One person: Starting with the Snow Drinking Blade

The smell was so strong you could grab it with your hands; so strong it made you feel like you weren't breathing air, but drinking a pot of thick soup that had been simmering for decades, laced with all sorts of poisons and chemicals. Your throat burned, your eyes stung, and it felt like countless invisible insects were crawling on your skin.

here--

It is the deepest core of the parliament's "Styx" base.

"Mother Nest".

Or, according to the incomplete name in Bald Bear's file—

"Nidhogg Hatchery".

"Oh my god..."

Zhang Chulan's mouth dropped open as the trembling beam of his flashlight swept across the enormous mass of flesh and the densely packed "cultivation rooms" around it.

His jaw nearly dropped to the ground, his eyes were wide open like saucers, and his pupils shrank to pinpoints in the flashlight beam.

A chill ran from the soles of my feet straight up to the top of my head.

The scene before him was completely beyond his understanding of a "laboratory." He had imagined a "laboratory" to be a place with instruments, people wearing white coats, and holding test tubes. It wasn't.

This is a living, running flesh and blood factory that devours life to breed monsters!

"This...this is 'Nidhogg'?"

Master Wang's face was deathly pale, and his voice was dry, as if something was blocking his throat.

Even with his strong will, he felt a jolt of dread in the face of this terrifying, blasphemous existence. His fingers trembled slightly inside his sleeve—not from the cold, but from an instinctive fear ingrained in his genes of something indescribable.

He could clearly feel—

The mass of flesh contained an unimaginably vast, yet chaotically violent, life force.

That vitality was like a boiling ocean compressed a million times, ready to explode at any moment and devour everything.

as well as--

A cold, greedy, and terrifying will that seemed to devour and assimilate everything.

That will is not "thinking," but "instinct." It has no thought, no purpose, only a pure, primal, uncontrollable desire—to eat. To eat more. To eat more. To eat more. Until it devours everything.

"No...not entirely..."

Bald Bear slumped to the ground, his eyes glazed over, like a person whose faith had been shattered, watching his idol crumble.

"The files say... 'Nidhogg' is the ultimate entity... but... this seems like a... 'Matrix'? A... incubator and energy center? Could it be... that what they're trying to create isn't a monster, but... a 'nest' that can continuously produce monsters?"

His words weighed even heavier on everyone's hearts.

A "mother nest" capable of incubating and producing all sorts of terrifying experimental subjects is probably a hundred times more threatening than a single powerful monster.

No matter how strong you are, you can always find a way to kill a monster.

But you can't kill them all—you can't kill one. You kill one, it breeds two; you kill two, it breeds four. It will self-repair, self-proliferate, and self-evolve. Like cancer cells, it's endless.

If this thing is fully awakened, or gets out of control...

"Look over there!"

Chen Duo suddenly pointed to the lower side of the "mother nest" fleshy mass.

On a relatively flat metal platform near the edge of the blood pool, several figures were standing at this moment!

With the flashlight beam and the dark red glow emanating from the "mother hive" intertwined, it became clear that—

It was none other than the previously disappeared Eagle Kingdom team leader in a suit, the bespectacled woman Catherine, and the Japanese Shogun Fujiwara!

The three seemed to have just arrived. Their clothes bore fresh tear marks and bloodstains, indicating they had also been attacked by monsters on the way. Catherine's hair was disheveled, draped over her shoulders, and her face was pale. Fujiwara Sousuke's bandages were seeping fresh blood, and the gauze at his severed arm was soaked through.

They were gathered around a raised, console-like structure in the center of the platform, nervously operating something.

The console wasn't metal—it was fleshy. Its surface was covered by a thin, elastic, grayish-white film, beneath which a dark red liquid flowed. Embedded in it were several crystal buttons and a touchscreen, on which data scrolled rapidly.

Several thick data cables, shimmering with a ghostly blue light, were connected to it. One end of the cable was plugged into the control panel, while the other end was deeply embedded in the outer sheath of the "mothership," like a giant needle piercing a blood vessel.

