Chapter 622: 'Tree' and 'Tree People'

Chapter 622: "Tree" and "Tree Nurturing"

Arriving at the entrance of Vault 100.

Zui Hei found a communication terminal on the wall beside the door, pulled a data cable from the VM strapped to his left arm, and plugged it into the port beneath the terminal.

Watching the green light flicker, a mix of joy and surprise spread across the faces of the players.

Unbelievable.

After soaking in sewage and garbage for so many years, this electronic device, manufactured two centuries ago, could still boot up!

He had to admit, the black tech of the People's Union had something to it.

Just as Zui Hei opened the "mini-program" of the scientific expedition team, imported the electronic key into the terminal, and waited for the progress bar, Chu Guang, stationed at Camp 101, was also monitoring the situation at Vault 100.

Perched on Chu Guang's shoulder, Xiao Qi suddenly opened her eyes and looked at him.

"The terminal has been used."

Chu Guang turned to her.

"Hasn't the door never been opened?"

A stream of data flashed through her pale blue eyes, and Xiao Qi muttered while rubbing her chin.

"Hmm... The door's power system has indeed been shut down for two centuries, but there was an access record in 2190."

2190.

That would be the 61st year of the Wasteland Era?

Chu Guang nodded thoughtfully.

It wasn't hard to understand.

According to Dr. Fang, Camp 101 had previously attempted to explore Vault 100 but eventually gave up due to unfavorable conditions.

Vault 101 was activated after the dissolution of the Post-War Reconstruction Committee, around 2174—the 45th year of the Wasteland Era.

Between the 45th and 61st years of the Wasteland Era, Camp 101 likely already existed. According to Dr. Fang, though Vault 101 was isolated, it hadn't completely severed ties with the outside world, continuously enlightening wandering wastelanders and conducting indirect scientific investigations through them.

Back then, the wasteland wasn't yet overrun with extreme mutant creatures, so it was entirely possible for Camp 101's residents to reach the entrance of Vault 100 using diving equipment.

In the brief moment of this exchange between human and AI, Zui Hei's VM had already obtained permission to open the vault door.

And at that moment, a silver metal sphere appeared on the terminal's display.

"Welcome! Friends from the future! You've finally found us—we thought you'd forgotten all about us. By the way, what year is it? How many colony planets do we have? I always said relying on just one Aurora Planet would cause problems! If we had a hundred Aurora Planets, none of that nasty business would've happened."

Zui Hei couldn't quite follow his rambling, so he started with what he could understand.

"2342 of the People's Union Calendar, the 213th year of the Wasteland Era. Unfortunately, we're still on the home planet... By the way, don't you even have a timer?"

The metal sphere seemed stunned, its wobbling growing anxious.

"Wait, still on the home planet? You mean not a single one? How is that possible! What about Zhiyuan Star? The Zhiyuan ship heading there must have reached its destination by now!"

Zhiyuan Star?

Zui Hei thought for a long moment before recalling that it was the original destination of the Enterprise's colony ship. His expression turned awkward.

"No... If you mean the Zhiyuan, it never left the solar system. It deliberately beached itself in the Cloud Province and built a city there according to colony standards. I heard they took in quite a few survivors."

The silver metal sphere seemed to pause for a moment, its bucket-like mouth clicking before it squeezed out a sentence.

"What a waste..."

Zui Hei didn't understand what it meant by "waste," but he was more curious about what this thing actually was.

"My name is Zui Hei. What about you? What should I call you?"

"Lingdang... That's what everyone calls me, because I always jingle and clatter when I move or talk, like a rusty bell. My designer created me 55,845 work cycles ago. He thought that by the time the door opened again, it would be a new world outside, and someone would take me to work in a museum or something. But now it seems his wish didn't come true."

As if losing its initial vitality, the silver metal sphere drooped its soft antennae, muttering to itself in a disjointed stream.

The incoherent words seemed to answer the visitor's questions, or perhaps lament its own fate.

