Chapter 34

Xie Xishu stared at Qi Wu, his heart sinking into the pit of his stomach.

If Qi Wu were truly "fine" as he claimed, it would be impossible for him to have left such crude and violent wounds on himself. At the very least, he wouldn't be bleeding. And he wouldn't be in such pain.

Feeling the stinging sensation at his fingertips, Xie Xishu frowned. His face was deathly pale from the intense tension, with dark, haggard circles under his eyes. Yet, the mass of flesh now clinging tightly to him seemed to be in an even worse state. Qi Wu’s tentacles felt abnormally cold, wet, and sticky, and the force with which they sucked and gnawed at his wounds was alarmingly savage, as if he were losing his grip on sanity.

Furthermore, as Qi Wu repeatedly muttered to Xie Xishu about how hungry he was, countless droplets of wet saliva poured out from the grotesque mouthparts scattered across the surface of his tentacles.

"Qi Wu..."

This scene, hauntingly familiar, sent an indescribable shiver racing down Xie Xishu’s spine.

"What do you need?" he asked.

"You..." Qi Wu whimpered in response, his voice pained and hoarse. "You smell so good," he said.

Across the surface of the monster—which bore no trace of human form—countless fine, lewd fissures gradually emerged. Unlike the mouthparts filled with tiny teeth, deep inside these crimson, fleshy slits, only long, slender tongues reached out. Each tongue was slick, moist, soft, and dexterous. Only when they tensed inadvertently did they expose the fine barbs hidden within the mucosal folds. Those barbs were translucent, glistening with mucus—a sight both crystalline and terrifying. They pulsed and swayed, undulating to a peculiar rhythm. They trembled and spasmed in the air, inching toward Xie Xishu.

"I want to be... with you... forever..." the mutated boy hissed, repeating the fragmented words. He didn't even notice that his tone was identical to the man's face that had emerged from the chest of the decapitated woman earlier.

"You are so delicious... hiss... I really want to... I want to... eat you."

More and more tentacles coiled around Xie Xishu’s arms. They climbed from his fingertips, quickly wrapping tightly around his wrists and forearms. It looked like the scene of a large monster’s feeding, the only difference being that the creature, acting as the predator, seemed so lost in chaotic confusion and struggle that all its movements appeared surprisingly gentle.

Gentle, yet ravenous.

Xie Xishu soon realized that while the tentacles coiled and licked with wet suction, the barbs beneath the tips were digging deep into his skin. His breathing grew rapid, yet his body felt as if it had been anesthetized; he was completely unable to move. He couldn't even manage a struggle, forced to let those limp, wet tongues wind around him and consume him.

"Ah, Little Xie, what, what the hell do we do?" Xiao Tianming watched the horrific scene in terror. "Didn't you say this guy still retained his human sanity? But now, how does it look like he's about to eat you?!" The man was desperate, his voice trembling.

Neither Qi Wu nor Xie Xishu answered him. The only sound in the air was the wet, squelching friction of soft flesh against mucus. Xiao Tianming gulped; for a second or two, he seemed genuinely tempted to rush forward and save Xie Xishu. But a few seconds later, he merely shifted his body clumsily, moving farther away from Xie Xishu and Qi Wu... and then farther still.

By now, nearly half of Xie Xishu’s body was covered by the layers of writhing "tongues."

"Ah, damn it, this isn't my fault," Xiao Tianming muttered toward Xie Xishu. "You see, this... I really can't do anything."

However, just then, Xiao Tianming saw with horror that a blurred human face had faintly emerged in the center of the mass of flesh. The crooked, strange face looked abnormally distorted, but the rage erupting from those deformed eyes was authentic... belonging to a human. A human in agony, yet still struggling desperately.

Suddenly, Qi Wu opened his mouth and bit off the most greedy and thick tentacles at his side with teeth that were far from human. As blood sprayed, the tentacles coiled around Xie Xishu snapped taut, then slid off the boy's arms in a reluctant, twitching heap.

"Go... get away..." Qi Wu roared at Xie Xishu, his voice hoarse, veins bulging. "Otherwise I will eat you! I'm so hungry, so hungry, I'll eat you completely, I have to eat you, I'm so hungry, I'm so hungry, I must eat—"

Then, curling all his tentacles, the creature—or rather, the monster—slithered toward the other end of the road with lightning speed.

"Qi Wu!"

