Chapter 161: Boundary Line
Translator: Pluto Editor: Vermillion
In the open wilderness, the night winds bellowed stronger than during the day. The bonfire built from broken twigs and dead leaves jumped and flickered in the wind, and the column of smoke scattered in the air before even reaching the sky.
Apart from the small bonfire, there wasn’t a single source of light on the horizon—even the dimly lit stars from before had been concealed entirely by a thick layer of clouds. In the darkness, six people and B.Rabbit huddled around the fire. The wavering flames illuminated each of their solemn expressions. No one spoke for quite a while.
It had already been six hours since the disappearance of Bai Xiaoke and the two others.
Although no one explicitly spelled it out, everyone knew clearly in their minds that the hope of rescuing them alive wasn't all that great...
Finally, B.Rabbit looked to his left and right before breaking the silence. He opened his mouth and asked a question with an answer he had already confirmed a number of times: "Green Melon, didn’t you see anything strange when you were in the air that day?"
"I’m telling you the truth, Boss," Green Melon showed a despondent expression, sounding dispirited and dazed, "How would I dare to miss a single sign of disturbance! But there was really nothing besides those endless rows of ridges, I didn’t even see a single bug, let alone traces of human activity."
This afternoon, after Lin Sanjiu’s Dog’s Frisbee’s lit up, they stopped their tracks after leaving the danger zone. Lin Sanjiu suddenly realized that she could get Green Melon to wear his [Cloud Mimicry Raincoat] so that he could fly up to the skies to survey the situation.
Although [Cloud Mimicry Raincoat] could only allow its user to rise straight from where he was standing without granting the user the ability to move around, Green Melon might discover something if he had an eagle's view of the place. However, that thought swiftly turned into a disappointment.
Even though they didn't dare to step into that area rashly, they exhausted all other possibilities: they used every suitable special item they had to scout the area; after the items came back empty-handed, they spent a considerable amount of effort to capture two bugs. They tied the bugs and threw them into the area.
To find out what exactly transpired, Green Melon monitored the situation from the sky while Lin Sanjiu called out her Diary Card. Ignoring its constant display of "Oh gosh this is so disgusting" and other complaints, she tied the card and the worms together before releasing them into the danger zone.
When they pulled back the string, the bugs had disappeared as expected whereas the Diary Card was left dangling from the string. Lin Sanjiu suppressed the sudden excitement she felt. She removed the card and noticed that her Diary Card only recorded a single sentence: "5:04pm, the disgusting bugs suddenly disappeared."
Then, she called Green Melon down to question him. Unfortunately, his answer wasn’t any better, "I only saw two little shadows rolling for a bit before they disappeared... I couldn’t see clearly how they disappeared. It seems like it happened in the blink of an eye.
With that, they were completely at a loss as to what they should do next. After quite a while, someone suddenly heaved a long sigh.
"This is all my fault," Lin Sanjiu was the one speaking. She lowered her head, staring fixed at the small piece of land in front of her, "If I didn’t bring all of you here recklessly, they wouldn’t just… disappear."
One of the twins, it wasn’t clear which, suddenly let out a loud sniffle.
"It wasn’t your fault, Sister Lin!" Hui Chuyan consoled anxiously, "We all agreed to come here together. When we are nearing the area, you even told us to be on alert. But this is simply too illogical, even if it wasn’t you, no one would ever expect this to happen!"
Lin Sanjiu patted her hand lightly as a gesture of appreciation toward Hui Chuyan’s intention to defend her. In the end, Lin Sanjiu said nothing, seemingly disagreeing with what Hui Chuyan said.
There was still something, buried deep in her heart. Something she had not told the others.
The point where the LED lights blinked again was not the same location where they first stopped. It was at least two to three hundred meters away from the first boundary. No matter how hard Lin Sanjiu thought about it, she couldn’t think of an explanation for this phenomenon. To make things worse, the more she thought about it, the more she began to doubt her memory.
After all, the landscape which surrounded them had already been barren for a long time. It was littered with ruins and sparse vegetation which looked more or less the same without any prominent landmarks. Besides, she was in a hurry back then; it was very possible that she could have remembered the first spot wrongly. The fact that the others seemed unaware of this was perhaps proof of this suspicion.
"Let’s analyze this for a bit." Lin Sanjiu rubbed her face, speaking in an almost sighing manner. She knew that no amount of regret would bring those people back. Instead, the best choice of action was to try a little harder.
"The bugs and my Diary Card were released together. The bugs disappeared, yet the card remained. This probably means that only living organisms would disappear?" She gave a sweeping glance at everyone, holding a faint hint of anticipation.
"That appears to be the case," B.Rabbit immediately replied. "Moreover, only the things on the ground will disappear..."
"But, there is something odd about this. The people and bugs disappeared in different locations, with significant distance between them..." Xueqin commented hesitantly, "If something attacked them, could there be more than one of that something?"
Green Melon rejected her conjecture promptly, "That’s impossible. Even if there was only one, I’d have detected it, let alone a few of them."
