Chapter 101 Gourd Man

Everyone's scalp tingled.

Zhang Xuqiang said in a deep voice: "Sun Duxiu mentioned that word before."

Li Yi said solemnly: "I was careless too. I saw Sun Duxiu said it before but nothing happened, so I didn't pay much attention to him. Now I think about it, he was also affected at that time, so he mentioned it twice in a row, but he didn't finish the second time, which prolonged his survival time."

Pharmacist Wan asked, "That is to say, Sun Duxiu had already shown signs before, but it was only just now that it fully erupted?"

Li Yi nodded and said, "That's right. In short, everyone should be more careful and always pay attention to your mental state from now on."

Now Li Yi finally understood why the advance team got stuck when they followed the previous route.

There were no casualties here at the time, most likely because they quickly retreated after realizing something was wrong.

The subsequent explorations were still unsuccessful, and finally they went to a non-densely populated area according to the information provided by Li Yi's team.

Of course, it is not ruled out that there are more powerful guard mechas in this fourth level.

Although they didn't find anything else in the fourth level last time, that was in a non-dense group.

But now they are exploring in a densely populated area, so the situation naturally cannot be generalized.

…

After that, everyone became more cautious. Whenever someone couldn't help but speak, Li Yi would forcibly interrupt them and divert their attention.

After doing this again and again, I finally walked out from the depths of the densely populated area to a relatively less depressing environment.

Although the huge mushroom forest around here is still very dense, it has indeed become much wider than before. The space between the basic mushroom stems has increased from only being able to accommodate one mecha to now being able to accommodate three mechas.

Li Yi pointed to a spot under his feet and said, "It's about this spot. We should be able to get through to the next level directly."

Everyone was stunned, and Zhang Xuqiang asked, "Don't we have to follow the steps of the advance team this time?"

Li Yi said:

"No need. The advance team is stuck here, which means if we go any further, we will most likely run into the next guard mecha or other obstacles."

"Now that we have confirmed the approximate location of another closed map in the fifth level, and the vibration frequency coming from the ground is shallow enough, it means that this location is already the thinnest layer in the surrounding area."

Zhang Xuqiang suddenly said:

"That's right. We are not here for fun, so there is no need to take the usual route. So how do we make our way now?"

Li Yi smiled and said, "Don't worry, let me freeze the outermost layer first, and then Yao Shi Wan will alternate between hot and cold, so that the melting efficiency will be higher."

As it spoke, the Pluto mecha unleashed its Pluto characteristics, and slammed its punch into the ground.

With a crackling sound, a huge vertical hole was created on the ground, and countless white stones that broke into sharp cones burst out and were bounced into the air by the reaction.

Immediately afterwards, the freezing special effect was activated, and the ground below that had not been dented was instantly frozen into a hard block.

The gravel that bounced up in the air was blown away by the Pluto Mecha, which activated its tornado characteristics and blew it away far away.

The series of movements were freehand and natural, which drew cheers from the crowd.

The pharmacist praised: "Li Yi, your move is very skillful and natural, and the changes are ingenious. Could it be that you have recently developed a new mecha skill?"

Li Yi nodded and said, "It's not a new use. It's just that I've gained new insights into the divinity of Hades recently, and I can use it to perform more subtle moves."

Zheng Xueyuan said: "I'm so envious. When will my Winged Divine Nature be able to be used in such a wonderful way?"

The pharmacist smiled and said, "You should increase the damage of the divinity. In terms of subtlety, the characteristics are already subtle enough."

While chatting and laughing, Yao Shiwan controlled the Fire Luan Mecha and walked out, arriving in front of the deep hole created by the Pluto Mecha's punch.

The Fire Luan Mecha took a short breath and then directly stimulated the orange-yellow Fire Bird, which burned rapidly and continued to advance the distance.

In this way, under the joint operation of Zhang Xuqiang and Li Yi, a huge passage with a depth of about two hundred meters and a diameter of about twenty meters appeared in front of everyone.

…

During the descent, all the mechas were looking forward to it.

"I didn't expect that there is actually an entrance to the fifth level down here."

