Infinite Hunter

Cheng Yijiu was now dizzy, vomiting, and nauseous. His whole body was in great pain and he felt weak. He tried hard to hold the rifle, and raised the muzzle with all his strength. When the muzzle dropped again, he pulled the trigger - then his eyes went black and he passed out.

Before he passed out, he finally saw the bullet hit the ape's waist and abdomen again. "Damn..." Cheng Yijiu fell into darkness.

When Cheng Yijiu regained consciousness, his first thought was, "I'm still alive." However, he couldn't feel his limbs, and it took a long time before he could feel them. Since he was still alive, the stinking ape was probably dead. Otherwise, Cheng Yijiu didn't think he had a chance of waking up.

His limbs were still there, unbroken and untied. When he finally regained some strength and pushed his upper body up, he found the ground covered in vomit. He was incredibly lucky not to have choked on his own vomit. "Where's the stinking ape?" Cheng Yijiu finally stood up. The first thing he wanted to see was the stinking ape's body—if the second bullet had been as powerful, it was very likely that it had indeed killed the monster.

This was undoubtedly a dark creature, but Cheng Yijiu didn't see a corpse. He only saw a pool of black, smelly mucus and a few long strands of hair in front of him. There was nothing else - oh, and a hunting knife. He slowly moved to the hunting knife and grasped the handle.

With a humming sound, the entire blade shone with white light from end to end. The foul-smelling slime that had clung to it hardened and burned in the light, turning it into dust—even the handle and the area in Cheng Yijiu's palm were affected. The flames were not hot, and the white flames burned away the slime wherever they touched, leaving no trace of the foul smell.

After catching his breath for a long time, Cheng Yijiu finally stood up straight. This was because he placed the hunting knife emitting white flames on his mouth and nose - the flames burned away the "stinking poison" that filled his nasal cavity, mouth, respiratory tract, chest and abdomen, at the cost of making him slightly dizzy.

Cheng Yijiu looked at the pool of mucus here, "It's impossible that this guy melted?" He was a little skeptical, "This area and the amount of mucus... Considering the guy's two-meter-tall body, it's really too little." It's hard to say whether the amount here is even an arm.

There were no traces of the creature leaving, and no clues as to where it had gone. Cheng Yijiu stood aside for at least half an hour, pondering, before finally adjusting his hat and turning away. "Perhaps the stinking ape will remain a mystery forever. Although I have a rough idea of ​​what it is, I can't explain where it went."

In Cheng Yijiu's opinion, this monster may not be a zombie, but perhaps some kind of "water ghost", or as the Chinese guys are used to saying - "water monkey".

But this thing was definitely a dark creature, and definitely a "dead thing." Cheng Yijiu's hunting knife and his bullets proved this. The damage wasn't like that of a werewolf, but rather very similar to that of a zombie. Cheng Yijiu had already increased his speed to maximum. Perhaps the bodies of the local thugs and their family he'd murdered last night had already been discovered? He needed to speed up.

As for Barton and the others being implicated in the phone records? He wasn't worried at all. These two guys lived in California, and the local state police had to hand them over to the FBI for questioning. Barton and the others didn't actually know Cheng Yijiu's specific identity. In other words, Cheng Yijiu was a person who didn't exist in the American criminal database.

And would they really be discovered? It seems the gang didn't notify the police after two people were beaten to death. Now they must have decided to solve the problem themselves. Cheng Yijiu didn't care about the deceased's family at all, and when he walked all the way to the parking lot, he did find that there were no local police officers.

These people weren't jungle special forces; they couldn't possibly be lurking in every corner without Cheng Yijiu knowing. So when he got into his RV, no one came to raid it. Cheng Yijiu cleaned himself up, threw his clothes into the washing machine, changed into some comfortable clothes, and drove away overnight. As long as he crossed the state line, he didn't care at all.

There are countless unsolved cases in the United States, and highway murders are commonplace—the murderer was murdered. "Within a week, at most, the neighbors should have discovered the murderer. The local police probably have no ability to track down the murderer—I suspect the coroner will be the town's second-rate doctor. The best they can do is confirm the cause of death."

