Volume 12: Yaguna Kotor Chapter 573 Liquid Gate
The further he went in, the more uneasy Ke Lan felt.
Neatly arranged crystal jars, increasing serial numbers, rusty metal wires... everything in his field of vision constantly reminded him of the special nature of this cave... Perhaps tens of thousands of years ago, for the Alpha civilization, the importance of this place was no less than that deserted island that could only be reached by "falling" deep into the seabed.
But compared to that deserted island, this place... seems a little too easy to get into.
Could it be that the mechanism originally set up outside this relic has been destroyed by the heretical sect?
A complete laboratory of Alpha civilization. For the prophet who can read Alpha language, it is not difficult to transform it into the combat power of the heretic sect... Ke Lan suddenly understood why the prophet brought Dr. Renee to this place - he was not forced to flee here to escape the pursuit of Fleet Zero. This relic was originally the prophet's destination!
Dr. Renee's research results, her own cell cloning organization, and the mysterious laboratory left over from the Alpha civilization, these three elements added together, it was no longer surprising to Ke Lan what the Prophet could come up with.
The Prophet must be stopped...
Just when Ke Lan counted to the seventy-eighth crystal jar, the jar was finally not empty!
This jar numbered seventy-eight contains a person!
The man was tightly wrapped in a sticky substance all over his body. He looked like a cocoon, or a mummy that had been eroded by mold and not properly preserved. As for the things wrapped around his body, they were somewhat similar to melted chewing gum.
Before Ke Lan got close to the jar, the man began to struggle violently. Ke Lan seemed to hear vaguely the dull cry for help coming from his throat.
"Save me...save me...save..."
But the more he struggled, the tighter the "chewing gum" wrapped around him became, and the sticky fluid even poured into his mouth, blocking his throat.
His struggle gradually weakened. Although the sticky substances were fluid, their toughness after stretching was no less than that of steel wire. The slimy threads even cut his skin directly and squeezed into his flesh. The blood flowed along the surface of the human-shaped cocoon, but before it reached the bottom of the jar, it was absorbed by the slime.
The body that had been motionless began to move again, but Ke Lan could see that it was not the person inside that was moving, but the things attached to his body.
When all the mucus fell off, the flesh and organs on the person's body had disappeared, leaving only a blackened skeleton.
"Black skeleton..."
Just as Ke Lan expected, the black skeleton that had just been "born" just moved its joints slightly, then quickly crawled out of the crystallization jar and pounced on Ke Lan.
Apart from its fast speed, the black skeleton itself is not very strong - Ke Lan only found out later that the black-robed bishop in the East Ninth District turned into a black skeleton after activating the Holy Word not because he did not want to exchange for more power, but with his meager vitality, he could only achieve this level as a sacrifice.
If it were someone stronger, such as a strengthened human like Park Sang-woo, Ke Lan and his team would probably have to pay a heavy price if they wanted to pass through that block.
The distance of more than ten meters between the black skeleton and Ke Lan was wiped out in the blink of an eye, and the slender black bone claws stabbed fiercely at both sides of Ke Lan's neck - its target was Ke Lan's heart. According to the falling trajectory of the bone claws, they would penetrate into Ke Lan's chest after piercing his neck, and then cross at the position of his heart.
Just a slight stir is enough to tear this organ, which is second only to the brain, into pieces.
But a pair of hands wrapped in blood-red armor tightly grasped the black bone claw, preventing it from falling any further. As Ke Lan clenched his fists, a few crisp "cracks" were heard, and the black bone claw was actually broken by Ke Lan.
The black skeleton's biggest advantage is "speed". In front of Ke Lan, who has the ability to stop time, it is just like slow motion. Ke Lan can even analyze its attack movements by pausing each frame and prepare for it in advance.
After breaking all ten bone claws, Ke Lan directly put his hands through the ribs of the black skeleton and grabbed its spine.
The black skeleton without claws attacked Ke Lan frantically with its arms and legs, but those sharp bones could not leave any marks on Ke Lan's active armor - even if a tiny scratch appeared, it would disappear without a trace in the blink of an eye.
Ke Lan felt that even if he stood there and let the black skeleton attack him, it would not be able to do anything to him.
Whether in terms of power, speed or physical strength, the active armor completely crushed the black skeleton. Ke Lan didn't even have to spend any effort to break the skeleton into pieces.
However, looking at the black bone fragments scattered on the ground, Ke Lan didn't feel relieved at all.
This person... is most likely one of the exiles who disappeared outside. If that's the case, he will definitely encounter more and stronger monsters on the rest of his journey.
