The cave was dim and damp, illuminated by the faint fluorescence of the plants. The stone walls were wrapped with vines that were a dark green, dark purple or thick black, just like large groups of entangled snakes.

A black flying insect staggered in. It had six hard wings and three mouthparts. The next second, a huge purple and swollen vine rose from the tangled up vines and split apart like a mouth. It closed in the next moment, swallowing the flying insect in its stomach. The vine wriggled slowly and the swollen part was gradually restored to its original state.

There was a sound like wings flapping in the cave. A drop of mucus dragged a translucent filament down from the top of the cave onto the sticky moss on the ground. It wriggled slightly and the mucus was quickly absorbed, disappearing into the ground.

There was a corner illuminated by the fluorescence of a green fungi. In the gap between the rock and soil, white water gushed out like a tidal wave. Covering a large area was white mycelium. It grew, spread and stretched out hundreds of millions of antennae, finally creeping toward the centre. It gathered and lengthened until it formed a body. A foot stepped on the soft moss, sinking into the moss until only a white ankle was revealed.

An Zhe looked at his ankle. This was a human limb that supported the skeleton, muscles and blood vessels. Joints could move but they weren't flexible due to the limitations of the skeleton. The stratum corneum formed the fingernails, smooth, round and transparent. The final product was degraded and took the sharp tip of an animal's claws.

He raised his leg and took a step. The moss, that had previously sunk down from being stepped on, was wet and elastic. It gathered together again after he left, like an upright earthworm. This time, he stepped on something else under his feet—the arm of a human skeleton.

In the darkness, An Zhe looked at the skeleton. Fungi and vines had taken root deep in the bones.Dark green vines were wrapped around the hip and leg bones while brightly coloured little mushrooms grew in the ribs like blooming flowers. Fluorescent mushrooms were born from its hollow eyes and sparse teeth. The green glow was like quicksand, blurred in the fog of the cave.

An Zhe looked at it for a long time. Finally, he bent over and picked up a backpack made of animal skin beside the skeleton. The contents inside the backpack weren't affected by the moisture. There were a few pieces of clothing, human food and water as well as a black chip half the size of a palm with the number '3261170514' on it.

Three days ago, the skeleton was a living human being.

"3261170514." The young man's voice had been hoarse and intermittent, the green fluorescence of the cave shining on his face. "My ID number. This is my ID card. I can go back to the human base with it."

An Zhe asked, "Can I help you go back?"

The human smiled, his fingers of his right hand gently drooping against the side of his body. The chip rolled from his hand, hidden in the moss. He leaned back against the mountain wall, raised his head and pressed his left hand to his chest. There was a huge wound there. Grey bone spurs pierced his back and the skin around it was festered. Some of it was grey and the flocculent flesh covered the surface of the bone spurs. The other part was dark green and moved up and down with the rhythm of his breathing.

He gasped a few times before whispering, "I can't go back, little mushroom."

His shirt was thoroughly stained, his skin pale, his lips dry and his body trembled irregularly.

Anzhe looked at him and didn't know what to say. He could finally only mutter the name of this young human. "An Ze?"

"You have almost completely learned the human language." The human looked down at his body.

In addition to the pus and blood, there were also white mycelium on his body. They had become part of his body. The mycelium grew in a winding manner and clung to An Ze's torso and limbs. The purpose of the mushroom was to stop the bleeding for this dying human being. However, instinctively, the mycelium also absorbed and digested the fresh blood.

"Can you learn so much from eating my genes? The pollution index of this place is truly very high," the human questioned.

Fragments of knowledge unfolded in An Zhe's mind. After five seconds of conversion, he knew the pollution index meant the speed at which genes were transformed. Now genes were flowing into An Zhe through the human blood.

"Maybe… when I die, you will eat all my body… and gain many things." An Ze looked at the top of the cave and his lips flattened. "I seem to have done something meaningful, although I don't know if it is good or bad for you."

An Zhe didn't speak. His entire body moved in An Ze's direction. He held An Ze's shoulder with his newly grown human arm and a large number of mycelium came and piled up beside An Ze, supporting An Ze's crumbling body.

In the silent cave, there was only the sound of the dying human gasping.

After a long time, An Ze finally spoke again. "I am a person whose life has no meaning."