They seem to be... trying to connect, read, or... control the "mother hive"?!

"It's the Americans and the Japanese! They really are here!"

Zhang Chulan gritted his teeth, his fists clenched so tightly they cracked.

"What are they trying to do? Start this damn thing?!"

"Stop them!"

A cold glint flashed in Nie Lingfeng's eyes.

Whatever this "mother nest" may be, it must not be allowed to be touched by the people of the Eagle Country and the Cherry Blossom Country.

He put Xiaoyun down, his movements gentle but quick. As Xiaoyun slid off his arms, her little hands still clung to his collar, refusing to let go. He gently pried her fingers apart, one by one.

He urgently told Chen Duo, "Keep an eye on her, and hide!"

Then, with a swift movement, he was about to rush towards the platform.

however--

Just as he set off—

"Gurgle...gurgle...roar—!!!"

A deep, painful roar, yet filled with boundless violence and madness, suddenly erupted from the depths of the "mother nest" mass of flesh!

The roar did not travel through the air.

Instead, it directly affects everyone's mind and spirit!

It was like an invisible giant hammer, smashing down hard on everyone's head.

Zhang Chulan's vision went black, and he almost collapsed to his knees. He felt as if his head had been forced open from the inside; his temples throbbed, and his eardrums buzzed. His nose felt hot, and something was flowing out—he reached down and touched it; his fingertips were covered in blood.

Master Wang Ye's Qimen Dunjia formation instantly went awry; the illusory Bagua image beneath his feet fluctuated violently, shattered, reformed, and shattered again. He groaned, a trickle of blood spilling from the corner of his mouth, and quickly gritted his teeth to steady himself.

The shock made everyone dizzy and their blood churn!

Immediately afterwards—

The entire "mother nest" began to spasm and convulse violently!

It trembled, twisted, and contracted as if it had been electrocuted. The "eye" crystals on its surface flickered wildly, the dark red light flashing on and off at a dizzying speed.

Countless blood vessels dilate—the blood vessels that were originally just slowly pulsating suddenly swell up, like balloons being inflated, with dense vascular patterns appearing on their surface, as if they might burst at any moment.

It was as if they were enduring immense pain.

The "straw" inserted into the blood pool twisted and turned wildly—like several snakes whose tails had been stepped on, thrashing and slapping wildly on the ground and in the air, splashing up patches of dark red liquid. The speed at which the nutrient solution was extracted increased dramatically, the blood pool churned violently, and the liquid level dropped visibly.

at the same time--

Those honeycomb-like metal rooms clinging to the domed rock walls.

Among them were more than a dozen tightly closed metal doors—

It was violently blasted open from the inside!

"Boom! Boom! Boom—!"

It wasn't a single sound, but a series of loud bangs, as if someone inside was pounding on the door with a hammer. The door panel bulged outwards, the concrete around the door frame cracked, and the reinforcing steel bars were exposed.

Accompanied by a teeth-grinding metallic twisting sound—"creak—"—it was the sound of steel being forcibly bent.

And the sound of chains snapping—"clang—" The iron chain broke into several pieces, flying through the air and bouncing a few times on the ground.

One after another, figures, each exuding a fierce aura and with different, yet twisted and terrifying shapes, roared as they leaped out of the room!

Some of them landed on the metal walkway connecting the platform—the walkway was hit with a loud "bang," vibrating violently, and rust and dust fell down in a shower.

Some landed on the rocky ground below—creating a shallow crater in the ground and scattering gravel everywhere.

There were "Rippers," over three meters tall, covered in thick bone plates, with claws like giant scythes. Their bone plates were grayish-white, like a heavy suit of armor, covered with rough patterns and protruding bone spikes. The blades of their claws were longer, thicker, and heavier than Sato Ittosai's "Blood Cherry," gleaming with a cold white sheen under the dark red light. When they landed, they left two deep craters in the ground.

