Chapter 632 Assimilation Fighter? (1/2)

A dark underground tunnel.

After being knocked unconscious, the three newbies were dragged here by a group of slime mold fruiting bodies, and then moved to a claustrophobic room.

This seems to be somewhere in the underground transportation network of Qingquan City, but it has been transformed beyond recognition by plaque, and it is impossible to tell where it is.

The player who woke up first shook his head and put his hands on the ground. He felt his hands were sticky and was startled when he opened his eyes.

I saw a scarlet red surrounding, and the stirring carpet was like fresh meat, exuding an unsettling stench.

The big pig's trotters looked around blankly, and it took a long time to hold back a sentence.

"What the hell? What the hell is this place?"

Why was it that after being offline for a while, I even moved my position when I came back online?

At this time, another man and woman who had been kidnapped also woke up and were trembling with fear when they saw the situation around them.

Hungry force: "I giao... we won't be swallowed by slime mold, right?"

Bowing to the hungry forces: "Wake up, how can you swallow such a big lump if you don't chew it to bits?"

Hungry force: "...?"

Bow to the hungry forces: "I was wrong."

At this moment, a strange figure appeared in the dark entrance ahead.

It was as tall as two people and its burly body almost occupied the entire passage. There were only abstract features on its face. Its upper body was burly and strong, and its lower body had a stretched skirt, with cilia like octopus tentacles rolling around the edges.

It is somewhat similar to Xiao Yu when she was still a mother, but it is obviously larger and has fewer human elements.

The three of them were all startled by the abstract appearance of this guy, and backed away with expressions on their faces that they had seen a ghost.

Unfortunately, this was a dead end. There was a wall behind them and there was no room to move.

Seeing the guy slowly moving his tentacles in front of him, cold sweat broke out on his forehead, he swallowed, raised his neck and breathed hard.

"Gu...just kill me, I won't say anything!"

It is said that she has wanted to try this line for a long time, and the key is that they, the newbies, don’t know anything about it.

I don't know if he understood her words or just heard her voice. The alien turned its abstract facial features towards her, and the hem of the skirt that was sticking to the ground suddenly opened a seam.

Just when everyone was wondering what it was going to do, countless tentacles rushed out from the gap and instantly pulled her into the open bloody mouth.

He didn't even have time to scream "Wu Ka", and the hungry force that was still stubborn a second ago disappeared in the closed "mouth".

The stretched skirt moved up and down, as if chewing carefully.

Seeing his partner being eaten by the monster in front of him, Xiang Xian bowed his head to the hungry forces and after a brief daze, let out a hoarse scream.

"Wife!! I will fight with you!"

After saying that, he struggled to stand up and rushed towards the monster who was two people tall with his fists.

However, his fate was no different from previous players.

Before he could take two steps, he was tripped by a tentacle that slipped out from under his skirt. Like a mosquito landing in front of a frog, he was licked into the bloody mouth without any suspense. .

A pair of dogs and a man died.

Thea, who had a full meal, swayed the tentacles under her body and slapped the ground happily, as if she was chewing the steak she had swallowed in her mouth.

It's just that the abstract facial features still have a trace of confusion, as if they are wondering about something.

Looking at the scarlet skirt that was constantly beating, Big Pig Trotter's nervous face turned pale, and he rolled his eyes in desperation.

"Brother! Don't eat me, I don't taste good...I, I, I surrender! Do you need a translator? I'll be your second-in-command!"

I heard that this game has a lot of freedom.

What if it happens?

Thea turned her abstract facial features to him, and after some thought, she suddenly opened the hem of her skirt that was close to the ground again without any warning.

Looking at the clothes falling out of it and the tentacles rolling like a meat grinder, Big Pig Trotters had a premonition of his own end, and his expression suddenly changed.

This is damning no matter what!

"I--"

Before he could even curse the dog mastermind, the bloody mouth swallowed him up. Without even a chance to resist, his remaining consciousness merged into the sea of ​​scarlet blood.

Feeling the breath of life melting into her body, Thea chewed quietly for a while, and the confusion on her face gradually turned into incomprehensible anguish.

"strangeness……"

As if aware of the child's confusion, the mother's voice appeared quietly in its hazy sea of ​​consciousness.

"What's wrong? My child."