"If there are no slime creatures in this entrance, we will make a fortune."

When Zhang Xuqiang was sighing, Zuo Ying suddenly said:

"I smelled a similar smell to the one I smelled in the Gourd Man's laboratory last time."

Li Yi's eyes moved slightly:

"What kind of smell is that in the laboratory? Is it the Gourd Man himself, or the creatures in his culture chamber, or the items inside?"

Zuo Ying said uncertainly:

"It could be the smell of the gourd man himself, but I'm not sure."

Li Yi asked, "Why are you not sure? Is it too light, or is there a difference?"

Zuo Ying said: "It's both reasons."

Li Yi began to think.

In the blink of an eye, six mechas fell from the cave one after another.

According to their previous experience in the fifth level, if they fall from the dome, there should be poisonous ferns covering the left side.

There should be about three hundred meters between the dome and the ground.

"Everyone, prepare your divine energy to mitigate the force of the landing and prevent a huge shock from causing any accidents."

"clear."

As he was speaking, the Pluto mecha entered first.

As soon as he fell into the air, he immediately activated the wind and fire thrusters located in the shoulder armor slots, and orange-yellow flames whizzed out with a huge flow rate.

Whoosh whoosh!!! Soon, the Pluto mecha made way and hovered in the air, observing the ground, the dome, and the surrounding situation.

The first glance at the ground shows that the terrain is indeed a feature that I have never seen before when exploring the fifth level.

The ground is still covered with various types of giant ferns.

But the good news is that these ferns appear to be non-toxic.

It's completely different from the poisonous ferns in the slime creatures.

This shows that poison fern is not inherently poisonous, and the source of its toxicity lies in the mucus organisms.

"It seems that your inference is correct, Li Yi. This is indeed a relationship of upper and lower positions. The small map of the fifth level is small, not because it is small, but because it hides another area."

Beside him, Yao Shiwan's Fire Luan Mecha, driven by the flamethrower, stood side by side with the Pluto Mecha.

Li Yi shook his head and said, "Currently, it has only been confirmed for the first five levels. Whether it is true for levels below the fifth level is yet to be confirmed."

There was something Li Yi didn't say.

But if it is true, as long as you are strong enough and not afraid of risks, you can dig holes all the way to the bottom.

However, this is only what Li Yi would think in virtual reality.

If it was a real ruins exploration, he still wouldn't dare to do it.

After all, if you accidentally release some super-terrifying super monster, the whole team will be wiped out.

…

In the calm sea, the mechas landed on the ground.

At this moment, just as the mechas landed, AI Xiaochi's voice came as expected: "Congratulations on discovering a new path to enter the fifth level. The entire intelligence is sufficient and of high value. It can be rated as S+ intelligence. Due to its high feasibility and medium difficulty, it is estimated to be worth 200 million star coins. Congratulations."

This is the first intelligence update for everyone in two weeks.

Moreover, it was a huge order of 200 million at one time, and everyone was quite happy.

Moreover, there is more than one piece of good news.

Everyone found that although there were huge ferns around, it did not give people a sense of oppression.

There is even a sense of being tailored.

As the Pluto mecha was falling, it used its detection system to detect an unusually familiar place from afar.

But he was not sure. After Zuo Ying landed, he asked:

"Zuo Ying, after you landed, did you find that the smell of the gourd man was stronger?"

Zuo Ying controlled the Baikui mecha and pointed in a direction, saying, "Yes, and it's denser in that direction."

Li Yi nodded slightly. It was indeed so! "It seems that we are lucky. We have encountered the gourd man who left the fifth level laboratory before. Or, he did not leave the fifth level, but sealed off another area of ​​the entire fifth level to prevent the slime creatures from finding the door."

Pharmacist Wan suddenly realized:

"Yes, when we saw that there was nothing in the laboratory, we thought that the gourd man had completely left this area. But in fact, we were in the dark!"

The others also understood and felt the wonder of the world.

"No wonder the atmosphere here is completely different from other levels. It turns out that this place has been cleaned up by the Gourd Man?"

