The Cornered Beast Fights Back, Breaking Through the Encirclement with Fiery Fury

The briny sea breeze rushed through the cracked iron sheeting of the warehouse, and Bo Yu leaned against a rusted oil barrel, his fingers lightly brushing the tactical belt that Tang Yao had left behind.

The explosion six hours ago still left his left ear ringing, but what truly burned his nerves was the searing bite on his shoulder blade — the mark Tang Yao had left on him before disappearing. It now flared with a red glow, in sync with the vibrations from a cruise ship engine a hundred meters away.

"Thirty-two steps," he muttered, licking the scabbed blood off his canine teeth, his wolf-like eyes scanning the shelves piled with fishing nets and buoys.

When the seventh rat fell from the ventilation pipe, the rusted iron door hinge finally screeched with a sound that could make one's teeth ache.

Shen Killer's figure was elongated into a twisted blade by the moonlight, the tungsten steel trident in his hand dripping with something — whether it was seawater or the blood of his last victim, Bo Yu couldn't tell.

"Mr. Xu sent me with a message." The sound of the killer's boots crushing barnacles on the floor echoed, "He says your girlfriend's canine teeth are a lot sharper than he imagined."

Bo Yu's lower back collided with a frozen squid crate, but his right hand silently found the valve of the cold storage unit.

He was too familiar with such deliberate provocation — three days ago, the traitor surnamed Qian had used the same malicious tone when mentioning Tang Yao's birthmark.

But this time was different. He listened intently to the sound of the killer's carotid artery's mechanical pressure pump, then suddenly grinned.

"Do you know why deep-sea divers have to modify their gills?" Bo Yu kicked over an oil barrel, which exploded into a hail of rusty metal, and the chlorine gas canisters hidden inside sprayed a white mist as Shen Killer raised his arm to block.

"Because you scum can't even smell real blood!" Bo Yu shouted, the nano-robots he had placed earlier assembling into an electric net.

Shen Killer's metallic laugh echoed through the mist as he moved sideways like a shadow to avoid the corrosive gas, his trident carving sparks into the concrete wall as he skidded.

But Bo Yu had already climbed up to the crossbeam, his wolf-like claws digging deep into the rusted steel frame. Tang Yao had once told him that the best predators always swoop down from the blind spots of their prey. Now, moonlight pinned the killer's shadow in the center of the fishing nets scattered on the floor.

"You should save your cleverness for writing your will," Shen Killer sneered, suddenly spinning and throwing the trident, its cold light slicing through Bo Yu's raised work jacket, but only shredding a few floating fish scales.

The real killing blow came with the high-frequency dagger that followed, buzzing ominously as it neared Bo Yu's throat. Just as it was a hair's breadth away, the blade froze mid-air in the salty, humid air.

A ghostly blue flickered in Bo Yu's wolf eyes as he tilted his head back, allowing the dagger to tremble mere inches from his nose — Shen Killer didn't notice that he was standing on a puddle of reflective liquid. The cold pipe that had been corroded by chlorine gas three minutes ago had frozen the entire area under the killer's feet into a mirror-like surface.

"Reflections of hunting dogs..." Bo Yu murmured, repeating Tang Yao's riddle. He slammed his wolf-clawed hand onto the rusted fire hydrant.

A burst of water shot out in a column, carrying with it twenty years of iron rust, and as Shen Killer lost his balance on the ice, he was blasted deep into the shelves stacked with fluorescent buoys.

In the roaring sound of breaking rotted wood, Bo Yu smelled the scent he had been waiting for.

When Shen Killer howled and tore apart the beam trapping his right leg, the trident embedded in the wall began to melt — the tungsten steel surface corroded by chlorine gas now exuded the familiar scent of bluefin tuna from Xu's cruise ship's cold storage.

"Seems like your boss..." Bo Yu flicked the ice shards off his wolf claws, letting the tail end of his words fade away in the gap between crashing waves.

He saw Shen Killer's mechanical eyes shrink into needle-point slits, a cybernetic reflex specific to modified humans, reacting far more sensitively to key words than humans ever could.

The killer's next move was faster by three fractions of a second, but this time Bo Yu didn't dodge.

He took the sidekick head-on, using his shoulder blade to absorb the impact, the excruciating pain causing the beastly nature in his wolf blood to boil over.

In the 0.3-second hesitation caused by Shen Killer's shock, Bo Yu's blood-coated fangs had already pierced through the cooling pipe at the back of his neck.

"Tell Mr. Xu—" Bo Yu spat out the oily taste of the coolant, pinching the metal chip he had pulled from the killer's spine, "The 'little octopus' he's hiding in the cold storage on the third floor is a lot cuter than you, his watchdog."

