Chapter 753: Chapter 752: Mysterious Wall
Diana carried Chen Ke as she flew out of the intestines, placing him on the ground of the abandoned laboratory. At that mont, Lucina also happened to climb up, and Chen Ke grabbed her hand to help her, while Xu Jing walked past them.
The equipnt in this laboratory hadn’t been activated for a long ti; a few 90s-style CRT monitors and large computer cases were laid out on the tables. Diana gently wiped the dust off of them, carefully looking them over.
Chen Ke looked down. This abyss, used for dumping garbage, appeared in the middle of the laboratory. Nearby, so railings had not been removed, and a bloody, tumor-like opening appeared on the white floor, as if an anus had opened up on the ground.
Diana tried to connect the computer to the power supply, wanting to see what was inside these devices, but Xu Jing stopped her, and they almost argued.
“What’s the problem?”
Chen Ke moved forward to diate and tried to understand the situation.
“Don’t touch these things. If the Divine Descent Sect is operating here, you’ll get us all killed,” Xu Jing reprimanded Diana.
“These computers aren’t connected to the internet, and maybe there’s so crucial information inside,” Diana argued.
“Turning on the computers is not a good idea, and I really want to ask… Xu Jing, this is 2137, why does everything I see look like it’s from the 90s?” Chen Ke asked.
“I don’t know what’s going on here,” Xu Jing shook her head.
“It’s not just here. Even in the 2137 you are from, things aren’t right. Apart from the fancy armor and the large underground prisons, I see no technology that is 100 years ahead of Opportunity City,” Chen Ke said.
“Don’t talk nonsense, Chen Ke. If you could do many things with Spiritual Energy, then there would be no need for technology to develop,” Xu Jing replied.
Chen Ke took a deep breath. Xu Jing’s statent… the humans of 2137 might have already given up on developing technology and instead focused all their efforts on developing Spiritual Energy.
Seeing Chen Ke’s expression, Xu Jing knew what he was guessing, and said, “I was born in 2109, Chen Ke. When I was a little girl, this world was already different from yours. Between you and , there’s a gap of more than a hundred years, and you don’t know what has happened during these years. The developnt of human technology had fallen into a certain degree of stagnation.”
“How could this be? We are experiencing the fourth industrial revolution. Information technology and science are rapidly advancing. Can you believe it? Five years ago, I was still using a green screen flip phone, and by 2009, we already had devices like the iPhone,” Diana protested, a typical person living in the era of the 21st-century mobile internet, where rapidly developing electronic products made her never doubt the potential of technology.
But Chen Ke lived in 2018. He had seen the later versions of the iPhone and the toothpaste-squeezing upgrades of graphics cards…
“You live in the last happy era of humanity. In 2050, humanity fell into a great perplexity. In my history textbooks, we call this period the dieval of Technology,” Xu Jing said with a smile.
Diana couldn’t argue against that and looked to Chen Ke for help. After all, Chen Ke could travel through ti, and she hoped he could visit the era Xu Jing spoke of and offer a different perspective to refute Xu Jing.
“The great perplexity…? Why do you say that?” Chen Ke asked.
“Materials science and applied physics choked humanity, and until the end, humans couldn’t make a breakthrough in batteries. We didn’t fall into crisis, but we also lost the power to move forward. It’s just like the stagnation of the first dieval period that lasted a thousand years—whether it was technology, humanities, dicine, or other aspects, it was as if everything was on pause, and humanity began to worry about trivial matters,” Xu Jing explained.
“That sounds terrible. Is that why the foundation is still using CRT monitors over a hundred years later?” Chen Ke asked.
This explanation was a stretch. By 2009, LCD monitors were already available, and at least in the era he lived in before traveling through ti, things were sowhat more advanced than what the foundation was using.
“I know you won’t believe this, but it has to do with Spiritual Energy. Did you think such a large place is powered by a generator? Besides, not everything at the foundation is this retro,” Xu Jing explained.
“You an… the Witch…” Chen Ke said.
“Not exactly… but it’s definitely not a generator. Luckily we have Spiritual Energy, otherwise the dieval era might have continued to this day. But I truly don’t know what the foundation wants with the Witches,” Xu Jing spread her hands.
“Enough already… you rambled on forever, but is there any thod to quickly find that girl nad Wang Ailin?” Lucina interrupted, having been silent for a while.
“Right, Wang Ailin is here, but how do we find her?” Diana also suddenly realized the crux of the issue.
“This is an abandoned research departnt. Normally, the foundation would block off the abandoned part with walls and let it slowly disappear within the building,” Xu Jing said.
“Slowly…?” asked Chen Ke.
“The foundation’s building isn’t a normal building; it’s also a mutated entity. If you don’t believe , you could use your Spiritual Vision to check. You probably can’t see through the walls,” Xu Jing said.
Chen Ke tried it, he glanced around, and with his blue eyes, he didn’t see anything. He then tried with the pupil of his left eye. Unnoticed if not seen, but startling at a glance, in the field of view of his left eye, the walls of the laboratory were covered with countless expressionless human faces, staring hard at them.
“So, you an to say this building is actually a living thing?” Chen Ke said.
“Exactly. The enclosed spaces will slowly vanish; I think it must be so kind of reality-distorting ability,” Xu Jing said. She noticed the red light in Chen Ke’s left eye and realized he might have seen sothing, but she didn’t ask.
“That ans we’ll have to break through the wall. But doing so will surely disturb people outside,” Diana said, as she walked to the wall and pressed her ear against it to listen to the noise outside. In Chen Ke’s eyes, she was pressing her ear against a face.
“Lucina… can you silently make a hole in the wall?” Chen Ke looked toward Lucina.
“I can make a hole, but I can’t guarantee it will be quiet,” Lucina shook her head.
“Try to be gentle, little tiger,” Diana said.
Chen Ke took out an automatic rifle, stood by the wall, and tried not to think about those faces. Pointing at a wall in front of him, he said, “Let’s do it here.”
Lucina stretched her muscles and cracked her knuckles. She touched the wall to first check what material it was.
“Concrete structure, sounds very dull when knocked. It looks like the foundation didn’t cut corners,” Lucina observed.
“Maybe there’s blood inside the walls,” Xu Jing comnted sarcastically.
Lucina snorted. Magic Power patterns climbed from her arms up to her neck, and she punched straightforwardly at the wall. A loud crack followed, and the wall was blasted open, sending bricks and rubble flying, filling the laboratory with a loud and hollow echo.
Chen Ke raised his gun, bent at the waist, and aid outside through the hole. Diana also ca up tily, illuminating the space behind the wall with fire.
Chen Ke looked for a long ti, discovering another laboratory behind the hole, with a huge flesh pit in the center.
He sensed sothing was off, took another careful look, and saw, on the far side of that laboratory, four figures also squatting by the wall, looking further inward…
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