At this moment, had “Qi Wu” heard his plea? Xie Xishu didn’t know.
He had no time to think about it either.
The creature, out of control and ravenously hungry, was always cunning and ruthless when hunting. From its gaping, menacing jaws and the tentacles coiled around Xie Xishu’s body, a thick, poisonous slime oozed out. Xie Xishu quickly realized his brain was turning hazy, his thoughts blurring and slowing to a crawl. The toxin affected not only his brain but also his perception… it was a strange sensation.
No, the poison did not make him completely numb.
This now out-of-control creature wouldn’t treat its prey so mercifully.
The numbness merely rendered his hands and feet weak and powerless, unable to run or resist. Xie Xishu could feel the barbed tongues slicing swollen wounds across his body and the fine, hair-like tendrils gradually probing into each of his wounds.
Those things wriggled under his skin like parasites.
They sent waves of piercing pain surging through him.
Xie Xishu let out a weak cry, feeling his body twitching involuntarily.
He called out “Qi Wu” again, but the creature in front of him still did not respond.
Yes, it was too hungry.
At this moment, all its attention was focused on this exceptionally sweet and delectable prey. Even though it had degenerated into a creature driven solely by base desires, it instinctively abandoned its former rough and careless feeding methods used on other creatures.
It chose to “savor slowly.”
So those fine tendrils now infiltrated Xie Xishu’s body like the dense roots of an aquatic plant, slipping under his soft, fair skin without the splatter of fluids that would typically result from tearing open a corpse—even monsters could not tolerate such wasteful extravagance.
And for the prey being devoured, this was undoubtedly a terrifying experience.
He could feel that, in addition to the invasion through the wounds on his body…something was pressing directly onto his abdomen.
Several tendrils began probing into his body cavity through his navel.
Ah, the organs.
Xie Xishu thought of the corpses in the villa area that had been emptied of their organs.
Perhaps, to the creature, human organs indeed had a unique flavor.
The only bit of good news, perhaps, was that the toxin secreted from the tentacles spared him from much of the pain. He could only feel those things slowly stirring incessantly among the gaps between his internal organs.
The thick tentacles occupied the expansion space of his chest. Xie Xishu gasped for breath, but he could not draw in enough oxygen no matter how hard he tried.
As the fat and muscle under his skin were slowly gnawed away bit by bit, his vision also began to blur. Warm fluid, perhaps tears, perhaps sweat, or maybe blood, seeped from his nostrils and ear canals.
That fluid seeped onto his lips, and a faint salty taste rose on his tongue.
But soon, the fleshy appendages pursued it.
They did not spare the fluid that seeped from Xie Xishu’s body, nor did they spare his saliva.
The midday summer air and the enclosed forest thicket were thick with the fragrance of grass and trees mingled with the stench of the creature. Everything around became increasingly distorted, increasingly feverish with Xie Xishu’s labored breathing, and his skin grew damp, with sweat and tears oozing from his pores, only to be carefully sucked up by the “tongues” that swept over them.
And after licking him clean, they showed no intention of leaving; an unprecedented hunger drove the creature to wrap that precious “food” even tighter.
“Qi Wu’s” body gradually swelled.
Finally, it could no longer restrain the greedy nature in its veins. That once frail and slender human was swallowed into its mouth bit by bit.
And Xie Xishu sank back into an old nightmare.
That dream where he was slowly enveloped by the “sea anemone” in a seawater tank, gradually digested and ultimately absorbed entirely.
He could no longer tell if he was still breathing, but his remaining brain faintly registered some nerve sensations of prickling pain and mild numbness.
He was melting.
【Such a sweet scent…】
Qi Wu’s voice seemed to come from a distant place.
[“I like you.”]
Was this a memory from the past, or a whisper from reality?
[“I really like you…”]
Something warm and pliable crept over, its flexible, nimble tip piercing into Xie Xishu’s body, half-dissolved by the monster’s digestive fluid.
It toyed with the fragments of his soft internal organs, only remnants now, moving with a gentleness that was filled with desire. Its rough tongue leisurely licked along Xie Xishu’s remaining blood vessels and connective tissue, sometimes pausing at nerve-dense spots as if savoring the texture of the meat there.
Finally…
*
Xie Xishu felt a ripple wash over his body.
He shuddered.
A sudden burst of white light flared up in his once-clouded vision.
Then, enveloped in a humid scarlet heat, he fell into a dark, deep dream.
