Chapter 41

The Other World

This concept first appeared in a paper by a professor at Lighthouse.

The world's first pollution incident can be traced back to the early 22nd century, when several citizens in a certain neighborhood died one after another. People initially thought it was premeditated murder, until the forensic doctors who were examining the bodies also died. The forensic doctors' bodies decomposed rapidly, and countless red worms crawled out from them. The first person to discover the worms soon went insane.

Since the emergence of pollutants, humanity has been gripped by immense fear.

At that time, humans will be able to go into space and dive into the deep sea, and the vast majority of organisms and substances on Earth will have been included in the database.

When people learned that the genetic sequences and material composition of these new organisms were completely undetectable, the shock was no less than the discovery of quantum mechanics.

Everything has been turned upside down!

Where did these new species come from?

How are their bodies structured?

Countless mysteries followed.

The lighthouse was established at that time, and this structure was created to detect the source and trajectory of pollutants.

There are three main theories regarding the origin of these things: the "deep-sea theory," the "space theory," and the "inner world theory."

The first two are proposed because the ocean and space are the only two areas that have not been fully explored by humans, while the "other world" theory is based on the fact that local monitoring is completely unable to trace the origin of these organisms whenever pollutants appear.

They seemed to have appeared from an arbitrary door in space.

Therefore, the professor believes that these creatures come from a higher-dimensional space.

Moreover, this higher-dimensional space folds with the three-dimensional space in which humans live in this century, so humans are invaded by higher-dimensional beings.

Of course, Xiao Shengyun knew nothing about any of this.

He got up from the ground and looked at the scene in front of him with a blank expression.

The mountain range winds its way up to the sky, but instead of sky and white clouds, there is a flowing blue substance, like the ocean overflowing into the sky.

Beneath my feet was a layer of dark red soil, covered with all sorts of strangely shaped plants.

This is my home.

An indescribable emotion welled up in Xiao Shengyun's heart. The air here was filled with various smells, and his half-disabled sense of taste and smell seemed to come back to life.

It's like a baby returning to its mother's embrace.

"Whoosh—"

A white thing ran to his feet; it looked a bit like a rabbit.

Xiao Shengyun reached out and picked up the thing. The little thing twisted twice and bit Xiao Shengyun's palm.

...

"Ahhh, what happened to my body?!"

"Holy crap, what is this—"

You've been cuckolded!

"You're the one who's been cheated on!"

"I said your hair is covered in grass."

Green leaves sprouted from countless ordinary people, and some even awakened their talents, plunging S City into chaos.

"Captain, what do we do?" The members of the action team were also encountering such a situation for the first time, and they were so frightened that they were at a loss.

"It's over, it's all over!" Ye Ting covered his face with his hands.

The entire city is affected by the pollution, which is simply beyond their current capacity to withstand.

"Immediately. Contact headquarters and transfer the Awakened One with the talent 'Purification' over here!"

"Transfer all those with healing-related talents here, and while you're at it, apply for all the antagonists in the Dongshan District."

That person is one of the few awakened individuals who can completely cure the pollution, but unfortunately, their skill level is relatively low, and they can only treat one person a day.

This man had been working like a slave for ten years, without a break all year round. I heard that he recently threatened suicide in exchange for a seven-day holiday.

"Captain, are you crazy? This application is impossible to get approved!"

"Just go when I tell you to."

With no way out, we had no choice but to take a gamble.

"Everyone must reinforce the barriers; we must not allow pollutants to harm ordinary residents!"

As soon as he finished speaking, a huge tremor suddenly came from beneath his feet. It was caused by a collision of enormous energies, and the energy fluctuations spread along the land to the ground.

Zhang Tianhe was sitting in mid-air when he was unexpectedly thrown off by the violently shaking mother tree.

A team of officers on the ground were keeping a close eye on the situation. Upon seeing this, they disregarded the violently shaking ground and rushed towards the direction where the object had fallen.

Oh shit.

Zhang Tianhe hadn't expected such an absurd situation. He placed his palm down, and a thick lawn quickly grew, forming a soft cushion that caught him steadily.

He nimbly rolled over and got up, then took off running.

"Help me!" Zhang Tianhe shouted towards the sky. The huge tree seemed to be suffering some kind of pain, its branches swaying in the wind, completely ignoring Zhang Tianhe's words.

"Blazing flames".

"Gale".

Huang Yu activated the flames, and his companions immediately cooperated. A huge fire tornado rose out of thin air and spread like wildfire as soon as it touched the grass.

The heatwave forced everyone to retreat, scrambling to find a safe place.

