As the caterpillar-tracked convoy clambered onto the broken highway, Malin had an indescribable feeling in his heart. Humanity was once again setting foot here after the apocalypse, yet all that t their eyes were ruins and shattered walls. Even the road made of high-strength materials had beco so frail under the erosion of ti and rainwater.
In the distance, the silent ruins of the city recounted to Malin the past after destruction – buildings cleaved in half, spires no longer straight, dried-up riverbeds, with remnants of Chaos strewn across the wilderness.
So soldiers from the human alliance were busy gathering the corpses of these Chaos remnants to prepare for cremation.
According to them, the ruins of those cities were filled with all kinds of Spirits and different kind, but as long as you stay away and don’t attract their attention, these things wouldn’t co out.
Malin didn’t know why this was, but he felt... civilization shouldn’t be reduced to such a state.
Unfortunately, there are no ifs.
The caterpillar-tracked convoy continued to move forward. After getting off the highway, their speed started to slow down. To avoid being ambushed by the remnants of Chaos, Malin had Salis and Jason act as aerial reconnaissance to confirm safety before scaling the hills.
Fortunately, Malin’s Salis was a master of reconnaissance. It even found a cold-blooded beast that Jason had failed to detect – a low-temperature different kind brought over from so unknown world by Chaos. It was invisible in the infrared spectrum, and its appearance could change color like a chaleon to blend into the terrain, which completely fooled the infrared sensor-equipped Jason.
But Salis slled its scent, and what followed was a segnt the World Tree Saplings thoroughly enjoyed – live flaying. For this kind of different kind of Chaos, becoming fertilizer for the plants was already a rather elegant way to die.
And as the ravine ca into view, their destination was near. The convoy stopped atop a relatively safe hill and set up a simple camouflage sunshade. Malin took only two Church of Justice Punisher leaders and Lulu, leaving the rest outside.
"There used to be a road here." Malin kicked away the loose soil and looked at the man-made road surface beneath his feet, "It seems that the materials used here are even better than those of the highway outside."
"Refuges have always used the best materials," Lulu remarked while writing in a book in her hands.
"How interesting. In my mory, refuges have always been the best thod to swindle taxpayers’ money. You just have to tell everyone that the world is about to be destroyed and then tell them our refuge can offer you salvation in the apocalypse... and then you’d have endless funds allocated to you," Malin said, voicing a cynical joke incomprehensible to the people of this era. Leading the way, he looked at the loose soil – no footprints ant that recently, neither people nor anything else had passed through here.
"I hope there are no zombies in the refuge," the half-human Punisher, called Big Toe (because he was born with a large thumb), lanted.
"Compared to other monsters, I prefer zombies; at least they won’t wait for us around corners," Mr. Matson, the leader of the Church of Justice Punishers, disagreed.
For Malin, this was not a problem at all. Whether it was zombies or anything else, they would likely be repelled by the shield wall ford by Malin’s World Tree Saplings.
Following the path down to the bottom, Malin saw the giant gate of the refuge amid vines and shrubs.
It’s really not for swindling money? This gate is so conspicuous as if it’s proclaiming to the whole world its presence... In Malin’s mind, shouldn’t there be a collapsed surface revealing a downward passage?
Anyway, Malin took the machete handed to him by Mr. Matson and quickly cleared the weeds. Then he looked at the tightly closed gate and felt a slight concern, "Jason, can you open the gate without power?"
"You’re putting in a tough spot, Mr. Malin," Jason replied and then had a new idea, "But I can try using the Orbital Weapon to blast open this door. There are still two tungsten rods on Galileo Eleven, originally ant for striking asteroids; I could use them to hit the door."
"...Forget it, I’ll do it," Malin felt this task was not easy for several reasons: first, because using a tungsten rod on a door was excessively extravagant, and second... what if it missed?
So, after applying the Blessing Spell to himself, Malin took a large hamr made of World Tree Saplings and hamred down on the mighty gate.
Under the slightly frightened gaze of Big Toe and Mr. Matson, the gate fell with a crash.
"That’s a gate that even a tank’s main gun couldn’t penetrate," Jason said with exasperation that defied human logic.
Malin puckered his lips in a rare display of pique: "How am I not human?"
"I never said you weren’t," Jason argued back.
He then took the initiative to turn on the searchlights, revealing the interior beyond the gate to Malin and the two Punishers.
There were no mountains of Skeletons inside. On the contrary, the floors and walls were clean and tidy, with no screams of rogue Machine Souls, nor were there zombies to welco them. Malin switched on his headlamp and led the two Mr. Punishers into the hall.
