228: Chapter 228 Humanoid Life?

The ice sheet was vast, giving one the illusion of being swallowed by the entire world.

White.

Gray-white.

Further away, still white.

Snowstorms swirled from all directions like countless tiny blades, scraping against Lu Cheng's face.

Lu Cheng stood in place, looking at the few sets of footprints half-buried by the wind and snow, his brows slightly furrowed.

Trying to find the Second Exploration Team in a place like this was undoubtedly like looking for a needle in a haystack.

What was even more troublesome was that the spatial structure here was clearly problematic.

Even though it was a plain ahead, in the perception fed back by the Yueyao Pulse, it felt like countless layers of folded thin ice were hidden there.

One step out, and one might fall into an unknown region.

Lu Cheng crouched down and reached out to touch the snow.

There were many footprints.

There were military boots.

There were academy-standard combat boots.

There were also several traces that clearly did not belong to modern exploration teams.

Among them was a trail of dragging marks; it was shallow, yet it extended deep into the wind and snow.

Lu Cheng closed his eyes.

"Seeking Good Fortune and Avoiding Bad Luck" was quietly activated.

The world before his eyes seemed to be divided into several lines.

Some lines were pitch-black and heavy.

Some lines were dim and unclear.

And among them, one line, though filled with intense baleful intent, hid a faint glimmer of good fortune deep within.

Su Wan and Li Chenzhou were both in that direction.

Lu Cheng opened his eyes.

"Found the direction."

The man and the fox followed the footprints forward.

Traces left by the Second Exploration Team gradually appeared on the ground.

Torn packaging of compressed rations.

A snapped half of a glow stick.

And a piece of military fabric covered in frost.

Lu Cheng picked it up to examine it.

There were scorch marks on the edge of the fabric.

In the snow nearby, there were also a few shell casings.

A battle had taken place here.

It was just that the bodies and bloodstains were gone.

The wind and snow were too heavy.

Blood would be buried.

The bodies might have been dragged away as well.

Lu Cheng's gaze deepened.

After continuing forward for about half an hour, a muffled sound suddenly came from under his feet.

Click.

The snow layer cracked.

Lu Cheng paused, his body instantly launching into the air.

The next second, a large area of the snow surface collapsed directly downward.

Boom!

The thick snow fell like a white tidal wave.

An ice-sealed highway was revealed from beneath the snow layer.

Lu Cheng landed on a broken road sign, steadying himself.

He looked down.

Beneath his feet was actually an extremely wide road from the old era.

The road surface material appeared dark silver; even after being sealed in ice for many years, it hadn't completely corroded.

There were broken guardrails on both sides.

Further away, there were rows of abandoned streetlights.

Only, the tops of the streetlights were not ordinary bulbs, but a type of blue crystal-like Source Power device.

Most of the crystals had already shattered.

Occasionally, a few still flickered in the wind and snow, emitting intermittent, ghostly blue light.

Lu Cheng jumped down from the road sign and stepped onto the ice-sealed road.

Crack.

The ice layer cracked slightly.

Large amounts of abandoned vehicles were buried on both sides of the road.

There was an armored vehicle half-buried in ice.

Its turret was broken, and the body was covered in claw marks.

There was a transport truck overturned on the side of the road, its cargo compartment torn open by some kind of force.

There were also several military robots that had long since stopped functioning, their bodies embedded in the ice, with only half a mechanical arm exposed.

Moving further ahead, Lu Cheng saw a few corpses.

To call them corpses wasn't entirely accurate.

They looked like human figures.

Yet their bodies had obvious signs of modification.

Metal interfaces were embedded in their necks.

Their chest cavities had been opened, and instead of complete internal organs, there was a frozen, cracked blue core.

Their arms were covered in semi-mechanical Augments.

The skin on their faces had long since been frozen gray-white, and there was a dim crystal at the center of their brows as well.

Lu Cheng crouched down to examine them.

"Cyborgs?"

He remembered the information Mei Wushuang had given him.

The Origin Organization liked to conduct human experimentation.

But the modification style of these corpses was not exactly the same as the existing technology of the Origin Organization.

It was more ancient, and also more precise.

Lu Cheng stood up and continued forward.

Suddenly.

Click.

The eyes of a broken robot by the roadside lit up.

A red scanning line swept across its shattered head.

Immediately after, a second one.

A third one.

More broken military robots lifted their heads little by little from the ice.

Their mechanical skeletons emitted a harsh, grating sound.

Some robots had only one leg left, yet they still supported their bodies and stood up.

Some had cracked energy cores in their chests, yet they were still forcibly operating.

A cold, mechanical voice sounded on the abandoned highway.

"Intruder… detected…"

"Defense protocol… initiated…"

"Eliminate…"

The next second, dozens of red beams locked onto Lu Cheng simultaneously.

Lu Cheng sighed.

"Welcoming me as soon as I arrive."

"Quite hospitable."

Snow Spirit waved her little claws.

"Bad robots!"

The first robot popped out a micro-cannon from its shoulder.

Boom!

A Source Power shell tore through the air.

The shadow under Lu Cheng's feet stirred.

