Chapter 430: The Collapsed Elevator Shaft
However, as the amount of sliced flesh paste increased, the blade of the small knife began to lengthen, the bloodstains staining it gradually grew, and the knife's power became stronger and stronger.
Lin Ye pulled the Flesh and Blood Chess Piece to the rear, controlling the flesh paste to surround the Metal Chess Pieces, allowing the small knife to continuously grow until it finally transformed into a blood-colored longsword.
At this moment, Lin Ye placed the small Parasitism chess piece formed from the Parasitism rune onto the chessboard. The blood-colored longsword was parasitized by the biological sample, and its blade sprouted a large number of constantly wriggling red flesh buds.
The red flesh buds quickly grew into blood-colored tendrils. These blood-colored tendrils stabbed into the bodies of the Metal Chess Pieces, completely taking control of them.
Because the blood-colored longsword possessed metal attributes, the blood-colored tendrils born from its body could even parasitize metal.
The blood-colored tendrils quickly spread across the entire chessboard, parasitizing all the Metal Chess Pieces.
Then, a dazzling pure white Glowing Sphere shrank and entered the chessboard. Under the sphere's illumination, the parasites in the parasitized state began to burn. The blood-colored tendrils contracted, and those Metal Chess Pieces gradually returned to normal.
Lin Ye placed the small Alienation chess piece formed from the Alienation rune onto the chessboard. This piece was noticeably larger than the other rune chess pieces. His current understanding of the Alienation rune had surpassed his grasp of the other runes.
The pure white Glowing Sphere began to undergo Alienation. A pitch-black point of light appeared on the sphere's surface. The black dot multiplied at an ultra-high speed like a virus. In just an instant, the pure white Glowing Sphere transformed into a pitch-black Glowing Sphere.
Under the illumination of the black light, the blood-colored tendrils rapidly multiplied. The entire chessboard turned into a blood-red chessboard, and the surfaces of all the Metal Chess Pieces sprouted numerous blood-colored tendrils. Under the influence of the Berserk chess piece and the Alienation chess piece, all the Metal Chess Pieces entangled together. Finally, a Metal Giant holding a blood-colored longsword appeared at the center of the chessboard.
"I'm a bit confused. Why did a single Alienation chess piece turn that light sphere black? Is this a corruption?"
Bessie, who had been watching the battle from the back, asked in confusion.
"The effect of the pure white Glowing Sphere is to purify the chess pieces. That's why the illuminated parasites burned up.
All I did was Alienate a black point of light onto the pure sphere. This made it impure, violating its own inherent concept. Therefore, it could only transform into a pitch-black Glowing Sphere, unable to retain even a trace of pure white.
The nature of the pitch-black Glowing Sphere is completely opposite to that of the pure white one, so naturally, it strengthens the parasites."
The chessboard temporarily showed no reaction, seemingly in the process of selecting anomalous phenomena to form new chess pieces. Lin Ye wasn't anxious either. The elevator was still ascending, and anomalous creatures were everywhere outside. They were the ones who needed to buy time.
Seizing this opportunity, Lin Ye carefully observed the anomalous creatures outside, collecting information about this area.
Then, a new change occurred on the chessboard. Some emerald-green plants sprouted from within the blood-red chessboard. These plants grew by absorbing flesh and blood. Soon, the green color covered the entire chessboard, and all the flesh paste was consumed.
However, the Metal Giant and the Flesh and Blood Chess Piece made no attempt to stop these plants from growing, because that flesh paste wasn't something to be eaten casually.
Although the raw material for the flesh paste was the Mutation Creatures chess pieces, once in the hands of the Flesh and Blood Chess Piece, it naturally added some 'seasoning' to it.
If this were before, Lin Ye would probably have tried using the Fusion Secret Technique to deal with these plants. But now it was different. The biological sample had incorporated the tumor-like structure combined with the Wooden Structure. Relying on these wooden structures, the biological sample could now even parasitize plants.
Those emerald-green plants quickly sprouted a large number of red root systems composed of flesh and blood, chaotically protruding from their surfaces.
Some of the plants even grew blood-red fruits. These fruits were crystalline and translucent, looking remarkably similar to some kind of precious spiritual energy material.
But if anyone dared to eat one, they would have to start thinking with their stomach from then on.
The chessboard fell silent once more. Clearly, it hadn't expected Lin Ye to be able to parasitize plants as well.
Just as Lin Ye and the chessboard were locked in their intricate struggle, the elevator suddenly began to shake violently. Lin Ye hurriedly extended his mental energy outside through the breach. This was not the time to worry about attracting anomalous creatures; they had to grasp the elevator's condition, otherwise they might not even know how they died.
"Damn it! The elevator shaft is gone!"
The situation outside was not as simple as Lin Ye's words suggested. The elevator shaft had collapsed. The elevator was now exposed amidst anomalous creatures and fragments of the floor space. The only things maintaining the elevator's continued ascent were the metal cable above it and the remnants of the elevator shaft around it.
"Ah? Then aren't we doomed?!"
Bessie hugged her duplicate, hiding in the corner of the elevator. Although she knew it probably wouldn't help, clinging to hope was human nature.
"How much farther to the top?!"
Andrew also wanted to sense the external situation, but the moment he slightly used his mental energy, he attracted an anomalous creature not far away.
"I can't see the top at all! Without the elevator shaft, I'm not sure how long we need to travel upwards to reach floor 10000! If we still calculate based on two seconds per floor, we would need the elevator to operate normally for another thirty minutes to reach floor 10000!"
The Metal Giant chess piece sliced through the anomalous creature that Andrew had attracted and which had jumped onto the chessboard with its blood-colored longsword. Lin Ye carefully sensed the area above the elevator, ready to deal with any obstacles blocking its ascent at any moment.
However, before any obstacles appeared, a new change occurred first on the chessboard.
A very ominous-looking dark green passageway appeared above the chessboard. The passageway was slowly opening; for now, it was impossible to determine what was connected on the other side.
But it didn't take a genius to figure out it wasn't anything good.
Lin Ye directly used the small collapse chess piece formed from the collapse rune on the passageway.
But it was completely useless. The passageway continued to open slowly.
Lin Ye rarely used the collapse rune because this thing had absolutely no effect on stable entities. It could only cause unstable things to collapse.
The Metal Giant chess piece swung its blood-colored longsword at the dark green passageway. The longsword passed through the passageway without causing any effect.
The dark green passageway was like a virtual image that didn't exist in this space. Neither material nor energy attacks could affect it.
But Lin Ye soon keenly noticed that energy attacks were not entirely ineffective against the passageway. Each time it was hit by an energy attack, the speed at which the passageway opened increased slightly.
'In other words, if we can create an environment without spiritual energy, we can slow down the opening speed of the passageway...'
Lin Ye controlled all the chess pieces to absorb the spiritual energy on the chessboard at full capacity. However, the chessboard continuously replenished spiritual energy. The rate at which the chess pieces absorbed it couldn't keep up with the chessboard's replenishment speed.
'Perhaps we can accelerate these chess pieces' absorption rate of spiritual energy...'
This wasn't some rare ability. Lin Ye had seen many mutation organs possessing this type of mutation structure in that mutation organ display corridor.