Li Yi said:

"Based on the traces around us, maybe the situation is not that simple. Anyway, we should be able to know the deeper secrets later."

At that moment, six mechas took off and landed quickly, rushing towards the laboratory over there.

Zuo Ying, on the other hand, activated the land skateboard under the foot slot of the Baikui mecha, and stood on the land skateboard with a slanted figure eight step, stimulating divinity.

Then, the land skateboard slightly raised its height, and colorful ripples appeared at the back, pushing it backwards.

In an instant, it suddenly started to slide on this relatively flat ground.

It was so fast that it suddenly reached the front of the team, scaring Zuo Ying so much that she quickly slowed down and got alongside the Pluto mecha.

Several people were a little surprised.

Zheng Xueyuan said enviously:

"Sister Zuo Ying, your land skateboard is very cool. It is very suitable for land marches, and it doesn't seem to consume much divine power."

Li Yi also felt good about it and said with a smile:

"If there's a chance, we can consider equipping the Land Skateboard. Some scenarios may not be suitable for flying combat, but if we use the Land Skateboard to accelerate, we can also obtain good propulsion kinetic energy, which is very useful whether it's a land march or a ground chase."

This statement drew everyone's approval.

Zhang Xuqiang sighed, "If I were really fully armed like this, I might be able to kill a 130-meter slime creature by myself."

As they were talking, they marched quickly and covered a distance of more than ten kilometers.

At this distance, the obstructions gradually decreased, and a gourd-shaped laboratory of about 30 meters appeared in the long-range detection field of view of everyone.

…

The mechas stopped in front of the door.

Zuo Ying said:

"It smells like decay, like a corpse, like there's no living thing."

Li Yi thought for a moment and said, "Zhang Xuqiang and Zheng Xueyuan will be on guard. The rest of you will directly eject from the insertion cabin and follow me into the experiment."

As he spoke, the Pluto mecha crouched forward, half-popped out of the insertion bay, and the entire person jumped out from it.

"The air environment here is normal, everyone come down quickly."

With a nervous mood, Pharmacist Wan, Zuo Ying, Zhang Xuqiang and others followed Li Yi into the laboratory gate.

"This structure is exactly the same as the previous laboratory. It is intact."

Pharmacist Wan observed for a moment and asked curiously, "Even many of the details, furnishings, and even tiny patterns that I remember are exactly the same. Is this gourd man too obsessive? Or do they have some way to copy the laboratory?"

Li Yi observed more carefully and said, "I think it's the latter, because some of the tiny traces of bumps and bruises on the wall are exactly the same."

The first floor was quite empty, so everyone walked around and then went up to the second floor.

Since we already knew the internal structure, we didn't have to split our forces into two groups this time.

Entering the second floor, not only Zuo Ying but everyone else could smell the stench.

"Could it be that the Gourd Man died here?"

Everyone looked at each other, walked around the second floor which was filled with empty culture tubes, and cautiously walked into the third floor.

On the third floor, the stench of corpses became increasingly stronger.

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

All I saw was a humanoid, skin-and-bone corpse half-lying in a corner, hidden behind countless glass-like transparent culture tubes and culture dishes.

His upper body was leaning against the wall, his two shriveled thighs were stretched out, and in his hollow eye sockets, pink and white maggots the size of a little finger were slowly wriggling.

This humanoid corpse, which was skin and bones, was about two meters and three meters tall. There were fist-sized swollen balls on its neck, arms, and thighs. It seemed that due to the slow changes in the material, the bubbles on the body had never burst.

There was a huge bloody wound on the chest, and two rows of bones that had been broken into pieces could be seen.

On the bones, there was a faint foam of blood and separated white and red body fluids, which flowed slowly, as if everything was frozen at the moment of death.

"Could it be that this is really the body of the gourd man?"

Everyone was a little surprised.

Although everyone had a vague guess in their hearts when they smelled the stench.

But when they actually saw the extremely strange decay process due to the slow changes in matter, everyone was still quite shocked.

"This corpse looks like a human."

Zuo Ying murmured.

Li Yi said: "AI Xiaochi, can you collect genes?"

