Chapter 125 Extra Chapter 2: Exploring a New World 2 [Author's unrestrained creativity, proceed with caution]
The water plants had grown in a small patch, which the two of them plucked and put into their space capsules.
In order to adapt to the changes in the new world, the base specially established a Mutant Biology Research Center, which is independent of the research institute.
Jiang Zhi also received the title of deputy minister.
Therefore, whenever there is a species that Jiangzhi has never seen before, she will habitually collect some samples.
After collecting the items, the two continued walking forward.
After more than ten meters, within the area illuminated by the bubble lamp, their vision suddenly vanished.
—Below was a dark, deep cliff in the water.
The bottom of the pool where they were now stood suddenly broke off, forming a bottomless ravine with jagged rocks eroded by the water flow along its edges, dark and sinking deeper into the depths.
Looking up, they could see the shallow pool where they were, where the water still let in a bit of light.
Looking down, all that could be seen was an impenetrable darkness. Even the beams of light from mining searchlights seemed to be swallowed up, fading into nothingness after only a few meters.
The two stood on the edge of the cliff and looked at each other.
Jiang Zhi made a gesture—Go down?
Lin Yuan nodded.
As soon as the two stepped off the cliff, they felt the rushing water cascading down the cliff face.
Occasionally, a few loose rocks would break off from the cliff face, falling without making a sound, as if the bottom of the cliff was not water, but a void that could swallow up all sound, making one's neck tighten.
There are also many mutated creatures in the deep pool. The dashboard reported a series of mutated creature names and their related abilities.
"A mutant water cockroach has been discovered. It is an aquatic insect that feeds on feces."
"A batfish, an amphibian mutant, has been discovered that can disguise itself as a bird to hunt prey."
...
Most of them are ordinary, non-aggressive mutated creatures.
After capturing some usable specimens for research, Jiang Zhi continued to venture deeper into the pool.
Jiang Zhi threw away the bubble lamp in her hand and replaced it with a searchlight to shine into the depths.
Soon the two fell another ten meters or so.
Jiang Zhi's strange feeling grew stronger and stronger.
It's too quiet.
There wasn't even the faint sound of muddy water scurrying through the cracks in the rocks; there was only the muffled sound of water flowing past one's ears. Even the cliff face illuminated by the searchlight had an unnatural smoothness, as if it had been carefully polished by something.
She grabbed Lin Yuan's wrist.
Lin Yuan stopped tacitly.
The two men cautiously scanned the area with their searchlights, their eyes following the beams of light as they looked around.
As the beam of light swept across the distance ahead, it was suddenly "swallowed" by something.
Immediately afterwards, a soft white light suddenly spread out from the surrounding darkness.
It wasn't the cold, hard light of a searchlight, but a warm white with a pearly sheen, gradually illuminating one end of the cliff face and soon covering every inch of the rock wall within sight.
Jiang Zhixin tensed up. Before she could react, Lin Yuan instinctively stepped in front of her to protect her.
At this moment, a notification sounded on the dashboard: "Beep - Soft-bodied staring barnacle (giant form) detected. It prefers to parasitize amphibians and can provide energy to the parasites."
The indicator on the dashboard is green.
This proves that it is not aggressive.
Jiang Zhi subconsciously shone the searchlight towards the light, but her hand suddenly stopped when she saw two eyes the size of the toilet.
It turned out that the sudden light came from this giant soft barnacle.
Realizing this, when I looked around again, I immediately saw the entire barnacle.
—The deep pool and cliff, with a diameter of seven or eight hundred meters, were completely encircled by this giant, staring barnacle.
These barnacles did not have the calcareous outer shell they had imagined.
Instead, it spreads out in a thin and tough sheet around the broken arm, like a translucent jade membrane attached to the rock wall, with its edges fitting perfectly into the rock, making it difficult to see the boundary without careful observation.
What's most chilling is its eyes.
Inside the circular body that could hold more than a dozen humans, black, glass-like eyes stared straight at the center of the pool, emitting a soft white light.
Jiang Zhi looked closer and then discovered a four- or five-meter-long slit under its eye, which turned out to be its closed mouth.