Shen Killer's mechanical pupils began to overload, his body rigidly collapsing to the ground as his right hand clutched desperately at the emergency button on his chest.

Bo Yu squinted, staring at the device bearing the Deep Sea Group's logo, suddenly recalling a reflection of a crew member's work ID from the port security cameras the night Tang Yao disappeared.

The sound of the waves suddenly thickened, and Bo Yu stumbled, propping himself up against a leaking wall.

The backlash from overusing his werewolf abilities hit him faster than usual. He could feel his claws retracting back into human form, the bite mark on his shoulder burning like a hot iron.

But what was worse was the sudden vibration of the chip in his palm, Xu's hoarse laugh mixed with the hum of electrical currents exploding in the empty warehouse.

"Bo, has anyone ever told you that you're like a sea cockroach?" the voice echoed, causing his temples to throb, "The dirtier the corner, the more you thrive."

Bo Yu's wolf claws dug deep into the wall, and he held onto the excruciating pain to stay alert.

Something in the shadows behind the shelves flickered in sync with Xu's voice, and when he saw the twelve red dots counting down, his rear molars almost cracked — the spot where Shen Killer had fallen was now pressing down on half a box of underwater demolition charges.

"How about we play a game of hide and seek?" Xu's breath suddenly sounded close, as if whispering in Bo Yu's ear, "I bet your legs are faster, or I am with the detonator?"

The moonlight was suddenly swallowed by dark clouds, and the raindrops leaking from the warehouse roof splashed on Bo Yu's burning forehead.

He listened to the ferry's horn signaling the ship's departure a hundred meters away, and tasted a third kind of briny sweetness, beyond the sea and blood — the kind of shiver the pack leader always felt before a hunt.

Bo Yu's pupils shrank into vertical slits, and he pulled off Tang Yao's tactical belt, wrapping it around his trembling right hand.

The red light from the countdown of the explosives reflected off the rusted oil barrel, just like the warning symbols Tang Yao had drawn with her lipstick on the hotel mirror that night.

The moonlight shattered into silver scales on the ground as Bo Yu focused on the twelve red dots flickering in the shadow of the shelves.

The countdown of the explosives and the frequency of the waves merged, and in a moment of disorientation, it felt eerily similar to the fisherman's song Tang Yao often hummed.

His throat swallowed the taste of blood, and his right hand, wrapped in the tactical belt, suddenly brushed against something hard — the adrenaline needle hidden in the compartment, pressing into his palm through the waterproof fabric.

"Five, four..."

Xu's countdown mixed with the electrical static pierced his eardrum, and Bo Yu's pupils constricted into the wolfish vertical slits typical of his kind.

He heard the snap of his own bones, the bite mark on his shoulder burning like a red-hot iron digging into his flesh.

When the third rib began to twist, Shen Killer's broken mechanical body spasmed, and the blue light shooting from his cybernetic eye illuminated the warehouse like a ghostly glow.

"Watch out for the sonic weapon!" Feng Hacker's shout came just as the glass window shattered, and Bo Yu's wolf claw had already torn through Shen Killer's metal chest.

The modified infrasound emitter was running at full power, and the squid crates fifty meters away exploded one after another into stinking clouds of snow.

Zheng Yufu, with his conical hat, rolled out from behind the shelves, and with his salt-crusted palm, expertly threw a fishing net: "Catch this, young lad!" The oil-soaked nylon net unfolded in mid-air like a golden spider's web, perfectly catching six miniature harpoons aimed at Bo Yu's carotid artery.

Bo Yu felt warm liquid flooding his nostrils, and the overuse of his werewolf abilities coated his vision in a blood-red filter.

When Feng Hacker's laptop fell from the ventilation duct, Bo Yu suddenly recalled the stormy night three days ago — the hacker, always in plaid shirts, huddled in the engine room of the fishing boat, piecing together Xu's satellite communication frequency with three old radios.

"The octopus in the cold storage on the third floor..." Feng Hacker's fingers flew over the keyboard like a predator's tentacles, and the blue light on the screen illuminated his glasses, "Uncle Zheng said it will glow?"

The explosion's shockwave overturned the oil barrel, and Bo Yu finally understood the code Tang Yao had left behind.

His werewolf back arched, and the roar that erupted from his fangs resonated with the ferry's horn.

Shen Killer's mechanical joints screamed under the pressure, and the twelve detonators' countdowns suddenly froze at 0.7 seconds.

