Trickster Hunter.

Chapter 417 What are you looking at?

"Roger that!"

Helicopter No. 3 quickly lowered its altitude and dived into the clouds.

After a while, a cry of surprise was heard in the communication channel.

"What's going on? Unit 3?" Liu Li asked hurriedly, "What did you see?!"

"We'll transfer the image right away!" the person on Unit 3 replied.

After a short loading, the images captured by the long-distance observation equipment on Unit 3 were directly displayed on Liu Li's computer screen. Almost one-third of the huge body of Chimera 17 had changed from its original smooth appearance to a state that would make people with trypophobia faint at the mere sight of it.

When the camera zoomed in again, Liu Li could see clearly that those flesh-colored bumps that looked like papules were actually distorted human faces squeezed on the surface of the giant cocoon!
Liu Li took a breath of cold air.

However, his hands were not idle. He immediately transmitted the images back to the combat command center, and accessed the data in the archive to compare the faces one by one.

Although most of these faces are in a distorted, deformed or incomplete state, their original appearance can still be restored thanks to the powerful AI recognition function... After a few seconds, the comparison results with the archive data came out: a total of 13757 faces were scanned, of which 8701 faces found matching objects.

Some of these faces are soldiers and hunters who died in the memetic sample collection operation; some are people who died or went missing in various strange invasions and secondary disasters in Tianfu City and neighboring towns... and a few faces belong to the garrison personnel in Bunker No. 1 and Bunker No. 2 who lost contact not long ago.

"These... these faces..." the crew members on Unit 3 murmured. This strange and terrifying scene obviously brought a great shock to them.

"Chimera No. 17 has undergone an obvious mutation. I suspect that the loss of contact with Bunker No. 1 and Bunker No. 2 may be related to this mutation..." Liu Li suddenly stopped talking halfway because he suddenly discovered that the faces that had originally had their eyes closed had now opened their eyes and were looking at him through the lenses and screens of the observation equipment.

The low voices of the crew of Unit 3 were also heard on the communication channel.

"These faces seem to be able to sense the gaze of the observer... regardless of whether they are being observed directly or not..." Liu Li seemed to be talking to himself, but also seemed to be talking to Sun Hang, "To be honest, being stared at by them like this makes me feel very uncomfortable, as if..."

At the same time, inside the cabins of the two helicopters, without anyone noticing, groups of facial features began to slowly emerge on the alloy cabin walls, as if the alloy material had been pressed into a film and then covered on someone's face...

"Look at each other?" Upon hearing this, Sun Hang squatted down next to Liu Li and glared back fiercely at the faces of the people on the screen who had opened their eyes.

For some reason, a widely circulated joke on the Internet suddenly popped up in his mind.

"What are you?"

"Hey, why are you?"

"Why are you looking at me?"

"I'm just looking at you, what do you want?"

Generally speaking, at this point, both parties should change their means of communication from mouths to fists... But now Sun Hang is looking at the person's face through the screen, as if they were swearing at each other on the Internet. He doesn't believe that the other party has the ability to come over through the Internet cable to cause trouble for him.

But what Sun Hang didn't expect was that after he glared at them, those people quickly closed their eyes and showed expressions of extreme fear on their faces.

"What's going on?" Liu Li shuddered. "Unit 3, did you find anything over there? Why did these human faces suddenly close their eyes? And... they look so scared?"

"I don't know...we didn't do anything!"

Sun Hang was standing a little further back than Liu Li, so Liu Li, who was concentrating on staring at the computer screen, didn't see the scene where Sun Hang and those people were staring at each other across the screen.

In those inconspicuous places on the inner walls of the cabin, the faces that had just appeared disappeared again, and the deformed metal materials returned to their flatness again, as if nothing had happened.

Just as Liu Li was still immersed in the shock brought by the human face, a shrill alarm sounded from the robot deep in the bunker.

"What? The target is lost?" Liu Li looked at the glaring red words on the screen with some disbelief, as well as the cross-sectional analysis diagram of Bunker No. 1 on the split screen - the flashing red dot that originally symbolized the humanoid monster was now missing, and the only things left in the entire analysis diagram were the yellow and green dots of light representing the robot and the Crystal Princess.

"Missing? Impossible! He must be hiding somewhere on the third floor of the bunker!" Liu Li immediately controlled all the robots to conduct a carpet search of the third floor of the bunker. The Crystal Princess, who had just arrived at the target location, also joined the search.

However, they searched the entire third floor of the bunker and even dismantled the outer shells of the heavy equipment. Liu Li even sent a micro reconnaissance robot into the core of the reactor, but they were unable to find any trace of the humanoid monster.

"There is no secret passage... The internal structure of the bunker is also intact and has not been damaged. Where can he hide?" Liu Li stopped operating and stared at the computer screen in thought.

"It's also possible that it has left the bunker." Sun Hang said, "I heard that some strange creatures have abilities similar to 'teleportation', maybe it can do that too?"

"I'm more inclined to believe that it is hiding itself and completely blending its aura with the surrounding environment." Liu Li said, "The ability to camouflage is more common than the ability to teleport."

Sun Hang didn't say anything. He remembered the videotape in the basement of the commercial center... If he wanted to hide, there would probably be nothing more useful than that.

That strange object can directly erase the target's existence... I just don't know what state the target will be in during the period of "non-existence".

"So what should we do now?" Princess Crystal asked on the communication channel.

"Seal off the two bunkers and leave robots and drones to guard them." Liu Li said, "With our current capabilities, we cannot conduct a thorough search of the bunkers."

"A thorough search?" Princess Crystal didn't quite understand what he meant. "Wasn't our search just now thorough enough? We almost took the reactor core apart to have a look."

"What I mean by a thorough search is to fill every corner of the bunker with liquid gel, so that no matter where the monster is hiding, its figure will definitely be revealed... But I can't do that now."