By midnight, he had already driven out of the state. Cheng Yijiu parked the car, returned to his workbench, took out a large notebook, and began writing. He first sketched the monster's entire body with a pen, followed by a quick sketch of the monster's head from memory and a close-up of its large forelimbs.

"Now that I'm thinking back, I realize this guy's forelimbs are webbed." Cheng Yijiu, reminiscing carefully, remembered the webbed fingers of the stinky ape he saw. This reminded him of the protagonist of a TV show he had watched as a very young child a long time ago, Michael Harris...

"This shouldn't be a primate, because there are no large advanced primate fossils on the North American continent. Rather than saying that this thing is some kind of ape, it's better... I think it's more like a patchwork, and then covered with a simple fur." ​​Cheng Yijiu believed that this was definitely not a biological weapon. "There must be something wrong with this land... But I can only be sure of it when I can find a Mothman." Cheng Yijiu decided to go north to New England to see the so-called Mothman or the giant owl.

Chapter 19 Camp

Coming and going, Cheng Yijiu had originally thought he'd be able to travel with Barton and the others for a while, but now he was wandering alone again. For their future safety, Cheng Yijiu would not contact them anymore. As for those six college students? It was best for them to forget about them.

Cheng Yijiu adjusted the signal and connected to the network. American mobile broadband networks are a classic example of a mess. Even in the city, there are dead spots, not to mention the wilderness, where there's generally no signal. Cheng Yijiu parked the car in a small town—it wasn't exactly a desolate place, with quite a lot of traffic. He even saw a specialized comic book store on the street. Such stores meant they had a large customer base, so there were definitely plenty of people there.

There was also an RV campground here. Cheng Yijiu drove the Unimog to the campground, connected the water supply and electricity, registered, activated the vehicle handling system, and began to add water and clean the gray water tank. "Hmm, it's completely on a different level," Cheng Yijiu muttered, looking around.

In the US, even RVs can be considered registered addresses, and many people use RVs as their homes. This is also true in this RV campground, where quite a few RVs appear to be "fixed residences" that have been parked there for a long time, likely the homes of these poor people.

There are also some who seem to be about to fall into this class, or are already in this class but prefer to wander around the U.S. The real minority are those who travel in RVs - these people are really more common in tourist attractions, and are quite rare here.

Cheng Yijiu was one of them, and the RVs of people like him were the best maintained and most expensive—even the trailers. Cheng Yijiu looked around and confirmed that his car was undoubtedly the most expensive one, knowing that he was the "highest class" in this camp.

Cheng Yijiu smiled and prepared to walk to the town's cafe to have a meal, and then go to the town's supermarket or market to replenish supplies. Of course, he might also go to the bar for a drink - this was to get some information.

Whether it's the Mothman or the giant owl, if the Chupocabra and the Stink Ape are monsters, they're myths, involving supernatural legends. Both the Mothman and the giant owl are associated with "signs of disaster," and disaster is certain to occur soon after they are seen.

Was it the work of Mothman or a giant owl? Some believe it wasn't, that they were simply messengers of the goddess of disaster, foreshadowing disaster. Just like the black dog that roams the cemetery—in this legend, the large black dog, with eyes like burning coals and a sulphurous smell, is a symbol of death.

If Cheng Yijiu wanders around New England, a region with a long history, he might also see black dogs in the cemeteries - after all, this kind of "monster" only appears in ancient cemeteries.

"Mothman, at least two meters tall, seemingly headless, with eyes that glow red as bright as searchlights, and wings that are like bat wings, but oversized." Cheng Yijiu muttered. There are not many sightings of this thing, and its appearance is not widespread. "Giant owl? It's estimated to be more than one meter tall, an extremely large owl."

This is nonsense. Owls have been studied quite thoroughly. To say that in the more developed New England region of the United States, there is an owl that is several times larger than an eagle owl and can be as tall as a human and has not been discovered by humans is basically a joke.

Many of these "monsters" are actually jokes. If there may be large creatures in the ocean that have not been discovered, it is almost impossible to find them on land.

