The Mysterious World Under Steampunk

"Why hire me?" Leo didn't reject the web spinners because they were non-human. After all, when he was in the Earth Federation, he cooperated with aliens countless times, and most of them were It's not a humanoid body, and he is more curious about the employment conditions proposed by the other party than the other party's alien identity.

"Clean... Li..." The web weaver struggled to say two words.

Although it was very simple, Leo already understood the meaning of the other party, but he still confirmed: "Do you want me to help you clean up those close gods?"

The Web Weaver nodded.

"What benefits do I have?" Leo asked with interest.

"Friendship...friendship..." The Web Weaver gave an answer that surprised Leo.

If it was before, Leo would definitely refuse to hire him without even thinking about it. In his opinion, the so-called friendship is too illusory compared to substantial items.

But now, Leo's mentality is different, and he looks at things from a different angle. The friendship of an ordinary person may not move his heart, but the friendship of a mysterious existence like a web weaver is extraordinary, far from money measurable.

Although the time spent with these web weavers is very short and there is very little communication, it is not difficult to see from some behavioral details of the previous web weavers that these web weavers are more like a type of artificial intelligence. Some rules and procedures operate, even if they have wisdom, but wisdom is only based on the most basic rules.

Therefore, Leo speculates that the employment conditions proposed by the web weavers are their friendship, which is equivalent to establishing a new rule on top of the underlying rules. As long as he does not break this rule, this rule should be able to bring him benefits. Less benefits.

The reason why Leo made such inferences about the behavior of the web weavers is entirely because among the alien civilizations that the Earth Federation has made friends with, there is an alien race whose behavior pattern is similar to that of the web weavers. And after this alien race and the Earth Federation concluded the alliance treaty, no matter how great dangers and disasters the Earth Federation encountered, they never abandoned the alliance treaty until the Earth Federation did some stupid things and broke the alliance treaty themselves. This made him cancel his alliance with the Earth Federation.

"Is it your friendship, or the friendship of the web weaver?" Leo asked again without rushing to answer.

The weaver of the web said slowly: "I...weaver...net..., weaver...net...I..."

"Psychic symbiosis!" Hearing this, a name immediately appeared in Leo's mind.

From the words of the web weaver, it is not difficult to hear that all the web weavers are a whole, there is no individual, and Leo has established a friendship with a web weaver, which is equivalent to establishing a friendship with all the web weavers.

This kind of situation where the individual is the whole and the whole is the individual can only be seen in the psychic symbiosis, but it is still a psychic symbiosis that has completed evolution and reached a higher life form.

When Leo was in the Earth Alliance, he had never seen this kind of psionic symbiosis, but he had heard rumors of this kind of symbiosis, and knew that each child of this kind of symbiosis existed independently. They have the wisdom and emotions of ordinary people, but they are a whole, just like the blood cells of the human body. And what's even more amazing is that when the parent body of the psychic symbiosis falls in a battle or disaster, one of the countless daughters will automatically evolve into the mother body, which makes the psychic symbiosis have as many daughters as it has. A chance for rebirth.

It's just that this also made Leo feel puzzled. In his opinion, the dangerous existence of those spying on asylum seekers should be easily solved by the web spinner, just like the net spinner just approached the children of the swamp, and the children of the swamp immediately fell into desolation And escaped. Whether it is by relying on the strength of the few web weavers in front of them, or by allowing some descendants of the web weavers to descend from the world web, they can easily solve the problem without hiring him as an outsider.

But now the Weaver of the Web asked him for help very abruptly, and at the expense of the Weaver's friendship, hired him to clean up the dangerous existences such as family members who were close to these refugees, which was really unreasonable.

"Unless there are restrictions on them?" Leo couldn't help guessing in his heart.

This is the only answer that Leo can think of. He remembers that it is recorded in an ancient religious book in Rembrandt’s old man’s study that explains the god’s descending ceremony. God’s descending into the real world requires many complicated conditions, and will be limited by the world itself. Make things beyond the limits of the world.

Leo doesn't know whether the content written in this book is true or not, but if it is assumed that the content is true and the web weaver is really the psionic symbiote that Leo guessed, then hire him to clean up the surrounding threats This thing also makes sense.

Because no matter how perfect independent intelligence the daughter of the psionic symbiosis possesses, it is still a part of the mother body, just like Leo's sub-brain is always a part of Leo no matter how high the intelligence is, so the present The Weaver of the Web can also be equated to the great existence above the world's great web, and after such a great existence comes to this world, it will naturally be rejected and suppressed by the world.

Thinking of this, Leo also made a decision, nodded and agreed: "I accept your employment."

Hearing Leo's answer, a smile appeared on the Web Weaver's face. Although his smile looked stiff in normal vision and hideous in spiritual vision, Leo felt a kind of sincerity. Inexplicable emotion.

Now that the employment agreement has been reached, Leo naturally has to fulfill his employment responsibilities. In the following time, he opened his mental net from time to time to perceive everything around him. To infiltrate the camp from elsewhere.

Although Leo discovered these Swamp Children in advance, he couldn't completely eliminate them, because these Swamp Children's ability to hide and escape is really strong, and they are also very familiar with the surrounding terrain, coupled with their extremely cautious personality, making them When Leo was about to go up, he was spotted immediately, and then fled away, and he would appear from another place after a while.

This kind of harassing warfare may be useful to ordinary people, but it is not applicable to Leo. Whether it is the combat skills of the cyborg period or the psionic power he possesses now, it can help him to keep fighting for a few days or even dozens of days. To stay in the fighting state, there is no need to sleep to relieve mental and physical exhaustion.

At this moment, Leo missed his king and queen very much. If he had those two psychic weapons in his hands, there was no need for him to get up and approach them. He could just find a resting place with a wide view and shoot.