"…I have nothing outstanding so it is normal for them to leave me behind. In fact, I'm very happy not to go back to the human base. It is the same as the wild where only valuable people live… I've wanted to die for a long time but I didn't expect to meet you, a gentle creature, a little mushroom, before I died."

An Zhe didn't have a clear sense of some of these terms, such as value, such as death. He focused on one noun again, 'human base.'

He leaned on An Ze's shoulder and said, "I want to go to the human base."

An Ze wondered, "Why?"

An Zhe raised his left arm and his fingers dangled in the air. It was as if he was trying to grab air but he had nothing to grab. Just like his body. His body was empty. A huge hole was born from the deepest part of his body and there was no way to fill it, no way to heal. There was only the endless emptiness and panic that haunted him day by day.

He organized the human language and slowly spoke, "I lost… my spore."

"Spore?"

"My… seed." He didn't know how to explain it.

Every mushroom will have spores in their lifetime. Some were numerous while some only had one. Spores were the seeds of mushroom. They were born in the gill and scattered on the wind, putting down roots and become a new mushroom. Then this mushroom would gradually grow up, having their own spores. A mushroom's only mission in life was to nurture and mature the spore. However, he lost his own spore when it was far from mature.

An Ze slowly turned his head. An Zhe could hear the click of his bones as he turned, like an old human machine.

"Don't go there." The human's voice was hoarse and slow. "You will die."

An Zhe repeated the word. "…Die?"

"Only humans can enter the human base and you can't escape the judge's eye." An Ze coughed a few times before taking a hard breath. "Don't go… little mushroom."

An Zhe was at a loss. "I…"

A human hand suddenly grasped An Zhe's mycelium. The human had used a lot of strength and his gasping became more rapid.

"Listen." After a violent tremor and gasp, An Ze slowly closed his eyes and spoke in a low voice. "You have no attack or defense. You are just… a little mushroom."

Sometimes, An Zhe regretted telling An Ze that he was going to a human base. If he hadn't told An Ze, An Ze wouldn't have spent his last moments stopping An Zhe. He might've been able to listen to An Ze tell a story. Maybe An Zhe could've taken him from the dark cave to look at the changing aurora in the sky for the last time. However, An Ze's eyes didn't open again.

The short memory dissipated in the air, just as An Ze's life suddenly dissipated in this world. An Ze was only a snow-white skeleton.

However, he still wanted to go against An Ze's wishes.

He slowly opened his five fingers. On the delicate skin and lines of the palm, there was a brass-coloured, metal bullet case that was very heavy. There were some incomprehensible and unusual lines on it. This was what he had found in the place where he lost his spore. He hadn't let go of it once he found it.

If there was a one-in-million chance that he could retrieve his spore then the possibility lay on this shell, which was a human creation.

He sighed and placed the bullet shell into the animal skin backpack left by An Ze. He leaned down and picked up the clothes An Ze had worn. It was a blood-stained grey long-sleeved shirt, black pants and black leather boots.

Having done all this, he walked outside the cave. The slightly loose clothes rubbed against his skin and small electric currents were transmitted from his fine nerve endings in the skin of the centre. It was the first time he was in a human body and he hadn't adapted. He frowned and pulled up the sleeves of his loose shirt.

The cave was long and winding. The vines were piled up on the cave walls and pushed each other. As An Zhe passed through the cave, they receded and occupied the top of the cave.

After three turns, the wind entered. It was very humid. The mushroom opened the dead vines that fell from the mouth of the hole. Mushrooms, his kind, stretched out endlessly in his vision. They seemed to rise to the sky, everything calm and silent. Through the canopy, the dim light of the sky entered. The sky was grey with some green luster. An Zhe could smell the rain, fog, snakes and rotten plants.

It was currently evening. He sat down at the entrance of the tunnel under the canopy of grey mushrooms. He took out a dark yellow map from his backpack. There were different shades of colour on the map, marking the degree of risk in different regions. An Ze had once pointed out the approximate location of the cave where they lived. This was the blackest area on the map, which meant the danger level was six stars and the pollution level was six stars. It was called the 'Abyss'. On the map, the area where the Abyss was located was also marked with many strange symbols. An Zhe checked them one by one according to the index on the lower right corner of the map. These symbols meant there were mushrooms, man-eating vines, man-eating bushes, simply mammalian monsters, mixed-type mammalian monsters, common reptile monsters, highly poisonous reptile monsters, winged monsters, amphibious monsters, mixed polymorphic monsters and human-like monsters in the Abyss. At the same time, there were valleys, hills, mountains, ruined human cities, road sites and other topography.

