Of course, most of the so-called 'wildlings' were the people who fled to the underground world because they could not stand the demon race's reign in the Great Dark Age in the past tens of thousands of years, and the demons who fled to the underground world on the same path when the demon race's reign collapsed.
It was because the environment at the boundary between the crust and the mantle was extremely harsh. Not only was the breathable oxygen a fatal problem, but the temperature was also unbelievably high. It was impossible for normal human beings to adapt to the wilderness environment without an air circulation system and a cooling array. Soon after they entered the wilderness, they perished.
The demons, and the human beings who were ruled by the demons in the 'Great Dark Age', however, had their unique advantages.
Li Yao now knew that the so-called 'demons' and 'human beings' were essentially the same thing. The thirty thousand years of the Great Dark Age was in fact the cruel oppression and domination of human beings over human beings.
However, it was an era when biochemical technology was highly developed. The studies on the release of genetic power had reached the peak.
In order to excavate the mother lodes below the ground and make use of the geothermal energy, many human beings were forced to accept genetic modification and turned into various kinds of demons that consumed little oxygen and were highly resistant to drought and heat. Some of them even turned into bizarre giant reptiles.
The human beings who had undergone genetic modification had essentially broken the 'genetic lock' inside their body. The odds of genetic mutations in their offspring were much higher than that of ordinary people. Generation after generation of such 'humans' or 'demons' fled to the underground world. Their offspring mutated even further under the influence of the harsh environment. They consumed less and less oxygen, and they were more and more resistant to drought and heat. Some of the mutants even had a layer of dense plants growing on their skin. The plants swallowed carbon dioxide and spat out oxygen, and the demons swallowed oxygen and spat out carbon dioxide. It was such an amazing relationship.
At first glance, such demons looked like plants that had been enlightened. But in fact, they were just poor people who had been forced to migrate to such a harsh environment.
Therefore, the human beings in the 10084 district who only went to the underground world in the age of the Star Ocean Imperium could barely adapt to the deeper life without the shelters and the civilization of mankind. However, the few descendants of the human beings and demons born in the Great Dark Age could still live in the darkness as' wildlings'.
Other than wildlings, there were also spiritual beasts, demon beasts, and etherealized plants and demonic plants. The demon emperors and demon gods of the Great Dark Age and all the Cultivation civilizations after the Star Ocean Imperium wanted to develop the underground world. Other than building shelters and colonization bases below the ground on a large scale, they also raised countless creatures that were adapted to the lack of oxygen, darkness, and heat below the ground through genetic modification and radiation mutation.
They tried to replicate the entire ecosystem on the ground below the ground so that their living space would be expanded by more than a hundred times. However, ninety-nine percent of the experiments on the underground creatures failed. The spiritual beasts, demon beasts, and etherealized plants that were raised could only adapt to the artificial environment in the shelters and the colonization bases at best. They were all abnormal breeds that could only live to the end of their lives in the comfortable laboratories like the rock worms.
However, after many shelters and underground towns were destroyed by earthquakes and magma eruptions, one percent of the experiment creatures managed to escape and survived the difficulties with great luck, turning into wild demon beasts and demonic plants!
The relationship between those demon beasts and the rock worms was like the relationship between wild boars and domestic pigs, or between wolves and dogs.
Li Jialing told Li Yao that, while the wildlings and the demon beasts were brutal, they would not attack the organized towns such as the 10084 district easily. That was because, although the shelter system in this place had collapsed, some of the defense runes were still functioning. Also, the residents here had traded tremendous rock worms for a lot of powerful attack magical equipment with the residents of the upper class. It was unlikely that the wildlings would swallow a town in a row unless they were engaged in a life-and-death battle with all their might.
Besides, the wildlings had conflicts with each other too. They were divided into different groups and tribes, and their hatred for each other had lasted for more than ten thousand years. Most of the time, it was the wildlings who fought each other. The residents of the 10084 district, on the other hand, minded their own business.
Li Yao asked Li Jialing, "What's the hatred between the wildlings?"
Li Jialing replied that the wildlings gradually evolved into different tribes according to their origins and the years they entered the underground world. The wildlings of this tribe were the oppressed human beings who came to the underground world in the Great Dark Age thirty thousand years ago, while the wildlings of that tribe were the demons who fled in panic when the Star Ocean Imperium rose. Didn't the two tribes hate each other naturally?
While the two tribes were fighting each other fiercely, the Star Ocean Imperium on the surface of the planet collapsed again, and a large batch of people who had just begun to embrace the ideas of Cultivators fled to the underground world. Although most of them stayed in the shelters, some of them intended to stir trouble with the strength of the wildlings. As a result, fuel was added to the fire, making the never-ending dark war even more chaotic and cruel.