Facing the empty scarlet wall and the indigestible impurities left at her feet, Thea murmured silently.

"They are empty."

Those guys are an empty shell.

And it is even more pure and empty shell than simple organisms such as cockroaches and mice, like a blank piece of paper without any information.

This is the first time since its birth that it has seen such a strange creature.

This kind of thing cannot be assimilated, or even if it is assimilated, it has no meaning. They are just a walking zombie.

It cannot understand what kind of existence they are.

Are they, like their mother's "fruiting bodies", puppets controlled by a consciousness outside the body?

But they have shown strong autonomy.

Xia's face was filled with confusion.

Could it be that...

These humans also have a mother nest?

...

"They are assimilated aliens."

Shelter 404, B4 floor browsing room.

Sitting on the sofa, Heya briefly described to Chu Guang and Yin Fang the preliminary test results of the Union Biological Research Institute on the two fruiting body samples.

Hearing the unexpected and interesting statement, Yin Fang put down the coffee cup in his hand and raised his eyebrows with interest.

"Assimilation?"

Heya nodded seriously and continued.

"That's right...the slime mold collected their DNA data, and while absorbing their organic matter, it retained a part of the neural tissue that originally belonged to those creatures."

After a pause, she continued.

"You still remember Bachi, right? He's the guy parasitized by slime mold. He has similar situations to those special fruiting bodies, except that the slime mold in Qingquan City is obviously more aggressive than that in Yongdong City. The slime mold here is more thorough in assimilation, turning most of the captured organisms into parts of its own body, and only retaining a small part of the host's brain tissue."

In a sense, this is actually an improvement for the mutant slime mold in Qingquan City.

It's like going from the Stone Age to the Bronze Age.

In addition to making weapons out of the bones of their prey, they also learned to domesticate them on this basis - that is, to train their prey into "combat servitors" that obey them.

Yin Fang pinched his chin and fell into deep thought.

Chu Guang, who had been silent, coughed lightly.

"Can you change the way I understand it?"

Heya explained patiently.

"In short, they have made improvements based on unified consciousness. In the past, both the gnawers and the crawlers hunted under the guidance of the mother nest, but now some special fruiting bodies have retained their combat experience before assimilation, and can use the stronger flesh given to them by the slime mold to hunt in the original way." Yin Fang interrupted. "It is equivalent to a combat robot with an intellectual plug-in installed and not controlled by a cloud server." Heya snapped her fingers. "That's right!" Chu Guang touched his chin and thought. "What does this mean?" Yin Fang analyzed according to his own understanding. "The meaning is that the mother nest can allocate more of the hive's 'computing resources' to strategic-level command, while some higher-level fruiting bodies and evolutions can make tactical decisions based on experience. Even if their tactics may not be brilliant, they will be more flexible and changeable than before... Am I right?" Heya smiled and nodded. "Yes, that's it!" Yin Fang took a sip of the coffee cup and sighed. "It has evolved to this point in just one year... The speed of evolution of this thing is too exaggerated." Heya shook her head. "It's not a year. Evolution is a long process. They have been learning from us, whether it is our tools or our society... I am more inclined to believe that the emergence of the Alliance has accelerated their evolution to a certain extent, but the factor that really prompted them to achieve a qualitative change from quantitative change is their long-term observation of us." The spore cloud is spread all over Qingquan City. In theory, the mother body in the city center can indeed see them. Just as the Alliance's Biological Research Institute has been looking for a way to solve the mother nest, that guy must also be tirelessly looking for a solution to the disintegration of human society. Perhaps it would be a better way to eradicate them in the early days of the Wasteland Era. The slime mold at that time would not be as difficult to deal with as it is now. But these are all later stories. People at that time also had their own troubles. It was not easy to survive in the severe cold of dozens of degrees below zero, let alone fighting an unprepared battle against an unknown enemy. "Actually... compared to what you said, I am more worried about another thing." Seeing the two people looking at him, Chu Guang paused and slowly continued. "They gradually learned to hide themselves in the process of evolution. While testing us, they consciously prevented us from obtaining their remains." "They seem to understand us more and more." ... "Wasteland OL" official website. Unlike the solemn atmosphere in the browsing room, the forum is bustling at this moment. Since the release of the new expansion pack, players have been looking forward to what new work the dog planner will come up with, and this time it really did not disappoint. The original wave was a group of fruiting bodies rushing up A, but now this group of fruiting bodies not only know how to move, but also played a wave of jaw-dropping cooperation, and even kidnapped three little newbies under the nose of Brother Fountain. This is something no one expected. Quit Smoking: "Awesome!"

