High Above

  Chapter 271 Central Control Room (910)

   It's not impossible.

  Before, Ian knew from the murals that the ancestors of the Sequoia Aboriginals used many methods to allow future generations to remember the knowledge they needed.

The learning machine with the most stable and best effect was eliminated due to difficult maintenance and excessive energy consumption. In the end, this laboratory with an alien heterogeneous ecosystem chose to use a biological plug-in to carry the necessary memories. Transform yourself and imprint some of the most critical knowledge and thinking into the DNA of future generations.

Ian knew that the Terrans were a stable race whose DNA was extremely stable and would not mutate abnormally due to the reproduction of offspring. The advantage was that they could remain stable and not mutate even under various extreme circumstances. The disadvantage... There is no harm in cooperating with the bioalchemy of the Terrans.

  But if there is no bioalchemy, the most disadvantages are distortion, and it is difficult to adapt to some extremely abnormal special environments through mutations.

  However, the people of Terra are already adaptable to all environments, so this disadvantage really does not exist.

  Similarly, if the knowledge is written in the biological plug-ins of Terra technology or even in their own bodies, that is indeed a more stable inheritance method than anything else.

However…

   All technology will not go wrong, the premise is that people will not go wrong.

  A certain generation of Sequoia elders had a different idea.

  He wants to live forever.

   "Is it to transform the auxiliary thinking organ and let your memory cover those who have installed the thinking organ?"

   Immediately, Ian thought of this possibility.

Probably.

  Of course, as the great elder who inherited the civilization technology of the previous era, compared with the great shaman who has deteriorated countless times, he must be very aware of the difference between reverberation, echo and mirror.

  It's just the reverberation of memory coverage, not immortality at all.

  Even if the modified parasite has its own neural network and thinking algorithm, it is just an echo.

   There is still a long way to go from the mirror method of true immortality.

   But the problem is...

   "There is psychic power in this world—if the guess of this auxiliary memory plug-in is true, its quick link and knowledge transmission are probably also a kind of psychic power of mind sharing."

Crush the brain of the brain devourer in his hand, and carefully observe some traces of psychic energy left in it. Ian doesn't feel disgusted at all, but is full of interest: "Could it be that the great elder integrated himself into the brain devourer?" The psychic network of the worm only needs to constantly update the host of the brain-eating worm to ensure that one's own thinking can continue to spread?"

   "And the reason why Master Gesai showed abnormalities before was because he came into contact with the knowledge stored in the brain devouring psychic network, or was it part of the memory of the great elders?"

  Thinking about these possibilities, Ian somewhat understood why the Sequoia natives left the Sequoia base back then.

A certain great elder who has mastered almost all the keys, in order to live forever, used other tribesmen as flesh and blood tools to copy his own consciousness, which led to the uprising of other Sequoia tribesmen—the battle between the two sides led to the damage of quite a few ecological tools, those who were still in the ecological environment at that time All kinds of monsters and creatures in the circle have left the ecosystem, deteriorating the originally stable base situation.

  —Although I don’t know the exact time, the fourth-level Rinfrost Crystal Dragon and Frost Butterfly can fight in the cooling room. The chaos back then was definitely tens of times more intense than it is now.

  The Great Elder must have failed. This can be seen from the fact that all four keys were preserved by the indigenous people, but because of the destruction of the ecosystem, they still had to leave the 'Holy Land'.

   "The great elder may not be completely dead—just like the great shaman, the death of Crocodile Dragon may be a way for him to get rid of his golden cicada, and there may not be any successors left by him in the Sequoia natives."

   "Of course, Crocodile Dragon is dead. Even if the great shaman is still alive, it doesn't make any sense. What's more, he certainly doesn't have such a high technology. At most, he just needs to back up a memory."

After washing his hands with river water, Ian stood up and looked around. He thought: "As for the Sequoia people back then, they should have wanted to destroy all the brain-eating worms, but obviously, they didn't do that. Hastily evacuated from the base—judging from the current situation, the Brain Devourer is alive and well, at most, some of them are not so clear and confused.”

  Integrating information from various sources, Ian had a rough guess about what happened in Sequoia Base in the past, and Ian couldn't help feeling a little bit emotional: "It's also fortunate that Inaiga II resisted the temptation back then."

   "As one of the most powerful psykers of that era, it would be easy for him to transfer his soul, right? After obtaining the Echo technology, he can even transform people who meet the requirements into mirrors at will."

