Chapter 76: One Ring After Another
Tiny fireflies flew in from afar, one after another, more and more, like a mighty river flashing in the pitch-black night sky.
The bright light flickered, and the surroundings were no longer chaotic and dark.
Jiang He retracted his fist and stared blankly at the giant tree in front of him.
She could see clearly that there was a huge and sturdy tree standing in front of her. Its roots were so huge and twisted that she couldn't see the top. Under her feet were winding roots that stretched to the horizon.
The fireflies were also attracted by the branches of the trees and circled around the leaves.
Jiang He saw a brown bear.
His body was a thick tree trunk, his legs were roots rooted in the dark ground, and his hair was a dense tree branch.
His face was on the tree trunk, merged with it, and the outline of a human head was gone, only the facial features remained.
A long branch bent down from the tree, approached Jiang He, and awkwardly placed a rainbow hat on her head.
Jiang He then realized that she had been hitting the brown bear's torso with her fists.
The Devil's Eye Fantasy Sky Vine was ugly and ferocious, but even though the brown bear was merged with the Devil's Eye Fantasy Sky Vine, it did not turn into the ugly appearance of the Devil's Eye Fantasy Sky Vine. The giant tree in front of her seemed to be standing tall and supporting a shimmering dream space for her at the bottom of the abyss.
She grabbed the branch that the brown bear was trying to retract and held on tightly, "Brother Bear."
Her voice was hoarse, trying to suppress her grief. "Did I hurt you just now? I'm sorry, I didn't know it was you."
The brown bear's eyes were looking at Jiang He. He had already lost the ability to control his body and was immersed in the illusion set up for him by the Magic Eye Fantasy Sky Vine, forgetting everything outside.
But Jiang He found him.
She came here and went through countless dangers. He told her not to come here, but she still came.
The Evil Eye Fantasy Sky Vine was annoyed that Jiang He was always resisting, so he threw Jiang He into his illusion. Perhaps he felt that this illusion was more real, and wanted to completely imprison his last bit of resistance.
In the eyes of the Demon Eye Huantian Teng, using Jiang He to imprison him is simply the perfect way.
After all, this is the woman he has been thinking about and can't let go of. With this woman, he is fulfilling his wish.
But the Evil Eye Fantasy Sky Vine does not understand human nature.
He could indulge in a false fantasy, but he could not indulge in a fantasy with her.
He liked her, but didn't want to drag her into the darkness.
Jiang He's stimulation not only failed to completely sink his consciousness into the illusion, but instead allowed him to shatter the illusion and break out of the shackles of the Magic Eye Fantasy Vine that imprisoned him.
At this moment, the Demon Eye Fantasy Sky Vine was roaring and cursing wildly in the two people's consciousness space.
"I've already gotten her to be with you. I've done everything I can for you. What's wrong with you marrying her and having kids? Are you crazy? Are you mentally ill? Are you still a man?"
"I just don't understand how you can break through my illusion!"
"You coward, you don't even dare to mate with her, you are not human."
"You idiot, such a good opportunity! You can't even do it, I'm so pissed off."
…
No matter how the Demon Eye Fantasy Sky Vine roared, the brown bear ignored it.
His eyes were fixed on Jiang He.
Compared to the close contact in the illusion, the distance between the two at this moment is actually quite far.
"Xiao He," he said, "I'm not hurt."
His voice was different from before. It was like the rustling of old trees, harsh and vague, almost not a human voice, and it was difficult to hear what he was saying.
Perhaps he felt that the voice was too unpleasant, and after he finished speaking, he fell silent again.
Jiang He had prepared herself mentally before coming here. She had made plans for the worst, but when she saw the brown bear in this state, she was still extremely sad.
A branch touched Jiang He's head and rubbed it, as if silently comforting her.
Another branch took her hand.
The next moment, Jiang He's eyes blurred and he entered the illusion again.
The night sky was full of twinkling stars, and the sand dunes stretched out endlessly. Jiang He sat on a high cliff, as if he was in the starry night sky and became one of the stars.
Next to her sat a brown bear.
Brown Bear said to Jiang He, "You have to leave as soon as possible. The five-yearly release round will be coming up soon. If you have enough points, you can take part in the trial and find a way to leave the training camp."