It was still holding its own tail in its mouth, its head and tail overlapping, forming a closed loop around the deep ravine.
This scene is enough to trigger megalophobia in anyone who watches it.
But Jiang Zhi was very excited.
The barnacles are practically tailor-made for the air sac hydra!
If it could be allowed to parasitize the air sac hydra, it could not only attach itself stably but also provide nutrition, which would be an absolutely fantastic thing for the air sac hydra.
She turned to look at Lin Yuan, her excitement still lingering, and gave him only a glance.
Lin Yuan immediately understood and nodded almost imperceptibly, his fingertips already quietly pressing on the tool buckle at his waist.
Without needing to say more, a tacit interest shone in both of their eyes.
—We need to find a way to get rid of these barnacles.
The two moved closer.
With a flick of her wrist, Jiang Zhi used the retractable rope to tie up the barnacle.
But as soon as the rope touched that transparent body, something unexpected happened.
The giant barnacle that was originally right next to the cliff face suddenly shrank, shrinking to the size of a palm in an instant.
It's like a balloon that's suddenly pricked and deflates.
The shrunken, wide-eyed barnacle hung in front of the cliff, its two large eyes still radiating a glassy light.
It stared at the two of them with its round, dark eyes, and had lost all of its previous frightening appearance, instead looking like a soft, squishy toy.
It looks so cute.
The two looked at each other in bewilderment.
Lin Yuan's supernatural power was already ready to be unleashed, and seeing the barnacle shrunk into this state, he found it both amusing and exasperating.
Jiangzhi was also amused.
The fact that this glaring barnacle shrank saved a lot of trouble in bringing it back. Otherwise, given its previous enormous size, it would have easily become a sitting duck if it bumped into anything on the way.
She took out the bio-bag.
That was developed by Professor Shen specifically for storing mutated plant specimens. It's filled with oxygen, allowing the mutated organisms to survive for a short period of time inside.
Unfortunately, it is currently only one square meter in size, and the storage time is not very long.
After Jiang Zhi put the glaring barnacle inside, she nodded to Lin Yuan.
The two continued to fall deeper into the ocean.
In just a short while, it had already fallen more than two hundred meters.
The scene in their field of vision gradually became strange—many mutated creatures swimming around them had an abnormally flat body shape, as if they had been crushed by an invisible force field.
Even at this depth, the water beneath our feet remained bottomless, a deep, dark expanse with no discernible bottom.
I have no idea how deep this deep pool is.
Just as Jiang Zhi was hesitating about whether to continue exploring downwards, the dashboard suddenly flashed a bright red light.
"Warning! Warning! Phantom jellyfish swarm detected. They can transform into any species and mimic its habits. Please leave immediately! Please leave immediately!"
Jiang Zhi's heart skipped a beat. Without the slightest hesitation, she grabbed Lin Yuan's hand and swam upwards.
Lin Yuan also instantly sensed something was wrong and tacitly activated his gravity ability to the maximum.
The next second, the two seemed to break free from all the stagnation at the bottom of the water. Their bodies became light, like two feathers supported by the airflow, and they floated up to the surface of the water with a "whoosh".
However, it was too late.
Countless tiny halos of light had already spread out around them.
It wasn't the kind of brightness that comes from sunlight shining through the water; it was more like phosphorescent lights clustered together, slowly drifting upwards.
Those things were suspended around them, their outlines resembling jellyfish.
The translucent canopy has long, thin tendrils hanging from its edges, adorned with tiny fluorescent dots. They sway gently with the current, causing the canopy to tremble slightly, as if someone has opened a huge, breathing night lamp underwater.
The two reacted very quickly.
But the next moment, the same halo appeared in Jiang Zhi's peripheral vision.
One, two... In the blink of an eye, several more floated over, each as tall as an adult. Their canopies touched, their tentacles intertwined, turning a small patch of water into a hazy blue-green, and even making the underwater light flicker.
Before Jiang Zhi could react, something even stranger happened.
The bell-shaped caps of those jellyfish began to twist and change, and in a short while, they transformed into the likenesses of her and Lin Yuan.