Cheng Yijiu had a very unremarkable meal in town, then hung out in the bar for about half an hour without success, and finally returned after a large shopping spree at the market. When he arrived at the camp, he found several people surrounding his car.

There were no police officers among them. They looked like typical American poor white men. They circled the car, looking like they were about to take something out of the car to sell. Cheng Yijiu didn't bring a pistol with him when he went out, he only brought a hunting knife - Cheng Yijiu didn't want to gamble with the professionalism of the American police.

"Hey, man, is this your car? It's a nice one." As they approached, a body odor wafted through them, but these guys seemed used to it. Their dirty clothes, unshaven beards, and rough skin made them look like old scoundrels. "Hey, man, give me twenty bucks," someone said, cigarette butt in hand.

These were shameless old American scoundrels, ripping off seemingly valuable parts of the car right in front of their owner. Luckily, the Unimog was practically semi-armored, so these bastards couldn't be taken down by human power alone—just looking at their appearances told you they were the worst kind, heavily intoxicated and drugged, their bodies completely drained.

"Get out of here!" Cheng Yijiu said calmly. He didn't draw his knife, nor was he worried about these old bastards, even though they had guns on their hips. They looked like they were in such a state, they probably hadn't taken care of their guns. There was no telling if they would explode when they fired, especially at this distance. Cheng Yijiu could definitely knock them down faster than they could shoot.

Cheng Yijiu didn't want to cause any trouble and call the police. He wasn't sure if the murder case had happened, and it was possible the neighbors wouldn't report it. He just wanted to avoid any trouble. If something did happen, he might have to dispose of all these rubbish. It looked like they had been in the area for a long time, and while they were probably hated by everyone, he couldn't rule out regular police visits.

Because Cheng Yijiu, one of these old ruffians, can guarantee that every one of them has a criminal record...

Being able to intimidate them was enough. It seemed they were also selective—there were a few families traveling with Cheng Yijiu, and those families seemed to be peeking out, not daring to come out, only hiding to watch the "dispute" here. They were white and black, and Cheng Yijiu was the only yellow person and drove the best car. Of course, these old thugs chose him to extort.

After Cheng Yijiu shouted "Get lost!", the atmosphere in the room changed. These old thugs had either drunk a lot of alcohol or taken illegal drugs, and their minds were completely out of sorts. As soon as Cheng Yijiu said this, they immediately and spontaneously started pulling out their weapons—they wouldn't consider the consequences of turning extortion into robbery, something their peanut-sized brains wouldn't consider...

Chapter 20 Encounter?

Of course, the old thugs didn't consider the line of fire, nor did they think about who would be hit after the gun went off. Cheng Yijiu had no interest in letting them do such a thing. As soon as the old man in the lead pulled out his pistol, he had already made his move. Cheng Yijiu was extremely fast, grabbing the pistol's slide and pulling it back, twisting it, and the other man screamed in pain.

After snatching the gun, Cheng Yijiu turned and elbowed the second man down... It took Cheng Yijiu less than three seconds to kill them all, and they were all lying dead on the ground. Cheng Yijiu had four guns at his feet, and he was now leisurely emptying the magazines. He also turned off the water and electricity, preparing to leave.

A few minutes later, Cheng Yijiu was ready. He squatted in front of these scumbags, swallowing the discomfort in his nose as he looked at them. "As expected, there's no hope of saving them. They're complete scumbags. I could have used them as bait, but it's a pity I can't—otherwise, I could have gotten rid of some trouble for the local area." Zhao Ting hadn't yet decided to kill people along the way. There was no point in making himself a federal felon.

Although if he did that, there was a high probability that he would not be caught by the FBI.

"I'm a hunter, not a killer," Cheng Yijiu told himself. He shouldn't get used to hunting humans. For now, it's better to focus on completing the man-eating beasts in his mission. He didn't want to become like that Tsarist colonel who hunted humans for fun. He had already killed people, several of them, but fortunately, humans didn't bring him any particular pleasure at the moment—the people he killed when he was a tiger, shark, or python didn't count.

