Chapter 52 seems to have been mistaken for one of the snakes' kind? ...
A chilling aura swirled behind him, and Pei Qing dared not breathe, carefully lying prone.
The sound of scales rubbing together grew louder and louder. Woman A stared intently ahead, ready to run away at any moment.
She moved little by little toward the edge of the rock, her limbs pressed tightly against the rough rock surface, clinging to the stone like a giant gecko.
Pei Qing moved her body little by little, and just when she was about a meter away from getting down, several pieces of gravel suddenly fell from above and hit her head.
She frantically dodged, but more and more pebbles obstructed her view. Fearing danger, she had no choice but to retreat back to the relatively flat and safe area. Pei Qian was on the verge of tears; she had just painstakingly climbed to the edge of the rock!
She dared not move too much, slowly stretching her leg back, when suddenly she bumped into something slightly hard but flexible. Pei Qing froze; if she remembered correctly, there seemed to have been nothing here just moments before.
She then realized that she hadn't heard the sound of scales rubbing together for a long time; "it" had stopped long ago and was quietly watching her every move from the shadows behind her.
A few strands of silver-gray hair fell down in front of Pei Qing, and her heart jumped into her throat. Her eyes involuntarily glanced to the side.
An upside-down face came into view.
"hiss--"
A strange grin spread across his lips, revealing a scarlet snake tongue. A half-smile graced his handsome, inhuman face, his dark gold vertical pupils cold and indifferent. His human-like upper body hung upside down in an extremely distorted posture.
Pei Qing was so frightened that she retreated repeatedly, and in an instant, all the dark tentacles surged out and tightly enveloped her.
The snake-man saw the dark, wriggling tentacles, and a human-like curiosity flashed in its vertical pupils. Its snake tail meandered forward, and its upper body twisted and stretched out like a snake, with its hands hanging down at its sides and swaying.
It stared at the tentacles with curiosity, its eyes filled with childlike innocence and wonder. After watching for a while, it stuck out its tongue and licked one. The sharp tip of the tentacle pricked it hard, drawing blood.
The snake-man frowned, staring at the drops of blood on the ground. It seemed to have misunderstood something. Its tail quickly curled up, its head was raised high, its vertical pupils narrowed, and it kept hissing aggressively at the tentacles.
Pei Qing opened her eyes wide nervously, fearing that it might eat her if it didn't like her, but after waiting for a long time, the snake-man did not make any attack.
She cautiously peeked out, revealing only her eyes, and saw the snake-man constantly swaying its body, following the outer tentacles, occasionally touching them with the tip of its tail, as if communicating.
Seeing this strange scene, a completely absurd thought suddenly came to Pei Qing's mind: Could it be that it has mistaken her for one of its own kind?
It has a human-like upper body, and it also has legs (selectively ignoring the legs); it crawls close to the ground, and it also crawls forward close to the rocks (similar way of moving).
It has a long, flexible black tail, and also has many small, flexible black tentacles; it has sharp fangs, and also has spikes at the tips of its tentacles...
From these perspectives, I do seem quite like a snake-man.
The more she thought about it, the more alarmed she became, and the more absurd it seemed. But apart from that, Pei Qing couldn't figure out why the snake-man wasn't attacking and was still gently swaying its tail.
She decided to test this theory; if all else failed, she'd risk everything, since she was now barefoot and had nothing to fear.
Pei Qing tentatively shook the limb, her mind racing through snakes' ways of communicating. Perhaps, a slight touch or rubbing of the tail was a way of expressing friendliness.
She searched for the few documentary science facts in her mind and imitated them without any regard for the facts.
The snake-man in front of him paused for a moment, then followed Pei Qing's movements, slowly bringing its tail closer and rubbing against him, gently flicking its tongue, relaxing its upper body, and pressing its large tail flat against the rock surface.
The plan worked! Pei Qing was overjoyed, but she remained calm on the surface, afraid of frightening the snake-man into thinking she was about to attack it.
Just then, her stomach rumbled, shattering the peaceful atmosphere between them, and the snake-man's upper body rose high once more.
Pei Qian closed her eyes in pain. Why did this kind of unexpected event always happen? She immediately lay down and shrunk her body to show that she had no ill intentions. Her stomach rumbled a few more times.
The snake-man's gaze shifted to Pei Qing's abdomen, as if realizing something, then he looked at his own well-defined belly. His tail extended towards the scattered tentacles, the tip curling up into a relatively thick tentacle that reached towards his own stomach.
Pei Qing blinked, observing the series of actions before her. Did it roughly understand her meaning? Or did it simply think the two structures were similar?
The snake-man's skin has a unique texture; it has no pores, feels similar to that of a giant salamander, is slightly moist, very smooth, and has a highly elastic softness, making it very pleasant to touch.
