Chapter 2: The Only Greenery on a Waste Planet
On this barren, desolate, and sparsely populated planet, a group of special guests arrived today.
Perhaps hearing the strange noise from the ground, a black armored insect hiding underground tentatively poked its head out. Suddenly, a massive shadow covered the sky.
Squelch!
When the shadow left, only a puddle of thick, disgusting liquid remained on the ground.
“How disgusting!”
A man shook the filth stuck to his foot with a look of revulsion. Seeing it wouldn’t come off, he cursed and rubbed it vigorously against the ground until the soil completely covered the stench lingering at the tip of his nose. Only then did he feel relieved.
“Stop dawdling. If we delay, our brothers will have to eat dirt for the next few months.”
Behind the man, a bald giant who looked about two meters tall and was burly and strong kicked him unceremoniously.
“Ow, ow, ow! Leader, we’ve been searching this planet for half a month and haven’t seen any trace of that Shen family bloodline. Is the client playing us for fools?” The man clutched his calf and howled.
Xiong Si looked toward the distant, gloomy forest of withered trees and the bottomless rift valley appearing in the distance. Hearing his subordinate’s complaints, he replied, “Our main task now is to eliminate the fierce beast suspected to be of the Shen bloodline, complete the client’s mission, and collect the bounty we deserve. What do other matters have to do with us bounty hunters?”
“I’m just curious. Back then, when the Zerg invaded and swallowed half the territory of the Federation, it was the former Marshal Shen Zhengtu who killed the Broodmother with his own hands to trade for the Federation’s current peace. It has to be said that Shen Zhengtu’s genes are powerful; his three offspring all awakened fierce beast bloodlines, and their abilities are no worse than the Marshal’s in his youth. Now another fierce beast has popped up… Tsk, no wonder someone spent a fortune to eliminate it.”
“Shen Zhengtu hasn’t completely stepped down from the Marshal position yet! And you! Enough with the nonsense, move it.”
Xiong Si raised his foot and kicked again. Another large footprint appeared on Wil’s backside as he fell into a pile of alien beast feces, getting covered in the smell of waste. The bounty hunters walked past him; no one went to help him up.
“I wonder if our old leader is getting on in years. Is his eyesight so bad that he let such a piece of trash join the team?”
“I heard someone offered themselves to the old leader, so Bacchus was pushed out.”
“Eww~ Someone actually managed to kiss that orange-peel face? Their taste is truly unique.”
The smile on Wil’s face completely vanished after the bounty hunters walked far away, and large patches of beast markings appeared on his face. By the time he got up to leave, a small, thumb-sized round ball rolled into a crevice in the rocks.
The group of bounty hunters arrived at the edge of the great rift. Looking at the abyss-like crack, the bounty hunters calmly checked their equipment.
Bounty hunters, as the name suggests, will take on any task regardless of its morality as long as the price is high enough. In the Interstellar era, bounty hunters probably made money the fastest. They usually roamed the dangerous fringes of the galaxy, forced to live with their heads tucked into their belts.
This time, the bounty hunters had received a special mission. Someone had offered an astronomical bounty to stop the Shen family bloodline from hatching, at any cost.
Recently, someone had posted news on the Federation’s StarNet that the Shen family still had an unhatched bloodline hidden on a waste planet, causing quite a stir. After receiving the mission, the bounty hunters began scouring for news, traversing various suspected waste planets.
However, this group of bounty hunters had bad luck and encountered a ship of star pirates midway. Although bounty hunters would kill and loot for money, even they would turn pale when encountering the star pirates on those ghost ships. After all, they were a group of people forced to run around for a living, while star pirates were a bunch of complete lunatics. Who would want to cross paths with a madman?
Thus, the bounty hunters were chased and intercepted by the star pirates. In their panic, they were forced to land on an inconspicuous planet on the edge of the Interstellar. They thought they had lost both their troops and their money on this trip, but they found a silver lining when they realized this waste planet was very similar to the one described in their data.
Looking down from the air, there was a black line cutting across the entire land—it was exactly the canyon where the bounty hunters were currently standing. The canyon was like a sharp sword splitting the earth in two. Below was a blanket of white mist, its depth unknown. Occasionally, the sound of wind passing through the weathered cliffs could be heard, making a weeping sound.
As the leader of this operation, Xiong Si stretched his limbs and was the first to jump down. The other bounty hunters followed suit. Several bounty hunters developed fine feathers on their arms, stretching from their shoulders to their fingertips. Gray-blue wings spanning nearly three meters unfurled as they dove down.
Xiong Si accurately grabbed the hind claw of a birdman and landed easily. One birdman could carry another person with no pressure. Xiong Si tapped the light-computer on his wrist, and red light flashed before his eyes, projecting a 3D holographic map of the canyon.
Stepping on the damp, soft soil, the bounty hunters followed the map’s route forward. On the wilderness of the waste planet, the dark night was the natural camouflage for predators.
“Hiss!”
