Chapter 800: Hell is always the same
Chapter 800 Hell is always the same
In a dark tunnel.
A dozen Weilant soldiers in protective clothing were holding flashlights, carefully searching every shadow-covered corner around them, while cautiously moving forward.
The air here was filled with a suffocating depression, and it seemed that there were pairs of covetous eyes hidden in the darkness… that was the covetousness of the dead for the living.
Because this space was too quiet, any slight sound would seem abrupt and abnormal, so everyone intentionally or unintentionally reduced communication, and only talked to each other when necessary. It had
been an hour since the thousand-man team led by Favre discovered this tunnel, and it had been a full hour since this exploration team went deep into the ruins to search.
However, until now, they still have not explored the end of this tunnel. So many people even couldn’t help but start to wonder if they were going around in circles.
It’s no wonder they think so.
After all, this tunnel is as long as a black hole.
So the deeper they explore, the stronger the feeling of uneasiness in everyone’s hearts becomes.
It was as if if they stayed in here for too long, they would never be able to get out again…
”Damn… where did those guys who dug the pit find this unfortunate tunnel.”
”Who knows…”
”The ruins of a settlement more than a hundred years ago… I just want to know what’s the point of exploring this thing? Could there still be living people here?”
”Enough, shut up!”
Telling ghost stories at this time would do no good except to scare yourself. The man who was scolded by the captain smiled embarrassedly and stopped talking.
The others also shut their mouths involuntarily, and the eerie silence returned to this bottomless tunnel.
Finally, it was time for the routine report again.
The Willant soldier standing at the front of the team took a deep breath, took off the walkie-talkie hanging on his shoulder and said in a deep voice.
”This is the ‘sled’… everything is normal below, and no suspicious targets have been found for the time being.”
After a brief rustling sound of electricity, the voice of the superior came from the communication channel.
”Continue searching.”
”…Yes!”
Obviously.
The superior would not allow them to come back empty-handed.
Before they found a sufficiently valuable target, they could only continue searching in this bottomless tunnel.
The captain of the Willant team hung up the communication, gestured to his teammates behind him, and then led the demoralized people to continue walking deeper into the tunnel.
After passing through a crooked steel bar, they crossed a half-collapsed ventilation duct, and the space in front suddenly became spacious.
Seeing that the situation in front had finally changed, everyone’s faces showed an excited expression, and they all quickened their pace and continued to move forward. Soon they came to a small square of about a hundred square meters. In the
center of the square stood a square stone tablet, and around the stone tablet were a bunch of crooked chairs.
Most of these chairs were empty, but nearby they could see the remains of clothing and several completely weathered skeletons.
Enduring the discomfort in his heart, the captain of the Willant team walked to the stone tablet with a flashlight, and followed the flashlight’s light to search around.
”This is the ‘sled’… We found a square. This should be the gathering place for local survivors.”
After a pause, he pointed the flashlight at the stone tablet and found lines of tiny words engraved on it, so he continued.
”There is a stone tablet in the center of the square. We found some engraved words on it. They seem to be the names of local residents… Wait, there seems to be another line of words at the bottom of the stone tablet.” After
carefully identifying the tiny words, he barely recognized them and said.
”‘Our world has ended, we will restart a new reincarnation’… I don’t understand, is this some strange religion?”
The voice continued to come from the command center.
”Is there any geographical information about this settlement on the stone tablet? For example, the name?”
”No… Before confirming the place name, I will call this place ‘Stone Tablet Town’.”
The captain of the Willant people showed an interested expression on his face and walked around behind the stone tablet with the flashlight in his hand.
Because his attention was focused on the stone tablet, he didn’t notice his feet at all, until a crisp “crunch” sound came through the sole of his boots. He subconsciously lowered his head and realized that he had crushed a human skull.
It was at this moment that he saw the scene that he would never forget.
In the open space behind the stone tablet, densely packed bones grew like weeds. The head he stepped on was just an insignificant one among them. Human bones piled up into a small mountain in this not-so-spacious space…
This didn’t look like a settlement at all.
It looked like a sacrificial site for some cult.
What on earth happened here? !
Even though he was used to seeing the tragic scene of mountains of corpses and seas of bones on the battlefield, he still unconsciously felt a little panic about this weird death.
”Damn…”
He swallowed hard and couldn’t help but take a step back until his shoulder hit the stone tablet behind him.
At this moment, not only him, but also other Weilant soldiers who followed him into the tunnel also discovered the situation behind the stone tablet, and they all felt the coldness of their hands and feet.
The command center on the other end of the communication channel seemed to have noticed the abnormal situation below, and a hurried voice soon came from the headset.
”This is the command center, what did you find?”
”Dead people…”
”Dead people?”
