Humans are ultimately diurnal animals. While it's possible to reverse their sleep schedule, that's very harmful to the body. Dark night and a snowstorm—perfect weather! Jiang Ling felt her trip was truly worthwhile; perhaps it would be her last. She had never craved light as much as she did now, even just a little illumination.

The three of them were quickly engulfed in the blizzard, forcing them to tie themselves together with ropes. The wind was so strong that even the two massive 500-kilogram hulks were swaying in the snow.

Jiang Ling was sandwiched between two exoskeleton warriors, the mole in front, the flying squirrel behind, and herself the groundhog. The night was quiet, nothing could be heard except the howling wind. Each of them had their own unique method of exploration. The mole in front led the way, guided by the map and tactical flashlight, while Jiang Ling in the middle used her sensory abilities to detect nearby bioluminescent spots, and the flying squirrel at the end simply followed.

The mole's judgment was correct; they could definitely follow this path because there was a viaduct next to them that hadn't collapsed yet. A few people could walk along the bridge piers, sometimes even resting against them.

The blizzard had its upside: signs of life on the surface suddenly decreased significantly. Mutants also feared the cold; more accurately, all living things feared the cold. Cold meant insufficient energy, which led to starvation. Unless the worst happened, the frantic beasts, enraged by hunger, would succumb to the cold before encountering food. At least within Jiang Ling's range of perception, she hadn't seen any animals wandering the surface.

"Crack!" The flying squirrel behind him broke through a patch of frozen ice and fell into the water below. His feet, freed from the cold wind, quickly froze, slowing his mobility. "Be careful! There are still a lot of water and craters here!" he warned over the comms. They were carrying a lot of loot, and the weight of their bodies was immediately apparent.

"Are you okay?" Jiang Ling noticed that the rope connected to her body tightened, and the three of them stopped at the same time.

"It's okay, wait for me to get the ice off my feet. The outside temperature is too low." The flying squirrel replied.

"Be careful, we're in a contaminated area. Don't go near unfrozen pools!" Mole warned again, having said this no less than three times along the way. Jiang Ling had thought he was a taciturn person, but it turned out he was being deliberate. Once he got into his professional world, he was like an old woman.

"Ahem~ Now that there are no outsiders, I finally don't have to install it." The Mole sighed into the terminal. "That junction station has serious nitrifying bacteria contamination. The station's waterproofing wasn't properly implemented, and during the nuclear war, the seismic waves damaged the waterproofing layer. Two flooding incidents occurred within a month after the war. It's also because the initial site selection was poor. They focused solely on transportation and didn't consider the surrounding water system. If it were just leaks, the station wouldn't have to be closed."

"So it's mainly mutants of those microorganisms?" Jiang Ling asked curiously.

"It's half and half," the mole said without denying it. "Nitrifying bacteria are a problem, but their only metabolic product is nitric acid. If it had been dealt with properly earlier, it wouldn't have gotten to this point."

"I think the human factor is more involved. Many doomsday novels discuss human nature, and it is indeed undeniable that people have subjective initiative." The flying squirrel at the back commented.

"What on earth did they do?" Jiang Ling didn't dwell on human nature. Without the reference of the external environment, discussing human nature was meaningless.

"They flushed the acid down the tunnels with water," the Mole replied, his steps slowing down. "They used surface river water to flush it down. Radioactive river water! The Junction Station is in the Green Zone, and the administrators thought the water in the Green Zone was low-radiation. But they were wrong. The river water flows, and it passes through the Red Zone. So the acidity seems to have decreased after flushing, but the radiation makes the bacteria multiply faster. And then the contamination spreads, and every machine that comes into contact with the water becomes a source of contamination. I really can't understand why they use river water for flushing!"

Jiang Ling pondered for a moment, then asked a soul-searching question: "Could it be that they were using river water to flush because they were short of water? They knew the river water was radioactive, but they had to use it?"

The three of them were silent for a while, and finally the flying squirrel broke the silence: "Well, I think we've reached the edge of the mushroom forest!"

Looking up, the group noticed that the giant mushrooms had appeared almost instantly. The mole's flashlight had been shining down the path, so they hadn't seen the mushrooms initially. The mushrooms they saw weren't the red ones the guide had mentioned. These were the woody mushrooms with gray stems that searchers favored for firewood. It's said that the caps of these mushrooms can photosynthesize, but from this angle, they couldn't see the color of the caps.

"Replace the oxygen tank, these mushrooms all look the same!" said the mole.

Jiang Ling took a deep breath and removed the two canisters from her helmet, but this time she didn't discard them. She first attached the oxygen tank connector to her helmet, then sealed the two opened canisters in a sealed bag and hung them on her chest belt. "Huff, puff, puff, puff..." She adjusted the tank pressure and then reported on the communication channel that she was done.

The mole didn't waste any words, and the others continued forward. More and more mushrooms appeared around them, some of which had already spread to the road. Jiang Ling noticed that the mushrooms that spread to the road usually grew from bomb craters on the road. It seemed that human buildings still had some protective capabilities.

My dear, there is more to this chapter. Please click on the next page to continue reading. It will be even more exciting later!