The laboratory of the Alpha civilization has been restarted by the prophet, and the exiles left outside the ruins are ostensibly the guards of this stronghold, but in fact they are used as "meat animals" for experimental materials...
Ke Lan continued to walk inside.
The frequency of "something" in the jars embedded in the rock walls on both sides began to increase, but not every experimental subject in the jar could be successfully transformed into a monster. The vast majority of the "meat livestock" turned into corpses, and the parasites on them died along with them.
The success rate of human experiments like this is not high. Even the Seed of Corrosion has very high requirements for the "container". Ke Lan encountered a total of 20 jars filled with things along the way, but the things in the jars were able to run out and attack him only four times, including the first black skeleton.
At the end of this passage is a tightly closed white door.
The material of the gate looks neither like metal nor rock, but rather a bit like a polymer - although this word sounds very high-sounding, in fact, to put it simply, it can be described in two words - "plastic".
"A plastic door?" Although Ke Lan couldn't explain the reason, he always felt that it was extremely incongruous to have such a plastic door in the deepest part of the cave.
He has explored quite a few Alpha ruins, and has explored even more ruins through the Internet and various pictures, videos and text materials. He has seen many magnificent stone doors, metal doors and even crystal doors, but he has never seen a door made of "plastic".
Not only doors, but even the relics of the Alpha civilization excavated from the ruins are rarely made of plastic.
The main reason for this is that plastic is a material that will age and degrade on its own. Its durability is far inferior to that of stone and metal. Even if some ruins once had doors made of plastic, after such a long time, it would have turned into dust long ago.
In the old era on Earth, the "white pollution" caused by the difficulty of degrading plastic was once one of the most serious environmental problems in the 21st century. However, even the most difficult to degrade plastic will return to dust in a few hundred years - and these relics of the Alpha civilization have existed for more than ten thousand years.
"Could this door have been added by the heretic sect?" Ke Lan's mind was full of doubts - even if the heretic sect wanted to install a door here, plastic is definitely not the best choice... It can even be said to be one of the worst choices.
Moreover, this door was a whole piece, with no traces of splicing. If you wanted to make it, you would need a huge mold and extremely advanced injection molding technology. For Ark, it was not difficult to make such a door, but for the heretics in the wilderness, solving the problem of survival was the most important issue. How could they waste precious resources on such things?
According to the exiles' style, the best solution is the one that is economical, reliable, simple and easy to implement. Even if a door is welded out of discarded steel pipes and iron sheets, it is much better than this flashy plastic door.
"There must be something wrong when things are abnormal." With this thought in mind, Ke Lan did not push the door immediately, but approached and observed carefully.
It would have been fine if I hadn't observed it, but once I did, I discovered something incredible.
This "plastic door" is not in a static state, but in liquid state!
Because the entire door is pure white, many details are not obvious at first glance. Only when you look closely up close can you see the traces of the flowing white liquid.
There is an invisible force field that confines the liquid, forming the shape of a door - this may be a deadly trap... Ke Lan is not sure whether he will become part of the "door" if he crashes into this liquid door.
He turned back, picked up some fragments of the black skeleton's wreckage, and returned to the front of the liquid gate again.
He carefully picked up a piece of black bone and inserted it into the door.
"Huh?"
Ke Lan did not feel the position that imprisoned the white liquid. The bone fragment penetrated almost unhindered and "inserted" into the door.
Where the bone fragment touched the "door," ripples did appear, indicating the disturbed fluid - these ripples were like the ripples that appear on the edge of your palm when you put your hand into flowing water.
But the problem is, if you put your hand into flowing water, you can clearly feel the thrust from the direction of the water flow. However, although the bone fragment in Ke Lan's hand has interfered with the white liquid, he did not feel any force.
"This door... is so strange..." Ke Lan muttered to himself. He suddenly decided to make an attempt - a somewhat exaggerated attempt.
He returned to the passage again, but this time, he used violent means to remove an entire empty crystal jar from the rock wall.
Then, he walked back to the white gate and pushed the crystal jar on his shoulder into the white gate like a battering ram.
The flowing white liquid was suddenly separated by the huge cylinder, but the next second, they had penetrated the wall of the crystallization jar and filled the inside of the jar. When Ke Lan pulled the jar out, the liquid in the jar seeped back in and did not remain inside the jar.
Ke Lan suddenly felt a cold sweat on his back.
This white door may not seem dangerous, but it is actually deadly to living things.
