.
For some people, even the weakened bacteria could make their health worse.
Victoria said nothing, but as she injected each nun, she could not shake the guilt that she was handing them a bomb.
