CHAPTER 656: CHAPTER 653: ANIMALS OF THE ICE LAYER

"Anger, Drat, what’s happening on your end?"

Heard through the commotion in the communication, the mercenary Airen, who walked at the front of the team, immediately tried to ascertain the situation.

"Are you in danger? Give me more details."

"..."

For a moment, the communication went silent.

Afterwards, the somewhat panicked voices from below resumed:

"There’s... something down here, I saw something moving inside the ice layer."

"But it disappeared in the blink of an eye."

Airen furrowed his brows and continued:

"Are you sure it’s not a trick of the eye? What did the thing roughly look like?"

As a mercenary, he had seen many instances of hallucinations born from fear, and the current environment was prone to inducing such conditions.

"I’m not sure." Accompanied by Airen’s inquiry, the person beneath the ice layer started to regain composure after the initial panic, organizing their thoughts and trying to provide some useful answers, "The structure of the ice layer here is quite complex. I only saw some blurry shadows, it could be the result of light semi-reflecting on the ice surface."

"..."

While they were having the conversation through the communication,

Ronald, who was in the middle of the team, felt somewhat speechless.

He now felt as if he didn’t belong to a scientific expedition but was instead on the set of a horror movie.

Support staff for the expedition, special and bizarre environmental landscape, unheard-of strange creatures... taken one by one, these were all elements common in monster movies or horror films.

In serious research, how could there be all these fancy and bizarre things?

However, this situation

also inspired him to some degree.

Going by the original content of "Divine Comedy", the canonical trial he was supposed to be in would definitely not include such a strange environment. It was supposed to be a fantasy setting like Heaven or Hell, or some important historical background from when Poet Dante wrote the book.

The trial presenting such a scene at the moment...

Ronald believed there had to be a reason for its existence.

Pondering over these things, Ronald’s gaze started to focus on the surrounding environment.

Only upon arriving here did he understand why the two from the expedition team insisted on staying behind and choosing to conduct destructive excavation in this area. Because beneath this shattered ice cave, circular corridors extended to both sides every few meters downward, skirting around the shape of the ice lake, forming tunnels that seemed endless at a glance.

With Ronald’s perspective,

these orderly circular tunnels could definitely not be a naturally occurring terrain; there must be some kind of ’builder’ exerting absolute influence.

After entering the relic, if, through some fragile ice structures, one were to discover hints of what lay beneath, and upon seeing the breathtaking underground constructs, it would be understandable for curiosity to arise and further excavation to continue.

At this time, Yani, who had stayed on the surface, suddenly spoke up through the communication:

"Guys, the situation here isn’t looking good."

"Those blue creatures that attacked the base have appeared at the entrance; I probably can’t stay put any longer."

Airen almost unhesitatingly instructed:

"Yani, find an ice hut with an opening above and hide in there. The temperature here is low, so you should be safe if you’re careful."

Before Yani could even respond through the communication,

Ronald cut in first:

"Yani, I suggest you’d better come down as well. If these animals have successfully traced us here, the temperature interference is probably not enough to ensure safety."

"..."

"Old Yang, wait for me to come down."

After only a brief silence, Yani informed everyone of her decision through the communication.

Ronald then immediately turned his gaze to Airen.

He knew that this control-driven mercenary was likely to be quite displeased with his interruption. Yet the risk of staying above was too high, and Ronald didn’t want to continue losing people in such circumstances.

Just as Ronald had thought.

When Airen saw that Yani had rejected his own command and instead followed Ronald’s suggestion, his gaze was quite displeased.

But when he caught Ronald’s eye.

He realized how serious the situation was and reluctantly returned a very perfunctory smile.

"Heh, you’re the expert, it’s right to listen to your preparation."

"..."

After the unsettling interlude, the team continued downward.

Drat and Anger, who were in a deeper position, had not found that kind of movement again.

The current situation.

Seemed to have returned to a stable transition phase...

Crack crack crack—

Suddenly, the pickup function of the professional headphones began to alert them.

As the positions of the two groups above and below approached beneath the ice layer, and they were finally able to see each other’s lighting systems, there appeared to be the sound of some sharp object rubbing against the ice, nearby in the surrounding ice layers.

It was incredibly like the kind of movement that the two had described in a panic before!

Ronald immediately asked:

"Anger, Drat, did you two turn on the pickup feature of your headphones before?"

"Pickup feature? Why turn that thing on?"

The two explorers below sounded somewhat puzzled.

Considering the drain on battery life, this non-essential feature was usually off, as communication was the most important function of the headphones. Now, at Ronald’s query, they finally reached out to press the pickup switch on the side of the headphones.

Crack crack crack—

The strange noise arose.

At the position where Anger and Drat were.

The ’crack’ sound was even clearer than it was where Ronald and the others were.

For a moment—

The already sparingly used communication channel fell into complete silence once again.

Anyone who had activated the headphone pickup feature knew they were in big trouble now.

What Anger and Drat had discovered before was not a misperception born of crisis. In this strange underground glacier environment, something truly was moving!

And if you listen carefully to the position of the sound.

You could be shocked to find something—the sound was growing louder.

This thing was approaching them!

"Yani, I’m here."

Also, just at this moment, Yani used the pulley system that Ronald and the others had set up on their descent to reach the team’s depth.

Airen, nominally in charge of commanding the team.

Almost immediately turned his gaze towards Yani, who had just arrived:

"Miss Yani, do you know of a kind of..."

"No, I don’t know!" Yani answered Airen’s question almost immediately, then didn’t forget to describe the seriousness of the situation. "There are animals that live in glacier environments, but I have never heard of one that can move freely within the ice layers like this."

Crash—

As Yani was speaking, the lighting from the team above and the two groups below collided.

Right at this spot.

They saw an extremely shocking scene.

A creature, made entirely of crystal-clear, ice-like material, was thrusting its ice-spike-like sharp tentacle towards one of the two people below!