"Did I hear it wrongly? I thought I heard a dog barking."
The bird lowered its voice, looking confused, and obviously couldn't understand why there was a dog barking underground.
Yan Bing nodded in his helmet: "Yes, I heard it too. Sir, could it be a mad dog?"
Tian Yang nodded: "It's possible. Let's go and take a look. Mad dogs are not underground creatures. Since they can come in, we can find a way out by following their traces!"
This news made Xiaoniao very excited. Although the world of the opposite world itself was a depressing world, it was even more depressing underground. The girl had been groping in these underground passages for several hours and had long wanted to go to the surface to get some fresh air.
When the girl heard about the traces left by the mad dog and that it could lead them out, she immediately became motivated.
Tianyang reminded them: "Mad dogs are different from prowlers. They react to light and sound. Let's turn off the tactical lighting accessories. There are fog crystals everywhere underground, which is enough for us to see the road clearly."
Xiaoniao and Yanbing had no objection, and the latter simply turned off the lighting accessories on his rifle. The light suddenly dimmed, but after a moment, they adapted to the surrounding environment.
The mist crystals that sporadically emerged from various places in the passage emitted a deep purple glow, providing a faint light.
Tianyang activated the infrared vision mode of the tactical eye, and the vision became clearer. Everything was ready. He made a gesture and was responsible for clearing the way.
Yanbing walked in the middle, and if anything went wrong, he would protect Tianyang.
Xiaoniao was responsible for covering the rear. She didn't carry a gun, but the rapier could release frosty sword energy, which was much more powerful than a rifle.
The three of them walked along the side of the passage, groping their way forward in the crooked and disorderly underground space.
After walking for a while, they heard a few clear dog barkings. Tianyang easily identified the direction and led the team into a cave.
"This is.."
After walking a few steps, Tianyang stopped, as if he had discovered something.
The bird came over curiously and looked in the direction Tianyang was looking. It turned out that above the underground passage, there was a piece of plant-like rhizome emerging.
The thing crossed the passage and pierced into the wall on the other side. This section of the root was very thick, and under the deep purple glow of a cluster of mist crystals nearby, it was not difficult to see that the diameter of this thing was at least 20 to 30 centimeters.
The surface was rough, with complex lines, and had an oval cocoon-like bubble growing on it. It emitted a dim red light, and there seemed to be liquid flowing inside, causing slight wrinkles on the surface.
The three of them looked at each other, not knowing what was going on. Suddenly, there was another barking sound from the front.
"Let's go, don't worry about this for now."
Not long after, they found a mad dog. The monster, which looked like a dog and a human sewn together, was in trouble.
More than a dozen plant roots entangled it. Not only did those things tightly strangle the mad dog's body, some roots even penetrated into the monster's body.
But there is no sign that these roots, like the dead tree, will suck blood and flesh. Perhaps, piercing into the mad dog's body is just to better catch it
Why do I say that? Because Tianyang and the other two could see clearly that the roots were trying to pull the mad dog upwards, even though it was struggling desperately.
Tianyang raised his head and saw a thick plant root attached to the top of the cave.
When the roots dragged the mad dog to the vicinity of the rhizome, a section of the rhizome suddenly cracked, and the strands of root hairs entangled with each other and were torn apart and broken one by one.
The root had a nearly two-meter-long crack, from which black, muddy mucus flowed, winding down the cave wall, like ink splashed on a gray-white canvas, filling the picture inch by inch.
The air was filled with a sickening smell of corruption.
Yanbing, who was wearing a helmet, was unaware of anything, but Tianyang and Xiaoniao's noses suffered.
Just when their eyebrows were about to be twisted into a "川" shape, the mad dog let out a few howls and was pulled into the crack of the rhizome.
The crack closed, and the surface of the rhizome continued to bulge, as if a mad dog was struggling desperately inside.
Unfortunately, its struggle didn't even last for a minute.
There was no more sound in the passage, and it was as quiet as a cemetery. If Tianyang and the other two had not witnessed this scene with their own eyes, they might not believe that a mad dog was actually "eaten" by this root!
"What is this? I've never seen anything like it." The bird said in a low voice.
Tian Yang said in a serious tone, "No matter what it is, it will catch prey, even the people of darkness. It seems we have to be careful and not get too close to it."
Xiaoniao and Yanbing both agreed with this suggestion.
Carefully keeping a distance from the strange plant, Tianyang checked the ground nearby and indeed found traces of the mad dog. These traces were all over the ground, and if he followed these traces in reverse, he should be able to find the exit.
Tian Yang was about to ask the two to leave when he suddenly saw a red light in front of him. The red light came from the plant root on the cave wall, and the oval cocoons of various sizes on its surface lit up.