There were "shapeshifting monsters" whose bodies constantly shifted and deformed like mud, capable of spraying strong acid and poisonous stings. Their bodies had no fixed shape, sometimes elongating, sometimes shrinking, sometimes forming a sphere, sometimes flattening into a pancake. Bubbles constantly rose from their surfaces, and each time a bubble burst, a small stream of strong acid or a poisonous sting shot out. Wherever they crawled, the metal walkways were corroded into pits, hissing and emitting wisps of blue smoke.

There are "Screamers"—winged creatures that can glide at low altitudes and emit high-frequency sonic attacks from their mouths. Their wings are not feathered, but rather membranous, like bat wings, covered with fine blood vessels. When spread, their wingspan exceeds five meters. They hover in the air, their wings flapping with a "whooshing" sound, and when they open their mouths, a visible, distorted wave of air shoots out—that's a high-frequency sonic wave; if it hits a person, it can cause them to bleed from all seven orifices.

There were even eerie entities, like shadow aggregates, capable of firing gray-black energy tentacles, similar to those that had previously ambushed Nie Lingfeng. They had no fixed form, merely a hazy, semi-transparent gray-black mist that appeared and disappeared in the darkness. Only when they launched their attack could one see the octopus-tentacle-like energy beams shooting out from the mist.

They appeared without any hesitation.

Their crimson or murky gazes were all fixed on the three people from the Eagle Country and the Sakura Country who were operating the control panel on the platform.

And—Nie Lingfeng and the others who just rushed out of the tunnel!

Clearly, the unusual activity and roar of the "mother hive" had awakened these sleeping—or imprisoned—"guards" or "failures".

A chaotic battle is about to erupt completely in this terrifying flesh and blood factory!

"Damn it! We've stirred up a hornet's nest!"

Zhang Chulan felt his scalp tingle and his hair stand on end as he looked at the terrifying monsters closing in from all directions. His body crackled with lightning, illuminating a pale face soaked in cold sweat.

But at that moment, there was no time to be afraid.

Lightning flashed across his body again, and blinding white arcs of electricity surged from within, forming a thick layer of lightning armor on his body.

"Brother Nie! How do we fight?!"

Nie Lingfeng's gaze swept across the entire arena with lightning speed.

The people from the Eagle Country and the Cherry Blossom Country have clearly triggered some kind of defense mechanism of the "Mother Nest," or caused it to become "uncomfortable," leading to the awakening of these monsters.

Now, they and those monsters have become enemies.

"Clear the monsters first!"

Nie Lingfeng made a decisive decision.

We must not let these monsters get close, and we must not let them attack the "mother nest" or interfere with the people of Eagle Country and Sakura Country—who knows if they will become desperate and do something even crazier?

"Wang Ye, control the situation and divide the monsters! Chu Lan, Ling Yu, Bao Bao, follow me, let's finish this quickly! Chen Duo, protect Xiao Yun and Bald Bear!"

"clear!"

Master Wang Ye took a deep breath, suppressing the shock and turmoil in his heart.

He stepped with firm, heavy steps, as if driving piles. The Qimen formation beneath his feet unfolded in full force, the phantom of the Eight Trigrams lighting up in the darkness, illuminating his pale face.

"Feng Hou Qi Men - Chaotic Golden Clapper - Slowing Barrier!"

"The character 'Kun' signifies sinkholes and quicksand!"

An invisible wave emanated from beneath his feet, and within a hundred-meter radius of the platform, all the monsters that rushed into this area visibly slowed down. Their movements seemed to be in slow motion; the speed of their claw strikes changed from lightning to that of a tortoise, and the amplitude of their pounces changed from that of a tiger to that of a sick cat.

Meanwhile, the ground in front of the platform turned soft and muddy, like quicksand. The legs of the ground monsters sank in, unable to pull themselves out, and the more they struggled, the deeper they sank. Some had only half their bodies sticking out, still desperately waving their claws, but they could no longer reach anyone.