A three-headed snake that had been hiding in a crevice suddenly lunged out. Its open mouths revealed venomous green fangs; a single drop could easily take down an adult beastman. Crucially, with such potent venom, the creature had a total of three heads.
However, the bounty hunters were all experienced veterans. They easily caught the three-headed snake that tried to ambush them, extracted its venom, and stuffed it into a specialized spatial bag. Once they returned, selling it to a merchant would be a decent income.
The bounty hunters had a great time catching snakes in the back. As the leader, Xiong Si’s brow remained furrowed. Wil noticed the leader’s unease, rolled his eyes, and stepped forward to ask, “Leader, have you found something?”
Xiong Si was silent for a moment before saying, “Don’t you think this place is a bit strange?”
“Strange?” Wil looked around. Other than the occasional excited sounds of his teammates catching snakes behind him, there didn’t seem to be anything wrong.
One of the bounty hunters said, “Is it possible you’re being too sensitive, Leader? This place looks normal.”
“It’s precisely because it’s so normal that it’s wrong. If Shen Zhengtu really hid his bloodline on this waste planet, it definitely wouldn’t be this easy for us to find.”
Xiong Si waved his hand in the air, and the holographic map before him changed form. Mini-icons of Xiong Si and the others appeared on the map, along with scattered red dots flashing with life signs, looking like fireflies in the dark of night.
Suddenly, the flashing red dots on the map increased sharply. A rustling, fine sound gathered from all directions. Before Xiong Si could react, a scream tore through the silence of the wilderness, awakening the creatures slumbering within the canyon.
Xiong Si turned around. Wil and the other bounty hunters, who had been standing not far from him, had disappeared, leaving only some drag marks on the ground.
Xiong Si’s entire body was covered in steel-needle-like fur, and sharp claws popped out of his hands. A whistling sound came from the wind. Xiong Si turned abruptly and struck out with a bear claw. A burning pain shot through his claws. Behind him, something moving so fast it was a blur stabbed fiercely at the back of Xiong Si’s head.
Xiong Si only felt his vision go black as he lost consciousness.
When he woke up again, it was pitch black all around, with occasional rustling sounds—sounds that felt very familiar. Xiong Si listened carefully and tentatively called out, “Wil?”
“Leader?”
“Yeah. Are you guys okay?”
Moans of pain echoed from the darkness. Judging by the voices, they should all be his team members. Xiong Si let out a sigh of relief, endured the sharp pain in his claws, and cut through the vine-like things binding him.
Using the holographic light, he saw the things binding him and couldn’t help but gasp. They were in a massive underground cave. Thick vines, about the size of a bowl, were coiled everywhere. At a glance, they were so dense they occupied almost the entire cavity.
The state of these vines was far too active. It wasn’t normal!
A waste planet was called such because it had suffered a great natural disaster, and its core was severely damaged. On a planet without resources, life would gradually decrease until the planet eventually fractured and shattered, becoming a meteor or asteroid in space.
The bounty hunters had seen nothing but barren land and lifeless forests on their way here. The overly exuberant plants before them made it hard to believe this was a waste planet on the verge of breaking apart.
The lush green vines were intertwined, their stems squeezing into every crevice. They were like distinct threads of a spider’s web, precisely crisscrossing through the giant cavity to form a massive net. In the pitch-black darkness invisible to the eye, the master of this web was quietly waiting for its prey to arrive.
Xiong Si and the others were the new batch of prey the “spider” had been waiting for. Seeing that the condition of Xiong Si and his group was not good showed that the predator’s hunt had been very successful.
The first person who had screamed was now hanging half-suspended in the air, barely clinging to life. His limbs had been crushed by the vines and hung powerlessly, blood dripping down to nourish the plants. The blood made the green leaves look vibrant, but it sent a chill through the hearts of Xiong Si and the others.
“Save me, I don’t want to die…”
Bounty hunters weren’t exactly a formal army; they were mostly a makeshift group and lacked any sense of “team spirit.” They lived on the edge of life and death year-round and were accustomed to seeing many dead people. They would only abandon someone who had become a burden.
The bounty hunters looked at each other and made up their minds. They stepped toward the man. The man seemed to realize something, and his eyes filled with despair.
“No! You… you can’t do this…”
His resistance was futile in the eyes of the several strong beastmen. He watched helplessly as his companions snatched away the usable resources on him, including his protective suit—practically wasting nothing. Bounty hunters were a group of beastmen who needed to make a living; they wouldn’t let resources go to waste.
Even their leader, Xiong Si, stood by without saying a word, watching coldly.
Soon, the bounty hunter who had lost his protective suit was completely enveloped by vines. Along with the tooth-aching sound of bones cracking, his flesh gradually shriveled and withered. In a few moments, only a skeleton covered in skin remained.
Xiong Si felt no ripple of emotion in his heart. His eyes caught a glimpse of a scene through the gaps in the vines. He turned and saw a massive mechanical wall door made of energy stones, and his eyes burst with joy.
“Found it!”
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