Embers Ad Infinitum

When approaching the entrance of the cave, Jiang Baimian stopped, turned back to Long Yuehong, who was wearing an exoskeleton device, and said:

"You are on guard here."

She thought for a while and added:

"Look more outside the woods. If the jeep is lost, it will have nothing to do with Bai Chen and I. You will have 'enjoyment'. Many things, if done step by step, humans can accept and adapt to, but if it happens all at once Just push it to hell difficulty, and most creatures will collapse directly."

"Yes, team leader!" Regarding the fact that she could not enter Black Rat Town, Long Yuehong was not disappointed, but instead breathed a sigh of relief.

From the residents of Black Rat Town who died outside, he seemed to be able to foresee the tragic situation inside the cave. He suspected that this would have a strong impact on his spirit and leave a psychological shadow that required treatment.

After giving instructions to Long Yuehong, Jiang Baimian turned around, bent down, and walked into the cave entrance, which was almost 1.4 meters high.

Shang Jianyao and Bai Chen each held weapons and followed behind, one on the left and the other on the right. However, one's back and knees were bent more severely, making it a bit difficult to walk. The other was relatively better.

They did not observe outside first and confirm the general situation before entering as the training manual said. Instead, they fully trusted the team leader's ability to sense weak electrical signals.

In this regard, Jiang Baimian has already demonstrated sufficient credibility.

There is still light from the sky at the entrance of the cave, allowing people to barely see the surroundings clearly. The further inside, the darker it gets until you can't even see your fingers.

At this time, Jiang Baimian had taken out a flashlight with a silvery shell and an obvious grainy texture, and pushed the switch up.

A yellowish beam of light shot out, illuminating an area in front, and combined with the natural light near the entrance, Shang Jianyao initially saw what the scene in front of him looked like:

The cave is quite wide, and the deeper parts are still shrouded in darkness, with no end in sight.

There were originally many naturally formed stone pillars here, but now they have all been broken. A large number of stones, moss, and dust fell from the top of the cave and covered the surface.

The center of the ground where Jiang Baimian's flashlight shines is the origin, with traces of flames radiating outward in a circle.

In the inner pit closest to the origin, no bones could be seen that could be called intact, only countless pieces of burnt black and red meat and blood mixed among the stones and soil.

In the middle circle outside the potholes, one short corpse was lying down one after another. The surface of the body was charred and black, with many broken parts. The state of death was extremely miserable.

As Jiang Baimian's flashlight moved, Shang Jianyao saw what was happening outside the central circle and near the edge of the cave wall:

There were also corpses of residents of Black Rat Town lying on the ground in various states, but their bodies were basically intact, with only certain burn marks. In addition, some thick black hair remained.

Some of them had no obvious external injuries, while others had horrific wounds torn by bullets on their backs and chests, and many of them had no clothes.

In the cave that Shang Jianyao could see, nothing was left except porcelain bowls, pottery bowls, and clay bowls that were broken into small pieces.

No one needs to explain this scene. Both Shang Jianyao and Bai Chen instantly understood the fact:

Black Rat Town was massacred.

Jiang Baimian looked around silently, sighed and said:

"It may be a thermobaric bomb fired from a shoulder-mounted individual combat weapon...

“Those who didn’t die on the spot were all shot again.

"Very professional."

Thermobaric bombs are a combination of high-explosive bombs and fuel-air bombs. They are mainly used to kill enemies in limited spaces such as caves and underground bunkers.

After the thermobaric bomb explodes, it will deplete the surrounding oxygen, release a large amount of energy, and produce a high-speed expanding fireball. This fireball will sweep through a limited environment accompanied by a high-pressure shock wave, killing enemies and damaging equipment to the greatest extent.

For a place like Black Rat Town, where the entrance is only 1.4 meters high, it is obviously an unwise choice to rush in and fight the residents who have adapted to this environment. The best way is to directly launch thermobaric bombs and various bombs inside. .

"Not many teams have this kind of bomb, and some big forces don't have it." Bai Chen tried to calm himself down and replied simply.

Although she was an experienced former wilderness wanderer and was used to fighting and killing, this was the first time she had witnessed this kind of direct massacre of a town and a settlement.

The corpses and pieces of meat on the ground, even if they all belonged to sub-human beings, were full of unspeakable shock and horror.

No matter what, the residents of Black Rat Town are almost indistinguishable from normal humans except for their height, fingernails and body hair.

——Bai Chen has actually seen massacred settlements, but that was long after the tragedy occurred. Except for a few remaining bones and uninhabited dilapidated houses, other traces have long since disappeared.

Jiang Baimian nodded:

“Take out the flashlight and split up to look for clues.

"Maybe, maybe there are still a few survivors?"

Shang Jianyao immediately took off the flashlight and the standard "Ice Moss" pistol from his armed belt, and walked towards the edge with the light in one hand and the gun in the other.