Up north and down south, his eyes went all the way up. Above the brightly coloured map was a pure white area marked by a red five-pointed star. The right side of the five-pointed star had the name of this area: Northern Base.

The green light of the sky was becoming brighter while the background became darker. At midnight, An Zhe could barely recognize the stars in the sky. He knew the brightest one was called Polaris and could indicate a direction.

He pointed the upward arrow in the upper left corner of the map in the direction of Polaris. He stepped on rotten wood, leaves, mycelium and soil, walking out step by step.

The night wasn't dark. The changing green lights that humans called the aurora illuminated everything ahead. Only mushrooms filled his vision. They were yellow, red or brown mushrooms with large caps. Small, dense mushrooms were gathered on the mountain rocks. Round bacterial packages were scattered on the ground. Once they matured, spores would be ejected like fog and rain. These spores would land and divide in the moist soil, growing into spherical sacs like their mother. There were also mushrooms without caps. There were just white or yellow hyphae grouped together or separated radially, floating in the air like seaweed.

However, this wasn't only a world of mushrooms. There were vines, moss, bushes, man-eating flowers and strange-shaped trees quietly lurking in the night. In the jungle of plants, there were some dark shadows and some strange shapes. Beasts or mixtures of beats and humans ran in the jungle, howling and fighting. Animals fought with animals, animal fought with plants or plants fought with plants. High and low howling hit the eardrums while the stones and mud were mixed with fresh blood. An Zhe saw a pine tree bend its trunk to swallow a snake with two tails. He also saw a giant toad stretch out a long, bright red tongue to grab a bat with human arms from the air. Five minutes after swallowing the bat, a pair of black wings grew from its back. This was only one of the thousands of scenes the mushroom had seen and he had grown used to it.

At this moment, a grey beast came over. It had four eyes and was covered with scales, feathers and fur. The head was like a crocodile and a giant wolf. Its seven teeth were exposed to the outside and it leaned close to An Zhe, sniffing him with a bloody nose.

An Zhe didn't move. He quietly leaned against a mushroom and breathed evenly as his entire body was sniffed. The huge monster seemed to get nothing and dragged its heavy feet away.

An Zhe realized that nothing would notice him, even if he used a human body as a shell. Perhaps it was because mushrooms were everywhere, nutrient-free. They weren't aggressive and were sometimes poisonous. Thus, he and the creatures of this world lived in peace.

Maybe it was as An Ze said. He was just a little mushroom.

An Zhe walked for a long time.

After many days and nights passed, the distance he moved on the map was only the size of a human's little fingernail. He was an entire finger's length away from the Northern Base. He didn't have the human means of transportation and didn't know how long it would take him to get there.

Finally, he smelt the damp and dark air fading away and felt the soil under his feet becoming harder.

In the evening, the sun sank like a deep red eye. The distant black hills accepted it and the sun gradually disappeared. The twilight and aurora floated together. An Zhe unfolded the map and tried to identify the characters and symbols.

He had just walked past a dried up river that was the boundary of the Abyss. After the boundary was a place called the 'Second Plains.' It had three stars in danger level and two stars in pollution level.

Indeed, the undulating terrain of the Abyss, the rifts in the ground that could be seen everywhere and the tangled shadows of tall trees in the middle of the night were all gone. This place was unobscured and had a panoramic scene of a flat and endless twilight.

Still, An Zhe was uneasy. The dry air of the Second Plains wasn't suitable for a mushroom. He couldn't find any soil to absorb nutrients so he could only recover his physical strength using human means, such as sleeping.

He had walked for so long and finally found a small depression with scattered green and yellow grass. He sat down with his arms holding his knee and found a suitable position to curl up in.

A mushroom spent most of its life sleeping but this was the first time he had fallen asleep in a human pose. A sleeping mushroom quietly stayed in one place, waiting for the passage of time. However, a human's sleep seemed different. Soon after closing his eyes, endless darkness rose up like a tide. His body became lighter like he was gradually losing his body.

