Invasion - Chapter 51
Chapter 51
Lin Yuan heard the piercing scream, her eyes flickered, but she didn't move.
The tentacles slowly moved, wrapping Lin Yuan more tightly, only her eyes still exposed.
"Help, save me!" the sentinel cried out to her. "I know you're human, save me, let your mental body save me."
"This place is insane, these beasts, you don't know what these beasts have done to me!"
Tears and snot streamed down his face, his words slurred, his voice a shrill plea.
Lin Yuan's eyes rolled, she didn't move, just kept staring at his eyes.
Those were eyes filled with intense negative emotions, fear, pain, and resentment pouring out from them.
He was already on the verge of collapse.
But I don’t have the ability to save you, at least not right now.
The strong pig man stopped, his thick nose twitching, still not seeing Lin Yuan, who was standing not far away.
He forcefully pulled on the iron chain, dragging the man forward.
The man, as he was dragged further and further away, seeing Lin Yuan not coming to rescue him, his expression twisted. He suddenly pulled on the iron chain, pointing in Lin Yuan's direction, and shouted,
"There, there’s a person there."
He pointed in Lin Yuan's direction, screaming with all his might, as if capturing Lin Yuan too would bring him relief.
"There’s a person there, can’t you see? She's right there!"
The pig turned its head sluggishly, tilting its ear to listen. It listened several times before finally understanding what the prisoner in its hand was saying.
Lin Yuan had already started retreating when the sentinel started shouting.
But the pig was too fast, its speed completely disproportionate to its large body.
Almost the moment it understood, its foul-smelling nose and fangs were instantly right in front of Lin Yuan.
Lin Yuan moved to an open window, and when the pig man pounced,
She fell backwards, the tentacles taking her through the dark window.
The moment she fell into the house, a sharp blade light, with a heavy whistling sound, flashed before her eyes.
A sharp pain shot through Lin Yuan’s mind. A tentacle blocked the blade for her, its soft wrist foot severed into two.
That pain, transmitted into her brain stem, felt like a hand reaching into her brain, ripping out a nerve, it hurt so much that her entire body twitched slightly.
But Lin Yuan’s face remained expressionless.
Her body trembling with pain, her bloodless face like a porcelain mask, showing no reaction.
She took advantage of the momentum, rolling on the ground, into the corner of a side cabinet in the living room.
Curling up in the shadows of the cabinet, her eyes unfocused.
The numerous tentacles surged up, quickly covering her.
The wooden door of the house was slammed open with a bang, wood splintering and flying everywhere. The fat pig-headed monster, its back to the light, appeared at the doorway, holding a bloody butcher knife.
On the street, the sentinel with the chain around his neck was still lying there, screaming and shouting.
Lin Yuan in the shadows lowered her eyelashes.
A tentacle emerged from the ground on the street, sliding into the sentinel’s brain.
Instantly, the man's eyes bulged, his expression became dull, and he could no longer speak properly.
Lin Yuan had made a move, driving him completely insane.
The pig-shaped monster snorted and panted in the dim living room, walking step by step on the messy floor, the house shaking with its footsteps.
Its bristling mane, its drooling mouth, its bloody butcher knife.
It couldn't sense Lin Yuan at all, it couldn’t find the human girl who had flashed through the window.
So it angrily swung its butcher knife, randomly chopping and slashing in the house.
The knife had a very thick back and a sharp blade. She didn’t know what it had cut before, but it was stained with thick black blood.
Countless pieces of furniture in the house were shattered under that sharp, heavy blade.
Many times, the blade’s wind and the debris flying around the room grazed Lin Yuan’s tentacles, even cutting her face a few times.
But she still sat in the corner, hugging her knees, motionless.
Her body felt pain, and her mental bodies were injured again and again.
The pain stimulated Lin Yuan’s nerves, but it didn’t matter, the pain only made her calmer.
The pig-headed monster raged in the dark house for a long time before finally leaving.
Soon, sharp screams came from outside, again and again, tearing through the silent, eerie space.
Mixed with the pig’s snorts and the chewing sounds of it eating.
Lin Yuan hugged her legs, sitting in the darkness, listening to those tormenting sounds for as long as they continued.
The darkness, amidst these terrifying sounds, deepened.
A twisted world, a strange silence, and alone in the darkness.
When she was young, in that fire, her father, who was a Guide, had blocked her pain receptors, her five senses, and all her emotions.
After her father died, that mental block had long been lifted.
But Lin Yuan was as if forever trapped in that cold winter.
