The Mystic Nine

(Extra: Chen Pi Ah Si's Story) Chapter 26: Nine-Clawed Hook

The three gangs and five factions rushed into the water and started heading for the ship, which was about eighty meters or so from the shore. Since the old woman was blind, she didn't know what had happened and was still sitting there silently. The short boss' body didn't fall down, but stood there like a pillar. When the people in the water looked up and saw this scene, they all hesitated and then stopped.

The white fat man snorted and said to the old hunter, "Break his legs."

When the old hunter didn't make a sound, the white fat man became angry and turned his head. "Are you fucking deaf?!" He saw that the old hunter's head was drooping on his gun and he was leaning against the bamboo hats. A lot of blood was oozing out from under the bamboo hats.

When he went up and tore the bamboo hats away, he saw a strange thing lying on the old hunter's back. The old hunter's scalp had been completely torn off, revealing the white skull underneath. He was dead. That thing had been lying motionless on the old hunter's back, but suddenly turned to look at the white fat man the moment the bamboo hats were torn away.

The white fat man saw an extremely thin, slightly deformed face. Not only was the face small, but its head was as well. At first glance, it still looked like a person, just one with a little head.

Then it moved a bit, and he could see that it was an extremely thin "person", but its nails were all crusted, and they were as long as a finger. The skin all over its body was wrinkled, and it looked especially creepy because of its disproportionately small head.

The white fat man cried out and went to pull his gun from his waist, but the little-headed thing opened its eyes wide, leaped up, and threw the white fat man to the ground. Two claws pierced directly into the white fat man's chin, and tore through his whole face and scalp.

Almost at the same time, the people in the water heard the sound of six or seven doors opening in quick succession on the ship. Countless shadows emerged from the doors and jumped into the water.

Then they saw a lot of strange little figures in the iron cages hanging under the ship.

"Go ashore!" Someone shouted from the water. Everyone immediately began to retreat, but three or four seconds later, a series of screams were abruptly cut off as people were instantly dragged into the water. They struggled desperately, but were quickly dragged under the ship, where they saw that the iron cages were full of barbed hooks. Those little-headed "people" pulled them into the water and pressed them onto the barbs until their chins and clothes were pierced. They put up a fierce struggle, but couldn't break free.

A mass of blood rose up in the water. Only twenty people managed to escape, but before they could react, the little-headed "person" still on the shore dashed over. All twenty people pulled out their guns and shot at it until it was riddled with holes. But before they could relax, more of those little-headed "people" climbed out of the water. The people on shore scattered and fled, but were instantly killed just as they were about to make it to the tree-line. At that time, shots rang out everywhere and blood spattered all over the place.

The short boss' body still stood there motionless, but then it slowly reached out and pulled a cable on the side. All the bamboo curtains on the ship were lowered, and then the corpse's shoulder seemed to crack open and another head appeared.

It looked at the destroyed head and took a deep breath before moving. After a moment, it stretched a hand out from the place where the destroyed head used to be.

This two-headed trick was a skill he had learned when he was a "Xuandeng bandit" in his early years. It was originally a trick only known by a generation of great witches and monks in Hubei and Hunan. He was actually curled up in his clothes, with one hand reaching up into the dead man's decapitated dead to control his expressions and speech. He would use his other hand to act, which made him look much shorter. A truly skilled person could even make the decapitated head roll its eyes to seem more lifelike.