Chapter 3

Moonlight spilled across the sea, stirring countless silver-white ripples.

Perhaps it was an illusion, but the moon in the world Sui Xiong had transmigrated into seemed much larger and brighter than Earth's. Though it was night, visibility was still quite good. Sui Xiong could even make out the teeth in the mouths of the little fish closing in.

They swam quickly and ate quickly. In only a short while, they had torn apart and devoured many of the jellyfish on the surface, gradually reaching Sui Xiong.

Sui Xiong did not run. He floated quietly on the surface, ready for battle.

Soon, the three nearest fish entered his attack range.

As natural enemies, those little fish held an overwhelming advantage over jellyfish. But hidden inside this jellyfish was a human soul.

More importantly, this jellyfish was completely! utterly! different! from the weak creatures helpless before their natural enemies.

Watching the little fish bare their grim white teeth as they prepared to tear apart their food, Sui Xiong smiled.

He extended his soul's hands, grabbed two little fish, effortlessly tore out their souls, and shoved them into his mouth.

Then the third fish followed in its companions' footsteps.

The price was that Sui Xiong—oh, rather, the jellyfish he possessed—was bitten once.

The bite was not severe, but it made him wary.

He was far stronger than these little fish and could kill two at once, but he only had two hands, while there were conservatively estimated to be more than a hundred fish.

Three fish had already left him unable to cover everything and gotten him bitten. What would happen if over a hundred fish swarmed him at once?

Sui Xiong shuddered and looked carefully, only to discover that he had already been surrounded.

"Damn it! So many of you ganging up on me—what kind of heroes are you? If you've got guts, come fight me one-on-one!" he cursed.

But clearly, these little fish were no heroes. Or perhaps they could not hear him. Or perhaps they heard him but could not understand.

So they charged in from every direction.

Sui Xiong turned pale with fright. He no longer cared about eating, wildly throwing punches in every direction as he tried to kill all the damned fish.

For a time, shimmering waves flashed chaotically across the sea. Fish scales and sharp teeth gleamed against each other, while the curses of a newly born water ghost rang without end.

After quite a while, the sea finally calmed again.

Sui Xiong stood amid a vast stretch of floating fish corpses, looking at the jellyfish body that had been mangled beyond recognition, on the verge of tears.

"I've only been here for one day, and I almost got dismembered. This world is way too dangerous!"

After lamenting for a while, Sui Xiong began considering what to do next.

This jellyfish body was simply too weak. There was an online joke that said a shut-in's combat power was equivalent to 0.5 geese; this jellyfish's combat power was probably not even worth 0.1 geese. Although Sui Xiong, now a water ghost, was tremendously strong and had killed every opponent he had met so far in a single move—the One-Horned Giant Whale excepted—he only had two hands and could not protect himself from every direction. A mere school of little fish, not even enough to fill his stomach combined, had forced him into such a miserable state. What if something fiercer came along?

If possible, he naturally wanted to leave this useless body behind and find a stronger one. But for the moment, he had no way to leave the jellyfish's body, so he could only think differently.

"No matter what, I should find a way to fix this body first," Sui Xiong muttered, lifting a tentacle that had been mostly torn off. "I remember that the lower the life-form, the stronger its self-healing ability—as long as it has enough nutrients."

But where would he get nutrients?

According to Sui Xiong's recollection, jellyfish needed to eat plankton.

But Sui Xiong had been searching ever since arriving here and had yet to find any of the legendary plankton.

What was he supposed to do without plankton? Just wait to starve to death? Perhaps before he starved, this unlucky jellyfish body would already succumb to its injuries.

If this body died, would his soul be finished too?

Maybe... it was possible...

No, that would not do! A real man could die, but he could not die in such a ridiculous, laughable way!

With no other choice, Sui Xiong turned his gaze toward the countless dead fish around him.

He had already devoured the souls of these fish, but their bodies were still intact. In theory, fish flesh was also nourishment and could fully replenish what the jellyfish body needed.

The question was, how was he supposed to eat it?

Question: How did jellyfish eat? Waiting online, kind of urgent.

But there was no internet...

Sui Xiong pondered for a while, then tried poking a tentacle toward the nearest dead fish.

A jellyfish's tentacles were its weapons. In theory, weapons and feeding tools were often related, like teeth and mouths.

But he quickly discovered that jellyfish tentacles could do nothing to the fish. Faced with their tough scales, no matter how Sui Xiong commanded them, the tentacles could not pierce through.

"A whole pile of food is right in front of me, but I can't even take a bite. This is too tragic!" Sui Xiong muttered. Still unwilling to give up, he directed his tentacles to poke all over the dead fish, trying to find an unprotected spot.

Hard work paid off. He eventually found one.

The fish's mouth.

The fish's entire body was covered in scales, but its insides were not. As long as he inserted a tentacle through the fish's mouth, he could pierce it from within.

However, what was he supposed to do next?

Sui Xiong fell into thought again.

Secrete digestive fluid?

He tried hard several times. Whether jellyfish simply lacked that ability or his intelligence was too limited, in any case, he failed to secrete any digestive fluid.