Battlefield Atmosphere Group: "Even the dog spring water was defeated, unscientific! (funny)"

Spring Water Commander: "Get lost, how could I be defeated? Picking up a corpse is already a great achievement, okay!"

Irena: "Speaking of which, what about the remaining corpses? Isn't there a monster? (curious)"

Spring Water Commander: "After the fog dissipated, it disappeared. It was probably either dragged away for recycling or eaten on the spot."

Fang Chang: "It's okay if it was eaten..."

Ye Shi: "Hiss... This new mother body feels a bit special."

Makabazi: "Speaking of the brothers who were kidnapped by those fruiting bodies? Haven't they come down yet?"

Big Pig Trotter: "That's me... I might have seen the mother's body!"

Upon hearing these words, the players squatting in the post instantly became excited.

Quit smoking: "Holy shit! Is this real or fake?"

Elf King Fugui: "Tell me what that thing looks like, brother. (Funny)"

Big Pig Hoof: "I don't know how to describe it. It's a bit like Xiao Yu's appearance before...it's a bit bigger and uglier."

Although he has never seen Xiaoyu in the game, there are always photos of Xiaoyu posted by other players on the forum.

Comparing those photos, Xiaoyu still bears some resemblance to it, except that the contours of his facial features and body are smoother, and the color is more pink.

An inappropriate but vivid metaphor is that the mother body called Thea is more like a shark with its mouth wide open, the kind that can scare children into tears. Xiaoyu is more like a dolphin. Although it has a ferocious side, it is closer to human aesthetics.

Commander Quanshui: "Do you remember where you saw that guy?"

Big Pig Trotter: "I don't know...but I feel like it's somewhere underground. It's very similar to a subway station."

Edge of water: "Subway station... this target is too broad."

Commander Quanshui: "But no matter what, I can confirm that this time the mother's nest and the incubation room are hidden underground... Damn it, no wonder it's something we haven't seen before."

Fang Chang: " x-on:Big pig's trotters, that mother finally ate you all?"

He bowed his head like a hungry man: "Yes, it swallowed my wife in one bite...and in front of me, woo woo woo."

Hungry force: "Tsk, you guy, don't say so weird, okay! (angry)"

He bowed his head like a hungry force: "I was wrong."

Big pig's trotters: "..."

Commander Quanshui: "Then what? Don't you find anything else? Anything is fine."

Hungry force: "Well, I feel... it seems to be responding to our voices."

Commander of Fountain: "Voice?"

Hungry force: "At first it seemed to be planning to eat my partner first, but as soon as I opened my mouth to speak, it swallowed me first... I always felt that it didn't understand what I said, after all. I don’t know Renlian either.”

Like a hungry force, he lowered his head and said: "Hey... I also remembered when you said that. I was the second one to say anything, and then I was eaten right after you."

Hungry force: "So this alien species relies on sound to hunt?"

Commander Quanshui: "No, I think there is another possibility. It mistook you for a human giving orders...like the alpha wolf among the wolves."

Hungry force: "Huh? Do I still have this ability?"

Like a hungry force, he bowed his head and said, "What the hell? Is my partner capable of this?"

Commander Quanshui: "Then I don't know, but maybe that's how it looks from its perspective. After all, most mammals rely on vocal cords to transmit information. Maybe the mother's nest understands the sound as a Maybe a biological pheromone.”

Big Pig Trotter: "Speaking of which, I also discovered an unusual place. I don't know if it's a clue... the guy who seemed to be the mother's body seemed to be very surprised after taking those two bites."

Commander Quan Shui: "Surprised?"

Big Pig Trotter: "Yes, it feels like eating the wrong thing... I looked at it and savored it for a long time before vomiting out the clothes and shoes."

Fang Chang: "It's interesting."

Quit smoking: "Uh, what do you mean?"