Just as the tornado was about to burn the cult leader's backside, the mother tree finally recovered from the aftermath of the battle, and with a flick of its long branches, it pulled the person into its protective range.

What happened underground?

Ye Ting hurriedly contacted the executors below, but the communication device only emitted a "buzzing" sound.

The communicator on the other side lay silently on the ruins. The entire underground was filled with the roots of the mother tree. All the executors were tightly bound, and most of them had fallen into a coma.

These people were lucky; during the battle with Xiao Shengyun, the mother tree protected its root system, which indirectly protected them as well.

"Hey, is anyone awake?"

Zhang Yu opened her eyes, but found herself unable to move, while her companions' faces remained hidden in the shadows.

There was no light here; only the Awakened's powerful night vision could reveal a vague outline.

His faint voice was amplified in the silence.

1.

2.

The executors, still conscious, continued to count intermittently, but everyone had lost the ability to move, and soon the underground fell silent again.

Dark clouds gathered, and a bolt of lightning ripped through the distant sky, illuminating a world ravaged by war.

Large raindrops began to fall.

"My arm—"

"My hair, my hair has sprouted leaves!"

The heavy rain aggravated the pollution of the mother tree, and screams and cries filled the streets and alleys of the city.

Ye Ting had given up hope.

The real dead end is when you realize that nothing you do is of any use.

"Don't be so pessimistic. Look at everyone else, even if they're not human anymore, they're still living well, and even better."

The cult leader comforted him with a smile.

"Bullshit! Do you even know what pollution is? Do you think turning residents into vegetable-like beings will make them live better in this world? Isn't all of this achieved by that monster behind you? If it goes out of control one day and stops obeying your orders, do you think the fate of all mankind is in your hands?" Ye Ting felt that the cult leader had a cruel naiveté.

"You're quite stubborn, young man. You experienced that catastrophe back then, so you should understand that humanity is utterly vulnerable in the face of these things. All the research we've done over the years—weapons, technology, biology, chemistry…—is just a pile of waste paper in the face of those things."

The cult leader seemed to have thought of something, and his face gradually contorted.

He looked down at the city from his high vantage point, and the groans coming from the corners carried on the wind to his ears, the pain they contained sending a shiver down his spine.

I did it to save them...

Yes, that's right, it was to save them!

Over the years, he has repeatedly told himself that this way he can sacrifice those people with a clear conscience and shield himself from all the pain and cries.

Suddenly, he sensed an unusual atmosphere in the air.

The cult leader stretched out his hand, and rain fell, but other things were mixed in with the rain.

Behind the clouds, thousands of drones flew in, overwhelming the sky.

"I'm sorry I'm a little late, but I should still make it in time."

A familiar voice came from behind Ye Ting, and he turned around abruptly.

It's Zhou Zhi!

Why did you come back here?

"Come here to save the world," he chuckled.

The pesticide carried by the drone landed on every inch of the land, just like cleaning agent being injected into oil stains, instantly neutralizing the pollution on the mother tree.

"This is a new technology from the research institute, a special antagonist, tailor-made for each pollutant. Of course, currently only this one has been successfully produced."

The large number of polluted remains, fake roses, data remaining in the instruments of the Rose Church, and most importantly, fragments of the mother tree in Yue Ning's body provided ample experimental samples. Then, they experimented with thousands of known pollutant components one by one, and finally extracted the special drug.

Unfortunately, the seed inside Yue Ning's body lost its activity. In order to obtain the energy of the mother tree, he made a crazy decision—to put the seed inside his own body!

The previous generation of antagonists were general-purpose drugs. By adding ingredients that target the energy of the mother tree while retaining most of the components, a special drug targeting specific pollutants can be developed.

No one expected that a third-rate church would go to such lengths. After learning about the situation in the city center, Zhou Zhi immediately contacted a drone company in S City and managed to catch up by opening a green channel.

The cult leader also noticed the uninvited guests outside the venue.

His twenty-year plan was ruined in an instant, and he was almost blinded by rage.

Kill him!

The vines came rushing towards them, and Ye Ting and a few executives barely managed to block them.

"Why are you, a weakling, not in the lab? What are you doing here in person? Just to show off? We can't stop this thing!" Ye Ting said ruthlessly, but actually shielded the man behind him.

Zhou Zhi opened his hand, and a red crystal appeared in his palm. The vines of the mother tree that were rushing towards him immediately changed direction, as if the plant had encountered a flame.

This is the source nucleus of a Class A pollutant. These pollutants are mutually antagonistic, and the specific antagonist is made from the □ of this pollutant.

"This can destroy its core!"