Seeing Lin Xi fall to the ground, Xavier immediately struggled to get up.
"Lin Xi—Lin Xi—"
It was calling out incoherently. It was already on the verge of death, but Lin Xi's current condition forced it to squeeze out some life force from its near-death state.
Xavier used all his strength to struggle to his feet and then barely managed to crawl to Lin Xi's side.
It nudged Lin Xi in a panic. Just seconds before, he had been radiating an ancient and cold aura, but now he looked so pale and thin.
Xavier instinctively spread out his insect limbs and hugged Lin Xi tightly.
It felt extremely uneasy; an ominous premonition swept over it, leaving it defenseless.
It was at this moment that Xavier clearly heard a sticky, damp rubbing sound coming from around him. He struggled to wriggle his body, trying to cover Lin Xi more completely.
Something is getting closer...
The maddening chanting grew louder and louder, and drew ever closer.
Xavier slowly raised his head and looked around.
Then, a look of terror flashed in its eyes.
Those things...
Those things, which were called special experimental subjects, somehow squeezed out of those frozen culture dishes at some point.
The moment he saw them, Xavier's body stiffened considerably.
The constant stream of test subjects rushing towards him made even this powerful mutant species feel a chill run down its spine.
These bizarre and disgusting clumps of rotting flesh exuded an odor that made Xavier extremely uncomfortable. Of course, this odor was not unfamiliar; Xavier quickly recalled the smell he had previously encountered in that dark, damp "greenhouse."
"Get away—"
Xavier propped himself up and hissed menacingly at the surging experimental subjects. He tried to drive them away, but as before, these writhing, wet chunks of flesh were incapable of thought and therefore did not react to Xavier's intimidation.
Even worse things were yet to come.
Just as Arthur was once bewitched by a strange-looking man in the darkness, Xavier's mind became noticeably dull and confused when faced with a group of experimental subjects.
Xavier felt as if he had been split in two.
One part of it was involuntarily drawn to the swarm of writhing, fleshy monsters, while another part of it was constantly sounding alarms in its heart, with danger and fear crashing against Xavier's fragile nerves like waves.
The damp, sweet, and slightly fishy smell emanating from those monsters made Xavier's vision blur. In his daze, he seemed to have transformed back into that weak insect egg from the very beginning... It was nestled in its egg case, fast asleep...
And surrounding it was Lin Xi's warm and incredibly sweet embrace.
However, just as Xavier dazedly lowered his head, he immediately saw Lin Xi, who was completely unconscious in his arms.
No, that's not it—
Seeing Lin Xi's unconscious profile made Xavier gasp. It became much more alert, but then it realized that before it lost consciousness, the special experimental subject, which was still a short distance away from them, was now gradually covering it and Lin Xi like flowing asphalt.
What a maddening scene it was! Xavier had only ever seen similar scenes in horror TV shows made by humans before.
However, whenever it saw such a scene, it couldn't help but wave its insect limbs, secretly glad that it wasn't as weak and powerless as a human...
Now, Xavier could only watch helplessly as those... those fleshy chunks covered with crisscrossing blood vessels and mucous membranes crawled little by little onto Lin Xi's body.
Intense anger and an indescribable sense of powerlessness gnawed at Xavier's soul.
It involuntarily emitted a long, sharp hissing sound. Then it forcefully raised its limbs, desperately trying to tear the chunks of flesh from Lin Xi's body.
The tumor-like lumps of flesh were still covered with Scripps' facial features, only they looked distorted and deformed... They seemed harmless, but the moment Xavier reached out and touched them, those crooked lips suddenly opened to reveal fine fangs.
They screamed and then began to bite Xavier's foretarsus forcefully.
Pain pierced through the tips of his limbs, but Xavier paid no heed—at this moment, physical pain was nothing.
Its only wish was to take Lin Xi away from here...
However, in the end, Xavier found that all his efforts were in vain.
Just as it was about to successfully peel a special experimental subject off Lin Xi's body, it clearly heard Lui Lin Xi, who was still in a deep coma, let out a muffled cry of pain.
