As soon as the door opened, a chill hit their faces, making the three of them shiver. It was not unexpected that the temperature in the Winter Garden was the lowest. Lu Ning breathed a sigh of relief, forming a white mist visible to the naked eye in the air.
The body temperature was about six or seven degrees Celsius, but Lu Ning didn't say it. This was not something she should be aware of because of the role she was playing now.
"Do you feel that the Winter Garden is quite different?"
Maoyou rubbed his hands while looking into the two corridors. Everything around the Winter Garden was somber gray and white, and there were many fewer colors compared to the other three gardens. The two corridors also give people a different impression from other gardens. First of all, one of the corridors is completely blocked by the room in the middle.
"Let's go this way." Lu Ning pointed to the direction that was not blocked. "This road should lead to the internal bifurcated corridor."
"How can we tell the difference?" Maoyou looked around in astonishment, "The configuration of this corridor is completely different."
"The corridor on the left hand side of the elevator in the Grand Garden is always going to the bifurcated corridor, because the basic structure of each floor is the same." Lu Ning took a step forward, "Let's quickly find the supply point here and change into winter clothes, otherwise we will easily get into trouble due to the cold. .”
"Haah...I hate winter the most." Maoyou quickly followed.
What is winter like in this world? Lu Ning searched for information from those fragments of memory. This little girl has survived many winters, and it seems that the coldest weather is just that.
Since the danger level in the suburbs in winter is greatly reduced, many people are able to bravely go to nearby places to collect some food. For example, tubers buried in the soil, small bushes that only bear fruit in the snow, and even small animals and insects that crawl out to look for food in winter are all edible.
Even in the alleys, only in winter would people come to distribute food. Although it was just black-gray and cement-like liquid food with no taste, it was thick enough to keep people from feeling hungry for a whole day—if there was no activity.
There is also the always-bright central area, which Lu Ning now knows is called the "Master Brain". The light and warmth emanating from that place also radiate to the alleys, making the most terrible cold in winter much less severe.
In a blink of an eye, the three people had reached the intersection leading to the bifurcated corridor. They also saw that the two rooms in this corridor were shaped like two arrows, pointing to a mission machine in the middle corresponding to the entrance of the bifurcated corridor. , this was a two-star mission. Lu Ning swiped through it and found that he could actually accept it directly.
[Task Level 2: Obtain two second-level props. 】
It is similar to the mission of Gorius, except that this mission is obviously losing money. In other words, it is not worth doing if it is not obtained through killing and inheritance.
"A mission to deceive people." Lu Ning glanced at Mao You and Ping Na, and then walked towards the entrance of the corridor.
"Lu, are there any hidden things behind the two arrows pointing at this machine?" Mao You asked.
"This machine is a whole, any secrets can only be written on the surface. If it is related to the entire map, we can't see it yet." Lu Ning didn't look back, "I drew it on the map, don't worry. "
The basic structure has not changed, and the bifurcated corridors of the Winter Garden are no different from the other three. The only difference is that it feels colder. Lu Ning glanced sideways at the glass door leading to the courtyard. The courtyard on this side was like a mountain covered with heavy snow. Everything was covered in snow. It was conservatively estimated that the thickness of the snow layer alone was half a meter deep. Inside It’s hard to tell what they were originally, they are all big and small snow bags.
"How can anyone get in here?" Maoyou wailed as he looked at the snowflakes still flying in the air.
Lu Ning didn't open the door, but stood at the door and observed carefully. The footprints left in the snowflakes have been almost covered, but after all, they are a little different, and the traces can still be seen. She could roughly tell that a fierce battle was taking place here based on the topography of the entire courtyard. What was strange was that there were only two entrances and exits in the courtyard, namely the glass door here and the snow capital of the elevator passage at the other end. There were no traces of anyone walking.
"Lu! There is a one-star mission here!"
Maoyou had already run deeper into the corridor and soon started shouting.
"Content?" Lu Ning asked casually.
"Three different levels of missions at the same time!"
