Chapter 64: Northern Plateau
Shu Fu remembered that the small street that was attacked last night had a deep drainage ditch and many large and small depressions nearby. Because of the rain, these places became small water areas on the shore.
If these strange fish are nocturnal, those places would be their perfect hiding places during the day.
Because there are too many ponds like this in the Hexi town, as well as ditches, and there is no one living in the area north of the town, they jump onto the shore for some unknown reason at night, and their slippery bodies make a slight "click" sound when jumping. After attacking people, if they find something is wrong, they can immediately hide in the canal and disappear. In addition, the color of their bodies can perfectly blend into the surrounding environment, so none of the three of them noticed anything unusual.
What about those who disappeared in the past?
Imagine that two people who were walking alone at night were attacked, paralyzed and unconscious, and there was no one else around to save them, so where did they go?
Shu Fu thought of a possibility at this moment, but this possibility really made her feel a little creepy...
All the people who escaped from the ship ran in the opposite direction of Shu Fu. Their destination was to escape back to the town, so they would not run towards the mountain.
Those strange fish seemed to be holding a grudge. It was not known whether it was because these people had disturbed their "fish nests" while fishing, causing these strange fish, which originally hid during the day and came out at night, to attack them like crazy and chase them relentlessly.
But the strange thing is that none of the people who were attacked were in the same state as Chen Fa last night. The strange fish chasing them seemed to be biting purely with its teeth, without using its tail stinger for paralyzing attacks.
I don’t know if it’s because there are bound to be exceptions in a group, just like now, while those strange fish were chasing, two of them turned around and chased in the direction of Shu Fu.
She heard a "click" sound behind her and knew that a fish was chasing her. The feeling made her scalp tingle.
She never thought that in her lifetime, she would be chased by fish on the shore.
She quickened her pace again and quickly ran out of the woods. When she was sure that the other people on the boat could not find her, she gently dropped her travel bag and boat bag, instantly opened her personal protective shield, and then took out a nail gun from the backpack in front of her.
Fish are much smaller than humans and can bounce around on the slippery mud. She fired a row of nails but only hit one. The other one opened its huge mouth, accelerated and jumped high, and actually came towards her face.
Even though she had her personal protective shield on, her heart skipped a beat when she was bitten by such a strange-looking fish, and she almost subconsciously wanted to turn around and run away.
But she held back, and quickly took out an electric baton, adjusted the power to maximum, and the moment the strange fish hit her protective shield, she pushed hard into its big face.
After a series of crackling sounds, the strange fish's body stiffened and fell to the ground with a thud, but it was still able to move. It was still struggling in the mud, opening and closing its big mouth, trying to jump up again to attack.
This thing was quite ferocious. Shu Fu took out a nail gun full of nails, aimed it at the strange fish on the ground at close range, and hit it directly with a combo, turning it into a hedgehog fish.
She put away her weapon, took out her cell phone, and began filming the two strange dead fish on the ground. She took photos and videos for later research.
When she got closer to take the picture, the more she looked at the big head and eyes of the strange fish on the ground, the more familiar it looked. Shu Fu quickly realized that she must have seen similar fish before!
It was when she was still in the waters near the cave restaurant. There were many schools of fish passing by in the surrounding waters. She quickly glanced around and saw this kind of fish with a big head and a small tail among the passing fish.
But it was in the water at that time, and she didn't see any "legs" under its abdomen. It might be that it hadn't grown "legs" yet, or it might have been hidden while it was swimming.
Thinking back further, the first time she spent the night in the underwater bedroom, she felt something staring at her while half asleep and half awake, and vaguely heard a popping sound, which might be the sound of this big-eyed strange fish accidentally swinging its tail and hitting the outer wall of the underwater bedroom when it appeared nearby.
When the raft's protective shield is not turned on, creatures outside cannot see inside and cannot get in, but external forces can touch the raft and the drifting island house.
It turns out that there were signs of everything.
The mutation of aquatic organisms has already begun.
When she put away her phone, she heard a loud noise coming from the shore of the woods again. The last group of people who persisted on the boat also escaped. Some of them were wearing raincoats, and only their hands and faces that were exposed were injured.