"Lin Xi—"
Xavier froze, looking down in shock at the peculiar experimental subjects that bulged like tumors.
In just a short while, those bloody, slimy chunks of flesh sprouted dense blood vessels. Upon contact with Lin Xi's skin, these vessels immediately pierced through it and then grew together with the unconscious Lin Xi.
This is why it caused Lin Xi so much pain when Xavier tried to tear these things off her.
Those flesh and blood... those special experimental subjects are merging with Lin Xi.
"No, no, Lin Xi..."
Xavier looked at Lin Xi helplessly.
What happened to Lin Xi caused it immense pain.
Immediately afterwards, Xavier felt a tingling sensation around his exposed wound. He turned his head and looked straight at his chest—right next to his wound, large clumps of shapeless special experimental subjects had somehow crawled up.
Deep red new blood vessels, like worms or coral, emerged from the rotting flesh and burrowed deep into Xavier's wound.
However, upon contact with Xavier's blood, the newly formed blood vessels immediately turned grayish-white and then detached.
They do not need Xavier's body.
If this continues... Lin Xi will be completely swallowed up by these "things".
Although he couldn't understand what had happened at that moment, the realization still flashed through Xavier's mind with unparalleled clarity.
It clung tightly to Lin Xi, who was already covered by a large mass of rotten, tumor-like flesh, and then struggled to its feet.
Amidst a sea of blood, Xavier staggered and led Lin Xi toward the door.
What was a short distance felt incredibly long to Xavier at that moment.
However, before Xavier even reached the door, some more ominous... more maddening wet sounds came from the direction of the door.
Xavier pressed Linxi forcefully into his arms, and it stood straight in place.
Then, it opened its red compound eyes wide and stared blankly at the doorway.
It saw a familiar figure appear there—the strange man who was nurturing countless offspring in the dark greenhouse, slowly emerging from the darkness, surrounded by countless pink embryos.
He still appeared empty and dark, his gray eyes devoid of any emotion.
As he moved, he left behind a large clump of viscous liquid and a large number of insect eggs scattered on the ground.
He appeared so ethereal and serene, like a zombie that had died long ago. Yet, the instant Xavier met his gaze, Xavier clearly felt as if his thoughts were being firmly gripped by a pair of invisible claws.
"Hiss...no...hiss..."
Xavier let out a painful gasp.
Xavier was being controlled. Despite the intense anger and worry for Lin Xi surging within him, his body was frozen in place, unable even to look down at Lin Xi.
And so the man gradually approached Xavier and Lin Xi.
The viscous, chaotic, rotting flesh was right in front of me.
From this distance, Xavier could clearly see the man's swollen abdomen—beneath the constantly writhing, translucent membrane, lay a large number of insect eggs. However, compared to their last meeting, the man's body appeared even more deformed, and he was clearly in a rather abnormal state.
Many insect eggs were activated prematurely, and some of them even hatched while still inside his body.
Those tiny, pinkish embryo-like things simply tore through the man's skin and emerged.
They crawled rapidly across the man's constantly shifting and writhing body, eventually merging directly into the army of monsters beneath him.
The man's mouth was opened to its limit, making his expression extremely distorted.
The same low moans as those of his kind kept emanating from deep within his throat; they weren't even sounds produced by his tongue or vocal cords...
What unique organ inside its chest cavity is making a sound?
"Waaaaah...waaaah...waaaah..."
The long sobs and cries gradually became exceptionally loud.
After that man appeared, the infected creatures that had been relentlessly clinging to Xavier and Lin Xi became even more excited.
At this point, even if Xavier wanted to escape, he couldn't.
Finally, the man opened his decaying arms toward Xavier and Lin Xi, who were tightly embracing each other.
Xavier knew he couldn't resist.
At the same time, it had no way to escape.
At this moment, the only thing Xavier could do was to shield Lin Xi with his own body.
And so, with a twisted expression, the man covered Xavier and Lin Xi directly.
Under his immense pressure, Xavier, already overwhelmed, collapsed weakly.
