Seeing that the crab monster was about to charge again, in the nick of time, Liang Qu manipulated the water currents. He quickly threw up a cloud of silt-choked water to block the creature's vision, setting the flow into a violent, strangling vortex!
He clenched his five fingers tightly, but within his sensory sphere came no sign that the crab monster's eyes had been crushed.
Yet the crab monster suddenly began flailing its massive pincers wildly, sending shattered rocks flying in every direction and churning the riverbed into complete murk.
Its compound eyes had not been burst by the water pressure, but it had felt intense pain.
Liang Qu leaped once more to dodge outside its attack range. Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted the Fat Catfish darting in behind the crab monster.
A perfect chance!
Just as the crab monster was thrashing in pain and frenzy, the Fat Catfish swam right alongside it. Opening its gaping maw, it gulped down a mouthful of muddy water along with one of the crab's compound eyes, biting down savagely.
The eyestalk was torn away in the catfish's jaws, dragging out pink tissue and nerves.
Blood poured from the hollow socket. The agonizing pain nearly drove the crab monster insane; its eyes, protruding from its body on stalks, were practically its greatest vulnerability.
Unfortunately, the crab's two eyes were set too far apart, and even the Fat Catfish's wide mouth could not swallow both at once.
Having succeeded, the Fat Catfish struck and fled immediately. It barely evaded the crushing pincer that swept in to snap it, then pumped its tail with all its might to flee for its life.
The crab monster flew into a berserk rage, terrifying enough to strike helpless dread into any ordinary onlooker. Ignoring Liang Qu altogether, it charged straight after the Fat Catfish. Broken rocks blasted aside along its path, and the entire riverbed seemed to shudder.
The scene turned to utter chaos.
No one had anticipated that the crab monster could be so terrifying.
Liang Qu's heart pounded wildly, but watching Ah Fei flee, he did not hesitate for a second. Channeling the water currents entirely into his spear, his muscles rippled like waves. Strands of muscle coiled tight as iron wire, then burst with power.
He lunged forward like an ape leaping down from an ancient tree, thrusting with all his strength toward the jointed legs beneath the crab monster's body.
The sharp, hard flint effortlessly pierced the articular membrane. With a twist and an upward flick, he tore open the entire joint of the crab's leg.
The crab monster stumbled mid-stride. Suddenly finding the leg planted in the silt unresponsive, momentum snapped the limb clean in half.
The crab monster only had six walking legs beneath it. Snapping one drastically threw off its balance, and its speed in pursuing the Fat Catfish plummeted instantly.
Clouds of bubbles spewed from the crab's mouthparts. The relentless torment pushed its nerves to the limit. Giving up on the catfish, it spun back around to attack Liang Qu.
The giant pincer swung around, crashing in head-on. If caught in its grip, a person would surely be snapped in two!
Dread gripped Liang Qu's heart. The muscles of his left leg went taut as he tried to push off a cluster of rocks to dodge, but his foot found nothing solid!
His foot sank deep into the silt. While it still offered some resistance, it was nowhere near as firm as solid rock!
The instant he stepped into the mire, Liang Qu's heart nearly leapt out of his chest. His adrenaline surged, cold sweat bursting forth like an open floodgate. Caught unprepared, he had no choice but to raise his spear shaft horizontally to block, doing everything in his power to manipulate the water currents and push himself sideways.
Yet this time the massive pincer came sweeping down from an angle, making it far harder to deflect the impact than before.
Snap!
The spear shattered into two pieces on the spot. The pincer's momentum barely slowed, but fortunately, the thrust of the water currents finally took effect, shifting Liang Qu aside by about a chi. The giant pincer grazed past his waist as it smashed down.
Silt billowed everywhere. The ruptured pig bladder float crumpled like a deflated balloon, bubbles of air racing toward the surface.
Liang Qu choked on a mouthful of water. A searing pain flared across his waist and abdomen, as though a layer of flesh had been sliced away by a blade. Yet he dared not pause. Holding his breath once more, he rolled aside, grasped a rock, and scrambled desperately forward.
On the other side, the frantically fleeing Fat Catfish spun around decisively.
Now the tables had turned, and it was Liang Qu fleeing for his life, kicking off boulders and riding the water currents.
The crab monster surged forward in pursuit. But just as it reached a certain pass, the mud and sand beneath its feet erupted. The Sow Dragon, which had been lying in ambush beneath the sediment all along, gaped wide and clamped down hard on another of the crab monster's legs.
The Sow Dragon's tremendous bite force easily punctured the joint membrane. Threshing and rolling violently in a death roll, it tore the crab monster's leg clean off.
Having lost two of its six legs—and both on the same side—the crab monster was beside itself with fury. Its all-crushing pincer slammed down once more, intending to smash Cannot Move into mincemeat. Yet at that very moment, its vision went completely black, and fresh agony spread through its skull.
From atop its head, its remaining eye was gone!
The returning Fat Catfish had repeated its trick, gobbling up the crab's other eye. Diving downward, it nudged the slow-moving Sow Dragon, which had no time to scuttle away on its own, and hurried off with it.
Crabs could not cry out, but seeing the thick torrent of bubbles erupting from its mouthparts, Liang Qu knew it had to be in excruciating pain.
The human and two beasts skirted the thrashing crab monster, regrouping once more.
***
On the other side, a chaotic melee was also raging at the Yang Family Martial Hall.
The three disciples with Lu Tingcai snatched up wooden clubs and charged straight at Li Libo and Chen Jiechang.
Chen Jiechang yanked Li Libo aside to dodge one blow, but couldn't avoid the rest. The wooden sticks slammed into their bodies with enough force to shatter bone.
"Fuck your mother!"
Chen Jiechang was older and more composed than Li Libo. He had endured everything, trying hard to bury the complex tangle of inferiority and helplessness inside him. But beneath the rain of clubs, the fury born of sheer humiliation surged straight to his head. After all, he was still not even twenty.
Enduring the pain, Chen Jiechang gritted his teeth and locked his eyes on one of the incoming clubs. The moment it came down, he grabbed hold of it with a death grip and threw his entire body forward in a desperate tackle.
Xue Dingyi was caught off guard. Taking the full brunt of the tackle, he went tumbling to the ground with Chen Jiechang, and the two tangled into a brawl.
The remaining two tried to rush forward and pull them apart, but Li Libo seized the opening and tackled one of them to the ground. When the other moved to help, someone kicked him in the shin amid the chaos, sending him crashing down and pulling him into the scuffle as well.
None of the five present had broken through the barriers; they were mere martial apprentices, not even worthy of being called martial practitioners. Flared by raw rage, they fought with no discipline whatsoever, no different from street thugs in an alley brawl.
They rolled together in a tangle of limbs, clawing, kicking, biting, driving elbows and ramming knees with everything they had, relying solely on ruthlessness and tolerance for pain.
Rage set the fighting spirit in their blood ablaze.
Xue Dingyi threw an elbow, splitting the corner of Chen Jiechang's eye. Chen Jiechang clamped both hands around Xue Dingyi's throat, fingernails digging deep enough to nearly tear open the skin and leaving raised bloody gouges. Behind him, another apprentice rained frantic punches down on his head and face, but he paid it no heed!
What was the best way to handle a brawl?
Grab one bastard and beat him half to death—beat him so badly he'd be bedridden for at least a month.
Lu Tingcai and Xue Dingyi—Chen Jiechang had both names burned into his memory. No matter how the others beat him from behind or beside him, he focused every ounce of violence on beating Xue Dingyi half to death!
Chapter 27