Volume 9: Molten Mine Chapter 466: Shell
Could it be that the third civilization that built this tunnel and the ancient battleship "Aguna Tor" is the culprit that caused the disappearance of the Alpha civilization?
But the existence of the Molten Mine Area proves one thing: from the timeline, the existence of this third civilization is earlier than that of the Alpha civilization. The period when the third civilization existed is like the Mesozoic era when the earth was dominated by dinosaurs. By the time humans were born, these ancient creatures had already become completely extinct.
However, one difference is that the technological level of the Third Civilization is far superior to that of the Alpha Civilization, so the time difference between the two civilizations is probably far more than hundreds of millions of years.
Ke Lan estimated that the civilization level of this third civilization must have entered the sequence of third-level civilization...
Unless destroyed by a higher-level civilization, it is difficult for a third-level civilization to die out on its own. The dinosaurs faced extinction when faced with a series of disasters such as meteorite impacts and climate change, but humans were able to escape the earth and continue their race to this day.
Perhaps, this third civilization still exists in some corner of the universe, but because of natural disasters, resources or population reasons, they gave up Alpha and turned to expand their territory to the vast starry sky?
Then one day, they suddenly had the urge to return to their former home planet, but they discovered this group of Alpha people who had occupied their home planet, and in anger they wiped out the Alpha civilization?
But if that is the case, why are there so many intact remains of the Alpha civilization left on this planet?
Moreover, apart from "Aguna Tor" and this tunnel, there is nothing else related to the Third Civilization on Alpha... The term "mother planet" may not be accurate.
Ke Lan thought of another possibility: the Third Civilization's fleet discovered this planet while exploring an unknown star region, and then "erased" the Alpha Civilization... As for this battleship, it was shot down by the Alpha Civilization during the battle, and fell into the magma lake...
That’s not right!
The Molten Mine was obviously built for the "Aguna Kator", which means that the Alpha civilization has "mined" Nino alloy from this ancient warship for at least several decades. Considering the gap between the two civilizations, the war could not have lasted so long...
The only explanation is that this battleship was actually just a long-range reconnaissance ship with a low level of weapons configuration. After being shot down by the Alpha Civilization, it took the army of the Third Civilization several decades to cross the distant time and space and come over to destroy the Alpha Civilization?
But if the Third Civilization won the war, why didn't it develop Alpha into its own colony?
Do you think highly of this planet?
Although Alpha Centauri is much poorer than the Earth, it is still a planet suitable for carbon-based life and is one in a million in the universe. The Ark drifted for nine hundred years before finding such a planet... Could it be that this third civilization is not a carbon-based civilization?
There is still a doubt - if a war breaks out between the Third Civilization and the Alpha Civilization, then won't the "great god" believed in by the Alpha Civilization intervene?
Would He...or They, just watch their loyal believers being killed?
Once upon a time, Ke Lan thought that the "Great God" was just a fictional idol, just like the God and Buddha that humans once believed in. But after experiencing the "Holy Word", his attitude changed 180 degrees - the "Great God" believed in by the Alpha civilization is real, and He possesses enough power to subvert the human worldview... This power, from a human perspective, is almost equivalent to a "miracle."
What makes Ke Lan most uneasy is that when his believers pray to him, he will respond...
In other words, this great god is most likely watching everything that happens on this planet.
This can't help but make Ke Lan feel creepy...
"That monster...it stopped!" An agent's shout brought Ke Lan back to reality. He turned around and saw that "Park Sang-woo" had stopped. The front end of its tentacles cracked open like a calyx, revealing the tiny and dense fangs inside.
"Is this its mouth?" The hound frowned and said, "It's really disgusting. I don't want to be bitten by this thing."
Everyone stopped and stared at the monster vigilantly. An agent tried to fire two shots. One bullet went through the tentacle, and the hole formed was filled with mucus almost in an instant, and then disappeared. The other bullet hit the teeth inside the "mouth", making a crisp sound like metal collision.
However, these two shots caused the monster's tentacles to tremble violently, especially the cracked flesh petals at the front end of the tentacles, the frequency of the trembling was even more alarming.
Combined with the hound's previous words, it can't help but feel as if it is screaming.
But no one heard any sound.
"Could this be... an infrasonic attack?" One of Aya's agents suddenly blurted out.
"But my equipment didn't detect any infrasound waves..." Before Layton could finish his words, the agent's expression suddenly changed and he walked straight towards the monster.
"Nicholas! What are you doing?!" Aya Breya shouted immediately.
The agent named Nicholas ignored Aya's words. He didn't even look back. He walked until he was only ten meters away from the monster and stopped.
"Danger! Nikolai! Get away from this monster! Come back here quickly!"
Nicholas turned a deaf ear to Aya's orders. He stood in front of the monster, motionless, as if staring into the monster's non-existent eyes.
"You guys cover me, I'll go and pull him back!" Aya said and was about to rush out, but her wrist was held tightly by Ke Lan.
"Don't go! Otherwise you will become like him!" Ke Lan shouted harshly, with a serious look in his eyes.
"You know what happened to him, right?" Aya asked anxiously, "Is this a mental attack? Was Nikolai seduced... or controlled?"
"Almost..." Ke Lan nodded.
"Is there any way to save him?" Aya continued to ask, speaking quickly, "What do you Ruins Hunters do when you encounter such a situation? I can't just watch him being -"
Before she could finish her words, she was interrupted by Ke Lan.
"It's too late." Ke Lan shook her head at Aya.
Nicholas' body began to tremble along with the monster. He slowly turned around and lifted the visor of his helmet.
His expression looked extremely dull, and deep red blood slowly flowed out from his nostrils and corners of his eyes.
