Chapter 310: Sudden Change!

Tang Yun's words made Lin Xian and Kiki somewhat surprised. They naturally understood what she meant, which also indirectly explained why Tang Yun and the others appeared here. Essentially, they participated in part of the Deep Red World project, for which they must have paid a not-so-small price.

"How much do you know about this Deep Red World?" Lin Xian asked at this time.

"I... don't know much. Coming here was all brought by my husband. This organization is very mysterious. The highest level I've seen here is a white man named Julius Lite, about 40 years old. He was the one who told us about the characteristics of the mycelium network here and personally took us to experience the hallucination spores. Others..."

Tang Yun wasn't a person with too much of her own opinion. Everything was listened to her husband, Wen Dong, Kiki's second uncle. So what made people somewhat unable to understand was why Tang Yun's husband sent his wife and son here, but ran away himself?

"Wen Qi, it's really good that you're alive..." Tang Yun looked at Kiki, her expression decadent: "Although your aunt took away the assets of you and your father, the underground city quota your father exchanged for you couldn't be replaced. Regardless of whether she became a councilor of Dawn City, you have the identity of the heir of the Linglong Group and a senior member of the Dawn Plan. You can go to Dawn City, which should be the safest place besides the Phoenix Society's headquarters now. You can live there..."

Kiki turned to look at Lin Xian upon hearing this: "That's true. I heard that Dawn City is already overcrowded now, and the entry fee is getting higher and higher. This identity of mine is useful."

Lin Xian said: "However, your aunt and those Wen family members shouldn't welcome you."

"Whether they welcome me or not has nothing to do with me. Does this young lady need them to welcome her?" Kiki flew up on the spot, arms crossed, with a proud expression.

Lin Xian smiled, thinking to himself that it was true. This little girl could now crush a truck with her bare hands. This super-rare telekinesis ability had much more value in the doomsday than those wealth and status.

"Alright."

Lin Xian looked at Tang Yun: "Put on your clothes, get on my train, I will take you away from here."

Who would have thought that Tang Yun, upon hearing this, didn't show any emotional fluctuation, but kept her head buried in silence. It seemed that after a long time, she said:

"I don't want to leave."

Kiki frowned upon hearing this: "Hey, if you don't want to leave, what do you want to do? Didn't you see it? So many people died. Do you want to die?"

"No!"

Tang Yun's face was miserable, her eyes red, constantly shaking her head and saying: "No, they didn't die. My son didn't die. He is in that world. We are together every day. That's not fake!"

Lin Xian glanced at her, not sure if the other party couldn't accept the death of her son, or if she was completely lost in the mycelium hallucination, so he could only say:

"After we leave, this place will be completely powered off, there will be no more robots to maintain it, the survival cabins will no longer work, and your bodies will completely die and begin to rot. Are you sure?"

Hearing Lin Xian's words, Tang Yun flashed a few fears in her eyes, but was quickly replaced by obsession. Her chest heaved rapidly, and she said: "It won't, it won't. After I enter that world, I will live in that world."

After speaking, she suddenly knelt to Kiki, saying in a pleading tone: "Wen Qi, I appreciate your kindness, but I feel that I no longer live in this world. Just let me go back..."

Kiki watched this scene, and a rare anger appeared on her face. She shouted: "I said they are all fake! Fake! You finally escaped. As long as you follow us, you can survive. Isn't living good!!!"

Kiki's words made Tang Yun's expression dim. She was silent for a moment, lowered her head, and a head of messy hair covered some of her well-maintained face, saying miserably:

"My son is over there. He will be sad if I'm not there. He is still looking for his father over there, looking and looking... I want to go accompany him. With so many strangers, he will definitely be lonely, will be sad..."

"Wen Qi, just look at the fact that I'm your aunt, help me this once..."

Tang Yun knelt and begged, her whole person seeming to have lost all vitality, neither happy nor sad, neither angry nor sorrowful. It seemed that this world was a nightmare for her, and as long as she entered that survival cabin again, she would wake up again, in that happy, free world.

