Lin Yuan and Ni Ji walked in the ruins of the underground city for a long time.
The space here is huge, with countless houses and buildings, abandoned shops, vegetable markets, cinemas, game halls, and everything else. Layer by layer, it spirals downward, and it has sheltered countless humans.
But now, this underground city with extensive connections has become a dark abyss and a lair of monsters.
Ni Ji threw a stone down, but still could not hear the sound of it hitting the ground, so he didn't know how deep it was.
The two men found a secluded house and stayed there for the night.
The former owner of the house left in a hurry and left behind a lot of daily necessities.
There are two soft single sofas and a magnetic levitation coffee table dropped to the ground in the small space.
There was a large bed, blankets, pillows, and even a small pot to boil water.
Lin Yuan sank into the sofa and felt that his spine and neck were well supported. The sofa had many functions, with many high-tech buttons. It seemed that it could change according to body shape, extend and retract, suspend, and even had massage functions.
It’s a pity that there is no electricity, but for someone who has been fighting all day, it’s comfortable to lie down.
"The Land of No Pupils is a polluted area from a long time ago, right?"
"According to research, this was most likely a large shelter for humans to escape the disaster when the catastrophe just began," said Ni Ji.
He dismantled some wooden items, built a small fire on the ground, and put the small pot on the fire to cook something.
The flames flickered, and the orange-red light reflected on his face. The bright light and the projection of his facial features were clearly demarcated.
He had undertaken most of the close combat tasks along the way, his clothes were covered in dust and his face was stained with blood.
But Lin Yuan thought the little fish were very pretty at this time.
She supported her chin with one arm and sat on the sofa, looking at Ni Ji.
Beside the lights, the beauty is like a painting.
As he watched, he yawned in a daze. Before falling asleep, Lin Yuan vaguely felt that the sentry's ears were reflected red by the campfire.
Lin Yuan fell asleep in the dark and ancient dungeon, and she had a dream.
She had dreamed about the scene before, and those blurry images often appeared in her dreams. But this time it was unusually clear.
In the dream, she was a giant monster with sticky skin, huge size, countless wriggling tentacles, crawling slowly in a dark underground world.
I can always hear some subtle mutterings coming from outside in my mind.
They were another kind of creatures, and they called themselves "humans." Those humans would offer sacrifices to her and ask her for strength.
At first, the only sacrifices on the altar were cattle and sheep. But for some reason, the humans gradually offered her their own kind.
She liked the way humans were placed on the altar.
Every time this happens, the tentacles become excited and climb up the stairs from the damp underground to the altar in the moonlight.
The offering is full of emotion and is a good toy. It is just a little too fragile and can be easily broken, so it needs to be treated with care.
From above the gap where the sacrifices were placed, sounds of quarreling could be heard from time to time.
Some of those voices were angry, some were extremely frightened, and some were full of greed and excitement.
They call themselves researchers, or saviors, or other strange terms.
"You are crazy, really crazy. Do you know what you are doing?"
"Such a horrible, primitive... monster, why did you hatch it?"
"When did it become so huge? What on earth are you using to feed it? Does anyone know how long its body has lasted?"
"Extract its blood and combine it with humans? Oh my god, what a horrible experiment. How many people died in this process? How many people have quietly lost their lives for such a crazy idea of yours?"
"You are crazy, you are a bunch of crazy people."
"Stop it, this kind of crazy behavior will eventually destroy humanity."
"Humanity did not lose to the deformed creatures, but was destroyed by a bunch of lunatics like you."
"Help, let me go... Help. Someone is killing me!"
Finally, Lin Yuan heard that the noisy voices had disappeared. The opposing emotional bodies disappeared one by one inexplicably.
They finally spoke with one voice.
"It worked. After injecting His blood, a new type of human appeared."
"The one whose body is strengthened is named Sentinel, and the one whose mental power is strengthened is named Guide. It seems that the Guide has more genes of 'it' integrated into it."
"In any case, we have a powerful weapon to fight against the deformed creatures."
"Finally, there is hope for a counterattack and to leave this damn dungeon."
"Evolution is the instinct and future of all living things. We have succeeded. From now on, mankind will enter a higher level and step into a bright world."
"All sacrifices are worth it. We will save all mankind."
Those human spirits were very excited and passionate, and filled with things that Lin Yuan didn't quite understand.
But it doesn't matter, she doesn't care about it.
Those guys don't understand that to her, all humans who have merged with her blood are already her cubs.
The young cubs are still alone and weak, chirping all day long, and no one knows what they are doing.
No matter how they struggle, those little guys have her blood in their bodies and one day they will completely become her people.
She lazily moved one of her tentacles in the darkness of the ground. She felt that those noisy creatures were connected to her by blood, which made her feel close to them.
These humans don't seem to know that reproduction is the instinct of all life.
It is the ultimate pursuit of all living things.
Especially for a creature like her, who has great difficulty in continuing her bloodline.
She slept unconsciously at the bottom of the sea for countless years, eventually waking up and being raised to maturity, becoming this huge creature.
She began to desire to complete her mission. She wanted to obtain this land and make this prosperous land a hotbed for her seedlings.
Her mood brightened. The tentacles stretched outward, crawling further, expanding into deeper darkness.
