novelraw Chapter 154: Worms
Chapter 154: Worms
The declaration from the Root Guardians leader still echoed in their ears.
The tremor beneath their feet had escalated from a slight shudder to violent shaking within seconds.
This was not the chaotic tearing from deep within the earth's crust, but a more eerie and purposeful rhythm, hinting that a slumbering behemoth was awakening and turning over beneath them.
The thick snow covering the pile of rubble was shaken loose by this force.
Below, rock "sculptures" that had once been living beings were exposed.
In this upheaval, they remained silent, like numb spectators admiring the birth of a new "exhibit."
"Steady! Find cover!"
Klaus's roar exploded, trying to restore order amidst the chaos.
His burly frame was like an iron nail driven into the ground.
His legs sank in a standard mountain combat posture, maintaining balance on the violently shaking ground.However, the UMA's attack was far more precise and deadly than a simple earthquake.
"BOOM—!!!"
A massive tremor came from the narrow pass they had used to enter the valley.
The rock walls on both sides of the pass were squeezed inward by a pair of invisible giant hands. Countless tons of rock and snow and ice collapsed with a thunderous roar, silently sealing their only escape route.
This was not a random landslide. This was a precisely calculated demolition designed to trap them.
Simultaneously, a precise landslide occurred on the slope leading to the ridge on the other side.
The falling rocks and snow were like a white waterfall, instantly separating the joint investigation team from the three "Root Guardians" on the ridge.
Forming an insurmountable natural barrier.
Now they were trapped.
Trapped in this circular arena personally crafted by the UMA.
"It's that thing!"
William, wearing [Zulu's Gaze], sharply turned his head toward the steep rock wall on the right.
He saw the source of the spiritual fluctuations causing all this chaos.
"It's inside!"
As his words fell, the surface of the solid rock wall he pointed at suddenly became soft like melting butter.
Countless fine cracks spread rapidly like a spiderweb.
Then, a huge rock over two meters in diameter silently caved inward.
Finally turning into powder, it revealed a bottomless, pitch-black cave.
A pungent odor mixed with damp humus, the metallic smell of minerals, and unknown chemical substances surged wildly from the cave.
Then, under the wary gaze of everyone, a creature slowly wriggled out from the deep darkness.
Lin Jie's pupils constricted sharply, his brain operating at high speed, trying to match the creature before him with all the UMA files he knew.
Yet he failed.
The creature before him bore no resemblance to the "Tatzelwurm" legends circulating in the Alpine region.
The legendary Tatzelwurm was a fierce predator with a cat's head, a lizard's body, and sharp claws.
What appeared before them now was a more primitive, more grotesque, and more geologically conceptual creation.
Its size wasn't enormous, about three meters long, its form strikingly similar to a giant earthworm or cave worm magnified hundreds of times.
It had no eyes, no claws, and even its head and tail were difficult to distinguish.
Its body showed a dull color somewhere between rock gray and earth brown.
Its skin surface wasn't covered in scales or a carapace, but a layer of slippery, wrinkled cuticle constantly secreting a translucent, viscous fluid.
This thing looked slow-moving, non-threatening, and somewhat disgusting.
It looked like an ordinary invertebrate that had accidentally crawled up from a dark, damp underground cave.
But not a single hunter present dared to underestimate it.
Because everyone knew that the precise landslide capable of sealing the entire valley just now was the work of this seemingly harmless "big bug."
It was the "Petrification Worm."
It was the culprit behind that "Silent Landslide."
After completely crawling out of the cave, the Petrification Worm did not immediately launch a frenzied attack on the investigation team.
It just slowly raised the front end of its body, its featureless "head."
It swayed sluggishly left and right in the air, sniffing this battlefield it had modified with some sense humans couldn't comprehend.
Then it moved.
Its movement was shockingly fast, a stark contrast to its clumsy appearance.
Its body suddenly contracted and then sprang, like a spring compressed to its limit being instantly released.
Its entire body became a gray-brown blur.
Adopting an anti-gravity posture of vertical crawling on rock walls, it began high-speed, irregular movement on the rock walls and ground surrounding the group.
Wherever it passed, the translucent, viscous fluid secreted from its body surface was evenly smeared on the surfaces of rocks and ice and snow.
Leaving behind slippery trails that gleamed with an oily sheen under the dim sky.
"What is it doing?"
A huge question arose in everyone's mind.
It didn't attack, didn't threaten. Like a graffiti artist, it wantonly painted patterns they couldn't understand across this natural circular arena with its own body.
"Everyone, be careful! Don't touch the mucus!"
Lin Jie was the first to react.
He had discerned the terrifying properties of this mucus from the reverberations of the petrified victims earlier.
