The Human Body, the Fish Tail

Chi Li's brows knitted tightly in his sleep. His entire body began to burn, the temperature rising without pause. He jolted awake and opened his eyes.

The bedroom was empty, with only him inside. His heavy breathing sounded especially clear in the silent room. Si Jinyan had not returned yesterday either.

Chi Li's pheromone scent grew stronger and stronger throughout the room.

He opened the bedside table drawer, hoping to find an inhibitor. His room had always been stocked with plenty of them in the past.

However, ordinary inhibitors had no effect on Si Jinyan, much less would they appear in Si Jinyan's residence.

Chi Li prepared to leave the bedroom and ask the butler to fetch him an inhibitor, or call Si Jinyan and hope that he would return to help him through his susceptible period.

When he repeatedly failed to open the bedroom door, Chi Li realized it had been locked from the outside.

Chi Li gripped the doorknob and twisted it harder, but it still would not open.

His susceptible period intensified the unease in his heart, and his heavy heartbeat battered against his chest.

Chi Li's instincts screamed. Realizing something, he began knocking on the door. He pressed his burning face against the cold door panel, trying to hear movement outside. Yet the soundproofing was too good—or perhaps the people outside had no intention of opening the door at all. Chi Li heard nothing.

He called Yuan Ru's name.

"Uncle Yuan!"

"Uncle Yuan, are you outside?"

There was still no response.

Chi Li's limbs began to weaken.

Only then did he notice that his optical brain had been taken away as well. The doors and windows were locked, and there was nothing in the room that could be used for communication.

Something must have happened on Si Jinyan's end, Chi Li thought.

Had Si Jinyan already discovered him?

Since when? When they returned from the Federation government that day, he had seemed not to...

A chill suddenly rose in Chi Li's heart.

Perhaps Si Jinyan had known all along?

Then when had Si Jinyan begun to notice that something was wrong?

High fever, desire, swelling, and pain... tortured both Chi Li's body and mind, leaving him utterly unable to calm down and think.

To remain conscious, Chi Li went to the bathroom and took a cold shower.

Chi Li stared at the person in the mirror. The whites of his eyes were bloodshot, his eye sockets red, his chest heaving violently, and his lips had already been bitten bloody.

Chi Li lay on the bed. He had tried to break the window and escape, but the military-grade security system and materials throughout the residence had completely dispelled that idea.

After an unknown amount of time, the sound of the bedroom door finally opening rang out.

The effects of his susceptible period had dulled all five of Chi Li's senses. By the time he raised his head, the butler had already walked up to him carrying food and placed it on the table.

The butler said, "Mr. Chi, you should..."

Chi Li did not hear what the butler said. He grabbed the hem of the butler's clothes, his voice terribly hoarse. "Give me an inhibitor..."

The desire he could not relieve became agony, crushing his body. The unrelenting heat left his eye sockets dry, his vision blurry, and breathing painful. A constant buzzing filled his ears, his entire body was swollen and aching, and even lying on the softest sheets brought stabbing pain...

Only five hours had passed.

Unable to relieve himself, Chi Li had rubbed himself raw, leaving nothing but pain.

The butler pulled his clothes from Chi Li's grip. "Mr. Chi, without the Marshal's orders, I cannot give you anything."

Yuan Ru's voice was clear and steady. Chi Li widened his dry eyes at him, taking a moment to process those words.

Chi Li's voice was hoarse. "I feel terrible."

Yuan Ru lowered his head slightly. "I'm sorry, but I cannot provide you with any assistance. Please finish your lunch first, Mr. Chi. Perhaps you will feel a little better."

After saying that, the butler left.

Chi Li thought of Si Jinyan.

It was hard to imagine what awaited him. Chi Li could not eat anything; burning heat filled his stomach, and anything he swallowed seemed as though it would soon be provoked into coming back up.

But Chi Li knew he could not eat nothing right now. At a time like this, energy was all the more important.

Chi Li forced himself to finish the meal through sheer willpower. Yet as soon as he was done, the heat in his abdomen triggered a nauseating spasm, churning the food he had just swallowed in his stomach.

Chi Li crouched before the toilet and vomited everything he had eaten.

The side effects of the falsifier he had injected had amplified the severity of his susceptible period severalfold.

Forcing himself through a susceptible period could, at best, cause parts of his bodily functions to rot and necrose; at worst, it could inflict irreversible damage on his nerves.

Chi Li filled the bathtub with cold water and sat in it. His overheated body shuddered when it touched the icy water.

Though his body still felt awful as it cooled, it was much better than before.

During a susceptible period, even the smallest emotions were often amplified. Chi Li looked at his trembling wrist. Si Jinyan would not even give him a single inhibitor...

Chi Li felt furious. His despair gave rise to an ever-stronger will to survive, mixed with a trace of grievance that even Chi Li himself had not noticed.

Si Jinyan's face surfaced in Chi Li's mind again. During the time he had spent by Si Jinyan's side, he had come to understand Si Jinyan's temperament well.

A thought slowly formed in his mind: was Si Jinyan planning to slowly torture him to death as punishment?

After ten long hours of high fever, his bones and flesh felt as though they had been smashed apart in a furnace and reforged.

No matter how good Chi Li's constitution was, by the time midnight approached, he had completely fallen into a half-dreaming, half-waking stupor.

When Si Jinyan returned, he asked the butler, "Did he eat everything?"

Yuan Ru reported truthfully, "He finished all of his lunch. When dinner was delivered in the afternoon, Mr. Chi was already asleep."

Chi Li did not know how much time had passed. At first, he could still get up and move around after sleeping, but now even moving a finger felt difficult.

When he opened his eyes, his vision was dim and blurred. Chi Li frantically touched his eyes, thinking for an instant that even his optic nerves had been scorched.

Only when his eyes gradually adapted to the darkness and he saw the vague outlines of the furniture did he let out a breath of relief.

But immediately afterward, he heard the sound of water coming from the bathroom.

Someone was there.

Chi Li's heart suddenly began pounding violently.

Chi Li pushed himself up and walked toward the bathroom. "Marshal?"

No one answered him, but the sound of water became clearer and clearer. He could even hear the dull sound of something slapping against the surface.

"Si Jinyan..."

Chi Li pushed open the door, but his words cut off before they could finish.

In the spacious bathroom, Si Jinyan sat in a bathtub large enough to hold five adult men.

But what made Chi Li's heart race uncontrollably was—

A fish tail.

The exact same fish tail from the video appeared before him, carrying a visual and mental impact far more powerful than anything on the screen.

The silver-black fish tail filled the entire bathtub. Its tip, adorned with translucent black fins, hung over one side of the tub and lightly stirred the water on the floor.

The bathroom light fell over it, giving off a cold, sinister chill. Si Jinyan's upper body was human, but his lower half resembled an evil creature born from hell.

The shock and trembling of seeing it directly far surpassed what he had felt through the video.

Chi Li gripped the doorframe so tightly that his fingers turned white.

Having long hovered at the edge of life and death, Chi Li's nerves, exceptionally alert to danger, stretched to their absolute limit. He took half a step back.