Chapter 2

What was the most exasperating thing for a predator?

Sui Xiong thought it was being invincible in a fight, yet having such short legs that he could not catch his prey.

Well, that was exactly his situation right now.

At this moment, he was running through the seawater with all his might, trying to catch the big fish ahead of him. Yet no matter how hard he ran, the distance between them only grew wider, soon reaching a despairing extent.

So he could only give up and stop with a sigh.

During that stretch of hunting, he had successfully eaten the souls of over a dozen small fish, yet he had failed to catch even a single big one.

These fish, whose names he did not know, were clearly more alert the larger they were. The little fish were muddleheaded. Even when he came right up beside them, they noticed nothing, allowing him to catch them easily, pull out their souls, and eat them. The big fish were different. They could clearly sense his presence and danger, so whenever he tried to approach one, it would turn and swiftly swim away, fleeing far from him.

Of course, he had tried sneaking closer, but it was useless. It seemed he was like a firefly in the darkness, so flashy that he could not hide his presence at all. He had also tried chasing prey, only to discover in vain that he was simply far too slow.

"This won't do!" After another failed hunt, he told himself, "This won't do. There's no way I can catch them!"

So he could only turn his attention back to those foolish little fish.

Though an individual small fish's soul was worth very little, he could just eat more of them...

Bullying the weak was not exactly honorable, but it was different when survival was at stake. Didn't every carnivore in nature prioritize the old, weak, sick, and disabled when hunting?

Sui Xiong tried to use that thought to ease the gloom in his heart, but it did not work very well.

The carnivores in nature probably did not have intelligence as high as his, nor did they possess the melancholy sentimentality of an artistic young man.

Or rather, they did not have his overwhelmingly invincible combat power. Their "lives" were a cycle of hunting and resting, leaving them no time for sentimental musings.

Standing amid a school of dead fish drifting every which way with the current, Sui Xiong let out a melancholy sigh.

"Always hunting little fish will disrupt the ecological balance!"

A few hours later, when Sui Xiong saw a school of fish so enormous that he could not see its edges, he realized his mistake.

A predator as small as him, no matter how much he ate, could never disrupt the entire ecological balance.

Didn't he see that giant whale with a horn on its head, rushing this way? One meal for that thing would probably equal half a year's worth of food for him. If that thing did not disrupt the ecological balance, what was he worried about?

As Sui Xiong thought this, he suddenly sensed extreme danger.

It felt like a thorn at his back. No, "a thorn at his back" was far too mild. It was more like a needle tip pressed against his eyeball, just a little farther forward from blinding him.

Where was this danger coming from?

Sui Xiong looked around, searching for the source of the threat.

Soon, he no longer needed to search, because the answer was right before his eyes.

For some reason, the One-Horned Giant Whale ignored the vast feast before it. With its enormous body, it knocked aside countless little fish that should have been its food and swam straight toward Sui Xiong.

"Damn!"

He cursed and turned to run.

What came around went around fast. Just a moment ago, he had been chasing others; now it was his turn to be chased.

Looking at the giant whale's massive body, he did not even need to think to know he could not beat it. Since he could not beat it, he could only run.

Yet he stopped after just a few steps.

The giant whale swam so fast. Could he escape on his short legs?

Obviously not! He would have a better chance of growing wings!

What should he do, then?

Faced with a life-or-death crisis, Sui Xiong fell into deep thought.

Question: When you are alone in the wilderness, with no transportation and no weapons, and a terrifying beast is charging at you from afar, apparently intending to make you its dinner, what should you do?

Waiting for an answer online. It's kind of urgent.

But that was completely useless, because he did not even have internet right now. No matter how long he waited, all he could wait for was that One-Horned Giant Whale.

And it would not take long.

All sorts of sensible and nonsensical ideas flooded his mind. Sui Xiong frantically looked around, seeking a chance to escape.

But he found none.

If he could dive into the deep sea, perhaps he could hide in a crack among the rocks on the seafloor. No matter how strong the One-Horned Giant Whale was, it could not possibly overturn the entire seabed just to catch him.

But he could not dive very deep. At most, he could go down around two meters.

If he could fly high into the sky, he could evade that marine creature's pursuit. He could even make faces at it from above and mock its helplessness.

But Sui Xiong could not fly either.

He had tried. Though he could jump out of the water briefly, even without his soul being restricted by weight, he could only leap about two meters high at most.

If he were on Earth, a two-meter vertical leap would be an astonishing record, enough for him to sweep the Olympics and leave behind a legend. But it was utterly useless in his current predicament.

That distance was not even worth mentioning to a Giant Beast Mountains creature whose open mouth might be over five meters wide.

"Could it be that my transmigration ends here? If this giant whale eats me, will I transmigrate back?"

