EDEH Chapter 117

The old general was most composed, asking: “Is there more?”

 

Sang Jue answered: “No more.”

 

Everyone had different expressions, trying their best to ignore their unease about Sang Jue and think about what was underground.

 

“Is it all caves underground?” someone speculated. “Too winding so they got lost?”

 

“Unlikely. General Huo definitely instructed everyone to stay close to the team before departing. At most one or two people might fall behind—having a thousand-person team all scattered seems too exaggerated?”

 

Soon, Liao Te brought Sang Jue’s backpack.

 

The backpack had previously fallen at the outer perimeter of the fallen manor. Though damaged, the dirt had been cleaned off. Only the diary inside had some indelible stains, but it didn’t affect reading.

 

Huo Yanji handed the diary to nearby Ling Gen, who took it confusedly and read a couple lines: “‘Ivan’s Bored-to-Death Underground Work Diary,’ balls are indeed a bit sore, probably because I changed underwear today… what the hell?”

 

“This diary was picked up when searching for exits in Rift No. 2 last time. It’s handwritten by the first batch of workers who went down into the rifts over a hundred years ago.” Huo Yanji gestured with his chin: “Keep reading.”

 

Ling Gen patiently read two more pages, his expression gradually becoming grave. He immediately spread the diary on the projection device, displaying the diary’s contents clearly on the big screen for everyone to see.

 

They frowned and watched with complete bewilderment.

 

Sang Jue and Huo Yanji, having already read it once, weren’t interested. The former was checking his backpack. The game console Old Karl had given him was broken, the screen cracked like a spider web and wouldn’t turn on.

 

The game console was quite old—calling it an antique wasn’t excessive. Having lasted until today was already impressive; breaking was normal.

 

Besides that, everything else was still there: Wuke’s diary, Huo Yanji’s shirt and belt, with clear bite marks still imprinted on the belt.

 

Sang Jue rolled up the clothes and belt and put them back, pursed his lips, and stubbornly tapped the game console again, trying to make it light up.

 

A broad palm reached over, grabbing Sang Jue’s stubborn tapping hand: “Stop tapping. I’ll have someone try to fix it tomorrow, okay?”

 

Sang Jue didn’t actually want to play the games inside much. After all, he’d experienced all kinds of games from the technological era over a hundred years ago. This old game console was just for novelty.

 

Sang Jue let Huo Yanji hold his wrist, saying sullenly: “This was the first gift I received from a friend.”

 

“Shouldn’t the first one be from me?” Huo Yanji reminded: “The communicator.”

 

“That was to track me, doesn’t count as a gift.” Sang Jue mumbled: “Besides, you’re my wife, not a friend.”

 

Hearing this, the high-ranking officials studying the diary contents on the big screen all turned their heads in unison, made eye contact with the expressionless Huo Yanji for a few seconds, then turned back to continue reading.

 

Sang Jue muttered: “You only said I couldn’t call you Ji Ji outside, didn’t say I couldn’t call you wife.”

 

Huo Yanji: “…”

 

The little evil dragon was doing it on purpose.

 

Huo Yanji was everyone’s general, but also the dragon’s wife. Evil dragons were possessive too—he didn’t want to share Huo Yanji with humans.

 

Though monopolizing wasn’t realistic, Huo Yanji could only be his wife alone.

 

He wanted everyone to know.

 

This way Ji Ji couldn’t escape from him.

 

As the diary pages turned, everyone’s expressions gradually shifted from grave to uncomfortable dread. How similar were the diary’s contents to the audio Huo Jiangmian had sent back?

 

What unknown thing was hidden in the deepest part of the rift?

 

“Wait, turn back to that page and look again.”

 

[Ten days now, they haven’t returned. Only transmitted sound waves once in between. Dr. Luce said Lair disappeared, silently, but they found no monsters.

 

No, there was one monster, one he’d never seen before, beyond existing knowledge. It wasn’t bound by flesh and blood, standing quietly in the darkness, watching them.

 

It kept following them.]

 

An officer rubbed the goosebumps on his arms: “Here, if the ‘monster’ Dr. Luce mentioned came to the surface…”

 

“Don’t forget, this is a diary from over a hundred years ago.” The old general was more composed, his aged voice containing rationality: “Our current contaminated creature catalog has an entire volume more than a hundred years ago.”

 

Huo Yanji directly revealed: “What Dr. Luce saw were humanoid creatures.”

 

The horror immediately dissipated by more than half.

 

Humans always feared unknown, uncontrollable existences, but once they discovered such existences were within solvable range, fear would largely disappear.

 

Huo Yanji looked down, not telling them the true nature of these “humanoid creatures.”

 

Turn two more pages and they’d see.

 

[They’re back again, hahahahahaha no no, they’re back again…]

 

[Though they’ve changed appearance, I can still recognize which of my colleagues they each represent, from height, from form. Luce, I’d recognize you even if you turned to ash.]

