Master of the Starry Sky

At the moment of collapse, the octopus creature entwined its seven tentacles, forming a living shield around its body, while its primary limb gripped the massive iron cudgel tightly, pushing aside the boulder crashing down upon its head. The main tentacle then twisted relentlessly, wielding the cudgel to batter the stone.

Lizhui had initially intended to annihilate the beast with a cluster grenade, but after securing the explosives, he abruptly reconsidered. To everyone's astonishment, he resolved to capture the octopus alive.

Feng Sun'er gasped, "Big Brother, I think that plan is utterly absurd!"

"Indeed, it's a foolish scheme," Lizhui smiled, "which is why you all must keep your distance. Now, let's proceed."

"No, I won't leave. You helped me before; now it's my turn to help you," Sun'er declared firmly.

Lizhui felt a warm current ripple through his heart. In these times, those who understand gratitude are rarer than phoenix feathers and unicorn horns. Yet, he resolutely declined, knowing she would scarcely withstand even a single strike from the octopus beast.

Lizhui wedged the cluster grenade into a narrow crevice above the small cave, deftly removing each safety cap. With meticulous care, he tied fine cloth strips to the pull rings of the pins, then bound them together onto a single rope.

Gripping the rope, he withdrew into the great fissure, stopping roughly seven meters from the entrance, where he found a precarious spot to conceal himself. Behind him, closely pressed against his back, stood She Yaoyao—her breath quickened with a mixture of excitement and apprehension.

The moment the explosion thundered through the cave, Lizhui hurled himself into the stream channel, plunging downward with the tumbling rocks. From his elevated position, he descended directly above the octopus monster.

The iron cudgel had already carved a gaping cleft in the stone. Seizing the momentum of his fall, Lizhui raised his miner's pick high and brought it down with ferocious force. The blade drove deep into the tentacle.

The creature let out a howl of pain, instantly releasing its grip on the iron cudgel. As it recoiled its tentacle, the pick remained firmly lodged, anchoring it in place.

Infuriated, the beast lashed out violently, flinging Lizhui through the air with the force of a sledgehammer.

At that exact instant, Yaoyao struck. Her dual claw hammers drove into the tentacle, and with a sharp twist, twin bursts echoed—*thump, thump*—and the limb, thick as a man's thigh, burst like an overinflated tire.

The creature's nasal vents whistled furiously as it yanked its tentacles back, tearing free from the embedded hammers.

By then, Lizhui had recovered and lunged forward once more, seizing the haft of his pick and yanking the tentacle taut. Blood welled up into his throat, but he forced it down with grim resolve.

As though reading his mind, Yaoyao sprang into action. Without a word, she raised her claw hammer and struck wildly along the edge of the embedded blade. The tentacle, under the relentless barrage, was finally severed.

Though the monster managed to retract what remained of its primary tentacle, it was now incomplete. The loss did not cripple its combat ability, but deprived of the iron cudgel, its threat level was significantly diminished.

Lizhui understood this with crystal clarity. Instead of pressing the attack, he turned toward the fallen weapon. Hoisting the massive cudgel onto his shoulder, he exerted all his remaining strength to lift it—at the cost of vomiting a mouthful of blood.

His entire body trembled as he staggered forward a few paces before collapsing, both man and cudgel plunging into the stream below. Yaoyao rushed to his side without hesitation.

"Forget about me—hurry, climb up and lower the iron chain!" Lizhui urged anxiously.

By now, the octopus beast was seething with fury. Its eight tentacles braced against the ground, its massive body straining upward in a desperate attempt to break free from the crushing weight of the stones.

Yet its physiology was not built for brute endurance. While its tentacles could lash and entangle with fearsome power, they were ill-suited for bearing such weight. After a frenzied bout of thrashing, the creature suddenly fell still. It had begun to evolve once more.

Roughly ten meters up along the great fissure, the trio had fashioned a resting ledge using a natural recess in the rock. Fastening the iron cudgel with chains, Yaoyao and Suyaner heaved from above while Lizhui pushed from below. It took the combined strength of all three to haul the 300-tg behemoth to the ledge.

Though the severed tentacle was merely the tip, it still matched the size of a grown man's foot—more than enough to serve as a hearty meal, especially discounting the humanoid salamander.

