Doomsday Wonderland c1-855

by N. Heller

  [Did I interpret those words correctly?]

  Lin Sanjiu was almost stunned.

  "Some fruits are good, like—" Conversing for the first time with other creatures that weren't snake-faced people, the snake-faced person seemed to have some interest in continuing the conversation. When it spoke to this point, it used its tongue to pronounce a complex syllable, appearing to be someone's name: "... ate one, she can glow. Some are no good, the one I ate, made me understand words."

  "Every fruit has different nutrients, the one the leader ate, is the best."

  Even though what the snake-faced person said wasn't quite clear, Lin Sanjiu immediately understood everything.

  Those apple trees, in a certain kind of sense, were a type of 'reprocessing machine'. The blood and flesh of posthumans were mixed by the tree and converted into the apples growing from the tree. Each apple probably packed a few posthumans' abilities. When the snake-faced people ate those apples, they would obtain the corresponding abilities.

  Naturally, from the snake-faced people's perspective, nutrients did not refer to humans but rather the abilities they possessed.

  In that case, it was easy for Lin Sanjiu to understand why the apple could talk. The apple trees had to keep the posthumans alive so that the apples could retain their abilities. However, whether they survived in their usual human form or as a large apple structure made of a mix of blood and flesh, it wasn't for those humans to decide.

  Coincidentally, the apple that the little snake-faced person secretly consumed possessed a sort of language communication ability.

  When she thought about B.Rabbit and her other missing companions, Lin Sanjiu felt anxious again. She wished she could search every tree branch this very moment, but she couldn't even move now.

  "You… said that you came from the tree." The snake-face person talked again, Lin Sanjiu's body shook due to the vibration of its voice, "Could it be, the nutrients in the fruits actually came from things similar to you?

  "That's right!" Lin Sanjiu was slight astonished that it never thought about the source of the nutrients. Following which, hoping for a bit of luck, she added, "I just want to find a few of my friends. Once I find them, we will leave immediately. We definitely won't disturb you guys from eating your apples… okay?"

  When she was drifting along in the rhizomes, she actually wanted to rescue a few more people. But now, she had already given up that impractical fantasy.

  Lin Sanjiu would be satisfied if she could just save B.Rabbit and the rest of her companions. Unfortunately, the snake-faced person crooked its head and stared at her, but didn't say a word.

  Lin Sanjiu grew more and more nervous. She stealthily hid her hands behind her back.

  After a long time, the snake-faced person finally spoke.

  "Being able to escape... trees, very strong." It spoke in the same slow manner but its body started swaying, "If I eat you, I will become powerful. Become leader!"

  "You motherf*cker!" Lin Sanjiu couldn't help spitting out B.Rabbit favorite vulgar word. At the same time the pupil in front of her rose up and a long shadow shot out from the snake-faced person's mouth, coming directing at her.

  Lin Sanjiu finally had a slight taste of what it was like colliding with Golden Gate Bridge.

  With a sudden loud boom, the tongue pierced deep into the tree bark. Debris flew everywhere and the 'ground' under Lin Sanjiu quaked. Fortunately, Lin Sanjiu was already prepared. Using all of her limbs simultaneously, she rolled quite a distance away, dodging the attack unglamorously.

  "You think I can't do anything, just because you are larger?" She spat fiercely. She saw its tongue aiming for another attack, but she couldn't think of any ideas. She had no choice but to jump to another slightly lower tree branch.

  Just as her legs left the first branch, the spot where she was before was instantly smashed to smithereens. The sap from the tree, so familiar to her, sprayed everywhere before it rained down on her body.

  [Dodging like this isn't the best strategy. If I had my [Bubbles Blowing Girl] with me...]

  When they were scavenging for items in Garden of Eden Laboratories, she practically took everything she saw, only turning all of them into cards after that. Hence, she even forgot some of these items. As she swept her eyes across the cards in her hands, she had a sudden idea.

  The attacks behind her had stopped. The ground continued shaking as the snake-faced person circled the tree and continued looking for her.