He did not believe there would be survivors at the center of the explosion or in the surrounding area.

After checking the corpses one after another, Shang Jianyao saw a woman with her back turned to him and her body curled up.

She still had some clothes left on her, and her hands and feet were folded together, as if she was hugging something tightly and pressing it under her body.

The thick black hair on the back of this corpse was vaguely visible, and there were wounds with solidified dark red blood. It looked like someone had shot it.

Shang Jianyao, who was already bent over, squatted down and used the flashlight as a stick to turn over the body of the Black Rat Town citizen.

As the light beam swayed, Shang Jianyao saw a little girl.

She was wearing a very old but partly clean white dress. She was hugged tightly between her chest and abdomen by the adult woman. At first glance, she seemed not to be hurt at all.

Shang Jianyao put the flashlight on the ground and tried to check the little girl's condition, but he couldn't break the adult woman's hand.

After giving up this instinctive attempt, Shang Jianyao saw that the little girl's face was cyanotic, and there were traces of dark red blood flowing out from the area close to the adult woman's chest and abdomen.

He then used his fingers to test the other person's breath and feel the body temperature.

A few seconds passed, and he slowly retracted his palm.

Because the two bodies hugging each other turned over, Shang Jianyao quickly used the light of the flashlight to discover that where they originally fell, there was a depression extending deep at the junction of the cave wall and the ground. , with obvious nail dig marks remaining on it.

Seeing this depression, Shang Jianyao seemed to see the scene at that time:

During an enemy attack, a female citizen of Black Rat Town was anxiously using her mining talent to create a refuge space for her children.

Unfortunately, it wasn't faster than the bomb.

Shang Jianyao reached out and touched the depression, and found that there was a small naturally formed cavity, and there seemed to be something cold and unknown in the cavity.

He took it out and by the light of the flashlight, he found it was a rectangular black object slightly higher than his middle finger.

There is a miniature LCD-like display on the upper side of the object, a few buttons in the middle, and a speaker covered by a grid below.

Shang Jianyao studied electronics in college, so it was not difficult to identify what this tattered and old-fashioned thing was.

This is an old world voice recorder, a voice recorder that was repaired and modified by the townspeople of Black Rat Town.

Perhaps it fell into the hollow of the depression in advance, or perhaps it was quite far away from the center of the explosion and blocked by a human body, but there was no trace of damage to the electronic equipment.

Shang Jianyao squatted on one knee, studied briefly, and pressed a certain button:

Amidst the banging gunshots and various chaotic movements, a young voice asked in fear and confusion:

"Mom, mom, why do they want to kill us?"

A slightly hoarse and trembling voice replied:

"Because we are sub-human."

The childish voice asked:

"What is a sub-person?"

The slightly hoarse voice was silent for a few seconds before answering:

"That's right, someone who is sick."

The childish voice became more and more puzzled:

“But, mom, are they going to kill us just because we are sick?

"I, I can repair electronic equipment, I'm very useful..."

The banging gunshot suddenly became closer, as if it had reached the entrance of the cave, followed by the sound of something falling, and the recording stopped abruptly.

After listening in silence, Shang Jianyao turned his attention to the two corpses again:

Whether it was the adult woman or the little girl, there were no thick black hairs on the face. There were obvious signs of shaving and they looked clean.

This is the same as many female employees of "Pangu Biology".

The recording was quite loud, and Jiang Baimian, who was walking deeper, and Bai Chen on the other side, could hear it quite clearly.

They also became extremely silent. No one spoke or moved for a long time.

After a while, Jiang Baimian breathed out slowly:

"Continue to search for clues."

Shang Jianyao solemnly put the recording pen into his pocket, then took the flashlight and bent down to stand up again.

As the light beam moved, he saw some words on the cave wall.

These words belong to the Gray Language and have obviously existed for many years. Many places have long been blurred and are obviously not left behind when the citizens of Black Rat Town were attacked.

Shang Jianyao put the flashlight close to him and carefully distinguished it for about ten seconds before finally recognizing a few words:

"……A visit……"

"...Jin and...Le will never be separated..."

At this time, Jiang Baimian seemed to have seen something similar. He shook the flashlight and said with some emotion:

"It seems like this was still a tourist attraction before the destruction of the old world? Who would want to come if it's so short?"

After saying that, she stared at the rock wall for a long time.

After a while, she finally looked away, searching for possible clues.

Ten minutes later, the three of them met again in a place with natural light at the partial entrance of the cave.

Jiang Baimian said with regret:

"The people in Black Rat Town had dug two prepared escape routes before. Unfortunately, the thermobaric bombs or other similar bombs came too quickly."

"And the attacker left no clues." Bai Chen responded.

Jiang Baimian shook his head:

"It's not that I didn't stay, but that I deliberately took the time to deal with it after resolving the battle."

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