These liquids seem to be able to penetrate the surface of any material - if it was Ke Lan who drilled through the door, then all the cavities in his body would be filled with these unknown white liquids, including the brain, heart, internal organs and blood vessels throughout the body, and the gaps and holes between muscles and bones, without exception.
This level of foreign invasion is enough to kill most of the creatures on this planet.
"I just don't know if the active armor can resist these white liquids..."
Ke Lan gritted her teeth, stretched out a finger and inserted it.
A cool feeling came from his fingertips. This feeling was not painful, and it was even a little comfortable... But after just a few seconds, Ke Lan's expression changed drastically: he could no longer feel his fingertips!
He immediately retracted his finger and removed the active armor on his fingertips. Only then did he realize that the part of his finger that had been inserted into the door had completely died... The tissue had died so quickly that the nerves didn't have time to transmit the pain back to the nerve center...
There was only a slight tingling sensation in the middle of the fingers, and there was no feeling at all further forward.
Ke Lan had no choice but to grit his teeth and cut off the necrotic finger - to be on the safe side, he cut it off completely at the root. In the instant before the blood spurted out, the flowing active armor sealed the wound, and a finger made entirely of solidified blood appeared at the location of the severed finger.
Before new fingers grow out, active armor can only be used as a substitute.
He did not throw away the severed finger, but carefully put it away - the Seraph incident made Ke Lan realize a very troublesome problem: although he did not think of himself as a monster, in fact, his cells could be used as material for biological weapons.
Whether he likes it or not, he has to acknowledge this reality.
Putting aside the question of whether he is a monster or not, the strange door in front of him is the first problem that Ke Lan has to solve.
Extra Chapter: New Year's Eve
New Era, 951, New Year's Eve.
It is chilly in spring. Even on this planet which is countless light years away from my hometown, the Lunar New Year arrives in the cold.
Ke Lan sat on the edge of the observation deck and couldn't help but wrap his coat tightly around himself.
This is one of the highest observation decks in the Ark. Although there is a transparent thermal insulation cover outside the deck, the temperature on the deck is still enough to make people feel the chill deep into their bones.
Ke Lan was the only one on the observation deck - no one would set off fireworks in the wilderness of Alpha, and no one would climb to an observation deck over 10,000 meters above sea level on New Year's Eve to watch the sunset that could not be seen by the naked eye.
The sun of Alpha Star hid behind the thick lead-gray radiation cloud, and only a circle of fuzzy halo could be vaguely seen. As the halo gradually sank below the horizon, dusk surged from the sky like a tide, driving away the last trace of warm light and coating the lead-gray cloud with a layer of indigo light film.
The dust and water vapor suspended in the air mixed together and condensed into hexagonal snowflakes under low temperatures. The snowflakes were beautiful, but anyone with common sense knew that on Alpha, it was best not to let the snowflakes falling from the sky fall on you.
These seemingly pure white snowflakes are mixed with a large amount of impurities such as radioactive dust. To humans, they can actually be regarded as one of the dirtiest things in the world.
"Dirty snow" is a term used by people who have been working in the wilderness for years to describe it.
Radiation itself is just a neutral word representing a physical phenomenon, but when this word is associated with disease, mutation and death, it becomes something that people try to avoid - even in this era, when human life is inseparable from radiation, in the minds of most people, there is still no change.
Just like power, people who possess power will be respected by others, but when the power becomes strong enough to exceed a certain threshold, they will only be regarded as monsters and aliens.
The color of the clouds became darker and darker, and the only remaining light in the sky was gradually swallowed up. If it weren't for the light on the top of the thermal insulation cover, the entire observation deck would probably be completely swallowed up by the darkness.
"The sky is about to snow tonight, can you drink with me?" a voice came from behind.
Ke Lan turned around and saw the hound wearing a thick cotton jacket, holding an incubator in his right hand, and climbing up the ladder from the bottom unsteadily.
"Where did you copy this poem from? It's good to learn and apply it immediately." Ke Lan teased.
"What do you mean by learning and applying now? I am a man of great learning and elegance..." The Hound rolled his eyes at him and sat down next to Ke Lan with the incubator in his arms. "How about a drink?"
Without waiting for Ke Lan to answer, he opened the thermal box, poured a small glass of wine and placed it in front of Ke Lan.
The hot wine was swaying in the cup, and the white hot steam rose vertically, mixed with a hint of spicy wine aroma, and floated in front of Ke Lan.
"You know, I don't like drinking, especially distilled liquor."
"Today is New Year's Day, and look at you, your lips are frozen purple. Have a drink to warm yourself up." The hound advised.
