Chapter 1128: Chapter 127: Giant Beast (Part 7)
In the PPDC military base offshore at Port City, the high-ranking officials stood stunned, watching the series of images captured by surveillance cameras on the big screens.
They saw plant-based missiles, calculated with precision, landing accurately in other urban districts’ construction sites, city parks, green belts, by rivers—or anywhere with bare soil.
Pa.
The plant-based missiles exploded collectively, spewing a large amount of white, cotton-like fluff over the soil.
This fluff naturally spread out, quickly growing into complex, thread-like structures resembling lichen moss, penetrating into the land,
then further developing roots akin to higher plants to extract nutrients from the soil.
The white lichen moss efficiently eroded and expanded from the bare soil as its center.
The grass, flower clusters, and shrubs in the green belts seemed gradually dyed by a white fuel, covered with a thick layer of moss,
and even the taller landscape trees,
yellow bells, flame trees, eucalyptus, royal palm, fan palms...
became targets for lichen moss erosion as well as natural springboards for fungal expansion—
The lichen’s threads quickly corroded the internal structures of various trees, poisoning their branches, leaves, and fruits.
Every flower, leaf, and fruit
grew white mold on their surfaces.
Whether deciduous or evergreen,
all dropped their fruits to the ground,
flowers withered, leaves fell off,
some already light leaves grew fluffy, pure white spherical fungi,
and fell, drifting like dandelions in the wind to other places.
When falling on water, the pure white fungi would float, drifting along the current, naturally reaching the soil on the shore, expanding along the river.
When falling on cement pavement, the pure white fungi would find their way through cracks, searching for soil.
Even when landed on inorganic objects like bus roofs, skyscraper windows, metal billboards, the white fungi balls adapted—
they would spread as wide as possible, increasing area,
waiting for other factors to carry them away to disperse.
Like humans.
Pedestrians on the street were terrified, overwhelmed by the sudden white tide,
screaming, fleeing in panic.
They drove vehicles, carrying expanding cotton-like fluff, speeding away.
They stepped on carpets woven by white fungi, leaving pure white footprints where the fungi hadn’t reached.
They shoved each other into underground shelters, or rushed into high buildings,
without noticing the white fungi clinging to their clothes, ready to spread.
The aerial view of the entire city looked as if dozens of drops of white paint had suddenly fallen, flowing unchecked.
"Mold is a general term for branched fungi, a type of fungus.
Its defining feature is a developed mycelium without large fruiting bodies; you might imagine an orange on a shelf for too long, surface covered in yellow-green mycelium.
Opposed to branched fungi are those with larger fruiting bodies, which are mushrooms."
Li Ang, facing Fang Xuewen’s angry glare, calmly said, "Mold reproduces mainly through various sexual or asexual spores,
Mold spores are small, light, dry, abundant,
varying in form and color, with long dormancy and strong resistance; each can produce thousands, even billions or trillions of spores,
drifting with wind, flowing with water,
dispersing and propagating everywhere, pervasive and omnipresent.
The lichens you see are a special composite of algae and white fungal threads,
akin to the first cooperation of algae and fungi five hundred million years ago,
Algae contain photosynthetic pigments, capable of photosynthesis, providing nutrients and a sturdy existence foundation for fungi,
while fungal threads provide water and inorganic salts, protecting algae,
simultaneously, fungal threads can generate numerous visible spore balls, carrying fungal offspring with algae, continuously expanding through air, water sources, and biological channels.
Phase one, which is the current phase you observe,
lichens will attach to soil and other plants, secrete enzymes, and locally expand.
This phase’s lichens are relatively fragile and harmless to humans,
if dealt with appropriately, they can be eradicated by fire,
and a ’firebreak’ can be created for isolation using large amounts of metal, glass, and other non-conductive parasites."
As if verifying Li Ang’s words,
one PPDC member at the base of the skyscraper operated a mecha, activating a flamethrower to burn the white fungi-infected ground in sight.
The flamethrower emitted eerie blue flames, melting and dissolving the fungi where it touched,
and some PPDC members without flamethrower features on their mechas saw this and intelligently reciprocated, using the vector nozzle mouths on their mecha backs, mutual scorching the mechas,
clearing the white fungi attached to the mecha.
"However, the excessive total quantity is enough for lichens to enter the second stage."
Li Ang, treading on plant carpets, casually said, "They will deeply embed into the soil,
reaching depths of ten or even twenty meters,
weaving a gigantic network underground with diameters unimaginable to humanity, spanning thousands of kilometers,
then sprouting on the surface like bamboo shoots after rain.
Human civilization lacks the technological capability to renovate an entire continent’s soil,
or cover every soil surface with metal plates.
Therefore, lichens inevitably reach the third stage."
Li Ang continued, "Masses of uncontrolled lichens will emerge from the ground, sprawling and expanding,
even if humans incinerate with extinguishers, they cannot eradicate them completely.
New lichens will always arise in areas beyond human reach, breaking surface.
The third stage lichens will form structures like the primordial algae—that was the special mushroom from the Silurian period 438 million years ago, shaped like giant columns six meters tall, one meter thick, resembling termite mounds.
In this phase, lichens no longer rely on fallen leaves from surface trees for long-distance spreading, as you will inevitably attempt to cut down trees.
They will explosively eject white dandelions merging fungal spores and algae cells from thousands of apertures in these columns,
Dandelions drift wind and water, expanding.
Upon landing in water, algae cells activate, forming lotus-like structures,
granting fungal spores abilities for transcendental spread.
And in this process, human civilization has no resistance space.
Thus, lichens move onto the fourth stage."
Li Ang tilted his head slightly, calmly stated, "The fourth stage, also known as the final stage,
Lichens will cover 70% of the world’s land, parasitizing all large plants, secreting enzymes, decomposing organic materials while plants are alive.
Soil will turn white, unfit for cultivation,
wild trees, shrubs, flowers, and grasses unable to survive, ceasing to produce food or oxygen.
Herbivores and carnivores will face extinction.
This is not the end; white fungi will commence evolving,
Cryptococcus, Candida auris, Rhizopus...
they will evolve into hundreds or thousands of deadly fungi, harming human hands, feet, eyes, nose, ears, respiratory tract, lungs, and gastrointestinal tract.
Any unprotected activity on the surface will be lethal.
Human civilization will be forced to shrink into limited underground cities, relying on canned goods and earthworm breeding factories for protein.
While on the surface,
land, ocean, mountains, snowfields, deserts,
everything will be tinted in white.
The entire process spans three years."
Li Ang calmly said, "You might deem this cruel, but I call it efficient.
In my creation sequence, it is named,
Pale World."