Then, his world turned dark...
The damp, sticky chunks of flesh seemed endless, constantly surging up Xavier's body and covering it completely.
Coral-like blood vessels growing from the base of those fleshy lumps even pierced through Xavier's exceptionally hard carapace, then pierced through Xavier and finally plunged deep into Lin Xi's body.
Just as Xavier had vaguely sensed before, all the experimental subjects in the cryogenic warehouse were merging with Lin Xi.
The churning, churning flesh, along with the mangled human organs and facial features, gradually covered the entire floor of the laboratory.
At that moment, almost everything was dissolved and dominated by those chunks of flesh.
The only witness to this horrific sight was a white, deformed alien.
Arthur trembled as he secured his body to the top of the laboratory.
It stared blankly at the surging sea of flesh and blood below it, its simple mind a complete blank.
Arthur had no idea what was happening, but that didn’t stop him from feeling the unsettling, chaotic aura emanating from below.
After all the clumps of flesh had burst out of the frozen petri dish and fused together, they formed a huge, pulsating giant fleshy sac.
Thick blood vessels and mucus enveloped the deep red flesh below, while Xavier and Lin Xi... and even that incredibly terrifying man, had long been encased in fleshy sacs and were nowhere to be seen.
But the story doesn't end here...
Just after the sac stabilized its shape and began its first pulsation.
The pink embryo that led the evil man to the laboratory began to wriggle in the darkness.
Whether whole or deformed, these tiny pink creatures charged straight toward the enormous sac of flesh.
"hiss……"
Arthur's body stiffened, staring at the scene below with immense fear.
Because just as those pink, embryo-like monsters began to move, the fleshy sacs reacted at the same time—countless ring-shaped mouthparts squeezed out from the gaps in those sacs.
Even from this distance, Arthur could still clearly see the long, scarlet licking tongues and densely packed teeth in those mouthparts.
Those teeth are not sharp, but their rough surfaces are perfect for chewing.
Almost every embryonic-looking monster voluntarily jumped into its mouthparts.
They greedily devoured the embryonic monsters that pounced on them one after another, copious amounts of blood and slime gushing from between their crooked lips and teeth. Then, a series of soft, chewing sounds instantly echoed throughout the laboratory.
The smell of blood became even stronger.
Those tiny monsters quickly turned into food for the fleshy sac.
But after the enormous fleshy sac devoured countless tiny monsters, its already terrifying body swelled several times its original size at a visible rate.
However, the fleshy sac did not stop developing and feeding.
After the numerous embryonic monsters were completely devoured, what appeared in the laboratory was an amazing ocean of tiny insects.
An astonishing number of insects systematically crawled into the laboratory along the corners of the walls and through the ventilation ducts.
With Arthur's current intelligence, he would never know from which crack these tiny insects crawled into the heavily guarded underground laboratory.
It couldn't understand why these alien insects from AS192 were so obedient, and why they kept sacrificing their lives to serve as nourishment and food for that evil lump of flesh.
But while some things may not be understood, others are quite obvious.
Something extremely evil is happening in this laboratory.
Arthur's body trembled uncontrollably. He could feel a strong desire welling up within him—he wanted to rush toward the large, churning mass of flesh in his line of sight, he wanted to be a part of it...
It desperately wanted to convert its own body into nutrients to nourish the other, but...
But Arthur was unwilling to do so.
Because Lin Xi's last words to him were to let it escape.
Moreover, Lin Xi said that when he reappears, he will call for Arthur.
Arthur is not a nameless monster on this planet; he has a name… Lin Xi gave him a beautiful name.
Arthur kept repeating his name, then gritted his teeth and slowly crawled to the corner of the laboratory furthest from the lump of flesh.
In his final moments before his consciousness faded into chaos, Arthur found a thick, abandoned pipe and secured himself firmly to the base of a frozen culture dish at the edge of the laboratory.
It had to make sure that after losing consciousness, it wouldn't rush towards that fleshy mass like its kind.
Immediately, Arthur fainted completely due to the overwhelming mental strain.
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