Chapter 976 - 44: Breaking Into the Tunnel

The spacious hall was instantly filled with screams!

Except for the special profession of the Hunter, most Sha Sea remnants never go to the surface in their lifetime. Their eyes, accustomed to the dim environment, were blinded by the strong stimulation from the flares.

Although this blindness was extremely short-lived, in a battle on the verge of outbreak, it was already fatal.

Wang Xiyi was the first to rush out, darting into a corner — even without using her abilities, her physical strength and defense ranked among the top in Sun Hang's team, and the weapons of the Sha Sea remnants couldn't inflict any effective damage on her, rather she knocked down several of them with one punch each.

From the dented chests of those people, it was clear Wang Xiyi had no intention of holding back — indeed, from the moment the sand ship outpost was ambushed, the relationship between the team and Sha Sea remnants had already turned into one of life and death.

If the other side chose to surrender, Sun Hang might consider taking prisoners, but since they chose an ambush, there was no need for mercy.

"Everyone, fire at will, kill anyone who resists!" Sun Hang commanded.

Nuer put down the weapon box he was carrying. Sun Hang casually picked out two short-barreled submachine guns, one in each hand, and marched towards the tunnel where the Sha Sea remnants were lying in ambush.

Apart from bone spears thrown by hand, another long-range weapon used by the Sha Sea remnants is a blow dart — this uses a whole hollow arm bone as the barrel, sharpened to the thickness of chopsticks, with extremely sharp bone as the arrowhead. Although lacking tail feathers reduces the flight distance and accuracy, within twenty meters, these blow darts still have considerable lethality.

Not to mention, those arrowheads emitting a strange brown glow, obviously had something "extra" added.

However, every bone arrow flying towards Sun Hang was intercepted midway by fungus suddenly sprouting from the ground, and Sun Hang walked into the tunnel unhurriedly, then raised his guns, firing at the group of Sha Sea remnants who had just put down their blow pipes and hadn't yet picked up their bone spears.

Blood splattered everywhere, the ambushing Sha Sea remnants suffered heavy casualties instantly. Sun Hang tossed aside two empty magazines, replacing them with new ones while saying to the rest of the team, "Quickly finish them off, then we'll strike at Candle Dragon directly. Don't waste too much time here, otherwise these dead will revive soon!"

"No need to wait! They're already reviving!" Wang Xiyi stomped on the head of a Sha Sea remnant transformed into a Penitent, then swung another obese Penitent towards a group of Sha Sea remnants charging from another tunnel, "I do want to strike directly at Candle Dragon! But there are so many branching paths here, do you know which one to choose?"

"Just pick any!" Sun Hang said, as a Sha Sea remnant who was just killed struggled to rise at his feet, numerous fungus wrapped it into a human-shaped cocoon, its latent mysterious creature meme immediately absorbed completely, "Follow your instinct!"

"So which way does your instinct say?" Wang Xiyi kept shouting.

"Right in front of me!"

Each tunnel had dozens of Sha Sea remnants lying in ambush, and more of them charged from deep within the tunnels. It was hard to determine which tunnel led to the core area just by their defensive focus. Sun Hang also tried reading their memories to find a correct path, but after trying several times, he completely gave up.

These Sha Sea remnants had long lost their original sanity, their self-awareness and memories erased, leaving only the battle instinct and a command to eliminate all intruders.

In their current state, they are like a bunch of zombie-like combat puppets, perhaps this is why they fearlessly charged at the team, ignoring Sun Hang's modern weapons.

"What about Ye Jiu and Jin Hongyi?" Amidst the chaos, Candle Dragon shouted at Sun Hang.

"Leave them here for now! We'll pick them up when we come out!" Sun Hang replied, "The Sha Sea remnants can't harm them!"

