In the spacious cave, dark red smoke was filled with the sour smell of decay, and grotesque monsters chanted Yiyi's cries.
They are huge in size, astonishing in number, and even more diverse in variety, with different shapes and functions. Some have powerful single arms growing on their chests, while others are shaped like centipedes with multiple hands and legs.
The only thing they have in common is that most of their bodies are covered with pustules, and their limbs are rotten and prone to sores.
The dark red smoke seemed to be squeezed out of the pustules, and the huge mosquitoes and flies lingering around them seemed to have grown from there, clustering around them as intimately as their offspring.
These maverick mutants call themselves "plague monks", believe in the ubiquitous and omnipotent "plague", and regard it as a treasure.
Rather than saying that these guys are mutants, it is better to say that they are suture monsters that were born after countless mutants were dismantled and rearranged. They have completely broken away from the concept of "human".
This is especially true for the monster in the middle surrounded by Naiyi's cries.
Its name is Sodo, he is the prophet of the plague monks and the leader of the Bloodhoof clan.
Its body is even fatter than Oulon of the Rock Ax clan. It has two heads with three eyes. The long horns growing from the skull are inlaid with rusty bells. As it shakes its head,
The practice makes an ominous tinkling sound.
With its bloated body and sparse hair, it looks like a sick pig. With that amiable smile, it looks indescribably weird.
In front of it stood a bubbling pot of dark red soup, filled with pus squeezed from the pus bubbles on its body.
There was obviously no fire under the pot, but bubbles continued to bubble out, and crackled into dark red smoke, just like boiling water. But what was boiling was not water, but some evil pathogen.
It calls it the "original soup."
As the mother body that breeds viruses - or gifts, Sodo scooped up a ladle of pus with a wooden spoon, laughed evilly and howled, and poured it on the singing tribesmen.
The mutants who were drenched in pus moaned happily, and some screamed with excitement, and their expressions were twisted with pleasure as if they had been blessed by the gods.
Compared to those cheerful lunatics, the short man who shuttled between the legs of the big old men was much more pragmatic.
These goblins and mutant children scrambled to crawl on the ground, frantically licking the "original soup" given by the prophet, as if it were some kind of delicacy.
Some goblins began to mutate, and their bodies swelled into a ball as if they were foaming. Some also curled up into a ball and seemed to become smaller, so small that they were almost unrecognizable. Then their bodies began to tear apart, and they were quickly destroyed.
The same kind shared the food and ate it.
Whether they are the cubs of the big old men or the dwarf goblins, the survivors have all become the "plague monks" who spread the plague, joining the chorus cheering for rebirth and death.
The "feeder" holding a large basket of flesh-red fungi in his hand squeezed in from the entrance of the cave and splashed the filthy flesh-red fungus on the crowded believers.
The newly born plague monks rushed forward like wolves and tigers, scrambling to stuff the organic matter into their mouths to fill their hungry stomachs and absorb the nutrients needed for growth and development.
Amid Naiyi's strange words and one after another burps, the bloody and chaotic party went on endlessly, spreading the diseased body like a plague.
Very satisfied with the new batch of works, Sodo nodded with satisfaction, then picked out a larger pustule from his body and started creating the next pot of soup.
However, at this moment, there was a commotion at the entrance of the cave, and a dozen humans who had been stripped of their equipment were carried in.
There were men and women among them, most of them were seriously injured and fell into coma. There were also a few people who were awake, looking at everything in the cave, with obvious fear on their faces.
He grabbed one of them by the neck. The three-meter-tall man with six arms gave a sinister smile and raised the longest arm high, showing off the struggling "antelope" in his hand.
These guys are the Alpha team trying to sneak into the cave. After eating two brains, it figured out all the plans of these little mice.
Bathed in the cheers of the plague monks, it stared at the prophet intently, with worshipful pride and desire for rewards in its eyes.
"Human thing! Transparent! Thinks we can't see! Gagaaaah!"
