Chapter Nine: Blazing Fist Radiance

The lights in the front hall began to flicker intermittently.

In the wavering gloom, Liu Huadong squirmed on the floor, his entire skin swelling as if something within him was struggling to break free.

Crack.

Crack.

Crack…

The sounds of bones shifting out of place and fabric tearing grew ever more intense, an increasingly terrifying and shocking spectacle.

Li Can had no idea what was unfolding before his eyes, but reason told him that if he delayed any longer, things might become even more dangerous.

He couldn’t be bothered to wipe away the sweat trickling into his eyes. Raising the kitchen knife, he brought it down hard on Liu Huadong’s head.

The blade whistled through the air, striking the back of Liu Huadong’s skull with brutal force.

But the expected spray of blood did not appear.

Instead, a metallic clang rang out—the knife had struck something like metal, and was bounced away, its edge warped and ruined in an instant!

Li Can’s hand went numb from the impact, but before he could regain his footing, a slender black shadow whipped toward him, striking his shoulder squarely.

With a heavy thud, the force sent him flying backward, his spine slamming into the edge of the table. He winced in agony, saliva dribbling from his lips.

At the same time, Liu Huadong’s skin finally burst apart completely.

Shed fragments of his skin revealed a reddish-brown form beneath, and the black shadow that had attacked was attached near the base of his spine.

Li Can’s eyes narrowed.

So he hadn’t been seeing things earlier—that really was a tail!

The tail was as thick as an arm, its surface covered in dense, scale-like armor.

“To think you’d force my true form out… I underestimated you,” came a guttural, hoarse voice as the light steadied. Before them crouched a creature unlike any Li Can had ever seen or heard of—a four-legged monstrosity, crawling close to the ground. Its head was broad and flat, encased in bone, its mouth bristling with sharp teeth.

Four black, pupil-less eyes were set at the joints of its forelegs.

Its back was covered in gray bristles, hiding a row of sharp bony spines.

Most bizarre of all, beneath its forearms, gill-like slits reminiscent of a shark pulsed with each breath, oozing black fluid.

A wave of loathsome, oppressive evil began to fill the room.

“Are you afraid?” the creature asked, its tail sweeping the wall and gouging out a huge patch of plaster, even wrenching out a sliver of rebar with its armored scales—a testament to its immense strength.

Afraid?

He should be, shouldn’t he?

Who could remain calm in the face of such a monstrous being?

Li Can moistened his parched lips.

Where, in the end, had the black dot of antimatter gone?

What did it truly mean to become the agent of a god?

Suddenly, everything that had eluded him before seemed clear.

The answer did not come from speculation, but from the intense, instinctive repulsion Li Can felt upon seeing Liu Huadong’s true form.

It was like meeting a natural enemy.

His blood began to boil.

Whoosh.

At that moment, the creature’s tail whipped toward him with a slicing sound.

Li Can didn’t dare be careless and rolled right, evading perfectly.

“I must say, for a human, your physique and reflexes are astonishing!” the creature hissed through jaws dripping with viscous saliva, as though it were a predator savoring the anticipation of a meal.

Li Can ignored it, leaping up and dodging another swipe of the tail, maneuvering closer to the beast.

The creature seemed to realize his intent and made no move to evade.

Li Can’s eyelids twitched, but there was no turning back now. Clutching the ruined kitchen knife, he drove its tip down toward the monster’s skull.

Thud.

The creature’s head slammed into the floor, the force of the impact making the entire hall tremble faintly.

From the kitchen came the clatter of a wok dropping.

Li Can’s hands froze in their chopping motion; but on closer inspection, the blade hadn’t even pierced the creature’s skin. Bent and deformed, it was stuck fast in the white bone encasing the monster’s flesh.

“Hah…” the creature exhaled a cold breath, its jaw pressed to the floor as it slowly raised its head.

“Such ferocity… but alas, you cannot break my hide. It’s all in vain.”

With the last word, it opened its cavernous maw, lunging for Li Can’s head.

At such close range, he could see worm-like tendrils writhing in its mouth. Each one split open at the tip, and from each fissure, new tentacles were growing—a sight to make the skin crawl.

Li Can dropped his hips, leaning back just in time to evade the bite—only to see the creature raise a massive claw and bring it down on him.

His balance was off; he had no way to dodge, and could only watch as the paw slammed into his chest.

Bang.

The monster’s strength far exceeded what it had been as ‘Liu Huadong’. The blow nearly tore Li Can apart, three bloody gashes opening on his chest, blood welling from the wounds.

“Hmm?” The injuries were obvious, but the creature was surprised. By its reckoning, even an ox would have been shattered by such a blow!

But that was of little consequence.

Compared to the delectable Su Rui, the young man lying on the ground before it seemed even more appetizing!

It hadn’t eaten in months.

With that thought, the monster opened its jaws wide again, sticky saliva stretching in strands between its fangs.

It bit down.

At that moment, as death loomed, Li Can suddenly sensed a fiery current surging in his right hand.

But there was no time to investigate—he clenched his teeth and struck out with his fist.

…

A flash of white light.

Everything stopped.

…

Who could have imagined that the monster impervious to even a kitchen knife would have its skull shattered by Li Can’s desperate punch?

The beast collapsed limply, the last trace of excitement still lingering in the four eyes at its joints.

It died without ever realizing what had happened.

Too fast—everything happened too fast.

Li Can stared dumbly at his fist. Aside from a slight heat, it seemed utterly ordinary.

“What just happened?” he muttered, rubbing his chest as he stood. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed the phone lying on the farthest table.

He had deliberately left the camera running earlier to gather evidence of Liu Huadong’s motive for murder.

Picking up the phone, he stopped the recording and played it back, skipping to the end of the timeline.

He watched the screen intently…

At the moment he threw that final punch, a burst of flame erupted from his fist—the same color as that white sphere of light!

“So the light wasn’t what made my body stronger,” Li Can mused, studying his right hand with curiosity. He was pondering how to summon the white flame at will when the monster’s corpse suddenly began to pour forth thick black vapor.

Wherever the vapor touched—be it the ruined kitchen knife, the wooden furniture, or the walls—subtle changes appeared, as though they were coming alive.

Li Can’s expression grew strange—not out of fear, but because he felt an overwhelming urge to devour every wisp of that black vapor.

It was a natural sensation, like hunger drawing one to food.

Pop, pop.

As if responding to his desire, the vanished white flame reappeared suddenly in his palm.

It slowly formed into a vortex.

The suction began.

(To be continued…)