Gurgle Gurgle—
There was a sound of water flowing through the rhizome, as if there were hollow pipes inside it. Now, water was flowing through it, just like the ubiquitous sewage channels in the lower city of the fortress!
"Ah!" For some reason, the bird cried out in surprise.
Tianyang looked towards her and saw the girl pointing at a cocoon bubble on the rhizome with a horrified expression: "I think I saw someone inside."
"Is there someone?" Tianyang looked up and stared at a cocoon bubble above.
But no matter how hard he tried, he could hardly see what was inside the cocoon. He could only see a string of bubbles.
Just when he was about to look away, a man's face suddenly appeared on the cocoon bubble!
It looked as if this face had been gnawed by something, and only bones were left on the left half of the face. Looking into the eye sockets, one could even vaguely see a grayish-white substance.
That must be his brain...
The broken and terrifying face appeared suddenly and disappeared suddenly. It was just a sound of one or two seconds, as if it was carried by the water flow, through the hollow channel of the rhizome, and floated to an unknown distance.
The sound of running water lasted for nearly a minute before it stopped. Tianyang looked along the root. It was attached to the wall of the cave, extending diagonally deep into the ground.
The red light emitted by the cocoons on the rhizomes began to dim, and after a moment, it returned to its original barely perceptible brightness.
But the scene just now has been deeply imprinted in the minds of the three people. For some reason, the water flow in the strange plant made Tianyang and the other two think of the same word: eating.
Tianyang thought for a moment and said, "I plan to go down and take a look."
He pointed in the direction where the plant's roots extended: "This thing doesn't look like it was formed naturally. We haven't found any living things underground along the way."
“But this thing can hunt, so how can it grow in a place where there is no prey
So I think there might be something strange going on down there. Otherwise, there wouldn’t be such a plant growing there for no reason.”
The little bird agreed: "Maybe the black people have other arrangements down there. If we find anything, it will be a great achievement."
Now that they had reached a consensus, the three of them changed direction and followed the growth of the plants above the cave, heading deeper into the ground.
On the way, the sound of flowing water was heard among the roots of the plant again. This phenomenon happened three times in total.
Every time there is the sound of flowing water, the cocoons on the rhizomes will light up red, like red light bulbs.
What made Tianyang feel a little relieved was that the thing seemed to have no interest in humans. The three of them had followed it for so long and had not been attacked.
Two hours passed like this, and when Tianyang was wondering whether this root would lead to the deep center of the earth in the opposite world, the end point appeared without any warning.
When turning a corner, the front suddenly opened up, and it turned out to be another wide underground space. In the huge space in front, a figure appeared in Tianyang's eyes without any warning.
The young man quickly stopped and made a warning gesture to the two people behind him.
But upon closer inspection, I realized that it was not a human figure, but some kind of plant.
It is made up of countless tangled roots, and is very tall, about seven or eight meters tall. Strangely, whether intentionally or unintentionally, it has been shaped into the image of a human.
So when Tianyang suddenly saw it, he thought he saw a human figure.
From the boy's perspective, it looks like a woman, and the countless roots hanging from top to bottom form the woman's "hair".
In the shoulder-shaped area, the roots are coiled like a ball. From a distance, it looks like a child's head is resting on the woman's shoulders.
The thick root that extended all the way here and penetrated into the body of the tall "woman" reminded Tianyang of something like an "umbilical cord".
The boy held his breath and observed for a moment, making sure that nothing was wrong before making a gesture.
The three of them walked lightly to the "sculpture" of a woman made of plants. When they got closer, they found that it was actually a "pregnant woman".
Its belly is round and sticks up high.
Two "arms" formed by the entangled roots are holding the belly in a very vivid way.
The legs of the "woman" are spread wide, as if she is about to give birth. This huge sculpture, with its strange image and underground location, makes people feel eerie and spooky no matter how they look at it.
Tianyang looked back at the other two people, and Xiaoniao and Yanbing both looked a little ugly.
Why do these plants deliberately create such an image of a pregnant woman about to give birth? Is it just a coincidence, or is there another deeper meaning
Tian Yang coughed dryly, bringing Yan Bing and the other two back to their senses: "We should leave now. Let's leave this weird thing to the headquarters to study. We have already fulfilled our responsibilities, there is no need to stay here any longer."
"Besides, we are not botanists, so we probably won't be able to research anything if we stay here."
The little bird hugged his arms and looked around: "I think so too. This place is too weird. There is only this scary thing. I would rather run into the black people than this..."
Before he finished speaking, the barking of a few dogs could be heard faintly from the darkness ahead.
The bird was stunned for a moment: "No way, did I really run into a black civilian? My crow mouth is too effective!"
ps: Thanks to Liezu Liezong kk for the reward, thank you!