Apocalyptic Island - Chapter 12

Chapter 12

Wen Yishu then noticed the faint bloodstains on the ground, spreading from the inside to the front of each room.

Aix’s calm voice sounded in her ear: “There is an unknown creature approaching from behind. Do you want to access the image? Warning, the picture is too bloody.”

Wen Yishu clicked yes. A screen of what was behind her popped up in front of her eyes.

The screen was a bit laggy, as if the signal was bad and there was a delay.

A standing, fish-like monster appeared in the central lounge. Its black skin was covered with dense, different-colored protrusions, like large pieces of shattered coral reefs stuck to it.

Its gills were opening and closing, and its fish mouth was facing the sky as if it were breathing.

The entire fish’s body was a mix of blood and mucus, dragging a long trail on the ground. Its two fins were slowly moving toward them.

In the dimly lit human lounge, the fish-like monster stood in the blue light and shadow of the corridor. The two scenes were so absurd and surreal that it felt ridiculous. This was not a Variant that should have appeared here.

That dead, fish-like eye stared intently in the direction the group had left. It hunched over, feeling like it was about to pounce at any second.

Wen Yishu ran for her life. After turning a few corners, she stopped, still holding Bai Mi’s hand.

But Huo Xiaoguan and Ling Shuang were no longer behind her. She was panting heavily, her chest heaving violently, and she cursed under her breath.

They had gotten separated at this moment. When Bai Mi pulled her to run, she was not ready at all. The two people behind them should not be far away.

She grabbed the sleeve of Bai Mi’s gray jacket and leaned against the wall: “Let’s stop for a moment. I’ll ask them where they went.”

Bai Mi stood straight, leaning against the wall, and stuck her head out to look behind them.

The moment her quantum computer turned on, Wen Yishu started looking for Huo Xiaoguan and Ling Shuang’s chat boxes.

On a dark electronic grid, several red unread messages were particularly obvious.

Wen Yishu suddenly smelled that foul fishy odor again. Before she had a chance to look, the person next to her pulled her and started running again.

Several chaotic footsteps came from the corridor. Bai Mi next to her was almost dragging her forward at a great speed.

Although she had exercised yesterday, her physical strength was still terribly poor.

Her entire body’s weight was almost entirely on the other person’s. Wen Yishu barely kept up with her pace to keep from falling.

Her entire head was spinning from running, and she couldn’t even tell which direction they were going anymore.

Damn it. Judging by the look of that fish behind them, it shouldn’t be able to run this fast. They had a flamethrower in hand. Was it necessary to run this far?

She felt like her lungs were about to burst. She couldn’t even say the words to tell the other person to stop.

The underground shelter was on a single floor and had no second level, so it was built very large. There were identical rooms and corridors everywhere. The only difference was that the room numbers on the doors were in sequence.

The two of them ran all the way, and Aix’s voice kept sounding: “Warning, a dangerous unknown creature is approaching! Warning!”

The doorknobs were like endless telephone poles along a wilderness track, rapidly flashing past her eyes. Wen Yishu didn’t know how many turns they had made. The two of them stopped at the end of a hallway.

The door in the corner was ajar for some reason, and there were no bloodstains around it.

The two of them went in without hesitation. Wen Yishu plopped down on the bottom bunk, panting heavily.

Sticky sweat on her forehead blurred her vision. She had to quickly wipe it away with her hand. The intensity of the escape didn’t give her a chance to breathe. How was it any different from running 800 meters with a heavy load?

She took out a bag of water from her backpack, bit a hole in it, and gulped it down.

She heard a click in her ear. It was the sound of the door locking.

Wen Yishu wiped her face. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Bai Mi fiddling with the door lock and walking toward her.

She finally had the strength to speak: “You are really cautious. I don’t think that thing should be able to catch up.”

Bai Mi showed a strange smile: “Who knows? Maybe it will appear soon. It’s better to be careful.”

Wen Yishu felt a little strange: “A fish can’t teleport, right? There’s actually a monster like that down here. I didn’t have time to read the messages just now. They seem to have gotten separated from me. Let’s wait a moment before going out. I’ll check my messages.”

As she said that, she opened her quantum computer. The sound of Aix in her helmet was still constantly sounding. Wen Yishu frowned and reset the helmet data.

Aix’s voice only stopped for a short time and then started again: “Warning, a dangerous creature is approaching.”

She subconsciously looked toward the door. The data analysis that appeared in front of her did not indicate any danger.

