Chapter 935: Penguin Fragments

935. Penguin Fragments

Lin Ye successfully found the Giant Pipeline, but the old man and the little guy inside it were already gone.

There was no Shelter near the Giant Pipeline. After circling the area twice, Lin Ye continued deeper into the Death Zone, searching for the Shelter.

As long as he could find the enemy Shelter, he could deal with those people.

But the Death Zone was much larger than Lin Ye had expected. He slid through the pipelines for a long time without encountering a single living person.

And the deeper he went into the Death Zone, the more complicated the pipeline structures around him became. Lin Ye felt that the Shelter probably wouldn’t be built in a place like this. He might have already passed the right location.

‘Good thing this body has a special ability gained from the abnormal spiritual imprints.’

Lin Ye activated the special ability. The penguin’s ability was to travel through space while sliding.

The surroundings shifted, and chaotic spatial energy appeared around Lin Ye. When he came to his senses, he had been split into four parts, each sliding through a different pipeline.

‘Damn it! What kind of lousy ability is this? It’s completely unreliable!’

The abnormal spiritual imprints were already highly unstable, and the Death Zone’s influence had made things even worse. That was why he had ended up like this.

And that wasn’t all. As he kept using the ability, Lin Ye went from four pieces to eight, then from eight to sixteen. By the time his mental energy was completely exhausted, he had become 256 penguin fragments.

…………………………………

“What happened this time?”

Little Guardian turned to look at Lin Ye.

“Um… my plan was a great success. I’ve found the Shelter.”

It took Lin Ye a while to sort through the spiritual imprints uploaded by several thousand penguin fragments.

After those penguin fragments died, the Parasitism Network collected their lingering spiritual imprints through the sacrificial ritual system and passed them on to Lin Ye.

“You didn’t deal with them?”

Little Guardian had assumed Lin Ye would take care of those people directly.

“I couldn’t. By the time I found the Shelter, I was down to a single claw.”

Lin Ye answered helplessly.

Those abnormal spiritual imprints still needed further study. Otherwise, something similar might happen again.

“Then should I send people to deal with that Shelter?”

Through her research into the Death Zone, Little Guardian had already found a way to weaken its influence.

“No need. I have a better option.”

This time, Lin Ye used the abnormal spiritual imprints to create a batch of parasitic multi-headed sharks. He planned to use them to deal with the problem over there.

“Oh.”

Little Guardian gave Lin Ye a rather speechless look.

Lin Ye infused his mental energy into one of the multi-headed sharks. Then he led his squad of sharks through the spatial rift, flying quickly toward the Death Zone.

Once they entered the Death Zone, the multi-headed shark squad charged straight toward the enemy Shelter. Lin Ye led the way. The Shelter was extremely well hidden, but no matter how well concealed it was, it couldn’t escape the detection of thousands of penguin fragments.

The multi-headed shark squad had only flown halfway when they ran into a group of Armed Personnel. They were hiding inside the pipelines, firing at the sharks above them.

Lin Ye led the multi-headed shark squad straight at them. The bullets couldn’t pierce the sharks’ epidermis, leaving only a dense spread of bullet holes across their bodies.

Several multi-headed sharks spun toward the armed squad. Turning their shark heads as they went, they drilled into the pipelines and bit to death the squad members hiding inside.

Every time a multi-headed shark ate an Armed Personnel member, it grew another head.

Before long, the Armed Personnel had all been eaten. Lin Ye’s multi-headed shark minions had grown dozens of heads, making for a very bizarre sight.

Lin Ye continued leading the way. As they passed a platform, he encountered a combat squad that looked quite formidable. Among them were the old man from before and Kurt, who had been taken hostage.

“If you keep approaching the Shelter, I’ll have no choice but to kill him!”

The old man grabbed Kurt, whose face was swollen from being beaten, and tried to threaten Lin Ye into backing off.

“Uh, he’s just a guide I found around here. Are you sure you want to threaten me with him?”

Lin Ye turned his shark head, confused.

“He said he had something of yours, so we spared his life.”

The old man glared at Kurt. He also thought Lin Ye wouldn’t care whether Kurt lived or died.

“He wasn’t lying, but to be honest, I don’t really care about that basic system panel. You can all die now.”

Lin Ye sent his multi-headed shark minions to attack the combat squad.

“Wait! You’ve already been infected with the Death Plague. If you don’t want to die in the deep layer of the Death Zone, your only choice is to join the Shelter. I came here to invite you to join.”

The old man wasn’t being kind, of course. But Lin Ye was even more dangerous than he’d expected, and this was his only option now.

“I don’t understand. You should know more about the Death Plague than I do. If you want to weaken its effects, shouldn’t you restrict the spread of information? Why are you infecting me with the Death Plague?”

Lin Ye couldn’t make sense of their thinking. If fewer people knew about the Death Plague, the Death Zone would weaken.

Infecting more people with the Death Plague would only make the Death Zone more troublesome, and those patients would be affected even more deeply.

“You’re absolutely right. But the Death Plague can’t be eradicated completely. Once you’re infected, you’ll be affected by it forever. In the end, you’ll enter its deepest layer, and you’ll never be able to escape.

“If a small number of people had been sacrificed when the Death Plague first appeared, all information related to it could have been sealed away completely.

“But what if you were one of those few people?”

The old man stared at Lin Ye. He was one of those few people.

“…Spreading the Death Plague can ease your situation?”

Lin Ye had more or less guessed how the Death Plague spread.

“That’s right. If I infect one person with the Death Plague, I can survive a little longer in the Surface Layer of the Death Zone. If I turn someone into a deeply infected person, I can survive in the Surface Layer for a long time. If you were me, what would you choose?”

The old man tried to persuade Lin Ye. Only then could he trick him into going to that place.

“I’d find a way to deal with the Death Zone.”

Lin Ye answered without hesitation.

“Heh. Then go deal with the Death Zone!”

The old man was nearly laughing with exasperation.

“What do you think I’m doing right now?”

Under Lin Ye’s control, the multi-headed shark squad spun and pounced on the combat squad below. He hadn’t been wasting time just now. He’d been letting the sharks adapt to the environment here.

The old man had taken a punch from Lin Ye earlier and still hadn’t fully recovered. Two multi-headed sharks soon trapped him inside a pipeline.

The remaining members of the combat squad were no pushovers. They fought the multi-headed shark squad to a standstill.

If the sharks hadn’t grown new heads, the opposing side might have killed them.