Her Tentacles 47

Chapter 47: Lin Ran

Lin Jingshu walked toward Shu Yao step by step.

During this time, countless jellyfish paved the way for her. The poisonous stinging tentacles of the jellyfish, like fine threads, wrapped around the black and red tentacles that were blocking the way, and hundreds of different combinations of neurotoxins were poured into Lin Ran’s body.

Even though the [Monarch Slayer] had already increased her resistance to these poisons in her several battles with them, after the special selection of the Styx jellyfish, the ones summoned to appear in the sea near the cruise ship this time were precisely the varieties she had not encountered before.

The tentacles, which had been full of killing intent and swift in their movements, gradually became sluggish and even listless as they blocked Lin Jingshu’s path.

【Girl—girlfriend…】

【Don’t…】

Even the noisy, childish voices that had appeared in Shu Yao’s mind before now became hoarse, like a sick child, weak and powerless.

Her expression couldn’t help but become even more bewildered. She subconsciously retreated. Even though she smelled the salty sea breeze mixed with the smell of blood blowing in from the broken glass window, and was now facing this scene of a giant beast battle, she still didn’t want to accept that all of this was real—

If they were all hallucinations, then she could also not believe what Lin Jingshu said.

It’s all fake.

It’s all fake.

Although she thought so, the light in her eyes was wavering, like a stubborn believer who, even if the temple collapsed and the pillars shattered, would still stubbornly believe what she believed—

However, this expression, in the eyes of the [Martyr], only made her seem cute, because with just a little more force, she could crush Shu Yao’s layer of self-deception, just like crushing the glass shell of those greenhouse flowers.

“Alright.”

Several gray-black fine gauzes wrapped around the last colorful tentacle that was bluffing and surrounding Shu Yao, tightening and pulling it aside. When she finally met her without any obstacles, Lin Jingshu showed a smile, snapped her fingers at her, and a strange light lit up in her black pupils:

“Since you don’t believe what I said, then you can feel it for yourself.”

“Feel the truest form of your girlfriend.”

The unique illusionary realm of the Styx jellyfish enveloped Shu Yao like a nightmare.

…

Shu Yao suddenly returned to the afternoon when she was followed by Wu Li.

She had run home from the subway station at the fastest speed. The moment she closed the door, locked it, and leaned against it to breathe, a “bang bang bang” sound exploded from behind her, and the door was also shaken by the force of the blows.

The almost forgotten terrifying experience was replayed in front of her once again.

Shu Yao found that her mind was still blank. She could only tremble and take out her phone, trying to call the police—

But the moment her gaze fell on the phone screen, her vision rose infinitely, through her body, over the rooftop, and became a view of this tall building from the sky.

And because of this.

She finally saw Wu Li, who had squeezed out of the small window of the stairwell in a strange form, climbing up to the rooftop on all fours like a spider, standing in front of the rooftop door, wanting to enter her home from another path.

The next second after he put his hand on the doorknob.

A black and red, colorful tentacle appeared from behind like lightning and pierced through his head.

Shu Yao followed the tentacle and saw Lin Ran, dressed in a white coat, standing on the edge of the rooftop.

Her thoughts were in a daze.

She suddenly remembered more.

For example, on the day Lin Ran came to the school to find her, Wu Li, who had been staring at her with terrifying eyes from the audience, had shown symptoms of heatstroke when Lin Ran looked over, and had even fled in a panic.

And for example, the day after she was followed, Wu Li never came to work again. Later, the police investigation came to nothing, and the case could only be closed as a disappearance.

So he hadn’t disappeared.

He was already dead.

Bones and all, along with the monster that had been living inside him, had entered her girlfriend’s stomach.

But this was only the beginning of the illusion.

Next, Shu Yao was pulled back to the day she entered the industrial park. She and Situ Jin were groping in the dark, holding hands and slowly descending the endless stairs of the unfinished building.

Her vision was also constantly being pulled upwards—

While the two of them were groping for a path in the dark, flames erupted in the industrial park.

In the dust of the leaping flames, a black and red, colorful tentacle wrapped around a figure with countless semi-circular, ethereal fleshy wings spread out on its back. Then, other tentacles eagerly came forward and tore off the sea slug’s fleshy wings, piece by piece.

Human blood, monster blood…

Limbs, bones, were all torn to pieces.

And Lin Ran, bathed in it, closed her eyes, her expression exceptionally pleased and calm, letting the tentacles behind her extend and dance, devouring this delicious human, who had almost perfectly merged with a monster, bit by bit.

It was at this moment.

Shu Yao remembered that Lin Ran had unhesitatingly let her and her split up to find people. But after the special department personnel arrived with the Situ couple and entered this area, they could no longer find the monster that had been chasing Situ Jin.

And Lin Ran had walked out of the ruins with some people.

It was said that not long after she had separated from her, she had been accidentally knocked unconscious by a brick, and didn’t know what had happened during this time until these people came to rescue her.

But for many days after leaving that industrial park.

There had been no more incidents of monsters eating people in Nancheng. The special experience that had once made the citizens panic, and had even made them feel like they were participating in a random lottery every time they saw a faucet, had also slowly faded from people’s memories.