Ai Xiaochi replied: "This is what the Relic Authority reveals. I can't see the underlying situation of these encrypted information."

Li Yi understood and said, "That is to say, this corpse is most likely not part of the ruins itself."

aixiaochi said:

"There's nothing wrong with what you said, but besides the possibility you mentioned, it's also possible that this is a key area of ​​the ruins, so I don't have the authority to identify it."

Li Yi nodded and didn't ask any more questions.

He walked forward and examined the body carefully.

Huh? Li Yi reached his hand under the wound on the corpse's chest, and found a notebook made of very tough material.

Its material and style were exactly the same as the experimental notes they had found in another laboratory before.

The notes seem to be somewhat damaged as they have blocked some huge damage.

But the overall content still does not affect the reading.

Fortunately, Li Yi had participated in the deciphering of the gourd script, and had also been trying to figure out and absorb the corresponding knowledge recently.

Therefore, after opening it, he did not fall into a state of blindness.

Instead, read it carefully.

When the people around saw that Li Yi had made some discovery, they gathered around and studied it carefully.

Zhang Xuqiang was surprised and asked, "Li Yi, can you already understand the gourd text?"

Li Yi said: "I can understand some of the words, but I still need to figure out the specific meaning."

As he spoke, he unfolded the first page which was still intact and said:

"This page happens to be about the gourd man being chased by the slime creatures. Since he himself is not strong, he relied on ancient technology to capture the slime creatures."

"So, he had no choice but to take all his belongings and flee to the densely populated area of ​​Level 5. Then, he used the authority of ancient technology to drive a huge wall to separate the two areas."

"Then, the gourd man drove the divine mecha and flattened the densely populated area."

After hearing these words, everyone had question marks on their faces.

"Wait, Li Yi, did you translate it wrong?"

Zhang Xuqiang asked quickly: "Since the gourd man is so powerful that he can wipe out the densely populated area in the fifth level, why does he still need to avoid the slime creatures?"

Li Yi said:

"That's all the information in the text. As for why, I don't know."

"But I can confirm that the accuracy of the translation just now is over 90%. We can test it when we get back. I think it will be fine."

"Okay, keep your doubts for now and continue translating."

Li Yi nodded, turned to the next page, and said:

"This page is a follow-up to the previous page. He said that the control of ancient technology might have some risks. After using it, his mind began to feel dizzy. In order to prevent any accidents, he will record every situation he encounters in detail."

Li Yi continued to turn the pages and said, "The main information on the last three pages is severely damaged, and there are a lot of blood stains on them. I can only judge that these three pages are all about his daily life in setting up a new laboratory here."

"This fifth page talks about how the gourd man's body, which could have lived for a long time, suddenly developed problems. He began to twitch all over, and was extremely hungry and thirsty. He developed a disease similar to bulimia and kept eating and drinking like crazy."

"There are not many uncommon characters in the content on page 5, so the accuracy of the content should be no less than 98%."

"Page six says that after the gourd man ate and drank lavishly, his mind became increasingly unstable. A voice kept calling him to activate the authority in his hands and unseal the entire ruins."

"Unblocked?"

Everyone couldn't help but hold their breath.

This word seemed to have triggered everyone's DNA, and all kinds of bad images immediately came to mind.

Yaoshi Wan asked hurriedly, "Could it be that the control authority of this relic is an ancient AI that is still functioning? If it is unsealed, will it release some extremely terrifying ancient creatures?"

Others share this concern.

The low-level creatures of the eighth level, after being transformed by the gourd man, have grown to a state where even the B-class divine mechas might not be able to take them down.

You can imagine how ferocious the monsters at the bottom are.

Li Yi shook his head and said, "I don't know either. Let's translate it first to see if there are any clues."

Everyone suppressed their doubts and continued to listen to Li Yi's explanation.

"Page seven talks about the gourd man's self-analysis and self-cognition. It's a bit confusing and illogical, so I can't translate it."

"Page eight, same content, but with a little more logic."