Lizhui, following the same procedure as before, extracted juice from the octopus flesh to feed Yongzi. Then, without hesitation, he devoured several pounds himself. Naturally, Yaoyao and Huozi feasted eagerly as well—only Suyaner refused to touch it, not even allowing the meat near her lips.

"I'll go clear the way," she snapped, her tone sharp with irritation, and vanished into the streambed ahead.

Lizhui simply shrugged, indifferent to her inexplicable anger. He carved off a large chunk of meat for later and distributed the rest to the humanoid salamanders.

The silence beneath the stone pile grew increasingly unsettling. A gnawing doubt crept into Lizhui's mind—had his decision been a grievous mistake?

Below, the octopus monster was altering its form. This time, it chose to evolve by shrinking. Rapidly expelling water and converting fat reserves, it reduced its body mass with astonishing speed.

Though embedded with human genes and vaguely humanoid in form, it possessed no skeletal structure. As its body shrank, the stone heap lost its grip.

In under ten minutes, the creature wriggled free. Yet it had learned its lesson—rather than returning to its former size, it continued to contract, now focusing on defense. It reinforced not just its outer skin and musculature, but even its internal organs.

Through his infrared binoculars, Lizhui detected this new threat and quickly distributed gas masks. Once everyone was protected, he detonated a tear gas grenade.

To their surprise, the beast neither flailed in confusion nor fled. Instead, it launched a full assault.

But this time, the monster fought with cunning. It used its tentacles to grip large stones, hurling them like catapults toward the upper fissure.

With a deafening boom, one boulder shattered against the walls, causing part of the cliffside to collapse. Lizhui couldn't help but mutter praise under his breath—this creature was extraordinary. His resolve to capture it only deepened.

The beast fired off eight stone "shots" in rapid succession, like a living ballista. Though the spectacle was formidable, it lacked precision. The stones clattered off the narrow, winding fissure walls, unable to cause real harm.

Sensing the futility, the octopus monster shifted tactics once again. It now seized stones as large as serving platters, and began smashing them with force against the mouth of the fissure.

A large section of the cliff face crumbled, the stone it hurled shattered to pieces. Forced to select new projectiles, the beast grew increasingly irritable with each failed attempt—until once again, it began to transform.

Seeing the octopus monster fall unnervingly silent, Lizhui feared it might attempt to flee. Gritting his teeth, he resorted to a desperate gambit. From the leather sheath at his side, he drew a long awl—an improvised weapon fashioned from a screwdriver during his captivity in the core zone.

With no hesitation, he drove the awl deep into his right calf. When he pulled it free, a dark, round hole was left behind, blood quickly trickling down into the stream.

The crimson trail surged toward the octopus monster's feet, and upon catching the potent scent of his enemy's blood, the creature immediately opened its grotesque mouth and began to ravenously s*ck.

Almost at once, it realized that the blood—this enemy's blood—transformed into blazing energy the moment it entered its gullet.

A thrilled hum resonated from its nostrils. The octopus reversed its body, turning the gaping mouth skyward. Two tentacles scouted ahead, four latched to the cave walls for support, while the remaining two coiled into a defensive ring.

The pair of tentacles lashed the stone like whips, crack-crack, as it cautiously advanced. When it reached the shallow depression in the rock, it froze.

It had been buried alive once already. It had lost a limb. It would not fall for the same trap again so easily. And yet—that blood. That intoxicating, maddening blood!

Temptation finally triumphed over fear. Inch by inch, the creature slithered forward, its six limbs feeling out the walls. With its hyper-sensitive hearing, it clearly registered the rhythmic tapping of someone chiseling just ten meters ahead.

The stream washed over it, bearing not only grit and pebbles but the maddening scent of blood—so close it could almost taste it—yet just out of reach.

Driven by primal desire, the octopus plunged into the hollow.

By the streambed, a blood-smeared undershirt, pinned beneath a rock, lay in wait. The beast latched onto it with a tentacle, raised it to its nostrils for inspection, and once satisfied, shoved it greedily into its maw.

In that very instant, it caught the thunderous sound of a heartbeat—then, like a lightning strike, its entire body spasmed. All eight limbs thrust outward. In a blink, the creature shot out of the hollow—

—only to be met by a whistling bolt. An armor-piercing arrow had already pierced its skull.

Lizhui had studied its behavior closely. Every element of this ambush had been carefully prepared. Using his own blood to bait the beast, he had taken up Yongzi's climbing crossbow and scaled the top of the great fissure.

