Alien Relic Hunter.

Chapter 753 A false alarm

Of course, the others also saw the outline of the skeleton. Except for Mo Jue, the whole team adjusted their positions within half a second and entered the battle state.

But the skeleton seemed to be just floating nearby, and did not continue to approach the crowd.

"What's going on?" Ivan frowned. He held a large-caliber hunting pistol in his left hand, and the mechanical arm in his right hand held the short knife that was just used to cut bark.

"This thing seems to be hanging there..." Ke Lan narrowed his eyes and said, "Go, go and have a look."

"Yeah." 33 nodded, and with a wave of his hand, dozens of black flying blades floated into the air—originally, 33 didn't have so many flying blades, but since he joined the Hunting God Hunting Group, Ke Lan directly asked Layton to forge several hundred Nino alloy flying blades for him, even if they were used as consumables, it would not be a problem at all.

Nearly a hundred flying blades protected 33's body tightly. He took a deep breath, and then walked step by step towards the skeleton hidden in the thick fog.

Ke Lan also walked forward, and Ze Luo followed closely behind him. Every time the two of them took a step forward, the fog blocking the front would be pushed away a step.

They only took three steps forward, and all the mist surrounding the skeleton was squeezed away... Only then did everyone realize that it was a human skeleton surrounded by more than a dozen air roots. Instead of burrowing into the ground to form a prop root, it burrowed into the skeleton's ribcage like a vine, hoisting it in mid-air.

"Phew... it turned out to be a false alarm." 33 retracted most of the flying blades, leaving only about ten of them on alert - manipulating so many flying blades at the same time was a mental burden for him It was also extremely heavy. If he mobilized all the flying blades on his body, his brain would be completely "drained" in a few minutes.

Ke Lan stepped forward and looked at the skeleton carefully - although the flesh and blood organs of the skeleton have disappeared, the clothes on the body are still relatively intact, except for a few holes pierced by those air roots. Besides, there are no other signs of damage.

This is an "Arc'teryx" mountaineering jacket. This brand is relatively high-end in the civilian market, but because of the premium issue, it is rarely included in the official material procurement list, so it is basically certain that this is an unofficial explorer. .

This jacket was covered with a thick layer of dust, and the alloy accessories were also covered with traces of oxidation, and the pockets on both sides were filled with finely divided leaves of mist roost.

"This skeleton looks like it's been a few years old, so it shouldn't be denim." Ke Lan turned to look at Mo Jue, trying to comfort her, but found that she was staring at the chest of the skeleton.

Mo Jue knew this skeleton?

Ke Lan followed Mo Jue's line of sight, and saw a silver necklace that was also severely oxidized wrapped around the neck of the skeleton, but the pendant part of the necklace had been wrapped in by the coiled air roots of the Misty Wood. I don't know what it looks like.

"Can you... dig out that necklace?" Mo Jue's voice trembled.

"What? Do you know him?" Ke Lan asked.

"It's not sure yet." Mo Jue shook his head, "But I feel like..."

"33, dig out that necklace." Ke Lan ordered immediately.

"Yeah." 33 nodded, he didn't move, but the two black flying blades shot out with a "swish", and they cut open the air roots wrapped around the neck of the skeleton neatly, wrapping them The pendant inside is liberated.

It was a silver cross, and the surface of the cross was inlaid with small rhinestones, but these rhinestones have lost their luster now, and the metal part of the cross is also covered with a gray-white oxide layer.

"It's really him!" Mo Jue widened his eyes and said in shock.

"Who? The previously missing lumberjack from your group?"

"He is one of the veterans who created this team together with my father... No one knows his name. My father and others call him 'Golden Retriever', and I call him 'Golden Retriever'..." Mo Jue murmured Said, "He really likes to wear 'Arc'teryx' brand equipment...but it has been many years since he disappeared, so I can't remember exactly what kind of clothes he was wearing at that time, but this necklace , I will never admit my mistake!"

"Golden Retriever?!" After hearing this nickname, Ke Lan also became a little excited-this is one of the only few people in the woodcutter team who knew "that secret". Although he is dead, but Maybe some important clues can be found from him!
But in the next second, a warning flashed in Ke Lan's mind: According to Mo Jue's previous description, the place where the golden retriever disappeared was about 350 meters away from the red line, but why did his body appear here?

Could it be that they were moved here by the native creatures in the foggy forest?
At this time, Mo Jue had already walked up to the corpse hanging in mid-air, and said in a low voice: "Uncle Jin Mao believes in the Christianity of the old era...Although he himself said that God does not exist at all, he still said However, people always need to find something to put their faith in, even if it’s just an illusory thought. This cross necklace was given to him by a...uh...a bar girl he liked very much. gift from him, so he’s been wearing it all the time.”

"This behavior sounds like a lover... But didn't you say that he is a slut? If there is a wine girl you like, why don't you marry that woman? Even if the woman signed a contract of prostitution, in order to give you Income, it should be easy to redeem others, right?" 33 asked.

"I don't know... Uncle Golden Retriever's words are often contradictory. Except when discussing serious matters with my father, when he chats with us, he always tells the truth and lies, so..." Mo Jue said awkwardly.

"Understood." 33 nodded, "I also knew such a guy before, he was full of bullshit, but if he was drunk, he liked to spit out his own truth... That guy is good at marksmanship, but Fighting skills are not very good, if I get close, I can knock him down with just one move."

"Then how is that person now?" Mo Jue asked subconsciously.

"He's dead too." 33 shrugged his shoulders, looking indifferent, "I saw his abdominal cavity was cut open by the sharp jointed limbs of the man-eating spider...but he hadn't passed away at that time, the man-eating spider I just pressed on his body and bit his body with big pincers, his screams made my eardrums hurt..."