All of this had already had a significant impact on him, and his emotions were now quite dull—during the mission. Crouching in the bushes, he observed those people, and now, in retrospect, it felt similar to a tiger observing its human prey. So, he wouldn't kill those old scumbags, not only for the sake of witnesses, but also for his own sake. Cheng Yijiu kicked the scum aside, climbed into the truck, started, and drove off.

The car window opened, Cheng Yijiu rested his arm on it, steering with one hand. American country roads don't have sharp turns. He was heading towards Point Pleasant—the most common site for Mothman sightings. He didn't mind seeing a few other things along the way. He wouldn't hunt casually. Even though this mission was shrouded in doubt, that didn't mean he had to hunt casually.

It was dark, and Cheng Yijiu was still driving, still a long way from his destination. A little after nine in the evening, he stopped the car and veered into a clearing in the woods by the roadside. Cheng Yijiu didn't turn on the lights. He heated canned food on an induction cooker and ate with a small light—while checking the car's external surveillance system. To the outside world, the car was pitch black, its light was invisible. Silently parked, it felt like a beast lurking in the woods.

Cheng Yijiu didn't expect to find much here. "No more than coyotes, deer, black bears, and maybe wild boars at best. North America is surprisingly poor in species." Come to think of it, there should be mountain lions here, and North America doesn't have many large mammals. But there seemed to be a lot of strange and bizarre monsters. Almost every large lake had a legend of a lake monster, and there were also legends of the giant primate Bigfoot—Cheng Yijiu had just fought a desperate battle with something similar.

There were even legends that dinosaurs existed in the United States—that was a joke. Cheng Yijiu pondered the so-called American monster legends—for a country that could nearly wipe out the North American bison in a short period of time, and a people that could wipe out hundreds of millions of passenger pigeons, how could they allow monsters to roam the land? The only possibility of such monsters was that they were not beasts at all—whether it was the Chupocabra or the Stink Ape.

The same should be true for Mothman. Just as Cheng Yijiu was thinking this, something unusual outside caught his attention. The surveillance footage showed nothing unusual; Cheng Yijiu had heard a strange sound. He turned off all the lights in the RV, grabbed a pistol, and listened intently. "Is that the sound of air flapping? Wings?" Cheng Yijiu wondered, even slightly closing his eyes to listen more intently.

"Puff, puff, puff." The sound was almost a constant frequency, and Cheng Yijiu was almost certain that something was outside, flying about twenty meters above the ground and circling. Cheng Yijiu's mind seemed to have a three-dimensional picture. This thing was flying around his RV, and the altitude was getting lower and lower. He was not sure how big this creature was, but judging by the sound of its wings, it must be quite large.

"Owl or Mothman? More like Mothman?" Cheng Yijiu raised the observation deck. He stood below it and peered out through the gap. Cheng Yijiu saw the light. He saw the flying monster in the dark sky. Its body, connected by wings, lacked a head. On its chest were two glowing eyes—or, if you will, eyes. Their brightness was about the same as a candle after focusing.

"We've met this already?" Cheng Yijiu also found it incredible. He hadn't intended to shoot the Mothman—in fact, he wasn't sure if ordinary bullets would be effective against it. Besides, the Mothman didn't seem very dangerous. Cheng Yijiu's night vision also gave him a rough idea of ​​what it looked like—a pair of very large bat wings, and a body that wasn't exactly humanoid, but the structure of its two hind legs was somewhat similar to human legs.

This thing really did seem to have no head. Cheng Yijiu thought it was more likely that its neck had degenerated, because those two glowing things were indeed its eyes. The hair on its body was strange, obscuring the rest of its body and making it impossible to see it clearly. Cheng Yijiu had no idea what its nose and mouth looked like. Cheng Yijiu didn't even know why it was circling his RV? Was it trying to attack? If organisms could easily penetrate steel, then why would humans bother studying metallurgy?

Cheng Yijiu's car had a thick metal plate, and this thing didn't have any large claws, so its only chance of getting in was to smash through the cockpit window. But trying to penetrate the several-centimeter-thick bulletproof glass? Even a tiger couldn't do that. Furthermore, Cheng Yijiu had lowered the grille, so the high-strength grille was probably too much for this thing to break through. Judging from its flying posture, its skeleton must be light yet strong, and it certainly wouldn't be used as a battering ram.