As the giant whale drew closer and closer, Sui Xiong was so nervous that he could not help babbling nonsense.

Just then, he noticed a huge jellyfish slowly drifting across the sea surface.

Aside from being particularly large, this jellyfish had nothing special about it. It was no different from those he had eaten before.

Yet for some reason, it was as though lightning flashed through his mind, suddenly illuminating it.

Perhaps... he could give it a try...

In the next instant, Sui Xiong curled himself into a ball as tightly as possible, then slammed fiercely into the jellyfish.

The surroundings shook violently. A moment later, the trembling stopped, and his field of vision became calm.

Blue sky, blue water, and a small bit of food.

Before he had time to think, he swallowed the jellyfish's soul in one bite, then swam hard in the direction he remembered.

His swimming was clumsy. If jellyfish had clowning competitions, he could definitely win a gold medal with that performance.

A moment later, the water surface some distance away suddenly shook. An enormous body circled around on the surface, seemingly searching for something. Yet it found nothing in the end and sank back beneath the water.

He had won the gamble!

Sure enough, once he possessed the jellyfish and was no longer a soul without a body, the giant whale could no longer find him.

After the giant whale sank beneath the sea, Sui Xiong finally let out a breath of relief, though he did not dare relax completely. He paddled his tentacles with all his strength and continued swimming away from it.

Though he was not swimming quickly, he did not dare stop for even a moment.

He did not know how long he swam. Only when the sky gradually darkened did he begin to feel slightly reassured.

Night had fallen. The seabirds had returned to their nests, and the fish were resting. He should be safe now, right?

He was not entirely sure, since he had never studied marine biology and was merely guessing.

Still, night really was good for him. In every myth and legend, ghosts liked the night.

After resting on the sea for a while, he planned to leave this damned jellyfish body. The thing was far too fragile and swam far too slowly. If he wanted to possess something, he should possess a fish instead, preferably a big fish.

Yet he quickly discovered a problem, an enormous problem.

He could not leave the jellyfish's body!

It was not that he could not leave it at all; he simply could not completely separate himself from the jellyfish's shell. That thin shell, that weak body which seemed as though even a wave could shatter it, was now unimaginably tough. No matter how he tugged or tore, it remained tightly stuck to him and could not be separated. Worse still, with one careless moment, his entire soul would instinctively shrink back into the jellyfish, and even his perspective would shift into jellyfish mode.

After trying in vain for a long time, Sui Xiong finally gave up when the moon stood high overhead.

"I'm screwed. I've become a jellyfish."

He sighed toward the sky and had no choice but to accept that sorrowful fact.

Thinking back to before his transmigration, he had read stories about the Eight Immortals. Iron-Crutch Li seemed to have accidentally possessed a beggar's corpse, becoming a lame beggar from then on. When Sui Xiong read that story, he had mocked him quite a bit, thinking the immortal was rather brain-dead. If he ever had the chance, even if he did not possess an emperor, he would at least choose a big rock on Flower Fruit Mountain.

Yet in the end, he had possessed a jellyfish, becoming a creature in the lower-middle ranks of the ocean food chain.

What rotten luck!

After lamenting for a while, Sui Xiong quickly rallied, because he was hungry.

Sighing could not solve anything. What mattered now was filling his stomach.

"What do jellyfish eat?" When he prepared to look for food, he suddenly froze.

What did jellyfish eat? He had never learned that!

Fish?

Looking at his weak body and slender tentacles, he shook his head. It would be more likely for fish to eat him!

Then he must eat plankton?

But where was the plankton?

Sui Xiong looked around in every direction, searching for a long time, yet he could not find even a trace of plankton.

The feeling of hunger gradually intensified, and his mood grew increasingly anxious.

What would happen if he could not find anything to eat? He would definitely starve to death.

Could ghosts die? He was not sure, but this jellyfish would certainly starve to death.

Then if it starved to death, would he be freed from this jellyfish body?

Perhaps... there was no such good fortune...

Sui Xiong thought and thought, deeply troubled.

Just then, his heart jolted. He felt something watching him.

The sensation was nowhere near as intense as when the giant whale had targeted him, but it was still quite unpleasant, like a pebble inside his shoe rubbing against his foot.

Looking down, he saw a school of little fish swimming over from afar, tearing apart and devouring the jellyfish on the sea surface one by one like an autumn wind sweeping away fallen leaves.

These fish were not large, with the biggest no more than palm-sized, but they were quite fierce. Moonlight gleamed off the white teeth inside their open mouths, giving them a chilling air.

Clearly, they were jellyfish's natural enemies.

Sui Xiong was startled, but quickly steadied himself.

He could not handle the giant whale, but could he not handle a school of little fish?

Come on, then. Who knew who would eat whom!

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