A loving smile appeared on Sodo's face.
However, in the eyes of the Alpha Task Force member, that smile was as terrifying as the devil described in the old-era beliefs.
There was fear on his face, but because his throat was tightly pinched, he couldn't make a sound, so he could only watch as he was brought in front of that disgusting guy.
Sodo stared into his eyes, and suddenly a crack opened in his bloated belly, and intestines as thick as a bucket wrapped around him like twisted earthworms, pulling him violently into his belly.
The last remaining bit of consciousness seemed to "hear" the sound of bones breaking, and then his consciousness fell into darkness and turned into Sodo's burp.
Looking at the captain being swallowed alive, the rest of the team members who were still awake showed fear and despair on their faces.
Without hesitation, Sodo poured a ladle of soup onto the brave man who had brought the prisoners. He looked at the prisoners at the entrance of the cave and continued shouting at the top of his voice.
"Take it to the hatching tank!"
"Dedicated to the great Lord of Plague! Thank you for the evolution she has given us!"
The sound was like ten thousand cicadas vibrating their wings in unison, and the rustling sound continued to echo in the empty and dark cave.
"Oh oh oh!"
A group of monsters twisted their limbs wildly, and their excited shouts shook the earth, as if even the mountains were shaking with them.
The members of Mobile Task Force Alpha struggled and tried to resist, but were eventually forcibly dragged to the place called the incubation room.
It was a bottomless abyss, with a faint redness in the darkness, just like an extinguished volcanic crater.
The dark red mist that fills the mountains seems to come from there.
There were several wooden cranes placed on the edge of the abyss, with iron chains wrapped around the winches, and a string of iron buckets tied to the ends of the iron chains, with flesh-red fungi still remaining on them.
A female team member looked pale, her lips were purple, and she trembled and murmured.
"...the Brood."
It turns out to be the mother nest of mutant slime mold!
She must take this news back!
However, this is an unknown number of meters deep underground, and the outside is covered with an unknown number of meters of rocks, so ordinary electromagnetic wave signals cannot be transmitted at all.
not to mention--
Falling into enemy hands, they are now unable to protect themselves.
"Sacrifice to the great Lord of Plagues!"
The plague monk who brought her here grunted solemnly, and then threw her into the abyss.
She felt a warm current pass through her body, as if she had fallen into a hot embrace. Then her consciousness disappeared like a kite with a broken string in the darkness that could not be seen directly...
…
At the same time, halfway up the mountainside on the south side of Broken Edge Mountain.
A group of heavily armed soldiers wearing gas masks stood on the battlefield like statues, staring intently at the blood-smeared mountain peaks in the distance.
That bloody mountain was like a halberd falling from the sky, splitting the eighty-mile mountain road in half.
"Alfa Team 13 contact was lost...the package failed to be delivered to the intended location and no explosion was detected."
"Judgment that all personnel were killed."
"Plan C13 failed, plan B14...action is launched."
"receive."
Plan C13 is for a stealth team equipped with optical camouflage to go deep into the cave to place explosives and collapse part of the cave, thereby destroying the defenses built by the mutants in the mountain.
Obviously this solution has failed.
Even in order to understand the cause of the failure and formulate a more thorough attack plan, they must recover the remains of the soldiers of the 13th Squadron and go deep into the cave to learn more about the battlefield situation.
After the silent exchange ended, the soldiers waiting halfway up the mountain left the trenches uniformly, formed into teams of ten and headed towards the Bloody Mountain.
Different from the 13th Squadron.
Equipped with heavy-duty exoskeletons and electromagnetic weapons, they are the backbone of Task Force Alpha. They usually serve as the spearhead of the offensive on the battlefield and are responsible for eliminating dangerous targets that cannot be solved by the academy's exploration team.
At the same time, there was a deafening muffled sound in the distance, and two 902mm train guns spurted out tongues of flame, pushing several rifle-launched rockets carrying thousands of kilograms of cloud explosive warheads into the sky.