Some of them were not wearing raincoats, their clothes were torn by bites, their bodies were covered in blood, they were crying out in pain, and they were running only based on the instinct to survive.
The strange fish chasing them must have tasted the blood. They were more stimulated and jumped faster and faster.
Some of them jumped and turned towards Shu Fu. She cursed again, picked up her travel bag and boat bag, and ran up the mountain quickly.
This time, because the strange fish chasing her was far away, she did not stop to attack. She accelerated again and again and rushed up the mountain road in one breath.
There was a steep and slippery road in the middle of the mountain trail. She wanted to use that road to get rid of the strange fish, but the fish only chased her for a distance and quickly turned around and jumped away. Although they could go ashore, they still seemed to like places near water. When they were too far away from the water and could not see their prey, they automatically returned.
Shu Fu did not stop and continued to rush upwards. Finally, he returned to the valley safely and rushed into the container house again, panting heavily.
Chen Yuezhen turned around, closed the door, and walked quickly to her side: "What's wrong? Is someone chasing you?"
In the inner room, Chen Fa, who heard the noise, struggled to sit up and tilted his head to look outside.
"It's not a human..." Shu Fu was lying on the ground, not caring whether it was dirty or not, just wanting to take a good breath, "...It's a fish!"
**
After the video was played, Shu Fu filmed it from multiple angles and at close range. Chen Fa and Chen Yuezhen both saw the strange fish clearly. Especially the tail spine, because it was suspected to be the culprit that attacked Chen Fa last night, so Shu Fu filmed it very carefully.
The overall shape of this strange fish is similar to that of a mudskipper. It has a dorsal fin and is gray and inconspicuous. It is more than 30 centimeters long from the head to the tip of the tail, with the head accounting for nearly one-third of the total length. It looks like an enlarged version of a piranha, with large, protruding eyeballs that look like it is staring at you from any angle.
Two leg-like things grow below the head and body of the fish. They feel like fish fins, but they look a bit like shorter frog legs. The angle is just right to support their bouncing and moving on the shore.
The sharp thorn in the middle of the tail extends another seven or eight centimeters, and seems to be able to adjust the balance and change the direction of the bounce when it is swung.
They can stay on shore for so long, so in addition to gills, they must have lungs that allow them to breathe on shore.
Its mouth is also very large, and its two rows of teeth are extremely sharp, especially the four teeth on the front, which are very long and sharp. With one bite, it can tear off a piece of skin and flesh from a person.
No wonder those people on the boat were howling like ghosts just now.
"These two should not be as big as the one that attacked Fafa last night. The size of its tail spine would not cause such a big wound. However, the overall shape of the tail spine and the wound on her foot should be caused by this strange fish." Chen Yuezhen returned the phone to Shu Fu and asked her about the details of the strange fish's tail spine.
The three of them discussed for a moment and confirmed that there was a 95% chance that this strange fish was the culprit that attacked Chen Fa and caused people to disappear in the town at night.
"But why didn't the fish that came off the boat attack those people with their tails?" Or, conversely, why didn't the strange fish last night bite them directly? This was the only thing Shu Fu couldn't figure out, and it was also the reason why they couldn't confirm it 100%.
But no matter what, being attacked by an unknown creature and being attacked by a strange fish whose appearance you know are two completely different states of mind.
Chen Fa was finally relieved, as long as it wasn't a soft-bodied insect like a leech. Therefore, although the severe pain in Chen Fa's feet gradually faded away, she still managed to show a relaxed expression.
Shu Fu changed the medicine on her wound, using another large medicine bag taken out from the large waterproof travel bag. In it, she placed more and more complete medicines and first aid supplies, as well as professional gauze and bandages, which could better treat Chen Fa's wound.
In addition, Chen Fa has also taken antibiotics. Given her physical condition, there should be no problem. The wound will heal after two days of rest.
Although this container house is sturdy and hidden, it has no water or electricity, making living very inconvenient. Shu Fu redistributed the contents of her travel bag according to the supplies prepared by Chen Fa inside.