Something seemed to be squirming in his throat. It began to surge upwards, and then he spat it out with a "wow" sound.
What he vomited out was not the food residue covered with digestive juice, but a large group of constantly moving tentacles... These tentacles rolled over and covered his face. Faintly, Ke Lan seemed to hear the sound of bones being crushed.
"That thing! How did that thing get into his body?" Layton exclaimed, "He and the monster clearly had no direct contact!"
With a "thump", Nicholas' body fell face down on the ground. A group of tentacles several meters long emerged from his body. The surface of the tentacles was covered with mucus, dirty blood and fragments of internal organs that had not been fully digested. They staggered and struggled as they crawled towards Ke Lan and the others.
"Is this... the larva of that monster?" Ivan stared at the "new" tentacles and muttered to himself, "When was the embryo of the larva implanted into the agent's body? Was it before or after the sacrifice ceremony? The method and means of implantation are unknown..."
"Don't think about it for now, this thing is crawling over here!" Layton shouted as he fired at the tentacle group - however, this little guy was just like the mother body, and bullets could not cause effective damage to it. Even if it was shot into a sieve by a machine gun, it would heal as before in just one second.
" Damn it, I don't believe I can't kill you!" The Hound took out a large defensive grenade in a rage, pulled the pull of the grenade, counted a few seconds silently, and then threw it towards the tentacle group.
"The old dog threw an HF25 grenade, which has a killing radius of forty meters! Try not to use power armor to resist it! Find cover!" Layton shouted loudly, and at the same time opened the energy shield to protect Ke Lan and others behind him.
Valentina also controlled the machine and jumped in front of everyone, ready to block the shock wave and fragments.
However, before the hound threw the grenade, several tentacles shot out and captured it in mid-air. Just when everyone was worried that the monster would throw the grenade back , the tentacles tightly wrapped up the grenade that was about to explode. The tentacles stuck to each other, forming an enclosed space.
"boom!!!"
A muffled sound came from inside the confined space. The tentacles that stuck together suddenly expanded to more than ten meters wide, like a balloon that was injected with high-pressure gas. Through the mucous membrane that had become thinner due to stretching, Ke Lan could even see the flames from the explosion swirling inside the "balloon"...
However, the balloon did not burst. Instead, after a few seconds, it gradually deflated until it returned to its normal size. Then, the tentacles that were stuck together separated, and a pile of irregular metal fragments fell to the ground.
An explosion of astonishing power was easily resolved, and the hound was so frightened that his eyes almost popped out.
"This... this is actually possible?" he muttered. "I've thought of many ways to deal with this monster, but I never thought it could resist the grenade in this way... When I first saw it 'swallow' the grenade, I thought it was dead..."
"It seems to be able to control the strength of its body tissues at will." Ivan said, "When we shoot with guns, the bullets can easily penetrate its tentacles, but this grenade that exploded inside its 'body', neither the shock wave nor the metal fragments can break through the extremely thin flesh membrane... This characteristic reminds me of a creature we once encountered..."
"Are you talking about those 'anemone heads' inside Leviathan?" Ke Lan said.
Ivan nodded.
"That thing doesn't have any obvious weaknesses. The only one that was killed was killed by Asano Akira with his brute force." Ke Lan said, "But before I figure out the cause of the agent's death, I can't let Asano Akira rush up and engage in close combat with the monster."
"No, Ke Lan, you may have missed one point. Those anemone heads have weaknesses." Ivan said calmly, "You were the first to discover this weakness - they are afraid of acid. When we entered into close combat with the anemone heads in the front, the anemone heads in the back stopped spitting acid."
"Acid... Indeed, this method has not been tried yet." Ke Lan turned to look at Layton, "Is there any acidic corrosive liquid that can be used as a weapon? Or a strong alkaline one will also work."
"There is only a small amount of concentrated hydrochloric acid and concentrated sulfuric acid, but even if they are used to synthesize aqua regia, its corrosiveness is not as good as the acid secreted by those anemone heads." Layton replied.
"At least try!"
Ke Lan's eyes kept moving between the monster's mother body and the tentacles. Just as Leighton was busy preparing the aqua regia, he suddenly discovered that at the tail of the tentacles, there was a tumor-like protrusion. The outside of this thing was covered with a layer of translucent mucous membrane, and inside was a fist-sized black object that was constantly beating like a heart.
Could this be the heart of this monster? Or... the "core"?
Ke Lan couldn't help but turn his gaze to the monster mother body that Park Sangyou turned into, trying to find a similar structure on it - but soon, he discovered the problem.
The mother body did not abandon the lifeboat, but carried the "hard shell" on its back like a conch...
The position of the lifeboat just covers the tumor-like bulge behind it!
If it weren't for this young body without a "shell", Ke Lan would never have been able to discover that this monster had hidden this abnormal part of its body in the lifeboat.
That's its weakness!
"Valentina! Can you see the knobby bump at the end of that tentacle?"
"You can see it... it's always moving. The part you mentioned occasionally shows up." Valentina replied, "Do you want me to shoot here?"
"Yes, use electromagnetic sniper cannons - try not to let the shells pass through its body. If this is its weakness, it will definitely try its best to block the bullets fired here." Ke Lan said.
"Okay, I understand." Valentina pulled down the sight and began to adjust the angle of the muzzle.
At this time, Layton finally prepared the aqua regia and smashed the bottle of aqua regia towards the tentacle group.
This time, the tentacle did not reach out to the glass bottle, but dodged to the side. However, it was this dodging action that exposed the tumor-like bulge on its tail directly to the muzzle of the Valkyrie.
Valentina pulled the trigger without hesitation.
