Alien Relic Hunter

Valentina was stunned.

She clearly knew that she had only taken one step back into the fog... just one step!

Why...why is this?

He had not left the wreckage of the "Shaojiang Kai" frigate at all, but now there was nothing around the Blasphemer mecha except for the thick mist that was as thick as substance.

There are not even the fog perches that can be seen everywhere in the gray fog forest.

Originally, the forest floor was very rugged, especially near the crash site of the battleship. The turned-up soil and land showed a wave-like shape... But now the land under the blasphemer's feet is solid and flat, and it doesn't look like it has been touched at all. The appearance of impact.

The fear in Valentina's heart kept driving her, giving her the urge to manipulate the blasphemer to escape from this place, but her reason firmly suppressed this urge - she knew it very well. , if she ran around in the thick fog because of panic, then she might never be able to join Ke Lan and the others again.

"First, you have to figure out where you are..."

Valentina asked the Blasphemer mecha to kneel on one knee, put her arms forward on the ground, and dug her fingers deeply into the soil, assuming a posture similar to a sprinter's squatting start.

This position allows the body to cling to the ground stably, and it is not easy to lose balance even if it is hit by a huge force.

"I can't escape... I must control my emotions..." Valentina bit her lips tightly and kept saying to herself, "I can't let fear occupy my thinking... I need to collect more information……"

Her hands were clenched into fists, and her nails, which had become slightly longer because she had no time to trim them in the past few days, dug into the flesh of her palms through the gloves of her driving suit... After a few seconds of silence, she resolutely opened the blasphemous He jumped into the cockpit of the mecha, turned over and jumped out.

The thick gray fog immediately swallowed up Valentina's petite body. She held the outer armor of the Blasphemer mecha with one hand, and carried the emergency tool box with the other hand. She slowly groped around with the machine as the center. In a circle.

She could clearly feel that her calves were shaking and her ankles were a little weak... Even though the soles of her feet were on flat ground, she always suspected that she would lose her balance and fall to the ground in the next step.

Fear mainly comes from the unknown. The thick fog makes the visibility almost infinitely close to zero. In this environment, even if something is standing next to you, you are completely unaware of the other party's existence.

For those who have a very keen sense of danger, staying in this environment is simply a torture.

Valentina, who is good at high-speed maneuvers and close combat, is one such person. Her muscles all over her body are tense, and her fighting instinct reminds her all the time. There are always warning signs of danger in her mind. Come down.

After walking around the body, Valentina immediately squatted down. She felt that her whole body was about to collapse. The high-frequency breathing caused the white mist in the breathing mask to be covered again before it completely subsided. Going up, the vital sign monitor on her wrist kept alarming - Valentina's heart rate once exceeded 200. This heart rate is extremely abnormal in the absence of strenuous exercise.

"Huh...huh..."

Valentina got under the Blasphemer mecha, opened the emergency tool box, took out a metal cylinder completely invisible, and fixed it on the ground.

Not long after, a faint green fluorescence lit up on the top of the metal cylinder, and the surrounding thick fog that was as thick as substance was immediately dispersed.

Although the radius of the dispersion was less than one meter, it finally created a clear area in the dense fog.

"SL-S1 type fog dispeller", the prefix "SL" means that the thing was found in the ruins and is a creation of the Alpha civilization rather than an instrument produced by Ark. As for the "S" and "1" behind it, It means "small size" and "single use".

The number of this type of fog repellent is very rare. With Ke Lan's authority, he can only produce two without alerting other members of the Undead Crew Association. One is on Thirty-Three's body, and the other is left behind in Wa. In Lenina's emergency tool kit.

Compared with the fog repeller made by Ark, the "SL-S1 fog repeller" has a larger dispersion radius and stronger clearance capacity... If it is used at a depth of five hundred meters behind the red line, this fog repeller will It can even dispel gray fog within a radius of one hundred meters, but here, the diameter of the clear area is less than two meters.

The effect was reduced by a full fifty times.

Not only the dispersal range, but also the duration - at a depth of 500 meters, the "SL-S1 fog dispeller" can continue to operate for at least two hours... But the metal cylinder in front of Valentina The faint green fluorescence at the top is quickly dimming. At this rate, the fluorescence will be completely extinguished in five minutes at most.

The thick fog that was dispersed will come back immediately.

"You have to hurry up..."

Valentina immediately found a shovel specially designed for soil extraction from the emergency tool box and inserted it into the ground.

The prototype of this barrel shovel is the famous "Luoyang shovel" from the old era. The Luoyang shovel was first used by tomb robbers to determine the location and depth of ancient tombs, but later it was used more by archaeologists for shallow drilling operations. Identify soil and subterranean ruins.

From a certain perspective, tomb robbing and archaeology actually have a lot in common... As for the relic hunters on the Ark now, what they do is more inclined to tomb robbing between the two.

Valentina took several tubes of soil from different locations and depths... Soil is the only thing she can collect besides "mist" at present, and it is also the only "clue carrier" in this environment.

The soil in these tubes is very strong, with no sign of softness at all. This can basically rule out that it is the soil near the crash site of the battleship - the soil that was turned over by the shock wave will still leave obvious traces even if it is compacted again. , and the tubes of soil in front of me have obviously not been turned over for a long time.

The "Shaojiang Kai" frigate made a lot of noise when it crashed into the forest, and the shock wave spread to at least 500 meters away... In other words, Valentina's current location is 500 meters away from the crash point of the warship. distance.

"Five hundred meters..."

Valentina frowned, staring at the tubes of soil in transparent polymer containers in front of her... She remembered clearly that the edge of the thick fog was only ten meters away from the wreckage of the battleship, and the Blasphemer mecha retreated One step was about six to seven meters, and the distance between her and the wreckage of the battleship should not be more than thirty meters.

