Chapter 13: Devoured

He fled in a panic, narrowly escaping the lion’s jaws and preserving his life. Just as he breathed a sigh of relief and thought himself safe, an alarm sounded in his mind from the system.

“Warning, unknown lifeform approaching, quick—”

Lin Qiu never heard the rest, for suddenly the world spun around him. His body was rapidly spinning, hurled toward an unknown place, until he vanished into a dark void.

At the spot where Lin Qiu disappeared, a seahorse bared its teeth in a grin and closed its mouth with satisfaction.

“This little thing is interesting—small, but looks delicious,” conveyed the seahorse’s mental signal.

With that, the seahorse turned and drifted away unhurriedly, leaving a shadow over a hundred meters long beneath the waves.

Unbeknownst to the seahorse, there was now a tiny creature wedged between its teeth.

“How foul!” Lin Qiu, stuck between the seahorse’s teeth, felt nauseated.

Never think that fish lose their sense of smell in water—that’s a grave mistake. In fact, a fish’s nose is even more sensitive than a dog’s on land.

The moment Lin Qiu was swallowed, he seized his fleeting chance, struggled with all his might, and wedged himself into the seahorse’s teeth, barely saving his life.

Every time the seahorse opened its mouth, torrents of seawater rushed in, creating immense pressure that surged down its throat and into its belly. Along the way, smaller sea creatures emitted pitiful mental cries—shouting for help, begging for mercy—as they whirled down the seahorse’s gullet toward its stomach.

Hearing these agonized screams, Lin Qiu’s heart twisted in pain. He had always been the predator, devouring sea beasts—never before had he been preyed upon himself. The feeling was utterly dreadful.

“System, is there anything I can do?” Lin Qiu began to consult the system.

Now a level-two sea beast, his strength had doubled since his days as an orca. Yet all the ocean’s creatures had evolved—some awakened ancient ancestral bloodlines, growing even more powerful and bloodthirsty.

But Lin Qiu alone seemed to have been forgotten.

Could the core earth energy and golden liquid truly single him out? Was it because he possessed an orca’s body but a human soul? Otherwise, with his former strength as the ocean’s overlord and after a second mutation, he should still be able to sweep the seas.

Yet now—he was a tragedy.

“To answer the host,” the system replied, “this seahorse’s ancestor was an overlord of the oceans in the Triassic era.”

“Its bloodline, too, comes from a powerful species from an even higher epoch.”

“Some sea beasts have inherited Triassic ancestors’ bloodlines; others, bloodlines from five epochs past.”

“Moreover, after the outburst of core energy and the mysterious golden liquid, cells from creatures of five glacial eras past are once again evolving.”

“You mean to say,” Lin Qiu gasped, eyes wide with horror, “that creatures extinct for five epochs will reappear in this world?”

Through the electric pulses of the core energy, he saw the rise and fall of five epochs, each destroyed by meteorites. Across five eras, countless mighty rulers dominated sea, land, and sky. If all those creatures returned, could humans, with their current bodies and technology, hope to survive?

Lin Qiu’s heart was consumed with worry. Though his body was now an orca, his soul remained human, and news like this filled him with dread and unease.

“Mutation has only just begun,” the system continued. “It will take time for all sea, land, and air creatures to regain the power of the Triassic. For cells from those ancient beings to birth new life is no simple or swift task.”

“The host has ample time to share this information with humanity—so they may prepare in advance.”

“Tell them?” Lin Qiu’s voice rose sharply. “I can barely save myself—how can I get this message to them?”

“You may not know, host, but no matter how powerful a creature is, its insides are its weakness. This seahorse is a level-three sea beast—one rank above you. Externally, you cannot defeat it. But inside, where it lacks defense and offense, you can easily overcome it.”

“Easily overcome? I like the sound of that!” Lin Qiu’s eyes lit up—it was an excellent idea. As a level-two sea beast, if not for these new monsters, who in all sea, land, or sky could rival him? If he could not defeat the seahorse from without, he would destroy it from within.

With this thought, Lin Qiu ceased hiding. He slipped free from the seahorse’s teeth and, riding the powerful current of water the seahorse swallowed, surged toward its throat.

The seahorse was immense—over a hundred meters long and some twenty meters wide. Before the mutations on Bluewater Star, a tiny seahorse wouldn’t have even filled Lin Qiu’s teeth.

After all, these creatures—members of the order Syngnathiformes, family Syngnathidae—ranged from five to thirty centimeters in length. Their heads curved like a horse’s, hence their name. Their mouths were long and tubular, very small, with a single dorsal fin composed of fin rays. Their eyes were remarkable, able to move independently and look in different directions at once.

But after mutation, this noble-blooded seahorse had grown into a monstrous creature over a hundred meters long. Yet one trait remained unchanged: even with its transformation, its movements were still exceedingly slow.

The seahorse had no inkling that a little troublemaker lurked among its organs. If it could foresee its fate, it would never again eat so carelessly.

The great seahorse drifted slowly, passing beautiful coral reefs. These had once been its favorite home; it used to rest here, curling its tail around the reefs to sleep peacefully.

But now, the home it once cherished looked so insignificant. On impulse, it curled its tail around a reef—and before it even realized it, uprooted the whole thing.

The seahorse paused in confusion. The next moment, its body convulsed and it began thrashing wildly through the water, rolling and twisting at a speed it had never attained before.

Its mental signals became jumbled: “Such pain—heartache or stomachache…?”

The seahorse only knew pain, unable to say where it hurt. Agony drove it into a frenzy; the enormous creature twisted and rolled through the sea, moving faster than ever before.

“This guy’s bones are really tough!” thought Lin Qiu.

Inside, the seahorse was like a vast network of underground rivers, countless channels crisscrossing. Lin Qiu, only fifty centimeters long, struggled to move through the labyrinth, finding every step a challenge.