76: Chapter 76 The First Signs of the Fourth Calamity

When the news of Iron Stomach discovering Ancient One remains in the karst cave reached the Outpost, the giant rat swarms in the tunnels were launching their fourth wave of attack for the night.

Grey Mist Walker squeezed sideways into a narrow, steep crevice in the rock wall of the mine shaft. Her laser gun was so hot from a stray energy beam earlier that she could barely hold it. A giant rat's claws had torn a long gash across her left shoulder; the wound was barely held closed by auto-bandaging gel, but her health had dropped below half. She tilted her head to look deeper into the shaft—about twenty or so rookies were fighting their own battles. Some were firing guns, some were stabbing with stone knives, some were desperately trying to maintain formation, and others were shouting loudly at the rats, clearly not having given up on the possibility of "communication."

Rookie One stood on a small piece of high ground, his shouting drowning out the hissing of the giant rats and the noise of short clubs striking metal: "All members of the Third Squad, pay attention! Don't panic! Just hit that lead rat from before, concentrate your fire! Corner it! I'm talking to you, don't run, don't run—if you can't win, just respawn!"

It was that single phrase, "if you can't win, just respawn," that made Grey Mist Walker suddenly realize exactly what kind of method these people were using to fight. Tonight, she had seen with her own eyes how the Third Hunting Group dealt with a giant rat whose energy level was nearing thirty—not by using tactics to evade damage, but by using a recruit who had just received his Nutrient Paste as bait. The recruit deliberately let the giant rat bite through his forearm, his hands death-gripping the rat's hind legs; even when his right arm was torn to shreds, he didn't let go. He died. Five seconds later, he stood up from the respawn point, picked up his dropped automatic rifle, turned around, and charged back in the same direction.

She initially thought this tactic was absurdly ridiculous. That was until she saw the lead giant rat being pushed into a corner step by step by the Third Hunting Group. By the time the attackers used short clubs to crack its skull, that recruit had already died once more—but the time he gained by dragging the rat's hind legs was enough for the back-row shooters to empty three magazines of automatic rifle fire into it.

“Is the Third Squad insane? They seem to be actively seeking death.” Beside her, the veteran Iron Fist was full of confusion. He was one of the few players who had remained calm since the first wave descended, having served as a team commander in other VR games before, and he never approved of corpse-piling tactics.

“It's not seeking death,” Grey Mist Walker stared at Rookie One's commanding gestures, her voice resolute. “They are using the respawn trait to act as a damage-immune control chain. Look, that soldier who just died used himself to stall that big rat for about three seconds—in those three seconds, the Third Squad's shooters took off a third of its health. If he hadn't died that once, at least five more in the back row would have perished.”

Iron Fist fell silent.

Grey Mist Walker suddenly stood up from the rock crevice and waved her arm, shouting to her teammates in the First Squad: “First Squad, listen up! Don't run, don't retreat! Just like the Third Squad, your lives can be consumed! But every life must be traded for a rat! You are living traps! Don't treat death as a loss—treat respawning as your strongest skill! Charge!”

She saw Iron Fist charge forward holding a piece of scrap metal, using her shoulder to take the impact of a second giant rat rushing from the side. She was knocked to one knee, her hands bleeding, but she didn't retreat a single step. She saw a recruit from the Third Hunting Group get sent flying by a giant rat for the second time; this time he didn't die, scrambling up to smash the rat's skull with his rifle butt. She saw Mao Mao—the giant rat brought back by Rat Speaker—blocking the way in front of Rat Speaker during the chaos, letting out a hoarse hiss as it forcefully knocked back another, even larger member of its kind.

At a corner of the tunnel dozens of meters away, Rookie One was adjusting the Third Hunting Group's formation. The barrel of his automatic rifle was glowing slightly red, but his sights remained fixed on the depths of the darkness. “Iron Stomach, how is it on your end? Are there still rats running this way from the ventilation shaft?”

Iron Stomach poked his head out from the shaft opening, his face stained with what was either rat blood or a nosebleed from his own fall: “I saw it when I jumped down just now; there's another nest down there—about seven or eight of them, all small ones, but there's a big one guarding the outside of the nest. It's huge. When I came down, it was sniffing something at a crack in the ventilation pipe.”

“What thing?”