”Yes… There are dead people everywhere here. Starting from behind the stone tablet in the square to the streets that are suspected to be buried by garbage, there are at least thousands of corpses lying here. This feeling is just like…”
The Weilant captain swallowed his saliva again, looked around the devastated mess around, and said in a hoarse voice.
”It’s just like hell…”
…
At the same time that the Weilant soldiers were exploring deep into hell, at the refugee camp established by the Alliance a few kilometers away, two vertical take-off and landing Orca transport planes slowly landed on the open space near the camp.
There are more than ten thousand survivors stranded in the area. Haibei City, which is still surrounded by the Kingdom of Heaven, is obviously not a suitable resettlement point. Both the transportation of supplies and sanitation are big problems.
Therefore, the Alliance Army Command issued new instructions to the front-line troops, requiring the troops stationed there to transfer the survivors to the coastline 100 kilometers away for resettlement.
There is a temporary camp of the Alliance there, as well as a temporary dock that allows cargo ships to load and unload supplies, which is more than enough to accommodate 10,000 survivors.
However, since the “Overlord” transport aircraft independently developed by the Alliance must rely on the runway to take off and land, the task of transferring refugees can only be entrusted to the Enterprise Aviation Team.
Looking at the group of survivors waiting in a long line in front of the apron, the pilot sitting in the driver’s seat couldn’t help but smack his lips and said to the Alliance soldier who came to hand over the work.
”No offense… Are you guys picked up from hell?”
People with missing arms and legs are everywhere here, and it is almost impossible to find a complete person.
And not only that.
Many people have rotten scars on their bodies, which look twisted and hideous, making people unbearable to look at.
”It’s about the same, after all, we just crawled out of hell.”
The Killing Dagger grinned, smiled at the pilot who was making a fuss, and said a joke casually.
”Mutants like to eat live animals, often eating half and throwing away the other half, and throwing the rest back to the dungeon to keep… These survivors who have eaten Naguo basically don’t have to worry about wound infection. The rotten flesh will grow together with the new flesh on their bodies, and finally become what you see.” The
pilot sitting in the co-pilot seat retched, and after a long time, he raised his head with a pale face and protested to the Killing Dagger standing next to the cockpit.
”… Enough, stop talking!”
The description made him feel physically uncomfortable.
Killing Dagger shrugged his shoulders, threw the personnel list into the cockpit, and patted the pilot’s shoulder with a smile.
”There are more than 17,000 targets that need to be transferred, and the prisoners from the Weyland people are also going to be handed over to us… The task is arduous, anyway, it’s up to you, come on!”
Watching the soldier turn and leave, the two pilots sitting in the cockpit looked at each other and couldn’t help but whispered to each other.
”I suspect these people are mentally ill… otherwise how could they not feel uncomfortable at all.”
”I completely agree with your point of view…”
After explaining the situation here, Killing Dagger patted the hatch of the cockpit, and then turned around to do other things.
Just as the Enterprise transport plane was busy transferring survivors to the coastline, two Viper transport planes carrying researchers from the Alliance scientific expedition team flew over from the coastline and stopped not far from the Orca transport plane.
A group of researchers in white coats quickly got off the plane and, escorted by a group of players with live ammunition, quickly went to the entrance of Shelter No. 20.
At present, the entire shelter is still under the control of the Alliance’s Burning Legion. Not only have new monitoring equipment been replaced on the nearby streets, but drones have also been arranged to patrol around 24 hours a day. Before
completing the inspection of the data stored in the shelter, this shelter will not be open to other members of the Sticky Community.
Chu Guang is not the only one who is paying attention to the latest progress of the investigation. Fang Chang, who is very interested in Shelter No. 20, is also paying attention to the latest progress of the scientific expedition team.
While he was waiting for the results of the investigation, Old White, who had returned from patrolling outside, brought him an unexpected message.
”I have good news and bad news here. Which one do you want to hear first?”
Hearing this suspenseful statement, Fang Chang coughed lightly.
”Just start with the important one.”
Old White grinned and said.
”Remember the group of Willant people before? They really dug something from the position we gave up before.”
Fang Chang was stunned for a few seconds after hearing this, and then looked at Old White with an unbelievable face.
”Is it true?”
Old White nodded and said.
”It was the news given to me by the brother on the battlefield, it should be correct.”
Fang Chang asked immediately.
”What about the good news?”
Old White grinned and said.
”The one you just heard is the good news. As for the bad news… Unfortunately, our friendly forces were not very lucky. They didn’t dig up anything except corpses.”
Fang Chang frowned slightly.
”…Didn’t dig up anything except corpses?”
Old White nodded and continued.
”Yes, the passage they dug seems to be the entrance to a settlement. However, that settlement has been abandoned for more than a century, and there is nothing inside except the bodies of local survivors.”
Looking at Fang Chang who was lost in thought, Lao Bai paused and continued.