 

The cold light from the big screen illuminated everyone’s shocked expressions. They stood stunned for a long while before someone slowly spoke: “So… the original humanoid creatures were Dr. Luce’s group who went down?”

 

“The monster Dr. Luce initially saw underground was his colleagues who got separated at first?”

 

Huo Yanji said nothing, but his silence had already confirmed the truth.

 

“No wonder… no wonder there were no records of humanoid creatures before the meteor season…”

 

For nearly ninety years, people had made many speculations about humanoid creatures.

 

Some guessed they were special monsters exclusive to underground areas, others guessed they were alien substances brought by the ‘meteor shower.’ Most people speculated the latter, since no one wanted to admit their home planet harbored such terrifying existences underground.

 

“If that’s the case, then the theory that humans were abandoned by the ‘new world’ and couldn’t be contaminated doesn’t hold up.” A voice suddenly came from the doorway—it was Hill with her golden hair pinned up, someone Huo Yanji had summoned.

 

Huo Yanji’s goals differed from others. Since people had already been sent into the rift, others might want them to return safely or produce more powerful beings like Huo Feng, but Huo Yanji’s first reaction to guessing ‘Dawn Plan 2′ would restart was to use the opportunity to clarify the truth about the rift’s depths.

 

But he couldn’t do this alone—he needed researchers’ help.

 

Besides Hill, there was also the first person Sang Jue had met when entering the main city hospital—the briefly encountered Dr. Eugene.

 

Seeing them again after months apart, Sang Jue felt a strange sensation.

 

After a long while, he touched his heart. Perhaps this was humans’ melancholic feeling about time’s passage.

 

Though Sang Jue himself wasn’t bound by time, time was the murderer that killed those he loved.

 

He could never get revenge.

 

Others were stunned for a second, then realized what Dr. Hill meant.

 

“You mean we can view the humanoid creature phenomenon as infection?”

 

“Without other theoretical evidence for now, we can understand it that way.” Eugene held the same view as Hill: “This diary records things very subjectively. From the text, this Ivan’s mental state was already abnormal then. It’s not strange he’d ask questions like ‘did my colleagues become them, or did they become my colleagues?’ His scientific faith had been completely shattered.”

 

“Without knowing more truth, we can simply understand it as infection, just like those contaminated creatures outside and humans infected by monsters.”

 

Everyone unconsciously breathed a sigh of relief.

 

Writing had always been one of the most infectious manifestations of human civilization. Reading Ivan’s descriptions, people with weaker minds would inevitably waver and feel terror.

 

But with Hill’s explanation, that spine-tingling feeling disappeared.

 

“That is to say, there should be a substance in the depths underground. Unlike the ‘contamination’ permeating the air, it can infect humans and might even be tangible.”

 

“But from current observation, this existence isn’t something we can stop or control…”

 

The diary turned another two pages. Everyone’s eyes swept over line after line of text, then fell silent in unison.

 

At that time, unable to bear the darkness and mental torment from humanoid creatures, Ivan put on protective gear and went to the meteor season surface.

 

Though everyone present knew that during the meteor season, human elites led by the council had abandoned billions of compatriots, most hadn’t seen footage from that time.

 

So while knowing the abandoned humans’ fate was definitely tragic, they couldn’t specifically imagine how tragic.

 

Ivan’s written descriptions gave them specific imaginative space.

 

Festering sores covering the entire body, softened bones, half a body fused with the ground… soft, powerless arms unable to self-terminate, only able to wait for death during the long melting process.

 

Limbs stretched long and thin, muscles and fat disappearing, leaving only a thin layer of skin wrapped around bones, backs arched, eyeballs protruding, faces horrifying.

 

Most terrifying was that they all retained consciousness.

 

These abandoned people struggled between life and death, wails filling the fields. In the thick fog, radiation-mutated humans would occasionally emerge. They didn’t want food, drink, or supplies—only begged for a bullet.

 

Please… kill me.

 

…

 

Several officers clenched their fists and turned away unable to watch.

 

The two doctors who hadn’t experienced much battlefield stood calmly aside, hands in pockets.

 

Huo Yanji said: “After seeing this scene, Ivan believed humanoid creatures contaminating humans was actually saving compatriots, achieving symbiotic immortality.”

 

“…”

 

If this viewpoint had been raised ten minutes earlier, it would have faced a barrage of criticism.

 

But seeing the horrific suffering of those abandoned on the surface during meteor season, hearts inevitably wavered… for those victims, being contaminated was indeed like a blessing.

 

Hill sighed softly: “Everyone needn’t be too conflicted about humanoid creatures’ purposes. Whether salvation or persecution doesn’t matter… As Ivan finally said, all non-human species are monsters.”

