Chapter 5: The Bride

The hull around the boarding hall’s airlock had long since been riddled with cracks from the bear-like creature’s earlier impacts, leaving it in a precarious state.

With this latest assault, a single strike from the creature completely shattered the airlock and the surrounding hull, creating a hole two meters high. Fortunately, it was packed tight with cabinets, tables, and chairs, which would hold it back for a moment longer.

Seizing this opportunity, Li Youyi threw all the explosives Cai Yutong had crafted at the breach in one go.

At this point, who could still care about the consequences?

"Boom!"

"Boom-rumble!"

The explosive force was immense, temporarily forcing the bear-like creature back.

The cabinets and furniture blocking the airlock ignited in the blast.

The boarding hall’s portholes shattered one after another, and the freezing wind and snow surged in, further fueling the fire.

The shockwave from the explosion sent the security team members, Cai Yutong, and the short student, who had retreated into the dining hall behind the boarding hall, flying; some hit the ground and lost consciousness instantly.

Li Youyi, who was also retreating, was thrown back, his body slamming into the wall. The pain was bone-deep, and his entire body felt as if it were falling apart.

Waves of fire washed over him, scorching and searing.

Before Li Youyi could even stand, he saw the bear-like creature’s massive body smash through all the obstacles and charge out of the sea of fire. It tore an arm off the security team member who had thrown the concentrated acid, sending blood spraying everywhere.

The security team member screamed in agony and used the stun gun in his hand to attack the creature’s abdomen.

It was completely useless.

It only further enraged the creature, which opened its blood-stained maw and bit off the security team member’s head in one gulp. As if eating a strip of meat, it took a second bite to tear off his entire chest cavity, crunching it up and swallowing it.

Then, it let out a roar that shook the heavens and the earth.

The roar caused Li Youyi’s ears to bleed, leaving his head spinning.

At the same time, he noticed the creature had tossed the security team member’s mangled torso aside. Its eyes had turned blood-red, the long fur on its body was burning like a demon’s, and it was staring at him with a gaze full of fury.

With a physique as massive as a mountain, blood-red eyes, and sharp teeth covered in flesh and gore... anyone trapped in such a desperate situation would feel their legs go weak and their heart turn cold, collapsing to the ground in terror.

Human strength appeared far too insignificant in the face of such a ferocious beast.

They locked eyes for only a brief moment.

With a jolt, Li Youyi gritted his teeth, nimbly flipped to his feet, and sprinted toward the stairs.

In truth, a normal person fleeing for their life would retreat to the dining hall, using the security team, Cai Yutong, and the short student as human shields. You didn't need to outrun the bear-like creature; you only needed to outrun them.

Li Youyi naturally disdained such selfish and despicable behavior.

Besides, he had another plan.

He believed the bear-like creature was not without weaknesses, and he was not without the power to fight back.

Its massive size was its very weakness.

On the research ship, the corridors were narrow, and the creature couldn't maneuver at all. The stairs and the lower decks were even tighter, with even more restricted space; perhaps he could find an opportunity to counterattack.

Hearing the sounds gradually moving away, the people in the dining hall felt their despair ease slightly.

The short student hid in a corner, trembling with a mix of relief and worry: "Brother Li has lured that bear-like creature away!"

Cai Yutong climbed out of the rubble, still suffering from ringing in her ears, her long hair a mess. She looked at the security team members: "You hold weapons, why are you hiding here? Why don't you go and lend him a hand?"

The security team members looked at each other, not knowing what to say.

They were elites, but they had never faced life and death. When the shadow of death loomed, how could anyone not be afraid?

The bear-like creature could shatter the alloy hull of the ship; what use would they be if they stepped up?

A single charge would likely turn them all into blood and pulp.

Xie Jin, naturally unwilling to admit cowardice, said in a deep voice: "We were prepared to ambush it in the dining hall. Who would have thought Li Youyi would lure it elsewhere, disrupting our plan."

"Bang! Bang! Bang..."

The bear-like creature’s strength exceeded Li Youyi’s estimates. Despite the many obstacles on the research ship and the narrow corridors, they were like paper before it.