"Now!" Zheng Yufu tossed the second fishing net onto the ventilation pipe, stomping his salt-crusted feet firmly on the ground.

The twenty years of sea salt crystals in the air surged upward, forming a shimmering barrier in the moonlight — Feng Hacker's command to hack into the detonation system finally completed with the final transmission, thanks to this natural electromagnetic interference.

When Bo Yu's claws tore through Shen Killer's chest, he smelled the jasmine fragrance of the specially-made lubricant from the Deep Sea Group.

This scent, from a secret lab in the South Pacific, had lingered in Tang Yao's hair the night before.

When the mechanical heart exploded into a shower of parts in his palm, a cold sensation suddenly ran up his spine to the back of his head.

The sharp senses of his werewolf form were fading, and Bo Yu stumbled into the frozen squid crate.

He saw the blue condensation liquid stuck in the gaps between his retracted human nails. As it hit the air, tiny glowing text started to appear — it was a distress coordinate written in nano-ink by Tang Yao!

"Don't touch that!" Feng Hacker's alarmed shout came just as the glass bottle shattered.

Zheng Yufu splashed high-proof liquor over the condensed liquid, and the eerie blue flames flared up, momentarily illuminating the vaporizing numbers in the bottle.

Shen Killer's body suddenly spasmed, and the synthesized voice from his shattered throat let out one last transmission: "Mr. Xu... sends his regards..." The rusted mechanical fingers jabbed into his own eye socket, and the electronic eye exploded in a burst of purple smoke.

Bo Yu instinctively knocked Feng Hacker down, but heard the old fisherman's hearty laugh cutting through the toxic mist.

"The young lad's a bit too nervous," Zheng Yufu chuckled, standing by the vent, his patched-up coat fluttering in the sea breeze. "This kind of sea moon jellyfish toxin, we fishermen use it to pickle fish."

Bo Yu coughed violently, holding his knee, while the wolf head emblem on his tactical belt burned with heat.

As Feng Hacker used a homemade vacuum cleaner to gather the last of the toxic mist, the warehouse's iron door suddenly burst open with the sound of the ferry's horn.

The salty sea breeze, accompanied by the beam of the cruise ship's searchlight, swept in, illuminating a gleaming metal piece amidst the wreckage on the floor.

"What is this..." Feng Hacker plucked up the half-melted chip with tweezers, his eyes behind the lenses widening in shock. "The cold storage door access log for Mr. Xu's yacht!"

Last week, a batch of live octopuses was shipped to..."

His words were interrupted by Bo Yu's violent tremors.

The weakness from shifting out of werewolf form hit him like a tidal wave, and Bo Yu felt his knee buckle against the cold floor.

Zheng Yufu's fishy-smelling coat suddenly draped over his shoulders, the warmth from the old fisherman's palm passing through his shirt: "Take a rest, young lad. Chasing after a girl is like waiting for the tide..."

Feng Hacker suddenly turned his laptop towards them, the red dot flashing on the screen, tracing a strange course on the sea map: "Mr. Xu's yacht suddenly changed course ten minutes ago, now heading full speed toward international waters. But according to the access log, Miss Tang's biological data was last detected in..."

Bo Yu's pupils constricted violently.

His trembling fingers brushed across the compartment in his tactical belt, where the satellite locator should have been, but now only half a severed data cable remained.

The memory of the explosion suddenly flashed back — the night Tang Yao pushed him into the safety cabin, the red hue at the corner of her lips was not lipstick, but blood, shimmering with a golden glow.

"It's a symbiotic rejection reaction," Feng Hacker suddenly pointed at a segment of the gene map on the screen, gasping. "The deep-sea symbiote Xu implanted in Miss Tang should have reached maturity last night!"

The roar of the rain hitting the iron roof echoed, and Bo Yu heard the hollow reverberation of his own heart.

He reached for the glass bottle containing the condensed liquid, only to realize Zheng Yufu had already suspended it in the vent.

The old fisherman hummed an off-key fisherman's song, the cracked glass bottle casting blurred nautical charts in the moonlight.

"Thirty nautical miles northeast, there's a World War II shipwreck graveyard," Zheng Yufu knocked the copper smoking pipe against the bottle, and the light spots suddenly coalesced into clear coordinates. "Twenty years ago, I fished up a glowing iron box there, with an octopus design carved on the lid..."

Bo Yu's fingertips dug into his palm.

The tactical belt emitted a sharp beeping sound. The 24-hour life-sign monitoring device that Tang Yao had set up was now flashing bright red on his waist.

The sea breeze carried the distant thunder, pouring into the warehouse, scattering the glowing text on the fishing net like flickering stars.