 

Humans had always been arrogant, never able to coexist equally with any other beings.

 

Ling Gen exhaled deeply: “Back then, if General Huo had just told us about his underground experiences…”

 

This General Huo naturally didn’t refer to Huo Jiangmian, but to Huo Feng who had crawled out from underground decades ago.

 

Huo Yanji hinted: “Turn to the back of the diary—there’s writing left by Huo Feng.”

 

Ling Gen immediately flipped through pages while unable to help refuting: “How could there be General Huo’s writing in this—”

 

His voice cut off abruptly… there really was.

 

[…Maybe thirty years ago, after experiencing everything underground, the ‘me’ who crawled out of the rift wasn’t really me. Was it a monster wearing my human skin coming to the human world to play games, or did I become a monster’s believer?

 

I don’t know, I often can’t recognize myself.

 

…

 

Maybe all this is just my own fantasy, maybe I’ve always been there, never escaped.

 

…

 

I’m back… I want to see Him again, may He grant me eternal rest.]

 

Ling Gen murmured: “That rumor was true?”

 

Huo Yanji looked up sharply and asked: “What rumor?”

 

Everyone looked at Ling Gen, listening to his explanation.

 

Ling Gen frowned deeply: “Over ten years ago, I eliminated a cult in the lower districts, mostly low-level deviants who used General Huo’s name to spread bad ideas… even more ridiculous than rebels. Basically saying everything humanity has experienced is God’s will, that humans should obediently accept divine slumber, or face more suffering.

 

“They used General Huo as an example, saying he could be so powerful because he became a believer of God. As reward, God gave him part of divine power. Now time’s up—General Huo still couldn’t save humanity, so God will reclaim this gift and summon his believers back.”

 

In the thoughtful silence, a low voice stood out inappropriately: “Then this god is pretty lame.”

 

Huo Yanji pinched the back of Sang Jue’s neck, and the little evil dragon immediately shut up.

 

“…That leader was like a calm madman. On the surface he seemed normal with a calm tone, but as soon as he spoke, his words had a certain—” Ling Gen couldn’t think of a good description, “had a crazy flavor.”

 

“If you said east, he’d say west. If you said people should go against the current in adversity, he’d tell you to go with the flow because it’s divine will.”

 

Young Ling Gen back then was hot-blooded and mocked dismissively: “Screw divine will. Where’s this god? Have him come out so I can meet him.”

 

The cultist in handcuffs was thin and pale, but his eyes held calm certainty: “God is underground.”

 

“So before Huo Feng completely lost control, he returned to Rift No. 2, where he was originally infected?”

 

Though they already knew about the Dawn Plan and the truth of “evolution,” those present—especially the deviant high-ranking officials—looking at this confused, clearly mentally unstable writing left by Huo Feng, still felt vaguely uncomfortable.

 

The faith they’d followed for half their lives was truly just an empty castle in the air.

 

Everyone discussed for a long time without reaching conclusions. All current speculation was baseless, only adding fear. Everything had to wait for Huo Jiangmian’s next communication before further deduction.

 

They could only pray—pray that Huo Jiangmian and the others could hold on longer and bring more information.

 

Dr. Eugene asked: “Can I take this diary back for research?”

 

Huo Yanji nodded.

 

Sang Jue had no objections. The diary wasn’t his—Huo Yanji had asked him to keep it earlier.

 

Hill smiled at Sang Jue and left with Eugene, also copying the audio segment of Huo Jiangmian’s communication.

 

After they left, Ling Gen finally voiced his belated questioning: “Shouldn’t General Huo explain why Sang Jue can hear sounds in the audio?”

 

Sang Jue, who had been directly bypassed, said unhappily: “It’s my business. Why are you being fierce to my wife? How do you know I’m not making things up to trick you?”

 

“…”

 

Ling Gen froze, unsure if it was because of “wife” or Sang Jue’s latter statement.

 

“This isn’t something to joke about!”

 

Huo Yanji took a step, positioning himself slightly in front of Sang Jue, saying coldly: “Human brain potential is less than ten percent developed. There are always geniuses different from ordinary people, difficult to understand. I can give you no less than ten historical examples of geniuses who could hear abnormal sounds. Want to hear them?”

 

Ling Gen’s face was livid. He could only watch Huo Yanji take Sang Jue’s hand and stride away.

 

The protected dragon didn’t forget to turn back and seriously add: “You need to accept that some people are better than you.”

 

“…”

 

Once in the elevator, Sang Jue couldn’t hold back: “Am I a genius?”

 

Though the doctor often praised his intelligence, she’d never called him a genius. Ji Ji disliked lying so much, this should be sincere praise.

 

Huo Yanji glanced down at him: “Mm, a genius’s wife.”

 

“Mm…” Sang Jue didn’t follow, “Hm?”

 

**

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