Chapter 1611 - The Lair (2/2)

She suddenly halted her steps, her ears flicked around in alert. “Big Boss Cat, I hear voices!”

“What voices?” Hao Ren stopped again. “I cannot hear any.”

“It comes from the vicinity.” The cat maiden crouched. Her ears kept flicking around while she said quietly, “It sounds like someone is mumbling with something in the mouth. Big Dumb Cat, did you hear that?”

Lily cared not about how the cat maiden called her. Instead, she crouched beside Rollie with a solemn face, her hairy ears tilting back and forth. The two maidens with beast ears began to listen for any unusual sound in the tunnel like human sonars.

The humming sound of the machines and the ubiquitous air turbulence interfered with their hearing. Hao Ren and the rest, even with their superb hearing ability, did not hear anything wrong. But the synergy of cat and dog combination could work wonder. After a minute of careful listening, Lily and Rollie pointed at the junction ahead in unison. “The voices come from there! It is getting closer!”

Vivian summoned a Night Veil again to hide their breath and even their faint footsteps while they continued to move forward up to the bifurcation. The duct then branched out into two identical routes in different directions.

Y’lisabet mumbled, “There is nothing here.”

“It is below us. It comes from below,” Lily said. Only then, Hao Ren noticed that the material used on a spot of the tunnel was different from the rest. There was a rectangular metal plate, on which the raised lines and structures seemed to indicate that it was an opening.

Nangong Wuyue pressed her hand on the metal plate. As liquid water began to flow down her hand and permeate through the gaps, the deformable metal plate slid open with a narrow opening, through which a bright light shone.

Sure enough, there was something underneath.

Hao Ren came up and peeked in through the gap.

If the plan that Salaman provided was accurate, they should be near the great temple where the control center was located. There were more underground facilities here, and the duct just happened to be near one of such chambers. So, there was nothing unusual about this, and the fact that there were people in the underground room was entirely normal.

What Hao Ren was curious about were the mumbling voices that Rollie heard. The festered monsters could not speak. They had no reason to use language, let alone the ability to talk.

Who was still using language to communicate in this crazy place of Amantir? Could it be the commanders of the festered army?

Through the narrow gap in the floor, Hao Ren could see that it was a rather large room underneath. The room was brightly lit, filled with large equipment that emitted a humming sound. But the bright environment could not hide the deformed and gloomy air of the room. Dark-red patterns covered the equipment and the floor, and it was the evidence of festering.

Hao Ren saw a weird creature in the middle of the room.

Hao Ren’s heart missed a beat.

It was a swollen, ellipsoidal mass of meat, like a bloated brain, fixed on a circular metal platform with a dozen or so dark-red tentacles extending from under the ‘brain.’ The tentacles reached into a ring of circular holes around the metal platform. In turn, below the circular holes were many cables connected to the instrument in the room.

Hao Ren immediately knew that the ‘brain’ was operating the instruments in the room.

The mumbling voices that Rollie heard came from the ‘brain,’ which was talking to itself.

“Mr. Landlord.” Lily came up and said quietly, “What do you see? Let me take a peek.”

“What a surprise!” Hao Ren looked up with a what the heck look. “I almost forgot about this thing. Seeing it here really surprises me!”

Vivian instantly became curious. “What did you see?”

“A brain monsters!” Lily had taken a glimpse of the thing below and exclaimed quietly. “There is a brain monster down there—the kind of brain monster that we have first seen in Holletta and the city of the sirens!”