Our family is in decline

[These dark caves drip with excess moisture, making me feel very uncomfortable. I nearly twisted my ankles on the slippery rocks, which were made even more difficult to climb by the slime that lay as far as the eye could see. The puddles stirred and splashed, but when you looked at them, there was nothing there. The shadows under the light of the torch seemed to be alive, growing and shrinking uncomfortably.

My fears came true! Our torches were extinguished by the sudden waves - we were surrounded! These creatures have ape-like features, but have the head of a fish; these aquatic evil creatures suddenly attack us in the noise and darkness! I grabbed the fallen torch, and at that moment I caught a glimpse of the scaly limbs waving, rudimentary weapons that were sharp and spiny against the waves. They didn't last long after we relit the torch. Well, one of them bit me in the neck before I disemboweled him. The wound stung strangely. Our doctor asked me to clean it and bandage it carefully...

The wound on his neck began to fester. Beside the putrid water pool, I saw that the flesh and blood around the wound turned gray and wrinkled, and fell off piece by piece, disturbingly resembling scales; as I wrote this, I was breathing laboriously, and my lungs felt hollow. echo. My companion smiled and told me not to worry, it was just because I had inhaled too much of the salt spray that filled these water caves.

They all fell asleep. But I was lulled from sleep by the strange, whispering sound of the water, as if I was being gently lifted up by the ocean current. I didn't dare tell them that the tissue around my wound had rotted away and a strange silvery film was revealed; I covered it up. They were surprised to find me chewing raw meat just after the campfire went out, and my muffled voice was not enough to answer their questions. I think I'd better explain my situation carefully after they wake up. Maybe they will believe the seriousness of the problem, leave this ghost place, and go to the small town to find help.

Everyone else has died. They are all victims of that terrible mutation! Their scales turned into soft, fragile flesh due to decay. They are suffocating because they have no gills! Their eyes are like nightmares! Those bright eyes that were imprisoned by the proliferating flesh curtain, struggling in the obstruction and dying! As I washed my flippers, all I could think of was their horrible, distempered blood... and I almost vomited. May death put an end to their long suffering!

I don't even remember why we took such a big risk to come to land. Mother Sea provides us with everything we need, so why should we leave her gentle waves? My companions rested in torment and misery, and I was unable to continue the journey to land. Now I want to go home, to the embrace of the sea... (Unreadable scratches crowd the rest of the page)]

Seeing this, Lance put down the blood-stained diary with a strange expression. According to the above description, this seems to be a human team that entered the bay to perform an unknown mission.

They were unexpectedly attacked by fish-men. The owner of the diary was bitten and mutated. What grew out of the festering wound was fish scales instead of flesh and blood.

At the same time, he has other impulses, eating raw meat, hating the land, and longing for the sea.

Until the owner of the diary fell into an uncontrollable state late at night and killed all his unsuspecting companions.

When it woke up, it saw the mutilated corpses of its companions and its eyes widened due to drowning. It kept trying to clean the blood on its hands, only then did it realize that it had webbed hands, and the signs of gnawing on the corpses were even worse. It made it feel unspeakably uneasy.

The remaining humanity allowed it to write the last paragraph of the diary, but it was obvious that it had completely lost its mind after writing this.

The way of thinking has also fallen into that of a deep diver. Its mutation has penetrated from the physical body to the spiritual level and completely transformed, thus returning to the deep sea... becoming one of those deep divers.

If these diaries hadn't been left behind, I'm afraid no one in the world would know what happened here.

The fact that this human was bitten and transformed into a deep diver reminded Lance of the curse that followed the large number of injured people after the murloc invasion.

If he hadn't given his blessing to dispel the curse, I'm afraid that a large number of mutated fish-men would suddenly appear one day and start killing people, then turn around and rush into the water.

Now that he has figured out the origin of these murlocs, they probably transform humans into their own kind by constantly attacking humans.