The refugees and hunters in the camp were unaware of the danger hidden in the darkness. They spent the night peacefully in the uncomfortable tents and by the campfire. The long snowstorm also stopped, and the camp became noisy again.

One by one, the refugees got out of the tents and kept moving their bodies to relieve the cold on their bodies. Afterwards, under the command of the hunters, everyone began to pack up the tents and various items. Although it was a bit chaotic at first, it quickly become orderly.

However, this busy and peaceful scene was quickly destroyed by bursts of noise. The crowd gathered towards several different camps. After a while, one or two corpses were seen carried out from each tent. , placed in the open space in front of the tent.

These corpses are all old people, without any pain on their bodies, and their expressions are very peaceful, obviously they died in their sleep. The ups and downs of survival experience during this period, the hope of leaving Miria City, the hardships of walking on the mountain road, etc., all gathered together at the first time, and the strong people are fine, they will be affected but not Fatal, but for those old people who have already reached their physical limit, this effect is enough to be fatal.

In fact, this situation was already expected before the departure yesterday. The leaders elected by Barak and some other asylum seekers persuaded the old people to stay in the village, but in the end they did not stop them from fleeing the village. Lia City's determination.

The old man's death made the atmosphere of the camp a bit depressed, especially the remaining dozen or so old people seemed lifeless, completely different from when they camped yesterday.

Although some people died, this did not affect the progress of the team's assembly. Barak divided several people to find a suitable place, piled up the corpses of the old people, and then covered them with a layer of stones. Joint burial.

After all the luggage was packed and everyone was about to set off, I don’t know who initiated it first. Everyone picked up a small stone and put it on the graves of the old people who died, gradually thickening the graves of the old people. several copies.

Seeing this scene, Leo didn't have much emotion. After all, he has experienced too many wars in the Earth Federation, and all kinds of solemn funerals have become numb. The behavior was so novel that they also tried to pick up a stone and put it on the grave, but this behavior did not bring them the expected feeling, making their eyes full of doubts.

As everyone put their minds on the road, the depressed atmosphere that had been generated before gradually dissipated. Because the wind and snow stopped, the speed of the team was much faster than yesterday, and because there was no wind and snow to block, the mountains in the distance It is also clearer that everyone can feel that the distance is shortening a little bit with their pace, which also makes them feel a lot more optimistic.

Compared to the asylum seekers who were busy on their way, the hunters who were working as guards around them were obviously busy and nervous. Because they found some very weird footprints in the snow more than once. These footprints are neither human beings nor beasts. These strange footprints that have never been seen have made many people think about the Dibia Mountains. Monster anecdote.

There are rumors of monsters living in the Dibia Mountains in almost all the villages around the mountains. Many people have even seen those monsters in the forest or in the deep mountains. Some of the lucky ones even picked up some monsters left behind. The items that came down included some weird stone statues that looked like sculptures, and some monster bones. No matter what kind of thing it is, it can cause a lot of commotion among the wealthy merchants in Miria City, and it has become a favorite collection of these wealthy merchants.

Finding monster tracks is only a good thing for adventurers and treasure hunters who hope to make a fortune. For hunters who live in the Dibia Mountains all year round, the appearance of monster tracks often represents died and disappeared.

"Head, we should make some preparations. These footprints should be left by those cannibals." One of the old hunters, who had encountered monsters more than once, stood in front of some footprints, gestured at the size and shape of the footprints , and said to Barak who was standing beside him with some doubts: "However, I don't understand. According to the character of these guys, they should have attacked last night?"

Barak also looked at the footprints in front of him with a serious face. He didn't know if it was because of luck. He had never encountered any monsters in the Dibia Mountains since he was a child, even when he crossed the secret road in the canyon alone. In the Dibia Mountains, he did not encounter any monsters.

Although he has never seen a monster with his own eyes, it does not mean that he does not believe that there are monsters in the Dibia Mountains. Just like most other mountain dwellers and hunter villages in the Dibia Mountains, their villages are also the same. They believed that monsters really existed in the deep mountains, and they were even more sure that these monsters were not all ferocious. Among them were monsters that preyed on people, and some monsters that exchanged precious items with villagers for items.

The monsters that left these footprints in the snow now can be said to be regular visitors to Barak Village, and they are also the monsters that the hunters in the village hate the most. The hunters in the village have formed mountain search teams more than once to try to encircle and suppress these monsters, but in the end they failed. After success, he was even attacked by monsters once, killing more than a dozen people.

It's just that these monsters haven't appeared around the village in the past one or two years, and Barak has gone into the depths of the mountains alone many times, and he hasn't found any traces of monsters, so he thinks these monsters have moved to other places.

Unexpectedly, these monsters reappeared now, and they seemed to have taken their group as prey, which made Barak feel a little headache.

"Can you tell how many there are?" Barack asked the old hunter.

The old hunter replied very positively: "There should be about seven or eight, and no more than thirteen at most."

"It's good to have only this amount." Hearing this amount, Barak couldn't help but heaved a sigh of relief.

But the old hunter's words lifted his heart that had just let go.

The old hunter said seriously: "I'm just worried that they are just outposts."

The surrounding atmosphere also became a little tense with these words, and at the same time, the faces of other hunters showed a little flustered expression.

"What should we do now?" The old hunter felt that the atmosphere around him was not very good, so he asked directly, hoping to get Barack to come up with a countermeasure to stabilize everyone's emotions.

This is not the first time that Barack and the old hunter have cooperated. He easily understood the meaning of the other party, thought for a while, and said: "Don't spread the news, strengthen the defense, everyone is not allowed to act alone, the other few Guests should focus on protecting them and not let them have any accidents."