Chapter 164 Muscle Hound

Roger's home is at the edge of town. The kitchen window is open, and several bloody footprints can be seen on the windowsill.

According to Crown's knowledge, these footprints were similar to those of bears and monkeys.

He followed the smell of the air and tracked the path the enemy took, which should be the same path those things came from.

Watching his teammates tracking the enemy by smell, Jason couldn't help but tease: "You remind me of a Rhodesian Ridgeback. Now we have a talent for tracking."

Several others also laughed in good faith.

Dogs are loyal animals, and comparing humans to dogs here has certain positive meanings, but Crown does not feel comfortable because he has an experience that does not belong to this world.

He couldn't help but think of some bad words: a dog relying on the power of others, a desperate dog jumping over the wall, a sly and despicable dog, a chicken-stealing and dog-stealing dog. "Guys, I don't like this joke very much. It always feels a bit awkward."

"I'm sorry," Jason spread his hands, "I won't make such jokes again."

After the incident, the pursuit team continued to move forward.

The monsters usually move along the corners of the walls. Clown judged that they were lurking in the shadows, which were places that were not easily illuminated by light at night.

The scent was still strong for Crown's sense of smell, and he tracked it quickly.

After walking past several rows of houses, we arrived at the outskirts of the town.

At this time, other people can also find traces left in the wild.

The route was not winding and those things had no awareness of anti-reconnaissance at all.

Based on the traces on the ground, Crown judged that there were four of two kinds of these things, all of which could walk upright.

This is indeed where they came from and where they are going.

The weeds had not grown very tall at this time of year, so the tracking was going smoothly. Soon they arrived at the east side of the town and came to the window of a house.

James suddenly shouted: "Here, here is another family of victims."

"Another one?!"

Crown repeated that during the tracking process, he did not find any additional branching routes for the target, and he did not expect to go around in circles and return to the town.

"Let's go in and take a look."

He took the lead and jumped in through the window.

The layout of the room is no different from Roger's house. They live in the same small town and perhaps they used the same group of construction workers.

Crown arrived at the front door and found four human skins on the cabinet.

"I was the one who put it away," James tried his best to keep his tone calm, but everyone could feel his fear.

Nick touched the slightly shrunk human skin and asked, "Did you find anything else?"

Clown shook his head slightly: "No, I can only smell the blood and the stench of the monster itself."

He opened the door: "The smell is still there, the clue is not broken, follow me."

Finally, the group stopped at the gate of a large mansion.

There is a black iron gate and yellow leaves piled up in the yard. Looking up, you can see the fence behind the second-floor window of the house.

They returned to the house that had been attacked by evil spirits and flesh monsters that day.

The door was half open, and the strange leaf pattern inside had long since become blurred.

“We’re back to where we started.”

A hint of sarcasm flashed across Clown's face, and he turned around and said, "The smell has entered the house."

"So we didn't search carefully enough?" Nick said with a frown.

After the battle ended that day, they did not conduct a carpet search, so it was normal to miss some places.

"Now that we have found the clue again, we will know if we go in and take a look."

Jason took out his weapon and pushed the door open.

He walked in, turned around and nodded to everyone.

"Sir, do I need to go in?" James' voice trembled and his hands were shaking slightly.

"It's better to go in. Your safety will be better guaranteed if you stay with us."

As Crowne spoke, he stepped inside. Following the scent, he went around the house and came to a big tree in the backyard.

There is a tunnel sloping downwards here, and the exit is blocked by some dry firewood and dead grass. If you don't look carefully, you can't notice the tunnel below.

Del pulled away the covering, revealing a hole as big as a bucket.

The cave was pitch black, and the soil at the edge was slightly shiny, apparently due to frequent rubbing by something going in and out.

Del lit a torch and threw it into the tunnel.

Crown squatted down and observed the situation inside.

The slope of the tunnel is quite steep, gradually becoming thicker inside, and then it seems to turn further inside parallel to the ground.

He stood up and shook his head: "I can't see anything further inside."

He did not bring his two pets with him on this mission, so he is unable to detect the situation inside the tunnel.