Only then did Lu Ning realize that the place where Mao You was standing was in the corridor. It was not a hidden place. There was still a mission left? Or... the entire Winter Garden mission has basically not been picked up yet?
"Then we have to act quickly." After Lu Ning realized this, he immediately put down the strange things in the courtyard and pointed to the path, "Let's take a look inside. We have never searched the rooms here."
According to Lewanska, the rooms corresponding to this path have the same structure, one at the end and one on the left and right sides, for a total of three rooms. Judging from the current distribution density of task machines, there is no reason not to set it up here.
The width of the path was only a little over one meter, so it would be quite crowded if two people walked side by side. However, it didn't take long to reach the door of the room on the left. Lu Ning stretched out her hand to turn on the switch, but suddenly smelled the smell of blood.
There were two bodies in the hall of this room - no, even a house. One had half of his head smashed off and was lying beside a recliner, while the other was covered in bandages. He was obviously an exiled killer. A wound straight through the heart was very conspicuous on his back, and his weapon was gone.
"It was a fierce battle. Several people here were blocked in the room and had to be beaten." Lu Ning could easily tell the situation at that time from the blood stains and tear marks on the ground. "One of them died. , but it also created an opportunity for other people to assassinate, and they must have used some other means, but unfortunately the damage was quite serious, so you can’t tell."
"The body...hasn't anyone cleaned it up?" Aunt Pingna looked at the body beside the recliner with some pity, "That's it..."
"It's normal for corpses to be exposed in the wilderness, not to mention that these people may only be joining forces temporarily. Didn't you see that everything on that person's body has been rummaged through? There really aren't any resources left."
The floor was covered with thick carpets, and the temperature inside was a little higher than the cold corridor outside. Lu Ning approached the fireplace in this room and took the fire tongs from the corner.
"Now let's see..."
She used tongs to tear off the bandage that banished the killer. Mao You wanted to come up to help, but was stopped by Lu Ning.
"I remember you said that these guys are all transformed humans, right?"
"This is just a rumor. I don't know the specific situation."
"No matter what the rumors are, you have to find out what he has been through. You can first check to see if there are any mission machines in the house and look around."
Mao You and Ping Na walked into the small rooms on both sides of the hall to check, while Lu Ning carefully peeled off all the bandages, revealing the blue-grey skin underneath.
Although this matter seemed to have nothing to do with the mission or the main plot of the scene, Lu Ning's previous experience made her feel that she must know more about the outside world. The original knowledge reserve of this identity can be said to be ignorant. After all, he is still struggling on the line of survival. But she wanted to know more... about the outside world, about the class here, about the "mastermind".
Before that, she had briefly seen the bodies of three other exiled killers, and this was an opportunity to examine them in detail.
Judging from the body shape, there is no doubt that it has undergone some degree of biochemical transformation.
The bones and joints are extremely thick, and there are strange lumpy bulges on the surface of the muscles. Lu Ning used a knife to cut open several raised parts and found that metal sheets like battery sheets were buried inside. The limbs of the corpse looked well-trained, but what was not commensurate with this was the malnutrition-like dryness of the body and head. The wound was partly a fatal wound to the heart, but the amount of bleeding was far less than expected. It didn't feel like it was spurting out but flowing out.
The most obvious place where transformation occurs is in the brain.
This man's hair had been shaved, and there were more than twenty long-healed scars neatly crisscrossed across his head, which even reminded Lu Ning of the look of a Go board. Knowing that there is such a thing as repair spray in this world, the fact that he could still leave so many scars shows that the surgeon had no intention of using that kind of prop on him.
Lu Ning pointed the dagger at a scar, thought for a moment, and then drew it.
It might be more thorough to do this kind of thing if Ning Yeyi or Fujii Xueyin were to do it. After all, her main field of study was investigation and clues, and those two had really studied a lot of forensic science.
"Lu, I received a one-star... What are you doing?" Ping Na walked out of a small room and was about to report when she saw Lu Ning's actions.
"If there's anywhere they have to move, it's the brain."