In that moment, Xie Xishu finally regained the ability to move. The tentacles that had been wrapped around his arms had secreted a large amount of neurotoxic anesthetic, driven by the creature's greedy, bloodthirsty instinct, which had left his mind blank for quite some time. Once he came to his senses, Xie Xishu instinctively wanted to chase after Qi Wu.

He hadn't taken two steps when his wrist was yanked back painfully. Turning around, he saw Xiao Tianming’s deathly pale face.

"Xie, Student Xie, don't go, that thing is not right," the man said, looking terrified. "I think it’s true that he said he wanted to eat you. Don't be a fool..." Xiao Tianming took a deep breath, but couldn't hide the extreme fear in his voice. "No matter what your relationship was before, that thing is mad now. He has no sanity left. If you chase him, you're just adding a side dish to his meal!"

Xie Xishu stared at him for a few seconds. Then, Xiao Tianming watched as Xie Xishu suddenly pulled a knife from his waistband—the very same one that had been pressed against his side earlier, used to threaten him into charging at a terrifying monster. Xiao Tianming held his breath.

But then he saw Xie Xishu loosen his grip, dropping the knife to the ground.

"It’s not far to the safe zone now. Take this knife; you should be able to make it. Go on your own—to the shelter or to seek help from others. But for now... let go." The boy gestured with his chin at Xiao Tianming’s hand.

Xiao Tianming shuddered inexplicably, and then, uncontrollably, he obeyed Xie Xishu’s command and released his grip. Xie Xishu didn't even look back at him again; the boy’s slender, fragile figure simply ran into the distance, following the mottled bloodstains Qi Wu had left behind.

"...W-wait, hold on?"

In an instant, the empty asphalt road was left with only the crackling fire and the man standing there with a complex expression.

"What the hell is this all about?" Xiao Tianming held his head in despair, stumbled back a few steps, and sat down on the ground.

*

On the other side, Xie Xishu soon caught up with Qi Wu. Qi Wu had long since left the roadbed and darted into a wasteland overgrown with wild bushes below the road. During the real estate boom years ago, many developers had frantically seized land, only for the market to crash shortly after. These suburban plots were abandoned, left completely untended.

In the hot, humid summer of the south, wild trees and grasses grew wantonly. The wild mulberries, in particular, had grown nearly as tall as a person, their dense branches turning the entire wasteland into a small forest. Xie Xishu followed the path forcibly cleared by Qi Wu through the thicket.

The air was stagnant, heavy with the scent of crushed leaves and sap from overhead, but because of this, Xie Xishu could clearly smell the familiar, slightly musky odor of Qi Wu lingering on the mucus and blood on the ground.

Xie Xishu finally found Qi Wu in a corner of the wasteland.

"Hiss—"

At that moment, the boy’s tentacles were pinned into a weak monster that looked like a small, skinless monkey, its body entirely blood-red. Qi Wu was eating greedily and brutally, his entire mouthpart stained a wet, fresh crimson. With every chew, the sound of shredded meat and blood squelching between his teeth filled the air.

Upon sensing someone approaching, the monster’s mouthparts suddenly split open, swallowing the remaining half of the prey in one gulp. Then, all his tentacles flared out, writhing and clawing toward Xie Xishu.

"Hiss—"

Before Xie Xishu could react, the monster lunged like a viper, his heavy, viscous body slamming into the boy.

"Ugh..."

Xie Xishu let out a low grunt. It all happened too fast—faster than he could have anticipated. As he was pinned to the ground, those wet, tough tentacles coiled around his wrists, calves, and fragile neck. It was like an ancient torture of being pulled apart by five horses; "Qi Wu" stretched his entire body into a taut "X" shape.

The mouthpart, having just finished devouring the flesh and blood of a fresh monster seconds ago, slowly bloomed in the center of the tentacles, revealing a "tongue" covered in fine barbs.

"So... fragrant..."

The whisper that fell into his ears still sounded like a human voice. But Xie Xishu could feel that it was merely the monster parroting human speech—a faint, unconscious trace left in its chaotic consciousness, muttering those vague words.

"Hiss... so fragrant... I'm so hungry..."

Just like the other monsters that chased living things, those sounds held only endless greed and longing; there was no trace of human reason.

"Qi Wu?"

Xie Xishu’s chest rose and fell rapidly. He stared blankly at the "monster" inches away, realizing more clearly than ever before that he was facing death.