This is a forgotten corner of the wilderness.

Su Mo walked among the alienated plants, tan old trunks, dazzling flowers, and vines that meandered and cling......

He surveyed the area within a radius of 100 meters, and then looked down at the parchment map in his hand, which had rough lines and simple pictures, but did not look crude.

"According to the map, there was indeed a tribe living in this area......"

Su Mo muttered.

But he had just turned around, but he couldn't find any traces left by humans, no bonfires that had been extinguished for a long time, thatched dwellings, polished and fired utensils, and farmland that had been reclaimed and cultivated...... It is as if everything has been completely annihilated by natural erosion and wind and frost.

The only evidence that there may have been human movements here is probably the tenacious weeds growing under his feet and the familiar gray-black fruits......

"This is the map left by the Courier?"

Not far away, the silently vigilant Nornes asked.

"Yes." Su Mo replied dryly.

The Courier is the only channel of communication between human tribes on a mission and struggling to survive in the wilderness.

Each "messenger" is the elite of the tribe, and needs to embark on a dangerous and long journey alone, which is bumpy and dangerous, and Su Mo, who has just returned from the depths of the wilderness, has a lot to say.

While the human tribes on the map are mostly located in the outlying terrain compared to the real dangers of going deep into the wilderness, the risk of traversing the wilderness is about the same as when they were collecting plants around William City, and now they seem like playing at home......

However, according to the information left behind by Grover the Butler, the vast majority of the "messengers" are ordinary people with no supernatural powers, despite their rigorous training.

Grover's father, the man who followed the ancient human tradition of relaying the scene of his birth to him as a literal "birthday present", was one such "messenger".

"You said you were a scout patrolling the border," Summer looked at Nornes, his voice quiet, but clear in the quiet jungle, "I guess I've seen a lot of 'messengers' before?" ”

"Yes, I've seen quite a few." Nornes replied, "It's a fairly smart human, with a lot of skills to learn, and they lurk like inconspicuous weeds, but their ability to resist risks is very low, and most of them don't end well." ”

He said in a purely non-positive tone:

"They can avoid the gathering of wild creatures, but they tend to miss the small details.

"I once saw a 'messenger' lying in the grass bypassing the troll's line of sight, only to be attacked by a sighing worm hiding aside, and the entire lower half of his body, nay, presumably from the chest down, was devoured.

"But he didn't die immediately, he struggled and lived again about— well, maybe five or six minutes, and the blood that flowed attracted the moths and ate the rest of him."

Su Mo was silent for a moment.

Grover's relics, in addition to this hand-drawn map of the distribution of the surrounding tribes, also had a letter for him, which mentioned that the "messenger's" father never returned after a handover.

"Let's go to the next point." He said.

The next human tribal settlement was also a barren scene, but slightly better than the previous one in the jungle.

It is a charred land surrounded on three sides by valleys, and the faint magma flowing from the volcano forms the path, leaving behind a melted ruin.

Su Mo squatted down and gently twisted the hot mud, his fingers were burned black, but soon healed themselves into new skin, and the burnt skin was crumbled into fine crumbs and fell on the boiling ground.

The scene before me is familiar, the dust floats to form the surface of the mud, intercepting the escaping heat and steam, leaving the ground thick and hot.

"The tribes here are active migrators, and they should have mastered a certain amount of extraordinary power." "It's a good place, most of the time," said Nornes, crossing his arms. ”

They traveled to the third tribe recorded on the map.

This tribe seems to be quite special, it is quite close to the border between the Bloods and Xenomorphs, and even on the simplified map, there is a special line warning that "the tribe here is extremely aggressive, and it is suspected of actively attacking the courier".

And this extremely aggressive tribe is also a sign of desolation, but it is in line with Sumer's imagination: the tribe is full of abandoned campfires, utensils, shelters, farmland......

Nornes' calm face changed slightly, and he looked a little serious.

He took the initiative to come up and inspect back and forth, closing his eyes from time to time to sniff something.

Places where life has stayed often leave a specific feeling, just as any creature will have similar traces of the place where it has stayed.

Nornes returned to Summer and concluded with great certainty: "This place has been attacked by xenos across the border. ”

"There must always be a motive for an attack," Summer asked, "in your experience, what is the purpose of the xenomorphs?" ”

"In my experience......"

Nornes turned his head and glanced at the ruins of the tribe behind him.

There was a mocking look on his face:

"In my experience, the tribes here aren't a good thing either.

"They're mostly trading with xenomorphs for a long time.

"It's just that it doesn't seem to be negotiated later, or it simply loses its value, so that it becomes the last prey."

Su Mo's eyes widened slightly:

"Prey? Trade?

"Very aggressive, suspected of attacking the 'messenger'......

"Are they trading goods, people?"

"You look like you expected it," Noons said. ”

"All I know is that most xenos are saddled with some kind of curse," Su Mo said in a deep voice, "often with a desire to kill and bloodthirsty. ”

The "werewolves" in Sequence 7 are hungry for killing, the "living corpses" in Sequence 6 are hungry for warm human blood and fresh flesh, and the "Resentful Spirits" in Sequence 5 need to suck a certain amount of human souls......

If you can't satisfy your cursed desires, you'll fall into a state of extreme weakness.

Whenever there is a full moon, the curse erupts...... And now, every day is a full moon.

However, at this time, human beings exist as vassals and slaves of giants, elves and blood clans, and more than 95% of human beings live in the territory ruled by the three transcendent races of the pan-human camp......

Su Mo knew that the aliens were tormented by cursed desires, and the urge to crave human flesh and soul......

But a tribe is only a hundred people, almost not more than a thousand, even if it is very aggressive and takes the initiative to attack other humans, the number of "goods" in the end will seem to be a drop in the bucket.

He didn't hide it, and directly asked the doubts in his heart.

Nornes gave him a strange look and smiled without emotion:

"You seem to think that xenos would directly use humans to satisfy their desire to kill and bloodthirsty?

"No, that's too extravagant.

"The xenos have a more efficient way to do this:

"Humans as 'seeds' for the cultivation of inferior people."