*
He dreamed once more of his childhood self.
All around was silence, save for the steady hum of some pumping apparatus.
The entire space rippled with a wavering blue light.
The light came from a tank as tall as a wall right in front of him.
The massive tank made it almost seem like an aquarium, except instead of vibrant fish, what writhed inside were terrifying creatures, as if from another world—or perhaps from hell.
They clung tightly to the cold, thick glass wall, with pale blue and purple veins interwoven like complex roots, faintly visible beneath their translucent, pallid flesh. Dense suckers allowed their bloated, grotesque bodies to adhere to the glass, even allowing them to wave their tendrils and decaying flesh toward the human child on the other side.
They slithered across the glass gently, occasionally bumping it lightly. The faint glow of rippling water seemed to draw the space outside the glass deeper into the abyss.
Though deformed and hideous, they possessed an inexplicable, eerie beauty.
Xie Xishu was drawn to that hideous splendor.
He walked forward uncontrollably and pressed his forehead against the glass.
It was almost as if he were embracing the monster.
“Shh…”
He murmured to it.
“Behave.”
…
Then he heard a trembling question, “What… what are you doing?”
The child turned around abruptly to see his mother, who had appeared behind him without him noticing.
“Mom!”
The child version of “Xie Xishu” didn’t even answer her question, letting out a small cheer as he rushed toward his beloved mother.
But to his surprise, the next second, the woman’s expression changed, and she quickly sidestepped.
Xie Xishu stumbled, nearly falling, but a steady hand caught him, helping him regain his balance.
“Dad?”
Xie Xishu looked at the man who had quietly appeared, happy as always.
“Our Xiao Shu is adorable.”
The man reached out to pat Xie Xishu’s head, then glanced at his wife with mild reproach.
“That… really wasn’t necessary.”
The man murmured in a deliberately low voice.
“After all, he’s our child.”
The woman’s face changed dramatically at that moment. “I have no such child.”
She slowly retreated, darkness spreading over her white lab coat like ink.
She became ghostly pale in the darkness, and a deathly film gradually clouded her eyes.
“I… I don’t have a child who could… associate with monsters…”
Her voice became increasingly hollow.
Large patches of livor mortis started appearing on the skin exposed from her clothing, visible to the naked eye.
Xie Xishu gasped, and in an instant, the woman vanished like a small stone thrown into a dark pond.
The dreamscape instantly left only Xie Xishu and the man holding his hand.
His father.
“Mom? What’s wrong with her… Did I do something wrong?”
The child gazed in confusion at where his mother had disappeared, his voice tinged with deep unease.
Xie Xishu felt his “father” tighten his grip on his hand.
“You didn’t do anything wrong.”
The man lowered his head, smiling at him.
“In fact, Xiao Shu has been amazing lately. You haven’t fallen ill and worried Mom and me in quite some time, right?”
“Mm.”
“And you’ve done great with your studies too. The teacher said you get a little red flower every time.”
“I… I just followed the teacher’s instructions…” the child mumbled shyly.
The man’s smile deepened.
“Following directions makes you a good child, Xiao Shu. Oh, and you’re not as afraid of them as before, are you?”
As he spoke, the man’s gaze drifted to the creatures in the tank.
His voice grew low.
The child hesitated a long time before carefully nodding.
“…They said… they all like me.”
“Good. Xiao Shu.”
From the child’s perspective, his father’s smile looked slightly strange.
“The fact that they like you proves…”
The man murmured to Xie Xishu.
But that murmur was drowned out by a conversation that seemed to come from a distant place.
*
“Hey, um, is Xiao Xie alright?”
“I’m just asking, just asking. No other reason; he’s been sweating a lot.”
“…Look, he won’t be waking up any time soon, so, um, how about I eat the instant noodles in his pack?”
“Oh, no, no, I’m just kidding, ha, haha. I brought my own rations, see? These compressed biscuits I spent real money on. It’d be a waste not to eat them, haha…”
…
Although it was a conversation, in reality, there was only one voice chattering incessantly by his ear, enough to be irritating.
Xie Xishu vaguely felt that the voice was familiar. After thinking for a bit, he barely managed to dig up a name from the depths of his consciousness.
Xiao Tianming.
Yes, this was indeed Xiao Tianming’s voice.
But hadn’t he already parted ways with that guy? Back then, he was in a rush to chase Qi Wu.
Right, why was he chasing Qi Wu again?