Ke Lan did not continue to refuse. He picked up the wine glass, put it to his lips, and took a sip carefully. Suddenly, a warm feeling spread in his mouth. The bitter and spicy taste with a hint of sweetness instantly occupied all his taste buds.
Ke Lan raised his head and drank the whole glass of wine.
He felt that what he drank was not wine, but a cup of burning fire. The fire went down along the esophagus and then spread to every corner of the body, instantly melting away the bone-chilling coldness. Even his originally stiff face was covered with a faint blush.
"How is it, do you feel better now?" The hound laughed and took out the things in the incubator one by one. There were two bamboo tube-shaped containers with more than a dozen skewers inserted in them. The food on the skewers was immersed in the soup. The large amount of heat blocked Ke Lan's vision, so he couldn't see what was soaked in the soup for a while.
"What's this?"
"Snacks to go with the wine," said the hound. "The one in the bamboo tube is oden, and there's also braised beef and peanuts. If you want to eat something else, that's a bit troublesome... At this time, most of the shops on the street are closed, and only the big hotels that have taken orders for New Year's Eve dinners are still open."
"No, these are enough." Ke Lan picked up the whole bunch of skewers and took a look. Tempura, fish tofu, kelp knots, beef balls... the ingredients on the skewers were varied, giving the impression of a hodgepodge. The special soup in the bamboo tube had a rich and tempting aroma, mixed with warmth that hit his face, which immediately made Ke Lan's appetite grow.
He picked up a string of fish tofu and took a bite. The delicious and hot soup instantly squeezed out from the holes in the fish tofu and occupied his entire mouth.
It was a feeling of satisfaction that was hard to describe in words, spreading freely between the lips and teeth.
Ke Lan remembered that she had seen the recipe for oden soup on the Internet. Generally, the soup was made by boiling bonito and kelp. Later, the recipe was improved many times, and some people used broth made from pork bones, chicken racks and scallops. However, in this era, using these ingredients to boil soup is obviously a very luxurious thing. Most of the small shops selling oden use "stock cubes" produced on industrial assembly lines. These stock cubes are artificially synthesized. Although the taste can be indistinguishable from the real thing, if you compare them with the soup boiled with real ingredients, you can still taste a clear difference.
What the hound brought over was obviously the latter.
"Where did you buy the oden? The soup is good." Ke Lan asked.
"Buy?" The hound suddenly laughed. "Of course I make it myself. Where can I buy this kind of good stuff outside? I usually eat enough of the stuff made with artificial flavor enhancers. On a special day like today, I don't want to let my mouth and stomach suffer."
As he spoke, Ke Lan quickly finished two more strings of meatballs, while the hound helped him refill his empty wine glass.
"Good wine!" Another voice came from the side. Ke Lan didn't need to turn around to know that the person coming was Ivan, the alcoholic. A silver mechanical arm rushed out from the side and snatched the wine glass that the hound pushed to Ke Lan.
However, just as Ivan was about to touch the wine glass, Ke Lan grabbed the wrist of the robotic arm with two fingers, and it could no longer move forward.
"This is mine. If you want to drink, pour another glass." Ke Lan said.
"Hiss... Ke Lan, your strength is getting stronger and stronger. Even my robotic arm can't defeat you... This is a new model that I just spent a lot of money to buy." Ivan retracted his hand and moved his wrist and five fingers vigorously. The flap on the surface of the robotic arm opened like a show of skill, revealing the precise and sexy mechanical structure underneath.
"New hand?" The Hound poured another glass of wine and handed it to Ivan, asking casually.
"Yeah, they say that we should change into new clothes for the New Year, so we should also change into new robotic arms." Ivan took the wine glass, drank it all in one gulp, and smacked his lips twice. "Although in my heart, the great vodka will always be the most wonderful drink in the world, I have to admit that this traditional Chinese liquor has a unique flavor."
"Aren't you going to accompany Natasha?" Ke Lan asked, glancing at Ivan out of the corner of her eye.
However, Ivan did not directly answer Ke Lan's question. Instead, he asked Ke Lan, "How did you spend New Year's Eve in the past?"
"I just spend my life like this..." Ke Lan recalled, "I bought a lot of food, then stayed in my room waiting for the New Year's bell to ring, played a few games, glanced at the New Year variety shows on various social platforms, and then went to the forum to see if there were any rich people who gave out red envelopes. That's about it."
“One person every year?”
"That's not the case... I remember one New Year's Eve, probably the year before last, our car broke down on the way back to the Ark from the ruins... Although the entire convoy had six cars, each one was fully loaded, and we couldn't just leave the people in that car alone in the wilderness, so we just spent the New Year in the wild."