So it was also because.

This monster was already dead.

“Are you glad?” Lin Jingshu’s voice echoed throughout the world, with a hint of a smile that reached the depths of her mind. “Every time, the one parasitized by a monster is never someone by your side.”

“Have you ever thought that if you had arrived a little later that day, for example, if the traffic on the national highway had been more severe, or if the driver had driven a little slower, even if it was just five minutes, things would have been completely different—”

…

Time flew backwards.

Shu Yao and Lin Ran were once again standing in front of the building where they had found Situ Jin. But this time, the girl in the white dress, with half of her face covered in the monster’s transparent fleshy leaves, was smiling at her from below:

“You’re late.”

She stretched out her arm, her clasped palms choking another person’s neck—

It was Situ Jin.

Shu Yao’s eyes were about to burst. Even though she knew all of this was an illusion, she couldn’t help but cry out, “Jin!”

She rushed into the building without hesitation, running with all her might, as if she had already guessed what would happen next. If she could just run faster, a little harder, she could avoid the out-of-control ending.

But this time, when she ran all the way up to the top, she did not meet her good friend who had come down to meet her.

“Jin!!”

Her voice echoed throughout the abandoned building.

A strong feeling of having lost something important welled up in her heart. She looked around the floor where the monster had been, but could only see the empty floor paved with rebar and cement.

The wind from the night blew from all directions, chilling her to the bone.

She stood on this platform, alone, until the night swallowed the entire industrial park.

Boom—

Until an explosion occurred in the distance, and the firelight once again briefly illuminated the dark night.

She turned her head, and in the teetering building, her vision was so clear that she once again saw the white-robed figure wrapped in tentacles in the center of the firelight. The slender and thin human body was so fragile compared to the monster’s tentacles, and even the torn pieces of symbiotic fleshy leaves were just like the tin foil that was easily peeled off when roasting meat.

And this time, that person turned her head, and the face that was revealed was Situ Jin’s.

She looked at Shu Yao from afar, and from such a great distance, her lips moved, and she silently asked her: What took you so long?

Shu Yao couldn’t help but shake her head. She opened her mouth to call her name, and tears couldn’t help but fall. “Jin, Jin…”

In the swaying high-rise building, she wanted to run toward Situ Jin, to try and stop all of this, but the falling stones around her, and the spreading smoke and dust, always stopped her from getting close.

Until the last piece was about to hit her head, but was caught by a tentacle that came through the thick fog.

She was saved again. She would always be saved. But what did that matter?

This time, she couldn’t run to Situ Jin’s side.

“Lin Ran! Lin Ran!”

“No, no, don’t… it won’t be like this! It won’t be like this!”

She could only cry out in despair to her girlfriend, who had always been so obedient to her, as if that would stop this tragedy from happening, and as if that would wake her up from this terrifying illusion.

Of course, she couldn’t escape this dream.

As tears streamed down her face, more possibilities appeared before her—

For example, she had missed the SOS message from Situ Jin, and couldn’t stop Lin Ran and Lin Jingshu from having a private chat in the alley. In that dim alley, they would keep walking forward, to a place Shu Yao couldn’t see.

And then.

Her gentle girlfriend would once again, with the speed of lightning, extend her tentacles and pierce into this human’s brain. “You seem to have the scent of a very sweet food on you. Would you mind letting me see who it is?”

A short while later.

Only Lin Ran walked out of the alley and returned to Shu Yao. Her girlfriend walked toward her gently, held her face, and said with a smile, “Your ex-girlfriend just promised me that she will never bother you again.”

Of course she won’t.

Shu Yao thought in a daze, because she is also dead.

Noticing that her expression was not right, Lin Ran touched her forehead with the back of her hand. “What’s wrong? Are you not feeling well?”

She shook her head in a daze, opened her mouth to say something, but was like a goldfish that had been scooped out of the water, and could only open and close her lips futilely.

She stepped back, one step at a time.

And Lin Ran, who had seen her sitting with Lin Jingshu and the blind date at the steaming hot pot table, naturally couldn’t bear her escape.

The moment she turned around—

Several black and red tentacles stretched out in the sunlight, surrounding and entangling her.

And then.

The [Monarch Slayer] revealed its original form, and sent her into its mouth, cherishing her in its own unique dark space. A voice came from outside to inside:

“Don’t leave me, girlfriend.”

“Wouldn’t it be nice if we were together forever?”

Shu Yao did not enter the monster’s stomach and would not be digested, but she could also never escape from this place. From then on, her breath, her voice, her warmth, would only be known to the [Monarch Slayer] who had eaten her.

…

On the cruise ship, in the corner of the completely shattered cabin.

The shallow-haired woman, at some point, had lost even the strength to stand and had fallen to the cold ground. Her light-colored pupils were unfocused, unable to focus. And around her, everywhere were the traces of the monster’s bloody battle.

The corpses of the jellyfish, human blood, deformed steel, and the sofa and bed that were so broken that the cotton stuffing was flying everywhere…

“Yaoyao!”

A very powerful voice reached her ears.