Dozens of Shadow Clones scattered simultaneously.

The explosion blasted up a large amount of ice shards on the spot.

Lu Cheng's main body had already appeared on the other side, gold patterns lighting up on his arm.

The Yueyao Pulse circulated.

He threw a punch.

Clang!

The force of the punch slammed into the robot's chest, actually emitting a sound like metal clashing against metal.

The next second, the robot's entire chest cavity was punched through, and the blue core shattered.

The remaining robots turned their cannons, attempting to lock on again.

But the Hundred Shadow Killing Formation had already spread out.

Shadow Clones emerged from the snow, the bottoms of vehicles, and the shadows of broken streetlights.

They moved extremely fast, pouncing directly on those damaged robots.

The combat power of these robots was only about the Source Gathering Realm.

For ordinary exploration students, a large number would be very troublesome.

But for the current Lu Cheng, it could only be considered warming up his Tendon & Bone Stage.

Boom!

Boom, boom!

A few minutes later.

The abandoned highway was quiet again.

The ground was covered in mechanical debris emitting wisps of blue smoke.

One robot tried to crawl toward Lu Cheng at the end, but just as its mechanical arm reached out, Snow Spirit smashed its head with a paw.

Snow Spirit proudly raised her head.

"Snow Spirit also defeated one!"

Lu Cheng touched her head.

"Impressive."

Snow Spirit happily wagged her tail.

Lu Cheng inspected the wreckage of one of the robots.

There were traces of pollution at the core location.

It wasn't pure damage.

It was like some kind of black mist had invaded the control System, causing these robots to maintain chaotic attack logic even after many years.

"Similar to… pollution… perhaps?"

His gaze was slightly solemn.

Just as he was preparing to move on, the Yueyao Pulse suddenly captured a trace of an extremely faint life aura.

It was like a flame about to go out.

Lu Cheng turned his head and looked at a collapsed ruin by the roadside.

It was piled with rubble, snow, and broken metal plates.

If not for the extremely fine perception of the Yueyao Pulse, he would have almost ignored it completely.

"Someone is there."

Snow Spirit immediately jumped down and sniffed in the snow.

"Dad, here!"

Lu Cheng walked over and lifted a few pieces of metal debris with his hand.

There was a thick iron plate underneath.

The edges of the iron plate were frozen by the snow, almost stuck to the ground.

Gold patterns flashed on Lu Cheng's arm, and he directly pried the iron plate open.

Crack!

After the iron plate was flipped over, a narrow cavity was revealed underneath.

A little girl was curled up in the hole.

She looked to be about seven or eight years old, wrapped in a tattered gray-white cloak.

Her complexion was very pale.

Her lips were frozen purple.

But she didn't look quite like an ordinary human.

A light blue gemstone was embedded in the center of her brow.

Extremely fine blue patterns were drawn on both sides of her cheeks, like ice crystals, and also like some kind of ancient script.

Hearing the movement, the little girl suddenly looked up.

Her pair of ice-blue eyes were full of terror.

She shrank back, her voice trembling.

"Don't eat me…"

Lu Cheng frowned slightly.

The language she spoke was very strange.

The syllables were unfamiliar.

But Lu Cheng actually understood it.

No… it wasn't just simple understanding.

The voice was mixed with Mental Energy transmission.

She was speaking with language, while simultaneously conveying the meaning through mental fluctuations.

"I don't eat people."

Lu Cheng tried to soften his voice as much as possible.

The little girl still looked at him vigilantly.

Snow Spirit poked her head out from Lu Cheng's shoulder.

"Ying?"

The little girl's eyes widened slightly when she saw Snow Spirit.

"White… white fox?"

Snow Spirit blinked.

Lu Cheng asked:

"Where is your home?"

"I'll take you back."

Since there were living beings here, it meant that a civilization gathering place existed within this ice sheet.

If Su Wan and Li Chenzhou were still alive, they would naturally gravitate toward human gathering places as well.

When the little girl heard the word "home," her expression finally changed a little.

It was as if she remembered something, and her voice became urgent.

"Home…"

"Sister…"

"Take me back quickly…"

She struggled to crawl out of the hole.

But after taking only two steps, her body swayed.

The light of the gemstone at the center of her brow was becoming dimmer and dimmer.

She reached out a finger toward the depths of the wind and snow.

"Follow me… go…"

Before she could finish her sentence, she collapsed forward.

Lu Cheng was quick-witted and immediately supported her.

The little girl's body was very light.

Lu Cheng could feel that the life aura in her body was declining.

It wasn't just simple starvation; it was more like some kind of energy core was about to dry up.

He looked at the gemstone at the center of the little girl's brow.

That thing seemed to be a part of her life System.

Lu Cheng raised his hand, and a wisp of Source Power appeared in his palm.

"Can you absorb this kind of energy?"

The little girl had been so weak that she could barely open her eyes.

But after seeing the Source Power at Lu Cheng's fingertips, her eyes suddenly lit up.

The next second, she grabbed Lu Cheng's hand and lowered her head to take his finger into her mouth.

"?"

Lu Cheng froze completely.