Pei Qing guessed that it must have not only incorporated snake genes, but also, judging from its slightly damp silver hair, the snake-person must need to stay in water from time to time to maintain humidity and prevent its skin from cracking.
After the snake-man touched his own belly with the tentacle branch, his vertical pupils turned to Pei Qing's belly, and the tip of his tail was slightly raised, looking eager to try.
"Would it want to touch its own belly?" Pei Qing felt a sense of unease.
No, no, absolutely not! Pei Qian shook her head frantically in her mind, while physically hiding her stomach under the tendrils.
The snake-woman retracted the tip of its tail, looking somewhat confused, as if wondering why this fellow snake wouldn't let the tip of its tail touch its belly, when it was clearly trying to be friendly.
Seeing the snake-man's reaction, Pei Qing felt a deep sense of guilt. Maybe touching him would be alright? It wouldn't hurt to touch him, right?
She comforted herself in this way, and with her left hand, she bravely grabbed the tip of the snake-man's tail that was about to be pulled away, reaching towards her abdomen with a heroic expression.
The moment the tip of the snake-man's tail touched Pei Qing's abdomen, the snake-man's tail trembled, and its scarlet tongue was uncontrollably flicked out.
"Are you happy now?" Pei Qing watched silently from the side. After all that fuss, she was even hungrier, with a severe burning sensation in her stomach.
“Um…” Pei Qing directed the tangled branch to poke the snake-man’s tail, trying to bring its attention back. After a while, it went back to interacting with the tangled branch in ways she couldn’t understand at all.
"Aww, food, ahhh," Pei Qing opened her mouth, vividly imitating the action of eating, accompanied by excellent body language.
The snake-man looked at her movements with a bewildered expression, thinking she was playing some new game with it, and began to imitate her with "woof woof".
Pei Qian lowered her head in frustration. It was completely unworkable. After a while, she rallied her spirits. She remembered that the snake-man had eaten that mutated rat. Could it think that the mutated rat was food?
"Squeak squeak squeak—" She began to imitate the mutated rat's squeaking. But just making the squeaking sound wasn't enough. She used her hands and feet to imitate the mutated rat's shape, and then pointed to her own mouth and belly.
The snake-man seemed to understand something, wagging its tail to signal her to follow. Pei Qing breathed a sigh of relief; she was exhausted from jumping around, but finally understood.
She followed the snake-man to the stream beneath the rocks. The snake-man swam into the water and quickly disappeared. Pei Qing realized there might be more space inside. Looking at the filthy black water, she gritted her teeth, stomped her foot, and swam in after him.
After passing through a narrow waterway about ten meters long, Pei Qing's vision suddenly opened up to a large open space where she saw abandoned buildings and traces of human technology.
Could this be the place where they conducted their experiments before? Pei Qing walked to a large aluminum alloy building material that was stuck at an angle and touched the cool metal surface.
The snake-man suddenly appeared out of nowhere, wrapped its tail around her abdomen, and led her in one direction. Pei Qing followed it and arrived at a larger pile of waste materials.
Every time Pei Qing wanted to stop and take a look, she would be pushed forward by her tail, stepping over large petri dish fragments. After walking for about several dozen meters, she arrived at a cave.
Here, she saw many mutated rat corpses, and the smell of blood was overwhelming. Pei Qing gagged a few times, but her stomach was empty, and she only vomited a little bit of acidic water.
The snake-man, as if seeking credit, pushed her toward the pile of mutated rat corpses. Pei Qing lost her balance and almost plunged headfirst into the pile of corpses.
She managed to stand by holding onto the cave wall, her mind in turmoil.
Ugh, do I really have to eat those disgusting mutant rats? Just thinking about the tumors on the mutant rats made Pei Qing feel a surge of acid in her throat. No, no, I'm going to throw up again.
As she pondered, she fell silent. These were extraordinary times. Perhaps she should just make do for now? Her body was exhausted; if she didn't eat something soon, she'd probably be living next to a mutated rat corpse in less than a day.
To eat or not to eat, it was a truly difficult choice. To eat meant to live, not to eat meant to die. Pei Qian squatted on the ground, clutching her head in anguish.
The snake-man tilted its head in confusion, then curled its tail around a fat, mutated rat carcass and carried it to Pei Qing. The mutated rat was very fat and had died a gruesome death, its brains splattered into a mess.
Pei Qing still couldn't bring herself to be ruthless, and kicked the rat to the side with her foot. "Haha, this one is a bit big," she said, gesturing with her hand to make a circle that got smaller and smaller. "Do you have any smaller ones? About this big, or even smaller."