In addition to large medicine bags, we have added bottled clean drinking water and vacuum-packed ready-to-eat meat bags. Compared with canned food, this type of packaged cooked food is both lighter and less likely to spoil.
In addition, there are several self-heating hot pots and self-heating rice bags. After all, the gas tank that Chen Fa prepared for the gas stove only has one replacement, and she is afraid that it will not be enough for several uses. With the self-heating pots and self-heating bags, she can eat hot food at any time.
Finally, she also put a pair of high rain boots and some handy tools in the travel bag: a multi-functional folding shovel, a fire axe, and a lock picking bar.
The quantity is not large. After all, these were originally her supply packages, with one of each different type, which is enough for three people.
Chen Yuezhen picked up the fire axe and shook it in his hand, feeling particularly satisfied. The axe was pointed at one end and sharp at the other. It could be used for chopping or stabbing. It should be very easy to use it to deal with strange fish.
Shu Fu watched Chen Yuezhen practicing with the fire axe and swinging and chopping. She clapped from the bottom of her heart and exclaimed, "Grandma is so handsome!"
"Wow, you're so stupid..." Chen Fa reached out to pinch her face, motioning her to take out the map and pen from his bag. Now that there were more strange fish in the town, the sooner they left, the better. They should decide where to go and what route to take as soon as possible. "The longer the night, the more troubles you have. I'll be fine after another night of rest. We'll find a way to leave tomorrow morning."
Regardless of whether the strange fish really hides during the day and comes out at night, it is safer to walk during the day.
"However, we are not sure whether there are still those strange fish in the water. If they appear during the day and attack, the inflatable boat may not be enough for them to bite." Chen Yuezhen raised a more troublesome point.
Of course, it is also possible that this speculation is completely untrue. After all, it has been more than one or two days since someone in the town has disappeared at night. Since then, people from the Malaysian team have gone out fishing every day, but nothing has ever happened.
Let’s not talk about people far away, let’s just talk about Shu Fu. She has only been in the town for more than ten days. Didn’t she come back from the water safely?
Therefore, the Malaysian team's fishing boat was attacked today. It is very likely that they accidentally caught a nest of strange fish while fishing. Those fish may have been resting during the day, and woke up after being caught on the boat, and then launched the attack.
"Well, that should be the case. Xiao Fu said that the fish attacked people on the boat first, and then jumped into the water from the boat. The water there is very shallow, which is not suitable for the boat to dock. They may have been suddenly attacked by the awakened monster fish on their way back, and they were in a panic and wanted to get ashore immediately, so they appeared there."
Chen Fa and Chen Yuezhen analyzed the situation one by one, and finally agreed that they could leave during the day, but they had to be quick. After all, many strange fish had come ashore again, and they didn't know whether they would go back to the water or find a pond in the town to settle down. In short, the later they left, the more unsafe it would be.
As for the destination, they both chose Pincheng.
First, Pincheng is not like Lucheng, which is not a city open to relocation. It is a small city with many mountains and a small urban area and a small population. When the super tsunami caused chaos across the planet, the situation there must have been better than Lucheng.
Second, Shu Fu said that her original plan was to go to Pincheng, but she was passing through Hexi Town. She would probably still go in that direction later. It would definitely be safer for the three of them to go together.
"But Pincheng is in the northwest of the town. To get to Pincheng, you have to go around Lucheng. The area east of Lucheng is all mountainous, and the road is difficult to travel." Chen Fa pointed at the map.
"Yeah." Chen Yuezhen nodded, then pointed to the west of Lucheng, "There are two small towns here. We can go around them from the west."
“It’s going to be a long journey.”
"This town is close to Qinghe River. It is estimated that the water level is almost at the doorstep now. We can go there directly from the flood area."
"Rowing takes a long time..."
"Try to row as far as you can. If that doesn't work, go ashore. There are villages and towns here and here. See if you can find a car and fuel..."
"In fact, we can find a bicycle or something like that. It's light and can be used on any road."
"Okay, let's go this way."