Immediately afterwards, "they" also imitated the two of them, waving their limbs as they floated upwards, their movements slow but precise, like a mirror reflecting their images.
Jiang Zhi's heart tightened, and she subconsciously raised her hand to grasp the weapon at her waist. Just as she was about to thrust forward, the "Jiang Zhi" opposite her also raised her hand at the same time, making the exact same gesture of gripping the weapon, even the curvature of her fingers was exactly the same.
Lin Yuan's expression changed drastically, and he shouted urgently in a deep voice, "A-Zhi, use the teleportation device!!"
As soon as he finished speaking, the jellyfish next to him, which had transformed into the appearance of Lin Yuan, also moved its "mouth" and clearly made the same sound.
"—A-Zhi, use the teleportation device!!"
His tone of voice, manner of speaking, and even the hint of urgency were exactly the same as the real Lin Yuan.
Both of them felt a chill run down their spines at the same time, and almost simultaneously raised their hands, pressing their fingertips heavily on the button of the teleportation device.
In the instant the white light flashed, Jiang Zhi reacted swiftly, reaching out to the side and precisely catching a phantom jellyfish that was still mimicking her movements.
Before the jellyfish could react, the teleportation aura enveloped the two of them, along with the captured jellyfish, and they vanished instantly into the eerie waters.
Before the dizziness from the teleportation had subsided, the two landed steadily on a damp patch of land. Looking up, they saw enormous ferns that blotted out the sky, their broad, long leaves layered upon each other like a green dome, with sunlight filtering through the gaps in the leaves and casting dappled patterns of light.
"Chirp—!"
A clear chirping sound rang out, and the chirping figure darted out from the fern thicket like an arrow.
Jiangzhi had already contacted Qiuqiu when she was preparing to escape.
Upon seeing the two appear, it immediately swooped down from the surrounding area, its sharp claws firmly hooking onto their shoulders. With a flap of its wings, it carried them straight into the sky, so fast that it instantly left the ferns on the ground far behind.
The phantom jellyfish that Jiang Zhi was holding in her hand hadn't been still since it landed after being teleported.
He kept imitating Jiang Zhi's every move.
Jiangzhi raised her hand and wiped her face, and it shook its arm, which was the same as Jiangzhi's, and followed suit by wiping its face.
When Jiangzhi was pulled along by Qiujiu, she subconsciously frowned. On its blurry "face," a similar expression seemed to appear on its face.
In just a short while, it became more and more adept at imitating, even perfectly mimicking Jiang Zhi's habit of tilting her head slightly when speaking and the little gesture of unconsciously rubbing her cuffs with her fingertips.
If it weren't for the hazy blue-green light emanating from its entire body, its movements and expressions would have made it look seven or eight parts like Jiang Zhi herself, almost indistinguishable from her.
Finally, the jellyfish gradually began to resemble a ginger branch.
Jiang Zhi frowned.
This thing is too weird.
She tried to activate her supernatural power, and a faint golden light shone on her knuckles.
Almost at the same time, the jellyfish Zhou's hand also emitted the same halo, although the color was slightly lighter and the momentum was much weaker, it was indeed a superpower of the same type.
Clearly, it can not only mimic actions and expressions, but it can also imitate supernatural abilities. However, its power seems to be only at the level it should be at, far inferior to Jiang Zhi herself.
Jiang Zhi's heart sank; this ability to imitate was simply impossible to guard against.
If even superpowers can be learned in the same way, then... can even more fundamental survival methods, and even reproduction, be imitated?
Lin Yuan, standing to the side, also frowned, his gaze fixed on the jellyfish that was still cautiously following him, his voice deep and tense: "This thing... is too dangerous."
The two exchanged a glance, both seeing a chill in each other's eyes.
If such things were allowed to infiltrate the human world, they would learn to speak and act like humans, and even imitate specific people—at that point, it would be impossible to tell who is real and who is fake.
What's even more chilling is that if they can truly mimic humans perfectly, they could even reproduce in the same way as humans...
Then... who will be the real human being?
If these things reproduced with humans... what would be produced?
Jiang Zhi felt a tightness in her throat and dared not think any further.
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