"Enemies of mankind, these alien races must be eliminated!"

Lance classified these deep divers that are parasitic on humans as enemies of humans, and they must be attacked if encountered.

Holding up the torch and looking around, it can be seen that this is a long-abandoned camp, the original location where the scene took place.

The reason I chose this place was because there were no puddles around, so there was no sign of flooding.

It's just that the surroundings are surrounded by this almost tangible salty and humid water vapor, and not many can stay. Some tent wooden frames and other things have long since decayed.

As for the corpse, I don't know when it became the monster's ration. No bones or residue were left behind, but the remaining traces of the battle on the surrounding rocks still gave a glimpse of the scene that had happened here.

There are only some remaining charcoal on the ground and a box with a lot of barnacles attached to it. The metal part of the box has long been rusted and turned into slag when touched, but it still persists until now.

It was under the protection of this box that the diary was not corroded. Some random things could be found in it, but there were no surprises in it, and the map that Lance wanted most was not among them.

After searching here, Lance continued to go deeper.

Suddenly Lance stopped, his eyes fell on the calm puddle in front of him, he picked up a stone and threw it over.

The moment the stone touched the puddle, it seemed as if something in the water was disturbed. Several tentacles exploded out of the water and swallowed the stone at a rapid speed, making a "clicking" sound.

At this moment, a hooked spear poked out from the side and inserted directly into the monster's body.

The monster wanted to retract but was held back by the hooked spear. Suddenly, the tentacles waved wildly, splashing on the water surface, and the tentacles collided with the rocks, making a dull sound.

Wrestling with Lance, it will taste despair.

He was dragged completely out of the water, and his lower body was also exposed. Only then did he realize that it was a mollusk similar to an octopus. I wonder if it tastes good?

After leaving the water, the monster's struggle quickly weakened, and soon it fell into a state of depression. After all, the hook spear was inserted into its body, and the pull just now had torn its body apart.

Lance was very calm about this. He took out his knife and stabbed the monster, killing it directly.

He cut open the flesh with a knife before pulling out the rusty hooked spear. This was captured from those deep-sea warriors just now. Not to mention it was quite useful.

Looking at the monster again, it was a trap designed by some fishmen taking advantage of their hunting characteristics.

There are traps made by a kind of sea creature placed in these puddles, lurking in the water waiting for prey to pass by.

As long as you step on it, it will explode, and the spiked tentacles will instantly restrain the prey.

And the mouthparts in the middle began to bite. Even if it didn't hurt the muscles and bones, it would be a dead end if it was injured and bled in this place.

Lance used a knife to pick out the stone that it had swallowed. Seeing the gnawing marks on it, he estimated that the bones could not withstand it.

Knowing how to use marine life to set traps, it can only be said that the brains of these fish-men are not necessarily worse than humans. After all, they were once humans, and they became like this under the influence of some indescribable existence.

Lance has encountered them several times before, so he said that he should avoid these puddles and test out any suspicious places.

After easily cracking the trap, Lance hesitated and still didn't want to taste anything. After sacrificing it, he stepped on the slippery ground and kept moving forward.

The complexity of the topography of the bay is no simpler than that of the beast's cave, and it is even more outrageous, because it is a creation of nature with no rules at all.

Maybe it was because he took away too many fishmen in order to invade and blockade Hamlet. Except for the ones that were in groups at the beginning, Lance encountered some rotten fish and shrimps in the rest of his encounters.

But this situation without many obstacles also greatly improved his progress deep into the bay...

However, Lance's mood was not happy because the frequency of fighting was reduced. On the contrary, his mood became heavier.

Because the deeper he went, the more Lance felt something was wrong, because the surrounding environment began to become more and more strange.

Perhaps because it is far away from the coast, the rocks supporting the interior of the channel are no longer the rock walls eroded by water flow like blades, but have become stone pillars like caves. The clear boundaries of each section make the outer edge of the stone pillars seem to be rolling. of waves.