Not knowing awe, not afraid of pain, nor fearing this kind of darkness.
Only, if she stayed in a place like this for too long, her human emotions repeatedly eroded, sometimes she even felt that this dark and absurd world would be her final destination.
Lin Yuan hugged her legs, sitting in the small corner for a long time, listening to the noise outside gradually disappear.
In the darkness, she touched the tentacle that had been severed.
The soft tentacle, having lost a part of itself, its nimble tip gone, its half-severed body pitifully materializing, wrapping around Lin Yuan, showing her its severed end, as wide as a bowl.
Lin Yuan caressed it for a long time, realizing that it was useless, she couldn’t comfort her own mental body.
Many tentacles were injured, scratched, no longer smooth and moist, they wriggled at her feet, whimpering.
Lin Yuan suddenly wanted to eat something sweet, a candy, or any kind of sweet.
But she didn’t have anything on hand.
Lin Yuan thought of the sentinel who would find candy for her, thought of that orca, thought of the sweet sugar figure she had eaten.
Thinking of these things, she felt a little better. She patted the dust off her body and stood up.
A little blood, from a cut on her face, flowed down, touching the corner of her mouth. Lin Yuan licked it, only tasting blood.
There were no candies here, and no one who would go find candy for her.
Touching the mottled wallpaper, slowly walking through the dark, empty living room, Lin Yuan pushed open the door and walked out onto the street.
The road wasn’t easy to walk, those occasionally appearing monsters forcing her to stop and go, constantly changing directions.
She even saw a giant mushroom, its white hyphae floating, standing in a plantation. A pale human body lay on the ground under the mushroom.
When countless spores, large and small, floated towards her hand in hand, Lin Yuan ran.
When she was safe, Lin Yuan realized she was hiding in a place that looked like a farm.
Perhaps it should be called a "farm."
The keeper wasn’t there, and the spacious barn was filled with two rows of metal cages. Like a chicken coop, with a feeding trough on one end and a conveyor belt for eggs on the other.
But the creatures locked in those narrow metal cages weren’t chickens or ducks, but humans, adult male humans.
Lin Yuan hid under a shelf. Across from her, within her line of sight, a young man was lying in a cage.
His head stuck out from the cage, his neck restricted by the narrow opening, forced to maintain a仰面 position. A feeding tube was inserted in his mouth, constantly feeding him food, his abdomen bulging.
On the other side, the conveyor belt rumbled. After a while, a large, snow-white, hard-shelled egg was transported out, sent to who knew where.
She didn’t know what this man had been through, but one of his arms had been severed at the shoulder, the other was tightly locked to the cage, and his abdomen was covered in terrifying and strange symbols, blood-red runes glowing on his human flesh.
The inhuman torture and abuse had broken this man’s will. He lay there, his eyes open blankly, letting the food flowing through the tube be force-fed into his stomach.
Lin Yuan crouched under the shelf, staring at the sentinel across from her for a long time, and started biting her fingers.
Almost all the men in this barn were like this. Constantly being fed on one side, while large, hard-shelled eggs were transported away on the conveyor belt on the other side.
Almost all of them had completely collapsed mentally. Some let out strange giggles, actively stretching their necks to lick the food in the trough,
Some lay there, muttering repeatedly, "Golden Tree, hee hee, Golden Tree…"
Only the sentinel before Lin Yuan’s eyes still barely retained human consciousness and emotions.
Lin Yuan thought of the sentinel who had pointed at her and shouted on the street. That person had caused her to lose a tentacle.
She thought of Nicole sitting across from her in the courtyard of her home, resting her chin in her hand, her eyes shining, saying to her,
"Some sentinels are annoying."
"But there are also good people."
We have met many people, encountered many unpleasant things, and have truly come to understand that there are many lovely people in this world.
Lin Yuan emerged from under the shelf, poking her head out, looking at the sentinel lying in the cage, carefully pulling out the feeding tube inserted in his mouth.
She was ready, if this person screamed or shouted, she would immediately put it back in.
But no matter what, she still wanted to ask this person,
"You…"
Do you need my help?
Lin Yuan wasn't actually sure if she should ask this.
She wasn’t sure if she could take such a seriously injured person away, she even felt that she might not be able to even take herself away.
"Kill me," the sentinel, seeing Lin Yuan appearing by his cage, said.
He closed his eyes, his voice very soft, pleading. "Kill me."
Lin Yuan thought for a moment, and seriously asked the person, "I should be able to open this cage. Are you sure you don’t want to live anymore?"