Chapter 21 Fighting

Should he go out? Cheng Yijiu hadn't considered this—the correct way to deal with this thing was to sit in the anti-aircraft gun position, use the pedals to control the steering, the handle to control the height, and use the twin-mounted cannon or anti-aircraft machine gun to solve the problem. If he stayed in the RV, this monster would have no way to deal with him. If he went out, he would put himself in danger. However, Cheng Yijiu had a mission to complete, so he still had to go out...

"Is this guy included in the mission? I'm not sure, but we can't miss this opportunity." Cheng Yijiu felt that a pistol wouldn't be very effective against a guy like him, and a rifle that was too long wouldn't work either, so a short shotgun would be the most suitable. However, this time, Cheng Yijiu didn't bring his shotgun. He only had a pistol and a rifle, so even if they didn't work, he had to get out of the car with his M17.

Cheng Yijiu had more than just a pistol and a hunting knife in his hands. The first thing he pulled out was an M84 stun grenade. He pulled the ring, opened the car door, and threw the M84 out, closing it at the same time. With a loud bang and a flash of light, Cheng Yijiu pushed the door open and jumped out. His first instinct was to see where the monster was. Having been hit by an M84 stun grenade, Cheng Yijiu refused to believe it was harmless.

Amidst the explosion, Cheng Yijiu couldn't tell if there was a crash or a collision. He could only quickly circle the car, trying to locate the object. Cheng Yijiu saw the monster land—it looked like it had crashed into a tree due to a flash or a loud noise. Judging by the appearance of the monster, at least its wings were definitely injured. The monster stood up, and the glowing eyes on its chest turned to stare at Cheng Yijiu.

This was Mothman. Standing tall, he stood over two meters, a head taller than Cheng Yijiu. One of his wings was slightly deformed, but when folded, it stuck out at either side, like a headless figure with two horns on its shoulders. The monster walked with a slight stumble. Cheng Yijiu held his gun, his left hand holding the hunting knife backwards while protecting his right. His left elbow was forward, and his right hand holding the gun wasn't vertical or horizontal, but tilted inward at a forty-five-degree angle, protected by his left hand.

The triangle protection maneuver was Cheng Yijiu's customary shooting method. He half-sideways faced the rapidly approaching Mothman, and opened fire when he was about ten meters away—ensuring a hit rate, even Cheng Yijiu had to ensure a hit rate. The muzzle of the gun twitched slightly. This method of holding the gun made it easier to aim and control recoil. Cheng Yijiu fired a standard three-shot burst. Conventionally, two shots should go to the torso and one to the head—except this thing seemed to have no head...

Cheng Yijiu's aim then became those large eyes. He fired continuously, his bullets blasting the creature's triangular lethal area. He'd almost emptied a magazine before the creature stumbled back. "Amazing! 17 bullets didn't kill you," Cheng Yijiu muttered, knowing full well that none of his shots had missed the mark. It felt just like the time he'd shot the stinking ape.

There was no doubt that this was another supernatural creature. Bullets were effective but useless; they couldn't kill this thing. Cheng Yijiu casually holstered his gun, handed his hunting knife to his right hand, and took a few steps forward, ready to solve the problem with the knife.

This Mothman was incredibly ferocious. If it hadn't injured its wings and taken over a dozen bullets, Cheng Yijiu wouldn't have been sure he could have killed it. The Mothman's wings were truly formidable. Its bat-like wings had claws, and the wing bones felt like blades, effectively wielding two blades. Most importantly, it possessed immense strength and speed, but its legs limited its range.

As he fired, Cheng Yijiu finally confirmed one thing: while the creature looked human and had human-like hind legs, its structure wasn't quite the same. It was more like a bird standing upright, its hind legs not as long as a human's, and seemingly connected by a membrane. "Iori Yagami's pants?" Cheng Yijiu suddenly thought of something completely unrelated but very similar.