  Only the ground was emitting endless quakes, seeming to be from the snake-faced person movement around the tree then, as it was searching up and down for her whereabouts.

  Lin Sanjiu hid behind the fork of a branch. She was in the snake-faced person's blind spot. On top of that, she had stored her [Ability Polishing Agent] to avoid being the obvious target in the darkness. The pitch-black darkness affected the snake-faced person, making it more difficult for it to find Lin Sanjiu.

  "Where is it? How annoying, I want to crush you..."

  The long tongue hissed as it swept to and fro above the tree bark. Just when it was feeling impatient, it saw a silver light on one of the branches, but it quickly vanished. That split second was sufficient for the snake-faced person. It shot its long tongue toward the light.

  However, the series of events that unfolded was beyond the snake-faced person's expectation. It tongue pierced through a mist. It felt a sharp burning pain it had never experienced, the pain spread rapidly through its tongue. The snake-faced person let out a fearsome hiss and pulled its tongue back into its mouth involuntarily. Right after that, it could no longer make any sound...

  It collapsed to the ground, clutching its own neck tightly. It struggled soundlessly while it writhed and rolled on the ground. The ground shook, and a few apples fell. After some time, the vibrations similar to small earthquakes gradually stopped.

  The black outline of the snake-faced person, which now laid on the ground, was like a mountain range. It stopped moving.

  Lin Sanjiu looked down at the storage device for her [Microorganism Cloud] and revealed a bitter smile.

  As expected, the simple trap she set was useful. The snake-faced person stuck its tongue into the purple mist of [Microorganism Cloud]. The mist quickly adhered to its tongue and was quickly absorbed by its body. From the looks of it, she probably couldn't use the storage device to recover the mist.

  Once the snake-faced person stopped shrieking and struggling, the silence returned. Lin Sanjiu could hear her racing heart. [I don't have much time.] Lin Sanjiu thought to herself. She had to find B.Rabbit and the other before resting, and quickly escape before the other snake-faced people discovered this corpse.

  Chapter 174 - The Head of the Demolition Crew Had Been Possessed

  "F*ck. Did you work in a demolition crew in the past?"

  When Lin Sanjiu heard that familiar voice again, her wound-up nerves quickly relaxed. She could no longer drive herself with willpower, and the weariness she acc.u.mulated over these few days consumed her...

  "I don't care anymore," Lin Sanjiu mumbled and dropped to the ground, closing her eyes. "Deal with the rest yourselves."

  —

  Six hours earlier, there was an oppressive atmosphere in the air. There wasn't a single hint of breeze.

  Lin Sanjiu didn't think much about the exact size of this place. But considering the size of those snake-faced people, and the fact that she couldn't even sense their presence after they left. She could only imagine how vast the place was.

  While her thoughts ran wild, she leaped up and grabbed the branch above her before climbing up.

  Lin Sanjiu refused to even consider the worst-case scenario.

  Although she didn't know where B.Rabbit and the other were, or if they were alive, she followed her single motivation which had never changed: if they were alive, she wanted to see them; if they were dead, she needed to see their corpses.

  "If I give up just like that, what is the point of me struggling till today?" She grumbled to herself
softly. She held her [Vibroblade] and struck it down on the portion of the branch beside her.

  Although the knife looked too small compared to the size of the branch, the laboratory's technology truly deserved its reputation. When she used it for the first time, she was prepared to saw the branch a few times. Surprising, once the blade landed on the branch, it was as if she was cutting through air. It easily cut through the branch, and each time it left an edge with a polished surface.

  As she already had some experience with this, she immediately took two step back. Boom! The smooth, polished 'sealed' surface left by the cut from her Vibroblade burst open due to the pressure from the fluid in the branch. The tree sap sprayed out like a fountain.

  The length of the knife wasn't long enough to sever the branch with a single clean cut. The branch broke in half at the point of the incision with a crack. The apple hanging from the branch lost its support and fell to the ground.