Her knuckles were bent and wedged into the gap of the helmet. Aix’s nonstop alarm was really giving her a headache. She took off the helmet.

The sound from the bone conduction headset immediately disappeared, and the world returned to silence.

She tucked a strand of sweat-soaked hair behind her ear and casually placed the helmet on Bai Mi’s raised hand.

It was such a headache. The helmet, which seemed perfectly fine, was broken on its first use.

She didn’t dare to look into Bai Mi’s eyes. She could only check the live feed while saying: “Is Aix connected to the network? Why does it keep repeating the alarm? I’ve already reset the settings. Is the helmet broken?”

Wen Yishu carefully listened to the movement of the person next to her. A rustling sound came, as if she was examining the helmet.

Bai Mi: “Let me see.”

Wen Yishu hummed in response and then started to look at the live feed.

The information on it was constantly increasing. She had just seen that Huo Xiaoguan and Ling Shuang had messaged her, but she hadn’t had a chance to reply yet.

She guessed that the two of them were probably in a panic and she didn’t know where they were.

Her messages didn’t show the content, she had to click on them to see it.

Huo Xiaoguan: “Xiao Wen, where did you go?”

Ling Shuang: “Why did you run away? We looked up, and you were gone.”

Wen Yishu was a little confused. The monster was chasing them, so why didn’t they run?

Then whose footsteps did she hear just now? Was there someone else?

You Ning still hadn’t replied to her message. She could send messages from downstairs, so the signal should not be cut off.

Wen Yishu was a little puzzled: “I ran with the team leader. Didn’t the monster behind us catch up? Where are you? We got separated.”

Huo Xiaoguan and Ling Shuang anxiously waited in place. They were completely dumbfounded when they saw the message from Wen Yishu.

The two of them looked at Bai Mi standing in front of them and then at Wen Yishu, who was still messaging them.

If the person in front of them was the team leader, then who was the person with Wen Yishu?

The two of them tacitly took a few steps back.

They cautiously asked Bai Mi, who was frowning: “Team Leader, we’ve contacted Xiao Wen, but there’s a problem on her end. I think we might need to confirm your employee ID before we can proceed.”

The employee IDs of all Rhine researchers were confidential. Except for teammates in the same group and direct superiors, basically no one else would know them.

They were not very familiar with their team leader on a daily basis and didn’t know anything about her life. They simply asked a question that all three of them knew and wouldn’t offend her.

The person in front of them raised her extremely indifferent eyes and looked at the two of them. She expressionlessly said a few words: “BioSurv-128.”

She then turned her hand over and showed them the characters engraved on her quantum computer. After the two of them saw them clearly, she put it back on.

“Where is she?” Bai Mi didn’t say any more nonsense and got straight to the point.

Huo Xiaoguan stepped forward excitedly and showed her the message Wen Yishu had sent to them, word for word.

Bai Mi’s eyes couldn’t help but widen slightly. The voice of Aix in her helmet accelerated a bit: “Researcher Wen Yishu’s helmet communication connection has been severed.”

At the same time, Wen Yishu sat on the bed, looking at the two messages that hadn’t been replied to for a long time. She sent a few more.

Bai Mi was still fiddling with the helmet on the side of the bed.

She pushed the goggles up. A click sounded as they snapped into the groove.

Wen Yishu looked up with a guilty smile: “Haha, it’s not easy to fix this helmet without tools, right? When we find my friend, let her help us take a look. She’s from the technical maintenance department and is super amazing. There’s nothing she doesn’t know how to do…”

Wen Yishu’s voice came to an abrupt stop here because she saw Bai Mi’s slightly clumsy fingers sticking to the joint of the helmet.

A hard, transparent fish scale appeared in her hand. She pried it into the tiny gap, popping the entire outer shell of the helmet off.

She didn’t know how much force the other person used. The chip inside was pulled out by her hand the moment the outer shell hit the ground.

Bai Mi looked up, bared her teeth, and smiled at her. Those indifferent eyes suddenly turned into dead fish eyes. Her nasal cavity was filled with that fishy smell again. This time, it was even stronger and impossible to ignore.

The hand that had just grabbed the other person’s sleeve was also covered in mucus. Wen Yishu seemed to understand why her eyes had suddenly become blurry.

The messages on the live feed were still constantly flashing. This time, Wen Yishu saw the messages clearly.

Bai Mi: “Where are you?”

Huo Xiaoguan: “Xiao Wen, run! The person next to you isn’t the team leader!”

Support Apocalyptic Island