"You know, with the prestige and prestige of Inaiga II at that time... even if he wanted to live forever, there would probably be young people who worshiped him and couldn't wait to donate their bodies to become his new generation walking in the world. "

   "Just like the family I belonged to back then, when I got this secret technique, the first thing I thought of was to let him live forever."

  —Perhaps, it was this kind of worship that was almost regarded as a god, which made Inaiga II decide to veto this method of eternal life.

  Because he understood the temptation of eternal life, Ian could understand what kind of benefits and future Inaiga II rejected at that time.

   After waiting for a while, Ian realized that it might take some time for Shasha and Andor to wake up, so he observed their future with the prophetic vision.

   After confirming that there was nothing serious, he went to explore around.

  The giant eel has disappeared, and Patrick has not caught up. It must be that the giant eel lost its target and fought him.

   And Isengard is also with Master Goser now... Ian doesn't know if Isengard is prepared to deal with Patrick after hearing his hint, but with Master Goser, it should be no problem.

  Following the slowly flowing underground river, Ian observed the man-made and natural tributaries extending in all directions.

The predictive vision is also a bit bad, that is, when there is no danger, even with the medium of Frost Butterfly, it is impossible to tell whether which direction is the direction you want to go... There is indeed a difference between danger, but whether it is dangerous or not does not mean Ian needs it or not.

   At this time, you can only choose a road to gamble.

  Ian chose an upward river, because he heard a slight sound of movement from the other side of the river, not the sound of water, nor the sound of monsters, it was quite regular, like the sound of machinery running, which made the boy curious.

   Not long after walking, he saw the source of the sound.

   That's a person.

  Boom, boom, boom.

  In the semi-natural cave that has been repaired, it should be a rest station for maintenance personnel built by the civilization of the previous era. You can see the remains of a decaying maintenance hut by the river, and in front of it is a closed metal door.

   This metal door is not protected by the anti-corrosion inscriptions in the surrounding rooms of the previous sacrificial place. It is almost completely rusted now, but it is still strong.

  Boom, boom, boom.

  And a naked person, a human figure that looks very similar to the previous deformed person, is pounding on the door vigorously.

Ian clenched the long sword in his hand tightly. He thought that the deformed person would turn his head and attack him in the next moment, but he never thought that the other party would treat him as if he didn't exist at all, and was still beating with a very regular rhythm. metal gate.

  Boom, boom, boom.

  He was still beating, muttering some rambling words to himself.

   "Must go back to the central control room, must go back to the central control room, must go back to the central control room, must return to the central control room..."

   There are still many bones in front of the metal door, including people, wild beasts, and monsters. Most of these bones have been ossified, but some are still rotting.

  Pick up a long bone, which is probably the spine of some kind of beast, but it is completely hardened, and it is more like a stick than a spine.

   Similar distortions occur everywhere, every corpse has been parasitized.

  Boom, boom, boom.

  When Ian walked behind the deformed man, he was still knocking on the door. The boy narrowed his eyes, and the silver-blue halo flickered. He seemed to have discovered something.

   Crack, he swung his sword, and the deformed man's head was shattered, but there was nothing inside.

  Only a pink tapeworm that is still growing is squirming.

   The action still didn't stop, he was still knocking on the door.

   "Your head has been eaten, are you still knocking on the door?"

Said lightly, Ian used another sword, completely smashing the deformed man's body, his belly was torn apart by his own spine, and what flowed out along with the internal organs were large pieces of densely packed red and blue eggs and tadpole-shaped larvae.

  These worms are eating flesh and blood, growing themselves, and merging with each other, linking the neural structures in their bodies together, and reshaping all the sensory structures in the body of the parasite.

   Even so, the humanoid muscles dragged the broken body and climbed towards the gate.

   "Must go back to the central control room... guard the first ecological laboratory... can't... can't let the great elder succeed..."

  The relatively intact mouth and larynx are still extruding broken voices that humans can no longer understand. Only the boy with the silver chip can understand it through analysis.

   And these words brought him brand new doubts.

   "Can't the Great Elder succeed?"

  He muttered to himself with some doubts, and then looked at the parasitic deformed man under his sword: "Strange thing, according to the clues, isn't the elder behind the parasite?"

   "What's going on here?"

  (end of this chapter)