dark moon

Chapter 171 Footprint Tracking
"The wood stubble is new, and the mark was left not long ago." On the wooden pile, a lightning-shaped mark was very inconspicuous mixed with the texture of the wood. Only by prior agreement can it be discovered at a glance like Duck.Taking off his gauntlet, the Crescent Knight gently swiped his fingers on the printing machine, put the wood chips on his fingertips to the tip of his nose, smelled it, and whispered, "It was carved by Marlene's sword, and there is There are iris fingernail scratches, it’s definitely them, that’s right.”

"How were their emotions when they left the mark?" Shuer squatted aside, holding his chin and pretending that he could understand, but after looking at it for a while, he gave up, "Can you tell?"

"I know what you mean, but it's hard to judge. I can't tell if it's too detailed. But judging from the appearance, they weren't too nervous when carving the mark. There is no difference between the mark and the one carved under normal conditions. .”

"In other words, their situation at that time was basically normal and not urgent at all?"

"Yes, if the situation is urgent, it will be shown on the carvings." Crescent Knight nodded, "And Sister Marlene should also leave corresponding information, not just a mark of her visit."

"Has your mercenary group always had this habit?" Shuer asked curiously, "No matter what happens, you always leave a few signals for others."

"Of course, it is a habit that must be developed." Dak replied seriously, "Members who go out to perform tasks must leave marks to indicate their whereabouts and entry when entering places where they may encounter danger. If something unexpected happens, these marks can allow the reinforcements to get enough clues, improve the chances of rescue for those in distress, and at the same time ensure the safety of the reinforcements to the greatest extent."

"The question is, is this a place where danger may be encountered?" Xiu Er asked back with a half-smile, "If they hadn't disappeared before you, would you think you were about to encounter danger when you entered this camp to investigate? "

Duck couldn't answer the call. He realized that he had indeed ignored this question. Why did Marlene leave a signal?In the mercenary group, the setting of signals is strictly regulated. Under what circumstances a signal needs to be left, which signal corresponds to which state, it is divided into categories. The settings are very detailed, and it is impossible to leave them just as you want.

"Imagine, if it wasn't Ma Lien's team, but you and me." Xiu Er didn't know why, but he had a faster brain than Dak, and he could reason and imagine better, "After handing over with Xinyue and the others, we The two of them followed the smoke column..."

Halfway through speaking, Shuer's body suddenly froze, and he suddenly turned his head to look towards the center of the camp. There was indeed a deliberately made smoky fire. The fuel must have been exhausted, and only very light smoke rose from the fire. No wonder I didn't notice the smoke column from a distance just now.

"Don't worry, it's normal for the smoke column to dissipate. Don't be too nervous." Dak noticed what Shuer was paying attention to and explained, "I already noticed it when we were at the parasite's place just now."

"No, I'm worried about another issue. Let's talk about it later." Shuer shook his head and continued what he just said, "We followed the smoke column all the way and arrived at the outskirts of the camp. We patrolled outside. I found that everything was normal and started walking inside. If it were you at this time, would you leave a signal?"

"No." There is no doubt that there is no sign of danger at all. It is impossible for the mercenary group to leave a mark, but the fact is that Marlene did leave a mark, which means...

"It means they encountered a situation that we haven't encountered, either a person, a creature, or a phenomenon." Shuer continued directly, "This made them feel uneasy, well, intensely uneasy, so first Send us information to avoid accidents."

"What did they see?" Neither of them asked this question, because both of them knew that it would be useless to ask, but it was still revealed in the eyes of each other.

"What they met...maybe was a human being." Crescent Knight, who had been silent for a long time, suddenly woke up the two of them who were deep in thought. When he turned around, he found that Crescent Moon was walking around, his eyes never leaving the ground.

"How did you get in?" Dak was taken aback. He hadn't checked the space over there yet. God knows if there are any cracks in the space. It is a very dangerous behavior for the new moon to rush in deep.

"It's okay, I let him off guard, and you don't need to explore the way." Xiuer explained, "I can be sure that Marlene and the others must have gone in, and they must have run through the camp once. I didn't smell blood. , which means that they were not harmed by the space cracks, which means that there should be no space cracks nearby, which is a blessing among misfortunes."

"Phew." Dake breathed a sigh of relief. The previous experience did leave him with a lot of psychological shadow. It was not because of the blood, but because a combatant whose strength was close to his own was inexplicably cut into pieces. The same result would have happened to me. The more confident a person is, the more serious the psychological shadow will be at this time.

"That's good." Dak turned the weird shield in his hand back into a rose, "What did you just say, is it a human?"

"Yes, it's probably a human being." Xinyue was almost lying on the ground, crawling on all fours, "Look at the traces here."

