Chapter 379 Alien Battlefield (8) Escape

Chapter 379 Alien Battlefield (8) Escape

"So the car accident scene we witnessed before, or the things left behind, is actually related to this explosion?"

"It's possible, but according to the video, apart from the dazzling flash, the surrounding buildings in the area where the flash appeared did not actually suffer any substantial damage. Including the collapsed building we saw, in this video, the building is still intact."

"But the situation in the video where pedestrians suddenly fell to the ground collectively doesn't seem to be caused by any physical weapon attack. I have some other ideas about the cause of this situation. What do you think?"

"There are several possibilities, a large-scale biological weapons attack, a genetic bomb, or collective manipulation, or perhaps a sudden collective, but species-scale evolution with an extremely low survival rate."

"They suddenly fell to the ground, with no external injuries and no blood flowing out. According to the video footage, most of the people filmed in the video did not subconsciously cover their heads or important organs such as the heart with their hands before they died. But the premise is that the body structure of these contractors is similar to that of humans. However, judging from their body shape and social behavior, I estimate that they are similar."

"According to the footage at that time, their technological level at that time should be similar to that of the Infinite Company now, or even a little bit stronger. According to my investigation, the Infinite Company's current biological weapons technology can indeed produce biological weapons that can cause mass death, but these biological weapons will not take effect so quickly. If you want to achieve the effect in the video, you either need to increase the duration of the weapon's action or increase the dosage of specific drugs. Either way, it will cause great damage to human tissues, so it is impossible for people who have been attacked by these weapons to not bleed. So I think the possibility of a biological weapon attack can be ruled out."

"If it was a collective manipulation, this video recorded at least six hours after the person who filmed it died and before the device ran out of power and automatically shut down. During this time, within the range that the camera could capture, none of the people lying on the ground moved again, and the building was not damaged either. If it was a collective manipulation, I don't think the operator would simply let them lie motionless in any place, or even block the road, so this possibility should be ruled out."

"Then of the remaining possibilities, there should only be two that are closest to the cause of the situation at that time. One is large-scale evolution, and the other is the gene bomb. But I always feel that there may be another hidden story. After all, we currently do not know whether the sudden flash is related to this situation, and we also do not know how the destruction in the city occurred."

"So our goal is back to the original starting point. If we want to find out what happened in the city back then, we still need to go to the location of the information storage device that the contractor's equipment is connected to. Now that I think about it, that device is very similar to our current city's homeland security system. All kinds of information should be recorded in detail on that device. However, if their functions are similar, then according to our homeland security system, it is estimated that there are also storage modules on that information storage device that can only be read locally. If there is information that the contractor's equipment cannot read remotely, it should be there."

"That's the only way. This method of understanding the situation and information is much faster than searching the city. Of course, the premise is that the device really records the real cause of the situation at that time."

"Let's go, this place is not close to the information storage device."

After leaving the vicinity of the massive car accident, the two men's movement route gradually moved away from the main roads within the city. As the two men got closer and closer to the destination where the contractor's equipment was located, they also moved from the open main road into a building complex with relatively narrow roads.

After walking to a residential complex, the two also found a large number of skeletons lying on the sidewalk, as well as robots lying near them. According to the analysis of the contractor's equipment, most of these robots were housekeeper robots, companion robots, or furniture robots, tools used to assist life, and some security robots carrying non-lethal weapons. It can be seen that the living standards of the people living here at that time were still very high.

"The technological level of these tool robots is similar to that of the life-assisting robots used in our society today, but the energy used by these robots here is a little cleaner than what we use, and the radiation is also very low. In fact, in comparison, the radiation released by these robot energy is completely safe for babies. These robots still linger here for a long time after their owners die. Fortunately, they have no emotions and only act according to the system's programming, otherwise I can't imagine how sad they would be."

"Don't be too harsh. There are still many companion robots here. Emotion processing modules are not expensive nowadays. I guess it was not much of a big deal for the contractors at that time."

"...Sometimes I really hate your unsympathetic way of thinking."

"Well, thank you."

"...whatever."

Although Gloria really wanted to scold Han Zu for his lack of sympathy, she didn't have that much time now. Even if she did, Han Zu probably wouldn't react to her scolding. Simply put, he wanted to scold you, but was afraid that you would feel good about it.

However, Gloria still symbolically kicked Han Zu's butt. Although Han Zu didn't react, it at least allowed Gloria to vent some of her emotions, which helped to relieve some of the emotions.

Continuing to walk through the pile of bones and robot wreckage on the ground, Gloria suddenly noticed that some of the bones and robot wreckage seemed to have traces left by wild beasts. It seemed that after these people died, some wild beasts had used them as food.

"Well, it seems that if a pet is left without human education for a long time, no matter what kind of pet it is, it will eventually revert to its original form and turn into a wild beast."

However, Han Zu's idea seemed to be different from Gloria's. He believed that the marks on the bones were left by pets.

"Why a pet? Could it be a local wild animal from another planet?"

"No, they are just pets, but that's not very precise. To be precise, there should be some descendants of the pets they kept at that time."

"Why are you so sure? Do you have any evidence?"

"Of course, first of all, according to the contractor's equipment inspection, all the exits of the city are either still locked and inaccessible, or completely blocked due to structural damage caused by years of disrepair, just like the entrance we came in through. Similarly, outside the entrances and exits that can actually enter the city, there are still locked passages, and the three-dimensional structural map we obtained does not show any location with enough entrances and exits for wild animals to pass through."