The rocks on the ground have obvious traces of processing and are beginning to become flat. In some places, stone steps are even carved out to make it easier to climb up the drop.

What is even more outstanding are some wall carvings with an alternative style carved on the rock wall.

It is engraved with waves, tentacles, and some incomprehensible patterns, but they are not disordered, but have regular shapes, and basically contain marine elements.

Continuing deeper, Lance even found traces of masonry, the stone door formed based on the surrounding rocks, and the door panel clearly carved a pattern of two tentacles holding up a shell together.

This thing happened to have a symmetrical shape. Lance put the torch on it and raised his hand to touch the carving marks on it. This kind of fine craftsmanship can only be carved by a skilled stonemason. It has even undergone simple polishing. It is definitely not something that a fishman can do. s things.

So why do these things appear here? Who made these things?

Lance once again focused his attention on the shell pattern that appeared many times. What does this mean?

Not caring so much, Lance pushed the stone door hard. It seemed thick, but it opened without much effort.

After entering it, there was sudden movement in the dim place after taking a few steps. It was obvious that he seemed to have entered the territory of some creature.

Before Lance could see clearly, there was a sound of something spitting out from the turbid water vapor.

Lance, who had experienced the giant spider in the wilderness and the crippled pig in the cave, immediately understood that this was definitely not a good thing, and subconsciously dodged away.

Sure enough, in the next second, a lump of thick phlegm-like substance fell on the same spot. Lance, a mysophobic, could hardly imagine what it would feel like to have this thing fall on his body, because just looking at it made him feel nauseous.

Lance waved the torch forward, and the swaying firelight dispersed the water vapor that enveloped the place, and he was able to catch a glimpse of the enemy who had just attacked him.

It was a creature that looked like a snail, with two tentacles extending out from its purple worm body, and two rows of densely packed suction cup-like legs under its body.

The volute behind it occupies most of the volume. It looks like a rock, giving people a solid impression, and there are irregular spikes on it.

The deep sea snail can be as tall as half a person. You can't see where the mouthparts are, but its whole body is moist and its surface is covered with a layer of mucus. This proves that it was this thing that launched the attack just now.

What made Lance even more disgusted was that there was more than one of these things. Two sea snails could be seen under the firelight, and behind them was a deep-sea shaman waving a sea urchin staff.

The sea snails all reacted as soon as the fire came on, but seeing that the action was worthy of a snail, the shaman took action first.

Suffocating waves!

The evil power under the blessing of the rich water vapor wanted to swallow Lance up like a wave.

But Lance ignored this at all. Instead, he took out a church-style war hammer and rushed towards the sea snails.

Even though Lance was confident in the sharpness of the wolf fangs, he still felt distressed when using them to chop those stone-like volutes, but the hammer was different and had a better armor-piercing effect.

Anyway, I just picked it up and swung it hard and that was it.

Holding the hammer in one hand, it made a sound that broke through the air. The surface of the hammer disturbed the water mist, and the next second...

"Bang!"

There was a deafening roar, and a cloud of water mist exploded violently. The collision of terrifying forces made the water vapor condense and become visible to the naked eye.

The sea snail closest to him cracked open, cracking in the physical sense.

The seemingly solid volute was shattered into countless pieces by a hammer, and the soft body also died suddenly.

The slippery ground greatly limited Lance's speed, but he was still faster than those sea snails.

Before they could spit, Lance moved again, hitting each one while dodging the attack. The popping sound was like opening a can.

It's just that these guys don't have any brains, otherwise they would have fallen into panic and run away.

The sea snail doesn't, but the deep sea shaman in it doesn't necessarily. It doesn't understand why its witchcraft doesn't work, but it doesn't want to die here.

Immediately he held his staff and took staggering steps to escape. If it still retained human memory, it might understand that flippers are not as useful as feet on land.

but……

"Hmph! Want to escape?" (End of Chapter)