area51novel Chapter 45 On the Way
Chapter 45 On the Way
After making the decision, Xu Yang carefully checked the route through the Azure Sea once more.
Hope for a safe journey tomorrow.
He suddenly frowned, realizing he had planted a flag.
But after two seconds, he forgot about it and continued browsing the map.
My gaze lingered on those special areas within the buffer zone. Like the Azure Sea, they also had unique names, such as the Amber Plateau and the White Spot Desert.
During the visit, only brief introductions were provided, all advising against entering unless absolutely necessary, thus labeling it a dangerous area.
Fortunately, there aren't too many dangerous areas in the buffer zone, and the distance between these areas is often quite far. Large tracts of barren land are the norm in the entire buffer zone.
Scanning the map, which also marked the locations of some cities, Xu Yang even discovered the town where he and Lily had stayed.
However, it was only a fleeting moment; what was now catching his attention were two locations deep within the buffer zone of the Black Mountain area.
One of them was the ruins of Ring Star City, or rather, the ruins of the new home. He remembered that there was an investigation mission worth over two million at Settlement Three, which required entering this place.
Maybe I can go and take a look when the red petals fall in the future.
Xu Yang suppressed this thought for the time being, and his gaze swept across the room, turning to another name—Black Mountain.
The isolation zone in Heishan District, Heishan itself—it's hard to say there's no connection between them.
Unfortunately, the introduction only contained some clichés, and like all special areas, it did not point out the specific origin.
……
Outside the car window, the parking lot was silent and pitch black.
Xu Yang scrolled across the map a few more times, but couldn't find any more interesting landmarks. He tapped his finger and exited to the bookshelf page.
The time in the top left corner of the bracelet image is 21:23.
He hesitated for a moment on the list of books, but since he had nothing else to do at the moment, he clicked on "Dreaming Back to Taminis".
Because I have to drive all day tomorrow, I can't stay up late, or at least not for too long.
Xu Yang planned to watch it for five minutes before bed...
……
Five minutes later, the man had experienced the most fulfilling four hours of his life.
……
In the blink of an eye, the sky turned white.
Inside the SUV, Xu Yang, who had slept for three hours, opened his eyes, slumped over the steering wheel for a while, and then, as if a machine had started up, suddenly came to his senses.
He stretched and then started the SUV and set off.
He didn't look tired at all.
Three hours of sleep was enough for him, and as his physical attributes increased, his need for sleep gradually decreased.
Xu Yang suspects that as his aptitude increases, he might eventually reach a state of insomnia.
"At that time, wouldn't I be living half a lifetime longer than the average person?"
Thinking of this, he smiled slightly, gripped the steering wheel with one hand, and reached out with the other to turn on the car's music.
A burst of powerful music began.
The frenetic drumbeats, accompanied by the distorted guitar melody, explode together, and the heavy metal-style track resonates in your ears.
To be honest, those two bastards had... pretty good taste.
Her calves trembled incessantly in rhythm.
Before long, the vehicle crossed the gray wall and sped along an unfamiliar highway.
Xu Yang glanced at the location on the wristband; the vehicle was already on the right road.
Keep moving forward, and you'll soon reach the isolation zone.
He gripped the steering wheel, the wind whistling past his ears, and gazed at the bland, lifeless green scenery outside the window. Gradually, the story from last night's novel surfaced in his mind.
……
Overall, it was a rather interesting and eerie story, a dreamlike return to Taminis.
As the title suggests, in the book the protagonist repeatedly travels to a place called Taminis through dreams.
The plot is not complicated. It tells the story of how the protagonist starts having strange dreams one day, in which he arrives in a bizarre place with a harsh environment and strange civilization, and ultimately finds nothing in reality.
The strange thing is the author's descriptive technique. The further the story goes, the more the author reveres Taminis, as if this place really exists and is some kind of sacred and beautiful paradise.
The author expresses heartfelt admiration for the cold, dark ground covered with black rocks and the dark purple arthropods, as if eager to join them.
What is the connection between this place and the Black Mountain area?
This is also the reason Ron claims to have come to the Black Mountain area, which probably stems from what the author mentioned at the end of the book—
"...I saw a black mountain range shaped like an axe, which told me that hundreds of years from now, the Black Mountain would stand tall at the end of time."
Farewell, my hometown Taminis, your wanderer watches over you.
The area at the very center of the buffer zone in Heishan District is Heishan itself.
Interestingly, the current year is 20766 in the Federal Calendar, the book was written more than 700 years ago, and the appearance of the buffer zone, or Black Mountain, was more than 40 years ago, after the beginning of the Great Cataclysm.