In the illusion, his voice was normal and he looked normal.
But perhaps he was only thinking about what happened in the illusion before, and the brown bear didn't dare to look directly at the people around him.
Jiang He: "You come with me."
The brown bear shook his head, his eyes longingly gazing at the starry sky that was within reach: "I can't leave."
"You are no weaker than the Devil Eye Illusionary Sky Vine." Jiang He looked at him and said firmly, "You were not bewitched and suppressed by it at the beginning. You can definitely defeat it now."
The brown bear shook his head. He knew that his behavior would disappoint the little girl, but he still said, "I can't do it. After being parasitized by the aberration, I will slowly lose myself and I will be devoured by it soon."
"You're fighting so hard to survive, why should you be devoured by it?" Jiang He stared at him, his stubborn eyes burning like fire, brighter than the stars in the night sky. "You can even break the illusion it carefully set for you. You can bring me out of its clutches, Brother Xiong. You are more powerful than you think."
"Okay, I'll try again." Perhaps infected by the little girl, his chest swelled as if a fire was burning.
In his sea of consciousness, the Evil Eye Fantasy Sky Vine was laughing strangely, mocking him for his foolish dreams.
Mocking him for not even daring to mate.
And threatened to replace him and take away his mating rights.
The brown bear's chest swelled up more and more. He looked at the little girl beside him. In her eyes, he looked very powerful.
He didn't want to disappoint her.
"That's great." Jiang He smiled, "Brother Xiong, you are definitely more powerful than the Magic Eye Fantasy Sky Vine."
The Demon Eye Fantasy Sky Vine couldn't stand hearing such words. He gritted his teeth in anger, and the illusion in front of him suddenly became shaky.
"You need to leave the training camp first." Brown Bear knew that time was running out, so he quickly said to her, "This isn't a long-term solution. I'm safe in the abyss. It will take a long time to devour the Magic Eye Illusion Vine. You need to leave the training camp first. I'll find you outside once I'm gone."
Jiang He didn't understand why Brown Bear was so anxious for her to leave the training camp. "Brother Xiong, you said before that the training camp was great and you wanted to stay here forever."
The illusion became more and more turbulent, and the stars in the sky were falling one by one. The brown bear realized that the Magic Eye Fantasy Sky Vine was changing the illusion.
The Magic Eye Illusionary Sky Vine was most adept at using human desires to create illusions. Brown Bear was afraid that the next moment the illusion would turn into him and Jiang He doing that thing again, so he quickly said to Jiang He, "I just found out a while ago that being too powerful in the training camp won't last long. Xiao He, your ability must have been noticed by those people. You need to leave the training camp immediately. Don't worry, I'm a man of my words. I will definitely leave the Abyss and find you outside the training camp..."
Seeing the sky around him begin to collapse, the brown bear grabbed Jiang He's hand and jumped off the cliff.
Jiang He opened her eyes again and was still at the bottom of the abyss. Fireflies were flickering around the branches of a big tree. The face of a brown bear was integrated with the trunk, and its eyes were looking at her.
She didn't know if it was her illusion, but she always felt that the brown bear's facial features were not as three-dimensional as before, as if part of them had been swallowed by the bark.
"Brother Xiong." Jiang He calmed himself down and said to him, "I'll sit here and wait for you to transform back into human form."
"He doesn't look like your bear brother." The warden sighed and walked slowly from the darkness.
She was still playing with the colorful flame bug in her hand, but Zhang Yue and Major Jiang, who had always been inseparable from her, were not following her.
"He's no longer human, but he's quite impressive to have been able to fuse the ugly and disgusting Devil Eye Illusion Vine into this form."
The warden stepped forward and looked at the brown bear tree. He sighed and said regretfully, "What a pity! We failed again."
Jiang He turned his head and stared at the warden, "What failure?"
The warden glanced at her and said with a smile, "Knowing too much can easily lead to death. If you want to survive well in the training camp, ask fewer questions."
Seeing Jiang He clenched his fists, she raised her eyebrows and said, "Oh, you can also ask your brother Xiong and see if he can answer you in his current state."
The warden walked along, and although she looked a little disheveled and her makeup had fallen off, her eyebrows and eyes were sharp and beautiful, and she still had an aura of being superior and looking down on ants.