From a natural crevice, he had carved a sniper's niche with his nail puller. Meanwhile, Suyaner and Yaoyao chipped away at a false trail up ahead to divert attention. The earlier use of tear gas had masked their scent, leaving only the blood trail in the water for the monster to follow.

What Lizhui hadn't expected was that the creature wasn't hunting for vengeance—it was hunting for his blood.

At the rear of the bolt was a locking ring, which Lizhui had fastened to a chromium-molybdenum steel chain—the other end secured to his belt.

It was, by all accounts, a suicidal maneuver. As the beast lunged to flee, Lizhui was yanked along like a ragdoll, dragged through the air in a torrent of motion.

After the cave-in, the tunnel had narrowed so tightly that only one person could crawl through at a time. Even with its shrunken form, the monster's trunk was still thrice the width of a man's—but normally, that wouldn't have been an issue. It could contort through almost anything.

But not now. Not with the arrow embedded in its skull, jamming it squarely into the bottleneck.

This tri-bladed steel bolt had a tungsten-alloy head and a shaft of stainless steel wrapped in carbon fiber. Its spiraled tip bored into the creature's neural nexus like a drill, shredding it into pulp.

Had it struck the torso, the beast might have yanked it out with its tentacles, even at the cost of tearing open a massive wound. But with its nervous system in ruins, the monster was now little more than a blind, blundering husk.

Using the momentum of his chain-bound ride, Lizhui twisted hard, wrapping the steel link around one of the tentacles. Then he did it again. And again.

Tentacle after tentacle lashed back reflexively—only to pull the bindings tighter, until seven limbs were hopelessly entangled in a web of steel. Only the primary limb remained free.

Lizhui was dragged into the fray, the steel chain binding him fast. But he had anticipated this—he had tied the belt and chain together with rope, not steel. The rope snapped under the strain, setting him free.

Seizing the moment, he leapt into the air, drew his awl, and drove it with savage force into the base of the last free tentacle, burying the blade to the hilt. The limb recoiled in fury, lashing toward his back—but he twisted, narrowly dodging the strike.

He landed firmly atop the monster's heaving body. The primary tentacle swept in again. This time, he did not dodge. Drawing his nail puller, gripping it with both hands, he spun into the strike—the curved steel teeth sinking deep into flesh.

In the same instant, the limb struck him full force, slamming him into the rock wall. Dust and shards exploded outward. And within him, a roaring power surged to life.

"Heeyah!" With a thunderous roar, he vaulted through the air and landed astride the creature's primary tentacle. Both hands gripped the hammer's handle—one swift twist—*rip!* A gaping wound tore open across the flesh.

The tentacle recoiled instantly, attempting to constrict him. But with lightning speed, Li Zhui drove his right hand deep into the gash, clutching a handful of raw, writhing muscle.

"Open!" he bellowed again, yanking the hammer with his left. The hooked head tore through the flesh like a steel plow, ripping open a wound over a foot long.

The octopus beast, in its death throes, concentrated all its remaining strength into that main tentacle. It suddenly spun in a full 360-degree twist and lashed out violently, flinging Li Zhui into a narrow crevice overhead.

Though grievously wounded, the beast's brute strength remained terrifying.

At that very moment, She Yaoyao arrived like a tempest. Using her downward momentum, she spun gracefully in midair, her python tail snapping across the exposed wound of the tentacle with a deafening *crack.*

The primary tentacle curled reflexively in pain. Seizing the moment, Yaoyao rolled sideways, her claw hammer slamming down hard into the quivering mass.

Almost simultaneously, Li Zhui slithered out from the crevice like an eel. Though his hammer had slipped from his grasp, he still had a spike tucked in his tool belt. But instead of drawing it, he hurled himself at the wounded tentacle and locked it in a desperate embrace.

"Yaoyao, break it!"

With a wrench and a twist, Yaoyao yanked her hammer free. Then, with a savage howl, she brought it crashing down again and again—twelve furious blows in all—until the three thigh-thick strands of the main tentacle were severed cleanly at the base.

Still unsatisfied, she sprang to her feet and raised the hammer high above her head, aiming straight for the monster's skull.

"Wait! Stop!" Li Zhui leapt up, seizing her arm.

"Yaoyao, spare it. I want to keep it... as a pet."