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Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
The South Pole.
As the only two special locations on Earth, the South Pole was covered in darkness for half a year without daytime.
This was the polar night.
It was June, and Antarctica happened to be experiencing winter as well as the polar night.
When Ling Jiu and the others rushed to the South Pole, they saw an abandoned scientific research station.
“Before 2020, there were many such scientific research stations in Antarctica, but 20 years later, almost all of the research stations were abandoned.”
Niu Ben looked at the snow-covered research station and slowly said, “In the end, humanity’s top echelon discovered a wormhole that led to Mars in Antarctica and built the Antarctic Ice City. The Ice City is also the only building in use in Antarctica.”
“Look over there!” A cadet pointed in a certain direction and exclaimed.
As everyone looked over, they saw a cave behind the research station.
“Let’s go and have a look!”
It was indeed a cave, an ice cave that led straight down. It was a standard circle and was 3 meters in diameter.
It was too uniform as if it had been carved out directly from the ice with a red hot iron rod.
“It looks like this cave was probably drilled open by some kind of thermal equipment.”
“Is it possible for someone with an Ice Arcana to do it?”
“Yes, but it wouldn’t be that round.”
“No matter how it came about, the wormhole should be down below, right. Let’s go down!”
“You have a point…”
Everyone jumped into the ice cave one after another.
As they dove down all the way, a quarter of an hour later, they had arrived at the bottom of the ice cave, and into a huge underground cavern.
A white sphere was suspended in mid-air and that was the wormhole.
“Who’s going in first?”
Looking at the wormhole quietly suspended in mid-air, the cadets looked at each other, and most did not dare to enter first.
After all, there was a Class S planet on the other side. Who dared to set foot on it willy-nilly?
“A bunch of nancies,” a cadet sneered as he glanced disdainfully at the others and stepped into the wormhole.
“It’s Toynbee!”
“Bloody hell, we just got looked down on by that guy!”
“Let him be. He’s number one in the rankings, and he is indeed stronger than us.”
“You have a point…”
With Toynbee leading the way, all the other cadets entered the wormhole one after another. Ling Jiu and Bai Ya also followed, quickly arriving on the alien planet.
What entered their eyes were lush, verdant plants, intricate vines, and tall towering trees.
The magical thing was, be it the trees or shrubs, they were all almost identical to those back on Earth. It was as though they had been carved from a mold.
“Why are these plants so similar to the ones on Earth?”
Ling Jiu looked at the plants around him. “It’s clear that they are two different planets, but why are they able to breed almost similar plantlife?”
The environment determined the organisms. If there was any gap in the environment, it would have an incomparably huge impact on the organisms living there.
Plus, it was impossible for two identical planets to appear in the universe. It would naturally be impossible for identical creatures to be bred.
That was absolute.
Yet, the plants on this planet…
Ling Jiu suddenly understood why the matriculation camp would mobilize all manpower and sent the cadets here to look for the intelligent race.
If the plants were the same, would the intelligent race be the same as well? If they were the same, does that mean that this planet had also given birth to humans like those on Earth?
“Sister, probe the atmosphere.” Niu Ben turned around and said to his sister, Niu Miao.
“Already on it, Brother,” Niu Miao replied.
“Nitrogen 77%, oxygen 21%, argon 0.9%, water 0.25%, carbon dioxide 0.032%, others…”
Hearing Niu Miao’s answer, Niu Ben was stunned. “Why is the atmospheric composition here the same as Earth?”
“It is exactly the same!”
Niu Miao nodded.
“Unbelievable!”
Ling Jiu and Bai Ya exchanged glances and saw the consternation in each other’s eyes.
An alien planet actually had the same atmospheric composition as Earth? How did it manage that?
“Although it’s a little unbelievable, this seems to be true!”
Niu Ben shook his head in shock and remembered something. “Does that mean we can take off our Venom Suits?”
“Better not.”
Niu Miao quickly stopped him. “Even if the environment and atmospheric composition are similar, there should still be some difference.
“This small difference may give birth to deadly things like a virus or something. We better keep our Venom Suits on.”
“For safety, let’s just keep it on.”
Ling Jiu also concurred. In fact, with his powerful body, he could totally ignore the virus bred on this planet, or any other vectors harmful to the human body.
However, he would keep them on just in case. After all, the Venom Suit did not feel like a burden when worn.
They might have thought so, but some did not. Others had also noticed that the atmosphere of this planet was the same as Earth, so many tried to take off their Venom Suits.
“We can breathe!”
“Yes, there’s no problem at all!”
“Are you for real?”
“Is there any reason to lie to you?”
“Then I’ll give it a try too…”
Seeing this, many cadets took off their Venom Suits one after another. In the end, only a few people like Ling Jiu still wore them.
“It’s like going back to Earth!”
“Yeah, I’ve been on Mars for far too long, and suddenly coming here, it feels no different from Earth.”
“It is…”
The cadets discussed with excitement.
At that moment, a sharp neigh rang out in the distance like thunder on a clear day, and everyone fell silent.
Right then, everyone remembered that this was an extremely dangerous Class-S planet!