The snake-man understood. It picked and chose among the rats, finally selecting the smallest mutated rat and placing it next to Pei Qing. Then it ate the fattest mutated rat itself.
Pei Qing stared in disbelief as the snake-man opened his mouth to an unbelievable angle and swallowed the extremely fat mutated rat whole.
Is there some kind of extra dimension inside its stomach? Why isn't its belly bulging at all?
She unconsciously reached out and touched her abdomen. There really wasn't any change at all. How amazing!
Her gaze shifted downwards, turning to the enormous snake tail, which she roughly estimated to be about the thickness of a bucket. Could it be inside the tail?
She followed the arc of the tail as it swam, and suddenly spotted a metallic glint in the distance, the shape of which looked like a portable can!
Pei Qian immediately became excited and quickly ran to the location of the suspected portable canned food. She used both her hands and feet to dig at the soil. As the soil gradually receded, the thing underneath was gradually revealed.
Canned food! It really is canned food! A whole box full of canned food!
Pei Qing was overjoyed, she was so happy she was practically going crazy. She counted them and found there were a total of thirty portable compressed food cans!
Clutching the can, she continued digging, unearthing the leaked nutrient solution remnants; a disposable bath towel from who-knows-when; and a dilapidated, abandoned water purification device…
Digging and digging in the small mound of earth, they unearthed a dilapidated laboratory heating device, a laboratory table with only its frame remaining, and a big smile on Pei Qing's face.
Finally, finally I don't have to eat those disgusting mutant rats anymore! There's hope!
Pei Qian felt a surge of energy in her excitement. She dug here and there, unearthing many useful things, which she moved aside and sorted out.
"Ha, not bad!" Pei Qing clapped his hands, brushed off the dirt, pulled over the abandoned water purification device next to him, sat down, and began to study it.
She fiddled with it for a while, and the water purifier's light briefly turned on before going out in less than five seconds. Pei Qing rubbed her chin. "Strange, could it be that the transformer is broken?"
This water purification device is also portable, and the mobile power source is very durable. It is estimated that the connection is unstable. Pei Qing had an idea, picked up a piece of alloy material, broke it into a suitable size, and stuffed it in.
"Ding!" The water purifier is finally working. Although it stops working from time to time and you have to slap it to fix it, it's still better than drinking dirty water directly.
She picked up the heating device again; things were a bit better, it worked as soon as she turned it on, not bad at all.
While Pei Qing was fiddling with various instruments, the snake-man lay in the water watching. Near the cave, there was a relatively clean pool of water, which it liked to soak in when it had nothing to do.
It watched quietly as its strange companion dug around and pulled out a bunch of strange things. Some of these things felt familiar, like the round can.
It saw her take a cylindrical object to fetch water, then pour it into another object, and then shout excitedly there. It also saw her sitting on the ground, with stones in front of her constantly smashing something. Soon a fire broke out, almost burning her fur. Despite the danger, she seemed very happy.
Happiness? What is happiness? It didn't understand why it thought it was 'happiness,' but many strange, fragmented images floated into its mind. It 'saw' many strange, disabled kind of beings, without tails, sitting around a fire, their expressions very similar to hers. Was this happiness?
Because of food? Those round things, are they what she likes? Does she like fire? Those hot things? It only has a vague sense of liking; it likes the prey because it can fill its stomach.
The snake-man lay in the water, unaware of what happiness was, yet its expression unconsciously began to mimic it.
It suddenly smelled a peculiar scent, and following the scent, it climbed ashore and came to its kind.
Pei Qing had just heated up the canned food and was struggling to put it into her mouth with a metal plate. The satisfaction of the scalding hot food in her mouth almost brought tears to her eyes. It was good that she was still alive.
She didn't know when it started, but the snake-man coiled up beside her. She didn't care; eating her fill was the priority.
A piece of jet-black snake tail with dark patterns quietly coiled up the mutated rat's corpse and placed it on her heating device without Pei Qing noticing. It wasn't until she smelled something burning that she realized something was wrong and hurriedly looked for the source.
This search was terrifying. Upon seeing the charred mutant rat, Pei Qing was furious. "You! What are you doing?!"
The snake-man stood bewildered to the side, vaguely sensing something was wrong. He tried to wrap his tail around the charred mutant rat, but accidentally burned himself. He swung it uncontrollably, and it landed right in the can of food that Pei Qing hadn't finished eating. Then the rat's head broke off and, to make matters worse, fell into the water she had just filtered.
Pei Qing was furious. She'd finally managed to heat up the canned food with that lousy heating device! She'd only taken two bites and it was already contaminated! And what about the drinking water she'd painstakingly purified?! Ugh! She was going crazy!
"What are you trying to do?! Can't you just stay put?!"
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