The weapon refiner is not doing her job properly

Chapter 196 The Missing Lamb (4)

Tiny, hot metal fragments fell like scalding raindrops.

Lei Qingya suddenly looked up in the direction of the explosion, his expression changing slightly. Sensing a familiar presence, he whispered, "It was Teacher who made the move."

The Star Police officers guarding the tunnel entrance were also startled by the sudden high-altitude explosion.

The Star Police Captain immediately ordered, "Raise the observation drone, quick! Confirm the situation at the explosion point and see if it has triggered a ground fire."

Deep inside the tunnel, the loud explosion was weakened by the thick rock layers, and by the time it reached the nine people, it was only a dull, drum-like echo.

The passage itself did not feel any obvious impact or fluctuations; only fine dust fell from above.

The gunfire ceased completely, and a deathly silence returned, leaving only the heavy breathing of the group echoing in the narrow space, mixed with the rustling of equipment, creating a tense and oppressive atmosphere.

Su Ninglong fanned away the wisps of smoke that filled the air to avoid obstructing her vision. "This is terrible. The visibility from this thing (referring to the gas mask) is so poor. It's a complete burden for us hunters who rely on observation and reaction."

After using her mental scanning skill, she felt as if the air around her had turned into thick glue, and the invisible sense of constraint intensified, making it difficult to breathe.

Taking the opportunity, the hungry wolf tested the air composition in the passage again, and the result was somewhat unexpected: "Strange, the air readings show that the pollution level has actually decreased a lot, and is close to the safe threshold."

He speculated, "Perhaps the high temperature of the high-energy pulse weapon just now purified some of the harmful substances, or the shock wave and smoke from the explosion temporarily neutralized some components? But you still shouldn't take off your mask, it wouldn't be good if you accidentally got hit, after all, this is human territory."

Although Su Ninglong knew she had the ability to isolate those unknown gases, it was clear that in the current situation, exposing herself would not be beneficial.

She continued to wear her gas mask without saying a word.

The Star Police officers warily surveyed the chaotic battlefield.

Despite being three enemies, the team managed to unleash a devastating barrage of firepower far exceeding their numbers, thanks to the stealth provided by their optical nanosuits and their fearless fighting style. This caused the team considerable trouble.

The panda, fire lizard, and hungry wolf tacitly split up and began carefully searching the corpses of the fallen enemies and the scattered equipment. Soon, the preliminary findings were compiled.

The madman who self-destructed was literally angered to death.

He watched helplessly as the bomb disappeared, his breath caught in his throat, and he was gone.

“Reporting, Captain,” the team’s communication system failed, and the Salamander’s voice came from behind his mask, “The equipment has no organization or individual markings. The weapon is a modified ‘Viper’ pulse pistol, a common modified item on the black market. The armor under the nanosuit is also pieced together from various materials, with inconsistent defensive capabilities.” He paused, then concluded, “In other words, apart from that valuable optical nanosuit, everything else is a hodgepodge of miscellaneous items.”

"With just these ragtag pieces of equipment and three people, they managed to exert such dominance." Doug's voice carried a hint of seriousness. "The combat skills and teamwork of these three are remarkable."

Hungry Wolf did not participate in the discussion; he was squatting next to a corpse, focusing a powerful flashlight on the inside of the corpse's wrist.

The scanner's dim light swept across the skin's surface. "Captain, there's something here," he said in a low voice.

On the inside of the corpse's wrist, a clear triangular brand was visible.

Inside the triangle, several eye patterns outlined by minimalist lines silently gaze into the darkness.

"There's something on the inside of the wrist." Hungry Wolf carefully shone his flashlight on the area and recorded it with a scanner: on the inside of the enemy's wrist.

A triangle with several simple lines outlining the eyes in the center.

“A believer!” Su Ninglong blurted out.

Her words drew everyone's attention, and several pairs of eyes focused on her.

"A believer?" Yun Fei's tone was very low, his eyes flickering.

Su Ninglong nodded and explained, "I've done some... um... special instances in the training simulator and seen similar patterns. But the one I saw in the simulator was simpler, without so many eyes." As she spoke, she subconsciously turned the eye-shaped pin on her collar, and the eerie blue light seemed to flicker slightly, as if it had clearly recorded the strange pattern.

