The two returned to the laboratory within twenty minutes.
A group of people surrounded them, and seeing that they were unharmed, they knew the crisis was over and breathed a sigh of relief.
"Miss Zhao, what was it?"
"I can't say for sure. The body is outside. If you want to see it, you can go out and look."
The person choked, unable to speak for a moment.
Go look?
It was late at night, and a terrifying monster had just appeared. They would have to be out of their minds to go and look.
"I'll go take a look. Who else wants to go?"
Everyone looked over. It was Professor Li.
Zhuang Peng, who hadn't really wanted to go, said, "I'll go."
Speaking of which, this person was the one he was supposed to protect on this trip. It was just that thanks to those two gods, they hadn't encountered any absolute danger along the way, and he probably wouldn't have the chance to.
With such a huge monster appearing just now, it was safe to assume the outside was safe for a while.
However, it was better to be careful.
As soon as he spoke, his subordinates naturally wouldn't refuse. In the end, seven or eight people went out together.
It was still pitch black outside. They shone their flashlights for a while before they saw the colossal creature in the open space between the two experimental areas.
This thing was larger than any monster they had ever seen. Its body was shaped like a marine creature, with two fin-like organs on its sides. However, its skin was not slimy like a fish's, but hard armor. Some parts were covered in moss. The slightly softer skin beneath the "fins" was covered in small parasitic organisms, similar to barnacles. Calling them small was relative to the monster; in reality, even the smaller ones were as big as an orange cat.
Someone reached out to touch it and suddenly cried out in pain.
"Ah!"
"What's wrong!"
"Something bit me."
All the lights focused on them. Professor Li also walked over, picked up a piece of board he had found somewhere, and gently poked at those disgusting things.
Then, a circular mouth suddenly opened and clamped onto the board.
Where all the lights were focused, they saw the small monster's mouth, lined with a ring of sharp teeth, like a meat grinder, which sent a shiver down their spines.
"Damn it! What is that?"
"It's a bit like a jawless fish," Professor Li said, waving his flashlight around. He picked up a larger piece of board, chose a slightly smaller creature, and removed it.
Jawless fish were the most primitive fish-shaped vertebrates. They did not have true jaws, and their mouths formed a suction cup, usually parasitizing other fish and living a parasitic or semi-parasitic life. This thing did indeed resemble a jawless lamprey, just much larger.
Moreover, its skin was not slippery like that of ordinary fish, but like lizard skin, looking dry and unsightly.
"Let's take some back to study."
Someone ran back to get a plastic bucket. They packed two, and then began to observe the colossal creature.
It was truly enormous.
A group of people walked around it and returned to their starting point. Professor Li, while observing its mouth, said, "This is a mutation of some deep-sea fish. It should be about four hundred meters long, and over two hundred meters wide at its widest point. It has strong offensive capabilities."
Zhuang Peng's flashlight shone on its head. The blood that flowed through its body turned a darker red, almost unnoticeable.
He said meaningfully, "The cause of death was its head being blown apart."
Someone jumped up to look, but because the creature was so large, they couldn't see it at all.
"We'll look again tomorrow. Let's get some rest tonight."
"Okay."
They returned to the laboratory. Zhu Lin and Zhong Yan were already asleep. The others were also preparing to rest. Seeing them return, they couldn't help but ask a few questions, extremely curious about the monster they described. Su Dan Novel Network
If they weren't so timid, many of them would have wanted to go out and see for themselves.
The night passed more peacefully. Near dawn, everyone fell asleep. When they woke up, they found that the two people were gone.
A group of people were terrified and searched inside and out for a long time but found no sign of them.
"Did they abandon us and run?"
"The supplies are all in that man's spatial ability. If they really took everything, what will we do?"
"They probably won't run, right? They can't use those things even if they took them. Maybe they just went out for a walk. Let's have breakfast first."
Everyone looked at Professor Li and Zhuang Peng, wanting them to make a decision.
Professor Li sighed, "That's right. They can't use those things even if they took them. Let's have breakfast first and wait for them."
"Okay."
With uneasy hearts, they were halfway through their meal when the two returned.
They also brought two men with them.
Seeing them, the two men were visibly excited.
"Miss Zhao, where did you go? And who are these two?"
"We are survivors from the city. We heard the commotion here last night and ventured out to take a look today. You are from Central City, can you take us away from here?"
Zhong Yan conjured up several grilled fish and gestured towards the group: "For you."
It was obvious that they had gone out early in the morning for a private feast.
The group found it both amusing and exasperating.
But since there was food, no one objected. The more than 30 people devoured the fish. During this time, they listened to the two men talk about the situation here.
This place was not as deserted as they had thought. In fact, there were quite a few survivors.
Before the apocalypse, the city had a permanent population of over twenty million. Only a little over a million left with them, and a similar number had escaped successively. Of the remaining people, some were bound to have survived.
They learned that in the second month after the apocalypse, that is, a month after "most people" left, the city experienced a peak in deaths. Due to the lack of precise data, they didn't know how many people were still alive. It was only that gradually, the number of people decreased, and the monsters that fed on humans also decreased, that some survivors began to emerge.
They gathered the survivors they could find, and everyone huddled together for warmth, barely surviving. Yesterday evening, they heard the commotion inside, and this morning, they sent a few people to risk their lives to investigate.
One of the two men was a wind-elemental ability user, and the other was a strength-type. They were relatively good at escaping. They roamed around the area and encountered two people grilling fish by an artificial lake.
Almost everyone was surviving in the wild, but these two were out for a picnic, looking out of place. This immediately caught the attention of the two men.
After listening to their story, Professor Li asked with a grim expression, "How many survivors are there in your area?"
"A few thousand," one of the men said with a bitter expression. "We can't even feed a few thousand people. We have to go hungry sometimes, and we have to guard against those monsters and zombies. Fortunately, the zombies were all eaten by the monsters. Otherwise, their ability to track living people is much stronger than the monsters'."