"Here is the Gourd Man who is doubting himself. He is wondering why he came here as his research base. He thinks he was bewitched by some special existence and came here, which made his situation more and more dangerous."

"Don't ask me why the gourd man didn't escape, he didn't write it!"

As soon as this sentence came out, Zhang Xuqiang scratched his head in embarrassment. Hey, you actually predicted my problem.

Li Yi smiled and continued:

"Of course, if we only consider the possibility, it is possible that the area outside the ruins may not be safe for him."

"On page nine, the gourd man senses that he is about to die and prepares to write down his life story."

"It's a pity that only something resembling a name was left behind, and there was no follow-up. I guess he really died here."

As he spoke, Li Yi touched the bloodstain on the page, then observed the situation on the ground and said:

"If I'm not mistaken, this gourd man probably finished writing the last word of this notebook when his chest was pierced by something else."

"Moreover, the breach was made from the inside, not from the outside."

Hearing this, everyone's scalp tingled.

Zuo Ying was surprised and asked, "Could it be a facehugger?"

"Facehugger?"

Li Yi felt a little strange when he heard this familiar yet unfamiliar name.

Isn’t this the name of the monster in the science fiction movie he saw in the parallel world? How come there is such a thing in this world?

Seeing that everyone was puzzled, Zuo Ying said, "I just remembered a monster described in an ancient fantasy movie I watched before. That monster would parasitize the human body, devour the body's nutrients, and then when it grows to a certain size, it would burst out of the chest!"

Zhang Xuqiang was surprised and said, "Since the emergence of virtual reality, not many people watch movies anymore. You actually still go to watch those old junky movies."

Zuo Ying said: "Although the technology in ancient times was not good, the storytelling techniques were still very good. My family members are all fans of ancient movies, so I know a little about these."

Li Yi suddenly realized that the movie Alien also existed in his world, but he just didn't know about it.

After thinking for a while, he said, "I roughly know what the facehugger Zuo Ying mentioned looks like, but how should I put it? The size of the gourd man's chest and the shape of the thing that broke out of his chest are probably not like a facehugger, but something sharper and more peculiar in shape."

"But it doesn't matter what it is. What matters is whether the monster is still around. Zuo Ying, do you smell anything else?"

Zuo Ying said: "Very faint, he should have left here, but I'm not sure if he is still around here."

Li Yi nodded and continued searching.

After a while, a translucent crystal angular cone was taken out from the gourd man's palm.

"According to the description in the notes, this thing is the key to control authority."

"AI Xiaochi, do you have any reaction to this permission?"

AI Xiaochi immediately responded: "Xiaochi is here. Regarding this permission key, I am currently unable to confirm whether it is genuine, but I do not have a way to identify its specific information at the moment."

Li Yi asked: "Can you tell us where the advance team obtained the authority and then transferred it to you?"

Ai Xiaochi said: "This is confidential information. I'm sorry that Xiaochi can't tell you."

Li Yi said: "Well, even if you didn't tell me, I would have roughly guessed it. It is the temple at the far east of the first level, which is the entrance to the first level discovered by the advance team, right?"

Ai Xiaochi did not answer.

Beside him, Yaoshi Wan asked quietly: "Li Yi, are you sure it's there?"

Li Yi nodded and said, "The advance team was still stuck at the fourth level, and we have basically gone through their other routes. The only one we haven't been to is the entrance to the first level."

The pharmacist said politely, "Maybe we missed it in the passage?"

"It's unlikely because there are no similar items placed there, or any traces of them being placed there."

Li Yi shook his head and said, "Besides, if I hadn't seen this diamond-shaped cone at the beginning, I wouldn't be sure. But after seeing this thing, I roughly know that there are at least three of these things, or even six or nine."

Yaoshi Wan suddenly realized, "I understand. Does this diamond-shaped cone have tiny contact grooves? Can it be connected to other things? So, you are sure that this thing should have a fixed storage location?"

Li Yi nodded and said, "That's right."

As he spoke, Li Yi casually flipped to the blank pages at the back of his notebook and suddenly said:

"There's something behind this...wait, isn't this a map of the entire ruins?"

(End of this chapter)