It crashed through everything; even the doors and walls were torn to pieces.

Li Youyi held his sword in one hand and grabbed the stair railing with the other, leaping to the deck below with the agility of an ape.

The next instant.

"Boom!"

The bear-like creature tore up the entire stairwell, landing on the lower deck and causing the floor to cave in.

It growled low, searching everywhere.

Hiding above a pile of mechanical equipment, Li Youyi held his sword, holding his breath and focusing his Qi. He keenly observed that the creature was bleeding. Clearly, having been hit multiple times by rifles earlier, it had suffered significant injuries.

This was undoubtedly good news!

Although the Huang Long Sword was sharp, it was a cold weapon after all, and might not pierce the creature’s hide and bone defense. But those massive eyes could certainly be pierced.

The gap in strength and speed was immense; he only had one chance.

Just as Li Youyi was about to strike, he saw the bear-like creature below suddenly look up. It had discovered him and swiped its claw at him first.

It was the scent.

A bear’s sense of smell is two thousand times that of a human.

This bear-like creature’s sense of smell was likely even sharper.

It had long since locked onto Li Youyi’s position through its sense of smell.

The creature’s claw was as large as a palm-leaf fan and carried the force of a thousand jun. Not to mention a direct hit, even if it just grazed him, Li Youyi would lose a large chunk of flesh.

Aside from its massive size making it unable to maneuver and its eyes, Li Youyi had analyzed that the creature’s third major weakness was that its intelligence had not yet evolved to the level of a human.

Otherwise, it wouldn't have only attacked the boarding hall airlock earlier, but would have sought out other entrances.

So, targeting this third weakness, the spot where Li Youyi was crouching was exactly where the research ship’s pump equipment was located.

Only by utilizing the power of machinery and the wisdom of humanity—which transcends all other creatures—did he have a chance to compete with the bear-like creature.

The moment the creature swiped its claw, Li Youyi exerted force with his legs and jumped to the side.

"Bang!"

The massive claw shattered the pump pipes.

Instantly, high-pressure seawater erupted into a column, striking the bear-like creature in the head.

Li Youyi, having landed on the ground, used his hands and feet to sprint across the floor. Just as the creature retreated to avoid the water column, its vision and sense of smell not yet recovered, he thrust his sword with precision.

The sword was like a yellow dragon, fast as lightning.

"Puchi!"

The bear-like creature’s right eye was pierced, and blood gushed out like an arrow.

A roar filled with pain, fury, and rage echoed throughout the research ship, causing the bulkheads to tremble.

Having succeeded in his strike, Li Youyi immediately fled.

But his speed was still far inferior to the bear-like creature.

The creature swung its claws wildly in its rage, and one claw grazed Li Youyi’s left arm.

With a tearing sound, the clothes on Li Youyi’s left arm were instantly shredded, and a wound deep enough to see bone appeared on his upper arm, with blood gushing out.

Li Youyi’s rapidly moving body lost its balance, thrown to the ground by the force, sliding back toward the stairs. The left half of his body was in so much pain he was about to lose consciousness.

Compared to the creature’s terrifying strength, humans were like wheat stalks, snapping at the slightest touch.

Li Youyi sat against the wall, gritting his teeth, enduring the pain. He used a strip of cloth from his torn left sleeve to bind the wound on his left arm tightly to prevent excessive blood loss.

He picked up the Huang Long Sword that had fallen to the ground.

After the bear-like creature let out a series of miserable roars and shrieks while clutching its eye, it charged at Li Youyi with extreme ferocity, wanting to tear him into pieces.

Li Youyi knew he couldn't escape; he couldn't possibly be faster than it. So, he held the sword with one hand and stood up, his gaze disdainful and cold, firm and icy.

Whether it was a ferocious beast or a demon, it could not shake his courage to fight to the death.

He let out a roar, and the moment he swung his sword with all his might.

"Whoosh—"

The blood that had spilled onto the ground from his left arm wound earlier began to steam, turning the dim corridor into a world of pale red blood mist.

The floor, the bulkheads, the pipes... everything began to rot and mold inch by inch.