Zui Hei counted on his fingers. If a work cycle meant a day, then 55,000-odd work cycles would correspond to... over a hundred and fifty years?!

In other words, this thing had existed since around the 60th year of the Wasteland Era and lived all the way to February of the 213th year!

Watching Zui Hei count on his fingers at the entrance, Lingdang clicked its bucket-like mouth.

"Zui Hei, is it? I have to say, you really are quite dark."

Glancing at the sewage and mud on himself, Zui Hei patted his filthy chest plate and rolled his eyes.

"Anyway, can you open the door? We've already given you the password."

Lingdang: "Of course, you can come in anytime—just gently press the open button on your terminal... Or did you think all doors should open themselves for you?"

Tired of the chatter, Zui Hei rolled his eyes and tapped the screen of his VM with his index finger.

With a rumbling tremor and a grating screech, the massive metal gears slowly rolled to one side, opening a gap wide enough for two vehicles.

A staircase led down to a spacious buffer zone, and directly opposite the gap were two airtight doors with transparent windows, tightly shut.

Orange lights and warning lamps lit up one by one, shadows of metal parts flickering on the floor, accompanied by a clattering cacophony.

The entire vault was like an aged gasoline engine, its long-dormant fuel tank ignited by a new spark plug, reluctantly opening its murky eyes.

Zui Hei's VM screen showed that the vault's fusion reactor had reignited, and all facilities were switching from backup power to regular power.

Watching from Camp 101, Chu Guang couldn't help but be moved.

The fusion reactor of Vault 100 still had fuel left!

Just as Zui Hei was stunned by the changes, a few ghost-faced insects suddenly darted out, startling him into instinctively raising his gun.

"Hey! Wait, these little guys are harmless—"

Seeing him raise his muzzle, Lingdang was also startled and tried to stop him, but Zui Hei had already pulled the trigger.

Amidst the rattle of gunfire, the ghost-faced insects fell onto the rust-stained corridor, their bellies burst open.

Watching the dead little creatures, Lingdang on the screen let out a regretful complaint.

"You murderer! You killed them all!"

Not daring to let his guard down, Zui Hei carefully inspected the passage behind the door, then signaled to his teammates. Five of them moved forward to clear the buffer zone of any lurking mutants, while he stayed at the entrance for now.

Looking at Lingdang, still mourning the little lives, he lowered his gun and suppressed the urge to roll his eyes.

"They weren't interested in you because you're a robot. We ran into plenty of these things on the way here... They lunged at us the moment they saw us."

Lingdang was taken aback.

"Wait, you said... you encountered these things outside too?"

Zui Hei: "Yeah, why?"

"Impossible..." Lingdang muttered, its tone filled with astonishment. "In theory, it shouldn't be possible. The door has never been opened since it closed—not once. They couldn't have gotten out... Could there be a leak somewhere? Strange."

Watching the babbling robot, Ten-Fist Superman and Broken-Leg Kevin, following behind Zui Hei, exchanged glances and whispered to each other.

"Why do I feel a sense of déjà vu?"

"+1"

Looking at the astonished Bell, I Zuihei furrowed his brow slightly.

"You know them?"

Bell cleared his throat and began in a storytelling tone.

"Of course. They're called 'Gaba,' rich in chitin—a natural polymer, an excellent industrial raw material. Besides that, the protein and nutrients they provide are rare treasures, and all it takes to sustain them is a bit of household waste. It's no exaggeration to say this is one of the greatest achievements of this museum—no, this shelter."

I Zuihei's brow twitched. He couldn't see anything great about these highly aggressive little creatures.

"We call them Ghostface Bugs."

Hearing this amusing name, Bell let out a grating laugh that echoed eerily through the pitch-black subway tunnel.

"Ghostface Bugs? That name sounds good too... I'll go with your term. After all, this place already belongs to you now."

"Can you show us around?"

I Zuihei tentatively made the request. The silver metal sphere on the screen didn't hesitate; it nodded its round head decisively.

"No problem. That's my job anyway. Follow me."