The green fluorescent indicator light on the top of the "SL-S1 Type Fog Repeller" has turned into a dim orange-red, and started to flash one after another. At the same time, the surrounding gray fog began to approach again. It was about to swallow Valentina up again.

She quickly put away the soil specimens, emergency kit, and fog repellent, and climbed back into the cockpit of the Blasphemer mecha.

The moment the cockpit hatch closed, Valentina couldn't help but let out a sigh of relief - for her, the cockpit of the mecha was her "comfort zone".

She did not choose to fully connect with the Blasphemer mecha, but only maintained a "semi-connected" state.

The so-called semi-connection means that only half of the nerve connection tentacles are connected to the driver's spinal cord. In this state, the driver can issue some simple instructions to the body through consciousness, and at the same time he loses control of the body. .

But the result of dual-tasking is that the mecha can't be controlled well, and her own body can't be controlled well - Valentina once tried to eat in a semi-connected state, but as a result, her trembling fingers directly stabbed her nose with a spoon. , rice grains smeared all over her face, and the next second the blasphemer, who was originally standing, fell to her knees, causing her, who was already very embarrassed, to bury her head directly in the dinner plate.

Fortunately, no one saw this scene except Ke Lan and Ivan, who asked Valentina to perform the "semi-connection" test. Otherwise, it could definitely be regarded as a social death.

After that, Valentina never tried a "semi-connection" again.

In order to facilitate movement, she emptied the filling fluid in the cockpit, and then sat sideways on the fleshy driver's seat awkwardly - the "semi-connected" feeling was weird, like a person who was half dreaming and half awake, and her brain was emitting Some of the instructions will be conveyed to the driver's own body, and some will be conveyed to the body connected to the driver. However, confusion often occurs during the transmission process.

For example, the pilot wanted to reach out and dig his nostrils, but the pilot's arm did not lift up. Instead, the mecha's arm directly hit the body; or the pilot wanted to control the mecha to shoot. But the mecha didn't move at all. Only the fingers of the pilot sitting inside the mecha were making the empty action of pulling the trigger.

But if you just sit quietly, there won't be much of a problem... But in this case, this "semi-connected" state has almost no practical significance.

"Play back the previous battle video." Valentina ordered the Blasphemer mecha. Soon, a battle scene with the Blasphemer mecha as the first perspective appeared on the screen, which happened to be the time when the Blasphemy was cutting off the rear. , covering the scene where Ke Lan and others retreated into the gray mist.

Valentina's pupils couldn't help but shrink.

She saw that in this picture, the land under the feet of the Blasphemer mecha was still cracked and broken, but as the mecha retreated into the gray fog, these cracked and broken land actually became blurred. .

And... there is another crucial point. Until the Blasphemer mecha retreated into the gray mist, the safety rope fastened to the back of the machine body was intact.

The safety rope was cut off after entering the gray fog...but wouldn't those biological weapons attack targets in the fog?

"What's going on...could it be teleportation?"

Only teleportation could explain why he was alone and came to a place at least five hundred meters away from the wreckage of the battleship.

"But if it was teleportation... why didn't Ze Luo sense the abnormal changes in the space? Is it because the thick fog blocked her ability to perceive, or... they were also teleported to other places?"

Valentina thought hard, but no matter which guess she made, there were reasonableness and corresponding doubts, making it impossible to judge at all.

This is a bit embarrassing for Valentina... She is just a soldier, not a decision-maker. Even after joining the Hunting God Hunting Group, what she did most was to execute the orders issued by Ke Lan. Instead of thinking about such things.

Her hands were shaking uncontrollably, and even she didn't know whether this was because of fear or the negative effects of the "semi-connected" state...or maybe both.

She has tried all the communication devices in the emergency kit, and none of them can be used in this place. As for the "SL-S1 mist repellent", the remaining energy in it can still work for about ten to fifteen seconds - Valentina regretted it. When she just collected the soil samples, she should have done "blind sampling". The big deal is to take a few more tubes of samples instead of wasting precious mist eliminator energy.

The energy of this mist repellent cannot be replenished by Ark's existing technology. It is purely a consumable and can be thrown away after use.

Without a fog repellent, you can't even see your own body when walking in the fog, let alone identify the direction and find your lost teammates.

What's even more terrible is that where Valentina is now, there is not even a fog perch that can serve as a marker. These thick fogs seem to be coming from the void... If we move forward rashly, there is a high probability that she will die. It just keeps spinning in circles.

"Dense fog... coming..."

Valentina suddenly seemed to think of something, struggled to sit up, and opened the cockpit cover of the Blasphemer mecha.

The thick gray mist suddenly poured in, occupying the cockpit that was not filled with filling fluid.

During this process, Valentina had been staring at the gray fog pouring into the cockpit - she noticed that the fog at three o'clock seemed to be pouring in the fastest.

This means that the fog is the highest in that direction.

"Three o'clock." Valentina tore off a note and stuck it at the three o'clock position in the cockpit.

The goose-yellow sticky note was quickly corroded into ashes by the gray fog, leaving only a small amount of blackened non-stick adhesive remaining on the inner wall of the cockpit.

Although it is a joke to carve a boat and seek a sword, it can also play an unexpected role in some situations.

Valentina controlled the Blasphemer mecha to inject filling fluid, "squeezing" the gray fog out of the cockpit, and then repeated this "introducing the fog into the urn" operation several times.

She finally determined the direction with the highest concentration of fog: about four degrees clockwise from three o'clock.

[P.S. Thanks to Manxiang for the 200 starting coins; thanks to book friend 20220715143208521 for the 100 starting coins. 】