The sentinel’s closed eyes trembled. After a long while, tears slid down from the corners of his eyes.
He turned his head to the side, opened his mouth, his voice very low, choked with sobs.
Lin Yuan couldn't hear what he said at all.
But she understood, he wanted to live.
The black and white bracelet on Lin Yuan’s wrist melted, flowing into the lock of the cage. Lin Yuan crouched by the filthy, foul-smelling cage, fiddling with it for a long time.
During this time, the conveyor belt kept rumbling, the barn filled with giggles and nonsense. New eggs dropped down, carried away by the conveyor belt.
A giant hen, several meters tall, wearing an apron, walked past the window, its huge red eyes approaching the glass.
Lin Yuan quickly ducked back under the shelf, motionless.
The chicken pressed its face against the glass outside the window, looked for a while, not finding anything unusual, took out a handkerchief, wiped the glass, and left, satisfied.
Lin Yuan came out again, continuing to struggle with the lock.
With a click, the cage lock finally opened.
The sentinel lying in the cage bit his lip, tears streaming down his face as he sobbed.
He didn't cry for long. When Lin Yuan unlocked the chains on his wrist and reached out to help him, he had already composed himself, struggling to climb out of the cage.
He seemed to have been locked up for a long time, his legs weak, and with Lin Yuan's help, he struggled to stand up, his legs covered in blood and grime.
But he gritted his teeth, his eyes burning, limping as he walked outwards.
He seemed to know the way here, leading Lin Yuan through a small hole, hiding in a room piled with hay and debris.
There were a few pairs of farmer’s trousers in the room.
The wounded sentinel, the first thing he did after entering this room, was pull down a pair of trousers from the wall and put them on.
His only arm trembled constantly, only after he had pulled up his trousers, did he crouch down by the haystack, leaning against the wall, exhausted.
As if putting on clothes could bring him a sense of security, reaffirming that he was still a human being.
Not some livestock locked in a cage, constantly being force-fed.
"Excuse me," the man, leaning against the wall, hugged his trembling body with his only arm. "Do you have any Guide pheromones?"
"Guide pheromones?" Lin Yuan froze. "No, do you need mental guidance?"
The sentinel's eyes widened in surprise, he looked up.
Only then did he realize that the person standing before him was a Guide.
Usually, the natural mental attraction between sentinels and Guides made it very easy to distinguish each other’s identity.
But he was too weak and disheveled, he hadn’t even realized that the person who had rescued him from that miserable situation was a Guide.
A Guide, appearing in such a terrifying contaminated zone?
He remembered a rumor he had heard a few months ago. About a Guide who had stayed at an outpost for a long time, and had even entered a contaminated zone, just like a sentinel.
He had treated it as a joke at the time, not expecting it to be true.
That Guide was now standing right before his eyes.
"A Guide? Why… why are you here?" The sentinel looked at the young, beautiful girl standing before him.
There was a wound on the girl's face, blood, dust on her body, and grime on her hands.
But her eyes were firm, without a trace of fear in this bizarre world.
"I want to find that Golden Tree," the female Guide said. "Then get the key, and open the door here."
Lin Yuan wiped her hands clean and reached out towards the sentinel’s forehead.
The sentinel, however, turned his head away.
"No, thank you."
His voice was dry and hoarse. He could barely sit up straight, leaning against the wall, yet he refused Lin Yuan's help.
"Please save your strength for your own task.”
"What about you?"
"I'll just stay here, and wait for you to open that door.”
High up in the storage room, there was a row of narrow skylights. Sitting by the haystack, he could see the distant sky.
If the escape door opened, he would see it from here.
Lin Yuan looked at this sentinel.
He was very weak, covered in injuries, one of his arms useless, having suffered inhuman torture.
But there was a light in his eyes, he wanted to live.
I did the right thing, Lin Yuan thought.
"You will definitely succeed," the sentinel said to her sincerely. "I’ll be waiting for that door to appear in the sky. When that door appears, I'll see you at the exit.”
"Okay, see you at the exit."
Just as Lin Yuan turned to leave, the sentinel called out to her.
"Do you know where to find the Golden Tree?" He told Lin Yuan everything he knew. "Go to the rose garden, the rose garden at night.”
Ni Ji stood in a long street.
He had come in with several elite members of the Royal Guard. The moment they crossed the boundary, they were separated.
Alone, he had walked a long way in the strange and quiet streets. He wanted to find a certain figure, but after running through many places, he didn’t see that person.