With that, Bell turned around.

Just as I Zuihei hesitated over how to keep up, the iron door of the buffer zone ahead hissed open.

A silver metal sphere sat quietly atop a flat, basin-sized four-legged robot.

"What are you waiting for at the door? Come on in."

I Zuihei exchanged glances with the others nearby and followed the robot calling itself Bell through the two airlock doors of the buffer zone, entering the interior of the shelter.

Things weren't as bad as imagined. Even after years underwater, no sewage had seeped in from outside. Even Bell, who had lived here for a century and a half, couldn't figure out how those bugs had gotten out.

Still, even if not as bad as imagined, the situation was far from optimistic.

A multitude of "Gaba" had taken over the shelter, building nests everywhere, filling every grimy crevice like cockroaches. Dark excrement covered the floor, along with oily, shed carapaces and fist-sized eggs.

Watching a few Ghostface Bugs chirping "chee-chee-chee," I Zuihei and his ten-player squad raised their guns and fired.

A dense volley of gunfire rang out, and dozens of bugs dropped dead instantly, along with the eggs in the room, all reduced to a dark green pulp.

Operating its four mechanical legs to deftly avoid the scattered remains, Bell, perched atop the four-legged robot, no longer called the visitors executioners. Instead, he offered a quiet reminder.

"These are good stuff. The shed carapaces are rich in chitin, which can be used to make many high-performance polymer materials... Most electronic devices and machines can use them."

I Zuihei had no time to deal with him now.

Staring at the corpses and waste of Ghostface Bugs everywhere, he reloaded his empty magazine while reporting his findings to the rear with a crawling scalp.

"...This is I Zuihei. I've entered Shelter 100. It's infested with Ghostface Bug waste and eggs. There might be tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands! I suggest cutting off the shelter's air circulation system and coming back in a few days."

He now understood where those mutant water striders had come from.

All along, they'd been lured here by these little creatures!

Static crackled over the comm channel, followed by the voice of Brother Springs.

"I've reported the shelter's situation to the Administrator... His reply is that Shelter 100's ventilation system has malfunctioned. According to self-diagnosis analysis, something—maybe eggs, maybe shed carapaces—has clogged the intake filter. The Ghostface Bugs active in the shelter must have escaped through there."

I Zuihei asked, his scalp crawling.

"So... there's no efficient way to clear out the bugs here?"

Killing them one by one with a rifle would take forever!

At least give him some insecticide!

Commander Springs: "For now, there's no shortcut. Unless you can get to B2 and fix the ventilation system, but that's too much to ask of you—and of me. We need to at least clear out the mutants on B1 and B2 before we can send in an HVAC tech from Camp 101... But that's for later. We'll eventually reclaim the whole shelter, but that's not today's job."

Clearing his throat, he continued.

"Here's the main point: our mission is to retrieve the black boxes stored in the B40 warehouse—about twenty or so, you'll know exactly when you get there. Then, the logs in the Administrator's office on B51, which contain the data the Administrator needs. Also, B100 has detected signals resembling human life activity... but the signals are strange, not a perfect match for normal humans. Anyway, the first two are main quests, the last is a side quest. That's it."

"That's it," he said.

And this shelter had a hundred floors!

I Zuihei couldn't help but roll his eyes.

"Can't you come in and help?!"

Commander Springs gave an embarrassed laugh.

"Sorry, brother. I'm just as bad with bugs as you are... And I've admitted I'm a desk jockey. I'm better at talking than acting. But don't worry! I've added a hundred more men. You've got a full company now. When we get back, the top credit is yours!"

I Zuihei: "%￥#@!"

There were so many things to complain about that he didn't know where to start, so he just cursed a few times and cut the comm.

Ignoring I Zuihei's muttering, and not understanding a word of it, Bell walked ahead leisurely, speaking in a tour-guide tone.

"...The great Shelter 100 once sheltered 30,300 residents, and their numbers peaked at 81,711."

Ten-Fist Superman couldn't help but say, "Eighty thousand? Here?"