So, when this thing moves on the ground, walking on two legs isn't very fast; leaping is even faster. Cheng Yijiu's approach was also to break through from a low position. If he charged forward standing, he'd just be swatted by the giant wings. When the wings directly chopped off a tree as thick as a wine glass, Cheng Yijiu knew he'd made the right choice. He rolled in, thrusting his body forward to cut through the center line, then slashed forward with a backhanded slash.

The creature's fur was similar to that of a bird or bat, not tough enough for a single cut of the knife. From the feel of the blade and Cheng Yijiu's sense of distance, he could tell that the knife had penetrated roughly one-third of the way, a little under ten centimeters. This was the strong side, where the lever's force was strongest. With this strike, the monster let out a scream that made Cheng Yijiu's vision go dark. He could hear it at first, then lose it, only feeling the stinging pain.

"Ultrasonic!" Cheng Yijiu cursed. "Infrasonic ultrasound, what the hell is this!" He also saw the consequences of the knife. The flesh turned inside out and the internal organs leaked out. These were minor issues. The wound continued to smoke and burn, and the internal organs also glowed red and burned. This was the big deal - proving that this Mothman must be a dark creature. However, this thing seemed to be stronger than the stink ape because its wounds healed quickly.

The blow weakened the Mothman a bit, but it wasn't fatal. It didn't seem like a serious injury either. Cheng Yijiu finally saw what was going on with this thing. It turned out its head was fused to its body, without a neck. Its head looked very large and "flat." Its hair concealed a large mouth between its chest and abdomen. This mouth also looked like a human's, except that when it was open, it stretched across its entire body.

Cheng Yijiu rolled on the ground, dodging the opponent's waving wings. His two feet seemed useless - the toes had claws, and they were very long. However, such claws were only useful when high in the air, and were useless when standing on the ground. The Mothman also tried to take off while flapping its wings, but the previous collision seemed to have injured the bones, which did not heal for a while. The asymmetry of the left and right sides made it lose balance and unable to fly.

Cheng Yijiu slashed a few more times, but the Mothman's self-healing ability was very strong, and Cheng Yijiu's knife wounds were not deep enough - "The most important thing is that the power of this knife is limited. It seems that the power of the so-called demon-slaying knife has reached its limit." Cheng Yijiu thought, "As long as it continues, this kind of damage will be of some use."

Chapter 22 Dismemberment

There's a better, brighter material, red copper, but it's fine for bullets, not blades—it's a bit soft, and even if it were made into a blade, it wouldn't hold up well. It's quite good for bullets, though; the deformed bullet can create a larger cavity and better transmit the impact force into the organism.

The potential of cold iron is not limited to this, but the power of the spell that Cheng Yijiu currently masters in the alchemy formula to change and remove dark magic is limited to this point. To increase the power, one must either continuously stack the spell, that is, micro-carve it, or replace it with a higher-level spell. However, Cheng Yijiu is probably unable to do either of these two things at the moment.

He had considered laser micro-engraving, but how would he attach his spiritual power? Photoengraving the pattern wouldn't work; it would barely be effective. Until that problem was solved, the first method was out of the question. Cheng Yijiu couldn't handle the second one, at least for now. It wasn't that he didn't have the spell, but that he couldn't get it right.

Anyway, he was just sharpening the knife, just like playing a game and giving the old monster a pedicure. After getting used to the speed and rhythm of the Mothman's attacks, it was quite easy to deal with. Its only attacking tools were its wings, its mouth was hard to bite, and its two hind claws were useless on the ground. So, it was easy.

Cheng Yijiu used the rolling tactic. He actually wished that the Mothman was six or seven meters tall. He could easily get under its crotch and attack its testicles. However, the two-meter-tall Mothman made it difficult to deal with him. He did manage to chop the opponent's thigh until it was smoking, but it was too late.

The previous few cuts on the monster's belly had a much stronger effect than now. Fortunately, Cheng Yijiu quickly found the target - the monster's wings. Cheng Yijiu had a certain advantage in the ground battle. If this guy took off, the initiative would really change hands, which was unacceptable.