Behind him, in the vast and hazy blood mist, a slender figure appeared out of thin air, dressed in an ancient-style bright red wedding dress. Her posture was tall, her jade neck slender, and she wore a jade belt.

The wedding dress was grand and luxurious, woven with golden and silver threads in a pattern of dragons and phoenixes, with lotus patterns on the cuffs and hem, the hem spreading out like phoenix wings.

But she wore a red silk veil, with copper coins hanging from the four corners, hiding the bride’s celestial face.

The entire figure was very blurry, as if illusory, beautiful yet filled with a hair-raising, eerie quality.

How did she appear?

Why had the surrounding environment become as gloomy as a ghost realm?

This ghostly bride seemed to be formed from Li Youyi’s blood, yet also like a newlywed wife eternally following behind him, invisible to everyone else. As Li Youyi swung his sword, her slender jade hand also elegantly lifted in a waving motion.

"Puchi!"

Li Youyi had already prepared himself to die under the bear-like creature’s claws, but this sword strike actually sent it flying backward several meters.

In mid-air, blood sprayed like a fountain.

A terrifying sword mark over a meter long appeared on the creature’s neck and abdomen.

Li Youyi felt as if he had exhausted all his strength, staggering backward and barely standing by leaning against the wall. He looked in horror at the bear-like creature that had crashed to the ground...

Everything felt so unreal!

"With the strength of my mortal body, how could I have sent it flying with one sword strike? What just happened?" Li Youyi gasped for air, his left arm wound beginning to bleed heavily again, his vision darkening.

The blood mist, the decay, the ghost realm, and the newlywed bride with the red veil had all vanished, as if they had never appeared.

"Roar... awoo-roar..."

The bear-like creature struggled to climb up, its roar no longer as high-pitched as before, becoming somewhat hoarse and trembling.

As it approached Li Youyi again, its steps were much slower, filled with caution.

"Junior Brother!"

Due to excessive blood loss and bone-chilling pain, Li Youyi, who was nearly fainting, heard his Senior Brother’s furious voice in his ear.

Immediately following was the roar of bullets leaving the chamber.

"Bang!"

"Bang!"

Zhao Meng was truly furious, his eyes bloodshot. He held a shotgun in both hands, pulling the trigger repeatedly, forcing the bear-like creature to roar in agony and retreat into the darkness.

"Go, let's get to the upper deck first."

While reloading and retreating, Zhao Meng pulled Li Youyi along.

The two of them, one after the other, fled toward the fourth deck where the upper deck was located.

The shotgun’s power was immense, but the bear-like creature was clearly not of a mortal breed; its defense and vitality exceeded scientific understanding, and it continued to growl low in the rear.

The two fled all the way to the boarding hall, where the airlock had been smashed into a huge hole by the creature earlier.

The raging cold wind surged in, cutting at their faces like knives.

It was so cold!

It felt like a different world compared to when there was sunlight earlier.

The blood on Li Youyi’s left shoulder wound and his soaked clothes were almost instantly freezing into ice crystals.

Zhao Meng had a military-green bag strapped to his chest, which was quite bulging, as if it contained something important. His sharp, tiger-like eyes were filled with the intent of a final farewell as he looked at Li Youyi: "Senior Brother is afraid I won't be able to take care of you from now on; you must take care of yourself."

Without looking back, Zhao Meng rushed out of the boarding hall.

He ran across the deck, vaulted over the ship’s railing, and jumped off the research ship.

Aside from saying goodbye to Li Youyi, he had not hesitated for a single moment from beginning to end.

"Senior Brother..."

Li Youyi chased after him to the deck.

Outside, the wind roared like a vengeful ghost, almost blowing people away.

He didn't know why Zhao Meng had done this, but he knew that if he didn't chase after him, this would likely be his last time seeing his Senior Brother.

Watching the figure gradually moving away on the ice field, Li Youyi’s heart sank. He also leaped over the ship’s railing, which was several meters high, falling onto the hard ice.

Hearing the sound of a heavy object hitting the ground behind him, Zhao Meng, who was dozens of meters away, stopped abruptly, turned around, and ran back.

Zhao Meng scolded angrily: "Why did you chase after me?"