  Lin Sanjiu ignored the apple which fell with a screaming voice. After the sap from the branch stopped spurting out, she climbed to the edge of the incision and flashed her light to check what was inside.

  When she was dodging the attacks from the creature, its tongue pierced through the bark of the tree. Those areas exposed a thick layer of unknown plant material. Under that layer of cuticle, Lin Sanjiu discovered a dead body hanging from the edge of the damaged tree bark. It came out together with the tree sap.

  That corpse was a little different from the other dead bodies she had seen. Even though his skin was undamaged, appearing to have died not too long ago, his body was in a deformed mess, as if it had been squeezed by something. Judging from how the tree sap spurt, the pressure of the fluid probably increases as they reach the tips of the tree and this was the reason why the corpse couldn't even retain its original form.

  [Maybe, the flesh of the apples were made from the flesh of several dead bodies?] There was no way to verify this conjecture and Lin Sanjiu didn't want to think about it either. She looked inside the broken branch and couldn't help letting out a sigh of relief when she didn't see anyone inside.

  If B.Rabbit and the others weren't in the branches, there was still some hope of saving them

  She raised her head and looked up. The tree she was on didn't have a large canopy, it only had another 30 or 40 branches. But… Lin Sanjiu smiled bitterly, pretending that she hadn't seen the shadows of the other few colossal trees while continuing to climb to another branch.

  "Anyway, I only know such a stupid method," she sounded bitter, perhaps because she suddenly thought of Nüwa. "If I can't chop down the trunk, I'll just chop off every path leading to its 'destination' then!"

  [If Nüwa was around, she definitely would be able to think of a better idea.] Despite how much she rejected this thought, she just couldn't help thinking when she had to saw off the branches one by one.

  [If I was Nüwa, what would I do?]

  Lin Sanjiu did not dare to stop. She jumped, chopped and dodged the explosion of fluid… This had already become a seasoned process for her, and her mind started wandering. "If I was Nüwa, I would try to locate B.Rabbit and the others first.

  [If I was Nüwa…]

  Lin Sanjiu rushed towards the crack in the branch to investigate. If she had a mirror in front of her, she would have noticed her gradually changing expression. Her expression was icy cold, yet there was a forgiving smile on her face. Whenever someone saw that expression, it would give the impression that she was looking at an insensible child, while also looking like a patient who was on deathbed.

  That was an expression that Nüwa wore.

  "I'm nearly stifled to death!"

  When Lin Sanjiu slipped into a strange state unknowingly, she suddenly heard a voice she hadn't heard in long while. Initially, she thought she had saved someone from a branch. However, when she looked around, she realized that she was all alone.

  "Where are you looking?"

  Lin Sanjiu was stunned for a moment. She finally realized that the voice was coming from her own mind.

  "Mrs. Manas?"

  The Nüwa-like expression quickly slipped off her face, as if shattered ice. She couldn't react for a second, as her eyes widened from her bewilderment. "My [School of Higher Consciousness] is still around?"

  "Lin Sanjiu, you haven't even started your compulsory nine years of education, why would Teacher leave?"

  Lin Sanjiu held her knife absent-mindedly, while she stayed in the same spot without moving. In the past, she had to compose herself and slowly dive into her own consciousness—though she was not someone that could really meditate in reality. However, this time, she didn't know how she had somehow entered this state successfully.

  The kindergarten didn't change much.

  Mrs. Manas was still represented by two speakers. The teddy bear, Barbie, and Transformer figurine were still sitting on their stools. The foam flooring still felt very realistic. The only difference between now and her previous visit was that she was no longer holding an educational picture chart and the red flower brooch had disappeared.

  She never thought that she would actually miss this place a little.

  "It has been so long since I met you, I thought my [School of Higher Consciousness] had been sealed completely…" Lin Sanjiu sighed softly. "When did you return? What is the state of my [School of Higher Consciousness] now?

  Before Mrs. Manas could answer her, Lin Sanjiu stopped her promptly, "Forget it. This isn't the right time to discuss this. You should know my current situation, right? I need to look for some people as quick as possible…"

  After saying that, she planned to force herself out of her mindscape.