The Eternal Freeze Coffins housing Ye Jiu and Jin Hongyi are top models, even if an internal mysterious creature suddenly awakens, it's difficult to break out through physical means. Conversely, these coffins can be seen as a tough protective shell, with the Sha Sea remnants' attack methods, breaking this shell and attacking the two inside is next to impossible.

"Then let's move quickly! These things are increasing!" Wang Xiyi, tearing apart another charging Penitent and kicking away a mutating Sha Sea remnant, disregarded the blood and gore on her hands, immediately lifting Xue Yue and Bai Lingqiu, two team members lacking combat ability, and followed Sun Hang into the tunnel.

"I'll bring up the rear." Zhong Ling said, watching Cheng Ming, Zuo Jun, and Candle Dragon retreat into the tunnel, she waved her slender hand, and a pitch-black mysterious corpse blocked the tunnel entrance.

The next second, Zhong Ling spread her fingers, making a gripping motion towards the corpse.

The corpse's surface instantly swollen with many blood bubbles, that expanded from fist size to watermelon size in mere seconds, then exploded, spewing viscous tar-like substances, sealing off the tunnel entrance entirely.

After doing all this, Zhong Ling's face turned extremely pale, she intended to turn and follow the others but her legs suddenly weakened, about to collapse to the ground.

The shock from forcefully severing the link with the corpse through self-destruction was no less than having a copper bell over her head, and a dozen strong men swinging smelting hammers at it. The fact Zhong Ling didn't instantly faint was thanks to a month of targeted training before the operation.

Unit One corpse, at flashing speed, rushed to Zhong Ling's side, but before it could support her, dozens of Taixu Fungus tentacles already lifted her up and tossed her onto Sun Hang's back.

Unit One corpse used its emotionless eyes to watch Sun Hang for a moment, then turned to clear out the remaining Penitents inside the tunnel.

"Hold tight." Sun Hang tilted his head saying to Zhong Ling behind him.

"Okay." Zhong Ling wrapped her arms around Sun Hang's neck, pressing her body tightly against his back.

The back of the tunnel was sealed, yet Sha Sea remnants kept surging from the front.

Meme ability was disabled, causing the team's combat power to drop several levels.

Modern weapons in their hands could deal with Sha Sea remnants with ease, but against reviving Penitents, they struggled a bit. If not for Sun Hang who could wield part of his meme ability, their advance would be even slower.

In this operation, Dubhe Tower equipped Zhong Ling with corpses having aura concealing abilities, yet when the corpse self-destructed just now, its mysterious creature meme aura spread thousands of meters away — if Sinking Sand Giant Worms were within that range, not only their team, but the entire "New Thebes" might face annihilation.

Since the first mysterious creature war, Sinking Sand Giant Worms were confirmed to have a kinship attribute, if one discovered them, they might face dozens, even hundreds of worms.

"This scene feels like it's straight out of a zombie movie!" Wang Xiyi shouted ahead without turning, "These people are just like mindless zombies, seemingly unable to feel pain and completely fearless!"

"Just treat them like zombies." Sun Hang said, "Their self-awareness is erased, what drives their actions is just a command impressed on their minds by the so-called 'Priests'."

"Can you find a way to erase this command then?" Wang Xiyi asked again.

"I can, but the efficiency is worse than just killing them." Sun Hang couldn't help but chuckle, "Unless we find the person who issued that command."

[P.S. The early part of this month was mostly spent writing a new book, causing Mysterious Creature Hunter to stop updating for over a week. Due to changes in the full attendance mechanism and push flow mechanism, Mysterious Creature Hunter now hardly generates any income. Seducing authors to quickly abandon failed works or finish them and start new ones is what Qidian's current approach is evidently pushing for. However, this book is already over two million words, so it definitely won't be dropped. I can only speed up the conclusion. Besides, the new book I plan to write to about three hundred thousand words before publishing, to minimize breaks due to unforeseen events during launch, and allow seamless transition with Mysterious Creature Hunter. Once the conclusion and new book's release time are confirmed, I'll let everyone know.]