Chapter 761: Pseudo-Human Gathering
Pseudo-Human Gathering
Lin Ye felt along the wall a few times before opening a hidden door disguised as part of the wall. Inside the hidden door was a small, sealed space.
After Lin Ye entered that space, the wall behind him automatically closed, and a passage leading downward opened before him.
"Don't move!"
A man in combat gear appeared deep in the passage, aiming a Spiritual Energy Rifle at Lin Ye's head.
"The organization sent me to clean up the anomalous creatures in the city district. Are you an organization member? Or have you already left the organization?"
Lin Ye didn't resort to violence immediately. When encountering normal people, he generally tried to communicate with them first.
"The organization sent you to clean up the city district? Are you serious?"
The man stared nervously at Lin Ye. When he should have been fulfilling his duties, he had fled into this base with his family. He simply couldn't face those monsters outside, nor could he face other organization members.
"I need some weapons and equipment. Are you going to bring them out for me, or should I go in and get them myself?"
Lin Ye looked at the man with calm eyes. He would try to give the man a chance to live.
"...I'll go get them right now."
The man returned inside the base, and before long, he handed a box to Lin Ye.
"This is just a small base. There wasn't much in the way of supplies here to begin with."
The man stared nervously at Lin Ye.
Lin Ye opened the box. Inside was a set of combat gear, a backpack, a Spiritual Energy Pistol, a Spiritual Energy Rifle, several spare magazines loaded with spiritual energy bullets, and two large boxes of spiritual energy ammunition.
"Good. I'm leaving now. There might be some pseudo-humans following behind me, so you'd better keep that door sealed tight."
Lin Ye changed into the combat gear, holstered the Spiritual Energy Pistol and magazines in easily accessible positions, and packed the spiritual energy ammunition into his backpack.
"...Is there any hope out there?"
The man hesitated, then asked anyway.
"I'll resolve the problems here before the end of today, but you'd better wait until the organization has finished clearing out the remaining monsters before going out."
Lin Ye closed the hidden door and left this small shelter.
The tunnel was extremely quiet. Those things that might have been pseudo-humans hadn't caught up yet.
Lin Ye continued forward. He still needed to pass through three more stations before he could reach the target organization's base.
'Hm?'
Lin Ye pulled back his right foot mid-step. He hadn't actually stepped on solid ground just now. Good thing he had been paying attention to the road conditions, or he might have plunged his foot straight into empty space.
The flashlight beam illuminated the tunnel, and Lin Ye discovered a pit several meters in diameter on the ground ahead.
'This looks like one of those pits dug by the giant worms.'
Lin Ye circled around the pit. Just then, he felt a faint vibration coming from underground.
He immediately turned off the flashlight and moved away from the pit.
A giant worm burst out from the pit. It writhed around near the opening for a while before burrowing back inside.
'The light from the flashlight attracts giant worms?'
Lin Ye hadn't made any major movements just now—he had only turned on the flashlight.
'Looks like I'll have to move forward in the dark.'
Even with these pits in the tunnel, Lin Ye could still probe his way forward in the darkness. When he encountered a pit, he could feel his way along its edge to go around it.
This didn't significantly slow Lin Ye's pace. If giant worms were the only anomalous creatures in the tunnel, then for Lin Ye, this place was much safer than the surface.
Before long, Lin Ye spotted the lights of the underground platform. He hadn't even gotten close when he heard a scream coming from that direction.
A group of pseudo-humans had gathered on the platform. They surrounded a man, seemingly performing some kind of eerie ritual.
On one side of the platform sat several metal cages, each holding an ordinary person.
Lin Ye didn't waste words. He directly raised his gun and emptied a magazine at the pseudo-humans.
One magazine held thirty spiritual energy bullets—enough to blow apart thirty pseudo-human heads. He didn't even need to reload to clear the platform of pseudo-humans.
Among these pseudo-humans was a pseudo-human leader. It dodged the first spiritual energy bullet but failed to evade the second one that followed.
After dealing with the pseudo-humans on the platform, Lin Ye stepped up onto it, opened the metal cages, and then walked over to the man who had his limbs severed.
"Just... put me out of my misery..."
The man let out a pained voice.
"Are you sure? I might be able to attach new limbs for you."
Lin Ye swapped out a fresh magazine and aimed at the man's head.
"...Really?"
The man certainly didn't want to die in a place like this.
"I can give it a try. There happens to be plenty of fresh material here... What kind of limbs do you want? Pick out a set for yourself."
Lin Ye picked up some of the knives the pseudo-humans had been using. The man's limbs had been gnawed down to the bone by those creatures, but fortunately, there was no shortage of fresh materials around here.
This counted as some kind of self-service, in a way.
With a tragic expression, the man selected a set of limbs he fancied. Lin Ye skillfully cut the limbs off a corpse and tried attaching them to the man.
He had been in this area for a while and had developed some understanding of the inferior spiritual energy. Now was a good chance to test it out on the man.
The survivors who had escaped from the cages stared at Lin Ye with terrified eyes. Earlier, they had thought Lin Ye was a soldier sent to rescue them.
Now, they didn't think that anymore.
It took Lin Ye a bit of time to attach the man's limbs. The inferior spiritual energy in the environment was even more unstable than he had anticipated.
'The composition of this inferior spiritual energy seems to be constantly changing. I need to develop an organizational structure that can adapt to these compositional changes.'
Lin Ye looked at the man's deformed limbs and showed an expression of dissatisfaction.
"This is the best I can do for now. If you don't think it'll work, I can help you find peace."
"No need! I feel great right now!"
The man moved his new limbs. Though they were uneven in length, he felt they worked even better than his original ones.
"Good. Next, I'm heading to the organization's base to search for supplies. You all can follow behind me, but you must obey my commands and stay silent."
Lin Ye stepped onto the escalator leading up to the first underground level. He couldn't lead these survivors through the pitch-black tunnel filled with giant pits.
The survivors hurriedly followed behind Lin Ye. Seeing that Lin Ye had actually reattached the man's limbs, they began to think he really was some kind of organization rescue personnel again.
The first-floor Ticket Hall here was similar to the previous subway station. The floor and ceiling were also smeared with dark red blood, and a pile of something like dumpling filling sat in the center of the hall.
Lin Ye skirted around that pile of dumpling filling and led the survivors back up to the surface.
The subway entrance faced a large supermarket, where a group of pseudo-humans was performing some kind of ritual inside.