  Just as that thought surfaced, a voice blared from the speaker, "Lin Sanjiu!" The tone of that voice was rather fl.u.s.tered. "Wait! I know a way to help you!"

  "Huh?" Lin Sanjiu hesitated, "Aren't you just a manifestation of this ability? How can you help me?

  The speed of the words coming from the two speakers hastened, "Actually, the kindergarten had been restored some time ago. The reason why I didn't let you attend a class was because I was dealing with a problematic student… Anyway, something you did just now triggered your elementary school entrance ceremony."

  Lin Sanjiu listened on in a daze.

  She had too many questions in mind about this weird ability of hers. But, this wasn't the right time for a discussion so she waited for Mrs. Manas to cover some main points.

  "In short, you've learned 'Consciousness Mimicry' during your first grade. When you activate this ability, you can temporarily adopt the person's mode of thinking, and use the target's thought process to analyze a situation…"

  Lin Sanjiu was dumbfounded and instantly recalling her attempt to think using Nüwa's point of view.

  That must have triggered her elementary school opening ceremony!

  Seems like this is the one that triggered the starting of primary one level!

  "Of course, you can only successfully mimic the target's mode of thinking on the basis that you have had some level of contact with the target beforehand. This ability would disregard the difference in intellect, knowledge, and experience between the user and target to some extent…"

  Lin Sanjiu was already itching to get out and try her new ability. After clarifying the detail about how she could employ this ability, she ignored the ramblings of the teacher. She gave a quick farewell and left her [School of Higher Consciousness].

  Lin Sanjiu steadied her breath and closed her eyes as she formed the image of Nüwa in her mind.

  The 'Li Tao' appearance that Nüwa took was already blurry in her memory. However, Nüwa's unique expression and her detached yet sympathetic attitude towards things was still fresh in Lin Sanjiu's mind. No matter what face Nüwa used, Lin Sanjiu felt that she would be able to recognize that woman.

  As Nüwa's appearance and voice grew clearer in her mind, Lin Sanjiu's expression gradually changed.

  After some time, she slowly opened her mind again. She had successfully acti
vated her [Consciousness Mimicry].

  When Lin Sanjiu remembered this moment in retrospect, she couldn't help shuddering at the thought of Nüwa's deep insights.

  The total surface area of the planet was 90 million kilometer squares. Subtracting the 45 million kilometer squares of ocean, the remaining land area was divided into square grids in Nüwa's mind. The image of the region of dry land transformed into a 3D lattice model. With a single thought from Lin Sanjiu, it began spinning rapidly. It finally stopped on a precise set of coordinates.

  Using this set of coordinates as the spot where B.Rabbit and the rest were absorbed into the ground and analyzing the rhizomes' path from it thickness, an image of the planet's landform appeared in her mind. Modelled the flow speed of the tree sap, including variables such as gravitational force and using other planets as a form of comparison, Lin Sanjiu determined the location of this planetary core and simulated the few most possible pathways in her mind...

  Lin Sanjiu herself couldn't keep up with this series of calculations. A gazillion numerals, graphs and netlist flashed past her mind. It was as if someone was controlling a computer remotely, and she couldn't comprehend the series of operations.

  Lin Sanjiu didn't know how much time had passed when she snapped out from Nüwa's thought process. Lin Sanjiu returned to her normal thinking mode and took a large gulp of air. It was only then that she realized that she was drenched in sweat. She was exhausted, it was more tiring than those three days of non-stop digging.

  "Here!"

  Lin Sanjiu already knew the location of B.Rabbit and the others.

  She searched through the area of the tree 20 meters below the position she deduced from Nüwa's thought process. Standing amidst a messy pile of tree barks and sap, Lin Sanjiu bore with her dizziness and counted silently.

  After counted down for three minutes, she suddenly stuck her arms into a hole in the tree. As expected, she touched a soaked ball of fur that was pushed to this corner by the tree sap.