"I almost understand it. Also, the marks on these skeletons and the remains of the robots are almost the same in shape as the pets of the contractors we saw in the video at that time. So the situation at that time killed a large number of contractors, but did not cause any harm to their pets."

"Then, the less civilized group of pets and those that still had reproductive abilities gradually awakened their wildness due to the lack of human education. However, based on the situation at the time, this large-scale death should have occurred throughout the city. As their offspring were born, food gradually decreased, so they set their sights on corpses. For contemporary pets and their first and, depending on the species, second batch of offspring, these corpses can still be used as food. However, as time went on, all food was consumed, at least the food they could find, so they began to hunt each other until the last batch was completely extinct."

"There are also automatic sterilization and insecticide systems in various places within the city, which means that some small animals that feed on insects cannot survive. That's why we were unable to find any biological signals during the search of the contractor's equipment."

"But I think that incident at that time should not have directly wiped out all the people in the city, because some security robots also have a lot of marks of attack left by wild beasts. According to the scans of these security robots, their basic protocols indicate that they give priority to protecting contractors. So before the city was completely deserted, there should have been some people who did not have time or were unable to escape the city, but survived the incident and lived in the city for quite a while."

"It seems that these survivors have fought over the remaining resources."

When the two men passed through the building complex, they found some unnatural marks on some nearby walls. They did not look like non-lethal weapons used by security robots, but should be left by some live ammunition weapons.

"It's possible, but not certain. The number of survivors in the city is not proportional to the remaining food. The number of unopened food storage devices we found in the buildings just now is very large. So the fighting between them may not be entirely for supplies. There may be other reasons."

However, if they continued to move forward, the information they could find or scan was no different from before. So the two continued to follow the route given by the device and continued to move towards the target location. Soon, they left the current building complex and arrived at another location, which looked like a shopping mall. This building covers a large area, and there are two main roads that pass directly through the building. If they want to move forward, they must pass through this building.

Walking into the building, it was dead silent, shelves were tilted, and everything, including the two main roads that ran through the building, was covered with thick dust. Using the contractor's equipment to scan, the two found that the collapsed shelves did not seem to be man-made, and the ground was full of unopened food and water packaging. Although the contents might have rotted and deteriorated, it proved that at that time, no one seemed to be fighting for or even looking for these necessary supplies for survival.

The two looked at each other, their hearts full of doubts. Han Zu squatted down, picked up a food package and checked the production date. The date shown on it was not much different from the time when the flash appeared.

"The production date of these materials was not far from the time of the accident, only a day or two away. If the materials were really scarce at the time, they should have been snatched up long ago."

Gloria walks over to a fallen shelf and finds some potentially useful information.

"Han Zu, come and take a look at this."

Han Zu squatted beside the collapsed shelf and began to observe the position pointed out by Gloria. There were some subtle friction marks on the ground at the bottom of the shelf, as if someone had tried to move the shelf at that time.

"There's a door behind this."

Using his ability of perspective, Han Zu saw through the thick dust a door covered with dust that merged with the surrounding walls. The space behind the door was not small, and there seemed to be a lot of equipment inside, and there seemed to be other exits.

He casually moved the collapsed shelves aside to leave enough space in front of the door. After a brief observation, Han Zu confirmed that although the door was locked and the joints were blocked by dust, there was no useful alarm system connected to the back. The power supporting the alarm system had long been exhausted, and the line had been broken for some unknown reason.

"Om~~"

The door was too old to be opened in the normal way, so Han Zu used the high-energy rays from his eyes to easily cut the door open and put it on the ground. Entering the room, it seemed to be a store's warehouse, filled with entertainment electronic devices. At least it used to be, but now they were just some dusty garbage.

"The door you cut off has deep traces of damage on the lock behind it. It should be caused by repeated hitting and rubbing with a blunt object. Based on our previous observations, the shelves outside had been moved. I think it is possible that someone wants to block something or other people in this room. Could it be related to what we are investigating?"

"It's possible, but it's too long ago, and there's no useful evidence or clues left here. However, judging from the fact that the other things inside haven't been damaged by humans, whoever was imprisoned here at the time escaped from here in a very short time."

"According to a reasonable analysis, the time is neither long enough for the people inside to become extremely emotional and start smashing things, nor short enough for their emotions to change. Otherwise, the lock of that door wouldn't be the only one with signs of damage. Let's look for other exits, maybe we can find some clues."

"I've already scanned this place with X-ray vision. In addition to the door I removed, there are three exits in total: a manhole, another door, and a ventilation duct. The other door is in a similar condition to the one I removed, and is also sealed. However, the ventilation duct and manhole cover should have been opened."

"Looks like we should split up? Which side do you choose?"

"The sewer system in this city is huge, and there's a good chance something is still hidden in there."

"Then I'll start my investigation from the ventilation ducts."

"Keep in touch, and notify me in time if there is a situation that you cannot handle."

"Okay, you too."

Gloria jumped up swiftly, grabbed the edge of the ventilation duct, and then slid in neatly, leaving the room quickly. Not long after Gloria left, Han Zu also opened the manhole cover and climbed down the ladder below. In order to keep a low profile, he did not jump directly this time.