Kiki was somewhat anxious. Hearing Tang Yun's words, she felt inexplicably irritable in her heart. Although she was just a relative she hadn't been in contact with for long, she didn't want to see Tang Yun choose to die like this.

Just as she wanted to continue saying something, Lin Xian suddenly pulled her.

He found that Tang Yun's eyes were gradually showing some black threads, which was a sign of being about to mutate from dark invasion.

"Forget it, she has already lost the courage to live. In this situation, she will soon mutate into a zombie from dark invasion even if she stays. It's better to fulfill her wish."

Her psychological defense line had completely collapsed, her body was weak, and her mental state was extremely unstable. In this polar night, it wouldn't be long before she turned into a zombie, unless she was forcibly tied back to the *Infinite* and protected by the Isomorphic Rubik's Cube. But Lin Xian didn't want to do that either. This Tang Yun's worldview had completely collapsed. Even if Lin Xian and Kiki kindly took her in, it would be of no avail. She would only spend her days in sorrow, bringing negative emotions to the team.

Since that was the case, it was better to let her enter that hallucination and die in the joy of reuniting with her son.

Lin Xian thought about it. Perhaps he could leave a small robot and an array battery for Tang Yun's survival cabin, which could be considered a return for her providing this information to Lin Xian.

Kiki flashed a bit of helplessness upon hearing Lin Xian's words.

And Tang Yun, seeing that Lin Xian and Kiki didn't speak again, slowly got up, swaying and wanting to stand steady. She raised her head and looked at Lin Xian and Kiki's faces lightly, wanting to say something but gave up, just looking at the two with a grateful gaze, then turned around tremblingly, tore off the hibernation suit on her body, walked to the side of the opened survival cabin in the most primitive posture, then crawled in, lay down, and closed her eyes.

Da Lou and Shu Qin, who had been silent on the side, also watched this scene with complex expressions.

For some reason, Tang Yun's choice made people feel more complex than seeing survivors die directly.

(*Hum—low frequency startup sound*)

"Identity authentication passed, Tang Yun, Zero Element Number: 0403, survival cabin activated, current body temperature: 36c, heart rate index 62, life support system ready."

The survival cabin's prompt sound rang out, and the cabin cover slowly closed, completely isolating her.

Then the survival cabin entered the transport passage, descended into the interior of the honeycomb, was grabbed by the huge mechanical arm, and placed into an empty hexagonal mycelium connection area on the lower floor.

Upstairs, Lin Xian, Kiki, and the others watched this scene and all sighed slightly.

"Do you think her consciousness will really be uploaded to the mycelium network?" Kiki asked at this time.

"Perhaps."

Lin Xian said: "But the problem is, humanity only has one path left, which is to defeat the darkness. Either humanity perishes, or we destroy these dark creatures. So for us, they are already dead."

*Pa pa pa, pa pa pa. *

Lin Xian turned his head and saw Ding Junyi operating the mobile terminal seriously at this time, and at the same time, the monitoring screen showed the internal scene of Tang Yun's survival cabin.

"I added an extra brainwave o-band nerve connection electrode inside. If mycelium connection really occurs, perhaps I can capture some changes in brainwave interference phenomena." Ding Junyi didn't lift her head when she heard Lin Xian's footsteps, explaining to him.

Lin Xian just wanted to open his mouth, when he heard her say again:

"I didn't find this item in the previous monitoring content. Normally, such a research institute couldn't possibly not monitor this frequency band. I think there's a problem, so I want to pay more attention to it."

The words Lin Xian was about to ask were blocked by Ding Junyi. He scratched his head and could only say: "Alright, then you busy."

Ding Junyi's personality in the laboratory was like this: concise, straight to the point, straight to the target, never wasting time.

This point, no matter from any aspect, was reflected vividly...