This perfectly matches the information mentioned in the book about "several hundred years later".
What's puzzling is that the Black Mountain in the book is still not Taminis, but rather something related to Taminis, without specifying the exact connection.
Xu Yang guessed that this might be the passage to Taminis?
The author, who is almost like a "traitor," never mentions Montenegro again later in the story. He only praises his dream homeland.
As for whether there is any connection between the Black Mountain in the real Black Mountain area and the Black Mountain in the book, there is no definitive conclusion.
At least when he looked at the map last night, there was no mention of Taminis in the description of Montenegro.
Perhaps it's just that the author's idea collided with a real-world idea.
It was just a coincidence.
Xu Yang hummed a little tune, his gaze fixed on the empty highway ahead, with the plains in the distance, some of them barren.
Continue driving along this highway, and you'll soon enter the median strip.
……
The vehicle, accompanied by loud singing, made a racket all the way.
Xu Yang stuffed a few pieces of dried meat into his mouth halfway through, which he considered his lunch.
We've arrived at the isolation zone.
He turned off the music in the car, showing sufficient respect for the dangerous area.
I glanced out the window; all I saw in the sunlight was dust and withered grass stubble, which were kicked up by the wind as the wheels rolled, carrying the smell of smoke.
The road ahead was becoming increasingly desolate, as could be seen with the naked eye.
The endless plains looked like copied and pasted plots of land.
Xu Yang noticed some small piles of stones piled up by people along the way, and several signs hanging from a metal pole, bearing the names of some areas.
It's probably meant to be used as a road sign.
Doesn't it have a location?
Xu Yang subconsciously glanced at the map above the bracelet, a hint of surprise flashing in his eyes.
On the map, the small white dot that had been used to locate the target had disappeared. He reopened the map several times, but the white dot never reappeared.
Is the isolation barrier unable to be positioned, or is it simply broken?
Xu Yang turned the car around with some doubt and returned to the safe zone. The location returned to normal a moment later.
The isolation zone cannot be located...
Xu Yang sighed, suddenly understanding the stones along the way.
But now that things have come to this, there's no way to turn back.
He reversed the car a short distance into the safe zone, adjusted his direction by looking at the trajectory on the map, and then compared it with the small piles of stones scattered in the median strip ahead.
It didn't take much effort to determine the location.
Looking at the map, following this direction and the guidance of the piles of stones, there should be a small town on the left side of the road. Next to it, an abandoned road leads directly to the edge of the Azure Sea.
Afterwards, they continued forward along the edge of the area, leaving the Azure Sea, and soon they would enter the safe zone where Settlement Sixteen was located...
The off-road vehicle restarted, rolling over the identical yellow-green ground, with Xu Yang occasionally glancing at the road signs along the way.
time flies.
After crossing a rolling hill, the outline of a deserted town came into view.
Xu Yang circled the abandoned city, close to its edge, and headed towards the highway in the wilderness not far away.
He glanced at the side window from time to time and saw some zombie monsters scattered on the edge of the city. Some of them had even spotted the vehicle and were running towards him.
A faint roar came from behind the car.
He glanced in the rearview mirror, where a glowing monster stood out conspicuously.
As the other person ran, several streaks of electricity appeared around him on the ground, one of which chased after the off-road vehicle like a silver snake.
They don't look like the kind of people you want to mess with.
Xu Yang estimated in his mind that unless he directly sacrificed himself to charge at it, he might not be able to defeat this thing.
After all, electricity is much more troublesome than fire. Not only does it deal high damage, but it also causes a stun effect, making it a perfect counter to melee combat.
But it also seems to be very suitable for close combat.
I wonder if there are any mutations or biochemical plugins that can do that; maybe I can develop one myself someday.
He put his thoughts aside for the time being, and in the rearview mirror, the glowing monster gradually disappeared from his sight.
Ahead lay a pitch-black asphalt road.
With a loud crash!
The vehicle veered onto the road from the side, the steering wheel turned sharply, the handbrake was pulled up, and the tires instantly kicked up a cloud of gray smoke on the ground.
After a drift, the car straightened and entered the main road...
Time flies.
Until the scenery ahead suddenly blurred, and a visible anomaly appeared.
Xu Yang suddenly realized—
The blue sea.
Drizzle, drizzle...
A light rain was falling from the sky. Xu Yang stretched out one arm out of the window, his palm damp with rainwater.
It tastes salty when you put it on your tongue.
There was a faint salty, fishy smell in the air, making breathing feel strangely heavy. He looked out the car window.