Shu Yao dazedly moved her head with this voice. The illusion, in which all her friends were dead and even she was trapped in an endless dark cage, seemed to show signs of loosening. “…Jin?”

She murmured.

The sound of the helicopter’s blades sounded in the sky.

In mid-air, a very powerful steel fork was fired toward Lin Jingshu in front of her. This made the Styx jellyfish, who was not good at direct combat, a little unhappy. She “tsked,” and fortunately, she could spare a part of her black gauze stinging tentacles to block this attack.

Just as the light gauze entangled the cold weapon shot from the helicopter, a huge black and red tentacle that had been fighting against it broke and fell right in front of Shu Yao.

The brilliant and vivid red part had darkened a lot, and only the black was more terrifying.

Her whole body trembled. When she came back to her senses, the broken tentacle was right in front of her. Her face was pale, and her palms were on the ground, as if she had seen a ghost and wanted to avoid it—

Instantly.

More tentacles surrounded her, picked up the tentacle that had made her afraid, and Shu Yao watched as they sent this tentacle into the mouth of a giant octopus.

Lin Ran’s human form had long since disappeared. At this moment, what was revealed in front of her was a deep-sea octopus with silver rectangular pupils, its size as large as a dozen-story building.

Unable to eat those specially “seasoned” jellyfish for replenishment, the [Monarch Slayer], who could only begin to self-devour, looked at her with the eyes of its original body.

【Yaoyao.】

The voice that came through the biological signal was still so gentle.

Shu Yao couldn’t help but cry just by hearing it. But in the scene just now, the monster that had called her with such a gentle voice had also eaten Situ Jin, who had merged with a sea slug, and had eaten the ordinary Lin Jingshu, who was just stained with the monster’s scent… Now, this octopus was even eating itself.

She really couldn’t tell the difference between illusion and reality anymore.

Just like the flowers that were kept in the beautiful jars at home, as the glass jars shattered, they could only fall into the dust of reality and accept the cruel wind and rain.

A muffled thunder sounded in the clouds outside the mist. And the cruise ship, which had looked like a behemoth when it was docked at the port, was now stopped on the endless sea, and even seemed to be struggling to contain the battle between the two monsters.

The cruise ship was torn apart from the center of the VIP cabin.

Like the Titanic that had hit an iceberg, it was also about to be submerged in this vast sea.

The helicopter, which had opened a special signal tower and connected to the outside for rescue, was constantly raising its altitude, trying to find the most suitable position to approach Shu Yao.

“There’s no time.”

“There’s an even more terrifying monster aura, Miss Situ. If we delay any longer, even we will be trapped here!”

The person flying the helicopter stared at the radar monitoring system and shouted.

And the few people accompanying Situ Jin also had ugly expressions. On such a prehistoric giant beast-like battlefield, even humans with special abilities would find it difficult to intervene.

Situ Jin said again, “Yaoyao!”

She saw the transparent jellyfish climbing up the cruise ship from the sea, from all directions, and their target was Shu Yao. Although from her perspective, she didn’t know what the Styx jellyfish in Lin Jingshu’s body had done, there was no doubt that the other’s previous actions were all to buy time, just to wait for the arrival of this thunderclap.

There was no time.

Her face was ugly as she said, “Lower the rope ladder!”

“Huh?” The man with a cigarette in his mouth turned his head to look at her. “Are you crazy? My lady, at this height, with this intensity of battle, you’re fucking expecting a rope ladder—”

“I said! Lower the rope ladder!” Situ Jin commanded with a louder voice than his.

However, before the helicopter could operate and lower a rope ladder long enough to approach this battlefield, the octopus, which was surrounded by these jellyfish, had already made up its mind.

She suddenly began to eat again, regardless of everything.

Jellyfish, parasites, the stinging tentacles of the [Martyrs]…

And when the poison she had eaten stayed, the energy provided after digestion supported her to regenerate her tentacles. In this way, while eating and growing, she got closer and closer to Shu Yao’s position—

Until, she finally touched her.

…

When she was surrounded by the black and red tentacles again, Shu Yao couldn’t help but start to tremble.

But it was just like the first time it had approached her. It carefully retracted the fangs in its suckers and used its softest outer side to touch her skin. It even tried hard to secrete a lot of mucus, enough to heal the external injuries she had just suffered from the battlefield.

She was extended by the tentacles and brought to a height level with the helicopter.

Just as Situ Jin and the people around her joined forces to grab Shu Yao’s hand—

A bolt of lightning fell from the sky.

It just happened to hit that tentacle.

The immense force that had been lingering on her disappeared. Shu Yao turned her head and saw that the tentacle had broken and had fallen into the deep blue sea after the cruise ship had split open.

And that octopus, with only cold pupils and unable to show a gentle gaze like a mammal, turned around and blocked the new enemy with the [lightning] ability that had appeared in front of it.

“Lin Ran…”

Shu Yao once again couldn’t control her tears. She called out the familiar name to that strange octopus, as if that would bring her back to the past when nothing had happened.

【Yaoyao.】

But the only answer was the biological signal from the monster.

She asked her gently, 【Did I learn well enough?】

—In the matter of being a girlfriend, did I learn well enough?