Hungry Wolf used the scanner to confirm the details of the pattern again, and affirmed, "That's right, this design style, especially the eyes, is unlike any known conventional gang symbol. It's more like a symbol related to some kind of 'mystic' worship."

After initially identifying the enemy and taking photos, they temporarily left them here.

Su Ninglong's gaze began to scan the surroundings of the passageway, as if searching for something.

"That's strange... I haven't seen a trace of the lamb." She muttered to herself. To her, that "lamb" would be excellent raw material for "lamb skewers" once it grew up, but she hadn't even seen a single wool.

Yun Fei heard her words clearly, and the corners of his mouth curved up. He teased her in a lighthearted tone, "What, still thinking about your lamb skewers?"

Su Ninglong answered confidently, with a pure longing for delicious food: "Yes, those are lamb skewers!"

“We’ve been delayed for too long; we must move on immediately,” the fox sensed a sense of urgency.

He nimbly stepped over the corpse on the ground, his sharp gaze fixed on the dense darkness deeper in the passage, a darkness that seemed to devour all light.

At the edge of darkness, an incredibly heavy steel gate stood like a silent behemoth, its sturdy design and riveted structure reminiscent of the sealed hatches on ocean-going freighters capable of withstanding raging waves.

After confirming that there were no more living enemies threatening the scene, the nine-man squad quickly regrouped and headed towards the door.

The panda tried to restart the mechanical spiders, but the spiders' systems seemed to be bound by some invisible shackles, forcibly executing the shutdown command and becoming unresponsive.

"The system has been forcibly locked and cannot be woken up." A hint of seriousness appeared between the panda's brows.

Being cut off from communications by the enemy is a very dangerous thing.

However, hunters are used to doing missions in such an environment and have little reaction to this.

Facing the heavy metal door, Panda stepped forward again, silently activating his superpower.

With a low, sickening metallic clang, the sturdy lock twisted and yielded like soft mud, and the heavy door slowly swung open inward. The sight behind the door made everyone who saw it feel their spirits sink once more.

The gun, which had been raised, was lowered slightly; there was no one inside.

The two armed robots immediately initiated their scanning program, and a cold, electronic voice announced: "Scan results indicate a large water reservoir structure ahead, accompanied by a complex network of pipes. Air composition analysis reveals a high concentration of unknown organic compounds and abnormal biopheromone levels. Thermal imaging scan has not detected any large living targets. Please advise whether to maintain shield mode?"

Seeing that the damaged mechanical leg of the armed robot still showed an uncoordinated limp while moving, the fox decisively ordered: "Allocate some energy to repair the transmission system of the more severely damaged left leg first. The shield can be temporarily turned off."

"Command received. Thank you for your understanding." The armed robot replied politely, removing its energy shield and concentrating its computing and energy resources on its left leg, whereupon the internal repair program began to operate.

The group carefully moved along the edge of the huge square pool made of rough cement.

Under the bright lights, the scene inside the pool wall was shocking. Thick, indescribable bluish-black grime covered it like the scales of some living creature, interspersed with stubborn dark brown patches that looked like dried blood.

The pool water resembled a frozen, stagnant pool, displaying an unsettling dark green hue and thick as melted syrup.

A thick layer of greasy foam floated on the surface of the water, constantly wriggling and churning. It burst and regenerated, making a faint but nauseating "plop" sound.

Even through a high-efficiency gas mask, the stench, strong enough to penetrate the filter layer, mixed with rotting organic matter and pungent chemicals, rushed straight to the brain through the nasal cavity.

Su Ninglong was a clean person. Looking at the dark green pool water churning with greasy foam, she subconsciously took two steps away from the edge of the pool, as if the filth could stick to her through the air.

"Look at those things!" Tong Zi suddenly stopped, the beam of his powerful flashlight piercing through the layer of foam floating on the water's surface and focusing on the depths of the pool.

The Star Police looked in the direction she pointed, but didn't find anything strange.

“Underneath the foam, those flocculent, dark-colored things,” Tong Zi carefully observed from left to right, “look like solidified asphalt or some kind of silt, but they are not distributed very evenly.”