33 paused for half a second, sighed, and then continued: "I emptied three magazines at that man-eating spider, but none of the bullets could tear the carapace of that man-eating spider, so I had to turn the gun around. He ended his suffering for him. He was the first comrade-in-arms to die at my hands, so I remember it very clearly."

"Mo Jue, did you say that this golden retriever disappeared while exploring an area 350 meters deep? Why did he appear here?" Ke Lan also walked up to the skeleton and asked Mo Jue.

"This... I don't know." Mo Jue shook his head, and his face also showed doubts, "Not only is the depth wrong, but the direction is also wrong... In that exploration operation, we entered the forest from the south of the gray mist forest. , at least a dozen kilometers away from this place."

"Have you ever encountered this kind of situation before? It is a missing person whose body was later found far away from the place where he disappeared. Has anything similar happened?" Ke Lan continued to ask.

"No... This is the first time I have found the remains of a team member." Mo Jue replied.

"I don't think it's so strange..." Ivan interjected, "As Mo Jue said before, people who get separated from the large group will not die immediately, and it is possible that this golden retriever may be messing around in the forest after falling behind. He died because of exhaustion, poisoning, oxygen depletion, or other reasons after walking to this place. It is also possible that he died in other places. The corpse was dragged to this place by the indigenous creatures living in the foggy forest .”

"Indigenous creatures... I thought so too at first, but we didn't seem to encounter any indigenous creatures along the way." Ke Lan said while looking at the remains in midair, "Mo Jue, you are exploring and During the logging process, have you encountered indigenous creatures living in the foggy forest?"

Mo Jue: "I have encountered it, but the chances are very low... Contrary to those native creatures that live on the treetops and have the ability to fly, the native creatures that live on the ground are very timid and will quickly run away when they encounter human beings. Even if you shoot them, they don't attack humans, so they're basically not a threat."

"Forget it, don't think about this for now, let's put this corpse down." Ke Lan walked up, and 33 alone supported the thigh bone of a corpse. They all cut off.

"Ivan, come here and check it out, and see if you can find out the cause of his death." Ke Lan said while peeling off the coat of the corpse - Mo Jue said that his father always carried a copy of the book with him. "Important notebook full of secrets", if you can find something similar in this "golden retriever" relic, it will definitely be called great news for Ke Lan.

The pockets of the coat were stuffed with leaves, but there seemed to be something else hiding under the leaves.

On the other side, under Ivan's command, 33 used a flying blade to remove the air roots and vines wrapped around the skeleton, and a complete human skeleton was laid flat on the ground.

Ivan walked around the skeleton first, and muttered in his mouth: "Including the pelvis, there are six fractures in the whole body. The amount of bleeding from this level of fracture is enough to be fatal, but considering the entanglement of the air roots and vines just now method, these six fractures should all appear after the death of this person. Besides these six fractures, there are no other injuries to the bones... At least it is certain that the deceased has a high probability of not being injured before his death. Severe physical blow."

"Of course, it is also possible that the fatal injury did not touch the bone, such as damage to the heart and lung organs, spleen hemorrhage and other injuries, which can also kill a person in a short time, but because the body only has bones left, there is no body. I found foreign objects other than branches and leaves, so I can't make a judgment." Out of rigor, Ivan added.

Immediately afterwards, he squatted down again, scraped some bone powder from various parts of the skeleton, poured it into the test tube, added several reagents and test paper into the test tube, and shook it a few times.

"There is no sign of poisoning, or the degree of poisoning has not penetrated into the bone." Ivan shook his head helplessly, "It is difficult to determine the specific cause of death, and it is also possible that he was poisoned, and the toxicity did not kill him. But the person passed out, hit the back of the head on a stone that exposed the soil, or buried his face in the soil and caused suffocation... If I were forced to list them all, I could name at least thirty different ways to die."

"Check more carefully, don't miss any details." Ke Lan only left this sentence, and continued to look at the old mountaineering jacket.

Most of the outer pockets are filled with small, easy-to-reach items: a package of yellowed tissues, a small bottle of alcohol that has evaporated, a rusty jackknife, and a magnesium rod used to make a fire.

They are all very common things on explorers, and they are all brands and models that can be easily bought in the store, and there is nothing special about them.

Ke Lan even spread out the pack of tissues one by one, unscrewed all the screws on the jackknife, split the handle in half, and found nothing new—the tissues are just tissues, the pocketknife Also just a jackknife.

The pocket on the upper arm of the mountaineering jacket holds medical supplies, but it contains little more than a pair of scissors, a small roll of bandages and a long-expired Adrenaline only.

These medical supplies have no traces of being used, which means that the golden retriever was not injured at that time, or the injury was so severe that he could not use these medical supplies for himself.

There are two unregistered commercial bank savings cards in the inner pocket of the jacket, and a custom shop membership card with a pink lip print pattern. Ke Lan glanced at the address of this custom shop, which happened to be located in the Old East Ninth District On the "Kabukicho Ichibangai"... Both the store and the people in the store have long been turned into ashes floating in low-Earth orbit...

Most of the equipment carried by the golden retriever should be in the backpack, but 33 walked around the place where the corpse was found several times, and did not find the backpack or other things left on the ground.

Ke Lan was a little disappointed. Not only did the corpse not provide them with any useful clues, but it also brought them a lot of new doubts...

"Wait a minute, that necklace!" Ke Lan suddenly had a flash of inspiration, "That necklace that the golden retriever cares about...bring that necklace to me!"

[PS Thanks to Sophie 66 for the 100 starting coins. 】

(End of this chapter)