Extreme germ phobia

Chapter 391 Ant Nest
As Ouyang continued upwards, the lights below grew farther and farther away, and the light on his left and right grew dimmer and dimmer. Even though he tried his best to widen his eyes, everything in front of him was still blurry and he couldn't see clearly.

He longed for a tactical light; if only he had one! Or even a glow stick would do!

I considered going back to make a torch or something else to provide light, but after thinking it over, I ultimately gave up.

There's nothing else; I really can't think of anything that can be used for lighting.

The problems caused by insufficient light are not only poor visibility, but more dangerous is that the darker the light, the harder it is to maintain balance, and one could easily fall.

To ensure his own safety, Ouyang had to tie the cloth rope used to lift the steel pipe around his waist, so that even if something happened, it would at least cushion the impact.

Fortunately, the elevator shaft was filled with a large number of spores, which kept Ouyang's brain at a high level of activity, greatly enhancing his sense of balance and offsetting the effects of darkness to some extent.

Upon reaching the next floor, he eagerly pried open the elevator door.

As the soft light shone into the elevator shaft, Ou Yang suddenly had a sense of the rising sun, as if the clouds had parted to reveal the sun.

That's really tough!
Unfortunately, this floor was still a ward. After hesitating for a moment, Ou Yang gave up the idea of ​​searching this floor and just grabbed a trash can to block the elevator door to prevent it from closing and cutting off the light source.

As we continued upwards, feeling that we were close to reaching the next level, the raised steel pipe suddenly pierced through empty air!
Upon closer inspection, it was discovered that there were no elevator doors at all, but rather a horizontal passageway!

Or, to put it another way, the elevator shaft branches off here, making a right-angle turn, so that the vertical movement can be changed to horizontal movement.

An elevator that can move sideways? What genius designed this?
Ou Yang was completely stunned, then suddenly realized.

I originally thought the underground research institute was a vertical structure, with more than twenty wards on each floor, all roughly the same size.

In this way, even if there are twenty or even thirty floors, the entire underground structure is not very large.

But the presence of horizontal channels changes things. It transforms from a single vertical distribution into a three-dimensional structure, which is almost like a honeycomb.
No, the structure of a honeycomb is relatively simple; more accurately, it is similar to that of an ant nest!
So, should we continue upwards or move along a horizontal path?

Without much hesitation, Ouyang immediately decided to continue upwards.

Moving horizontally will only lead deeper into the base; moving upwards is the only way to escape!
However, it wasn't long before they found themselves with nowhere to go; the top of the shaft was completely sealed off!
In other words, although there are many shafts here, they are all passages connecting different areas, with only one or a few main shafts leading to the surface!

Ouyang's worst fears came true, and he nearly broke down on the spot.

If you have absolutely no idea about the structure here, how are you supposed to know where it leads to the ground?

Upon closer reflection, I realized that the buttons in the elevator car were indeed somewhat unusual. I hadn't noticed them before, but now I realized something was amiss.

With things having come to this point, Ouyang had no choice but to take the sideways route and see how things went.

Entering the transverse passage, the light became even dimmer, almost pitch black, with only a faint glimmer of light visible from below at the entrance.

Ouyang used the steel pipe as a blind man's cane, tapping it as he walked forward, finally realizing how difficult it was for blind people.

Since he couldn't see anything anyway, he simply closed his eyes and relied entirely on his senses to move forward.

Worried about encountering other shafts, Ouyang not only had to tap the ground but also the walls.

Firstly, to determine the situation ahead, and secondly, to find a new floor – since the elevator can operate here, there must be an elevator door!

Besides hearing, the sense of smell seemed to be amplified by the darkness; the further we went, the stronger the spore smell became. Suddenly, the steel pipe struck something different, and a hoarse growl came from the darkness.

Infected!
Ouyang immediately crouched down, shrinking to the wall and squatting down. He used the steel pipe as a spear, sticking one end into the ground and stepping on it, while holding the other end in front of him to prevent the infected from rushing up.

At the same time, he pulled out a nut he had prepared beforehand and threw it forcefully behind him.

The nut hit the ground with a clear, springy sound.

After being infected with Pneumococcus, a person's physiological functions are not enhanced due to parasitism. It is only because phagocytoxin has a certain promoting effect on the brain that the infected person has the illusion of enhanced senses.

Once it enters the growth stage, the rapidly growing hyphae continuously damage the host's physiological functions, making its five senses much duller than those of a normal person!

Even Ouyang couldn't see clearly, let alone the infected. They certainly didn't know where he was, so as long as he blocked his way, he didn't have to worry about an infected person pounce on him.

He held his breath for a moment and heard a faint dragging sound beside him. The smell of spores also became stronger. It must be an infected person with mobility impairment passing by him.

Ouyang took out another nut, threw it with all his might, and it landed even further, but the rebound only made one sound, as if it had fallen into the shaft he came from.

At this point, he could no longer hear any additional sounds, and the spore odor returned to normal levels.

Ou Yang secretly breathed a sigh of relief, and like a martial artist wielding a spear, he continued forward, holding the steel pipe.

He tried to move as quietly as possible to avoid causing unnecessary trouble with the knocking, but the passage was too quiet, and the visibility was poor, so he couldn't see where the wall was at all. He could easily knock too hard and make unnecessary noise.

Fortunately, no more infections were reported.

Or perhaps there weren't many infected people in the passage, and the one that just happened was just an accident!
After walking a while longer, a crisp tapping sound suddenly came from the side, instead of the dull thud of hitting the wall.

Ou Yang was overjoyed and immediately went over to feel around, confirming by touch that the elevator door was right in front of him.

He pulled out the tray he had never discarded, pried open the tightly closed elevator door, and the sudden light blinded Ou Yang.

The light wasn't strong; his eyes had already adapted to the darkness and needed a little time to adjust.

A few seconds later, his vision returned to normal. Ouyang removed his hand from his eyes and immediately saw an infected person who had entered the fungal transformation process and whose body was covered with small mushrooms.

He was sitting slumped on the ground outside the elevator, his back against the wall, his exposed skin covered with mycelium, some of which had even pierced through the epidermis.

Perhaps because the humidity in this layer is too low, all the mycelia that have emerged from the surface are in a half-dead, half-dry state, and even the mushrooms that have finally managed to emerge look listless and lack vitality.

Looking to the left and right, more infected individuals with bacterial infections came into view.

Strangely, despite so many people being infected, the spore concentration in this layer is actually lower than in the passageway.

Ou Yang quickly figured out the reason.

Infected individuals spread spores through respiration, but after bacterial transformation, the infected individual dies completely and can no longer spread spores as they stop breathing.

Under normal circumstances, the humidity level must reach a certain level for mushrooms to grow properly, but the humidity here is clearly not up to standard!
It's already incredibly difficult for mushrooms to grow on a corpse. Without enough water, the mushrooms are forced to stop developing before they can release spores, resulting in this strange contrast where there are fungal communities everywhere, but the spore concentration is actually lower.

(End of this chapter)