Invasion - Chapter 88
Chapter 88
Finally, the tentacles brought back an old backpack, perhaps left behind by a Sentinel long ago, covered in dust.
But the food inside hadn't expired, and there were still some edible canned goods. The tentacles took out these cans to show Ni Ji.
After seeing Ni Ji nod, the tentacles twisted into puzzled poses one by one.
Such an adorable Sentinel, why would they only eat food that smells so unappetizing?
Cold and not fresh, with lots of additives. Far less nutritious than live rats and insects.
A campfire was burning on the ground now, allowing them to see inside the nest. The space seemed vast, with countless tunnels and paths in its depths, pitch black, leading who knows where.
The ceiling and walls had many exposed pipes and heavy metal barriers. It was unclear what purpose this building once served.
But remarkably, the water purification system here still worked normally. Ni Ji saw a huge pool nearby with an automatic sensor water outlet above it. A pipe had cracked somewhere, dripping water steadily.
The dripping sound they'd been hearing came from there.
The tentacles glided over with the cans, washing their appendages clean in the pool, then twisting and drying themselves on a large towel. They washed the cans as well while they were at it.
Ni Ji noticed that although Lin Yuan had lost her memories, certain behaviors and preferences remained the same as before.
For example, being very particular about clean hands, and regarding him... being easily soft-hearted.
The tentacles opened the can, gripped Ni Ji's chin, and rolled up some meat paste, preparing to feed him.
"I can do it myself," Ni Ji said, "Th...thank you."
He really didn't want to eat things stuffed into his mouth by her tentacles under Lin Yuan's calm and indifferent gaze. It felt inexplicably embarrassing.
Fortunately, it was just the two of them here, no one else. Many things felt more private this way, not quite so awkward.
The tentacles thought for a moment, then placed the opened can on the ground in front of him.
Ni Ji reached out to take the opened tin can in the flickering firelight.
His fingers were still sticky with dried blood. His palm had a deep cut from the demon blade, with flesh rolled back on both sides, looking horrific.
When he touched the cold metal, his vision went dark for a moment, and he nearly knocked over the can of food.
The tentacles quickly helped steady the can, then pushed it closer to Ni Ji—they all eagerly gathered around. Waiting to watch this cute and delicate fellow eat.
Their Sentinel, so weak and helpless, couldn't even hold a can properly.
Needs careful nurturing.
So adorable.
Want to see how he eats.
Ni Ji forced himself to hold the can steady, feeling his fingertips still trembling slightly.
A warrior who should be holding guns, now lacking even the strength to pick up a small can.
He had always thought he could hold out much longer, could fight endlessly until finding Lin Yuan and returning with her.
In reality, he discovered that if he wasn't by Lin Yuan's side right now, wasn't being protected by Lin Yuan's tentacles in the nest.
He would have died out there long ago, torn apart by those snarling monsters.
Ni Ji used the metal spoon to scoop some meat from the can and put it in his mouth.
His body had no appetite for food due to drug overdose. But he forced himself to chew and painfully swallow a bit.
He needed to replenish his energy, to recover as quickly as possible.
To find out why Lin Yuan had become like this. Wake her up and take her back.
What if Lin Yuan couldn't wake up?
Ni Ji's hand paused, not wanting to think further. He just forcefully scooped up a large spoonful of food, stuffed it in his mouth, and made himself swallow it.
The tentacles had found a new amusement.
They watched the human use a tiny spoon to eat, one small bite at a time.
He only managed to eat a little before needing to rest for a long while.
While resting, he would curl up his body, hugging one of the tentacles, sleeping in the middle of all of them.
His body was very soft, his scent enticing, and even in sleep, he wouldn't let go of that tentacle.
The tentacles even fought over who would get to be the one held in his arms, twisting into braids in the underground where the human couldn't see.
When the Sentinel woke up again, he seemed to be doing a bit better. He crawled to the fire on his own, found a folding pot from that backpack. Boiled himself a small pot of hot soup.
Drank it one small sip at a time. So cute.
He even asked if they wanted to drink together.
Lin Yuan shook her head, indicating no.
The Sentinel then took out a small packet of sugar from that backpack, melted it in that small pot.
When it turned slightly yellow, he poured the syrup into a round bottle cap to cool.
Finally, using a small stick, like performing magic, he turned out the solidified round sugar piece.
His fingers were very nimble, his appearance quiet and peaceful as he sat by the campfire.
No matter what he did, it always seemed interesting.
The tentacles and Lin Yuan watched with great enjoyment.
Finally, that Sentinel held the small stick, offering the golden transparent sugar disk to Lin Yuan.
"Made it for me?" Lin Yuan said, "I'm different from you all, I don't need to eat."
Though she refused verbally, her fingers couldn't resist taking it. Her pale fingers held the sugar disk, turning it over to examine it.
Semi-transparent, light amber-colored food, giving off an enticing aroma.
Lin Yuan tried licking it once, her eyes brightened. She put the whole piece in her mouth.
She saw the Sentinel smile.
What's he smiling about? Not giving it back to you, Lin Yuan thought.
