dark moon

Chapter 17 Collective Life

"Everyone, before we officially set off, I think there is something I need to tell you."

Xiuer glanced at the forest elf who woke him up in the morning. This deer was happily chewing a few leaves that he found somewhere, as if he had nothing to do with him.

"I'm sorry, I should have told you all these things last night, but I ignored your feelings and didn't communicate with you in time. As the captain, this was my mistake. I apologize to everyone here. Fortunately, someone reminded me. I didn't go further and further down the wrong path."

"It's breakfast time now, you eat, you listen, I'll do the talking."

The current time is the second day after entering the Frog Man ruins, and it is also the day to prepare to officially start exploring the ruins.

Everyone didn't sleep very well last night. Before going to bed, they suddenly discovered an abnormal situation, and the captain did not give a reasonable explanation. Everyone's heart was actually hanging, and they were just pretending to be calm. In this state, of course It was impossible to rest peacefully.

However, the team members are not dissatisfied with this. Everyone knows that leading a team deep into the projection of another world puts the captain under tremendous psychological pressure. When encountering problems, he adopts the best option, so that he ignores everyone's concerns. Feelings are also understandable.

Therefore, everyone has been mentally prepared to continue to spend today in doubts until Shuer has figured everything out and is confident of solving the problem, and then explains the details to everyone.

No one expected that as soon as they got up and left the dormitory, they would see a steaming breakfast, a necromancer sitting beside him with a blank look on his face, a forest elf eating grass, and of course, Xiu Xiu who wasted no time in writing on paper. you.

"Boss, are you okay? You are a priest. If you fall ill first, everyone will be in trouble." The halfling wanted to step forward and touch the temperature of Shuer's forehead, but looking at the hammer on his waist, it was still Discarded this idea.

"Idiot halfling, this has nothing to do with illness. The captain must be under too much stress and has a nervous breakdown... Hey, captain, don't take away my plate, it's my breakfast..."

"You are sensible." The indifferent elf mage snorted in a low voice, but the corners of his mouth were slightly raised.

"Hey, that's great." The shy female swordsman was the happiest one. Last night, she was the most worried one. Of course, she was not worried about possible dangers, but about the person she cared about most.Seeing that Shuer had regained his composure, Saff smiled sweetly and gave Ms. Lin Jing a grateful look. However, what she received in exchange was the blank and innocent expression of Moriah who stuffed her mouth with leaves.

"Although I pretended to be relaxed last night, everyone should have seen that we are in a very troublesome situation now because we were inadvertently involved in a war that lasted for decades and has been unilaterally terminated. war."

"Whether this building is a civilian facility, military use, or other weird purposes, it doesn't matter now, because in the last few days, it has only one purpose, which is for these frog people to fight against external plants. fortress."

"I don't know how much of this world is occupied by those weird plants, but it is obvious that the projection world we are in now is definitely controlled by those plants, and this ruin is the only one within their sphere of influence that is not under their control. The territory below.”

"According to the rules of the projection world, of course everyone in the ruins is dead, but those plants probably don't know this. Over the years, they have been trying to break into the ruins, but they have failed."

"But now, they succeeded, as those few mushrooms prove. They successfully broke into the last rebel position."

"You mean, they are intelligent?" Miridi frowned.Attacking foreign enemies with hostility does not necessarily mean that they are intelligent, and it can also be driven by instinct. However, if they can conduct an organized war, it can only mean that they have a certain basic intelligence.If this is the case, these plants should be classified from the field of botany that Moria is good at to the field of life science that Meredith is good at.

"I don't know exactly how high they are, but they are definitely wise." Xiu paused, and said in a low voice, "Because they know how to find a way to come in with us."

"Huh?" Several people murmured in surprise at the same time, and Militi couldn't wait to ask, "I can imagine that they came in with us, but can you explain what you mean by finding a way?"

"This is just my guess. Maybe I am overthinking it, but I would rather think more than encounter unnecessary trouble due to lack of consideration."

"During Shadow Chasing, no matter how complicated you think, you will never think too much. What's scary is that you think too little." Mia said gloomily, "Just tell me."

"Yesterday, they didn't want to kill us. To be precise, they didn't want to kill us right away. They were actually just constantly putting pressure on us, forcing us to break in here."

"Yesterday we all ignored a problem. They turned this area into a dead place and killed all living things. They should have rich experience in how to kill animals and humans. Indeed, our physique and the living creatures here There may be many differences, but essentially there is no difference. They are all physical creatures, and the method of killing local creatures should be applicable to us, or at least it can make us feel uncomfortable."