Though Springs had mentioned over the comm that the shelter had a hundred floors, he still couldn't imagine this tunnel-hiding shelter holding nearly the population of Dawn City.

If it had that capacity, it would have to be an underground city like Shelter 79, right?

But this place clearly wasn't like that.

Unsurprised by his reaction, Bell let out a few sharp giggles and stopped in front of a sliding door on the side of the hall.

"...Your imagination is limited by your experience. Not just eighty thousand—in theory, this shelter could hold two hundred thousand people without issue."

As he spoke, the sliding door slowly lifted upward, revealing a world beyond that opened wide.

It was completely unlike the cramped space outside the shelter.

A wide circular corridor carved out an unusually vast space in this underground world, linking hundreds of densely packed rooms together.

The entire shelter was structured like a vertical shaft, with a hemispherical dome above emitting a yellowish light.

That light was like a sun carved into the cave, falling into the bottomless shaft.

The shed carapaces of Ghostface Bugs had formed a honeycomb-like tower on the inner wall of the shaft, shimmering with iridescent colors under the light.

A rainbow made solid!

But the most stunning sight was yet to come.

On the circular corridor, the wreckage of scrapped exoskeletons and mechanical bodies lay discarded like trash.

Among them were the classic police equipment "Type Five" exoskeletons from the Human Alliance era, as well as "Type Six" heavy cavalry units.

Besides these, there were machines that looked more like engineering tools than weapons—several crab-shaped engineering robots, waving pincer-like claws as if they had joined the fight.

Their bodies and surroundings were riddled with bullet holes, and traces of explosives dotted the walls and floor.

The mutants active in the shelter had gnawed away all organic matter beneath the metal skeletons, using shed carapaces and slime to assimilate those exoskeletons and mechanical bodies into part of the nest walls, together forming this tomb called Shelter 100.

Gazing at the breathtaking scene, the players stared wide-eyed. I Zuihei, closest to the door, almost instinctively blurted out, "Holy shit!"

The lighting effects!

The scene modeling!

Every frame seems like the budget is burning!

Absolutely epic!

Seeming quite satisfied with the shock on the visitors' faces, Lingdang let out a few sharp, scraping laughs after a moment of appreciation.

Riding the quadruped robot through the sliding door leading to the circular corridor, it stopped at the edge of the steep, downward shaft.

“Welcome to Vault 100. You are probably the first guests to set foot here since the doors closed two centuries ago.”

Glancing at the scattered wreckage, Wo Zuihei couldn’t help but ask.

“What exactly happened here?”

Lingdang said slowly and deliberately.

“Many, many things happened. If I were to start from the beginning, it would be a long story. My master recorded the history of this place on his VM. That thing should be in the administrator’s office. Go there and you’ll find out.”

Wo Zuihei pressed further.

“Is your master the administrator here?”

“Administrator? How could that be? Do other vaults have humans as administrators?” Lingdang laughed out loud. “Anyway, here he is just a supervisor… But my master was still very capable; he lived until the very end! Of course, whether that counts as luck is hard to say.”

Ten Fist Superman stared at him blankly.

“Supervisor?”

Lingdang said succinctly.

“The administrator of Vault 100 is not human, but a powerful AI. Its name is ‘Tree,’ and it has the highest authority in the vault. Its duty is to make optimal decisions based on parameters fed back by various sensor modules in the vault. If a light bulb breaks, it will know before the person under that bulb, and immediately report it to the specific warehouse and workshop.”

“And supervisors are the residents who ensure that Tree’s orders are carried out. They are both residents of this vault and part of Tree’s sensor modules, responsible for overseeing the most unreliable module in the vault—the residents themselves.”

At this point, it paused briefly, then said with a hint of playful sarcasm.

“But ‘supervisor’ is just what my master and his colleagues called themselves. Just like you named ‘Gaba’ as Ghostface Bug, those mischievous vault residents also disliked the official term and secretly honored them as ‘Tree People.’”