A wet and slippery sensation came from his fingertip.

The little girl sucked on the Source Power like a small animal, and the gemstone at the center of her brow lit up with a pale blue light little by little.

Lu Cheng felt a bit overwhelmed.

"No, wait a minute."

He paused again and immediately changed his phrasing.

"Absorb it like this?"

The little girl gave a muffled "Mhm."

Lu Cheng slightly increased the Source Power transmission.

The gentle Source Power surged into the little girl's body along his fingertip.

The gemstone at the center of her brow lit up more noticeably, and the pale blue patterns on her cheeks also began to glow slightly.

After a while, the little girl finally released Lu Cheng's finger.

Her complexion looked much better, and her eyes had regained a bit of spirit.

She looked up cautiously.

"Thank you, big brother."

Lu Cheng shook his hand, his mood complex.

"What is your name?"

The little girl hugged her knees and whispered:

"Ilo."

"People of the Snow Rock Fortress."

"Snow Rock Fortress?"

Ilo nodded.

"Our home."

"In the north."

"Sister is there."

Speaking of her sister, her eyes turned red again.

"Sister is sick."

"Needs Blue Crystal."

"A few days ago, I came out with the exploration team to find Blue Crystal."

"But suddenly a snowstorm came."

"And variants."

"I couldn't run, so I hid here, and I don't know where the others are…"

She looked down at her own hands.

"The gemstone is almost out of light."

"I thought I was going to die."

Lu Cheng looked at the light blue gemstone at the center of her brow.

"Do you all rely on this to live?"

Ilo nodded.

"Everyone in the fortress has one."

"Without the gemstone, you will be eaten by the snow."

This statement was very vague.

But Lu Cheng could roughly guess.

The environment here was extremely cold.

These humans might have undergone some kind of long-term adaptation, relying on the gemstone at the center of their brows to store Source Power and maintain bodily functions.

Lu Cheng pointed to the robots he had smashed by the roadside.

"What's the deal with those things?"

"Why did they attack me?"

Ilo looked at those mechanical remains, fear flashing in her eyes.

"Defense robots."

"They protected the road a long, long time ago."

"Later they broke."

"No one could recycle them."

"After the pollution came, they became very fierce."

"They will attack passersby."

Lu Cheng frowned.

"What is pollution?"

Ilo thought for a moment, her little face showing confusion.

"Black snow."

"It will drill into machines."

"It will also drill into people's hearts."

"People or creatures that are polluted will become variants."

"Very hungry, very painful, will eat themselves, and will also eat others."

Lu Cheng's gaze narrowed slightly.

It was very similar to the pollution on Blue Star…

It could also be a pollution source leaked from this ancient civilization wasteland itself.

"You mentioned Snow Rock Fortress just now."

"Are there many people there?"

Ilo nodded.

"Many."

"There are adults."

"There are children…"

Lu Cheng nodded, and he stood up.

"Can you still lead the way?"

Ilo immediately nodded.

"Yes."

But just as she stood up, she almost fell again.

Lu Cheng sighed and picked her up directly.

Ilo's body stiffened for a moment.

"Don't be afraid."

Lu Cheng said:

"I walk fast."

Ilo looked at him timidly.

After confirming that Lu Cheng really had no malice, she pointed the way in a small voice.

"Over there."

"See the blue lighthouse, then go down below."

"The wind will deceive people."

"You can't listen to the crying."

Lu Cheng's footsteps paused.

"Crying?"

Ilo nodded very seriously.

"There are people crying under the snow."

"If you hear it, you can't go over."

"If you go over, you won't come back."

Lu Cheng looked toward the distant wind and snow.

He had indeed heard sounds similar to calls for help earlier.

It seemed that this ice sheet itself was not clean.

Lu Cheng nodded.

"Let's go."

The Hundred Shadow Killing Formation unfurled.

More than a dozen Shadow Clones drilled into the wind and snow first, scouting the road in all directions.

Lu Cheng, carrying Ilo, continued forward along the abandoned highway.

At the end of the road, the wind and snow gradually diminished.

Deep in the ice sheet, the outline of a huge fortress slowly appeared.

It was built between broken mountains.

The outer wall was pieced together from black rock and metal plates, covered with thick frost.

Several blue crystal towers stood at the heights, like the remaining lights in the ruins.

Quite a few broken armored vehicles were parked around the fortress.

There were also a large number of defensive walls pieced together from beast bones, iron plates, and old robot shells.

That was Snow Rock Fortress.

The last gathering place between the wasteland and the ice and snow.

The moment Ilo saw the fortress, her eyes lit up.

"Home…"

"Big brother."

"That is my home."

Lu Cheng looked at that fortress, feeling a few very familiar Source Power fluctuations.

The corners of Lu Cheng's mouth lifted slightly.

"Looks like I found the right place."

But just as he approached the fortress, the alarm on the high wall suddenly sounded.

Blue searchlights instantly shone on Lu Cheng.

Several old turrets slowly turned, locking onto him.

A hoarse shout came from the wall.

"Put down Ilo!"

"Outsider!"

"Stay away from Snow Rock Fortress!"