CH 24

Subspecies (1)

The next day, the snow and the wind stopped. It was a rare sunny day.

That morning, Jiang Jianming and Tang Zhen got down the mecha together. The former was his usual calm self, and his mental state seemed to have recovered to the point where no one could even find a trace that he had coughed up blood last night.

Tang Zhen, on the other hand, had two dark circles under his eyes, and exuded an aura of ‘Three Views had already collapsed’.

In fact, his Three Views really did explode: a disabled human actually wants to go to the Crystal Nest, good heavens, a disabled human being…a disabled human!!

Tang Zhen rubbed his hair into a bird’s nest in despair.

“Jiang Jianming……!!”

Jiang Jianming walked in front as if nothing happened, and the young master of the Tang family followed behind, and muttered, “Let me tell you, this matter is not over yet!”

Jiang Jianming answered him lazily. “Hmm?”

This man is still pretending to be confused!

Wake up from sleep and then act like you didn’t say anything last night?

“You know that it is impossible for disabled humans to reach the Crystal Nest!!”

Tang Zhen became agitated that the veins on his temples twitched wildly, “The concentration of crystal particles there, even to a new human will experience ‘chaotic crystal’ and die suddenly on the spot. It’s impossible to get close even if you are covered with tranquilizers!!

“……”

Jiang Jianming touched his left chest pocket slowly. The cartridge case that Garcia gave him was still lying inside obediently.

He smiled silently, “It isn’t necessary to go, it depends on the situation.”

“You—!?” 

Tang Zhen was even more impatient, and pointed at the sky like swearing a poisonous oath. “Do you think I really won’t report you to the officer? Go to Crystal Nest, see if I don’t poke you in front of the old marshal………..”

Jiang Jianming casually patted him on the shoulder. “Okay, okay, you can say what you want to say…but let’s not make a fuss here, or we’ll be lectured by the lieutenant.”

They returned to their small team first, and then six of them gathered with the rest of the recruits and lined up.

Subsequently, Lieutenant Colonel Huo Lin announced to everyone the requirements for their field training.

There were eight squads of officers in this year’s adaptation period. Eight positioning chips had already been arranged by the fortress in advance, and each team needed to march to the location of the chip in the mountains, and in the process, work together to hunt down C-level alien creatures.

The time limit was five days, and each team must return to the assembly point within the limited time, hand in the chip and the real crystal ores taken from the alien creatures. The score would be given by the commanding officer after comprehensive judgment. The less time spent, the higher the quality of the real crystal ore, and the less damage to personnel and mechas, the higher the score.

The eight teams drew lots to determine their respective travel paths, and the coordinates of the positioning chip were transmitted to everyone’s wrist device and mecha afterwards.

“The points this time will be included in the meritorious service in proportion,” Huo Lin grinned and said loudly, “This is to cheer you all up. Making meritorious deeds and throwing corpses into the wilderness are often just one step away.”

“Now, the training officially begins, Go!!”

The six members of the third team were all ready to go, and got on the mechas one after another.

Suddenly, Bei Maner said in the team’s internal communication channel, “By the way, since we’re going to work as a team, shouldn’t we have a captain?”

Jiang Jianming smiled. “Then it should be Miss Bei.”

“Me!?” 

Bei Maner’s startled voice sounded on the channel.

Jiang Jianming: “Among us, you are the most suitable.”

Li Youfang snorted: “What do you mean by suitable? Of course, Miss Bei is indeed very excellent…….”

Jiang Jianming said calmly. “Correct, even if you and Tang Zhen are both stronger than Bei Maner in terms of combat power, but if any of the two you are appointed captain, you will only quarrel, no?”

Li Youfang: “…….”

Tang Zhen: ”……”

As they were talking in the channel, the six IP’s had also already started to run, leaving the assembly area behind them and setting foot on the rugged iceberg.

Thanks to their off-road morning exercises of mechas every morning these days, they have thoroughly mastered the skills on how to drive the mechas over the mountains.

Bei Maner said seriously, “Actually, Jiang should be the right one. Last time when we went to the ice forest to hunt red caterpillars, Tang Zhen and I got such high grades because we listened to Jiang’s advice.”