He didn't know what moment it was but there was a whining wind in his ear. It was the sound of the wind in the wilderness, his favourite thing previously.

However, this wind now had no meaningless. He lost his spore while rolling around in the wilderness. There had been human voices on the wind. He couldn't remember the syllables clearly and could only think of a few parts. In human language, there were some fragments that couldn't be put together.

"It is… strange, very…"

"…What to do?"

"Take… over here… sample."

The next moment, an unspeakable pain radiated throughout his body. The feeling was light but deep. A void appeared in his consciousness that could never be filled. He knew that he had lost the most important thing ever since.

Fear spread all over his body and from then on, he started to fear the wind and lived in the cave. His heart beat faster and fear suddenly struck. It was the fear of losing his spore.

He opened his eyes and realized he was dreaming. Only humans could dream. Then the next moment, this breathing completely stopped.

He knew the source of the fear. A black creature was standing in front of him. Two blood-red eyes glowed brightly. An Zhe's entire body was tense and his eyes moved down. It was as tall as a human with three pairs of thin and sharp sickle-like forelimbs flashing as coldly as moonlight.

After realizing what this was, his body trembled. It was a distant sensation from the first ancestor a thousand years ago. A mushroom would die from the bite of a group of termites. The beasts in the Abyss might be dismissive of mushrooms but they might be a rare delicacy on the Second Plains.

The moment this idea appeared, An Zhe subconsciously rolled to the side! There was a dull thudding sound against the ground. The sharp forelimbs of the arthropod monster plunged into the ground beside An Zhe. It was the place where he had just been lying.

An Zhe quickly grabbed his backpack and climbed up. He ran to the bushes nearby while the arthropod monster's dense footsteps rang in his ears. Once the sound became a bit smaller, he turned around and looked back. Under the aurora, he could finally see the entire picture of this thing. it was a huge black monster, like an ant magnified by thousands of times.

Fortunately, its body looked too heavy and a human's running speed was faster than it. An Zhe ran into the bushes ahead of it. Then he fell. In the blink of an eye, he was shrouded in the shadow cast by the monster. There was a sharp wind and the forelimbs of this monster descended towards his arm.

An Zhe's sleeves were suddenly empty. The soft cloth hung down and nothing was cut. This seemed to surprise the monster and it paused. At the same time, the mycelium spread and regrew in the folded sleeves, once again forming a complete human arm.

He rolled down on the spot to avoid the monster's next blow. He used his arm as support to get off the ground and fell into the low bushes. Two thick bushes blocked his body. This wasn't enough for him to escape the monster's eyes. He took a few short breaths and at this moment, his body started to change. The outline of his arms, fingers and other limbs were blurred. Something was surging underneath, turning into mycelium in order to escape in a more flexible manner.

At this point—

Bang!

A white glow crossed through the air and the meteor hit the joints between the monster's head and abdomen. There was the sound of a dull impact and the white light exploded silently mixed with a red glow.

An Zhe was in the bushes and watched the huge thing break into two pieces from the middle, crashing to the ground. The shrub leaves rustled from the shock and fell. The monster's head was less than half a metre away from An Zhe. The blood-red eyes were still looking in his direction.

In the Abyss, An Zhe had seen things cut into three and were still able to move. He was thinking of being a little bit further away from this thing when he suddenly heard a voice that wasn't far away.

"That is the last uranium bomb. After picking up the body, return to the base." It was a man's voice and it was very thick.

"Arthropod shells aren't cheap. I didn't expect to finally catch one." There was the voice of another man, this one a bit sharper than the last.

After a brief conversation, they no longer talked. Footsteps came over. It was the sound of thick leather boots stepping on the sand, mixed with the sound of sand friction.

They were humans. After An Ze's death, An Zhe hadn't seen a human for a long time. He quietly raised his head from the bushes. The bushes rustled and the first man called out, "Be cautious!"

The next moment, the black holes of three muzzles were pointed at him.

An Zhe just looked at them. He inevitably remembered the chaotic memory of the night he lost his spore. However, An Ze's existence had showed him the kindness and friendliness of humans. He thought about his current situation and said, "H… Hello."

Under the glow of the aurora, the scene in front of him was clear. There were three people in dark clothes and they were all men. They had wide brown belts around their waists with magazines tied to them. The man standing in the middle was tall while the other two were slightly shorter.