The rain suddenly appeared from mid-air, as if a vast ocean had been squeezed through some kind of sieve, with silk-like seawater overflowing into this area.
At this moment, the surrounding space was tinged with a light cyan color, with a hazy blue light. There were no clouds in the sky, and the higher one went, the more the mesmerizing cyan-blue color expanded.
Some strange, flowing figures swam within it.
Xu Yang looked at those figures and immediately activated the guide.
……
There is no information.
But it also means that it is nothingness, or at least there is no danger.
He stopped the car and carefully examined the strange landscape. This was only the edge of the Blue Sea; there might be even more bizarre things deeper inside.
Those figures high in the sky have a phantom-like, translucent quality; perhaps they are some kind of mirage, or perhaps they are traces left from the past?
However, this speculation was immediately proven wrong.
High in the sky, several strange figures began to swim downwards. They had clearly seen Xu Yang and were swimming straight towards him. As they got closer, their appearance became clearer.
A translucent blue phantom, with a smooth, sticky humanoid upper body and a swimming fish tail lower body, and two wings on its back that look like piled-up foam, with honeycomb-like pores on the surface, constantly bubbling.
These don't resemble mermaids from fairy tales; they're more like monsters formed from accumulated nuclear wastewater. They have bald, diamond-shaped heads, and their ugly features loom close to the SUV.
His deep blue eyes looked at Xu Yang through the car window.
Suddenly, ripples appeared on the surface of these phantoms, and more bubbles rose from their wings, like ripples spreading across water. After wave after wave of ripples, a beautiful woman wrapped in a light veil appeared outside the car window.
Her eyes and brows were full of spring, and her demeanor was graceful and charming.
……
"Door-to-door service."
Xu Yang smacked his lips.
In fact, he had kept the compass running ever since the monsters began to approach, and he still did so now.
If the guide hadn't failed to detect any monsters, Xu Yang wouldn't have dared to stay here so easily, let alone now that this phantom was even demonstrating a transformation.
Xu Yang narrowed his eyes and opened the window of the SUV.
pat.
The dark muzzle of a gun was pointed at the woman's head.
Bang!
Besides the sound of gunfire, there was also a faint sound like bubbles bursting.
The moment the bullet pierced the woman's head, her phantom vanished, and several blue monsters reappeared in the air, somewhat disheveled, swimming away from the sound.
But the bullets didn't hit any monsters, or rather, they didn't cause any damage when they passed through the monster phantoms.
They seemed more like they saw gunfire and were scared away.
Xu Yang touched his chin; the stubble was a bit prickly.
Now, the only certainty is that he can see the monster, and the monster can see him, but neither of them can harm the other.
There seems to be a transparent membrane preventing physical contact.
Perhaps it was the effect of the red pendant.
If it weren't during the Red Fall period, this area would probably be quite dangerous. Those monsters just now were probably "hunting" him, using an ability to create illusions.
Although it seems incredibly idiotic—transforming in front of you—anyone with a modicum of intelligence wouldn't fall for it.
Everything that exists must have its own rationale.
Is it an environmental issue?
Xu Yang muttered to himself, a guess forming in his mind.
Perhaps outside of the Red Fall period, this area was not just as it appears now, with its psychedelic colors; perhaps it had something more special, enough to complement the monsters' clumsy illusions and thus achieve a bewitching effect.
However, these are just assumptions and cannot be verified at this time.
After the Red Fall ended, he felt he probably wouldn't come back to this eerie place again.
perhaps?
Who knows?
He chuckled softly, reached out and turned the car music back on, and a familiar rock melody filled his ears.
The isolation zone isn't that dangerous; in fact, it's quite aesthetically pleasing.
Flowing, dreamlike colors, azure rainwater, the off-road vehicle continued forward along the original route.
During this time, Xu Yang also heard some strange singing sounds and the calls of some kind of whale, all coming from the side of the vehicle, which is the depths of the Azure Sea.
Giant, transparent pink tentacles appeared and disappeared in the sky, and there were even two monster mermaids like the ones from before, swimming behind the off-road vehicle and following it.
However, he ignored everything and silently turned up the volume in the car until he drove out of the eerie area.
Ahead, just beyond the edge of the azure sea, a white truck was parked, with two figures, one tall and one fat, standing beside it. The fat one was waving at the SUV.
Xu Yang's lips curled downwards.
This doesn't seem like a good sign.
The last thing that beckoned to me was an RPG combination.
He slammed the accelerator to the floor.
With a deafening roar, the SUV left the two waving figures behind.
They sped off towards the safe zone.