"After Master died, aside from you, Senior Brother, I have no other family! If we die, we die together; if we live, we live together." Li Youyi said.

Zhao Meng’s eyes filled with hot tears, and he looked up to the heavens in helpless sorrow.

"Awoo!"

The bear-like creature’s roar came from the research ship’s deck above.

It leaped off the research ship, landing with a thud not far from Li Youyi and Zhao Meng, and began to close in step by step.

In the dim light, the bear-like creature’s teeth were snow-white and sharp, one eye scarlet, the other bleeding incessantly. The blood gushing from the meter-long sword wound connecting its neck and abdomen stained the ice red.

It was not an immortal being and was already severely injured, but its single eye was fixed on the bag on Zhao Meng’s chest.

"Fine! If we are to die, we brothers will die together today; if we are to live, we live together."

Zhao Meng raised his shotgun, his expression even more ferocious than the bear-like creature’s.

Li Youyi gripped the Huang Long Sword tightly, his gaze as sharp as the blade, like a drawn bow, ready to strike.

Suddenly.

The sound of a baby crying echoed from the seabed, low and deep, yet it spread across the entire Arctic, causing the glaciers and snow ridges to tremble slightly.

It sounded like both weeping and laughter.

To be precise, there was more than one baby’s voice, coming from different directions, eerily hair-raising.

The bear-like creature opposite them immediately showed signs of terror, trembling as it stared behind Li Youyi and Zhao Meng, prostrating itself on the ground, its previous ferocity gone.

Li Youyi and Zhao Meng slowly turned their heads.

They saw.

A baby’s head, the size of a house, hung in mid-air, with disheveled black hair. When it laughed, the corners of its mouth split open, connecting all the way to its ears.

Inside its mouth, a dark red tongue stretched for several meters.

The neck connecting the baby’s head extended like a pillar into the cold seawater.

"Bang!"

The next instant, a second baby’s head appeared, having smashed through the research ship’s deck, rising all the way to the tenth deck, as if trying to compete with the sky in height.

"Clatter!"

A third baby’s head pierced through the ice cap ten meters away, appearing behind Li Youyi and Zhao Meng, emitting a low, weeping sound.

The fourth, the fifth...

All nine of the Nine-Infant’s house-sized giant heads emerged from the sea, hanging in the air, terrifying and awe-inspiring. Long, scaly necks like tentacles wrapped around the research ship, squeezing it until it gradually deformed and shattered.

The massive body hidden in the seawater flipped the gradually shattering research ship onto its side.

On the ship, screams, wails, and the sound of heavy objects rolling continued to ring out.

Before this, Li Youyi had not known of the Nine-Infant’s existence. Seeing this scene, as if trapped in a ghost-ridden world of dancing demons, his heart suffered an unprecedented shock.

Seeing all nine pairs of the Nine-Infant’s bone-green eyes fixed on him, while fear filled his heart, Zhao Meng smiled bitterly to himself: "Thinking that carrying the Buddha’s sarira could lure away the disaster—it turns out it was wishful thinking from the start; I shouldn't have held onto any luck."

All of the Nine-Infant’s heads were laughing eerily, and like nine pythons, they rushed toward Zhao Meng with lightning speed.

"Whoosh!"

Whether it was Li Youyi’s blood soaking the Dao Ancestor Taiji Fish or some other reason, this token of the Chan Gate Sect Leader, worn around his neck, suddenly erupted with a dazzling cyan light.

The cyan light was like a gorgeous and magnificent Arctic aurora, shooting straight into the heavens, instantly filling the world.

The Nine-Infant attacking Zhao Meng let out sharp, strange cries from all nine mouths simultaneously, actually frightened back by the cyan light erupting from the Dao Ancestor Taiji Fish.

At the same time.

The bag strapped to Zhao Meng’s chest trembled violently and ignited.

Inside the bag, the golden coffin and silver coffin containing the Buddha’s sarira shattered, and a red light flew out, colliding with the Dao Ancestor Taiji Fish around Li Youyi’s neck.

Brothers, you are too amazing. Old Yu took a look; first day of the book, number one on the sales chart, number one on the trending search, and about eighty thousand collections.

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 8 =====