Chapter 126 Breaking the Illusion
The convoy hurriedly drove out of the town. However, less than two kilometers away—
A horde of zombies appeared out of nowhere.
From the front of the road, the wilderness on both sides, and even behind, a dark mass of zombies roared and surged out, instantly forming an encirclement! The number was astonishing, and many of them were high-level mutants.
The battle erupted instantly. Gunshots, shouts, crashes, and supernatural light effects tore through the rain. The scene was chaotic and brutal.
Ruan Ning controlled the water arrows, precisely targeting and eliminating the zombies approaching the vehicle, but the sense of unease in her heart grew stronger. Something was wrong.
The attack patterns of these zombies are somewhat similar. The angle of their pounces, the rhythm of their roars, and even the special movements of some mutants all bear a faint repetition.
The flames spewed by the fire burned over the zombies, and the stench of burning filled the air, but the smell was slightly different from what she remembered; it was more like a simulation of burning plants and rotting matter.
More importantly, it's her mental strength!
When the horde of zombies appeared, she instinctively used all her senses to try and find a weak point or the command core. However, the images of the "horde of zombies" fed back by her mental energy did not conflict with what she saw with her naked eye, but there was always a sense of delay and blurriness, like a television picture with a poor signal.
She "saw" a soldier being tackled by a zombie, but in her mental perception, the energy fluctuations at that location showed extremely subtle and discontinuous jumps the moment the soldier fell.
It's like the stuttering during screen transitions.
Ruan Ning's sense of unease reached its peak, and the disconnect between the sluggish feedback of her mental energy and the tragic "battle" before her eyes grew stronger and stronger.
It's an illusion!
This realization hit her like a bucket of ice water. She abruptly withdrew all her outward mental energy, concentrating it into the sharpest beam, no longer trying to observe the outside world, but instead fiercely piercing the invisible "membrane" at the boundary of her own perception—the layer of mental interference from the giant tree!
"Break!"
The full sharpness of the fourth-order mental power, like a red-hot awl, suddenly pierced down!
"Pop—"
A soft sound, perceptible only to the spiritual realm. The scene of the "zombie horde" before them shook violently, like a screen with a poor signal, countless zombie figures appearing as double images and distorted. The roars became hollow and drawn out.
The fire shook its head in confusion, stopped attacking the phantom, and instead barked wildly in a fixed direction deep within the town.
That's it!
Without further hesitation, Ruan Ning reached into her pocket and grasped the cold, black wooden whistle. She'd used it to severely injure a psychic zombie last time; what about this time?
She brought the wooden whistle to her lips, drawing upon the remaining mental energy she had just exhausted, and mixed it with a resolute will to dispel illusions, and blew it out forcefully!
"Waaah————"
It was still that invisible, high-frequency sound wave with a strange vibration.
This time, however, the sound waves did not scatter. Instead, they were guided by Ruan Ning's mental power, like an invisible drill, piercing fiercely towards the direction of the raging fire—the source of the mental core where the illusion interference was most intense and which she had initially locked onto!
"Buzz—!!!"
From the depths of the town, a muffled spiritual roar, filled with pain and rage, seemed to echo!
The enormous illusion that enveloped the entire open space shattered suddenly, like a broken mirror!
The "horde of zombies" vanished instantly. The deafening gunfire, roars, and screams ceased abruptly. The heavy stench of blood was replaced by the damp, decaying smell of plants. The true scene was revealed:
They were still in the warehouse; they hadn't left at all. Several people were lying on the ground, some unconscious and convulsing, some bleeding from all seven orifices and already dead, and two or three who had suffocated themselves by scratching their own necks—all the result of mental breakdown or self-harm induced by hallucinations.
Qin Li and the others also managed to break free one after another, their faces pale and still in shock.
Ruan Ning had no time to explain. Her mental energy, following the direction of the wooden whistle's sonic impact, had firmly locked onto a real, massive spiritual source rooted deep within the town—it had never "moved" to the edge of the open space! The awe-inspiring "giant tree appearance" just now was, from beginning to end, a cleverly projected illusion!
"Fire! Follow me!" Ruan Ning shouted sharply, his figure moving like lightning as he rushed towards the town park. Fire followed without hesitation, transforming into a golden bolt of lightning.
"Ruan Ning!" Qin Li shouted, trying to stop her from going deeper into the dangerous area.