In a dozen breaths, a series of piercing screams penetrated the thin clouds in the sky, and exploded into clusters of mushroom-shaped red clouds in an instant.
The scorching flames were like magma falling from the sky, almost engulfing the entire mountainous area, and instantly drained away the oxygen within several kilometers.
The strange red mist lingering on the peak of Blood Mountain was blown away completely.
Facts have proved that in the face of sufficient power, all monsters and monsters are nothing more than paper tigers.
Of course, the concept of offense and defense is always relative, and the premise of everything is "enough".
There was a slight landslide on the mountain peak, and large rocks rolled from the top of the 3,000-meter-high mountain to the foot of the mountain. However, the entire mountain peak still stood there motionless.
Even the rising heat looks like the entire mountain has been roasted.
Within a few minutes, the coalition forces poured at least ten 902mm heavy rocket extended-range projectiles towards the Blood Mountain area.
This is enough shells to fill five carriages, washing almost all the places that can be washed, and not even an ant will be left.
At the same time, two hundred-man squadrons of Task Force Alpha have pushed to the front line.
Also arriving with them were a total of 200 quad-rotor drones carrying shellless rifles and grenade launchers.
Different from the alliance's drones, the academy's drones not only have a more sci-fi style, but also have a variety of integrated functions.
At the same time as the drone attack formation was unfolding, brilliant lights and shadows suddenly appeared below the drone, forming colorful portraits.
General Liam, who was sitting on the Allegiance airship watching the battle, stared straight ahead and thought it was some black technology such as teleportation.
However, he soon realized that this thing was just a holographic projection, and the soldiers who appeared out of thin air were not real people, so he sat back on the chair.
"Oh, pretending to be a ghost."
He sneered disdainfully, but there was a hint of fear in his eyes.
One thing to say, this holographic image is so lifelike that it looks real.
If drones and dummies fire at the same time, it's hard to tell whether soldiers on the front lines will be deceived by those camouflaged targets, thereby spreading the firepower.
Even if it is revealed that those illusory targets are actually disguised as holographic images, it is useless. After all, those drones themselves are "bunkers" that provide cover for the members of Task Force Alpha.
If you fire at drones that cannot carry much ammunition, you will play right into the hands of the slugs in the swamp.
If these guys are used as imaginary enemies to engage in firefights, the most severe situation his soldiers will face may not be distinguishing authenticity between drones and optical camouflage, but between a group of dummies and a few real people.
Identify real goals.
This is true from a tactical level.
On a strategic level, the officers under his command may face no less trouble than the soldiers fighting on the front line.
Although the academy did not show up in this battle, according to Liam's judgment, since they can use holographic light and shadow to provide tactical cover for frontline combat troops, there is no reason why they cannot implement strategic obstacle methods.
For example, they can use a few drones to disguise themselves as a non-existent force, thus causing strategic fraud.
Those slugs in the swamp may not be good at large-scale battlefields, but their intrigue skills are among the best in the wasteland.
The more Liam thought about it, the more frightened he became, and his palms even started to sweat.
He secretly made up his mind that when this battle is over, he must write a serious report and tell the Triumph City about the situation here.
The guys in the north are not as weak as they seem, and may even be more difficult to deal with than the losers in Ideal City...
Just when Liam was secretly frightened, the academy's Alpha Mobile Task Force had already attacked halfway up the Blood Mountain.
After being subjected to the unreasonable and indiscriminate bombing, the mutants on the Blood Mountain seemed to have been frightened by the bombing. They huddled in the cave and refused to come out.
Of course, it is also possible that they planned to place the battlefield in caves and tunnels that could not be reached by supporting firepower from the beginning, and take advantage of the terrain to deal with the invaders.
The soldiers of Task Force Alpha did not talk nonsense to them. Under the cover of drones and holographic light and shadow, the vanguard took the lead in entering the cave entrance halfway up the mountain.
Almost at the same time they entered the cave, the battle broke out instantly!