"Haven't you eaten anything these past few days?" she heard that Sentinel ask casually.
"What do you mean these past few days, I never eat anything," Lin Yuan said while licking the candy, "Since my birth."
"How long ago were you born?" the Sentinel sitting by the fire asked seemingly casually.
"How long? Not that long, I suppose." Lin Yuan had no sense of time, but she knew not much time had passed since she first had memories.
Perhaps what the Sentinel called "a few days."
She could sense that the Sentinel was trying to probe her, but his tone also conveyed genuine care, and the food he gave was sweet. So she was willing to answer him.
Lin Yuan licked the candy and told the Sentinel she was the deity of this entire underground city.
She had just been born, only remembering things from these past few days. She couldn't remember anything before her birth.
She controlled all living beings in the underground city, only consuming the souls offered up by her subjects, not eating food.
But in fact, these words were only what she had heard from her servants.
She was a newly born deity, having not yet tasted any offerings.
It seemed she also had no real interest in the so-called soul consumption.
Of course, she said this only to declare ownership over the Sentinel before her.
"No matter what, everything here belongs to me, including you of course," Lin Yuan said matter-of-factly to the Sentinel, "So you belong to me, your entire being. You cannot leave this place."
"I won't leave," the Sentinel by the campfire said, "I won't leave your side."
What an obedient human. Lin Yuan was satisfied.
She didn't notice that in the Sentinel's words, he had quietly changed from not leaving this place to not leaving your side.
After all, these two sentences emotionally sounded the same.
Lin Yuan stayed in the nest for two days, wanting to go out for a walk, but worried about her Sentinel.
She found some iron chains left here, said to be used for binding some powerful unruly creatures before.
The chains had metal collars at the top, with some kind of fine long needles inside the collars. When locked around the neck, even the strongest creatures had no strength to struggle and escape.
Lin Yuan crouched beside the Sentinel, comparing the collar against his neck.
The Sentinel sat there, eyes downcast, very submissive, showing no intention to resist her.
Such an obedient Sentinel, perhaps there's no need to lock him up?
"You can't run away," Lin Yuan said.
"I won't run," he said.
"Also don't wander around. There are many places here you can't go."
The Sentinel lowered his eyelashes and made a sound of agreement.
Lin Yuan didn't detect any special emotions, so she felt reassured.
"Be good and rest to recover, I'll bring back more food for you."
When Lin Yuan first returned, the Sentinel indeed hadn't wandered off, he was still obediently staying in Lin Yuan's nest.
He had even cleaned up the nest.
When Lin Yuan returned, the ground was neat and clean, even the messy pipes on the walls had been tied up properly.
The tentacles could now move between them without getting hurt easily.
Lin Yuan was so fond of him.
She gave him all the bits and pieces she brought back—various human tools and food left in this city, and some small toys she found interesting but didn't understand the use of.
Some things made the Sentinel very happy when he received them, some made his face slightly red.
"These aren't things for me to use, don't bring them back next time."
The second time she returned, she saw the Sentinel sitting by the pool washing his upper body.
When he heard movement, he quickly turned his body around. Lin Yuan only saw a wet back.
That back had broad shoulders, tapering down. The muscle lines were fluid, creating beautiful shapes when the shoulder blades moved.
A back crisscrossed with scars, all left from being torn and bitten, blood-red wounds not yet fully healed. It was remarkable that he hadn't been torn apart, could still stand here cleaning himself.
But Lin Yuan didn't find it ugly, rather it made him look dangerous and full of power.
A beautiful and powerful male, only showing weakness in front of her.
The firelight wasn't very bright, Lin Yuan saw the wet Sentinel's half-turned face in the firelight.
"Sorry, didn't know you were back. I'll be done soon."
His hair was cleaned, wet and black, his eyes like pebbles soaked in an icy spring, his nose beautiful, his lips tinged with moisture.
Lin Yuan just stood at the entrance of the nest watching, not going in, the tentacles surging in the darkness.
She didn't know why she hadn't walked in. Her Sentinel wasn't just cute, he turned out to be this beautifully alluring.
She always felt like she remembered this face, as if even when he was covered in blood, she knew clearly that once cleaned, such a bright and beautiful face would be revealed.
Where did this sense of familiarity come from?
Lin Yuan felt a dull ache in her head. As if something had struck it hard, something confined within struggling to break free.
In any case, she gradually let her guard down with the Sentinel in her nest.
He was always obedient, gentle, would make various sweet foods for her, and would clean up.
Could feed himself, treat his own wounds, and clean his body.
Only when the tentacles occasionally wanted to play with him, would he use his pleasant voice to ask her not to do that.
Given that he was a delicate and obedient Sentinel, Lin Yuan agreed.
He stayed in the nest, never wandering off.
Lin Yuan also gradually stopped being wary of him.
"You spoil that Sentinel too much," Teng Lu said to her, "This isn't good, he will escape from here, betray you, you'll regret it sooner or later."
Lin Yuan ignored her.
"It's alright, Sister Lin Yuan, you'll soon discover that indulgence only leads to betrayal. Pain and terror are what will give you eternal loyalty."