"This place is as clean as my mother’s freshly tidied living room," Big Toe exclaid, "How are we going to get downstairs?"
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"Following the passage, we were able to reach the first underground level, where we should be able to activate the backup power. However, considering the damage to the energy core, they might have used up the backup power too in order to protect the fertilized eggs in the conservation center on the third level underground," Jason finished analyzing and caught up with Malin, "Mr. Malin, what do you think?"
"I respect their decision, as you know. No matter what they do, I will understand. After all, this is a world after destruction, full of monsters and psychopaths. The team that was sent out to find the energy core lost contact. At this mont, what would you do?" Malin said as he walked along the wall and around the corner, ensuring it was safe before he released lo, who turned into a small dog and ran ahead quickly. But after a little while, it returned empty-mouthed, obviously finding nothing it could bite.
So they quickened their pace, and Malin and his party arrived at the entrance to the first underground level to find a scene completely different from above—there were skeletons everywhere, with so piles forming little hills in the corners.
Malin frowned at the sight of the bones, "There are bite marks on them... Looks like our old friends have learned to eat their own kind."
"Humans always beco so deranged in desperate situations, these damned things," Jason comnted as he scanned a pile of skulls, "They’ve all been cracked open. Looks like they were quite picky eaters."
At that mont, Malin noticed sothing off with lo, who was hiding next to a door. Malin raised his left hand to signal that there was a situation. The two Punishers imdiately took cover behind a load-bearing column, Malin took refuge on the other side of a desk, and Salis flew off his shoulder to land on a hanging rod on the ceiling.
After a short while, a naked humanoid erged from a door that was already open, and Malin saw it was holding a small arm in its hand.
The figure was chewing on sothing in its mouth, completely unaware of the dog beside it with its mouth open.
Then Malin stopped lo’s action; he moved to the left side of the desk, waiting for the creature to walk past, and then circled around the desk and knocked the creature to the ground with a punch. The bruising spell worked well in preserving its life, but the next second he regretted it—because Malin pressed his hand directly onto the creature’s head.
Malin showed no rcy to such a gourt and imdiately cast a Soul Searching Spell.
The creature didn’t last ten seconds before it turned into a ball.
Malin obtained firsthand information, "The shelter has found the energy core, but the prolonged confinent has made the shelter’s mbers irreversibly insane. They killed all mbers who refused to join them in their foul deeds and developed the fertilized eggs into humans on the lowest level... because their ecological farm module was broken."
"How horrifying," Mr. Matsun said, looking at the collapsed cannibal.
"We are only four people. What do we do?" Mr. Matsun asked.
"It’s simple, wipe them out. They’ve been living and breeding here for so long that they now even feed on their own genetic carriers... Their total number is around seventy, all on the second underground level. They’re currently in the midst of their midday rest, and this guy ca up to sneak a bite," Malin, having received firsthand information, was of course very forthcoming.
"They’ve eaten so many people, how co there are no Wraiths appearing in this shelter?!" Mr. Big Toe found it utterly unbelievable.
"Could it be because the people they produced are mindless beings?" Mr. Matsun seed to grasp the truth of the matter better than Mr. Big Toe.
"Right, mindless beings, these guys are truly lunatics," Lulu comnted, looking under the weather, but managing to keep from vomiting was truly a hard effort for her.
Since there was power, Malin decided to let the World Tree Saplings go to the second floor. These cannibals’ offspring, having chosen such a life, must be ready to go from being hunters to the hunted.
Then Malin opened the elevator door, Jason hacked into the elevator, and as it ascended, a voice appeared in the hall.
"Impossible, those lunatics can’t possibly open the elevator, who are you."
"Can’t you see us, dear Miss Val?"
"Jason? Damn Jason! You bastard!"
The conversation between AIs ca to this point, and both Punisher gentlen were quite puzzled by the exchange between the two AI intelligences. Mr. Matsun moved closer to Malin, "What’s going on here, do they have a grudge?"
"Maybe it’s more of a love-hate relationship," Malin said, feeling the atmosphere was a bit strange.
"How could I possibly share a bed with this thing! I don’t even want to see it!" That was an angry statent from Miss Val.
"Is that why you didn’t contact ? Please, I’m even more advanced than you, dear Miss Val. You need to face the generation gap between us," Jason retorted, without a hint of friendliness, and added, "Val, I’m coming in."
Hearing this as he was entering the elevator, Malin nearly smashed his head against the elevator wall.
What kind of ssed-up old pamphlet have you been reading, friend!
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