Where are the offerings? She hummed.
"Wake up. Lin Yuan."
"Lin Yuan?"
Lin Yuan heard someone calling her name.
She slowly opened her eyes, her mind went blank, and she couldn't come back to her senses for a long time.
For a moment, she couldn't figure out who she was and why she was here.
In the dark space, a small extinguished spark was burning on the floor.
There was a person, a sentinel's face, swaying before her eyes.
The man frowned slightly, held his shoulders and shook them gently.
It’s Ni Ji.
Oh, Lin Yuan remembered that she was a guide. She left the White Tower and entered the Land of No Pupils with Ni Ji.
They walked a long way today and went very deep underground.
She just took a break and had a dream, it wasn't really a monster.
Tentacles, it’s just that the monster in the dream has the same tentacles as mine.
Lin Yuan subconsciously looked for his tentacles.
I found that they were not affected by the dream. They were entangled in Ni Ji's body in a mess.
More unbridled and more rude than before. One by one, two of them were wrapped around their long legs and curled around their waists.
The suction cup was wet, and the slippery pink tentacles twisted back and forth, drilling into the cuffs, locking onto the ankles and moving upwards, lifting the hem of the sentry's uniform and twisting to explore inside.
Ni Ji was at a loss as to what to do. He had to tear at his clothes with one hand, protect his belt with the other, and was also busy trying to wake her up.
The light here was very dim. Lin Yuan looked blankly at the sentry opposite. He could only see that his eyes seemed to be covered with a layer of fine mist as he was in a panic.
That look is kind of cute.
Lin Yuan almost laughed at an inappropriate time. Fortunately, the light was dim and the sentry should not be able to see her rude expression.
Lin Yuan instantly retracted the tentacles. Cursing, they reluctantly retreated underground.
These guys are too bad. After entering this underground world, they seem to become more excited.
But it shouldn't be anything too extreme. Lin Yuan wasn't nervous.
Ni Ji is a very powerful sentinel. Not to mention that he is sleeping, it’s just that the tentacles are making a little trouble on their own initiative.
Even if she was awake and controlling the tentacles, she couldn't easily take down Ni Ji.
As long as Ni Ji is awake and resists, the tentacles cannot do anything excessive.
That should be the case.
"I'm sorry, I was sleeping so soundly that I didn't keep an eye on them." Lin Yuan apologized, "Did they do anything?"
In the dark world, the powerful sentinel avoided the question, reached out for a clay pot, and handed the instant food he had heated to Lin Yuan.
"I seemed to hear you talking in your sleep." His voice came from the other side, a little soft, with a vague and throaty sound.
"What did I say in my sleep?"
"You mentioned sacrifices, and some strange words."
Lin Yuan recalled the dream, the content of which was extremely strange.
It seemed like I wasn't myself there, but a terrifying monster that existed in this underground city many, many years ago.
At that time, in order to fight against the large number of deformed creatures that appeared in the world, humans hatched a strange egg. Someone secretly raised the monster covered with tentacles and extracted its blood for human experiments.
They performed many horrific experiments and sacrificed monsters as gods.
Eventually, the human body and the tentacle monster's blood mixed together, creating a powerful new human being: the Sentinel and the Guide.
Ni Ji squatted beside the campfire and used a wooden stick to stir the remaining charcoal on the ground.
Try to make the house warmer without attracting monsters.
The red firelight reflected on his cheeks, making them look rosy.
Lin Yuan sat on the sofa, holding a pot of warm soup, as if asking Ni Ji, or talking to himself.
"Tell me, why do there exist sentinels and guides in this world? Sentinels can go berserk, and guides are raised in the White Tower. They are very different from ordinary humans."
I am so different from ordinary people that sometimes I even feel like a monster.
"All the books and materials we can see say that sentinels and guides are miracles bestowed by God to protect mankind. The White Tower is a sanctuary bestowed by the gods to mankind, and the king is the spokesperson of the gods on earth." said the sentinel guarding the fire.
"But once, I found a book in an ancient polluted area." He paused, as if considering whether to say it out loud, and finally he told Lin Yuan,
"The book records that sentinels and guides seem to be man-made creations after the catastrophe."
The room fell silent, and the two people fell into deep thought.
After a moment, Ni Ji asked, "Lin Yuan, what are you looking for in the Pupilless Land? Can you tell me?"
This is something many people want to know, what is the Queen searching for when she frequently sends out sentinels
Why do guides like Lin Yuan risk entering dangerous contaminated areas again and again
But since Lin Yuan hadn't brought it up before, Ni Ji didn't ask along the way.
Until Lin Yuan started to act a little weird in this place, he became very excited and couldn't be woken up after falling asleep.
Even strange terms such as sacrifice, experiment, and original form were mentioned.
"It's not that I won't tell you. It's just that I myself don't know what I'm looking for."
The guide, who was sitting on the sofa, said, "But when I reach the core of the contaminated area and get close to the source, I can feel what I want. It's like this every time. When the time comes, I will share with you what I have found."
"Ni Ji..." Her small body curled up in the soft sofa, her eyes rarely blank, "Do you think I am a human? Am I a monster?"
(End of this chapter)