”But speaking of that settlement, it’s also very strange. According to the Willant people who went down to explore the ruins, the entire settlement seemed to be buried in an instant.”
”A large number of survivors’ bodies gathered in the square at the entrance of the settlement. There was no sign of resistance at the scene… Those survivors seemed to have accepted their fate. They carved their names on the stone tablets and wrote the prophecy of doomsday at the end, and finally calmly welcomed the final death.”
”The entire ruins exuded a weird smell from head to toe, and what’s even more weird is that I heard from the battlefield that the Willant soldiers who came back from below had some mental problems. They seemed to be frightened by something and became suspicious… Logically speaking, this is very abnormal. They are all experienced warriors, and they shouldn’t be scared like this by a few corpses.”
Fang Chang nodded in agreement, and after thinking for a moment, he suddenly opened his mouth and proposed a possibility.
”Could it be the influence of the mind interference device or some kind of bacteria?”
Lao Bai shook his head and said.
”That’s not clear. In fact, I was thinking that it would be better if we could ask the Legion for a few ‘wounded’ to come and cooperate with our research, but the problem now is… we obtained the information through abnormal channels. If they don’t confess voluntarily, it’s not easy for us to ask for it.”
Fang Chang sighed and said.
”Indeed… However, according to the clues dug up by the Weilantes, some of the conclusions of the scientific expedition team can be supported.”
Lao Bai’s heart moved and he asked in surprise.
”Did the scientific expedition team get any results?”
Fang Chang nodded and spoke slowly.
”According to the investigation opinion of the scientific expedition team, the administrator log of Shelter No. 20 should have been deleted manually, and it was after a disastrous experimental result.”
Lao Bai frowned and asked.
”Disastrous experimental result?”
Fang Chang nodded and continued.
”The main research direction of Shelter No. 20 is the development of outer space. According to the two technical concepts they designed for ‘return to space’, they considered two plans in the twenty years after the 51st year of the Wasteland Era.” ”
The first plan is to use limited resources to build a trackless space elevator, and step by step, walk the path that the Human Union has taken again. The other plan is to take a different approach and transmit thinking to the Human Union era space equipment that is still working in outer space, so as to complete the rescue from the outside to the inside… This can be regarded as a disguised overtaking on a curve.”
”According to the investigation conclusions of the scientific expedition team, Shelter No. 20 is very likely to have abolished the plan from the technical feasibility demonstration stage after conceiving the first plan, and put all the chips on the second plan from the beginning… We can’t find any specific experimental plans for the first plan on the shelter’s server for this reason. They didn’t try it from the beginning.”
Lao Bai frowned.
”Does this mean… that trackless space elevator plan won’t work?”
”Not really,” Fang Chang shook his head. “How can you say something won’t work if you haven’t tried it before? If that thing is really a technology that cannot be realized in principle, it wouldn’t have turned into a plan and appeared in this shelter.”
Lao Bai asked in confusion.
”Then why did they just give up?”
Fang Chang recalled what he had just heard from the NPC and continued.
”The opinion of the scientific expedition team is… at that time, the residents of Shelter No. 20 judged that the material cost and time cost required for the first plan were beyond their ability to bear. If they forced the plan to go forward, they might spend fifty years or even longer.”
Lao Bai said thoughtfully.
”Fifty years… that doesn’t sound unacceptable.”
”That’s what we think, but at that time, they thought that this time was too long… In fact, from their perspective, it’s not difficult to think that if it takes such a long time to return to outer space, it would take who knows how long to restore the territory of the Human Union during its heyday.” After
a pause, Fang Chang continued.
”The expedition team speculated that due to various factors, they most likely chose the second plan as the direction of their efforts… and placed all their hopes on the mind projection technology, which seemed to be cheaper but had more uncertainties.”
Old White couldn’t help asking.
”So they… succeeded?”
Fang Chang sighed softly.
”Didn’t I say that the administrator’s log was deleted after a disastrous experimental result…”
After a pause, he continued.
”We have no way of knowing what they did in the 21 years from 51 to 72 of the Wasteland Era, but if the bodies dug up by the Weyland people were left by them, then the result of that experiment is self-evident… The residents of Shelter No. 20 were eager for quick results, which led to the final disastrous consequences, so that the entire experiment turned into a desperate collective suicide.” Listening
to this cruel inference, Old White’s Adam’s apple moved up and down, and finally shook his head, and only uttered one sentence.
”It’s really crazy…”
Fang Chang nodded and said after a moment of silence.
”Indeed, that was another group of lunatics. They belonged to a different era from Torch, but their madness was exactly the same.”
”It is hard not to wonder whether Torch was inspired by his experience in Shelter 20 to do so many outrageous things…”
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(Thanks to “Book Friend 20230621171246491” for the leader’s reward!!!)
I feel that my cold has gotten better, a little better than before…
(End of this chapter)
