Chapter 10 A Narrow Escape

The bighead carp broke free from the seaweed's embrace without much effort.

However, the skin surface felt as if it had been pierced by tiny thorns, causing a slight tingling sensation.

He couldn't help but laugh and said, "This thing isn't powerful at all!"

“Indeed. But if you were surrounded by a bunch of awake seaweed, it would be a bit difficult to break free,” Achen said.

As soon as he said those words, a sudden inspiration struck him!

These dormant seaweeds may not be dangerous, but what if their prey is seriously injured or unconscious?

The thought crossed his mind, and he immediately urged the fathead fish: "Quick! Tear them apart and go deeper!"

"Ah Chen, do you mean that Nie Xiaoxiao and Xi'er might have been injured and unconscious, and were enveloped by these sea creatures, taken to a deeper place?"

As the fathead fish opened its large mouth and bit through more than a dozen pieces of seaweed with its sharp teeth, it asked anxiously.

He and Achen were of one mind; Achen worried about the two of them, and so did he.

As the seaweed wrappings were torn open layer by layer, the bighead carp first discovered several sea crabs.

They float on the murky seawater, with half of their bodies underwater and half above water.

A faint life force could still be sensed from them, but their bodies seemed completely paralyzed, motionless.

With a single, wide-open mouth, the bighead carp sucked the crabs into its internal space.

With the crabs no longer obstructing its view, the fathead fish noticed that the ravine continued downwards and gradually widened.

There is a natural cave on one of the rocks on both sides.

Ah Chen directed the fathead fish to carry him into the cave.

Upon entering the cave, one discovers that the space has become extremely open.

The water depth inside the cave is about three meters, and the space above the water surface is also more than three meters deep.

Beneath the surface lies a dense network of algae roots, while above it are densely packed seaweed, piled up in an intertwined mass, resembling a tangled mess.

However, amidst this tangled mess, one can see bulges of various shapes, and through the gaps in these bulges, one can see various marine creatures encased within them.

There are various kinds of fish, shrimp, starfish, sea anemones, and dead sea lions, walruses, and seabirds.

Ah Chen even saw a nest of sea duck eggs.

The seaweed here is no longer as dry as the ones I've seen before; it's noticeably more vibrant with life.

But without exception, they were all asleep.

It's unclear whether they are in a state of extreme malnutrition, unable to maintain their conscious state, or whether they suffered severe injuries that prevented them from ever waking up.

Ah Chen and Fathead Fish didn't have time to think about anything else; they just opened their eyes wide and carefully searched for the human-shaped bulge.

Suddenly, Ah Chen saw a pear-shaped bulge.

He suddenly remembered that before Xi'er was born, he had used his spiritual energy to enter his mother's womb and send energy to the critically ill Xi'er.

At that time, the mother's uterus that he sensed was somewhat similar in shape to this pear-shaped bulge.

If these seaweeds brought the unconscious Xi'er or Nie Xiaoxiao here, they would likely have compressed them into this space-saving shape.

It's like a mutated giant spider that wraps people up in its web like this.

Thinking of this, he instantly teleported to the pear-shaped bulge and carefully probed it with his mental energy.

The next second, he sensed a faint heartbeat and the softness of a woman's chest.

As if struck by lightning, Achen quickly withdrew his mental energy strands.

The spiritual energy strands are formed in the brain, and their perception is far stronger than that of a human finger.

Realizing he might have touched a woman, and definitely not a little girl like Xi'er, his face instantly turned bright red.

However, his shyness lasted for less than three seconds before he directly conjured a wind blade and carefully cut off the seaweed covering him.

A curled-up humanoid creature fell into the seawater. Once it was freed from the layers of ocean cover, seawater immediately filled its mouth and nose.

The fathead fish immediately dragged the person into its protective shield. The wooden spirit bead in Achen's hand flickered slightly, rolled directly towards the person, and then quickly disappeared into her brow.

At this point, Ah Chen was finally able to confirm that this person was indeed Nie Xiaoxiao!

She was in a sorry state, covered in yellowish-green slime, making it impossible to see her face inside.

Ah Chen quickly tore the mucus off her head, revealing a face riddled with holes from the corrosive mucus, a truly pitiful sight.

Ah Chen's tears instantly streamed down his face!

This is a friend he lived in the same house at Shifang Academy with for more than six years.

In his mind, Nie Xiaoxiao was already family.

At that moment, he had an urge to destroy all the seaweed in the entire cave.

However, he wasn't sure if doing so would alert the enemy, and if it attracted a large group of awakened demons, he and the fathead fish would be surrounded and trapped.

Moreover, they also had to take care of the unconscious Nie Xiaoxiao.

After suppressing his destructive impulses, Achen took out a life-saving pill and fed it to Nie Xiaoxiao.

Whether it was due to the Wood Spirit Pearl or the effects of the pills, her aura went from being barely perceptible to becoming slightly stronger.

At the same time, the ocean slick around them, driven by their hunting instincts, spontaneously moved closer to them.

Achen didn't dare waste any time, so he quickly directed Fathead Fish to split up and search for various pear-shaped, oval, and human-shaped drums.

However, in the end, only a few large clams, rotting sharks, and other unrecognizable sea creatures were extracted.

The biggest find was a piece of ambergris produced by a sperm whale, which was as big as a watermelon.

Furthermore, everything that was extracted contained a rich spiritual energy, unlike the thin spiritual energy they had sensed at Flying Bird Peak.

Why do the marine creatures hunted here contain such rich spiritual energy, even though they are not far apart?

They searched the entire cave but couldn't find any trace of Xi'er, not even a single piece of jewelry or clothing related to her.

Ah Chen finally left the cave. Looking down at the wider sea below, he concentrated half of his mental energy and released a mental net.

The next second, a sharp pain shot through him, and dozens of mental nets were severed!

This was the most severe injury Ah Chen had suffered since using the Mental Net, and it even affected the contracted divine beast, Fathead Fish.

Both the master and pet experienced excruciating pain. Ah Chen endured the pain and teleported back the way they came with the fathead fish.

Even though he had exhausted all his efforts to escape, he could still feel hundreds of hair-thin threads relentlessly pursuing him from behind.

After teleporting more than ten times in a row, Achen was exhausted. Just when he thought he was going to die, a rough tongue wrapped around him and the fathead fish.

At the moment when Achen suffered a severe blow to his soul, Long Batian, as the contracted beast, also suffered a backlash.

However, his backlash was less severe than that of the fathead fish, which was closer.

He immediately transformed into his true form, stretched out his tongue, and followed the trail of Ah Chen's breath downwards to find their location.

Just before Ah Chen was about to get entangled in those fine threads, it wrapped them up and quickly withdrew its tongue, bringing them back to its side.

The next second, Long Batian's true form quickly crawled upwards towards the top of the ravine, smashing many rocks in the process.

The filaments continued to track for several dozen feet, but when the light became brighter, they finally gave up and retreated.