On the road, Tsuchigumo spotted several hundred fresh corpses of black people, and only then did she realize the rumor mentioned by the chairman that nobody reached the bottom was wrong—the company had arrived long ago.
These black people suffered varying degrees of goldification, the gold-plated parts being hard, while the regions untouched by it were pitch-black and soft. The rotting death fluids slowly seeped out of them, emitting a scent akin to citrus and bitter almonds.
They seemed to have been used for pathfinding, gauging the combat ability of the hollow golden people, like a herd that could be lured by external forces into dangerous areas.
Some drones remained in place, used to supervise and inspect these bodies. The Cyber Specter glanced at them, their indicator lights flickering before they flew to its side like loyal bees after it issued new commands, and then they headed forwards.
