Chapter 12: Combat Expert

Bang!

Inertia and the larva’s own weight caused it to detach from the steel plate, crashing heavily onto the ground five meters away.

Chen Hai smoothly shut the iron door and said in a low voice, “Its weight is about fifty kilograms. I used nearly eighty percent of my strength. I wouldn’t recommend such a crude and forceful approach for ordinary people. It’s best to lure it completely into the room first.”

After speaking, he sprinted toward the dazed larva and grabbed a sharp iron plate, furiously striking its head!

Greenish pulp splattered everywhere. In just two seconds, the larva’s head was pierced and shredded to a pulp.

“Eight strikes to the head with forceful stabbing, with solid hits. The head isn’t particularly hard. Even a woman, wielding a sharp weapon and exerting full strength, could do this,” he observed.

“The wound would be fatal to an ordinary creature, but this alien species is not so simple.”

Indeed, it wasn’t that simple. Through Lu Ming’s perspective, the larva’s core organ, like the first two he had killed, was located toward the front of its abdomen, practically flush with the ground. So smashing the head alone was ineffective.

However, as Chen Hai spoke, he had already moved to the larva’s back to finish it off.

Thwack!

The iron plate pierced the larva’s body. Chen Hai’s eyes widened slightly, then quickly returned to normal as he calmly said, “As expected, its body looks soft on the outside, but beneath the fat layer, the muscles are extremely well developed. When the iron plate penetrated, there was obvious resistance, and the muscles even compressed to hinder the blade’s progress.”

“That explains why in the first video, the four warriors only managed to inflict superficial wounds on the maggot.”

“Therefore, I don’t recommend killing it without a sharpened long blade. Even if you have one, it’s best to use high ground and your own body weight to assist the attack. When pulling the weapon out, do it swiftly, or else the weapon might get stuck inside the body.”

While giving advice, Chen Hai stepped on the larva and vigorously pulled out the sharp iron plate.

If it was this difficult for him, no one else would dare to doubt it.

Lu Ming admired him even more. A combat expert was truly a professional—he touched on every crucial detail, all from personal experience.

At that moment, new flesh began to sprout from the wounds on the larva’s head and body.

The granulation tissue writhed wildly, and the wounds rapidly closed, the skin shifting from white to red.

Taking advantage of this, Chen Hai stabbed again into the larva’s body, but narrowly missed the core organ by about three centimeters.

He pulled out the iron plate and examined the corroded marks on it, quickly adding, “The abdomen contains a sac filled with highly corrosive acid, preliminarily assumed to be gastric acid. There may be a sac solely for storing acid. When the weapon contacts it, corrosion occurs, likely reducing the weapon’s durability. With both muscle protection and an acid sac that corrodes weapons, if I were an alien maggot, I’d hide my weak spot near the acid sac.”

“It’s about to ‘go berserk.’ I need to keep my distance. From the first injury until now, about eight seconds have passed—three seconds slower than the first video. I guess it relates to the degree of trauma. If the injury reaches a certain level but the kill isn’t completed, it will enter the next phase.”

Damn! That analysis was truly impressive!

Keep in mind, Chen Hai didn’t have any god-tier ability like the Eye of Truth.

Facing the scythe owl larva for the first time, with only eleven attack attempts, he had already figured out most of its characteristics.

Although there was a slight error regarding its weak points, it was undeniable that most larvae he had killed tended to keep their core organ close to the ground near the stomach.

Firstly, they usually crawl, making the lower abdomen the most concealed blind spot from enemies.

Secondly, gastric acid corrodes weapons. When people see their weapons corroded, they instinctively avoid that spot, forcing the enemy to stay away from the weak point.

As for the larva’s berserk transformation, or the “aroused” state, it was not, as Chen Hai said, triggered by reaching a certain injury threshold.

Rather, any attack on the larva would trigger it after a certain time, even if it was just a punch.

This time wasn’t eight seconds but five.

Because it depends not on when you attack, but when the larva realizes it’s been attacked.

For example, Chen Hai’s surprise strike was so fast and fierce that the larva lay stunned on the ground for a while before realizing it had been hit.

Despite this flaw, Lu Ming still freely lavished praise on Chen Hai.

Meanwhile, the scythe owl larva successfully entered its “aroused” state.

While crawling, it was only half a meter tall, but when upright, it seemed to stretch its flesh and skin, increasing its height fourfold.

It even towered over Chen Hai, who was 1.85 meters tall!

Its chest began to writhe and crack open, suddenly revealing a one-meter-long scarlet vertical maw.

Rows of razor-sharp fangs moved menacingly, and yellow slime dripped from its mouth, hanging on the teeth.

Its originally dark eyes now glowed with bloodthirsty red light, making the huge mouth all the more terrifying.

Lu Ming instinctively swallowed his saliva and tensed up.

By contrast, Chen Hai’s expression remained unchanged. He raised his left hand, bracing the iron plate with his usual cross grip, and calmly said, “After berserk, this alien stands up and exposes its fierce visage, entering attack mode. But due to the characteristics of soft-bodied creatures, it loses mobility and can only stay put. Of course, it might have some jumping ability, but probably not much; otherwise, it would have jumped to kill instead of spraying acid.”

“However, even without jumping or moving, it shouldn’t be underestimated.”

“Losing mobility, it gains several new attack methods. Based on the first video, it adjusts its attacks depending on how close the target is.”

“If the target is within arm’s reach, it swings its body to slash and tear. The momentum combined with sharp teeth can instantly rip apart an adult body.”

“If the target is out of slashing range, it switches to mid-range attacks, projecting its mouth about half a meter forward while leaning its body, extending its reach beyond one meter.”

“This shows its oral muscles are very well developed, likely the source of the piercing resistance we encountered earlier.”

“The last method is my current situation—keeping more than five meters away.”

At this, Chen Hai crouched slightly, his solid muscles stretching his pants near bursting.

His sharp gaze locked onto the larva’s vertical mouth as he spoke in a low voice, “At this distance, its mouthparts can’t reach me, so it triggers the last known attack: spraying highly corrosive acid. Judging by the shooting speed in the first video, its effective lethal range is at least twenty meters.”

Splash!

Just as he finished, the larva suddenly closed its maw, then opened it wide again, spraying a thick jet of sticky yellow acid.

Despite being prepared, Chen Hai was caught off guard by the high-speed spray and had to roll away urgently.

The acid barely brushed his back; otherwise, his head would have been hit.

It even knew how to aim for the head!

Looking back at the splatter marks the acid left on the wall, Chen Hai took a deep breath and corrected his estimate: “Revised data: the effective lethal range is at least eighty meters.”