Chen Fa and Chen Yuezhen were obviously very experienced in planning evacuation routes. After they had roughly discussed it, they realized that Shu Fu next to them had not said anything, so they turned around to ask for her opinion.
On the side, Shu Fu, who had wiped his face with a wet tissue and his hands with a disinfectant tissue, was fiddling with two boxes of self-heating hot pot and a portion of self-heating rice at the table.
She had only eaten some bread and biscuits for breakfast. She had just come down the mountain and had a quick run when she came back, so she was already hungry. In addition, she had not yet figured out how to disappear from Chen Fa and the others tomorrow, so she automatically reduced her presence.
Being suddenly cueed at this moment, she could only nod in agreement, indicating that their plan was very good and she agreed with it.
The self-heating hot pot soon boiled, and the tempting aroma drifted throughout the container house. Chen Fa and Chen Yuezhen also felt their stomachs were empty.
"Eat first. Only when you are full will you have the strength to evacuate." Shu Fu opened one of the self-heating hot pots and told Chen Fa that she was injured and could not eat spicy food for the time being, so she cooked a non-spicy one. The self-heating rice was also non-spicy, and she could eat both.
In addition, she took out a bag of vacuum-braised beef and vacuum-braised duck from her travel bag, saying that since she was leaving tomorrow, she should eat more today to reduce the weight of tomorrow's luggage.
After that, he took out a bag of dried vegetables and said they were for the meal, a can of chocolate and said it was a dessert after the meal, and a bottle of vitamin effervescent tablets, saying that we would each make some vitamin C water to drink later to relieve internal heat and relieve pain...
Chen Fa: ...
No wonder she was so anxious to get the travel bag back. Now Chen Fa could completely understand it.
**
That night, the small town of Hexi at the foot of the mountain was not peaceful.
At noon, the group of people ran back to the town in a panic, and the strange fish were still following them. Some of the strange fish suddenly changed direction while they were chasing them, and jumped to other places and disappeared.
But some of the strange fish kept following them, jumping on them and biting them when they got the chance, and then followed them all the way back to the town amid the screams of those people.
During the noon time, even if it was raining outside, there were still many people in the town who opened their doors and went out. Some went to the shops in the town to exchange goods, some were patrolling the town, and some had long been accustomed to this kind of life and went to visit their neighbors to see if they could get a free meal.
In everyone's opinion, although the outside world is not peaceful now and it is not suitable to travel in the town at night, the town is still very safe during the day. As long as you don't deliberately go to deserted alleys, even if there are people in the town who are short of food and have bad intentions, they can't do anything too extreme.
So, when these people who were originally part of the Malaysian team and usually seemed arrogant suddenly ran through the streets of the town howling and covered in blood, the people in the houses on both sides were shocked.
Some people are timid and afraid of trouble, so they close and lock the door first, then hide behind the curtains and carefully open them a little to look outside.
There were also some people who didn't understand what was going on, but relying on their strong bodies, they thought that it was Yang Can's team who were behind this, so they rushed out aggressively, intending to call on others to settle the score with the other party.
Most people didn't notice the gray, slippery strange fish following behind them at first. By the time they found the things bouncing in the rain coming towards them, it was too late. The strange fish seemed to have endless energy. They would pounce on anyone they saw and bite them, and each bite would take out a piece of flesh and blood.
In an instant, the streets of the town were filled with screams. Someone was bitten directly on the face. Before he could react, the thing fell to the ground with torn flesh and blood, and then jumped up and pounced on the next target.
The person who was bitten didn't even see what the thing was. He just felt sharp pain on his face, hands and body. Blood was already flowing down the wound. The bluestone brick road in the town was covered with pools of blood as the strange fish bit, fell to the ground and jumped.
The bloodstains were quickly washed away by the rain, and the air was filled with the smell of blood.
"Hurry! Kill them!" Those who came back from the boat were finally able to get away and call for help because the new people distracted the strange fish.
In fact, the scales of the strange fish are not hard. Even Shu Fu's nail gun can penetrate them. As long as you can aim well, sticks or iron bars can knock the strange fish unconscious and smash them to pieces.