In the entire hall, the equipment that could be devoured had basically been devoured by Lin Xian. His materials for the decomposition center were completely full. Originally, he was prepared to use them to lay 22 kilometers of tracks, but now it saved trouble. He could directly use them to manufacture ammunition.

Looking at the time, the active period of the mycelium had passed for more than ten hours. Lin Xian let Da Lou and Shu Qin look after Ding Junyi here. He and Kiki returned to the train first, preparing to settle Grace.

In Carriage 12, 【Grace】 stood quietly in the center. Because it wasn't turned on, Lin Xian had to use a support frame to keep her in a standing posture.

At this time, Shasha, Lv Chang, Miao Lu, and others were all surrounding Lin Xian, all looking curiously at this beautiful humanoid robot.

"My god, this robot is designed so beautifully, just like a perfect ballet dancer." Miao Lu exclaimed in surprise.

Lv Chang exclaimed in wonder: "Her mask is clearly beautiful, but I don't know why I always feel a bit creepy looking at it..."

"Me too~" Shasha reached out and touched 【Grace】's leg. A cold touch made her tremble all over, and she couldn't help but frown: "It feels like that kind of bad robot in a horror robot movie that breaks down and wants to kill people."

"Go, go, go, you little girl is usually so bold. Aren't you fond of mecha? How come a robot makes you afraid?" Kiki walked over and pinched Shasha's little face: "This robot uses holographic projection, no facial system was designed. You'll know after it's turned on, she's actually quite beautiful."

Lin Xian said upon hearing this: "Only the old family service robots needed a facial system, all for the sake of communicating and serving people. But this thing was manufactured to manage the Zero Element Center, and it also possessed not-so-bad combat performance, so there was definitely no need to design those useless functions."

Although he didn't complete the scan, in the process of scanning 【Grace】's torso, Lin Xian found that Grace's movement components were very powerful, and it was also equipped with a plasma beam pulse gun. Added to its almost indestructible body material, the combat power was estimated to be at least comparable to a Berserk-class ability user!

"Kiki, is it troublesome to overwrite the system of this thing?" Lin Xian asked.

Kiki nodded: "Relatively troublesome."

She looked at Lin Xian with watery big eyes, full of embarrassment: "You have to know that this thing isn't something ordinary people can come into contact with. Traditional hard drive overwriting can eliminate data through multiple overwrites, but the superposition of quantum states might cause information to remain in the environment through quantum teleportation. And I can't delete all her movement and intelligent logic. If I do that, she'll become a piece of iron, and it's impossible for her to even stand up, unless I rewrite it. I can't do that, and even if I could, it would require a massive amount of logic train..."

"Alright, alright." Lin Xian glared at her directly and said unhappily: "Stop fooling me. Ordinary people can't come into contact with it, but are you an ordinary person? If you have any requirements, just say it."

Kiki's cheeks suddenly puffed up round upon hearing this, her eyes curved into crescents, full of cunning, and she giggled at him: "Sure enough, you can't be fooled. Of course I can handle it, but the voice pack must be changed to mine~"

"Ah, Sister Kiki, don't you feel it's scary?" Shasha turned to look at her with a look of horror upon hearing this: "A robot with your own voice talking to you..."

"You know nothing~" Kiki immediately gave her a flick on the head.

Lin Xian didn't know what it was, so he said directly: "This is up to you. My demand is only for her calculation function and service function. Even if you change it to Shasha's voice and project Da Lou's face, I have no opinion."

"Ah!!???"

Once these words were out, everyone was shocked. Shasha felt even more terrified upon hearing Lin Xian's words. Thinking of that scene, she felt goosebumps all over.

"Please don't, Brother Lin!!"

Kiki, however, put her hands on her hips and provoked Lin Xian: "Alright, that's what you said."

Lin Xian cleared his throat and coughed, saying: "That... I was just saying, let's not do that. This... it really makes it hard to sleep."

After speaking, he walked toward Carriage 5, preparing to set up a new G3-electromagnetic railgun there.