It is true that the ground in the camp is very hard and there are no footprints left, but it does not mean that there are no traces at all. This is the wild after all, and there are many plants, dust, and things that can leave traces.Under the prompts of the Crescent Knight, the two discovered many traces of human activities.

"Most of them were left by Sister Ma Lian and the others. Look here, they are the boots of the wind wolf, the one next to them is the footprints of Sister Ma Lian, and these are the hoofprints of the Wind Splitting Beast. It can be seen that they They stayed at the gate of the camp for a long time."

Yes, it can be seen from the marks on the ground that the four knights wandered in front of the camp for a while.However, the number of traces was not many, which meant that they stood still most of the time, unlike the three of Xiure and the others who walked around in a small area.There are not many reasons for this phenomenon. The most likely reason is that they are confronting the enemy. If there are no enemies, then there is probably only one reason left, who they are communicating with.

When communicating face-to-face, of course it is impossible to walk around, that is not only impolite, but also looks stupid, which can well explain why the four knights left the current traces, and...

"And, look here." Xinyue climbed to the other side, patted the ground and said, "These traces are definitely not left by brothers, they can only be left by outsiders."

The few shallow marks on the ground were definitely not left by the knights, because the knights were all wearing heavy armor, and even the Split Wind Beast was wearing horse armor, so the marks left were much deeper.

Shuer looked at his feet. Well, the owner of the traces should be wearing cloth or leather armor like himself, otherwise the weight would not match.

"Could it have been left by the people in the original camp themselves?" Shuer tried to guess, "It happens to be close to the footprints of Marlene and the others."

"It's unlikely. You see, Your Majesty the Priest, this person's traces have always been on the opposite side of Sister Marlene's traces. Unless the two have been communicating face to face, it would be difficult to have such a coincidence."

"Yeah." Knocking on his thigh, Xiuer's brain was spinning rapidly, and he suddenly raised his head, "Crescent Knight, you can explore from the door to see if there is any trace of Marlene and the others leaving."

"No, I've already checked." His eyes dropped, and the Crescent Knight was obviously very disappointed. "There are only signs of coming in, not going out."

"That's it, I understand." Xiu Er nodded thoughtfully, "Okay, then try, follow the traces left by Marlene and the others, and see if you can find where they went after that."

"That's no problem. Their traces were left not long ago and are still very obvious." Xinyue still had some confidence. She stood up and patted the soil, lowered her head and walked toward the camp with Shuer and Dak, " Look, it's still the footprints of that person. He took Sister Ma Lian and the others around the camp for a while, including the truck parking area, material warehouse, and dormitory area. This should be the noble's camp, which looks the most luxurious. Well, it looks like He took his brother half way around the camp, stopping several times along the way."

"They should be introducing the situation." Shuer and Dak looked at each other and nodded, "It seems that Marlene and the others have met survivors."

"After a long circle, they finally arrived at this area." There were several large tents in front of them. The curtains of the tents were all open, and you could clearly see that there was no one inside.There are several large dining tables in the tent. As expected, last night's banquet was held here.There are no chairs in the tent. The chairs should have been put away. The table is still in place. It must be because it is too heavy. I plan to dismantle it and load it into the car when the camp is dismantled the next day. Unfortunately, no one expected that they have not dismantled it. Opportunity to camp.

"There are only traces of entering, not leaving." Xinyue gritted her teeth and said, "There are no traces of that mysterious person or Sister Ma Lian or the others."

"Could there be other passages in the back?" Xiu Er's thoughts were reasonable, but after going around the area of ​​several large tents, he can be sure that after five people entered, they never came out again.

"It seems that the problem lies in these tents." Xiuer narrowed his eyes and stared at the tents for a long time, "I don't know what happened to them after they went in."

"You'll know if you go in and take a look." Dak said with a straight face, obviously in a bad mood, "Go in and take a look, maybe there's a chance to pull them out."

"If you want to go, I'll wait here to help you collect the body." Shuer sneered, "If they really fall into the ghost space, then we are their only hope. If we fall into it too, then Let’s all just huddle together in the ghost space and finish it off.”

Sighing sullenly, Dak also knew that he was a little impatient, which was not a good sign.

Article [-] of the Mercenary Code: Impatience is the biggest enemy of mercenaries. As the level of impatience increases, the chance of survival decreases proportionally, and there will be no exceptions.

"Okay, you're right." Dak smiled bitterly, "I'm a little confused now, it's up to you to decide, what should I do?"

"Go back first. It's too weird here to stay for a long time." Shuer frowned and said, "I always feel that I have overlooked some problems. I will think about it tonight and let's come back tomorrow morning."

(End of this chapter)