Chapter 585: Tongue
Now I understand, this is definitely not me. I am seeing his actions from someone else’s perspective. This is no longer a sweet dream, but a nightmare, a prophetic dream I have whenever Older Brother Jayad isn’t by my side.
It seems the Dream Card still cannot stop me from having nightmares. After trying lying in Via’s coffin to block inspiration, this second attempt has also proven futile. It appears that for now, there’s no other way to stop the prophetic dreams from coming except by having Older Brother Jayad hold me while I sleep.
However, when I first attached the Dream Card, I undoubtedly entered a sweet dream. While resting on the beach, my mind and spirit were indeed recovering. When I took off my clothes, I also confirmed that it was my own body.
So, when did I go from a sweet dream to a nightmare? And when did my own body transform into this soft, boneless, fish-like skinned Water Ghost?
This body doesn’t obey my commands at all. It crawls like a snake through the ship’s ventilation pipes, with extreme speed, and it constantly uses a special type of listening to pinpoint the locations of creatures on the ship.
Each time, it can only confirm a person’s location, not track them. Therefore, it needs to repeatedly locate them to determine their movement trajectory. Soon, it locked onto a small team.
It was a five-person team, currently moving from a corridor towards the stern of the ship. This was a necessary path. Above the corridor, on the exhaust pipe, there was a ventilation opening blocked by a filter screen.
I first removed the filter screen and then quietly lay down in the ventilation pipe, facing the weak humans passing below. Not long after, they arrived, still talking.
“Damn it! Those Black-Robed people, they look down on us and tell us to stay on the ship and not come over. This is our warship!”
“Get real, I wish they wouldn’t come over, but the Major won’t allow it. He says this is our warship and we must retake it. Who knows how many Mutants are still on board.”
“We’re only responsible for ensuring the safety of the engine room. Hurry up. Once we get there, we’ll close the doors and wait for reinforcements.”
A team of soldiers wearing Santander Navy uniforms walked beneath the ventilation pipe, speaking as they scanned their surroundings. But it seemed they always forgot to look up, or perhaps the ventilation pipe was too small and too high up. They glanced quickly and felt there was no danger.
However, as they passed, I could only watch as the main perspective locked onto each of the five individuals, yes, individually. It felt exactly like when I used compound eyes.
A drop of thick saliva fell onto a soldier’s shoulder. He touched it in confusion, “Strange, is there an oil leak here? And it smells so bad.”
Just as they were almost all past, and the last person was passing, a long tongue suddenly extended down. I am certain that a normal person would never have such a snake-like tongue, especially with a small mouth at the tip of the tongue, which also had four sharp fangs.
The tongue shot out like a poisonous snake leaving its den, instantly biting the last soldier’s neck. Before he could cry out, it wrapped around his neck and blocked his mouth, muffling his cries for help.
Then the tongue retracted. A soldier of adult weight was actually lifted and dangled in mid-air, his hands and feet kicking in a death struggle.
All of this happened silently. From choosing the attack location, waiting in the shadows for the enemy to fall into the trap, to suddenly launching an assassination attack on the last person, the person I foresaw made no sound at all. He was undoubtedly a skilled and deadly hunter.
And I experienced this hunt from a first-person perspective throughout the entire process, including extending the tongue and controlling the mouth on the tongue to bite people. I could feel it all personally, even though I don’t actually have such organs.
As for this feeling, I can only say it’s disgusting. I want to vomit, but this body doesn’t feel disgusted at all; instead, it feels very excited. This contradiction makes me even more uncomfortable.
It sucked the fresh blood of its prey with the mouthparts on its tongue, and it became stronger by consuming the blood. This was also an experience I had never had before.
This should have been a perfect kill, but the strangled soldier, in his death throes, dropped his knife, which fell to the ground with a clanging sound.
“What?!” The four soldiers in front turned around and saw this terrifying scene: their companion was entangled by a tongue like an alien’s and was being dangled, his head pulled into the ventilation pipe.
“What is this? What kind of monster?!” “Is it a snake?” “Why are we discussing this, attack!” “But how do we attack? We might hurt our teammate!” “He’s already dead, attack anyway!”
Chaos erupted below. They were completely clueless. Soon, scattered gunshots rang out. Many bullets hit the soldiers, and a few hit the ventilation pipe. However, these bullets lost most of their power after penetrating the pipe, and they caused no pain or injury when they hit.
Then he released his tongue, and the unfortunate soldier fell to the ground. He was still twitching, but with so much blood loss, he was destined to die.
Then the monster moved forward rapidly. Even moving at high speed in such a narrow ventilation pipe, it made only a faint sound. Its body seemed to have a layer of oil reducing friction.
The soldiers below felt something above them but didn’t know where it went. I, however, could continuously track their positions through listening.
The moment they turned their backs, the monster suddenly emerged from a ventilation opening and swung a large pressure clamp down at the backs of these unfortunate souls.
The outcome was self-evident. In less than a minute, a Navy squad was wiped out. The scene was exceptionally bloody. Some were twisted grotesquely, some had their heads exploded, and one was even split in half.
I’m almost used to it now. I’ve also given up on the idea of controlling this body with my consciousness. I am just an observer, unable to change anything.
Although another squad of soldiers was killed, the sounds of combat here exposed his location. Surrounding soldiers converged again, so he immediately sprinted to the next area.
Along the way, I saw the tragic state of this warship. Every few steps, I saw fallen soldiers, flowing fresh blood, and signs of combat everywhere. Unlike on Sturgeon No. 3, where things had rotted, the blood here hadn’t congealed; it was still slowly flowing.
Finally, the monster charged into the engine room. Unlike Sturgeon No. 3’s single steam furnace, this warship had three huge steam boilers, with coal-fired furnaces below.
He lunged at a Black-Robed Person who was inspecting the steam engine. Only when he turned around did I realize it was an acquaintance. He wore a white mask and held a chainsaw sword in his hand.
