Chapter 163: Going Berserk

The person holding a knife to my throat was actually Tian Xiaoqi! Damn it, I never would have guessed in a million years that the person I’d just saved was this broad! But how did she get here? Had she been trailing our team the whole time without us noticing?

“What are you doing here?” I blurted out.

Tian Xiaoqi immediately made a shushing gesture. She lowered the knife from my throat and pointed it toward the wardrobe door. Clearly, she had also noticed the slimy, crawling thing outside. I quickly pulled myself together and switched off my flashlight.

The space inside the wardrobe was incredibly cramped. In an instant, aside from the approaching crawling sounds, all we could hear was each other’s breathing. I held my flashlight in one hand and my short dagger in the other. Tian Xiaoqi’s Kukri was held horizontally just an inch in front of me; the blade was so sharp I felt like it could slice my entire head off with a flick.

Just as my mind started to wander, the door to the room suddenly creaked open from the outside. Something had pushed it, followed by a series of strange footsteps. As my eyes gradually adjusted to the darkness, I instinctively pulled Tian Xiaoqi behind me and peered out through the crack in the wardrobe door.

Soon, a pitch-black shadow appeared in my line of sight. Terrified, I jerked my head back. Though I could only catch a blurry glimpse, I was certain this thing was a monster.

It looked like a human that had been stretched out, with long arms and legs, crawling in flat against the floor. It had no facial features, only two nostrils. As it crawled, it raised its head every so often to sniff around. I watched its movements with wide eyes. It climbed onto the wooden bed, causing the wood to groan and creak under its weight, a sound that rang piercingly loud in the quiet, empty room.

Startled by the sudden noise, Tian Xiaoqi took a step forward and grabbed my arm. Caught completely off guard, I stumbled as she pulled me, making the bottom of the wardrobe emit a sharp clack. At that exact moment, I saw the creature’s head snap up, staring straight toward us.

I hurriedly braced my hands against the wardrobe doors, cursing inwardly and wondering if this broad was doing it on purpose. The thing outside was too deformed to be a living creature and clearly wasn’t going to be easy to deal with. It was probably some anti-theft pet raised inside the tomb.

By the time I snapped back to reality, the creature was already crawling toward the wardrobe. I hurriedly pressed down on Tian Xiaoqi’s hand and pulled my head back, only to look around and see her bowing her head with her eyes shut tight. She was trembling and clutching my arm in a death grip, her previous terrifying aura with the knife completely gone.

I steeled my heart. No matter how dangerous this thing was, it still moved like a human crawling around, so there was a good chance it would still be afraid of something sharp like a knife.

So I grabbed Tian Xiaoqi, gesturing for her to tread lightly, and carefully pushed her into the deepest corner of the wardrobe. Then, keeping my eyes on the creature outside, I tucked my dagger into my waistband and took the Kukri from her hand, ready to act. If the thing outside wanted to play rough, I’d send it straight to the afterlife with a single chop.

The monster sniffed around the bottom of the wardrobe for a while before pressing against the doors to sniff there. I gripped the knife in a reverse hold and held my breath, watching helplessly as the thing clung vertically to the wardrobe door. It was only then I noticed that its human-like feet actually had suckers similar to those on sea creatures, enabling it to cling to walls like a gecko.

My mind immediately raced back. Could the thing I saw peering through the lattice carvings earlier not have been a human? After all, I had walked for so long without coming across anyone. Had it been this creature all along?

I looked up, my gaze dark and grim. The creature was currently pressed against the wardrobe door, completely off guard, and my position was aligned perfectly with its neck. No matter how capable it was, if I slashed right now, it would definitely die.

This time was different from before. I wasn’t just thinking about it; I truly wanted to kill this thing. Leaving it alive meant we would have to share the same space later, and its existence would ultimately be a massive threat to us.

I took a quiet, deep breath and held the knife across my chest. The creature retreated half a step, seemingly sensing our presence. Hardening my heart, I gripped the handle with both hands and, without a moment’s hesitation, drove the blade violently into its neck.

The creature’s shrill screech nearly deafened me, and rage instantly rushed straight to my head. Lord knows where I got the strength, but I kicked open the wardrobe door and actually tackled the thrashing monster sideways onto the floor.

The knife didn’t slip from my grip. I used the momentum to slash downward fiercely, wrapping my leg around from behind to lock the thing’s neck. I had learned this move from Lu Ayao. He said that for humanoid creatures, the neck has the narrowest range of rotation; they usually can’t protect their back while facing forward, making the neck their weakest spot.

Instantly, a fishy stench flooded my nostrils. Blood splattered all over my arm, so disgusting I nearly gagged.