Finally, he ran into an acquaintance.
The tall, bearded sentinel who had mocked him in the tavern not long ago, nicknamed "Blind Man."
When Ni Ji encountered Blind Man, a bull-headed monster, carrying a sharp blade, suddenly emerged from the ground.
It was almost right in front of his face, the cold, sharp blade right before his eyes.
Blind Man pulled him from behind, the two rolling to the side of the road, narrowly avoiding the charging bull.
Ni Ji flipped over, jumped onto the roof of a building, and crouched in the shadows, instantly suppressing all his emotions.
He knew from the information he had received before entering that the monsters here relied on emotional fluctuations to find humans.
He needed to conceal all his subtle emotions.
Ni Ji was very good at this, a skill honed from over three hundred trips in and out of contaminated zones.
Except in front of a certain person, he almost never failed.
But not every sentinel could do this. Blind Man didn’t have his level of control over his emotions.
The killing intent that arose in the moment they rolled away hadn't been fully controlled, and it was captured by the monster.
The mad bull-headed monster, holding its long blade, charged towards him.
Its blade cold, as fast as lightning.
Blind Man, his arms incredibly strong, his body tall and sturdy, his saber a two-meter-long giant blade,
He raised his blade to block, and under the force of the man and the bull colliding, the burly sentinel, who had always prided himself on his strength, was actually pushed backwards until his back hit a wall.
"Damn, what kind of monster is this, so strong," Blind Man cursed inwardly.
Before he even finished speaking, a whole team of identical bull-headed monsters turned the corner.
Each one holding a long blade, their low growls echoing, they lined up neatly, charging towards him.
No way, was this the terror of the No. 77 Contaminated Zone? Blind Man’s eyes widened in fear.
Was he going to die right after entering? This thought crossed his mind.
Countless sharp blades were right before his eyes.
The wind from those long blades almost pierced his skin, but at the last moment, the force dissipated, the blades clattering to the ground.
The red blade light still lingered in the air. Ni Ji’s blade had already been sheathed.
Those strange bull-headed monsters, their legs severed by the flash of red light, all fell to the ground.
Ni Ji pulled Blind Man’s arm. "Let’s go!"
Blind Man, having narrowly escaped death, reacted, and rolled into a dark house by the roadside with him.
The two rushed into the house and immediately held their breaths, hiding in the dark house, motionless.
Outside, the bull monsters whose legs had been severed gradually got up, the legs that had just been completely severed had already regenerated.
But this short window of time was enough for the experienced sentinels to conceal their mental fluctuations, completely hiding themselves.
The bull monsters mooed, no longer able to find their target.
Soon, they forgot about everything that had just happened, lining up, carrying their blades, slowly walking away.
"Damn, you actually saved me," Blind Man in the house let out a long breath. "Thanks, brother."
He took out a Guide pheromone stick and handed it to Ni Ji.
Ni Ji shook his head, declining.
"Being in the capital really changes a person, you’ve seen real Guides now, huh? Looking down on Guide pheromones," Blind Man couldn't help but mock, then lightly slapped his own mouth. "I just can’t control my mouth. Forget it, you saved me, I won't make fun of you anymore."
"Have you seen a person?" Ni Ji, standing by the window, suddenly asked a random question.
"What person? Who are you looking for? Name, gender?" Blind Man lowered his head, lighting the pheromone stick.
"Have you seen a person?" Ni Ji asked again. "Not a sentinel."
"Not a sentinel?" Blind Man lit the stick, took a puff, and said, puzzled, "Ordinary people wouldn’t dare to come to a place like this, if not a sentinel, who else could it be?"
Ni Ji didn’t speak anymore, lifting his foot to jump out of the window.
"Wait, where are you going?" Blind Man called out to him.
"To find the Golden Tree."
"Take a break, silly boy, it’s almost 'nighttime'," Blind Man pulled him back. "Why are you in such a hurry? In a dangerous zone like this, you have to wait, observe the situation first. You've been a sentinel for so many years, don’t you even know this?"
"I'm going to open the door," Ni Ji said. "The sooner the better."
It’s too dangerous here, I have to open the door so she can get out first.
He didn’t say those words out loud.
His figure disappeared from the window. A few leaps, and he was gone.
What’s wrong with this brat? Blind Man stood by the window, looking in the direction Ni Ji had disappeared to.
So impatient, not like him at all.
Forget it, thinking about it, he wasn’t having an easy time either. Blind Man touched his beard, he really wouldn’t make fun of him anymore.
Comments
Post a Comment