Jiang He did not follow the warden's advice.
Although she liked the warden's appearance, it didn't mean she liked him as a person.
She rushed over and jumped up, pinching the colorful flame bug that the warden immediately threw at her.
Countless tiny and dense corpse worms emerged from the body of the colorful flame insect. The brown bear shook off a few leaves, wrapped up the colorful flame insects and swallowed them.
There were more than just colorful flame insects on the prisoner's body, but every time he threw those little things at Jiang He, it was like feeding the brown bear in disguise.
Seeing that Jiang He's fist was about to hit her face, she had seen Jiang He's strength and was afraid that this punch would break her nose.
She pursed her lips and suddenly pulled out a bone whip from her palm and wrapped it around Jiang He's fist.
Jiang He was a little surprised. The warden's act of whipping out the bone reminded her of Captain Xiao who had pulled out a big knife from his back in the park.
Do all the people in power in these prisons have weapons that are integrated into their bodies?
She raised her foot and kicked the warden in the stomach, using the force of the other party's bone whip to throw the warden into the air.
Jiang He is a prisoner in the training camp. He fights with deformed beasts all day long. It is no exaggeration to say that he has narrowly escaped death.
On the other hand, the warden lived a life of luxury and tortured prisoners the most. Although she was still at level five after having her head chopped off and her body had been transformed time and time again, she could always take out various weapons from her body to deal with Jiang He. However, facing Jiang He's fierce and punch-to-the-flesh attack, the warden soon couldn't bear it.
"Stop beating me," the warden said angrily. "Whatever you want to know, I'll tell you."
Jiang He then stopped.
The warden sat on the ground. Although he was covered in blood, his eyes were still sharp. He sneered at Jiang He, "You've gone crazy for a man. You've really got something."
Jiang He had a blank expression on her face. No matter whether she had just beaten up the warden or at this moment, she looked extremely calm.
This excessive calmness left the warden speechless. "I hate people who act cool and aloof the most."
I'm already annoyed by Xiao Sen, and now another one appears.
Jiang He: "What's wrong, Brother Xiong?"
Her voice was cold and indifferent, as if she wanted to kill the other party if he didn't talk to her nicely.
Jiang He didn't think it was surprising that the warden could run to such a place.
She was almost certain that the warden and his men were also here for the brown bear.
Thinking of the information that Ying Gou had revealed to her before, Jiang He felt like a dark hole had opened up in her heart.
"You know better than me what's wrong with him," the warden said angrily. "The Devil Eye Illusionary Sky Vine is parasitic on him. Don't tell me you don't know."
Jiang He stared at her coldly, obviously dissatisfied with the answer, and clenched her fists again.
The warden was very tactful. Seeing her expression, he quickly said, "I'm just curious..."
Jiang He was in a bad mood and didn't want to waste time talking to her, so he interrupted her: "What's going on with the experiments on the first and second floors underground?"
The warden's expression changed slightly, probably because he didn't expect Jiang He to know about the laboratory.
She glanced at the brown bear suspiciously, feeling that the brown bear had no ability to say anything to Jiang He in his current precarious situation.
"Xiao Sen told you?" The warden sneered, his expression extremely disdainful. "You are quite good at bewitching men. One by one, they are obsessed with you."
Jiang He looked up at Brown Bear and said, "Brother Bear, hang her up. Do you have any other way to torture her? Be a little more ruthless..."
A branch rushed down and entangled the warden's legs.
"Wait, let me tell you..." The warden's legs had been entangled in the branches and were hanging up. He shouted at Jiang He angrily, "Let me down."
As soon as the words fell, the warden saw another branch about to pierce her body, and hurriedly said to the indifferent Jiang He, "Hurry up and tell your brother Xiong to stop. I will tell you everything you want to know about the lab."
Jiang He signaled the brown bear to stop, then looked at the warden.
"Any prisoner like Brown Bear who's been parasitized by aberrations will be sent to the lab for record keeping," the warden said. "Brown Bear ran too fast, and he had an insider, so we couldn't capture him and bring him into the lab. Those who tried to capture him also failed, so I, the warden, had to take action myself."
Jiang He: "Parasitic?"