This stuff was the direct carrier of the UMA's ability.
But it was already too late.
Before his warning had fully dissipated, the environmental monitoring mainframe carried by Gretchen suddenly emitted a sharp, ear-piercing, shrill alarm.
"BEEP—BEEP—BEEP—!!!"
Gretchen looked down sharply.
Her usually calm face showed unconcealable horror and disbelief.
"My God…"
She exclaimed involuntarily.
"The alarm shows the internal structure of all rock masses around us touched by the mucus is disintegrating!"
"Their 'structural strength' is being reduced to zero!"
Her words were like a bucket of ice water poured over everyone's head.
They immediately understood the UMA's intention. It wasn't that it couldn't attack.
It was conducting a grand pre-battle preparation.
It was using its mucus to transform this sturdy valley into a massive death trap composed of countless structural weak points that would collapse at a touch.
Once it completed this "painting," perhaps just one roar or a slight tremor would be enough to bury the entire valley and everyone in it under an irresistible, all-encompassing collapse, becoming the new foundation of this huge graveyard.
Just as everyone's scalps tingled at this battlefield modification ability, Klaus made a decision that surprised everyone.
Not only did he not order a retreat or to find sturdier cover, he instead let out a fierce, iron-blooded roar.
"Take the initiative and attack before it finishes its setup! Kill it!"
This German hunter's tactical thinking was filled with the same toughness and decisiveness as his personality.
Since they couldn't escape, then face the core of the threat head-on.
He was the first to charge out from behind cover, his hunting gun spewing angry tongues of flame.
However, the single slug bullet infused with alchemical materials only stirred a ripple in the mucus when it hit the Tatzelwurm's slimy skin, then was deflected at a bizarre angle, unable to cause effective damage.
Physical attacks were ineffective against its special body surface.
The worm seemed angered by the futile attack. It stopped its high-speed crawling, the front end of its body turning toward Klaus's direction.
Then a scene none of them would forget for the rest of their lives occurred.
It wasn't an attack launched by the worm itself, but the huge rock wall above Klaus's head that had just been "painted" with mucus by the worm silently peeled away like flesh losing all skeletal support.
A boulder weighing several tons, in a posture defying common sense, with irresistible gravitational potential energy, plummeted down toward Klaus.
"Supervisor!"
Gretchen screamed in terror.
At the critical moment when the shadow of death was about to envelop Klaus.
Klaus's face showed no fear. He just let out a roar.
He thrust his hunting gun into the ground, then unfastened a circular shield made of thick leather and brass components from his back.
He raised the shield high above his head, using all his strength to forcefully inject a surge of spiritual energy into the shield's core.
"HUMM—"
Accompanied by a bell-like chime, the complex alchemical runes engraved on the surface of the circular shield, barely half a meter in diameter, all lit up.
A translucent energy barrier over five meters in diameter exploded into existence above Klaus's head.
Grotesque Armament — [Unyielding Wall]!
"BOOM!!"
The boulder and the energy barrier collided in a world-shaking impact.
Shockwaves mixed with shattered rock and ice and snow swept outward in all directions.
The tremendous impact forced Lin Jie and the others to squint and raise their arms to block.
Finally, when the dust settled slightly, they saw a shocking scene.
The boulder had been forcibly stopped.
It was lodged on the golden energy barrier, countless cracks spreading across the boulder's surface but unable to advance another inch.
Beneath the barrier, Klaus's body was stubbornly supporting the shield.
His legs were already deeply embedded in the ground.
The muscles on his arms bulged high from excessive strain.
Blue veins throbbed violently beneath his skin.
Sweat mixed with blood seeping from his temple slid down his resolute face.
He alone had withstood a landslide.
Then Lin Jie's expression changed drastically, because he saw that after withstanding this impact, the surface glow of the golden energy barrier was visibly dimming at a noticeable speed.
This powerful defensive Grotesque Armament was nearing its limit, and this was only the beginning.
The Petrification Worm seemed somewhat surprised that its "work" had been blocked.
It paused on the rock wall, its featureless "head" tilting slightly, as if thinking.
Then all the rock walls and ground around it that had been contaminated by its mucus began to emit a "buzzing" resonance.
One piece, two pieces, ten pieces, over a hundred pieces…
Countless rocks of varying sizes began to peel away from their original positions in the same way.
Suspended in mid-air as if manipulated by an invisible hand.
At this moment, the entire valley transformed into a death domain dominated by the UMA, filled with deadly "floating cannons."
Klaus looked up at the death nebula composed of countless suspended boulders above his head.
His always resolute face revealed despair.
With a hoarse voice, he issued his final roar to Lin Jie and the others.
"We… are trapped in a trap!"