"Hehe~"

Kiki, who left Lin Xian speechless, smiled triumphantly. Seeing Lin Xian about to leave, she suddenly followed and whispered in Lin Xian's ear: "Hey, I heard that the service robots in the past had very complete functions, and even had companion functions. Do you want me to add some extra 【kits】 for you?"

This little girl was pushing her luck, just liking to see Lin Xian look deflated. Who would have thought that Lin Xian would stop his steps upon hearing this, turn his head with a smile, and reach out to her.

"【Kits】? You know I need blueprint scanning for mechanical manufacturing, let me see."

Kiki's smile froze upon hearing this, and she instantly reacted that what she said and what Lin Xian said were absolutely not the same thing. Her little face turned bright red in an instant, and she immediately exploded:

"Lin Xian!!"

"We'll see later. I have urgent matters to attend to." Seeing the little girl explode, Lin Xian hurriedly ran away.

Running all the way to Carriage 5, Lin Xian immediately began to clear the space and prepare to manufacture the electromagnetic railgun. He planned to manufacture two 1130s and an electromagnetic railgun on the *Infinite*. In this way, the firepower would be doubled, and added to the YJ-3 anti-aircraft gun, this 16-carriage train of the *Infinite* would be much more formidable.

"Once the *Sun* is connected, the carriages might need to be readjusted."

Lin Xian found an empty space and sat down, raised his hand, and began to manufacture the super-energy capacitor for the electromagnetic railgun first. Back in Xilan City, the entire train's integrated circuit system had already been upgraded, so he only needed to install the super-energy capacitor and connect it, and there would be no problem.

"Now there are two nuclear-powered locomotives, one Gemini 11R 290 megawatts, one Linglong industrial-grade 200 megawatts, 3 electric locomotives, two Weilong-class, one Ring Star 10a, plus my Giant Whale 03e gas turbine locomotive..."

"There are 6 power locomotives alone..."

Electromagnetic railgun, 1130, YJ-03, electric blade armor, arc pulse string vibrator, there were also research carriages on the train, mecha carriages, charging for hundreds of sets of power armor, plus the ultra-high-temperature plasma beam cutting array that Lin Xian planned to load later, the fully automatic bullet press, and the propulsion system that consumed more power...

All of them were big power consumers. The power generation of the two nuclear-powered energy carriages was no problem, but it was indeed necessary to have multiple electric carriages to store electricity to maintain voltage balance.

Fortunately, Lin Xian basically didn't need to drive the train through the Mechanical Heart anymore, so he didn't worry about needing to fully control these 27 carriages.

"Then put that Ring Star 10a at the front, like before, behind the gas turbine, and the traction will be enough."

However, what gave Lin Xian the biggest headache was the two nuclear-powered locomotives. The problem was that the heads of these two couldn't be connected, so they could only be placed at the end of the train. But Lin Xian wanted to separate the two to reduce the risk of damage to the energy carriages.

Thinking and thinking, it seemed there was only one plan left: two nuclear-powered locomotives at one end and one at the other, equipped with Weilong-class and Ring Star 10a respectively for cooperative energy storage and traction.

In that case, Lin Xian could only give up his Giant Whale 03e gas turbine locomotive from the very beginning...

"Sigh, I'm really reluctant."

This locomotive was repaired bit by bit by him using the most basic materials when his Mechanical Heart was only Level 1 in Jiang City. It helped him break through heavy zombie tides, climb the Underground City No. 9 tunnel, rush up the climbing elevator, and crush through the storm snowfield. Although the power output of this locomotive had become much smaller since Lin Xian stopped using the Mechanical Heart, Lin Xian was a mechanical ability user after all. Letting him devour this old partner who had made great contributions, he was somewhat reluctant.

Thinking about it, he thought he would wait until after rushing out of the polar night. At that time, he would just hang it at the end as a backup power locomotive. Anyway, he wasn't short of those mechanical source points now.

