THE BOY THEY CALLED A JINX BECAME THE SUPREME CULTIVATOR

7 - BLOOD I

He did not try to summon a glowing shield or strike back with the elegant martial arts of his former life.

Instead, he surrendered to gravity and let his failing knees give out to drop backward into the freezing mud.

The Abyssal Crawler sailed right over him with terrifying speed, its sheer bulk displacing enough water to create a turbulent downward current.

Zhentian landed hard on his back, his shattered right collarbone screaming in protest as he slammed against the scattered debris of the ocean floor.

He reached his uninjured left hand blindly into the dark muck beside his hip while the water above him churned violently.

His fingers closed around the smooth curve of the ancient petrified ribcage he had rested against just moments ago.

Panic threatened to freeze his lungs as the massive shadow of the beast blocked out the faint bioluminescence drifting from the trench walls.

He channeled every ounce of his terror and rage into his grip, twisting his wrist to snap a jagged shard from the ancient bone.

The petrified fragment broke off with a dull crack, leaving him holding a heavy, forearm-length spike that felt as dense as solid stone.

The Crawler quickly realized it had missed its prey, its massive multi-jointed legs tearing into the seabed to arrest its forward momentum.

Zhentian knew he did not have the strength in his one good arm to pierce the beast's thick chitin armor with a direct stab.

He flipped the bone shard over in his palm, wedging the blunt end deep into a narrow crack in the bedrock beneath the soft mud.

He angled the jagged, broken tip upward, turning it into a makeshift spear pointed directly at the space where the creature would strike next.

The beast let out a deafening hiss that rattled the heavy water around them, whipping its massive head around to locate the fresh scent of blood.

It spotted him lying in the dirt and launched itself forward again with a powerful thrust of its armored hind legs.

Zhentian did not flinch or attempt to roll away, bracing his shoulder against the ground to hold the improvised spike as steady as possible.

The Crawler descended with the full weight of a falling boulder, its open jaws ready to crush him into a fine paste.

It never even saw the jagged shard of petrified bone waiting in the dark shadows beneath its massive chin.

The beast's own terrifying momentum drove its pale, fleshy gills directly onto the unyielding point of the spike.

A sickening sound of tearing tissue echoed through the heavy water as the jagged tip punched deep into the monster's vital organs.

Dark, acidic blood erupted from the wound in a massive cloud, instantly blinding Zhentian as it washed over his face and chest.

The Abyssal Crawler shrieked in absolute agony, violently thrashing its enormous body in a desperate bid to free itself from the trap.

Zhentian clamped his hand around the base of the bone, fighting to keep the spike wedged in the bedrock as the creature flailed wildly above him.

The kinetic force of the beast's death throes transferred directly down the shaft of the bone, violently shaking his already battered frame.

He felt the remaining muscle fibers in his left arm begin to tear under the immense strain of holding the monster in place.

The sheer exertion forced his heart to beat faster, pumping more of his own blood out of the gaping hole in his chest and into the current.

His fractured Yellow Root gave a weak, pathetic pulse before going entirely silent, offering no aid against the tearing of his mortal flesh.

One of the creature's flailing armored legs struck him across the ribs, cracking a bone and knocking the breath from his lungs in a rush of bubbles.

Zhentian refused to let go, his teeth gritted so hard he tasted fresh copper pooling beneath his tongue as the struggle dragged on.

The acidic nature of the monster's blood began to burn his skin, leaving raw, red patches across his cheeks and neck.

He squeezed his eyes shut to protect them from the toxic fluid, relying entirely on the vibration of the bone to track the beast's movements.

The Crawler tried to back away to pull itself off the spike, but the jagged edges of the petrified bone acted like a cruel hook holding it firmly in place.

Its deafening hisses slowly turned into wet, gurgling clicks as the shard severed a major artery deep inside its chest cavity.

The massive glowing lures on its face finally flickered out, plunging the immediate area back into a suffocating, impenetrable darkness.

The lifeless bulk of the beast slumped forward, threatening to pin Zhentian forever beneath tons of heavily armored chitin.

He let go of the bone shard and threw his weight to the side, barely managing to drag his hips out of the way before the carcass settled into the mud.

The massive displacement of water from the falling body sent him tumbling across the seabed like a discarded rag caught in a storm.

He came to a stop several yards away, lying on his back and staring up into the vast blackness of the abyss above him.

Every single nerve in his body felt like it was on fire, yet the freezing cold of the ocean was rapidly numbing his extremities.

He could not feel his fingers or his toes anymore, and the dark water filling his vision began to swirl with encroaching gray shadows.

Zhentian realized he had no energy left to drag himself toward the faint blue light radiating from Ye Canghai's position across the trench.

His breathing grew shallow and erratic, the cold seeping past his skin and settling deep into his hollowed-out core.