So he had to destroy the monster's wing membrane. This guy's arms were like blades, and a head-on confrontation was definitely not a good idea, but he could cut the opponent's wing membrane - but it probably wouldn't grow back that quickly. The guy's impact injury was now gradually recovering, and the deformed arm bones were gradually returning to their original position.

Cheng Yijiu rolled to the side and rear of the monster and cleaved one of its wings with a single blow. The wing membrane wasn't that tough. As the blade swirled, Cheng Yijiu slashed off a large piece of the membrane at breakneck speed. As the monster spun and attacked, Cheng Yijiu took advantage of the situation and stabbed the creature in the waist, abdomen, and back.

He relied on his own weight and the force of the monster's twisting and turning, as well as his subconscious familiarity with the biological structure from many hunts, to accurately control the direction of the blade - thanks to the strength of his hands holding the handle. When the blade slid out, the Mothman could no longer control his balance and fell to the ground.

Cheng Yijiu's knife tip severed the spinal nerves in its waist.

Even if this was a monster with strong recovery abilities, a broken spinal nerve wouldn't heal in a matter of seconds. The monster fell to the ground, completely threatening Cheng Yijiu—this was the decisive blow.

"Although the blade is worn, I can't care less!" Cheng Yijiu jumped directly onto the back of the fallen Mothman and began to dismember him alive. Five minutes later, Cheng Yijiu stood aside, twirling the hunting knife between his fingers, watching his prey - the already dead Mothman, also dismembered into several large pieces.

The creature's blood was surprisingly phosphorescent, though it had been purified by the hunting knife beforehand, making it invisible. Its wings had been severed at the shoulder joint, its lumbar vertebrae severed, bisecting its body. One of its thighs was completely severed at the hip joint, and the massive blood loss ultimately killed it.

It was too late to recover.

Cheng Yijiu flipped the monster over and shaved off its fur. He finally got a clear look at what it looked like. "Hybrid?" Cheng Yijiu was completely baffled, as he saw that the large, glowing eyes were actually compound eyes, like those of an insect. He used a hunting knife to cut open one of the eyes, and it was indeed a compound eye.

By this time, Cheng Yijiu had switched to a regular Saab knife. Otherwise, he wouldn't have been able to clearly see the cut surface of the Mothman corpse with his hunting knife—it would have simply burned. He couldn't see the creature's nose, but its mouth was very similar to a human's. Cheng Yijiu cut open its skin and flesh and found that the skull and ribs underneath were fused together.

The creature's internal organs were strange, with almost no clear classification. Cheng Yijiu couldn't find any organs. It was just a tangle of tubes and a large amount of phosphorescent blood or body fluids. "It looks like a large moth." However, the moth didn't have antennae.

The two arms he severed were indeed bat-like. Cheng Yijiu thought the only useful part was the arm bone. The skin on the outside of the arm bone was very tough, and the hair on it had transformed into blade-like tissue. Cheng Yijiu quickly removed the arm bone and tissue, grasped the humeral head and swung it a few times. "It's quite easy to use, but this two-section knife is not very easy to use. It still needs to be separated again at the elbow joint to form two blades."

He accepted it, thinking it might be useful in alchemy—alchemy had descriptions of these strange creatures, saying they often contained tissues that could be used in alchemy. Cheng Yijiu figured if this Mothman had anything useful, it would probably be its eyes, blade-like arms, and claws on its hind legs. Perhaps its phosphorescent fluids would also be useful.

But he wasn't going to take all of it with him—his refrigerator wouldn't fit, and since it smelled bad, it was obviously the culprit. The best he could do was remove the eyeball, arm bone, and claw, wrap them up, and strap them to the roof of his car.

Cheng Yijiu took out a notebook and quickly sketched this thing. It seemed to decay quite quickly - especially after these body fluids were exposed to the air for a while, their phosphorescence went out and they began to bubble directly, accompanied by a sour and smelly smell. The places where the creature was contaminated by the body fluids began to rot rapidly.

Cheng Yijiu had already removed the bones and claws, and gouged out the remaining eye, so he didn't bother trying to save it. Perhaps flushing it with water would save it? But he wasn't optimistic about that idea. These creatures were supernatural beings, and their bodies wouldn't necessarily be preserved by ordinary preservation methods.

