Chapter 2723: Trap

The spiritual energy in this sector was scattered and aimless. The plants here had no consciousness, no initiative; they just attacked everything around them indiscriminately, worlds apart from the Divine Woman Vine.

But this vine that had just sprouted could already distinguish plants from animals. The spiritual energy it released went straight for Xu Huo first, and only shrank back after hitting a wall.

Using Psychic Attack as a hunting method was indeed different from other Mutant Plants.

Mental Interference to Spiritual Control, then further to directly lethal damage against living creatures—that was roughly the direction of Spirit Evolution. Before entering this sector, Xu Huo hadn’t been able to reach the level of Spiritual Control; he could only barely compress the duration of Mental Interference to carry out some simple commands. True Spiritual Control should be like Dou Shengnan’s—so powerful people simply couldn’t disobey.

Going a step further, Psychic Power gained more flexible applications. The mere oppression from the power was enough to make people dizzy, faint, even die. This was different from a Materialized Item turning Psychic Power into a physical attack; it was a truly hard-to-capture, hard-to-defend method, similar in principle to an Anchor.

There were countless Mutant Plants, but the Divine Woman Vine was the only one that resembled a human this closely.

Without even digging the soil, Xu Huo could sense that the roots of the Divine Woman Vine and the King Fungus were both connected to the Nüwa Stone. There was no way to estimate how far they would grow, so he simply took the chance to rest.

It wasn’t long before the Golden-Eyed Player and one of his teammates returned. The two of them had obviously held out until they really couldn’t take it anymore before heading back. They looked terrible, and when they saw Yan Jiayu again, that familiar suspicion appeared in their eyes.

"Did you find the Super Props?" Yan Jiayu lowered her voice a little, indicating Xu Huo was resting.

The Metal Shield blocked sight and perception, so the two Golden-Eyed Players couldn’t probe Xu Huo’s condition and could only rest nearby.

"No Props, but we did see some human bones." The Golden-Eyed Player’s teammate rubbed his right hand. He was missing his ring finger and little finger on that hand.

"Human bones?" Yan Jiayu grew interested. "Where?"

"In an underground fissure." The Golden-Eyed Player said, "Only two or three meters wide. A bunch of bones scattered inside, probably squeezed down when the cave tunnels formed."

"Where is it, how far?" Yan Jiayu pressed. "We’re here to look for someone, just in time."

"They’re already just bones..." The Golden-Eyed Player hesitated. "You came specifically to collect remains?"

"Just helping someone out." Yan Jiayu said. "A friend’s relative died here."

The Golden-Eyed Player didn’t really care whether her story was true or not and gave a rough location, well beyond the perception range of Xu Huo and Yan Jiayu.

"We’ll go after he’s done resting." Seeing Xu Huo unresponsive, Yan Jiayu said.

The two Golden-Eyed Players were at their limit; when they heard they still had to wait, they could only go lie down in the box again.

The Mechanical Being’s work efficiency was outrageously high. Yan Jiayu’s luggage bay was already stuffed full, and several tidy piles had been stacked on the open ground—high-quality ores, all carefully screened.

Unfortunately, after digging for so long they still hadn’t found any Secondary Stone, let alone Primeval Stone.

After spending half a day here, Xu Huo couldn’t stay any longer. He bundled up the vine that had already grown to five meters, stuffed it back into the flowerpot, repacked the Nüwa Stone with the metal box, stowed everything back into the luggage bay, then cleaned off the King Fungus Mycelium on his body that had turned incredibly tough before walking out of the dense Mutant Plants.

Yan Jiayu roused the Golden-Eyed Players, getting ready to go find the underground rift they’d mentioned.

"You really saw an underground rift? Could it have been an illusion?"

The Golden-Eyed Player paused. "That’s hard to say."

Hallucinations in underground tunnels were already the norm.

But unexpectedly, not far from them there actually was an underground fissure, probably naturally formed. Below were some uneven stone platforms with a few strips of white bone hanging loosely.

"It’s real." Yan Jiayu leaned over for a look. "Think there are snakes down there?"

Psychic Power flowed, and the white Materialized Item sank along the fissure, rolling up those white bones one by one, slowly gathering them.

When even bones a hundred meters, hundreds of meters, even a thousand meters down were taken out effortlessly, the Player who’d been out of sorts all this time suddenly let out a shriek, sprinted forward, and dove headfirst into the fissure!

The Golden-Eyed Player and the Broken Finger Player reacted sluggishly; by the time they realized their teammate had fallen and tried to save him, there was no sign of anyone below.

But before they could sink into grief or anger, the white Materialized Item rolled the man back up. Yan Jiayu strode forward a few steps and smashed him once with her hammer; the man who’d been screaming and yelling passed out again.

"You’re welcome." Yan Jiayu grabbed him by the collar, dragged him over, and dumped him in front of the two.

The Golden-Eyed Player and the Broken Finger Player exchanged a glance—and then simultaneously lunged toward the fissure...

But there was no way Xu Huo would let them walk away that easily. Spatial Power instantly condensed into a Spatial Barrier, sealing the fissure completely and leaving the two of them sprawled on top of it.

He dragged them back in front of him before saying, "What’s down there?"

The two stayed silent, with a kind of dullness like they weren’t fully present.

Xu Huo couldn’t be bothered to watch them play dumb any longer. He sliced away their Protective Suits, then pointed at the micro-bombs that had just floated up behind them. "You were waiting for those?"

"First you throw bombs down, then you throw bones. When you fail to trick us into going down, you plan to jump yourselves. I’m honestly curious what you’re trying to do."

The micro-bombs weren’t all that powerful. Bound inside the Spatial Barrier, they went off with a muffled thud that didn’t even stir a breeze.

The Golden-Eyed Player, now helmetless, went a little pale, but quickly calmed again. He looked at Xu Huo. "You think it only works if there’s a commotion? The way you manipulate Spatial Power is no different."

Xu Huo’s brows twitched slightly, and the next second, several meter-thick Mutant Plants shot up from the depths of the fissure, bodies covered in multicolored scales, flower-like maws packed with spikes, roaring at them like a Giant Python.

The eerily lifelike serpent roar was especially grating. Xu Huo flicked his fingers, and several Space Cutting Lines sliced them all apart. But with foul-smelling sap spraying everywhere, more Snake Vines shot out from the fissure one after another, ignoring the nearer Golden-Eyed Player duo and locking only onto Xu Huo and Yan Jiayu as prey!

And taking advantage of that brief chaos, the Golden-Eyed Player used a Prop to break the sealing barrier. Together with the Broken Finger Player, one grabbed the box, the other grabbed the man, and they jumped straight into the fissure!

Watching them fall, shielded by the box, Xu Huo took out the metal box he’d kept in the luggage bay all along. The moment he set it down in front of him, the two Snake Vines lunging at his face suddenly froze, as if they’d lost their target.