The flickering flame from the muzzle lit up the dark cave into daylight. The tracers of bullets opened up a path forward for the team that had not penetrated deep into the cave. The fire and shrapnel from the explosion of rifle grenades continued to harvest the lives of mutants.
The twisted and ugly appearance of these mutants is mind-numbing, but that's all.
Faced with the intensive firepower of assault rifles and Gauss rifles, the mutants who resisted with their flesh and blood were beaten back steadily, and they were unable to even mount a decent resistance.
Under the cover of optical camouflage, a team of four men broke through the Bloodhoof Clan's defenses with overwhelming force. They had conquered two tunnels in a row but were still unscathed. Only five drones were destroyed.
Four team members wearing gas masks fired silently while communicating silently on the communication channel.
"It stinks."
"It stinks."
"Canned herring."
"Stinks worse than that."
"...how did you smell it?"
"...?"
The four people immediately realized the seriousness of the problem, and their individual three-defense system was actually breached!
The stench lingering in the cave became more and more obvious, and the stench brought not only a strong sense of nausea, but also mental confusion and unnatural hallucinations.
Affiliated to the Science and Technology Committee, they did install some prosthetics and plug-ins to improve body functions, but these were only common components to improve combat efficiency. They could be removed and used by others after death or retirement.
And they themselves are not wealthy enough to be able to customize a bionic immune system for themselves like college researchers or corporate residents.
Realizing that he might be infected with Nacho mycelium or something similar, the team leader immediately issued an order to retreat.
However, at the moment when their offensive stopped, the mutants of the Bloodhoof clan suddenly revealed their ferocious fangs.
They could see that the phantoms constructed of optical camouflage were actually disguises for the group of human gadgets in front of them.
This is understandable, after all, they are also pretending.
Not only did they pretend to be weak and vulnerable, they even lay on the ground and pretended to be dead.
Seeing those guys getting up from the ground, the team leader with three teammates was stunned and couldn't help but feel his heart sink.
The chance of survival was less than 13%. He immediately made a judgment, transmitted the battle video saved on the brain chip to one of the drones, and set up an automatic return.
Almost at the same time he completed this operation, an ugly monster stepped out from the front of the passage.
Its body was fat and bloated, its eyes were stupid, its belly was cracked like a big mouth, and its fat intestines were exposed like a mop on the ground, even blocking its two short feet.
In the Bloodhoof clan, it is just a member of the Plague Monk, one of the followers of the Plague Lord, and a slave of the prophet Sodo.
It was carrying a large, weird-looking gun in its hand. It didn't have any armor on it, but it looked like there were serious scars everywhere, so that the four Alphas couldn't analyze its weaknesses for a while...
…
The battle on the front lines continues.
At this moment, on Broken Blade Mountain in the distance, a group of Weirant people were watching the battle on the front line.
General Modlin, the captain of the 310,000th legion, held a telescope in his hand and stared intently in the direction halfway up the Bloody Mountain.
All seems well on the front line.
However, what made him frown slightly was that the red mist that had been dispersed by the cloud bombs seemed to be gradually coming back...
The adjutant standing next to him couldn't help but twitch the corner of his mouth and murmured something in a low voice.
"So what's the point of their long numbered battle plan? In the end, it's not the same as us."
Even the artillery that projects heavy firepower was sent by the Southern Army.
General Modlin remained silent, just watching the front line silently.
I heard that the academy's combat plan has a total of dozens of G's, and the action numbers alone are a dozen-page table of contents. It can be said that the preparations are quite complete.
Not to mention his adjutant, even he himself was curious about what was written on the dozens of G's documents.
It's a pity that the academy did not intend to disclose the combat plan, and submitted the plan to the high command of the coalition forces, namely Chu Guang, on the premise of keeping it confidential.
It was precisely because of this that he could only use his eyes to confirm what methods the academy planned to use.
This was a rare opportunity to get to know his opponent, and he didn't want to simply miss it.