The warden said, "All the aberrations want to evolve into humans. They like to take shortcuts, which is to parasitize humans. Most of the parasitic prisoners will lose their self-awareness, and their transformation into monsters will be accelerated."
This situation is called parasitic failure.
There are some successful parasites, but most of the successful examples of parasitism are when the deformed creatures take control of human consciousness.
This is a result that humans do not want to see.
Humans would rather control consciousness after being parasitized by mutants.
"If one can fuse with aberrations and still maintain self-awareness, it's a new form of human evolution," the warden said logically, then sighed, "I've always had high hopes for Brown Bear, believing he'd be the first to break new ground."
Jiang He: "Are all the prisoners in the training camp your experimental subjects?"
The warden shook his head with a look of disgust. "Of course not. They're too weak for the aberrations to look down on. Only people like Brown Bear, who have been parasitized by the aberrations, are capable of that."
Jiang He suddenly understood why Brown Bear had just called her to leave the training camp in the illusion, and why he said that powerful prisoners would not live long in the training camp.
Because these prisoners will eventually become people parasitized by deformed creatures.
Brown bears are parasitized during missions, but more likely they are parasitized artificially in laboratories.
Jiang He: "How can I make him return to normal?"
"How is that possible?" The warden, hanging upside down, looked extremely impatient, but she was afraid that the branches so close would pierce her head. She glanced at the brown bear and said patiently, "It's a miracle that he can still maintain consciousness. It won't be long before the consciousness of the Demon Eye Illusion Vine is completely replaced."
She was afraid that Jiang He would not be satisfied with this answer, so she continued, "You have to understand that I want him to become normal more than you do. I came here at great risk just to see if there is any way to save him."
She said Jiang He's letter at the beginning, but the last sentence was clearly nonsense. However, Jiang He didn't care.
Jiang He asked her, "Why haven't there been any successful escapes from prisoners in A62?"
Lan Hu was already driving the flying ship to break out of the A62 planet, but he still lost consciousness the moment he came into contact with the atmosphere.
Lan Hu didn't understand why he woke up in the ruins, and Jiang He was equally confused.
The warden laughed when he heard this. "A62 is the most heavily guarded prison. Not even a fly can get out, let alone prisoners."
Jiang He stared at her, "Do you want to live?"
The warden was speechless and said, "If I didn't want to live, I wouldn't be telling you so much with all my heart."
Jiang He: "Tell me how to leave, and I'll let you live. Otherwise, you can only die here."
The warden sighed, "I really can't do anything. Even if you kill me, you won't be able to find a solution."
Jiang He looked indifferent: "Then go to hell."
As soon as she finished speaking, all the branches stabbed at the warden's face.
"Wait, wait, wait..." The warden was furious. He never expected that this woman was so cruel that she actually dared to kill her.
But she also knew very well that these heinous criminals had killed people like crazy and were capable of killing her.
"Although you can't leave A62, I can find a way to get you out of the training camp."
The branch that had already pierced her flesh stopped at Jiang He's gesture.
Jiang He leaned forward slightly, pinched the warden's chin expressionlessly, and asked, "How do you leave?"
"I, I, I, I'll arrange for you to become the best of the five-year program, so you can leave the training camp with honors. You..."
"You misunderstood." Jiang He said slowly, "I'm not the only one leaving."
Warden: "It's beyond my power to assign you one, and I can't do anything about the others."
She glanced at the brown bear and said curiously, "Your bear brothers are all here, who else do you want to be with? Don't tell me you have many boyfriends."
Jiang He ignored her teasing and said, "There's more than just me. I don't know exactly how many there are."
The warden was so angry when he saw how shameless she was that he glared at her, but she remained cold and unmoved.
She closed her eyes angrily, "You might as well kill me."
From afar came the high and low roars of beasts.
Jiang He looked up at the source of the sound.
The warden immediately opened his eyes and said to Jiang He, "If you want to live, let me go."
Jiang He: "No."
The warden glared at her angrily: "You're willing to give up your life for a stinky man. Are you possessed by a ghost?"
The next moment, a lot of leaves were stuffed into her mouth, and she couldn't make any sound.
