After collecting a few samples in the Mushroom Field, Hunter continued onward and reached an unusual terrain feature.
It was an underground river, but instead of water, it contained black mud.
This river of black mud was seven or eight kilometers long and four or five kilometers wide.
Hunter walked to the edge of the muddy river and glanced down. The surface of the black mud lay thirty meters below.
He could vaguely see the mud writhing, as though some kind of large creature was inside.
Hunter was about to activate the Bird Spectrometer to scan the muddy river.
Just then, nearly a thousand rats suddenly emerged from the cave behind him and approached the riverbank. Hunter stopped what he was doing and hurriedly concealed himself in the darkness.
After reaching the muddy river, the nearly thousand rats began setting up a crane-like device on the spot.
The crane stood over ten meters tall. An iron chain served as its rope, with a huge iron hook at the end.
After installing the crane, the rats began setting up a large winch that nearly a thousand rats could operate together, applying their strength to lower or raise the large iron hook on the crane.
Once the equipment was installed, a rat who appeared to be the leader shouted to the others:
"Bring up the sinner!!"
A terrified rat, squealing frantically, was brought forward bound by the other rats and hung on the large iron hook.
The rat on the hook shouted in terror:
"Why did you arrest me?! Why did you arrest me!!"
The lead rat sneered.
"Don't you know why we arrested you? Do we really have to spell it out?"
The rat hanging from the iron hook's lips quivered.
"You're going to kill me just because I stole a