The problem that made these people flee in panic was that they had never seen anything like this before and thought that this was another big catch. They didn't expect that the fish they caught would suddenly jump out of the big barrel and attack people.
The patrolmen from the Malaysian team also rushed over. They all had weapons in their hands. Some held knives, some held sticks, and some held axes. They started beating these strange fish jumping around in the rain.
Some people reacted quickly and wore thick raincoats, so they were not bitten at all. Some people killed two strange fish, but a piece of flesh was bitten off their hands. They cursed in pain and shouted for people around them to get the medical kit to disinfect the wound.
All the gray fish were killed on the bluestone bricks, their eyes wide open, their mouths full of sharp teeth, their stomachs broken open, revealing the smelly internal organs. In addition to the smell of blood, there was an indescribable fishy smell in the air.
Some people couldn't help but cover their mouths and noses: "It stinks! The fish's internal organs stink!"
Some people also remembered a rumor that had been circulating among fishermen earlier, and immediately shouted: "Is this the strange fish that someone said they saw before? It turns out there really is a strange fish! Oh my god!"
But more people were observing the dead strange fish in fear. The fish had extremely sharp teeth and could come ashore. It would bite anyone it saw and injured a large number of people. Its attack power was comparable to that of a wild wolf.
When someone was bandaging his wound, he suddenly remembered that some of the strange fish had jumped into a nearby pond on the way back, and now no one knew where they had gone or when they would suddenly appear and attack people.
It was too dangerous to let this strange thing stay in the town, so the Malaysian team held an emergency meeting and assigned a group of people to look for the people from Yang Can's team.
Zhou Feng, the captain of Yang Can's team, has no time to take care of these things at the moment. His girlfriend has been ill for a long time and has not recovered. Her condition worsened again last night. He was anxiously waiting for Tang Ping to deliver the medicine today, but Tang Ping never showed up.
He sent people to look for him everywhere, and later discovered that in addition to Tang Ping, there were some people missing in his team, and some of the people who were supposed to be on patrol today were also missing.
He suppressed his anger and asked someone for information. Soon someone came forward and said that he saw a team member taking his wife to the Malaysian team's area in the morning, and they were carrying something in their hands.
The other party greeted him politely when he saw him. He thought the other party was bringing something for exchange, so he didn't ask any more questions.
This situation has happened before. There are always some members in the team who would take the saved rations or other supplies to Malaysia to exchange with shops because of the different needs of their families.
This kind of private transaction cannot be discussed openly. After all, the two teams have agreed on a transaction date and rules. But we are all human beings and there will always be special needs, so as long as you don't make a big fuss about it, the people in Yang Can's team will generally pretend not to see it.
But it has been several hours since morning, and the team member and his wife who went to exchange supplies have not returned yet. Something is wrong.
Afterwards, several other team members said they had also seen someone go to the neighborhood where the Malaysian team belonged, and things started to seem a little strange.
Some people couldn't help but speculate quietly, saying that those people might have gone to join the Malaysian team. After all, the Malaysian team was the only one in Hexi Town that had two boats, and the larger one could hold more than a hundred people.
They used to come here by car, but now they can only come by boat.
Now many people do not want to leave. If they really want to leave, the only way to have the chance to leave is to go to Malaysia!
After saying this, Zhou Feng's face turned even worse, and he ordered to ignore those people for the time being, the most important thing at the moment was to find Tang Ping.
In fact, everyone was not very satisfied with this order. Tang Ping did not have to do any heavy work. He always took the highest-quality supplies when the supplies were distributed. He was arrogant and looked down on others. He was also sinister and mysterious. However, the captain valued him the most...
There was nothing we could do but complain in private for a while and then go find someone to help.
It happened that at this time, there was a commotion outside for a while. Not long after, the Malaysian team came over and ran into the team that was looking for someone. One side said that they were busy looking for someone and would not settle accounts with them for the time being, and asked them not to push their luck.
The other party said that the fish have all landed, and the sky is falling. Why are we still looking for someone? Hurry up and go with them to find the remaining strange fish and kill them all.
The members of Yang Can's team were confused and thought that the other party was looking for trouble. Looking for fish? Fishing?
