Chapter 4

Life at the Ninth Institute was busy, but it was also refreshingly simple.

There was no scheming among the elite, no biting sarcasm from Margaret, and definitely no suffocating control from Alexander.

All that mattered were the cold, precise lines of data and the rigorous, repetitive experiments.

For me, this was paradise.

I was working around the clock. Whenever exhaustion hit, I'd crash for a couple of hours on the military-style cot in the break room, then jump right back into the grind.

Charles felt sorry for me and kept urging me to rest, but I always refused.

I was…