Forbidden (First Update)

The institute was shrouded in fear. Several senior researchers personally appointed by the Emperor had once seen Si Jinyan on the verge of completely losing control.

To prevent the previous mistake from happening again, they had made thorough preparations this time...

Yet Si Jinyan, who had been calm moments ago, seemed to have suddenly been provoked by something. Abnormally, he broke free of his restraints and violently struck the walls of the glass chamber.

Physical restraints could no longer hold Si Jinyan.

Just as the Mermaid inside the extraction chamber broke free of the shackles around his tail, another scene that shocked and terrified everyone unfolded.

The scales covering Si Jinyan had only occupied half his body, yet they suddenly began to spread and grow. The scales beneath his waist and abdomen crept upward. On his upper body, which had originally been human in appearance, the dark patterns flowing beneath his skin transformed into hard scales. His fins also began to change, and the sharp translucent fins on either side of his tail grew into an even sharper form...

An elderly senior researcher recorded the scene, terrified yet exhilarated.

Ever since seeing Si Jinyan, he had spent his life obsessed with studying such a creature—a terrifying, powerful, beautiful creature.

He held the recorder with trembling hands. In the final frame, the monster's golden eyes fixed on him.

The old researcher met the monster's gaze. Tremors spread through his body, and fear pinned him in place. His limbs were rigid, leaving him unable to move as he stared back at the monster. Then he saw—a pair of enormous translucent "wings" extending from the monster's back, each more than half the length of its body.

It defied science, defied physiology, and was filled with strangeness, absurdity, and horror...

If he survived, he would remember this scene every night.

Only then did the old researcher realize that, in their past studies, they had grasped only the tiniest fraction of a creature with such an innate "evolution" ability. His breathing quickened.

But in the next second, the tail that had already broken through the glass chamber wrapped around his neck and effortlessly tore off his head like snapping a dead branch.

After being shot, Chi Li forced himself over to a tree trunk. With his back against it, he slowed his breathing and listened to the movements behind him. Yet the loss of blood still made his consciousness grow increasingly hazy.

Chi Li's breathing gradually steadied, but his heart beat faster and faster. There was that familiar warmth of being enveloped in a sphere of water...

Then he suddenly recalled the accident he had encountered along the Empire's coast last time. While half-conscious then, he had experienced the same thing.

Before he could think about why this was happening, his consciousness was dragged deeper...

In a thick mist, he saw someone walking toward him.

Before he could make out the person's face, he completely lost consciousness.

When Chi Li woke, everything before him was a blur of white, and his mind had yet to fully return.

A few seconds later, his vision cleared, and he abruptly met a pair of golden eyes.

Si Jinyan's former golden vertical pupils had been replaced by entirely golden irises. All emotion in his eyes was concealed, leaving only the dangerous gaze of a beast.

Si Jinyan was so unfamiliar at that moment that Chi Li's heart clenched. Chi Li shouted, "Si Jinyan?!"

It was as though he had truly become a ferocious beast.

Fine silver-black scales covered his neck and cheeks near the roots of his ears. His short black hair had become long silver-black hair, and his scale-covered arms confined Chi Li between the edge of the pool and his body.

They seemed to be in a hot spring pool somewhere inside a cave.

Chi Li did not know how Si Jinyan had found him, nor how he had discovered this place. The only thing Chi Li could be certain of was that Si Jinyan's current appearance was one stage of losing control and transforming into a beast.

Chi Li's heart pounded wildly. He did not even dare struggle too hard. His leg was coiled by the fish tail, his skin pressed against hard scales that could leave bloody gashes with the slightest carelessness. This far exceeded Si Jinyan's last loss of control.

Chi Li recalled the bullet that had entered his chest before he fainted. The wound no longer hurt as badly as before; his injury had greatly improved.

Startled, he reached for his back, but before he could touch the wound, Si Jinyan seized his wrist and stared at him with dark eyes.

Chi Li furrowed his brow and returned Si Jinyan's gaze warily. He could not communicate with Si Jinyan, nor could he guess what Si Jinyan would do next. He could only remain completely alert.

The air seemed to freeze, suffocatingly still.

The silver-black strands hanging at Si Jinyan's side slowly moved toward Chi Li. By the time Chi Li realized it, the silver-black hair had already wrapped around his wrist like tentacles.

The boneless, soft touch was no less horrifying than when he had first touched the fish tail. The strands seemed conscious, scrambling to coil around Chi Li's neck and creep toward his mouth.

Witnessing it with his own eyes, Chi Li was shocked and terrified, his scalp prickling. Yet Si Jinyan continued to watch him steadily, like a predator with everything under control.

When the "hair" further extended into Chi Li's mouth like sprouting vines, his breathing quickened, his heart hammered, and his eyes widened.

"Si Jinyan..."

He murmured Si Jinyan's name, trying to shake off the horrifying "hair," but those sounds were quickly swallowed as well.

Chi Li was completely bound, even his vision obscured, leaving only darkness before his eyes.

The next second, he felt something enter the wound in his back where the bullet had struck him. Something smooth, warm, and tentacle-like slipped through the millimeter-wide wound, wrapped around the bullet that had grazed his heart and embedded itself in his flesh.

If not for the obstruction before his eyes, Chi Li would have seen that the monstrous Si Jinyan had his lips pressed against his wound.

The monster's mouthparts entered the vulnerable wound and removed the bullet inside. The hard bullet made of scales was effortlessly crushed between Si Jinyan's teeth.

Si Jinyan crushed the bullet with a dark expression, but the scent of Chi Li's blood and flesh immediately made his pupils contract with excitement.

Chi Li did not know that the beast representing desire within Si Jinyan had completely emerged alongside his gradual transformation. The Si Jinyan before him would now act entirely according to his true intentions, following the instincts buried deep within him that Si Jinyan had always suppressed.

Those sealed memories and that subconscious had always been searching for someone. When Chi Li appeared, his subconscious eagerly locked onto him—in every decision Si Jinyan had made, the scales of reason had tipped toward Chi Li again and again.

A moment later, Chi Li felt the "long hair" probing deeper. He could not even utter a single word, only widen his eyes in despair at the darkness before him as every sensation was endlessly amplified.

Pain, trembling, unbearable...

As if he had fallen into an endless abyss, until only indistinct movement and broken sounds remained amid the rising mist.