It's very narrow here, and people need to crawl in. If you encounter any monster, it's difficult to use your strength, and you can't go down to search.

Nick squatted down, checked it out, and said with a smile: "There are times when you feel powerless."

He put down the small leather bag on his back and took out a palm-sized silver metal box from it.

On the surface of the box, there is an emblem of the Security Bureau and a triangle with an eye drawn inside.

Nick patted the box and sighed softly, "It's hard to imagine that the Wonder Item Manufacturing Association, whose members are mostly ordinary people, can actually create such a sophisticated thing."

He opened the box carefully, as if it contained a fragile and rare treasure.

Crown leaned over and saw a brass-colored metal dragonfly inside.

The dragonfly has two pairs of thin metal wings, and its eyes are like black gems that sparkle in the sun. There is a small metal frame inlaid on its back, and at the front end of the frame is a silver round mirror the size of a fingernail.

"This is a new type of reconnaissance artifact. It was just assigned to our branch, and I applied for it directly. I only know how to operate it simply, but it is enough for us."

Nick said showing off while holding up the metal dragonfly.

I saw his hand moving a few times on the dragonfly's abdomen, like turning on the start button of a toy.

The dragonfly's wings flapped rapidly, blue light flowed on the metal frame on its back, and the small silver-white round mirror flashed with light.

Crown heard the sound of wind whirring, and he realized it was charging.

Facts confirmed his guess. When the blue light completely covered the metal frame, the silver round mirror emitted a bright white light directly in front of the dragonfly.

The light is so bright that the white corridor can be clearly seen even under the shade of trees outdoors.

At the same time, the metal dragonfly flew up at a very fast speed.

It circled around the entrance of the tunnel and then flew into it. Crown bent down as it entered.

Seeing the metal dragonfly take off, Del and the others were stunned. They couldn't understand how a lump of iron could actually fly.

James' eyes almost popped out of their sockets.

The light in the tunnel grew dimmer and dimmer, and finally disappeared.

Clown turned around and said, "Since this thing can detect objects, wouldn't it be great to use it to patrol the town at night?"

Nick waved his hands and smiled bitterly: "I want to do that, but I can't."

"This thing looks small, but it's not light. It's powered by a very sophisticated steam engine and uses a very special fuel. The ration for each mission is limited, and it needs to be refueled every half an hour of flight."

Crown asked curiously: "How does it work? How do we get information after reconnaissance?"

This thing didn't have a control center for real-time transmission. He guessed that there must be a device for storing image information inside the dragonfly creation.

Nick explained: "This wonder can understand simple instructions and has a certain degree of 'intelligence', and it can become smarter as time goes by.

It is said that in the Guild of Strange Objects, there is a strange object whose intelligence is not inferior to that of humans, and that object can even think.

When I activated the reconnaissance dragonfly, I had already given it the command to search. All I had to do was use my spiritual power to connect to the magic circle inside it.

It will return before it runs out of fuel or encounters the first threat it poses."

Isn't this just a learnable artificial intelligence? The technology tree of this world is really incomprehensible.

There is no mistake in the poem, post, content, and read the book on 6, 9, and bar!

Putting aside the extraordinary system, the world may look a bit backward on the surface, but it can produce things that are full of technology inside.

Crown understood that his social class was not high enough and he was exposed to too few things.

Del asked, "Can we park it somewhere and only keep the function of storing images? When not flying, the fuel consumption of the strange object should be much less."

"It's a good idea, but if you don't turn on the light mode, you can't see clearly at night. If you turn on the light mode, you will become a target. The strange object is expensive, and it is not worth it to destroy it."

Several people were waiting at the entrance of the cave, chatting.

"There's movement," Crown suddenly raised his right hand, and he felt a slight vibration coming from under his feet.

Del immediately dropped to the ground with his ears pressed to the ground.

After listening for a few seconds, he told the information he had obtained:

"Yes, there are things running underground, there should be two or three."

"Guys, clear the entrance," Nick took a few steps back, gripping his shield tightly and bending his legs slightly in a defensive stance.

The enchanted armor on his body was activated, flashing like flaming flowers.