The man in the middle was the one who had spoken first about the 'last uranium bomb'. His voice was very calm. "A human?"

There was a moment of hesitation. Then he thought of the weapon that had stopped the monster and he replied, "Yes."

"What's your name? What's your ID number? Where is your teammate?"

"An Zhe, 3261170514, lost."

The man frowned and looked down at him. This person's eyebrows were thick and black, his nose was high and his lips were thick. The combination of facial features didn't give An Zhe a dangerous feeling like the beasts of the Abyss. An Zhe pursed his lips and looked back.

Three seconds later, another man appeared next to the first. He was a small, dark-skinned ma who aimed his gun, full of threats. He looked at An Zhe and ordered in a low voice. "Take off your clothes."

An Zhe got up from the bushes. He unbuttoned the first button of the grey shirt, then the second. The skin of his neckline was exposed. His skin was a smooth milky white and was a bit like the colour of his mycelium.

The next moment, he heard the third man whistle. It was a pale-rosy skinned, yellow haired man with many wrinkles on his face, which meant human aging. His eyes were grey-blue and he stared at An Zhe.

An Zhe lowered his head, undid the remaining buttons and took off his shirt. The grey-blue eyed man approached him and made a second whistle, looking him up and down. The man's eyes were very sticky, like the drooling beasts in the Abyss. After looking at An Zhe again, he went around to An Zhe's side. The next second, An Zhe's wrist was grabbed by him. He rubbed his fingers against the skin of An Zhe's wrist, thumb against the wrist bone. Then he asked in a slightly sharp voice, "What is this?"

An Zhe looked down at the back of his hand and wrist. There were some red marks where he had been scratched by the bushes while escaping from the monster's attack. He turned his head and motioned to the bushes behind him. "The leaves."

There was a brief silence. After a moment, the man smacked his lips together. "Do you want to take the rest off on your own or shall I take them off for you?"

An Zhe didn't move. He probably knew what they were doing. There were similar scenes in An Ze's memory. Genetic contamination occurred between monsters and monsters and between people and monsters. The first way to confirm if a stranger was contaminated was to check if they had any wounds.

However, this man made him feel uncomfortable. It was the same way he felt when he was a mushroom and a snake crawled over his cap. Thus, he looked up at the man in the centre. An Zhe had seen many ferocious beasts in the Abyss and could judge their danger. Now he had the feeling that this man was the least aggressive among the three.

"Horsen." After a brief look, the man in the middle spoke in a heavy voice. "Don't act sick in the wild."

Horsen sneered and looked at An Zhe in an even more unbridled manner.

Three seconds later, the man spoke to An Zhe, "Follow behind me."

An Zhe obediently followed the man to the rear of the monster head. There were no wounds on his body apart from being scratched by the bushes.

The man asked, "How long have you been separated from your teammates?"

An Zhe thought about it and replied, "One day."

"You have a great life."

"There doesn't seem to be many monsters here."

"However, there are many bugs." This man spoke in a very brief manner but he seemed reliable.

An Zhe did up the buttons of his clothes and whispered, "Are you going back to the Northern Base."

The man replied, "En."

"That…" An Zhe asked. "Can you take me with you? I have my own food and water."

"I say no." It was the short, dark-skinned human.

Just as he spoke, the man An Zhe was following stepped out and looked at the other two. "He isn't injured. Take him?"

Horsen smiled as he watched An Zhe and whistled a third time. "Why not take him? There isn't much to him."

Then he looked at the remaining human. "Don't you think so?"

An Zhe looked over into the dark-skinned man's gloomy eyes.

The aurora cast a green luster on the ground. This reflected off the man's dark skin, forming a strange dark green that was like the skin of a lizard or a toad. Finally, the man said, "We aren't judges. We can't confirm that he is 100% human."

"You say." Horsen folded his arms and dragged his words out for a long time. "The pollution level of the Second Plains is only two stars."

The dark-skinned man was silent again as he said, "The average variation time of the Second Plains is four hours. It takes four hours."

"Okay." Horsen declared. "We will pack up the spoils. If he doesn't change during that time, we'll take him with us."

The dark-skinned man finally nodded. The three of them glanced at each other and seemed to agree.

"My name is Vance." The tall man in the middle turned to An Zhe, introducing himself.