"What a mess this is! I think you are looking for a fight!"
"You are a bunch of idiots!" someone yelled.
Some people had already taken action, carrying a dead strange fish along the way and throwing the fish directly into the other team.
The man dodged subconsciously, and the strange fish hit another person behind him, splashing the smelly internal organs all over him. The man was about to curse, but he suddenly became quiet. He looked at the dead strange fish on the ground, his eyes widened like the eyeballs of the strange fish, and they were about to fall out.
"Why does this fish... have legs?!"
After that, the two teams in the town searched everywhere for the strange fish, and they actually found a few in the ditches in their town and in small puddles on the corners of the streets.
Among them, there was a strange fish that was particularly large, especially its belly, which was three or four times larger than that of the other strange fish. It was almost forty centimeters long from head to tail, and its tail spine was also particularly long. In addition to biting people, it could also swing its tail spine to sting people.
However, because there were many people nearby, everyone was frightened by the strange fish and rushed forward. Before the fish could sting anyone, they quickly killed the fish.
The town was littered with corpses of strange fish, and there was a strong fishy smell everywhere, but they had no time to clean up the dead fish. After killing them, they immediately went to other places to look for them, or to support their teammates who were screaming nearby.
Therefore, the people who killed the strange fish did not see that the belly of this particularly large strange fish was broken open, revealing the fish eggs inside. These fish eggs were each the size of a ping-pong ball, densely stacked together, and seemed to be wriggling...
At around three or four in the afternoon, the rain started to get heavier, mixed with small hailstones. People who had gone out to look for the strange fish returned to the buildings to take shelter.
Fortunately, by this time, they had found and killed a lot of strange fish. After counting, the fish that jumped off the boat before should have been killed. There may be a few omissions, but because of their small number, they will not cause group harmful attacks like before.
They reminded the townspeople who were watching the fun outside to be careful and to kill them immediately without hesitation if they saw similar strange fish.
The residents of the town were very scared and cautious. As soon as night fell, they closed the doors and windows and stayed indoors without going out.
Some of them went to bed early, but they heard "click-click-click" sounds coming from the doors and windows while they were half asleep and half awake. These sounds were very subtle, but dense, as if many things were piled up at the same time, hitting their doors and windows one after another.
Some people thought it was hailing outside again, so they turned over and fell asleep again.
Some people were so disturbed by the noise that they couldn't fall asleep. One person got up angrily, walked to the window and opened the curtains to check what was happening outside. But as soon as the curtains were opened, he was shocked by the dense black shadows outside the window that kept hitting the glass and lost his voice.
They were all the same strange fish that I had seen during the day. Most of the fish had heads only the size of a fist, and their bodies were much smaller than those seen during the day, but that did not hinder their visual impact.
When the fish saw the people appearing inside, they opened their mouths, revealing their sharp teeth, like starving young birds begging for food, with only the open mouth left in their heads.
The man looked outside, and with the help of the dim light from the nearby street lamps, he discovered that the streets outside, in front of the windows and outside the doors of the houses opposite, were filled with identical miniature versions of the strange fish. There were so many of them that it made his scalp tingle and he felt physically uncomfortable.
"Oh my god!" The man's hair stood on end and he subconsciously took a step back.
At this moment, there was a cracking sound, and the glass window in front of me, which was reinforced with wooden strips, was cracked by the outside.
A huge monster fish that was three or four times larger than a normal fish bounced up again, and its hard head hit the crack hard.
One, two, three times… The man wanted to move, to do something to stop it, but his feet wouldn't obey him. Although the window was reinforced, the glass was just ordinary glass, nailed with wooden strips, enough to withstand the mild hail and occasional storms in the vicinity.
But this man could never have imagined that one day, because of a fish, he would regret not following the example of several other residents in the town and seal the entire window with wooden bars or steel plates.
The huge monster fish jumped up again and hit the glass. There was a crackling sound and the glass in front of him was finally shattered.
That fish was too big to get in, but the other small strange fish could easily pass through the gaps between the wooden bars.
They jumped in one after another, opened their mouths wide, and pounced on the man...
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