"He won't leave. He promised," Lin Yuan said.
"You have many ways to control Sentinels, there's no need to just indulge," Teng Lu laughed, "Actually, you could try it on him. You'll find he becomes even more obedient and interesting then."
At this time, they were walking in a huge underground palace.
This place looked like an ancient place of worship.
The walls were covered with intricate murals, crimson carpets laid on the high steps in the center, with a rectangular altar at the very top.
The altar was pure white, but the patterns on the ground were stained with blackened colors. Who knows how many people's blood had flowed here, deeply soaked into the stone, becoming an indelible color.
On the long steps leading to the altar lay a huge withered body.
That body was immense, extending here from the darkness, its volume occupying most of the space in the entire temple.
It was like a long string of aged, withered tree roots, crawling all the way from the darkness, finally dying twisted and gnarled on the long stairs.
Ferocious, huge claw-like hands dried like dead branches, rigidly reaching toward the sky.
Its form was too huge, too decayed. So much so that Lin Yuan had difficulty distinguishing its features and head position from its layered appearance.
Only knew that this extremely ancient life seemed to have desperately desired something before death. Had fought and struggled intensely with someone here.
Finally it failed, lost everything, leaving only a rotted rigid shell.
They say it was the previous deity of this underground city.
Lin Yuan didn't like this place. Although this was where she was born.
Every time she came here, looking at that decayed body occupying half the space, looking at that pure white altar and the blackened bloodstains all over the ground.
She would vaguely feel a kind of fear and discomfort.
But something here seemed to be calling to her. Always making her instinctively want to get closer, entering again and again. Walking to the bottom of this altar.
Lin Yuan felt her brain start to ache again. Her mind was very chaotic, as if many voices were shouting in her brain, calling her to leave, telling her to wake up.
Yet something else was calling her, wanting her to stay, to get closer to that altar.
The two thoughts pulled her back and forth, giving her a terrible headache.
She always felt she had forgotten something. Some very important things that shouldn't have been forgotten.
Lin Yuan turned around in discomfort, wanting to leave this place.
"Don't go, you are our deity, the new deity," voices echoed in the vast palace. Those voices were very light, ethereal, fine and scattered, carrying a kind of primitive calling.
"Come, follow me. Accept our offerings."
"You will become stronger, control everything, become omnipotent."
Lin Yuan raised her head in confusion, saw Teng Lu's face, saw that huge withered trunk, saw many strange creatures lurking in this palace.
They either crawled on the ground or hung from the ceiling. Faces without eyes swaying before Lin Yuan.
These are all my companions, monsters like me, she thought hazily in her mind.
She sensed an instinctive feeling of hunger, as if something was calling from deep in her soul, growing from her bloodline, calling to her heart.
This made her feel very thirsty, very hungry, urgently wanting to devour something, to make herself stronger.
The tentacles spread and extended in the underground, this place seemed to have the best soil, mysterious primal power, making Lin Yuan's tentacles grow stronger, more numerous.
They could spread endlessly throughout the underground city, extending into every corner.
Lin Yuan saw many lights in the darkness, the ends of the tentacles faintly touching each bright point.
Those were individual human mental worlds, some very tiny, some bright and brilliant.
They were entering this underground city.
Lin Yuan saw many people at the same time.
Some were fighting with mutants, some were bending down to pick things up. Some were crying in grief holding dead companions, some were wild with joy over their findings.
Sorrow, joy, greed, fury, all kinds of emotions gathered from the spider web-like underground, converging in Lin Yuan's mind.
Those people's mental fluctuations appeared clearly one by one in Lin Yuan's vision, some strong some weak, rich and colorful, like offerings placed on the altar, waiting for the deity to choose.
Lin Yuan felt hungry, a faint thought grew from deep in her bloodline, wanting to devour these bright points, merge them into herself, to no longer be hungry, to become stronger.
In the chaos, her consciousness slowly permeated the entire huge dark world. Extending infinitely outward, to every corner.
She saw everything, controlled everything, becoming one with this underground world.
Human emotions became increasingly faint in this boundless mental world.
She began to become detached, rational, omniscient.
Until she saw that particularly bright light.
That mental presence was very powerful, exceptionally bright, like a brilliant star in the dark night, impossible to ignore.
Was it that Sentinel?
Her Sentinel?
He hadn't obediently stayed in the nest she had marked out for him.
Instead, at some point, he had quietly followed her, coming into the temple. Now, he was carefully advancing in the temple's outer area, exploring something.
"He deceived me?" A surge of anger suddenly rose in Lin Yuan's calm heart.
It wasn't really a big deal, just a Sentinel who had wandered out.
But all that detachment, rationality, omniscience, the shallow divinity just born instantly scattered.
He lied to me.
That Sentinel who pretended to be so obedient.
Lin Yuan angrily left the altar, no longer responding to the calling voices in the temple, walking straight out.
In the spacious temple, the gathered mutants peered and looked at each other in the darkness.
"Failed again?" Teng Lu dejectedly sat on the steps, burying herself in that huge withered body,
"Why is it like this, we were so close to succeeding this time."
Thank you for the update🐥
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