Wait, Qi Wu…
*
The pulsating of thick liquid.
A fine stinging sensation all over his skin.
The creature’s limbs stirring, twitching, and sucking at different parts of his body.
…
In an instant, countless memories flooded over him, pulling Xie Xishu directly back to reality from the depths of his foggy, chaotic dream.
Xie Xishu snapped his eyes open, only to come face-to-face with a somber, intense face.
A tall, strong boy was bending over him, his hand hovering hesitantly near Xie Xishu’s forehead, as if wanting to wipe away the fine beads of sweat, yet unable to muster the courage to actually touch him.
“Uh—”
Still not fully awake, Xie Xishu found himself abruptly face-to-face with Qi Wu.
He involuntarily gasped, his heart nearly beating out of his chest.
And Qi Wu wasn’t doing much better; when he suddenly met Xie Xishu’s gaze, it was as if he’d been burned, his hand jerking back so quickly that, being a mutated monster, he wobbled and almost ended up sitting down on the floor.
He looked even more startled than Xie Xishu.
Xie Xishu was taken aback for a moment.
Qi Wu, with his gaze fixed on Xie Xishu, also stood frozen for a moment before mumbling, “Y-you, you… you’re awake…”
And he stammered as soon as he spoke.
Xie Xishu, staring back at the boy in front of him, replied with a completely unrelated question.
“You didn’t eat me?”
But he clearly remembered feeling himself being drawn entirely into Qi Wu’s digestive cavity.
That feeling of being licked, devoured, dissolved was so vivid…
Qi Wu’s face instantly took on a complicated expression at these words.
There was anger, regret, guilt, but above all, a lingering fear.
“I’m surprised too, that I didn’t actually end up eating you!”
Qi Wu glared at Xie Xishu, nearly gritting his teeth as he replied.
“I never thought I’d have it in me, damn it—but I already told you, didn’t I? I wanted to eat you, so I told you to run!”
“Oh, so you mean I should’ve just run away and let you suffer alone? Do you know how close you were to losing it? You were on the verge of becoming a full-on monster. If I hadn’t followed you, you’d probably be out there as a hairless giant lizard running around eating people right now! When the government steps in, you’d be toast—grilled with a flamethrower, ready to be skewered as lizard kebabs! How was I supposed to just run away in that situation?”
Xie Xishu blinked, then stared back at him without backing down.
“…What kind of decent boyfriend would just let his guy fall to that kind of fate? I couldn’t do it.”
Qi Wu, who had been all fired up to lecture Xie Xishu, immediately turned red as a steamed tomato at that last line.
Xie Xishu, seemingly feeling that Qi Wu wasn’t embarrassed enough, continued speaking in his usual calm, detached way, though his words were nothing short of shocking.
“And besides, I had confidence that you wouldn’t actually eat me. You like me, don’t you?”
*
Only a small part of that statement was literal. As he came back to his senses, Xie Xishu immediately realized that deep down, he was indeed quite certain that Qi Wu wouldn’t truly devour him. Otherwise, in the midst of such a terrifying hallucination, he would have already descended into panic and madness.
But even he couldn’t fully explain the reason for this certainty, so he just said it casually to placate Qi Wu.
Qi Wu, however, just stared at him, wide-eyed and speechless, while someone nearby choked on their drink, spewing water and coughing violently.
Only then did Xie Xishu notice a man sitting not far away, holding a bottle of mineral water in one hand and a military ration in the other. He looked at them with a pained expression, coughing so hard his eyes had gone red.
“Why are you still here?”
Seeing Xiao Tianming, Xie Xishu couldn’t help but feel a little surprised.
He clearly knew that Xiao Tianming was someone who genuinely feared death.
Back when he saw that woman beheaded, Xiao Tianming had wanted to flee. It was only because Xie Xishu had threatened him with a knife that he reluctantly stopped at the gas station to fill up all those gas bottles.
The three of them had ended up together purely by chance, without any real camaraderie.
And given the situation earlier, with Qi Wu going berserk and him going off to face danger… Xie Xishu had assumed Xiao Tianming would’ve left for a safe spot at a shelter by now.
After finally stopping his cough, Xiao Tianming’s expression froze upon hearing Xie Xishu’s question. After a long pause, he stammered out a dry response, “…It’s a long story.”
__
Author’s Note:
Xiao Tianming: I know, I shouldn’t be here—I should be under a car.
