Chapter 241: Crow

This pipi shrimp must be over ten meters long, and its front limbs are hammer‑shaped; its eyes are so indistinct that it's hard to tell whether it's looking at Bai Lang. The pipi shrimp crawls toward the mountain, apparently still snacking on the leaping fish in the mudflats along the way. That special sand silkworm also begins climbing the peak, its many legs scraping the ground and producing a rustling sound.

On each side of the mountain a huge monster stands, and even in the ocean a creature capable of reaching the cliff where Bai Lang stands has appeared—giant tentacles extending from a vortex, each probably over a hundred meters long, with suction cups larger than the biggest tank opening, and a ring of sharp teeth inside.

Huge monsters approach Bai Lang from three directions, yet Young Master Bai remains completely unruffled; with just these three things, can he really be unable to deal with them or even flee? "Hahaha, three mere scraps, nothing can stop me!" As soon as the words leave his mouth, the clouds in the sky tear apart and a massive bird appears.

The bird looks anything but benevolent; its bald head and hooked beak make it look like a vulture, and beside the large head sprout four roughly equal smaller heads, its wings resemble tires, and it has massive claws. Most crucially, its body is longer than a giant dragon carriage, and its wingspan rivals that of a bomber.

Bai Lang watches the circling monster bird in the sky, speechless for a moment, "Words must not be spoken carelessly, food must not be eaten carelessly… today I finally understand." By then the sand silkworm has already reached the summit, yet its body remains in the cavern below.

The sand silkworm attacks at an absurd speed; the creature suddenly ejects a tube‑like structure from its mouth, and its massive jaws snap shut like lightning, aiming to slice Bai Lang in two. Bai Lang moves like a flash of electricity; his practice of Southern Dipper White Tiger Fist already incorporates the Tiger Form True Meaning, making his advances and retreats as swift as a ferocious tiger, and now he also adds the wind power learned from White Tiger and Arhat Benevolent King Fist, making him even faster.

Amid the explosive roar, Bai Lang easily slips out of the jaws' bite, even seeing clearly the silkworm's ejected oral organ—covered with palm‑sized irregular sharp spines and oozing a sticky fluid. "Stick it, then cut and grind it down?" he thinks. With a toe lift, he uses the force of White Tiger Fist to hew a massive stone, a few meters long and weighing thousands of jin, from the rocky mountain and kicks it straight into the monster's mouth.

Then the oral organ retracts; the sand silkworm shows no sign of choking, and with a chattering sound the stone should be ground down. Bai Lang shakes his head, "A troublesome thing." He flashes again—because the pipi shrimp has leapt up as well.

The pipi shrimp can bounce, unlike ordinary pipi shrimp. After it jumps up, Bai Lang is also extremely wary of its two front limbs—these are powerful weapons capable of generating supersonic cavitation bubbles, perhaps even cavitation nuclear fusion. Lasting a few ten‑millionths of a second at temperatures of tens of millions of degrees, such cavitation fusion in water would produce shockwaves strong enough to stun or kill the shrimp's prey.

At roughly the same moment, several tentacles have already reached the cliff. Bai Lang gives a wry smile; the raging wind around him subsides, and as his palms brush together a metallic clang rings out. "Golden Lock and Jade Seal, Unbreakable Golden Body… all the techniques I've cultivated so far turn out to be mere cross‑training skills…"

Even as his words linger, Bai Lang sweeps by like the wind, arriving directly beneath the sand silkworm— the monster still holds its body aloft. He curls his fingers into a fist, draws back, exhales, and launches a thunderous punch that strikes the silkworm's shell.

"Now you'll taste the White Tiger Shock‑Explosion Power! Break it!" Bai Lang's punch is the result of days of contemplation—who says Southern Dipper White Tiger Fist must always crush from the outside in? Can't it also infiltrate with a blend of hardness and softness, exploding from within? Who says the Southern Dipper cannot wield Northern Dipper Strength?

"Southern Dipper Tiger Breaks Dragon! This is a supreme skill of internal‑external fusion!" Though Bai Lang declares this about his punch, it still retains the essence of a hard fist—the shell cracks as if struck by a siege bolt. The sand silkworm pauses, then suddenly emits a sharp roar.

"This thing can actually shout?" Bai Lang is curious, and at the same time an explosion erupts; the sand silkworm's shell on the side opposite the impact blows outward, spilling gore. The crack Bai Lang created is about the size of an Eight Immortals table, while the rear opening is large enough for a coach bus to roll out sideways.

At this segment the sand silkworm is essentially emptied; its internal organs turn into a mush of gore that spews out. With a large hole now in the shell, the original cracks spread rapidly, and under the pressure of its own weight the remaining shell shatters completely, splitting the sand silkworm cleanly in two.

Sand silkworms are lowly creatures with tenacious vitality—so despite their unusually large size, their life force is even more vigorous. After being split, the creature still moves; the rear half slides down with a splash, and the surviving crabs swarm the wound, ravenously devouring the gore, while the front half continues to stir, and within a few breaths the cut is already sealed by a layer of secreted mucus.

The sand silkworm seems a bit more agile now, attempting to crawl across the ground to attack Bai Lang. Meanwhile Bai Lang has turned to deal with the swiftly charging pipi shrimp. Its attacks are like lightning; Bai Lang evades only by inspiration—such is the Innate Expert's inspiration; these beasts lack true Qi, so he finds Qi perception useless. There is another kind of Qi perception, a subconscious intuition born of countless combat experiences, which Bai Lang still lacks a bit.

The pipi shrimp attacks at a rapid pace; Bai Lang just dodges one strike when the second comes. Its hydraulically driven forelimbs strike again, followed by a sharp, roaring gust of air. Bai Lang crouches, seizes the extremely sharp jaws, and with hip‑and‑abdomen power hurls the sand silkworm forward, blocking it in front of him.

Like a bolt from the sky, the massive sand silkworm is shattered, and the pipi shrimp's strike is even more terrifying than Bai Lang's. It is sheer brute force; Bai Lang knows that even the sword‑wielding Innate Expert he observed would be unlucky to face such a blow. This is the power of flesh, something that contemplative, enlightened arts cannot overcome. The attack is as adamantine as diamond, clear and thorough, and only equal force can counter it.