The beam of light swept across the huge square pool, illuminating several massive metal devices standing in the center and around it—rusty filter tanks and centrifuges, now silent steel behemoths, long since ceased operation.

The thick pipes, like a dead python, extend from the surface and walls of the pool, coiling and connecting the walls and ceiling.

Many pipes were riddled with rusted holes, from which foul-smelling sewage dripped and seeped onto the concrete floor below, pooling into puddles of sticky, disgusting water.

The area closer to the control panel was even more chaotic.

The control panel was smashed to pieces, with various colored wires exposed like torn intestines, showing signs of hasty and thorough destruction.

Several heavy metal pipes leaned casually against the base of the filter tank next to it, with fresh scratches and dents on their bodies, clearly the weapons used to destroy the control panel.

Tong Zi walked over and picked up one of the long tubes to examine it. A large piece of the metal shell, which was corroded like mud, peeled off with a "crash" and fell to the ground.

"Don't touch these things," the fox immediately stopped them, his tone urgent. "We've already wasted too much time; we must move forward as soon as possible."

Tong Zi frowned, her concerns becoming more specific: "What if those flocculent things at the bottom of the pool are fragments of some monster's tissue? If we approach rashly and suddenly encounter a mental attack, can you withstand it?"

She looked at Captain Fox, "That kind of attack has nothing to do with guns and cannons; it's purely a crushing of willpower."

The fox was convinced instantly.

No matter how good their physical abilities or how sophisticated their equipment, Star Police officers are indeed like lambs to the slaughter when faced with the invisible attack described by Tong Zi, completely powerless to fight back.

This is a special battle belonging to the hunter's domain.

“You’re right.” The fox nodded, signaling Tong Zi to continue. Then he instructed his team to scout the surroundings and check if the next door was suitable for breaching.

Without hesitation, Tong Zi carefully picked up a relatively clean long tube, inserted it into the viscous pool water, stirred it a few times with effort, and finally scooped up a wisp of dark, flocculent material.

She threw the thing onto the relatively dry cement floor.

Tong Zi looked up and asked Su Ninglong, one of the experts present, that she was the most sensitive to the mysterious spirits.

"Get closer, how does it feel?"

Su Ninglong shifted her feet, squatted down, and focused her gaze on the slippery, fluffy substance.

“It’s strange…” she said softly, squinting as if trying to catch some indescribable feeling.

She asked Tong Zi for a long tube and carefully used the tip to gently poke at the fluffy material on the ground.

After a few stirs, the moisture on the surface of the flocculent material evaporated and disappeared rapidly at a speed visible to the naked eye.

It quickly dehydrates, shrinks, and hardens, its color changing from dark black to withered yellow. In just a few seconds, it becomes a dry, wrinkled lump, like old tree bark!
Even more bizarrely, several shriveled, dark red stripes extended from the edge of this "bark," clearly blood vessels.

Even if it is not a blood vessel, it is a similar thing to a blood vessel.

"Hmm... how should I put this feeling?" Su Ninglong stared at the strange thing, carefully choosing the right words to describe the indescribable sensation.

"Stop being so mysterious, just tell us," Doug urged. In this eerie environment, every second was nerve-wracking.

Su Ninglong wasn't deliberately delaying; she was genuinely perplexed by this unprecedented object: "This thing is contradictory. Part of its structure resembles tree bark, yet it's connected to obvious remnants of ordinary biological tissue. Hmm, a classic and conservative estimate is that it should contain human genes."

Su Ninglong wasn't making wild guesses; she had a thorough understanding of human organizations, after all, she had done a lot of murder in her previous life.

"Its recovery ability isn't strong; I could barely detect any life force. But it was continuously and extremely slowly emitting a very faint, yet strangely ominous, aura. If I weren't so close, I could hardly sense it."

She offered a chilling conclusion: "In short, it's a 'hybrid.' You could say it's like a mystic, but the intensity of its direct mental pollution isn't that high; you could say it's like a mutant or a parasite, but its pattern of continuous, low-intensity pollution is completely different. To sum it up in one sentence, it's a disgusting hybrid, a 'hybrid.' It's not like the pollution of a mystic, which is explosive yet releases pollution all the time."