As time went by, the civilizations perished, and the brilliance of most civilizations dimmed in their heads, but the mark of hatred was passed on generation after generation. To this day, even the wildlings themselves did not know why they were fighting the hostile tribes. It had become an instinct that had been engraved on their genetic strands.
Li Jialing told Li Yao that three wildling tribes, known as "Black Armor", "Night Wings", and "Red Ring", were lurking in the wild death area near the 10084 district.
As their name suggested, the Black Armors boasted an extremely solid black shell. Not only did the shell boast a high defense ability, more importantly, it was structured like a special solar panel and could store the high temperature below the ground and transform it into part of the energy necessary for survival. It significantly reduced the demand for food for the Black Armors and reduced their unnecessary hunting and hunting behavior to the minimum. Their survival ability was significantly improved.
The Night Wings, on the other hand, boasted a pair of broad membrane wings. In the rugged, narrow underground caves, the membrane wings were naturally not used for flying or gliding. Instead, they could enshroud the Night Wings and turn them into giant, cold cocoons. On one hand, they could prevent the loss of body heat and water, and on the other hand, they could prevent other underground hunters from detecting them through the infrared senses.
Many residents of the 10084 district believed that the Night Wings would turn into cold stalagmites after they covered themselves with the membrane wings. They could enter a special hibernation state without food or water for years. Of course, it was an exaggeration, but it was indicative enough of the Night Wings' remarkable survival abilities.
The Red Rings, on the other hand, were the most terrifying hunters in the area.
The naturally-endowed techniques of the Black Armors and the Night Wings were more focused on defense, but the genetic mutations of the Red Rings were more inclined to attack.
They had a pair of red eyes that were extremely sensitive to infrared rays, and they had also evolved a bat-like ultrasonic detection organ. These two abilities allowed them to sense everything around them clearly even in the depths of darkness where there was not the slightest bit of light.
With their powerful hunting abilities, the Red Rings had been suppressing the Night Wings for thousands of years. Even the membrane organs of the Night Wings were probably evolved to avoid the prying eyes of the Red Rings.
It was not until the Black Armors migrated to this place from other places and fought against the Red Rings together with the Night Wings that the war of the wildlings finally returned to balance. That was only the crudest description. Naturally, outsiders were neither familiar with the specific situation nor interested in it.
However, the earthquakes near the 10084 district had been more and more frequent recently. The habitats of a lot of demon beasts and demonic plants seemed to have been destroyed. The demon beasts and demonic plants were the wildlings' main targets for hunting and gathering. Now that half of their food sources were gone, the conflicts among the wildlings suddenly grew sharper.
If such conflicts were not resolved in time, there would be two possibilities.
Optimistically, the Black Armors, the Night Wings, and the Red Rings would all suffer heavy losses in a fierce battle and go extinct.
But it was also possible that, if none of the three tribes had a food source, they might hold back the hatred deep inside their genes and attack the nearest 10084 towns together. After all, the moans of thousands of fat rock worms could be heard all the way to the depths of the underground through the gaps.
It was exactly under such circumstances that Long Yangjun went to the active areas of the Black Armors, the Night Wings, and the Red Rings with some compressed food. A lot of Nepenthe believers went with her. Other than the believers in the 10084 towns, there were also a lot of believers from the four-digit towns and even higher places.
In the ideology of Nepenthe, all human beings were brothers and sisters. No matter what class they lived in, even in the underground wilderness that did not even have a number, they were all targets that deserved help and salvation.
Li Yao frowned. After hearing Li Jialing's introduction, he was about to pursue Long Yangjun's coordinates and go deep into the wildlings' tribes with him.
When he passed the "towering tree" at the center of the 10084 towns again, he suddenly thought of something and changed his mind.
"Wait a moment."
Li Yao said, "Tell me where the core units of the air circulation system and the cooling arrays of the 10084 districts are. Show me the place."
As Li Yao expected, the core units of the air circulation system and the cooling arrays were all below the "towering tree", or the mainframe crystal processor.
Those two things were the lifeblood of the underground locals. Once they were damaged, they would either be suffocated due to the lack of oxygen or be killed by the extreme heat.
However, there was no telling whether it was because of the fear of the "Immortal Cultivators" or because they had absolute trust in the "Serenity Seraph" that the honorable guest of the Serenity Seraph would not harm them. Therefore, none of the locals had the courage to stop their investigation but simply observed from a distance.
There were still doubts, confusion, and nervousness on the faces of the young onlookers, but there was only the usual calmness and silence on the faces of the adults and the old.
The air filtration and circulation magical equipment was one of the fundamental magical equipment that was indispensable in a space voyage. Every starship had one. They could not have been more common.
Besides, Li Yao was the prince of ventilation tubes who had profound studies on ventilation tubes and air circulation systems in various forms and structures. Naturally, it was impossible for him to make a mistake.
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