So this was the legendary cobra?
Although calling it a snake seemed a little too generous.
It was a strange thing to say, but Fu Qian genuinely felt that way.
He'd seen all sorts of snake-like creatures, including the classic pose of coiling into a tight spiral.
This one had no extra limbs, and its head was unmistakably reptilian. Even though the scales covering its body looked a little strange, at first glance it seemed to be coiled into a heap.
But after that first impression, a closer look made it clear that it really was a heap—
Rather than a long body coiled round and round to form the substantial lower half, it looked more like a swimming ring growing out of its belly.
That was right. The peculiar arrangement of its scales had gone far beyond any conventional understanding of structure.
The bulges in each ring had no clear boundaries between them. They were all connected.
Beneath the long head and neck, its body was still thin and upright.
But from the diaphragm down, a tremendous amount of subcutaneous fat had accumulated, dragging all the way to the ground.
Covered in tiny scales shaped like eyes, it made quite an impact.
But that wasn't all. Though his inspiration was currently unavailable, just by looking at it, he could tell that those peculiar scales seemed highly resistant to the Madness Fire that had just erupted.
The calamity he'd detonated in the form of fire had only changed the creature's shape—or, perhaps, made it reveal its true form.
From top to bottom, he couldn't see a single missing scale—wait, there was one.
As he was making his assessment, a scale that had been shifting and opening and closing in a strange rhythm finally dropped to the ground with a plop.