Didn't the Chupocabra decay quickly? This Mothman is only slightly better. "It's a little easier than I thought—in fact, if you ignore the unknown fear they bring with them as monsters...these guys are probably even less deadly than brown bears and tigers."

Chapter 23 Completed

This thing flying in the sky was terrifying, but Cheng Yijiu knew as he chopped off its claws that it was only a mediocre weapon in terms of lethality. Its claws weren't as exaggerated as those of a bird of prey, not in terms of length, but in terms of proportion. These claws were more like the long, blade-like claws on an orangutan's feet. The lack of curvature, combined with the shape of its hind paws, made it inconvenient for walking on the ground, nor for swooping down and grabbing prey in mid-air.

It is true that this thing can be used as a knife to pierce in the air.

After wrapping it up and tossing it onto the roof rack, he strapped it down. The remains of the Mothman below had already begun to rot down to the bones. "It's just scary... If I had a demon-killing sprayer, I might have been able to inflict a serious injury with the first shot." Cheng Yijiu ignored the decaying corpse. Judging from the rate of decay, there would probably still be a lot of bones left by the time the sun came out.

Cheng Yijiu returned to the RV to take a shower and sleep. He was very carefree as he had never heard of such monsters appearing in groups.

Before dawn the next day, Cheng Yijiu had already woken up—he slept so deeply that his sleep time was shortened considerably. He stepped out of the car. There were no animals outside, not a single one. But he saw bones—skeletons covered in decaying black soft tissue, still in the same state he had torn to pieces.

At this time, the sunlight came out and soon shone on the skeletons. These bones did not disappear in the sunlight like ashes, but the rotten black soft tissue on them was rapidly decomposing, and these bones also turned yellow, and some smaller bones broke into bone fragments.

"There are quite a few big bones left. Let's put them away. Maybe they will be useful." Cheng Yijiu still threw them onto the roof rack. His mission was not over yet. Now Cheng Yijiu didn't even know what to do. Will there be a punishment mission?

"If you turn me into a stinky ape, maybe committing suicide would make me happier." Cheng Yijiu was in a very unhappy mood, but he had no choice but to turn the car around and prepare to cross the United States along Route 66 in Chicago to Los Angeles. Maybe he could complete the task on the way.

It is possible to drive hundreds of kilometers on the roads in central America without seeing another car. I wonder how many missing persons cases have occurred on the many branch roads or country dirt roads along this highway. There must be many strange things wandering in the countryside that this road passes through.

Cheng Yijiu was driving fast on the road, and at sunset the truck disappeared without a trace on the road...

Seeing the familiar hall, Cheng Yijiu let out a long sigh. "Mission completed?" He didn't say much. Hunting alone for so long had made him accustomed to loneliness. At his feet was a large travel bag, filled with the bones he had removed.

Cheng Yijiu was not at all troubled. He carried the package to the alchemy room on the second floor, where a large alchemy array and a thick manual of alchemy materials would help him identify the items. Cheng Yijiu's current alchemy skills were limited to forming and combining items at once, so he was not yet able to complete more sophisticated coatings and mixed inclusions.

This package contains the materials of Mothman. After analyzing the Great Alchemy Array and consulting the Alchemy Materials Manual, Cheng Yijiu discovered the use of these materials - the arm bones can really be disassembled and used as materials for refining bone knives. Of course, metals can also be added to strengthen some of its properties. Naturally, metals can also be added to strengthen some of the properties of metal knives. These two properties are not exactly the same.

As for the Mothman's compound eye, analysis revealed its multi-angle and multi-image capabilities. Cheng Yijiu rushed to his study, fetched a massive alchemy manual, and, after reviewing it along with the materials manual, discovered that it could be refined into a remarkable artifact. "Multi-purpose glasses... but they'll need a little mithril and mercury," Cheng Yijiu muttered.

Mithril is easy to obtain. Long ago, it was a very difficult material to obtain, but with modern metallurgy, it is very easy to obtain because it is actually titanium, which has been processed by alchemy. Similarly, mercury is not pure mercury, it also needs to be processed.