An Zhe greeted him. "Hello."

"Horsen." There was a bit of annoyance on his face.

The remaining dark-skinned man was silent for a long time before spitting out a few syllables. "Anthony."

An Zhe also greeted him and said, "Thank you."

"No need for thanks." Vance smile. "We are all fellow humans. We just had a teammate die and we're short of manpower."

After that, he went to the head of the monster and commanded the rest of the humans. "Pack up the body and leave quickly."

Then Vance took out a pair of gloves and a long dagger from his backpack and threw them at An Zhe. "You go and cut off the legs."

An Zhe caught them and gave a reply. Then he took a dozen steps forward and stopped beside the half of the monster's body. He put on the gloves and started to observe the body.

The arthropod was large in size and the shell itself was smooth. However, there were some long, sharp burrs and protruding tubercles. He looked down at the monster's legs. There were six legs, thin and long. They were divided into three seconds and covered with dense, black and glossy hair.

On the other side, Vance and Anthony dealt with the monster's head. They removed the shell off its head, letting the brain and other fluids flow out before scraping the inside. Horsen stood guard on the perimetre.

Thus, An Zhe held the dagger and concentrate on cutting the monster's join. After five minutes, one joint was cut and one leg was separated from the monster's body, falling to the ground. At the cutting site, white and viscous liquid that was like brain fluids slowly infiltrated the yellow sand.

He heard Horsen's teasing voice. "Baby, don't be so disgusted that you vomit."

An Zhe was unresponsive and quietly continued to cut the next joint. He didn't have any feelings for the monster. He even felt that it was much cleaner than the beasts that lived in the Abyss.

However, Horsen didn't want to let him go. Footsteps were heard behind him as Horsen walked over, right hand on An Zhe's shoulder, fingers caressing the shoulder. "Baby, how old are you this year?"

An Zhe heard a type of greed from this tone. It was the greed of beasts in the face of food. It was just that based on his limited cognition, humans didn't feed on the same kind. Therefore, he answered calmly, "19 years old."

An Ze was 19 years old. Since he ate An Ze'sgenes, he was probably 19.

"You look like you're only 17." Horsen's laughter came from his chest and his hoarse voice was sharp and pointed.

An Zhe frowned and didn't know how to answer.

"Horsen." At this moment, Vance's voice came from not far away. "Concentrate on guard duty."

Horsen snorted and squeezed An Zhe's shoulder before walking away.

An Ze once again realized that each individual human might have different characters. For example, An Ze was different from the humans who took away his spore while Vance was different from Horsen. An Zhe was very grateful to Vance.

He bowed his head to continue cutting the joints. Each level was divided into three seconds and after cutting them, he neatly placed them in a pile. The shell gave off a metallic luster and was as hard as stone. Once stacked together, they made clear impact sounds.

By the time all six legs were dismantled, Vance and Anthony had also completed the dismantling of the head and came to the other half of the body. Vance glanced at the neat pile of legs on the ground and smiled. "You are quite serious."

Then he said to Horsen, "You drive the car over there."

Horsen didn't speak. He just turned and walked away. An Zhe stood to one side and watched Vance and Anthony take on the monster's chest and abdomen. He asked, "Can I help you?"

Vance spoke as he used gloves and held a long pliers the size of a human leg. "You haven't come outside much, have you?"

An Zhe replied, "…En."

"Just stay there." Vance used the pliers to pry open the shell over the connection between the monster's chest and abdomen. The edge of the shell was irregular and there were sharp black thorns at the connection to other shell pieces that flashed with a grey light. "There are many thorns and those with no experience can easily be contaminated," Vance explained. "The pollution level of the Second Plains isn't high and there is the possibility of infection."

An Zhe obediently stepped back and watched them dismantle the corpse. One black shell after another was opened. The viscera and body tissues flowed all over the ground.

He was watching when there was a dull rumbling sound. An Zhe looked to the right and saw a black, rectangular armoured vehicle like a huge crustacean monster. He knew this very well. There were five armoured vehicles in An Ze's former team. The car got close and Horsen jumped out of it. Vance didn't raise his head as he said, "Help him carry the things into the car first."

An Zhe hummed in agreement and picked up the pieces on the ground. Then she carefully tied them together with ropes and handed them to Horsen. Horsen took them and placed them in the storage room of the armoured vehicle.