"Its true form is there! We can't leave until we deal with it!" Ruan Ning's voice was resolute as she disappeared into the street enveloped by the frenzied plant.
Qin Li gritted his teeth: "Fire cover! Second and third squads, follow me! The rest of you hold the vehicles and treat the wounded!"
Ruan Ning hurriedly through the vine-covered streets. Fire cleared the way ahead, flames spewing and burning away the branches of the living plants that blocked her path.
The closer you get to the park, the more active and aggressive the plants become. Thick vines strangle you like giant pythons, and thorny branches lash out wildly.
The air was filled with a dense, dizzying plant essence and a terrifying mental pressure.
Finally, she rushed into the park in the center of town.
The scene before me was breathtaking.
In the center of the park, beside a dried-up fountain pool, stands a truly towering tree. Its trunk is far thicker than imagined, and its bark is a deep purplish-black, with a faint, shimmering light.
Its canopy blocked out the sun, its branches drooping like countless tentacles. It wasn't "walking"; its roots were deeply embedded in the earth, connected to the entire town's plant network. At this moment, the giant tree moved without wind, its branches and leaves shaking violently, emitting a tidal wave-like sound—the sonic attack from the wooden whistle had clearly caused it pain and anger.
[You insect! How dare you—!] A surge of rage directly assaulted Ruan Ning's consciousness.
Ruan Ning snorted coldly. Qin Li led the attack on the frantically lashing branches, while she concentrated all her mental energy, transforming it into countless invisible sharp needles. Together with the sharper and shorter sound waves of the wooden whistle that she blew again, she stabbed them fiercely into the depths of the giant tree's trunk—there, there was a condensed, vibrant, emerald green spiritual core!
The battle of wits has erupted once again!
This time, it's no longer about large-scale environmental manipulation, but the most dangerous core collision!
"Get out of my way!" The giant tree roared in pain, countless roots bursting up from the ground and coiling around Ruan Ning. The raging fire roared, its flames surging, protecting Ruan Ning at its center as it fought against the iron-hard roots, its fur being scratched and scorched.
A trickle of blood escaped from the corner of Ruan Ning's mouth as she forcefully maintained her mental focus, inching closer to the giant tree's trunk. She could "see" the light within the emerald core flicker and fluctuate under the impact of the sound waves and mental needles.
"Fire!" she screamed. "Now! Burn it! The base of the trunk!"
The fire understood immediately, took a deep breath, its chest bulged, and the golden patterns on its neck shone brightly. Then it opened its mouth and spewed out an unprecedented blazing white pillar of fire, which slammed into the base of the giant tree's purplish-black trunk!
"boom--!!!"
The flames clashed fiercely with the wood, which contained immense life energy, producing a deafening explosion. The giant tree trembled violently, and the mental impact momentarily dissipated.
It's this very moment!
Ruan Ning's eyes flashed with cold light as she combined her last bit of spiritual power with the strongest sonic wave emitted by the wooden whistle, transforming it into an invisible sword that pierced fiercely into the emerald core through the energy gap created by the fire!
【No--! ! ! 】
A silent shriek exploded in the mental world. The light of the emerald core suddenly dimmed, and countless cracks appeared.
Outside, the giant tree's trunk, where it had been continuously burned by the fire, suddenly burst open, revealing a large, charred hole. The wood inside was not ordinary charcoal, but rather flowed with a thick, glowing green sap.
The entire giant tree withered at a visible speed, its leaves fell with a rustling sound, its branches drooped limply, and its immense spiritual pressure dissipated like the receding tide.
The great fire, exhausted, finally stopped burning and gasped for breath. Ruan Ning was also nearly collapsed, needing to lean on her knife to stay upright. The wooden whistle turned to dust in her hand.
Ruan Ning barely made it to the side of the giant tree's remains. Using the tip of his knife, he picked out a fist-sized crystal core from the depths of the charred tree hole. The core was emerald green and seemed to have liquid light slowly flowing inside.
The crystal core felt warm to the touch and emitted a vast and pure life energy, unlike any crystal core I had ever obtained before.
"A wood-type plant-type crystal core, at least fourth-order, or even possibly fifth-order." Ruan Ning's voice was hoarse.
The battle is over. The source of the illusion has been destroyed. But the cost is that the wooden whistle is completely destroyed, Da Huo is seriously injured, Ruan Ning's mental strength is severely depleted, and the team has suffered real casualties.
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