Their discussion reached a dead-end once again. Lin Sanjiu scratched her head impatiently as she reconsidered a bunch of possibilities in her head: [Was it a mutated organism? A duoluozhong? A special item? A Pocket Dimension?]
As soon as the two words ‘Pocket Dimension’ entered her mind, she immediately looked up, drawing everyone’s attention.
"Is this... actually a Pocket Dimension?" Lin Sanjiu spoke slowly; her heart pounded rapidly as she thought that this was a small breakthrough.
"F*ck, it is possible!" B.Rabbit instantly perked up, "Some Pocket Dimensions start without any warning, sucking you in even without you knowing!"
With the exception of Xueqin, who just evolved not long ago and didn’t quite understand the term "Pocket Dimension," everyone else got enthusiastic. The despondent atmosphere in the air dissipated as they had a lively discussion about the possibility that they were in a Pocket Dimension.
"If that’s the case, there isn’t the risk of them dying for the time being… A Pocket Dimension doesn’t follow the natural order of things! We still have time!" As everyone seemed less perplexed over the matter, B.Rabbit got straight to the point, addressing the main worry they had in their hearts.
The heavy feelings of guilt which weighed down on Lin Sanjiu lightened. With that, her thoughts ran faster, and she immediately added, "Although we don’t know what type of Pocket Dimension this is, there must be a second stage. We must be prepared... Hmm, how about this? I’ve retrieved quite a number of items from the Garden of Eden Laboratories. Let’s distribute them tonight, it will boost our combat abilities in a short span of time."
Before escaping the Garden of Eden, she had already instructed the ladies around her to each carry a large bag. Meanwhile, those who couldn’t find a bag bundled their items in large bed sheets. Since Lin Sanjiu could only convert 16 items a day herself, she only chose large items, which were hard to carry, to convert into cards. After that, she slowly converted the smaller items into her cards while they were traveling.
Lin Sanjiu took out all the items that might be handy. She spread the cards out on the ground in one straight row. Xueqin shifted her gaze to one of the cards and picked it up. [Bubbles Blowing Girl] was the very item which caused them a lot of trouble during their mission in the Garden of Eden.
"We can use this to guard us at night!" she remarked with a bit of excitement.
[Bubbles Blowing Girl]
Developed by the Technology Department in Garden of Eden Laboratories, this product has the sturdy appearance of a 1.8m kindergarten girl blowing bubbles while holding a bottle of soapy water. The bottle of soapy water contains an intensive energy compression device. Thus the bubbles created can cause mini-explosions.
However, the most impressive part of it would be the "Enemy homing ability" integrated with the bubbles. The bubbles would automatically pursue the targeted enemies and only explode after honing in the target. The robot's towering shadow seemingly brought some sense of security to everyone. While Xueqin studied the robot to figure out how it operated, the others looked at the remaining cards before the cards were distributed according to their needs.
Now that they had some direction, everyone was more psychologically prepared. After they tested out the items for some time, the older twin, Metaphysics, suggested, "Boss, we still have some time before dawn. Wouldn't it be better if we all rested a bit?"
Since no one knew what to expect next from the pocket dimension, waiting tensely for something to happen wasn’t the smartest course of action. B.Rabbit thought for a while before arranging the rotating night watch duties in a boss-like manner: "I agree. Everyone should recuperate and conserve our energy... Green Melon, you will stand guard for two hours before changing shifts with... Uh, what’s your name? Hui Chuyan?"
Noting that B.Rabbit had everything in order, Lin Sanjiu took a rucksack out and used it as a pillow before lying down near the bonfire. B.Rabbit concluded with a final order, "Take a head count every thirty minutes, we don’t want to lose another person!" Then, he found a comfortable spot to rest, curling himself into a ball.
[He does have a semblance of a boss.] Lin Sanjiu thought to herself.
Apart from Green Melon, who was on the night watch, everybody else laid down on the ground in small groups. Although none of them had fallen asleep yet, everything quickly grew quiet. Soon, they could even hear each other’s breathing audibly.
After staring at the night sky for a considerable amount of time, half-alert, Lin Sanjiu finally drifted off to sleep. Unexpectedly, she had a restful sleep—it was peacefully quiet, and nothing strange happened.
When she woke up naturally from her sleep, the sky was still dark. The bonfire had already died down. It was pitch black all around. She could only make out a few figures in the near distance and the large [Bubbles Blowing Girl] standing beside her.
[Nothing happened...] Lin Sanjiu rubbed her eyes and sat up. "Who is on the night watch now?" she asked softly. She heard the sound of the passing breeze. Her question was met with silence. Lin Sanjiu’s palms began to sweat.
She looked carefully again and realized that the shadows belonged to the bags that everyone was leaning against while they slept. Despite the slight depressions on the bags, Lin Sanjiu did not see a single soul.
[Whe-where is everyone?]
Somehow, taking out her [Dog’s Frisbee] was the first thing she did. Following which, she held it in her mouth.
Unfortunately, against her wishes, the lights did not start flashing.