The huge monster became smaller and smaller and more shells were picked up by An Zhe. He was tying up a stack of shells with rope when his movements suddenly stopped. At this moment, the sharp piece of shell under his hand—the spiky tips on the surface had several condensed liquid drops They were dark and hard to find without careful inspection.

He looked down at the stains on the ground and confirmed that all the liquid in the monster's body was white, yellow or transparent. What were these dark liquid drops? He remembered the blood that came out of An Ze's body before he died.

An Zhe turned to look at Vance and Anthony. Both of them were intent on dismantling the body, looking calm as usual. Thus, An Zhe acted as nothing happened and lowered his head, continuing to tie up the parts.

After a long time, the dismantling finally finished. The three people seemed convinced that An Zhe wouldn't suddenly become a deadly monster.

"Get in the car and return to the base." Vance ordered. "An Zhe, you come too."

An armoured vehicle could hold seven or eight people. There was room inside to rest and it was simply divided into three compartments. However, each compartment was very low and narrow so people had to bow their heads to walk inside.

An Zhe was arranged in the outermost space with the door to his right side. He lay down on his backpack. Anthony was in the front driving, Vance was next to him and Horsen was in the innermost compartment.

The door was closed and they were plunged into darkness. Only a dim light shone from a small window to the side. After a burst of shaking, the armoured vehicle started slowly driving forward. There were occasionally bumps but not too much.

An Zhe looked at the darkness in front of him and felt like he was floating in a black tide that wrapped around him as he moved to the Northern Base, which he knew nothing about. He was surrounded by a slight bewilderment and was dazed as he sat quietly in the darkness.

The light from the small window grew stronger and the surroundings were a bit brighter. The car stopped and An Zhe heard Horsen get up. He took three steps and opened the door to get in the cab, going in to replace Anthony. Anthony went back to Horsen's original position and lay down. He breathed heavily and moved a lot, causing the floor to shake. Then Vance asked loudly, "What's wrong?" Anthony replied, "I'm a bit tired."

A long time passed until it was Vance's turn to replace Horsen. An Zhe instinctively curled up. He knew that Horsen would be sleeping next door to him and was disturbed. There was a delay in the sound of a human lying down next door.

An Zhe opened his eyes wide as he waited. The next moment, there was the rustling sound of footsteps and a man headed straight to him.

"Baby…" Horsen's voice was low and hoarse. He legs squeezed into An Zhe's folded legs and his arm went around An Zhe's shoulder. An Zhe reflectively moved but was pressed to the ground by a greater strength. "Vance, that guy doesn't know what you do… but I have been with more mercenary teams than he has ever seen."

An Zhe struggled and gasped a few times. "Please don't do this."

"Don't do it?" Horsen smile. In the dark environment, his smile seemed very fierce.

An Zhe didn't answer and Horsen released the hand against his shoulder to undo his belt. He seemed very happy that he could hold down An Zhe with one hand. His smile became bigger and his tone was rude and mocking. "Baby, what can you do with this strength? You can't drive or use heavy weapons. You can only wait to die when meeting monsters? What did your teammates take you out to do? To watch?"

He held An Zhe's neck as he spoke, leaning close, his stubble against An Zhe's neck. The acrid smell of smoke drifted over. "I've seen many prostitutes like you but this is the first time I've seen one so beautiful. What mercenary team were you originally with?"

An Zhe made a sharp gasp as Horsen pressed against him tightly, hot tongue moving over his skin. An Zhe turned his head and coughed from the smell of smoke. His right hand fumbled in the darkness and finally grabbed the dagger that Vance had given to him.

Just then, a huge sound was heard next door from Anthony's place, like something had been knocked to the ground.

"Don't worry." Horsen laughed loudly and called to Anthony, "It can be you in a moment."

However, his words didn't seem to have any effect because there was the sound of footsteps coming this way. Horsen cursed and held An Zhe up against the wall, forcibly pulling at An Zhe's shirt.

An Zhe no longer resisted and gripped his dagger, quietly looking at the dark corridor. White mycelium spread on the ground beside him, as if planning something. The next second, all his movements became still. A monster with a human torso and three pairs of slender legs stretching out behind it walked through the corridor with curled, soft wings, two blood-red compound eyes shining on its head.