Jiang He was originally worried, but when he saw her like this, he suddenly laughed and turned to Brown Bear and said, "That's a great idea."
But when he turned his head and looked at the warden, his expression became even colder.
The brown bear's facial features on the tree trunk became increasingly blurred. This time she was certain that the brown bear's facial features were being swallowed up by the bark bit by bit.
Will it be completely swallowed?
What will happen in the end?
She didn't even dare to think about it.
The fireflies hovering in the sky seemed to be frightened by something and scurried around in panic.
The warden, whose mouth was blocked, looked terrified and struggled, making noises to get Jiang He to let her go.
Jiang He ignored the warden and turned her head to stare at the dark place in the distance.
In the darkness, the eyes of the deformed beasts reflected a cold light under the dim light of fireflies.
They huddled densely in the darkness, like predators waiting for their opportunity.
Jiang He is their prey.
The warden struggled to squeeze the leaves out of his mouth and said to Jiang He with a gloating look, "After midnight, this place is dominated by aberrations. You're a great tonic for them. Only I can take you away. Let me down now."
Jiang He turned around and asked Brown Bear, "Brother Bear, can your tree produce poisonous fruit? She's full of lies, I don't really believe her."
One of the brown bear's branches dripped a lot of green juice into the warden's mouth.
Not until the juice slipped into the warden's mouth did the brown bear's branches release the warden's feet.
The warden fell heavily to the ground.
She stood up and glared at Jiang He, gnashing her teeth. She saw the deformed beasts getting closer and closer, and the surroundings seemed to be swallowed by circles of darkness.
"Come with me."
Jiang He turned to the brown bear and said, "I'll come back to see you soon."
The warden sneered.
Jiang He had a bad feeling. She asked, "What are you laughing at?"
The warden was still running forward quickly, and she didn't even ask Jiang He what the brown bear had fed her.
Obviously, she was more afraid of the deformed beasts behind her than the so-called poison.
"The aberrant beasts in the abyss are at least level seven," the warden said coldly, "you'd better pray that you don't become their food."
Jiang He: "The Deformations above level seven are very close to transformation. Have any of them transformed into humans?"
The warden couldn't understand why Jiang He was still concerned about such messy issues at this time.
But it was a good question, because only she could answer this kind of question, "Because they are castrated, they can't transform."
The warden rushed into the darkness filled with deformed beasts. The deformed beasts ignored her, their eyes fixed on Jiang He. The warden turned around and shouted at Jiang He triumphantly, "Do you really think I'll take you away? Hahaha, go to hell, you idiot."
Jiang He stared at her coldly: "I don't know whether I will live or not, but you have been fed poison by Brother Xiong, so don't even think about living."
The warden: "Look back, your brother Bear is already in trouble."
She laughed triumphantly, "My body won't be harmed by the poison of the aberrations at all. Boy, I want to see today what kind of beast will parasitize you, a woman."
Jiang He looked back and saw that the deformed beast in the darkness had already rushed towards the trunk of the brown bear and was biting the tree madly.
She stared at the warden's smug and superior expression.
Deformed beasts can transform into humans at level eight, but the deformed beasts at the bottom of the abyss have no chance to transform.
The warden said the aberrations were castrated.
The castrated deformed beasts cannot transform into humans on their own and can only choose to parasitize humans, using this "shortcut" to become humans.
The prisoners in the training camp completed tasks one after another. Those with weak abilities dug for gold, while those with strong abilities went to the bottom of the mine to hunt mutants. They gradually became stronger or died in repeated battles with the mutants.
The higher the crystal core of the aberration you hunt, the greater the reward you will get.
The reward attracted countless powerful prisoners to hunt for aberrations deep in the mine.
The prisoners think they are hunters, but in reality, they are the prey.
The training camp deliberately made them stronger and then "threw" them into the bait of the mutants.
Darkness gradually enveloped Jiang He. All the fireflies died and the last beam of light disappeared. At the same time, countless deformed creatures pounced towards Jiang He.
Even as the dense swarm of deformed creatures rushed towards her, she still stared coldly at the warden.
Pink tentacles quickly pounced out from her hands, their mouths wide open, and the densely packed teeth were sharp and white.
When the warden saw the tentacles emerging from Jiang He's hands, his face changed drastically.
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