It was just like gutting a fish. No matter how its limbs struggled and clawed at my diving suit, I kept pressing the knife down firmly. Soon, my arm was covered in bloody scratches. It hurt, but I didn’t dare slacken my grip, because the moment I let go, it would surely escape. As it thrashed harder, my blade sank deeper, and more black blood sprayed out. Once it had lost enough blood, the thing gradually stopped moving.

After a while, I finally pulled the knife out, my whole arm throbbing with pain. I scrambled up from the floor and clicked on my flashlight, only to realize I was sitting in a pool of blood. The monster’s skin was a pale grey, and all its blood had drained out.

Tian Xiaoqi was still standing frozen by the wardrobe. As I stepped over the monster’s corpse toward her, she saw the knife still in my hand and backed away a few steps in wary alarm, as if she were looking at a ghost. After a moment of speechless frustration, I reached out and handed the knife back to her.

Turning around, I used the flashlight to inspect the monster’s corpse from head to toe. I poked its skin and found that only the arms and legs had distinct bones; the rest of it was soft and squishy, like some kind of mollusk. “Have you seen one of these before? What is it?”

Tian Xiaoqi snapped out of it. “Before I came here, I visited a few nearby villages. When I went out to sea, some old fishermen said there are Sea Monks in these waters and warned us to be careful while sailing. I don’t know if this is a Sea Monk.”

“What’s a Sea Monk?” I asked.

Tian Xiaoqi thought for a moment. “I’ve heard they’re turtles, but there are also rumors they’re soft-shelled turtles. The most common description is a human head with a turtle shell. They say merchant sailors consider Sea Monks a bad omen because encountering one guarantees a shipwreck.”

“Oh,” I grunted, asking no further questions. I stole a glance at the diving suit Tian Xiaoqi was wearing, then leaned against the bed and used the quilt to wipe the foul-smelling black blood off my body.

After a long silence, Tian Xiaoqi edged closer and asked, “Why… why aren’t you asking anything else? Aren’t you curious why I’m here?”

After what happened before, my trust in this woman had dropped below zero. I didn’t want anything to do with her this time, no matter what. Whether she had followed our team in or come in on her own, I had no intention of asking another word.

“Not curious.” I finished wiping myself down with my head bowed, shouldered my pack, turned on my flashlight, and walked straight out.

Seeing that I wasn’t falling for her tricks anymore, Tian Xiaoqi was clearly bewildered, but she quickly followed behind. “Wait, aren’t you… aren’t you afraid of running into another one of those things in a minute? If the two of us stick together, it’ll be much safer in a place like this. Don’t you think?”

“I’m not walking with you. You do your thing, and I’ll do mine. We stay out of each other’s way. Besides, do you even trust me?” I stopped and flicked my flashlight beam toward her, smiling coldly. “Aren’t you afraid I’ll see whatever it is you’re investigating here?”

Tian Xiaoqi froze in place, stunned by my sudden questioning.

Thinking back on what she had done, I took a step toward her, my gaze burning into her. “Trying to trick me again? You don’t need to act weak around me. That Sea Monk back there, you could have handled it on your own, couldn’t you?”

“But it really is too dark here. Walking alone is really dangerous,” Tian Xiaoqi said, pulling the same old trick again.

At this point, my anger was reaching its breaking point. I spun back around, ready to roar at her, but I gritted my teeth and forced myself to hold it in.

“There you go again,” I said. “Testing me again. Does your conscience not bother you at all? Do I look that easy to push around? You just pick on me to trick, over and over! Ask yourself, when have I ever mistreated you? Even with a crippled leg, I carried you all the way into that tower. When you were unconscious and He Yu was interrogating you, who stepped up to stop him every single time? And what did you do? You drugged us, dragged He Yu ten meters across the ground, and tried to kill Lu Ayao. That’s my fucking brother!”

I pointed at my chest. “Do you have any idea what happened on that bridge back then? If that guy named Qiao had been even a little more accurate, if I hadn’t lunged forward, He Yu would have fucking died right there in the water! You were right there, weren’t you? Was it fun seeing us so helpless? Now I’m telling you to go and you won’t leave. What the hell do you want from me?!”

I rarely lose my temper like this, and my chest was heaving up and down. Tian Xiaoqi was so terrified that she pressed herself against the wall, not daring to move. I ignored her, turning away furiously to march down the pitch-black corridor. A dark cloud hung over me; if a dog had passed by right then, I would have kicked it twice just to vent my rage.

I really couldn’t understand it. I’d fucking saved this woman’s life again.