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Chapter 1: Zerg Base
*Drip, drip.* The sound of water droplets falling from the stalactites echoed as they hit a puddle below.
In the damp, dimly lit cave, a beam of light shone on the rocky wall, casting a faint greenish glow.
Suddenly, a shadow flickered across the light. It was an arm—an arm smeared with blood.
Tang Fang instinctively touched the ground. It was wet, sticky, with a faint gritty texture.
Where am I?
His head throbbed with pain, and his mind was filled with a jumble of disjointed memories—one moment, the bloodthirsty screeches of a swarm of bugs; the next, the intense flash of gunfire; then the undulating, model-like curves of a battlefield; and finally, the sour face of his company's boss, wrinkled like a pickle.
With a great effort, he pried his eyes open, only to be greeted by pitch darkness. Aside from the rhythmic splashing of water droplets, there was only the suffocating stench of decay, like rotting braised pork.
He forced himself to move his limbs, feeling a burning pain below his right knee. When he touched it, his hand came away sticky. Gathering what little strength he had left, he crawled half a foot forward and brought the wound under the light. What he saw made him wince: a large patch of blood.
*Gasp.* He sucked in a sharp breath.
Tang Fang couldn't fathom how he had gone from staring blankly at the ceiling of a hospital room just moments ago to this underground cave. Worse still, the leg wound from earlier had somehow followed him here.
He pushed himself forward another foot, trying to grab the flashlight to examine his surroundings. But when he reached for it, he realized it wasn’t a flashlight at all—it was a gun.
Tang Fang was startled, but what he saw next made his hair stand on end.
Corpses. Bug corpses. Hundreds of them, scattered all over the ground.
Yellow and green fluids were splattered everywhere—on the rocks, in the crevices, some even dripping down from the stalactites.
His hand shook, and his grip on the gun faltered. The barrel tilted downward, sweeping across the ground beneath him.
A corpse resembling a cockroach, about a foot long and wide, lay belly-up, its abdomen torn open. A few drops of green liquid were still slowly oozing from it, like an irregular trickle of urine.
A shiver ran down his spine, and with a sudden burst of energy, Tang Fang pushed himself backward. But his hand landed on a stone slick with bug fluids, and he slipped. His head hit the ground with a "thud."
*Buzz.*
A wave of dizziness hit him, and fragmented memories swirled through his mind, as if a film was being played in fast-forward.
Tang Yan—that was the name of this body's original owner. Age: 24. Occupation: Soldier. Rank: Sergeant. Role: Squad Communications Officer.
Mission objective: Investigate the thermal anomalies in the underground caves of sector α-103 and identify the types of minerals present.
Mission location: Planet 5, sector α-103, Salton Star System.
"α-103? Salton Star System?" Tang Fang was stunned. His thoughts raced, and a piece of information suddenly flashed before his eyes: May 25, 2267.
"May 25, 2267?" It had been 253 years. He had traveled 253 years into the future!
Time travel was not unheard of, neither was the idea of parallel worlds, but this? He had jumped forward in time, all the way to 253 years in the future.
This was the era of interstellar travel. He had no gunpower to invent, no novels or movies to plagiarize, and he wasn't some noble or privileged heir. He was just an ordinary grunt soldier. Who knew when a stray bullet would explode next to him, leaving him as another photograph on an empty space coffin drifting through the void.
Of course, "that day" might be far off. Or it could be today.
Although the surface of Planet 5 seemed barren, desolate, and lifeless, its underground was an entirely different story.
And these bugs... With their sharp fangs and claws, if they got close enough, one would be disemboweled in seconds. Fortunately, Tang Yan had already killed them all.
After confirming there was no immediate danger, he gritted his teeth and retrieved a medical gel from his supply pack. In the faint light, he applied it to the wound on his right knee. A cool sensation quickly seeped into his skin, soothing the burning pain.
With a long sigh of relief, he shifted his body back, leaning against a rock to make himself more comfortable. But as he pressed his hand down, it landed on another bug corpse.
"Ugh, gross." He cursed under his breath, trying to shake off the sticky fluids clinging to his hand.
Suddenly, an emotionless voice echoed in his mind: [Unknown DNA sequence detected. Diagnostic program initiated…]
[Diagnostics complete. Confirmed: Compatible Zerg strain.]
[Gene structure reassembled. Gene level: E. Research tree unlocked. Technology level: 1. Building unlocked: 'Spawning Pool.']
[Life energy collected. Total: 250 units.]
[...]
[Switching to host control…]
As the voice finished, a vision appeared before Tang Fang's eyes.
Three distinct images. On the far left, a purple creep spread across the ground, with a spherical hatchery at its center. Six clawed limbs stood tall, and five writhing tunnels, like giant intestines, snaked out from it. Nearby, a drone (worker), a larva wriggling like a sea cucumber, and an overlord floated ominously overhead.
The middle image was grayed out, marked with the insignia of a soaring eagle, representing Terran.
The rightmost image glowed gold, emblazoned with a fiery emblem representing the Protoss.
Tang Fang was dumbfounded. Wasn’t this the game Starcraft 2? He had ranked in the top ten on the list of the best players back in the day! How was it now suddenly appearing in his mind?
Thinking back to the voice he had just heard and the strange vision before him, it seemed like the bug corpses had activated some sort of system within him, tied to the Starcraft universe.
He wasn’t much of a soldier, but playing this? That was second nature. Clicking the mouse and hitting the hotkeys, the drone instantly dove into the creep, creating a pulsating building not far from the hatchery.
"Ugh, what am I doing?" He couldn’t help but curse himself. This was no time for games!
Pulling his thoughts back to the present and dismissing the Zerg base from his mind, he pressed his hands to the ground, trying to stand. The medical gel was working wonders. In just ten minutes, his leg had healed enough for him to limp along.
He picked up his gun and scanned the surroundings. He was in a depression, far from the ceiling of the cave. The drop from where he had fallen was at least seven or eight meters, meaning climbing back up was not an option.
Now, he had two choices. First, he could follow the winding path ahead and try to find a way back to base. Second, he could wait here for his comrades to rescue him.
The first option was risky. Who knew where that path led? If it took him to the bug’s nest, he would be done for. As for the second option, when he thought back to the moment he had fallen into the pit, something felt off.
He distinctly remembered being pushed by a teammate, causing him to slip. Logically, they should have stopped to rescue him, but instead, both of them had walked away without saying a word.
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