Wasteland Border Inspector - Chapter 620
Chapter 620: Chapter 215: Destruction Level Infection Source, the Unlucky Garcia! (Part 3)
“If we’re lucky, still manageable.”
Cheng Ye picked up the thread, looking straight at him. “You’ve seen what’s under the water. If we don’t contain it, no one’s getting out of here.”
“Just you?”
Garcia reflexively retorted, but the words caught in his throat. After two seconds of silence, he corrected himself: “Just us?”
“Strictly speaking, it’ll be me and Luokuke going into the water.”
Cheng Ye said in a low voice, “The target is a Destruction Level infection source and the Immortal Objects fragments inside it. You don’t need to face the risk head‑on. You just need to stay in town with Wang Kang and keep order, make sure the residents don’t panic or trigger a pollution tide. That’s your mission.”
“As long as we complete the mission, you’ll get a Destruction Level promotion metric. You know exactly what that means.”
One Destruction equals five Disasters.
The primary promotion metric for Third-stage Inspectors—survive and you get it.
Garcia’s eyes lit up instantly. He snapped his head toward Luokuke, and only when he saw him nod to confirm did his mind finally catch up. He spoke in a rush: “There are a lot of corpses underwater! They’re the drifters’ bodies washed down during that Lin River tributary flood in June, all carried by the current into the bottom of the White Water River, all in this stretch by Dapo Town… and they’ve all come back to life!”
“Resurrected corpses?”
Cheng Ye and Luokuke exchanged a look, both seeing understanding in the other’s eyes.
There are only a few types of infection sources that can reanimate corpses, especially with “flood” as a qualifier.
It could basically be locked onto as “Death Language Tentacles.”
Cheng Ye paused. A scene suddenly flashed through his mind: right before he activated the Collector, the last Infected Body he shot down had been a drifter parasitized by Death Language Tentacles.
“It should be Death Language Tentacles, no mistake.”
Cheng Ye confirmed gravely. “I’ve handled a similar Infected Body before—also a victim from that flood. But what’s strange is, corpses resurrected by Death Language Tentacles usually act on instinct to complete something they left unfinished in life, like returning home or looking for a specific person. Why would they all stay motionless at the bottom of the river?”
“That’s an important piece of information. If this is happening, there are two possibilities.”
Luokuke immediately picked up, starting to analyze: “If this is happening, odds are there are two possibilities. First, these resurrected corpses have been taken over by a new infection source—the Destruction Level infection source on the riverbed. It’s using them as ‘puppets’ to guard itself. Second, Death Language Tentacles were implanted with new directives during reanimation, their goal being to head for Dapo Town. But the probability of that is very low. The parasitic logic of Death Language Tentacles is very simple and extremely hard to tamper with.”
Control tools?
Lackeys for a tiger?
There wasn’t a trace of surprise on Cheng Ye’s face. As a fixed NPC, in the infection tides that crop up all over every winter, there will inevitably be one or several core infection sources.
Besides their own bizarre abilities and the massive threat they pose to humans, these infection sources can also use special magnetic fields to draw in surrounding Infected Bodies. The more there are, the more terrifying the resulting infection tide.
Over a thousand Infected Bodies resurrected by Death Language Tentacles, all gathered by a Destruction Level infection source beneath the waters of Dapo Town?
It sounded terrifying on paper, but by this point, Cheng Ye didn’t feel the least bit of fear.
Compared with Ghost Water Cave Crab Infected Bodies, corpses resurrected by Death Language Tentacles were inherently very weak, with no particularly special abilities. As long as you were careful, they simply couldn’t pose too great a threat.
However, Garcia’s next words made the nerves they’d just relaxed snap taut again in an instant: “It’s not just Death Language Tentacles… some of the corpses are also infected by Ghost Water Cave Crabs, turned into double Infected Bodies. When I sank to the bottom, I saw at least a dozen double Infected Bodies that had already reached Fusion Level…”
“A dozen Ghost Water Cave Crab Fusion Bodies?”
Luokuke instantly lost his composure, his voice rising a few notches.
Ghost Water Cave Crabs were completely different from the Stand-In Starfish that had just rampaged through the city; they were Infected Bodies famed for combat strength. Even a cluster of ordinary Ghost Water Cave Crab Infected Bodies would take a lot of effort to deal with.
And Fusion Bodies… those were monsters that needed specially made Armor-Piercing Bullets just to penetrate their defenses. They had no exposed vital points. Conventional fire coverage was useless on them!
Thinking of this, Luokuke reflexively turned his head to look at Cheng Ye. Seeing there was still no panic on Cheng Ye’s face, the heart he’d just had in his throat eased a little.
But that reflexive reaction, in Garcia’s eyes, made his worldview wobble, the feeling like his “three views” were collapsing.
Since when did a Third-stage Inspector start watching the expression of an Intern Inspector?
Who exactly was standing in front of him—Luokuke, or… Matthew Lee?
Was he still under the influence of hallucinations?
He subconsciously raised his hand to touch the green vine around his neck that hadn’t fully faded yet. Only when the slightly swollen vine pulsed with a special rhythm did he freeze.
“Besides those double Infected Bodies, is there anything else under the water?”
“Besides them… there’s also…”
Garcia paused, as if forcing himself to recall the scene underwater. Then, like rattling off menu items, he blurted out the names of over a dozen infection sources in one breath. “There are Face-Swapping Fish, Soul-Hooking Catfish, and Drill-Bone Shells, Water-Walking Leeches…”
Basically all common infection sources found on riverbeds—nothing that needed special attention.
But after he finished, Garcia took a breath, and his gaze suddenly turned fearful, his voice beginning to tremble. “But none of those are the real threat… the real threat is that Destruction Level infection source you mentioned. That thing… that thing is a true giant. It…”
He stuttered twice, then simply grabbed some vines scattered on the ground, dipped them in fresh water, and started sketching on the floor.
This was also a basic skill for Inspectors: when words couldn’t describe something, they had to use images as fast as possible to show the infection source’s form.
Garcia’s skill wasn’t bad. Very quickly, he outlined a rough shape.
As the central part was gradually filled in, Cheng Ye froze for a moment and couldn’t help glancing at Luokuke.
The two of them spoke almost in unison.
“A sponge?”
…