Everyone dispersed and prepared for battle.

James stood three meters to the left behind Nick. He pulled out his pistol and aimed nervously at the hole.

Clown thought about it and did not use the Golden Armor Technique on his teammates. Firstly, he did not think the monsters here would be that powerful, and secondly, he felt that there were not many monsters so it was unnecessary.

He practiced the Giant Bear Breathing Technique, and his expanded arms tightly grasped the Star Steel Sword.

The vibrations became stronger and stronger, and he could already hear a low roar coming from the tunnel.

A beam of light shot out from the tunnel, followed by a metal dragonfly flying out.

Behind it, two creatures that looked like two-headed hounds jumped out one after another.

The reason why they are called things is that although these two monsters have the appearance and heads of hounds, they are hairless, have bloated bellies, and have two pairs of deformed little hands growing on their backs.

Nick took a step forward, swung his shield hard, and smashed it hard at the first monster that jumped out.

Klauen took a quick step forward, raised his sword and chopped down at the second deformed hound that jumped out. This monster was closer to him.

The priest's shield hit the monster's head like a sledgehammer hitting a watermelon, and blood and flesh splattered everywhere.

Klauen raised his sword and slashed it down. Under his sword, the two heads of the monster were as soft as boneless and were cut off neatly.

The headless bodies of the two monsters were still able to jump around, and Clown drew his sword again.

Like a skilled surgeon, he chopped off their limbs.

Despite this, the bodies of the two monsters were still twisting.

Seeing their motionless heads, Crown realized that the central weakness of these creatures should be in the abdomen.

He easily dealt with the two monsters, but there was no joy on Clown's face.

He had recognized the appearance of the monster's footprints during the tracking process, and they did not match the claws of the two deformed hounds.

"Alert," Nick took back the dragonfly and held it in his hand.

Crown saw frames flashing in his pupils, like a movie played at high speed.

James came closer, and kicked the monster's torso in disgust and fear: "What the hell is this?"

“No one recognizes these deformed things,” Torres muttered, stabbing the monster’s belly.

"Fuck, he's pretty tough."

He shouted, attracting everyone's attention, and saw that the tip of his sword had only sunk slightly into the leather.

Torres held the sword with both hands and stabbed it hard, finally cutting open the monster's abdomen.

Crown saw that there were no internal organs inside, only dense blood vessels and muscles.

This is definitely not a natural creature, nor is it a mutated creature.

He became interested, pulled a Valyrian steel scalpel from his boot, released a golden light to protect his body, and began to dismember the monster.

The reason why he released the skill was because he was afraid that he would be infected by some unknown virus and cause trouble. The golden light body protection was much more useful than those fully enclosed virus protection suits.

That thin layer of golden light film did not affect his feel at all.

He stuck the scalpel into the dirt, holding the monster's torso with one hand and pressing hard with the other, feeling for the position of the bones.

A skeleton picture slowly emerged in his mind.

Its skeleton is very strange and not symmetrical at all. The ribs are arranged in pairs, some long and some short, completely enclosing the entire abdominal cavity.

When ordinary wild animals mutate, usually only the flesh and blood change, but this monster has mutated even its bones.

Crown pressed very carefully, and when he was sure that he had a complete understanding of the monster's structure, he picked up the scalpel and stabbed it forcefully into its back door.

Then he turned the monster's belly inside out and began to dissect it.

The monster's skin looks soft, but it is actually very tough, much tougher than cowhide.

His scalpel moved in a zigzag path from the monster's rear door to its neck without hitting a single bone.

His movements were calm and efficient. In just a few minutes, he stripped off the monster's flesh and blood, leaving behind a complete skeleton.

The monster's abdominal cavity only has a heart the size of a casserole, and the rest is muscle tissue.

There is no brain in their heads, only red and white muscles.

After the monster's heart was taken out, it was still beating vigorously.

This physiological structure confused Crown, he simply couldn't understand how such a monster could exist.

At this moment, Nick received all the images: "This is not good, guys."

I remember there were two dragonfly scouts in The Golden Compass, but I can't find a picture of them.

(End of this chapter)