Lin Qiao confirmed that some tunnels on both sides of the river were leading to deeper areas, then controlled the dark mist to bring herself higher.
As she prepared to get back to the others, Long Qingying and the others sensed a human vibe from behind them. They turned back and carefully looked around, but the vibe was gone. Long Qingying and Kong Qingming, who were standing by each other's side, made an eye-contact, both with a mysterious look in their eyes.
"Someone is following us stealthily, but leaking her vibe to let us find her on purpose," said Duan Juan coldly, "What does she want?"
"They're either hiding somewhere, waiting to launch a surprise attack, or brewing some kind of scheme," Kong Qingming glanced backward and shared his guess.
Long Qingying snorted coldly and said, "That woman is gonna suffer if she dares to do anything that we wouldn't like."
Her Chief had already known about the enemy's plan. She must have had a plan to deal with the woman. However, Long Qingying didn't say that out loud, as she didn't want the enemy to know it. Meanwhile, the people from Green Mountain Base quietly looked around and waited to see how things would go.
After that short conversation, they didn't look back again, but turned around to look down the crevice, because Lin Qiao's vibe had risen. Soon, she showed up in front of them. She first raised her eyes to glance into the tunnel behind them, then turned back and floated in the air as she said to her people, "There's a boiling river, about a thousand and six-hundred meters down from here. The air temperature down there is high as well, not to mention the river itself. Don't fall into the water if you don't want to be boiled. There're some caves with traces left by some creatures. We'll land by the riverside."
"Got it!" Kong Qingming responded to her. Then, he waved at his people and leaped down the crevice. His people followed him down, along with the people from All Beings Base. Next, the Green Mountain Base people also jumped without hesitation.
People calculated the depth of the crevice based on the falling speed and time. As the air temperature grew higher and higher, they launched what they had prepared together.
None of the people on the scene had wind power,so they weren't able to float in the air before breaking into level-seven. Therefore, if Lin Qiao didn't warn them in advance, they might leap straight down and end up being boiled in the water.
At that point, the whole team had fixed themselves on the rock face. After attaining a clear vision of the river, they carefully descended toward the riverside. Thankfully, they were all wearing tailored combat boots. The bottom of their shoes was made from alloy, so the hot ground wouldn't burn their shoes.
Lin Qiao soon landed on a rock near the riverside, and she couldn't help but take off her coat and throw it into her space. It was really hot after all!
The others would have done the same long ago if they weren't worried that the mist might enter their body through their pores to harm them. Lin Qiao had a body that was impenetrable and indestructible. Unlike her body, their own bodies were still fragile. So, they could only watch her take off her coat and wear only a vest, tying her hair into a ponytail.
Lin Qiao turned around to look at the caves behind her. There were a few near her, and some on the other side of the river. She looked around and chose the cave that had the strongest scents, "This way!"
Unlike the humans who leaped straight down, the dog from Green Mountain Base inserted its claws into the rockface and slipped down to the riverside. Its sharp claws were inside the especially hard rock all the time! After landing, it shook its head and sneezed a few times, almost throwing away its mask.
The dog was wearing a gas mask to keep it from inhaling any harmful gas.
Lin Qiao glanced at the quiet dog and thought of her extra noisy zombie dog, sighing in her head. No matter how annoying that zombie dog could be, it was still her dog. Thankfully, the nice Black had been keeping an eye on the dog, or else Lu Tianyi would be driven crazy every single day.
Her gaze made the dog grow vigilant and turn to her immediately. But three seconds later, it couldn't help but sneeze again.
People packed their gears and adjusted their body temperatures with their superpowers. In the meantime, they moved toward where Lin Qiao was pointing at.
Away from the riverside, the air temperature dropped largely. They walked into the cave and found the ground and rockfaces on both sides worn out. Quite some claw marks could be seen on the ground as well.
"We are about four miles away from the earth's surface now, right? As we thought, many creatures are living down here," Kong Qingming shone his flashlight from side to side and carefully looked around.
Lin Qiao was moving forward. On hearing his words, she responded, "There are some strong scents here. At least twenty different types of large-scale creatures have walked through this tunnel."
Before the apocalypse, the creatures who were able to survive thousands of meters deep underground were extremely rare, not to mention the large-sized ones.
"Twenty? So many!" Kong Qingming heard what Lin Qiao said and paused with surprise at first. But, he soon realized that more than twenty different types of underground creatures had already shown up on the earth's surface.
While paying attention to the environment and suspicious marks in the tunnel, everyone moved forward carefully.
At that time, a group of people showed up above the crevice. Xie Longyun, who was leading the team, looked around, then leaned her head forward to look into the crevice. The darkness in the crevice gave her a faint but not good feeling. Clearly, it was dangerous down there.
She took a step backward and pointed at a level-six wind-powered man under her command, "Get down and take a look. Move quickly! Don't let those people get too far away from us. Don't let them sense our presence too clearly either."
"Yes, ma'am!" The man nodded as he released his power and leaped into the crevice. He had wind power, and it was very easy for him to get down into the crevice, as a strong wind had been blowing out of it.