“The voice came from over there!” Someone pointed in a direction and said.
“How about… we go and have a look!”
The cadets jumped into the air one by one and headed over.
“We’ll head over too.”
Ling Jiu and the other three followed suit.
A few minutes later, everyone came to the place where the sound came from. The surrounding trees had been torn apart, leaving obvious traces of fighting.
On the ground… lay a Direbeast carcass.
Its body length was more than 50 meters long, with a slightly stout body. It carried a shell on its back, a bit like a tortoise, but this tortoiseshell was covered with thorn-like protrusions.
To say it was a tortoise… It was more like a dinosaur that had been extinct for many years, a Styracosaurus!
Yes, an Ankylosaurus!
This Direbeast looked much like an Ankylosaurus… or rather, an Ankylosaurus that had been magnified ten times!
“It looks like an Ankylosaurus, Is this a dinosaur planet?” Nio Ben whispered softly.
Dinosaurs were long-extinct creatures, at least on Earth. Even after the rise of the Direbeasts, and many reptiles, under the effect of Gene Arcana had an Atavistic Evolution, but none of them had evolved into a dinosaur.
For example, everyone called the Komodo dragon a dragon, but it was just a lizard that was several times bigger, not a real dinosaur.
So, seeing the Ankylosaurus-like Direbeast there, everyone could not help but be surprised.
“How did it die?” someone asked.
“Could there the be other Direbeasts on this planet?” Someone wondered fearfully.
“This is a Class-S planet, so everyone should proceed carefully,” someone reminded the crowd.
Dush!
Just as everyone was talking about it, the “Ankylosaurus” carcass, which had been lying down quietly, shook all of a sudden. To be precise, its stomach moved.
Immediately after, the Ankylosaurus’ stomach shook more and more violently as if something was beating at its belly.
“The hell?”
All of the cadets were stunned.
The next moment, in full view of everyone, the Ankylosaurus’ belly suddenly burst open as a bloody thing ripped out of it.
The thing looked like a snake covered in blood. There were all kinds of tiny barbs spread across the surface of its body. After coming out, it looked up and let out a sharp, shrill roar, making everyone’s ears hurt.
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“What the hell is that?”
“I… I don’t know!”
“This thing…”
Looking at the Ankylosaurus’ ripped open belly and the creature that was protruding out of it, Ling Jiu suddenly felt a chill run down his spine.
“It couldn’t be that thing, right? No! That creature is only something in the movies! How could it appear in reality?”
What did that remind Ling Jiu of?
He thought of the Xenomorph!
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Yes, it was that creature from the Alien movies, and that creature had left too deep of an impression on Ling Jiu!
It was not about how strong the Xenomorph was. In terms of individual strength alone, Ling Jiu believed none of the Xenomorphs in the movie were a match for the cadets present.
That was for sure.
However, what sent a chill down Ling Jiu’s back was the Xenomorph’s terrifying ability, the ability to absorb the host’s dominant genes to evolve!
To put it simply, the stronger the host, the stronger the Xenomorph could be. That was the most terrifying thing!
One needed to know that there were many terrifying Direbeasts on Earth. If those Direbeasts were infested by the Xenomorphs, the kind of monstrosities they would turn into would simply be unimaginable.
“Let me see what this thing is!”
As he thought of this, Ling Jiu used his Replication Arcana to detect the creature’s Arcana information.
Name: Unknown
Race: Xenomorph
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Arcana: Super Physique (Awakened), DNA reformation (Awakened), DNA reaving (Awakened) Super Adaptation (Awakened)
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“A Xenomorph! It’s really a Xenomorph!”
Ling Jiu hissed. “Bloody hell, it is really that bloody thing.”
“Ling Jiu, you recognize this creature?”
Niu Ben quickly asked when he heard the words.
Bai Ya and Niu Miao also looked at Ling Jiu with curiosity in their eyes.
“Yes.”
Ling Jiu had a conflicted expression. “This is a very terrifying creature, more terrifying than any creature we know so far! All of you must be careful!”
“More terrifying than any creature?”
Niu Ben and the other two looked at each other.
“Ling Jiu, are you an alarmist?”
A cadet’s voice rang out as he also heard Ling Jiu’s words.
“Whether am I being an alarmist or not, you’ll find out soon.”
Ling Jiu took a deep breath. At this moment, the Chestburster Xenomorph that had just broken out of the Ankylosaurus’ body crawled out of it.
Then, something that shocked everyone happened:
The Chestburster grew instantly at a speed visible to the eye. Its limbs, tail, and exoskeleton all increased in size…
In just a few minutes’ time, a Xenomorph with a body length of more than 60 meters, a fusiform crown, a black body, a hard exoskeleton, and a sharp tail… appeared.
However, unlike the Xenomorph in Ling Jiu’s mind, it had obviously inherited the characteristics of its host, the Ankylosaurus. It had a thicker torso as it walked on all fours.
Additionally, there was a thick tortoiseshell on its back, and its tail was no longer in a sharp knife shape. Instead, it was hammer-shaped with spikes.
The Ankylosaurus Xenomorph… had officially been born!