Suspended in mid-air, Steelheart followed closely behind the Wild Men, keeping pace with them as they moved forward.
Although it seemed the Wild Men were taking a roundabout path to minimize the risk of tracking,
under the spaceship's built-in surveillance equipment, their movements were completely exposed; the technological gap was simply too vast.
It was like comparing an adult to a nursery child, which made Steelheart, who was looking forward to a big fight, somewhat disinterested.
"I'm out here; let's share visual and coordinates," Tapai's voice rang in Steelheart's ear.
Not long after Tapai regained a high-altitude perspective, they quickly came upon a massive mountain of garbage.
This was not the same one Sun Jack and Tapai had fallen to; as a Metropolis, the amount of waste produced was staggering, and the most cost-effective way to deal with it was not to deal with it at all.
For hundreds of years, the rubbish transported out had piled up into several mountains; when one was full, they would simply start throwing trash in a new location.
"Bro, I finally know where the Wild Men got their ragged clothing from, seems like those OR movies weren't making it up," Steelheart commented with a hint of jest.
"Don't screw around with me. Utopia Security is ready on this end; as soon as we find Sun Jieke's Original Body, I'll provide you with firepower resources immediately."
As they spoke, the Wild Men vanished in an instant, disappearing into a desolate concrete jungle next to the garbage mountain.
"They went underground, damn it, the radiation is too strong, I can't scan anything."
Steelheart, with his quick temper, was ready to jump down and force his way through, but was stopped by a Cyber Catwoman perched on his shoulder.
Tapai's voice came through the woman's mouth, "Hold on, I'll send a combat avatar down to take a look; your size is too big, it's too easy to get spotted."
"Fuck, when the hell did you hide a 'meat chicken' near me?"
Tapai couldn't care less about his complaint and directly controlled the combat avatar that the Matrix had sent, jumping straight down towards the hole where the Wild Men had disappeared.
As the opening in the center of the pedestrian street grew larger, Tapai's combat avatar's provocative body rapidly became transparent until it finally faded into thin air.
Shortly after falling into the hole, Tapai could feel the radiation levels drastically dropping; the Wild Men had all hidden underground to avoid the radiation.
Lifting the thick ragged fabric, Tapai moved silently into the darkness, inching forward.
But not far into the walk, with the signal being jammed, Tapai felt anomalies in the data stream; he couldn't fully control the combat avatar, and if the network were to cut off, there would be no way to control it.
Seeing the situation, Tapai decided to upload his entire system and awareness into the combat avatar, "The interference inside is severe, I'm cutting off. If I don't come out after a long while, remember to mount a strong assault."
After disconnecting the communication with Steelheart, Tapai quickly familiarized himself with his new body, activated Mimetic Camouflage, turned on all Combat Prosthesis switches, and moved further inside.
As a former Holy Grail Person of the Matrix, it was clear that what he was given was naturally not some cheap stuff.
The body of this meat chicken is equipped with devices that are all extremely advanced, many times better than what it had originally. It had a variety of functions, even including a sex mode.
Accompanied by Tapai's rapid adjustment to night vision mode, the pitch-black tunnel was replaced by a shade of green, and the view gradually became visible.
It was at this moment that Tapai felt something unusual from the sensor in his right foot. Just as he swiftly bent sideways at the waist, several rusty, sharpened rebars just missed him, embedding in the rock wall to his left.
"There are traps, and they don't have any electrical power to operate them, or else they would have been detected earlier," Tapai said, turning to look at the rebar sticking out of the wall.
"This kind of trap is too primitive. It's like it hasn't even entered the electrical era. What's the difference between these Wild Men and the primitive tribes of the Amazon?"
"Why would they kidnap Sun Jack? I can't think of any reason."
As Tapai was pondering this, he saw people approaching. Old Three's language analysis came in handy, as he could easily understand what they were saying.
"The trap's been triggered. Nothing here, could it be a rat?"
"A rat wouldn't set it off, let's go back and tell the chief."
After quickly resetting the trap, the two turned around and headed deeper into the tunnel, but at that moment, Tapai was hanging upside down from the ceiling, following them further inside.
As they progressed along the tunnel, the dwelling of the Wild Men, resembling an anthill, was laid out before Tapai, complete with living areas, storage areas, a water access area connected to the underground river, and even a collection area that led directly to the bottom of the junkyard.
The Wild Men sorted through various pieces of garbage, searching for anything edible or usable. The useful things were carefully categorized and set aside, while the useless trash was thrown downstream into the underground river to be washed away.
Tapai scanned each area but could not find any trace of Sun Jack. He had no choice but to continue following the two deeper into the settlement.
As he passed by a certain cave, Tapai sensed something was off—this place was clearly very important to the Wild Men.
Their clothes were much cleaner and neater, indicating a status that set them apart from the Wild Men laboring outside. They appeared to be from a leadership class.
The most obvious difference between them and the Wild Men outside was the scarring behind their necks and on the insides of their wrists, resembling neural jacks, and some even had patterns on their bodies resembling mechanical prosthetic tattoos. Their decorations also consisted of various broken electronic chips.
At this moment, this group was kneeling devoutly on the ground, worshipping a large 'F' emblem on the wall, with poorly-drawn spacecraft carriers and drones beside it.
"What's this? A primitive religion formed based on high technology?"
It was then that the central figure among the Wild Men raised his head. Tapai realized he had no eyes – not that they were missing or damaged, but rather, he didn't have eyes at all; the area where the eyes should have been was unnaturally flat.
Suddenly, Tapai saw him tilt his head, listening with his damaged ears in Tapai's direction, "Someone's come in, not one of us! Over there!!"
With a pointed gesture, Wild Men flooded out from the tunnels around them, quickly grabbing long spears sharpened by mechanical arms, aiming in Tapai's direction.
On the other hand, a few Wild Men did not hesitate to attack Tapai. They gripped a disassembled gun barrel in their hand, then pulled out a needle used by Metropolitan Citizens for heavy drug use, coated it with radioactive dust, and inserted this deadly weapon into the needle barrel before blowing forcefully through it.
Then, the Wild Men of the wasteland began a frenzied onslaught against Tapai, utilizing a mix of advanced and primitive methods of attack.