Coincidentally, on the top of Broken Blade Mountain, Commander Quan Shui, the commander of the Storm Corps, was looking at the direction of the front line intently just like him.
Unlike NPCs like General Modlin, as a player, he can see the entire content of Task Force Alpha's combat plan on the official website forum of "Wasteland OL".
It's just that the thing made him confused - even to the point of being confused.
It's not that the people in those colleges don't speak human language, or that their descriptions are too abstract.
On the contrary, they wrote it in too much detail!
These guys have made classified statistics for each type of mutant on Blood Mountain, and analyzed their attack methods and weakness information through battlefield analysis AI.
Not only that, they even made meticulous designs based on these statistical information on the tactics and equipment used by mutants of different sizes, weights, and characteristics encountered by front-line combat soldiers.
The entire dozens of gigabytes of information is like a long-to-read game guide, which even provides guidance on what kind of monsters you encounter and what skills you should use.
In fact, there is nothing wrong with this behavior. The pamphlets issued by armies of various countries to soldiers will also mention some "little tips" on the battlefield, requiring recruits to remember them in order to improve their chances of survival on the battlefield...
However, no matter what, it is not as precise as "how many shots to fire at what kind of target", which is as cumbersome and complicated as that.
Commander Quanshui couldn't even tell for a moment whether this was formalism unique to Wandering Swamp, or whether their commander truly believed that this overly lengthy plan could really come in handy.
However, considering that the soldiers of the Alpha Special Service Mobile Team are equipped with bionic prosthetics like those of the Enterprise, and have received more professional training than the recruits of the Enterprise, I think they may have their own understanding of combat.
"Good guy... do you need so much ammunition to hit such a mountain?"
Standing next to the spring water, Yan Yan, who came to the front line to join in the fun, couldn't help but complain.
Unlike Brother Quan Shui, his focus was more on the round of 902mm heavy artillery fired previously.
The fireworks were really exciting, but the intensity of the firepower was a little too high.
With such a round of heavy artillery slamming down, he couldn't help but feel sorry for Aguang for the wasted ammunition.
Commander Quan Shui frowned and said.
"If they can take down this position, it will be worth it even if it is doubled."
Edge of Water gave him a strange look.
"You think they can't defeat them?"
"Don't say it's them, we're all in trouble."
Seeing the stunned expression on the edge, Commander Quanshui paused for a moment, looked at the blood mist that filled the mountain again, and continued with a solemn expression.
"...I always have this feeling. It's probably not the 'pseudo brood' we saw in Jinchuan Province."
The so-called pseudo-mother nest is the core of fruit harvesting.
According to the research on "Heaven" by alliance biologists, that thing is a "fruit-absorbing nest" similar to the mother's nest made based on the mother's nest in Qingquan City. Its main function is to control the fruit-absorbing mycelium in the realm of heaven and supervise
It releases spores and interferes with the infected person's will.
Before the Kingdom of Heaven enters the "fourth stage", the Kingdom of Heaven can be prevented from coming as long as the "Nest of Fruits" is destroyed.
But this thing doesn't look like a fruit.
After all, in his impression, mutants can rely on their strong immune systems to directly avoid the effects of Nagoya. They cannot be used as a seedbed for the reproduction of Nagoya mycelium.
In other words, Shifeng Mountain does not actually have the foundation to descend to the Kingdom of Heaven.
But if those spores were produced by the mutant slime mold mother nest, everything would make much more sense.
The expression on the edge of the water changed slightly.
"You mean...that thing is real?!"
Commander Quanshui nodded, held up the telescope and continued to look silently.
Almost every brood they encountered was different.
He has reason to believe that the guy in front of him is the same. He has his own understanding of "evolution" and has made completely different choices on the path of evolution from the Qingquan City Mother Nest.
However, it sounds a bit weird that a brood can "coexist" with manic guys like mutants. How do two extremely aggressive things achieve peaceful coexistence?
And if his speculation is accurate, then the setting of this thing is too similar to "Xiaoyu"...