Su Wu maneuvered the base vehicle inch by inch across the barren wasteland. As evening approached, the gray clouds above darkened into an inky blackness. Driving through the wilderness became increasingly difficult.
Sitting in the cockpit, Su Wu turned on the vehicle's high-powered spotlight, illuminating the terrain within a few dozen meters as if it were daylight. However, beyond the reach of the light, the darkness deepened, rendering anything outside the beam utterly invisible.
"Current speed: 15 kilometers per hour. External temperature: 72 degrees Celsius. Radiation index: 0.2."
Glancing at the environmental readouts, Su Wu was surprised by the lowered temperature and near-harmless radiation levels.
"Other than the endless rocky wasteland, this area's environment seems better than Chongzhou City. If the temperature drops a bit more, people might even be able to live on the surface here."
As he reflected, the vehicle's radar picked up unusual activity. Redirecting his attention, Su Wu noticed a shelter in the distance. Judging by the still-operational equipment, the shelter wasn't abandoned.
"Who would build a shelter in a place like this? Did someone foresee that the temperatures here would be lower than in Chongzhou?" Su Wu couldn't help but scoff.
This area lacked the natural caves found in mountainous regions, was extremely remote, and was surrounded by nothing but barren rocks. It was even more desolate than the area around his Arid Stone Village, isolated by several orders of magnitude. Building a shelter here seemed like a deliberate choice to be cut off from civilization, where even centuries might pass before anyone discovered it.
As these thoughts crossed his mind, Su Wu's expression suddenly shifted. Stopping the base vehicle abruptly, he sat upright and enlarged the radar's scanned image on the screen.
The image revealed a shadow resembling a grotesque, bloated mass, emitting intense heat. It pulsated rhythmically, as if alive, and was located within the shelter.
"What is that thing?"
After a brief silence, Su Wu decided to exercise caution. He slowly reversed the base vehicle until it was 150 meters away from the shelter, then stopped again.
Reviewing the radar data, he confirmed that the shelter seemed devoid of human life. Only the unidentified spherical object, approximately 2.5 meters in diameter, exhibited signs of vitality. Meanwhile, the shelter's air circulation system, central air conditioning, and generators were still functioning, indicating the owner hadn't been gone for long—otherwise, the fuel for the generator would have run out.
"Did I just stumble upon a crime scene?"
Weighing his options, Su Wu decided to investigate. The federal government in this world had an unusual penchant for withholding information. If he didn't take the initiative now, he'd likely never uncover the truth about this anomaly.
This situation wasn't one he could afford to ignore, especially since the shelter wasn't too far from Jianghe City. If he didn't take precautions, the consequences could eventually come back to haunt him.
Activating the vehicle's rocket launchers and quad-mounted 20mm cannons, Su Wu locked onto the shelter's location. He then opened the third compartment of the base vehicle, deploying his ground combat units to establish multiple defensive positions ahead.
Once everything was in place, Su Wu directed the engineering robot in the second compartment to board the Ore-1 transport vehicle and approach the shelter.
Typically, the doors of underground shelters were made from heavy metal. With Su Wu's current tools, only the high-frequency oscillating cutter on the engineering robot could breach them. It was a risky move; losing the expensive engineering robot was a possibility. However, it was a safer alternative than Su Wu personally piloting the miniature mech to break in.
The mech wasn't invincible. Not only could the unknown entity in the shelter pose a threat, but even the federal government had methods to breach its defenses.
Caution was the better approach.
The Ore-1 transport vehicle quickly covered the 150-meter distance and arrived at the shelter's entrance. The engineering robot disembarked and scanned the door's structure with its detection tools before activating the oscillating cutter. Slowly, it inserted the cutter into the door's seams.
In just over ten seconds, the door lock was broken. The engineering robot didn't proceed inside. Instead, it retreated back onto the transport vehicle and returned to the base vehicle, its task completed.
As the engineering robot withdrew, a heavily armed construction robot took its place. Accompanied by a soldier combat crawler equipped with a flamethrower, the robot advanced into the shelter.
When the shelter's heavy metal door creaked open, a beam of bright light spilled out from the corridor inside, illuminating the path ahead for the construction robot.
"The lights are still on," Su Wu muttered, taking a deep breath. His heart rate quickened slightly as he controlled the construction robot via the cockpit's touchscreen, guiding it slowly down the corridor.
Behind the robot, the combat crawler remained stationed at the entrance, flamethrower aimed down the corridor, ready to attack in case of an emergency.
After more than a minute, the construction robot reached the end of the corridor and pushed open an unlocked inner door. A cluttered hall filled with scattered supplies appeared on the robot's camera feed.
Examining the footage carefully, Su Wu quickly reached a conclusion.
"A standard private shelter
. Not very large. It could accommodate two to five people."
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