"It's a stupid idea, but it's very practical." Yang Qi's voice suddenly appeared in the communication channel, "We already know about the changes in Chimera 17. Now the issues of Bunker 1 and Bunker 2 are no longer the top priority... According to Liu Li's plan, seal off the bunker first, and then leave the robots to guard it. You should withdraw first."

"Retreat?" Liu Li narrowed his eyes, raised his head, and looked through the porthole in the direction of Chimera 17 with some reluctance. "Yes, retreat first." Yang Qi said, "The changes in Chimera 17 make me very uneasy. We may have to replan the next combat operations. Considering what happened in Bunker 1 and Bunker 2, it is too dangerous for you to continue staying there."

……

……

Three helicopters landed steadily on the helipad on the roof of the research institute building. A group of logistics personnel wearing protective clothing and holding high-pressure water guns immediately rushed up, covered the No. 3 unit and the power armor of the Crystal Princess that had been drenched by the dirty rain with plastic film, and then began to wash them. As for the crew of the No. 3 unit, they were taken aside and lined up for radiation contamination testing.

Liu Li didn't say much to Sun Hang and Crystal Princess. He simply moved his equipment onto an electric cart and left in a hurry.

"I feel like he... seems... seems..." Crystal Princess hesitated to speak.

"Like what?" Sun Hang glanced at her. Could it be that this little sister of Tiebi really has the ability to read minds?
"I feel like he's afraid of something..." Crystal Princess frowned and said, "I don't know how to express that feeling in words. The closest word is probably scared."

"Normal people would feel creepy after looking at those faces." Sun Hang shrugged. "For an infected person with high IQ like him, especially one whose brain has mutated, I think his thinking must be much more active than that of ordinary people..."

"What do you mean?"

"Who knows, he might have a nightmare about those faces tonight." Sun Hang chuckled, "No matter how smart a person is, they are afraid of nightmares, especially when you don't know if you are in a dream or not... That feeling of being out of control is probably what people like Liu Li hate the most."

"What you said makes me curious... I will apply for a video file later to see if the human faces growing on Chimera No. 17 are really that scary." said the Crystal Princess.

When helicopter No. 3 captured those faces, she was searching for traces of humanoid monsters inside the bunker and completely missed the opportunity to look those faces in the eye.

"Don't blame me if you have nightmares at night." Sun Hang said.

"I don't think so. I'm pretty brave." Princess Crystal said, "But you, you must have seen those weird faces too, right? Why don't you seem scared at all?"

"Why should I be afraid? They are just human faces." Sun Hang wondered, "If they dare to stare at me, I will stare back. What is there to be afraid of?"

"Are you really glaring?"

"I stared at him."

"is that useful?"

"I don't know. Anyway, after I glared at them, they were so scared that they closed their eyes. Maybe they were afraid of me?" Sun Hang said, "There is an old saying that ghosts are afraid of evil people. As for whether ghosts are afraid of evil people, I don't know."

After saying this, Sun Hang made a vicious face.

"Is this a coincidence? You're staring at the screen, so you can't see those weird faces dozens of kilometers away." Crystal Princess laughed, "You like to joke around, much more interesting than my brother who only knows how to train every day."

"I don't think that the guy who can take out the code name like Crystal Princess would be a mute person." Sun Hang recalled the image of the iron wall in his mind and said speechlessly.

"He's so boring. Even when he's joking, he always looks so serious... All the jokes he tells are just bad jokes. They only make people feel cold and don't make people laugh at all."

The two chatted for a few words and then parted ways. Princess Crystal needed to go back to write a mission report... Although Sun Hang also had to write it, he always asked Yang Qi to do this job for him.

When he returned to his own luxurious office, Yang Lian had already left. Only Lao Wang, wearing loose trousers and a sports vest, was left sitting behind the desk. A bucket of instant noodles on the table was emitting steam.

There was still a lingering smell of the peculiar smell after intense exercise in the room, but when Lao Wang tore off the lid of the instant noodle bucket, the smell was completely replaced by the spicy taste that went straight to the top of his head.

Although Lao Wang is not a native of Tianfu, her food taste preferences are no different from those of a native of Tianfu City. She loves spicy food - especially the Shuzhou-style spicy hot pot, which is her favorite.

"Hey, you're back?" Lao Wang took a mouthful of noodles. "Lucky, my noodles are just soaked. How are you? Are you hungry? Do you want to share half the bucket with me?"

"No, just eat by yourself." Sun Hang pulled over a folding chair and sat down. "Where's Yang Lian?"

"She left after she woke up, saying she was going back to the dormitory to take a shower." Lao Wang said, "Her clothes and skirts were no longer wearable, so I found her a set of clothes at the logistics department, but the size was a little bit too small to fit."

Sun Hang scratched his head: "Was I that violent before?"

"Yes." Lao Wang nodded, put the instant noodles aside, and said mysteriously, "Come here, I have a surprise for you."

"What surprise?" Sun Hang approached doubtfully.

Lao Wang pulled up one of his trouser legs, revealing a layer of translucent light grey fabric wrapped around his slender calves, through which his fair skin and black scales were faintly visible.

"I found this great stuff when I was helping Yang Lian find clothes at the logistics department. Don't you like it?" Old Wang said with a smile, "You don't know how much effort I put into putting it on. Those scales can easily get caught on stockings, and a single hook would create a tear..."

"Why did you suddenly think of wearing stockings?" Sun Hang asked with some confusion, "Weren't you afraid of trouble before?"

"Because I found that Yang Lian, wearing black stockings, seemed to make you work extra hard... and when I went to ask the girl in the logistics department, do you know what she told me?"

"What did you say?"

"She said this thing can increase attack speed."

(End of this chapter)