Lu Ning held the dagger steadily and cut along the scar, and soon opened the brain of the corpse.
"vomit!"
Maoyou, who happened to come out from the other side without finding anything, saw this and immediately covered his mouth and made a sound of retching.
That was a brain that even a layman like him knew was absolutely abnormal.
A layer of mesh-like substance exuding gray-black luster covers the outer layer of the brain, and a small claw extending from the edge of the mesh tightly grasps the front lobe of the brain, and the entire brain appears faint pink. The color makes people feel a little bright, as if they are still alive.
Even though Lu Ning had been mentally prepared, her eyes twitched at this moment, and she quickly threw away the dagger and retracted her hand.
"Don't show it to me! Ugh! Is this thing alive or dead? I've never seen such a disgusting thing... Ugh!!"
Maoyou leaned against the wall and retched. Unfortunately, it had been several hours since he last ate, and he couldn't vomit anything.
"What is this?" Ping Na also stood in the corner with a look of disgust on her face, not wanting to come over at all.
Lu Ning stretched out the tongs and pulled the "net".
Not moving at all.
"Probably dead."
"It's so damn...yuck! Stop looking at it, can we get out of here quickly? I can't get this thing out of my mind!"
"OK."
Lu Ning didn't want to take another look at it at all. It seemed that there was always an illusion. If this thing wrapped around his brain and slowly stretched out its claws...
No, I really can’t think about it anymore.
The three people rushed out of the room as if they were fleeing. They didn't even enter the other side room in order to get farther away, and rushed directly into the innermost room.
Surprisingly, and somewhat naturally, there was someone inside.
It was a woman with short brown hair and a distinctly Western face. She was wrapping the wounds on her arms and legs with torn strips of clothes, standing on a stool with one foot, completely unconcerned that someone might come in suddenly.
"Wow! I'm sorry!" Maoyou immediately screamed and turned around, but the woman didn't care at all and continued to wrap the cloth around the wound.
"Why are you panicking? I'm not wearing any clothes."
She was indeed still wearing Spring Garden's night clothes, but her arms and legs were cut off in half. Lu Ning could see obvious muscle lines on her body, and the skin on her arms and legs was also wheat-colored, indicating that she had obviously been exercising.
"Hello." She greeted cautiously. There was no second person in the room, which meant that this woman was probably a loner. Those who can act alone in this environment must be very capable.
"Okay." The woman tied the cloth into a knot, bit off the remaining part, then moved her legs and feet, and shrugged at the three of them, "My name is Rosa, Rosa Kress, from the city wall. What do you call it?"
It was easier for Lu Ning to deal with such a straightforward look.
"Lu, these two are my companions, Mao You and Ping Na."
"Oh." Rosa nodded and pointed to a hut behind her, "That's the weapons depot. You can find winter clothes suitable for activities here. Is that why you came here?"
"Are you...are you alone?" Mao You responded and suddenly asked again.
"What? Are you chasing me?" Rosa raised an eyebrow, "You are too short and do not meet my standards."
"not me……"
"Hey, boy, if you don't mean it, don't ask such things. There are rules for speaking outside the city walls. Didn't your boss explain it?"
Rosa picked up a cotton coat from under the stool, shook it twice, and then put it on.
"Sorry. What we want to ask is, are you alone in this garden?" Lu Ning took the question.
"Yes, because it's troublesome to take care of others. Of course, sometimes it's not too convenient. For example, when you don't have enough stars to buy spray, you have to resort to traditional methods to heal your injuries." Rosa took out another pair of jeans and started to treat them. Put it on yourself.
"Then do you know what happened in that room in front?"
"I don't know, everyone was cold when I came." Rosa curled her lips, "The group of corpse pickers were professional enough, they didn't even have any leftovers, and I didn't dare to take the bandages from that stupid guy. , so I had to come over and tear off some clothes."
"So you don't know anything about the current situation in the garden?"
"What do you want to know? It's just to stay alive, save thirty stars, and go out." Rosa counted on her fingers, "Other than that, it's all details."
