An unidentified pale yellow mist filled the canyon all day long, making visibility so poor that almost nothing could be seen beyond five or six meters. The mist seemed almost solid, its wisps winding around the trees.
The outsiders who came hurtling down shattered the quiet of this strange place. In the shadows, an unknown number of eyes snapped open, radiating pure greed and malice.
Because he had opened his parachute too low, and because of the mist below, Nick had almost no opportunity to choose where he landed.
He barely avoided several oddly shaped trees and landed beside a small, fast-flowing river. Moisture carrying a strange smell flooded his nostrils, but he could still just about breathe normally.
Both ends of the canyon were blocked by collapsed mountainsides, yet the river flowed so swiftly that it clearly was not stagnant water. Its ultimate destination was most likely an underground river.
There was almost no wind in the canyon. Nick reckoned he should have landed not far from Dahlia. After checking his bearings with the compass on his military watch, he headed straight east.
The forest below had an entirely different look. Branches grew and spread unchecked in ways that defied the laws of nature, while all sorts of unknown vines and exposed roots sprawled across the ground like blood vessels.
If the pale yellow mist around him were replaced with a blood-red haze, it would look exactly like the Zerg creep in StarCraft.
With that thought in mind, he swung his machete at a large tree as he passed it. What happened next left him dumbstruck.
A piercing shriek rang out from the completely leafless crown overhead. Then the entire tree began to shake, making a loud rattling sound.
Nick instinctively stepped back twice and cautiously gripped a grenade in his left hand.
A thick, bloodlike, reddish-black liquid flowed from the gash in the trunk, reeking of blood and decay. Then rustling sounds rose all around him.
Seeing that things had taken a bad turn, Nick broke into a run. Before he had covered much more than ten meters, even more hair-raising sounds came from behind him.
The tree screamed again, its branches clattering against one another, accompanied by strange rustling, tearing and chewing noises, and the crackle of rapidly beating insect wings.
Nick felt his scalp tighten, as though his SAN had dropped a huge chunk, and his heart began pounding uncontrollably.
Just then, a succession of pistol shots not far away startled him again. Then delight appeared on his face, and he sprinted toward the gunfire.
Dahlia repeatedly pulled the trigger at the monster lunging toward her, her left hand frantically trying to unfasten her parachute pack.
But the more she panicked, the harder it was to undo. The monster was already winding its way toward her along the trunk, its gaping mouthparts almost upon her. She could even smell the stench coming from between its densely packed teeth.
"Dasha, don't move!"
Nick's voice from beneath the tree sounded heavenly. A continuous but rhythmic burst of gunfire followed.
"Aaargh!" A sound that almost pierced their eardrums rang through the forest.
A monster with countless jointed legs, the body of a giant centipede, and a hideous human head fell from the treetop. It splashed up a pool of disgusting pus, then twitched feebly on the ground.
"Stay right there. Wait for me to come up." Nick looked up at Dahlia, who hung upside down from the tree by her parachute, and half his worry lifted.
He climbed into the crown more than five meters above the ground and freed the girl from the parachute cords tangled around her. Once they were both back on the ground, he anxiously checked her for fractures or internal injuries.
Dahlia said nothing, merely staring blankly as Nick checked her all over, her expression somewhere between laughter and tears.
"Are you okay?"
Nick thought the girl had been terrified and was about to comfort her gently when he heard her murmur, "You just jumped down like that?"
"Wouldn't you have done the same?" Nick asked, feigning surprise.
"Of course." Dahlia thumped him and was about to say something when a grating crunch interrupted her.
They turned to look. The human-headed centipede's corpse was sinking little by little into the tree's roots. Dozens of things shaped like human ribs extended from the roots and enclosed it.
Nick realized that the disgusting pool of pus splashed up when the monster landed had not come from the creature itself, but was some kind of bait hidden among the roots.
The tangle of roots was like a natural trap, a giant Venus flytrap specifically meant to catch prey that landed on it.
Dahlia drew her neck back in lingering fear. If she had been the one to fall there, she did not dare imagine what would have happened to her.
Fortunately, the girl had only suffered a few scrapes. After moving her limbs around to loosen them up, she had no serious problems.
"This place is just like the hell of legend." She took the M4A1 Nick handed her and slotted the magazines into her tactical vest one by one.
"Then let's get out of this damn place as soon as we can. We'll head west and search along the cliff for the hanging ropes." Thinking of the bleeding tree from earlier, Nick felt unsettled too.
But before they could leave this strange patch of forest, several roars rang out around them.
Both Nick and Dahlia knew those sounds well. They belonged to the "Hollow Men" that had tried to climb out of the canyon earlier. They were surrounded.
The trees might be "alive," and there were traps beneath them. The two could only stop in a small clearing and stand back-to-back, keeping their guard up.
The mist around them, previously only pale yellow, seemed to thicken at that moment. Visibility dropped until they could barely make out anything four or five meters ahead.
Wisps of mist wound around the branches and trunks of the "animated trees," like the breath of these plants of flesh and blood.
Suddenly, hoofbeats came through the mist, rapidly drawing closer. Nick's Lightning Reflexes activated instantly. With no time to wonder why there were hoofbeats here, he shoved Dahlia away from behind him and used the counterforce to roll forward to the other side.
Two mounted "Hollow Men" charged out of the thick mist, waving vines connected to their bodies. The two "men" and two "horses" crossed paths, then vanished into the mist again.
Although his backpack had blocked one blow, Nick had still been grazed across his lower back, leaving a burning pain. Anger flared in him, and he immediately rose into a half crouch and held down the trigger in the direction one of them had disappeared.
The thirty-round magazine emptied in an instant. Along with the crisp click of the bolt locking back, a thud came from the mist as a horse stumbled and fell, followed by a whinny.
At the same time, Dahlia, whom Nick had pushed to the ground, got up and fired in the direction the other "Hollow Man" rider had vanished.
But in the next second, two more "Hollow Men" riders charged out of the thick mist from two other directions. This time, they were wielding not vine whips but two rust-covered cavalry sabers.
Dahlia's reactions were no match for Nick's cheat-assisted reflexes. In her haste, she raised her rifle to block. The weapon struck the rusty saber in a shower of sparks, and the tremendous impact sent her flying.
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