Jiang Jianming just laughed it off. As a remnant human being, it would be impossible for him to be the captain…...at least not yet.

What’s more, from a comprehensive perspective, based on Bei Maner’s ability and personality, she was indeed the best person to coordinate and guide the entire team. After Tang Zhen and Li Youfang nodded, Joe and Ellie did not raise any objections, and the matter was settled in this way.

It was not easy to travel long distances in snow-capped mountains, as the mecha operation was very exhausting both physically and mentally. Especially in this season, when the sunny weather only lasts for a while, then there would be snow storms next, making it even more difficult for the mecha to run.

Jiang Jianming’s body couldn’t bear such a high consumption. Fortunately, he had Seth, and when he gets tired, he can let the intelligence help him drive for a while, which made it much easier compared to his other teammates.

All went well on the first day. They walked two-thirds of the distance at once, and encountered two waves of D-level alien creatures on the way. The few new crystal humans released crystal bones, and they cleaned them up neat and quick.

The road at night was dangerous, therefore they set up marching tents that evening. In the early morning of the next day, the six people continued to grope in the mountains along the positioning of the chip, and finally found the chip box embedded on a rock in the forest.

“It’s here….I got it.”

Li Youfang manipulated the robotic arm to remove the chip box and handed it to Bei Maner, who put the chip box into her mecha’s storage compartment.

“All right, the goal of the first phase is complete!”

Bei Maner breathed a sigh of relief, blinked and said, “Now, what remains is to kill C-level alien creatures, but it’s really strange, how come there are so few alien creatures along the way………”

Originally, according to the plan they discussed halfway, if possible, it was best to kill a certain C-level alien creature along the way as they were still physically energized and had power. But it’s a pity that there were no traces of C-level alien creature activities along the way, and there were even few D-level creatures.

Ellie touched her arm and whispered, “I don’t feel right.”

Bei Maner: “There is still enough time, let’s go ahead and have a look.”

Thus everyone continued to move forward, but things seemed to become a little abnormal. Half a day later, they didn’t encounter any alien creatures……..This time, even D-level creatures were not seen.

In that evening, Li Youfang had already become a little worried.

“Time is running out. Even if we can’t find any C-level alien creatures, we still have to return!” 

The time limit for this training was only five days, unfortunately, what they drew by lot was a route with gradually decreasing altitude. It would be downhill when coming down, and it would be uphill when returning back. They must set enough time to meet the deadline.

What’s more, there was a huge gap of strength of alien creatures in every level. It wouldn’t be easy for them to kill a C-class, but until now, they haven’t even found a suitable target yet—

“Wait, all of you stop. “

Suddenly, Jiang Jianming’s voice came through the channel. “Slow down the speed of your mecha.”

His voice was cold and steady, and his aura completely overwhelmed these young officers who had just left school. It was better when he stayed quiet for the past two days, but when he opened his mouth at this moment, those five people subconsciously followed suit.

Li Youfang involuntarily slowed down before regaining consciousness, then he suddenly became a little annoyed. “What stop, there is no time!”

In the cockpit of the IP, Jiang Jianming stared at a certain piece of data on the screen of his mecha, “The concentration of crystal particles here is too high, which is abnormal.” He sent the data out, “Be careful.”

“Hey, wait a minute,” Ellie said happily, raising her voice, “The high concentration of crystal particles means that there may be C-level alien creatures nearby, right?”

Jiang Jianming: “There are no traces of alien creatures yet. If it can affect even at such a far range, the opponent may not be an ordinary C-level.”

After he finished speaking, he looked around the surrounding environment again—it was a canyon. They had passed through the sparse forest and came to a canyon. The terrain was not too narrow, and there was not a lot of snow, but the shadows casted by the high mountain walls on both sides still gave people a lot of psychological pressure.

Bei Maner raised her voice. “Listen to classmate Jiang, let’s walk slowly and see the situation first!”

She looked at the map, thought for a while and said. “There seems to be a low basin further ahead, let’s go around the edge and observe the situation.”

Half an hour later, the six IP’s were on top of the icy mountain rocks and were watching the scene below.

“Oh my god……”

Someone murmured in shock.

As expected, the altitude was getting lower and lower as they went forward. At the exit of the valley, the terrain opened, and a huge creature crouched in the lowland.