"However, we don't have this discomfort, which means they're not doing anything."

"Captain, that's because you took countermeasures in time. Breathing and contact are cut off. Even if they want to use any tricks, they have no way." The dwarf's unique rough voice was particularly loud.

"Forget how you felt when you almost cut off your own head?" Xiu Er glared at Moback, "Everyone was affected at that time, which shows that they at least have a way to directly affect our emotions and amplify the negative emotions. If they really wanted to kill us on the spot, they would definitely not delay using it for so long, and wait until the end to use it, I am afraid it is just a means to put pressure on us." "Hey, Shure, I have two I don't understand the problem." The beautiful Lin Jing held up a few butter-coated leaves, and it was hard to imagine how this was eaten. "First, how did they know that we would come here? This is our own choice. Find this ruin , it should be a complete coincidence.”

"They don't know, and they don't need to know." Xiu Er sighed, "I don't think they even know that we and those frogmen are not of the same kind, and we have no connection with each other."

"You mean, in their opinion, we are the same as those frogs?" The halfling's high-pitched voice made his normal speech sound almost like a scream, "So they think that we always have to go back to here?"

"I think so. Our performance also confirms their judgment. The fact is that we did come in."

"Okay, this problem can indeed be explained in this way, but there is a second question." Lin Jing said leisurely, "Can they really have such complex thinking?"

"Not sure." Shuer shook his head and said, "Milidi, it's up to you to judge."

"In terms of life science, the complexity of thinking is determined by the soul and the brain. Without the support of a higher soul, no matter how developed the brain is, it will not be able to think too complexly. At most, it will be like those smarter monsters. , in the same way, without a developed brain, advanced souls will also lose many abilities, such as memory loss, confusion of thinking, loss of logical analysis capabilities, etc. By the way, the above content must exclude the undead, which is another kind of system."

"So? I want to hear the conclusion." Shuer knocked on the table.

"This is the conclusion." Militia shook her hair charmingly and said dissatisfiedly, "They do not have developed brains, and they cannot have complex souls. Theoretically, they cannot carry out such complex thinking activities. I I think you think of them too humanistically, they are still a group of plants after all.”

"Eh? Then I am too..."

"Eat the grass obediently and don't cause trouble, you tree." Regarding Moria, Militia and Mia's attitudes towards Moria yesterday were surprisingly consistent. Well, they were unanimous in a subtle way.

"No, no, no, that's not right, Xiure, Xiure is not at fault." The girl who blushed, suppressed her shyness and tried her best to defend Xiure, must be the girl Saff.

No one teased her, let alone laughed at her, but everyone looked at her seriously.

Everyone knows each other's personalities very well. We know that this archivist of the big library has always been respected by many people as the writer and inheritor of knowledge. He has absolutely rich knowledge in his mind, and what he says must be well-founded. He will never Talking nonsense just to defend someone.

really.

"I once read a book, the author was Carol." Saff looked directly at Meredith, even forgetting to be shy.

Mirity's face suddenly became ugly, and a few drops of cold sweat broke out on her forehead: "Master Carol...could it be said that clustered life really exists?"

"Explain it." Shuer knocked on the table again.He searched his memory carefully and made sure he had not seen this name before. It seemed that this book was not within his reading range.

"Carol was a master of life science 700 years ago, focusing on the study of insects." Mility said with a cloudy expression, "She put forward a hypothesis, which is swarm life."

"She found that the brains of insects are small or even negligible, and the souls are pitifully weak. However, some insects that live in groups often show reactions that are far beyond their proper thinking."

"So she put forward the hypothesis of swarming life. The core content is that these groups of insects connect each other's brains and souls to think together through some unknown method. Only in this way can their anomalies be explained."

"She even believed that if all the ants in the world...such as ants, all the ants in the world were gathered together, they could show thinking abilities that are far superior to humans, even though their souls are still inferior and their brains are small."

"Even she is not very optimistic about this hypothesis, and there is no evidence to support it. At best, it can only be regarded as a whimsical fantasy." Militty shook her head in surprise, "Could this kind of life really exist in a certain world?"

"It seems that this second question also has a possible explanation." Shuer smiled bitterly at Moria and sighed, "So I think they are very smart and forced us to 'return' here, and then followed us Come in, I'm even worried that they are spying on us at any time now."

These words made everyone feel a chill, and they subconsciously looked around, as if there were really some scary plants hiding in the dark and sneering at them.

(End of this chapter)