Kaidan Game Train: Abide Rule or Die!
Chapter 536: The People in the Underground Nest

Chapter 536: Chapter 536: The People in the Underground Nest

The temperature inside the city was lower than outside, but it was still not a normal climate suitable for human habitation, and soon after sunrise the temperature began to rise sharply.

Xu Huo chose to walk in the shade and hadn’t yet approached the rift at the city center when he felt someone was following him. As he reached the corner of the street, he looked back and saw two young Split-head Alien Species throwing stones at him.

He caught one and, with a swinging motion, threw it back. The two Aliens were startled by the stones next to them and turned to flee. Their escape was eerily human-like, at least they didn’t seem to have lost their senses on the surface.

Keeping a certain distance, he followed behind the two and noticed that they ducked into a sewer alleyway and quickly disappeared without a trace.

Even in the subterranean space, as long as it wasn’t too deep, Xu Huo could still sense a bit. The two children went down and there was no movement, which was abnormal.

After waiting outside the alley for a minute, he walked in, removed the manhole cover, and jumped down.

The tunnel below was cramped, possibly convenient for children, but a bit of a squeeze for a grown man like him. He managed to reach the end of the passage, and when he came out, there were several divergent paths.

Some of these passages were new and others old; two were crudely excavated, unlike the others that had metallic pipes laid down and were merely smoothed over with a coat of paint.

But these tunnels carried sound, and standing outside, Xu Huo could determine the direction of the footsteps.

He chose the left-hand tunnel, crawled through, took two turns, descended twice, and then the surroundings began to change.

It was no longer just a tunnel. He must have entered beneath the city center’s rift; occasionally, through the exits, he could see the sunlight in the narrow crevices and the clothes hanging there.

Indeed, clothes. From the two crevices he found, he saw at least three or four places where clothes were hung.

Some people lived underground.

Or rather, some Aliens lived underground just like humans.

A gaunt child passed by in front of him, bumping right into Xu Huo. Separated by a few meters, the child with a pale white forehead and crown opened his mouth and let out a "ha, ha" sound.

This noise attracted the attention of the nearby Aliens, the first to come running was the pair who had earlier thrown stones at Xu Huo. They shielded the skinny child, baring their teeth and making faces as they threatened Xu Huo while retreating.

Within a few seconds, several more Aliens appeared, likely the parents of those children. They immediately embraced the small ones tightly and gazed at Xu Huo with terror in their eyes. As Xu Huo moved forward, they retreated backward.

Emerging from the narrow tunnel that allowed only upright walking, Xu Huo saw many stone and earth caves hollowed out along the sides of the fissure outside. At first glance, it resembled the dwellings from the time when humans first developed intelligence. Inside, he saw faces pale and gray peeking out—some fearful, some angry, but most stayed inside their caves and didn’t come out.

Noticing that they were all devastatingly thin and, due to the cramped underground space, many were hunched over, they seemed vulnerable despite their numbers in the presence of a normal person.

Scanning the "Alien Species" that were on guard but did not attack him, Xu Huo spoke to several in front of him, "Can you understand what I’m saying?"

Several adults just stared at him intently, but it was the two children who had the courage. One of them grabbed a handful of mud and threw it at him, mouthing the word "Scram!"

Xu Huo smiled, raising his hand to toss something back at them.

The adults let out a strange shriek and hugged the children, but when the object landed, the weak child couldn’t resist the smell of food and struggled out of their parents’ embrace to pick it up and take a deep sniff.

"Food," Xu Huo said as he tore another piece and took a bite.

The skinny child mimicked him and opened the bread, but before he could take a bite, another child slapped it out of his hands. The bread fell to the ground, covered in mud, and seeing this, the skinny child started to cry bitterly.

Xu Huo ate the bread while staring at the child who had hit the other.

The child looked back at him angrily but soon compromised for his exhausted little friend.

Carefully picking off the mud, he handed the bread to the thin child, who ate it eagerly, prompting himself to unconsciously lick his fingers.

Some children crawled out of their holes, saliva dripping, and gathered around the thin child, each getting a piece of bread the size of a finger.

Xu Huo simply gave them all the clean bread from the luggage compartment and two bottles of water, then called over the child who threw the mud and asked if he could write.

The child gave him several long looks before scrawling his name on the ground and writing a question after it, "Do you like eating children? Are you trying to fatten us up before you eat us?"

Xu Huo’s smile disappeared in an instant, and he replied, "I have a lot of food, just came from outside, don’t eat children."

The child reluctantly believed him and then asked what the outside world was like.

Xu Huo took out a communicator and showed some images to him.

The images clearly held a greater allure than food, as not only the children but also the adults crowded around, greedily watching the holographic projection of the bustling crowds and various food shops.

"Can all those be eaten?" the child wrote on the ground, "Is there really so much food outside?"

Xu Huo nodded and then asked them what they ate underground.

A group of adults huddled together and discussed for a while before a woman stepped forward to show him the way.

The city was located in a high-temperature zone where not a blade of grass grows on the surface, but underground seeds could germinate. Some grass grew in the cracks, and occasionally there were wild vegetables, although rare. Aside from that, Xu Huo saw some dried meat from rats and other unidentifiable animals.

"Have you been living here a long time?"

The woman pulled out a worn notebook and flipped through it, displaying the words, "We came to the cleaning zone more than ten years ago."

"Turned into Aliens after the contamination, but we didn’t lose our humanity. We’ve lived underground for over a decade without ever eating anyone."

"The infection we’ve got isn’t highly contagious; you won’t get infected even if you come into contact with us."

"There are many children here who have never gone out and never eaten normal food. After so many years, there must be a Potion out there that can cure the infection."

"You’re a good person; can you take one or two children out? Clown City will surely cure them."

"Please!"

After flipping through the notes she had prepared in the notebook, the woman knelt before Xu Huo with tears in her eyes. Seeing that he remained unmoved, she opened the last page and held it high, "You must not know the situation here since you come from outside. Those living above ground see us as livestock. They will eat those who arrive in the city and are uninfected. We’re telling you this hoping you’ll at least take one child away!"

Xu Huo had already guessed that Gao Peng and his group weren’t decent people when the child questioned him earlier.

"How many people have you shown this notebook to?" Xu Huo looked at the woman, "If you haven’t lost your reason, why don’t you leave on your own?"