"Celebrating the New Year in the wilderness sounds interesting," said the hound.
"Yes, although everyone was reluctant at first, they accepted the fact and stopped thinking about it. An old hunter in the team even suggested hunting a big one for New Year's Eve dinner..."
"Huh, and then what?"
"We did it right away... It took us about half a day to find a black gnawing dragon in a valley..."
“Blackgnat? Hahahaha…” The hound suddenly slapped his thigh and laughed, “Although the meat of this guy is almost the same as pork after being roasted, but if the processing method is not good enough…”
"Yes." Recalling that terrible experience, Ke Lan's face turned pale. "Although there was no reaction after I took it, after returning to the Ark, I had diarrhea for two whole days and nights..."
“Hahahahahaha — I knew it!” The hound’s palms were already red from clapping. “The meat of this thing can only be used in emergencies, and you actually used it for New Year’s Eve dinner. Hahahahaha… I don’t know whether I should admire your courage or your anus, hahahaha…”
"But the Blackgnath is indeed one of the few 'edible' indigenous creatures, and its meat is ranked in the top three in terms of taste." Ivan said seriously, but at the end, he couldn't help laughing out loud, "In a sense, you are quite lucky... haha."
"Although I almost fainted from diarrhea...but to be honest, that was the most memorable New Year's Eve for me," said Ke Lan.
"That's right." The hound raised his eyebrows, "New Year, New Year, there has to be a lot of people to have the flavor of the New Year."
"Old Dog is right!" Leighton's voice rang out. Ke Lan had no intention of looking back, but suddenly there was a loud bang from behind, and even the ground of the observation deck began to shake slightly.
“What…?”
Ke Lan turned around and saw that Layton had actually moved an oversized metal grill to the observation deck... His mechanical prosthesis was directly split into six mechanical arms, which were responsible for spraying fire, applying oil, sprinkling seasonings, and turning the various ingredients on the grill.
Suddenly, a strong smell of oil smoke mixed with the aroma of barbecue spread throughout the observation deck.
"In fact, celebrating the New Year here is much better than in the residential area downstairs. At least the place is spacious enough, and people feel open-minded!" Zhuo Ligetu held the handles on both sides of the copper hot pot with both hands. The boiling red oil in the pot kept emitting huge bubbles and making gurgling sounds.
Valentina on the side was carrying a cleaned lamb and half a beef that had not been completely thawed - according to the custom of Zhuoligetu and his people, the meat for hot pot must be cut and boiled first to ensure it is fresh enough.
Qin Zhao followed behind Valentina, holding two plastic bags full of food ingredients... On the other hand, Asano Akira was standing next to her with empty hands, holding the sword he never left behind.
"What a pity, Miss Sakurai was captured by her father...she couldn't come." Qin Zhao said with some regret.
"Forget it... With her appetite, the food you prepared may only be enough for her..." Ke Lan couldn't help but complain, "Haven't you noticed that since she joined the hunting group, the food expenses of the logistics department have been rising all the way?"
"That's true... but I found that Xiaoze Luo seems to eat much more than Miss Sakurai Nana." Qin Zhao said thoughtfully - and the guy she named had already run to the side of Leighton, staring at the skewers made of fist-sized pieces of meat on the grill.
"Don't worry, the freezer truck is parked below the observation deck, you can eat as much as you want~" The last person who appeared in Ke Lan's sight was naturally Miss Soma. She was wearing a bright red cheongsam with a high slit today. Her pair of slender white thighs made Ke Lan feel a little distracted - if possible, he really hoped that Miss Soma could stay tonight...
"By the way, why did you all come up here?"
"You said you were here to relax, but you ended up going to such a high place to have a seizure... We almost suspected you were depressed, so of course we had to come and take a look." Hound half-jokingly said, "It just so happens that the eldest lady said that she had arranged a special program today and booked the entire observation deck, so we just arranged the New Year's Eve dinner here."
"Special program? What program?" Ke Lan turned to Sofia with a puzzled look, but the latter just smiled and said nothing.
At this moment, Qin Zhao suddenly pointed at the dome of the observation deck and exclaimed: "What is that?!"
Everyone looked up and saw a beam of flame with a bright tail rising straight into the sky.
"Surface-to-air missiles?" Layton was stunned for a moment. "No... It's not a missile! It's a firework!"
As soon as the words fell, the fireball exploded in the sky, dyeing half of the sky in brilliant colors.
Happy New Year!