“I don't know. But there's wind in the crack—not wind from outside, but blowing from the inside out. There might be a passage leading somewhere else.” Iron Stomach wiped the blood off his face, his tone suddenly becoming serious. “I just sent the location of the Ancient One remains to the channel. Lord Lin Qiming replied to me—he said it's a Level One Ruin Objective and gave me fifty merit points.”

“You fell so many times, fifty merit points is fair compensation.” Nightsong slid down from a nearby ladder, sticking a scrap rod into a crack in the rock wall used to mark arrows. “Rat Speaker is still down there; she says that wreckage isn't dead. She says it has a heartbeat.”

Iron Stomach was stunned. “The ancient one fragment has a heartbeat?”

“She said it's not a heartbeat. It's a Resonance of Spirits.” Nightsong didn't have a hint of mockery in his tone as he repeated the term. “She said that thing is calling her, not in human speech. But she can understand it. Mao Mao can too.”

The two looked at each other, and neither laughed. In the mine shaft ahead, Grey Mist Walker's First Squad was reorganizing their formation. Two more from the Third Hunting Group had died, but more people stepped up to fill the gap. Rookie One never left his small high ground, which was now soaked in giant rat blood.

Lin Qiming saw this scene as he walked through the tunnel. The bandage on Grey Mist Walker's left shoulder had been torn by a second claw wound, and she had resealed it herself with auto-gel. Her laser gun hung at her hip, and she held a short club she had just picked up from the ground—the recruit who had just been killed by the giant rat had left the club on the ground, and when he climbed back up, he had switched to another gun.

Lin Qiming slipped through the gaps in the battle line. Hephaestus's voice sounded in his mind, as flat as a weather report: “Grey Mist Walker's command rating has been updated. She is now the first player to autonomously issue a 'treat respawning as a tactical resource' command without instructions. It is recommended to grant an additional merit point reward.”

“Give it to her.”

“Iron Stomach's exploration data has also been synchronized. He sketched the structure of the ventilation shaft during his falls, reaching a certain level of accuracy. Do his death records need to be reclassified?”

“Accurate falls don't count as pure suicide. They count as scouting contributions.” Lin Qiming paused. “But if he jumps down without tying a rope next time, I'll let him be the rope himself.”

As he walked past the fork deep in the mine shaft, he saw the marker left by Nightsong—a glowing scrap rod stuck in a rock crack, the arrow pointing deep into the ventilation shaft. Nightsong himself was crouching at the fork, updating his danger zone markers with charcoal on a piece of scrap metal while helping Rookie One's Third Hunting Group bolster their defense. He had already died twice tonight: once when he was ambushed from behind by two giant rats and had his spine bitten through; once when a giant rat fell from the ceiling and struck the back of his neck during the reinforcement of temporary fortifications at the shaft opening. After he died, his two teammates killed the giant rat by the shaft opening and then waited on the spot, watching him stand back up five seconds later and pick up his dropped short club without saying a word.

Lin Qiming walked past the fork and down into the karst cave. The green and purple halo of glow-worms reflected on his face. Rat Speaker stood three meters in front of the Ancient One remains, her eyes slightly closed, her lips making no sound. Mao Mao lay at her feet, ears pressed against its head, tail wrapped around her ankle. A very low growl continuously emanated from its throat, as if responding to some resonance deep within the remains that was inaudible to humans. Iron Stomach and Nightsong were crouching not far away: Iron Stomach was rubbing the ribs he had just broken from another jump down the shaft, and Nightsong was adjusting a scanner. No one spoke.

Lin Qiming stopped a few steps behind Rat Speaker. He pulled up her background data. The psionic perception curve unfolded smoothly on the right side of the screen—no spikes, no oscillations, not a precursor to losing control. It was resonance. A stable, low-frequency, continuous resonance. The ancient one fragment was reading her, and being read. The corruption value was zero. He recorded this entry as "Spontaneous Resonance of Spirits—First Trigger," then turned and signaled Nightsong and Iron Stomach to package the transmitted data and prepare to return.

“What exactly is this thing?” Iron Stomach clutched his ribs, his voice kept very low.

Lin Qiming looked at the blue light flowing deep within the half-buried metal framework and paused for a moment. “A key. A key to what lies further below.”

As he turned to walk up the ladder, Nightsong pulled out a crowbar, drew a circle around the remains, and said to Iron Stomach: “Have someone install a guardrail here later.”

Iron Stomach, clutching his once-again broken ribs, nodded.