Lin Xian was thinking while manufacturing constantly. Because his mechanical manufacturing level had reached Level 5, the manufacturing speed was much faster than when he was at Hengshan Pass. Only after two hours, more than half of the super-energy capacitor unit had been assembled. After another hour and a half or so, a new G3-electromagnetic railgun began to rise slowly on the roof of Carriage 5. Just as Lin Xian finished manufacturing the main gun of the electromagnetic railgun and was preparing to perform a system self-check, he suddenly discovered that in the entire Carriage 5, it seemed he was the only one.

Where did Brother Huo go?

Lin Xian felt somewhat strange. He got up and walked to Lu Xingchen's room, finding it empty. The room was clean and tidy, and an old-style message machine was placed on Lu Xingchen's private tea table.

He immediately felt an unusual atmosphere. He raised his hand and waved it, the mechanical ability activated remotely, and the message machine pressed the power button. A burst of current crackled inside, and not long after, Lu Xingchen's message rang out.

"Brother Lin, Brother Lou, friends and partners of the *Infinite*, please forgive my unannounced departure..."

"I am poisoned by mycelium, knowing that I cannot harm my partners, and knowing that I cannot continue this journey to the east, so I leave alone to guard the peace for everyone outside the passage, to do my last bit of effort..."

Hearing the words in the message machine, Lin Xian's face sank fiercely.

Lu Xingchen was infected by mycelium?

How was this possible? There was no sign at all along the way, and he was protected by Kiki's telekinesis shield the whole time. Besides that, Lin Xian thought about it, it seemed that only Brother Huo, who performed disinfection work alone when the joint train entered the tunnel, acted alone...

"Damn it!"

The sudden situation immediately made Lin Xian feel a sense of chaotic heart and powerless anger. He immediately prepared to use the communicator to contact Brother Huo, but who would have thought that at this time, Ding Junyi's voice suddenly came from the communicator first.

"Lin Xian, there's a situation here!"

In the Zero Element Center, Ding Junyi looked at Tang Yun, whose head was already covered by mycelium. The brainwave o-band data constantly transmitted a very strange peak line graph. Ding Junyi's gaze condensed. She didn't expect that a cautious move of hers seemed to have allowed her to detect the true secret of the mycelium network!

"Speak!" Lin Xian on the other end of the communicator was very anxious at this time and shouted immediately.

"Tang Yun's brainwave o-band and the connected mycelium have a co-frequency interference phenomenon. This shows that being connected by mycelium and the hallucination spores we encountered before have an essential difference. Although the brain is constantly generating self-conscious hallucinations, the mycelium is co-frequency interfering with all brain neurons..."

"Get to the point!"

Ding Junyi adjusted her glasses, stared at the huge honeycomb center, and said:

"This mycelium network seems to really be able to connect to everyone's consciousness. But the problem is, all people's brain neurons are being mobilized regularly. This regularity doesn't conform to the changes of individual consciousness. It is very likely that this mycelium network is treating these human brains as calculation processors!"

"In other words, the entire mycelium network is very likely to be able to identify human thoughts, including Tang Yun's consciousness!"

*Boom boom boom! *

As soon as Ding Junyi's voice fell, the underground tunnel suddenly began a slight tremor, and instantly smoke and dust rolled.

This tremor instantly woke up everyone on the joint train who was resting and sleeping. Many people who were woken up immediately picked up weapons, and the various internal communication bands began to be noisy.

"What's wrong?"

"What happened?!"

"Was it an earthquake?"

On the other side, Chen Sixuan, who was still resting, also woke up. Out of caution, she immediately put on the Black Eagle armor and began to contact Lin Xian.

"Lin Xian, what's wrong?"

"I don't know." Lin Xian was already rushing down the *Infinite* with Kiki, rushing toward the Zero Element Center, and said to Chen Sixuan: "Teacher Chen, notify all fleets, prepare to evacuate at any time!"

"Alright!"