Eat it directly?

He tried hard several times. Whether jellyfish tentacles had no teeth to begin with or his intelligence was too limited, in any case, he failed to eat anything.

Faced with the hopeless situation of a mouse trying to pull a turtle, Sui Xiong got angry.

"I refuse to believe this! I can kill it, but I can't eat it? Can meat on the chopping block grow wings and fly away?!"

He racked his brains for a long time before finally digging up a bit of life experience from the depths of his memories.

A cup of milk tea sat on a table, and its lid would not come off. How did you drink it? Stick in a straw.

Since jellyfish tentacles could release venom, they had to be hollow. He could just use them as straws.

But... when he thought of sucking up what was inside a fish's belly through a straw, he felt a little sick.

This method had no dignity at all.

There was no need to describe what followed. In short, the circle of dead fish around him eventually became non-recyclable garbage: skin wrapped around bones and a heap of internal organs. Sui Xiong ultimately chose a compromise, stabbing his tentacles as deeply into the fish flesh as possible and treating it as eating raw fish.

Perhaps the organs were nutritious too, but whenever he thought about possibly sucking up something from the digestive tract, he felt nauseated.

Strangely, fish flesh should have been tough. Why did it dissolve and get absorbed like liquid with a hard suck? Did jellyfish have such an ability? Could it be that jellyfish in this world were all this formidable?

Looking over the results of the battle around him, Sui Xiong pondered for a while and attributed this bizarre phenomenon to the difference between worlds.

He had absorbed the nutrients. Next, he needed to put them to good use.

But how?

Sui Xiong thought deeply.

First, he needed to improve his movement speed. Jellyfish swam far too slowly!

But how should he improve it?

Add fins? But even with fins, that did not seem like it would solve the problem.

Grow more tentacles? Or make the tentacles flatter, like rowing paddles?

None of those seemed like good ideas...

Sui Xiong thought, thought, and thought some more. In the end, he actually came up with a solution.

He decided to equip the jellyfish with two propellers.

Propellers were common things on Earth, and their principle was not complicated. Put simply, they were just a set of angled rotating blades. As the blades spun, they drove liquid rapidly in one direction, producing thrust in the opposite direction. Their most common application in everyday life was probably electric fans.

Whether air or water, both counted as fluids—at least, that was how Sui Xiong remembered it.

"I need a sturdy central shaft, three strong blades, and a very solid bearing," Sui Xiong muttered. He directed the massive amount of nutrients stored in the jellyfish body, continuously converting them into strand after strand of muscle structure, then layering them again and again until he finally got what he wanted.

Discovering this method took him more than half the night, but after he found the right approach, making two propellers took only a little while.

Biological bodies truly were incredibly wondrous. As long as he had a fairly clear concept, the manufacturing process was unbelievably easy and pleasant. All he needed to do were two things.

Design, and wait.

Making the propellers rotate was not difficult. A simple gear transmission could accomplish it.

Perhaps for a living creature, turning its flesh-and-blood body into constantly rotating and colliding gears would be extremely painful. But Sui Xiong was not a jellyfish. No matter how damaged this jellyfish body became, he did not feel even the slightest pain.

Thus, the problem was solved. He gained a decent power system, allowing him to race through the seawater at a speed that would make the previous jellyfish die of shame.

With movement speed improved, what should he consider next?

Attack power? Defense?

Sui Xiong considered briefly before setting his sights on defense.

He already had a powerful means of attack. So far, he had not found any fish capable of resisting his terrifying soul-extraction attack. Naturally, defense was what needed strengthening.

The first thing he considered was scales.

Just as soldiers charging into battle on Earth liked to protect their bodies with metal armor, Sui Xiong also leaned toward wrapping the body he temporarily inhabited in sturdy armor—scales.

It was a good idea, but as he designed the armor, he found a problem.

The scales formed from repeatedly layered jellyfish muscle fibers were not strong enough.

It was not a lack of hardness. Those scales were essentially made from the same stuff as the propeller's bony blades. What they lacked was "elasticity."

Before transmigrating, Sui Xiong had read some military fiction. He knew that armor in the age of cold weapons needed not only hardness, but also elasticity. Relying on brute hardness to resist attacks would only cause the body to absorb the force directly. At most, a stab would become a blow.

Therefore, elasticity in armor was extremely important.

But he could not do it. He could not create elastic scales.

After confirming that, he had no choice but to settle for the next best option and try creating tough skin.

That was much easier. He only needed to layer the muscle fibers several times to form a shell of bony plates, then add several layers of mesh-like cushioning beneath the plates, and it would be complete.

Finally, he also adjusted the jellyfish body's shape.

When the sun, larger than Earth's, began sinking westward, Sui Xiong completed the modifications to the body he was temporarily living in.

It had a streamlined body, thick, tough gray skin, and a set of propellers protected by bony plates on each side to provide powerful propulsion. Finally, there were the slender tentacles at the end of its body. He had wanted to strengthen those too, but he had run out of nutrients, so it would have to wait.

No matter how one looked at it, it resembled a monster.