From under the originally normal skin, milky white tentacles like new sprouts emerged from the pores. Just like the surface of rotten meat with maggots, those tentacles kept wriggling and swaying. Finally, under the skin, more and thicker white tentacles tore through the skin and wrapped around Lu Ban's hand.

At the same time, the diner's mouth suddenly opened and divided into four petals, each petal was covered with fine and sharp teeth, like a blooming flower.

But the flower seemed to want Lu Ban's favor, and came towards his body without saying a word. A brain full of grooves could be seen in the center of the petals, and on the tofu-like brain, the furry tentacles were rubbing, waiting to be eaten.

The diner's clothes were stretched out, and his bones seemed to have been devoured and digested after hundreds of years of brewing. His entire body collapsed, and only more milky white tentacles extended out. He was like a plant that existed only to bloom the most beautiful flowers.

Lu Ban did not hesitate. He materialized a silver revolver [Last Words] in his hand and fired it. The monster immediately rushed towards the cabin, knocking down several dancers. It finally fell on the wall of the cabin and turned into a pool of blooming meat paste.

As for the dancers who were knocked down, white granulations were growing on the broken parts of their bodies, just like a paused movie being played again, and fast-forwarded ten times the speed. Their bodies underwent changes and turned into hideous and terrifying monsters.

"It seems that we can't let them touch each other."

Lu Ban thought about it, raised the muzzle of his gun, bent down, and quickly shot all the monsters into the sky, then continued to shoot, making them fly higher.

Then, these monsters froze in mid-air, just like the skeleton snake wrapped in thunderclouds, but different from their previous human form, they were now just pure monsters.

The deck was quiet again.

"These humans have been alienated. They have been severely polluted in this doldrums. However, due to the stagnation of time here, the erosion caused by the pollution has not appeared immediately. However, once time starts to flow for them, the erosion will immediately accelerate."

Lu Ban already had a general understanding of the impact on this sea area.

In other words, the pollution in the doldrums is not the same thing as the supernatural power that makes time here come to a standstill.

Even though the crew was able to resist the fate of time gradually coming to a standstill with the help of Xia, they were still suffering from the pollution.

It’s just that the pollution is not that serious, and just a few dozen minutes of contact is not enough to cause mutations in people.

And it is unknown how long this passenger ship has been stuck here.

Judging from the way these people are dressed, it is completely different from the style of the current era in Hedao. I don’t know what the historical process of Hedao’s mainland is like now. After all, there are even steam engines. There are probably some people with extraordinary abilities in the central area of ​​the mainland. They may be in a completely different world from people like Nagamasa who often drift on the sea.

Even on Earth, while many developed areas are drinking coffee and enjoying air conditioning, there are some backward areas that can only make a living by catching fish with spears.

The current level of development of the sea in Hedao is very low, and the closer the area is to the sea, the more backward it may be.

Therefore, these people might have fallen into the doldrums recently. Lu Ban could not draw any conclusion about the speed of alienation.

"Why is this happening? Pollution should tend to spread directly. This contradictory situation must be caused by someone's interference."

Lu Ban thought to himself.

Most pollution will spread spontaneously, from high-pollution areas to low-pollution areas, eventually making the entire foreign land polluted. Under normal circumstances, it will not remain like a doldrums for decades or even hundreds of years without spreading.

Rather, the stagnation of time here has prevented the spread of pollution.

Thinking of this, Lu Ban suddenly felt that the surroundings became darker.

The starlight seemed to be shrouded in a veil, vague and unclear.

Lu Ban saw that the leopard not far away became invisible, and he seemed to be wrapped in a black mist.

The next moment, Lu Ban felt a huge force grabbing him. He tried to resist, but Lu Ban found it difficult to move his hands and feet. It was not a feeling of restraint, but his body telling him that now was not the time to move. He was instinctively unable to move.

He soon saw that a huge monster shrouded in black fog was holding him in its hand. The outline of the monster could not be seen clearly, but he could intuitively feel that its body was at least hundreds of meters tall and as majestic as a mountain. In the black fog in the distance, its dark blue eyes exuded an ominous aura. Just being stared at by it, the pollution was like a cancer attached to his bones, spreading on Lu Ban's scalp and the surface of his body.

At this moment, Lu Ban saw that there were many arms extending from the black fog, and the monster seemed to come from an island in the distance. A silver light was blooming in one of the arms.

The silver light was like a blade, cutting through the black fog in two or three strokes, bringing a ray of light to this dark world.

The next moment, Lu Ban returned to reality.

He saw Leopard beside him, sitting on a rotten sofa that had grown tentacles and fur, as if nothing had happened. One hand was gently stroking the bald head of a creature growing on the armrest, and his fingers were still teasing the slightly open mouth full of sharp teeth on the top of the eyeless creature's head. He looked quite relaxed, as if he had returned home.

On the other side, Lu Ban saw Xia wearing armor.

“It’s a bit tricky.”

Shia said as she glanced at her arm covered in gauntlets.

"This monster exists in this doldrums, but in a special form."

She murmured as if talking to herself.

Just now, Lu Ban had roughly seen some of the monster's characteristics through [True Vision]. He casually picked up a piece of wood from the cabin that had been knocked down when the diner's body was smashed, and wrote some words [Last Words] with a silver pen on the surface that was about to sprout.

【You can check the time】

In a blink of an eye, the piece of wood turned into a clock that can tell time.

Lu Ban looked at the wood. The scratches changed their positions, forming a shape similar to the scale of a clock. The buds growing on the wood chip also moved slowly, becoming pointers.

Xia didn't ask what Lu Ban was doing, but she already knew something.

Lu Ban saw that time was gradually passing. When the stopwatch started to count down again and was about to reach 42 seconds, he felt that the surroundings were plunging into darkness again.

But this time, Lu Ban was well prepared. Following Xia's method, he quickly escaped from the black fog monster and returned to reality.

He immediately looked at the piece of wood in his hand.

The time shown on the wood chip is 43 seconds.