Fang Chang: "...Do you think there is a possibility that in the cognition of slime mold, other organisms are 'mushrooms' with autonomous consciousness, and the clone we used happens to not have autonomous consciousness, so it is Puzzling where our sense of autonomy comes from.”

Commander Quan Shui: "It seems we thought of going together."

Fang Chang: "However, if my inference is correct, I am afraid that this mother body is different from all the mother bodies we have encountered before. It does not simply eat its prey, but selects some of them and assimilates them into itself." people'."

While everyone was discussing, an announcement suddenly popped up from the official website.

["The Wave Returns" expansion pack update: Added the concept of "assimilated body"]

[According to the findings of the Alliance Research Institute, "Thea" will consciously capture organisms that invade the territory, assimilate them into part of the group, retain their aggression and part of their self-awareness, and at the same time forcefully implant biological prosthetics to transform them. 】

[Currently known "assimilations":

1. Bacteria-eating monster: It has similar power to a monster. Its recovery and defense are enhanced by the biological prosthesis constructed by slime mold. Its individual combat effectiveness will be more powerful than that of a monster.

2. Bacteriophage Death Claw: It possesses the speed and agility of the Death Claw, and on this basis has enhanced resilience and damage resistance. No samples have been collected yet, and qualitative biological analysis cannot be done. We can only speculate based on combat images. , which has combat effectiveness comparable to that of evolved bodies.

3. Bacteriophage Explosives: A slime mold fruiting body that is suspected of being secondary assimilated. No biological prototype has been found in the ecological environment around Qingquan City. Its ability is presumed to be to actively detonate itself and release corrosive poisonous mist, which will be destroyed by other fruiting bodies. It is thrown as a projectile.

…

】

Quit smoking: “Holy shit!”

Big-eyed debtor: "6666! We just talked about assimilation and updated the settings of the assimilation body!"

Ye Shi: "Brother Guang plagiarized the forum for real! (Funny)"

Fang Chang: "But this server announcement proves that our idea is correct. There are two pieces of information that can be extracted. First, Thea has the characteristics of an 'assimilation fighter', which will transform some prey to use their combat experience. , is better at micro-management than the mother body in the previous wave. Secondly, it is focusing on what is different about us, and is consciously studying us and learning from us... but due to its limited knowledge, it may not understand us. There were some deviations.”

Commander Quanshui: "These two clues are crucial! Since our opponents are no longer the group of idiots in the last wave, the form of the wave has probably undergone fundamental changes. It is very dangerous to use the original ideas to formulate tactics. of."

Edge of Water: "You mean, they might not play according to the routine? Bypassing our defense line in the northern suburbs?"

Commander Quanshui: "This is very likely. The experience of measuring the attack direction of slime mold through the concentration of spore clouds is very likely to be invalid in this battle!"

Commander Quanshui: "I even think that the wave has already started, but they are taking advantage of the inertia of our understanding of them to stay put and deliberately follow the schedule we expected. After two weeks, they only need to send a large number of cannon fodder, Just like the last wave, it rushes towards our position, and then sends a small group of elite troops around to the flank where our defense strength is the most empty, and can eat up our entire defense line in one go!"

Luo Yu: "Should I blanch it?! Do slime molds still have this kind of arrogance?"

Construction site boy and Brick: "Well, you don't think too much..."

Commander of the Spring Water: "I heard that slime mold can plan the shortest path to food based on its location. The mutant slime mold we are facing is obviously much smarter than the real slime mold. I have reason to believe this. Guys can do this."

Fang Chang: "I agree. Anything can happen on the battlefield. My opinion is the same as yours. If you underestimate the enemy, you will suffer a big loss."

Midnight Killing Chicken: "It's too troublesome. Do you two have any plans?"

Fang Chang: "After hearing what happened to the two cute guys, I have an idea."

Edge of water: "What do you think?"

Fang Chang: "As we all know, a guy who is a little smart but not smart enough is easier to deceive than a fool who doesn't understand anything. This time the matrix is ​​smarter and more difficult to deal with than before, but we can also take advantage of this in turn. "

Edge paddling: "How to use this?"

Fang Chang: "It's very simple. The idea is the same as the intelligence war during World War II. Since they understand us as 'a group of organisms that rely on sound waves as pheromones to transmit information,' then we only need to forge a 'brother's nest that gives orders.' Just show it our 'flaws'!"