A spider.

In other words, it was a creature similar in shape to a spider. Its body was almost as big as a small hill. The main body was black with reddish-gray stripes interspersed, and its body was covered with thick hairs.

It seemed to have fought with something, as two of its eight legs were broken, leaving only six intact legs. The transparent crystal condensed by the crystal particles was integrated with its carapaces, flesh, and fluff………integrated into one, and its oval abdomen was wriggling regularly.

Joe’s face turned pale. “No, we…are we going to fight such a big guy? It’s bigger than a red caterpillar……..”

Ellie kept rubbing the goosebumps on her arms. “It’s so disgusting!

“Tsk, isn’t it just a big bug.” Tang Zhen raised his eyebrows and waved his hand, “Okay, Little Jiang, don’t go down, let’s get closer and check the situation first.”

On the opposite side of the communication channel, Jiang Jianming was silent for two seconds. Then he said, “…If it’s just to check the situation, I’ll go.”

Jiang Jianming glanced at the snow-white bracelet on his wrist, “I have a mecha with higher defense.”

Li Youfang disagreed, and he made a gesture from here to the low ground where the giant spider was lying down. “No. Look at this distance, plus you can’t fight, just use the mecha only to lurk close, after checking the situation, turn back—move fast, how about an hour or two?”

“If we’re sure we want to deal with this guy, the few of us have to get close to it somehow, and it will take another hour. It’s a waste of time.”

He said firmly, “Therefore we all will still have to go, if we are sure we can kill it, then we do it on the spot!”

After finishing speaking, Li Youfang laughed jokingly at Jiang Jianming again. “Anyway, with or without you, our team’s strength is still the same. Little Jiang is not in good health, have a rest more.”

“…..”

Jiang Jianming ignored this guy, and just frowned while staring at the giant spider from a distance.

He had made a lot of preparations before coming to Silver Big Dipper, one of which was to memorize the alien biological atlas. But the one in front of him……..he didn’t recognize it.

This was actually not surprising, there were only a handful of numbers of alien creatures that could be discovered and recorded by human beings. What’s more, the farther one went into the depths of the far star, the more bizarre the forms of creatures were, and would be impossible to classify at all.

It’s just that…..these five teammates were all rookies still in adaptation period, neither in terms of ability nor mentality, were enough to adapt to the situation like real soldiers.

Jiang Jianming even thought to himself: If he was alone, maybe he would go up and try to fire a cannon, but what about his teammates……

“Maner.” Tang Zhen said suddenly, “You are the captain, you decide.”

“Me?” 

Bei Maner was stunned for a moment, frowned, then hesitantly said, “I……”

On the one hand, she felt that the situation was indeed a bit abnormal, and perhaps she should be cautious; but on the other hand, she felt that what Li Youfang said was reasonable. If they give up the opportunity in front of them, they would lose in this training.

Not to mention, they’re letting a sick and disabled person go to investigate this kind of thing alone……

A normal new human can’t even do it!

Half a minute later, Bei Maner bit her lower lip and said “The five of us will go! However, no one is allowed to attack without my order.”

Jiang Jianming thought for a while, but didn’t stop her, and merely said, “Okay, but don’t approach rashly within the range of hundred meters, and share the video with me when the time comes. The purpose of the training is just to gain experience, and it’s not worth working hard.”

Bei Maner nodded and agreed. “Student Jiang, we will be careful. If it’s unsure, I will bring everyone back.”

But as soon as the voice fell, Jiang Jianming saw a communication pop up on the corner of his screen.

Bei Maner’s face was displayed on the screen—she was talking to him via private communication.

Bei Maner was still biting her lower lip, and with a hint of tension in her clean eyes, she whispered, “…But classmate Jiang, if in case, just in case something happened……..you must go first and leave us.”

Jiang Jianming knew what Bei Maner meant. Because he was a disabled human being, he would not be of much help even if he rushed up at a dangerous moment, it would be better if he could run away..

He didn’t refute anything, but didn’t agree either, and just simply said, “Be careful.”

The private communication was immediately cut off.

Bei Maner said, “Let’s go together!”

In the next second, five M-IP 18’s jumped up.

The blue and black mechas slid along the mountain rocks together, with crouched postures.