"Brother Shi, Sister Ning, you check the situation of the subway line passage quickly, we might evacuate immediately!" Lin Xian contacted Longshan No. 1 at the same time.

For a time, Shi Di and Ning Jing from Longshan No. 1, Qian Dele and Xiao Meng from the Joker fleet, Mo Nika from the Queen Mo, as well as Luo Yang, Li Yi, and the leaders of over a dozen other train fleets all received urgent news. Everyone entered a state of emergency combat readiness for the first time.

Figures began to run busily in the corridors of each carriage, the electric airport's motor engines began to hum, and the sound of countless limiters of the 15-kilometer-long joint train being released rang out quietly.

"Quick, prepare to act."

"Release the limiters!"

"Reactor heating up, prepare to increase power!"

"Weapon station, machine gunners get into position quickly."

On the side of the subway tunnel passage, Lin Xian and Kiki were rushing toward the Zero Element Center quickly.

"Sister Ding's meaning is that those mycelium use human brains as processors for calculation, and at the same time can spy on human consciousness?" Kiki hadn't completed the overwrite work of 【Grace】 when she was pulled away by Lin Xian. Hearing Lin Xian's words, she understood immediately: "So mycelium might have known that we are hiding underground through Tang Yun?"

Lin Xian's face was solemn. He picked up the mobile terminal and looked at the monitoring he set up in the Yijin Bank vault and on the street. It was still quiet, so he said: "It can't be fully determined yet, but since it's Director Ding's judgment, we must prepare for the worst. The tremor just now was also extremely unusual."

"Where are we going now?"

Lin Xian was anxious at this time, gnashing his teeth: "Find Brother Huo!"

At this moment, on the top floor of Yijin Bank, Lu Xingchen leaned against the edge of the building, his gaze sweeping over the streets in the dark night. His ears were filled with all kinds of strange whispers. In those dark alleys at the street corners, it seemed that many unspeakable existences were hidden. In the dark clouds of the sky, strange tentacles appeared from time to time. The black sticky mist of the whole city had dissipated more than half. Lu Xingchen raised his eyes and could see the huge sky mushroom tower and the sky-covering crown in the sky, his eyes carrying a bit of coldness.

"Truly evil disasters everywhere, filth growing."

He lowered his head and pulled down his collar, his fingers ignited a flame, seeing that there were large patches of cyan mycelium spreading on his chest and neck, and couldn't help but sigh. 【310-14

Lu Xingchen picked up a communicator, and after confirming the signal was connected, he continued to scorch a gold bracelet he had picked up from the vault with the flame at his fingertips. The bracelet had been covered in mud, but after he wiped it clean, he burned it with fire just to pass the time.

After speaking with the building, Lu Xingchen feared that the mycelial spores on his body would affect the others in the vehicle. Furthermore, as a Berserker-level esper, he worried that his mutation would bring unimaginable trouble to the members of the Infinite. Thus, he quietly left the Infinite and came alone to the roof of the bank above the Zero Element Center, preparing to keep watch for the Infinite while peacefully waiting to be consumed by the mycelium.

Fwip~ Fwip~

On the dark rooftop, a tiny flame flickered incessantly.

"They say true gold fears no fire, but I've been burning this thing for so long and it won't melt. It seems my own cultivation is about to be worn away as well."

Lu Xingchen looked at the gold bracelet in his hand that refused to melt no matter what, murmuring in a rather self-deprecating tone.

Suddenly, he felt a slight tremor in the air. He immediately sat up, his gaze fixed on the massive shadow of the Sky Mushroom Tower not far away. At this moment, it seemed as if billions of energy filaments were climbing up along the complex root system of the mushroom tower like blood vessels, causing the mushroom cap, which was two kilometers in diameter, to shudder violently in the sky.

Lu Xingchen stood up, his gaze cold and sharp, and whispered,

"Interesting. I actually feel like I am being stared at... by a mushroom."

(End of this chapter)