This Damned Thirst for Survival

Chapter 93

Bodies were hung from the ceiling, with their toes dangling in the air. They were dressed in human clothing and presumably were human, but their appearances were far from human.

Their complexions were pale, their heads swollen, and blue veins climbed from their necks to their faces, with their eyes nearly bursting from their sockets like fish. More horrifyingly, their bodies were covered in mucus, dripping from their toes to the ground, sticking their legs together as if they had become fishtails.

Their noses and eyes on their faces gradually merged together, resembling both human and fish. Their abdomens were prominently swollen, as if both men and women were eight months pregnant.

A strong fishy odor assaulted their senses.

This terrifying scene left everyone rooted to the spot, speechless for a long moment.

There was no wind in the lower deck, yet the bodies hanging by ropes were slowly rotating. Lu Youyi suddenly pointed at a man not far away and said, "That is... that is Li Wei!"

Li Wei's arms hung by his sides, his head lowered looking at the ground, his abdomen so swollen it looked as though it contained two basketballs, large enough to even pop open his shirt buttons.

Lu Youyi's face turned deathly pale, "Are they already dead?"

But as he voiced this question, Lu Youyi already knew the answer. Transformed into such a state, how could they possibly be alive?

The sound of dripping mucus was everywhere in the lower deck. Jiang Luo slowed his breathing, trying to inhale as little of the air as possible. He looked at the mucus on the ground, reflecting light from the flashlight, and whispered, "Let's go, we should find Kuang Zheng first."

Kuang Zheng had only been taken away an hour ago; he definitely couldn't have turned into this state yet.

The group carefully navigated through the bodies. The deeper they went, the stronger the fishy smell became, as if they were immersed in stagnant water that hadn't been changed for years, filled with the rotting corpses of fish and shrimps and water plants, making every breath a torture to their noses.

Walking along, a pair of pale, white toes brushed past Jiang Luo's hand, causing him to abruptly halt.

He turned, lifting his head to stare at the body that had touched his arm.

The corpse's eyes bulged, its head drooping from the rope's tight grip. Jiang Luo observed it for a while before Ye Xun, puzzled, asked behind him, "Jiang Luo, what's wrong?"

"Ye Xun, they seem not to be corpses," Jiang Luo pursed his lips, "they should still be alive."

The people behind him reacted with shock.

Zhuo Zhongqiu, pondering the possibility of them not being dead, felt a chill down her spine. She whispered in disbelief, "How is that possible! I had just examined them closely; they weren't breathing."

Jiang Luo turned back to face them and suddenly asked, "What do fish use to breathe?"

Without waiting for an answer, he mused, "They use gills, and their noses are merely organs for sensing smells."

Following his lead, Ye Xun looked up at the bodies. In a brief moment, sweat had formed on his forehead. "Should we take them down to check?"

They lowered a body from the ceiling. The body showed no signs of consciousness, its eyes wide open in a eerie stare as if it was looking at each of them.

Jiang Luo touched its nose, finding no breath. He then moved his hands to the sides of its face, feeling nothing unusual. Moving the flashlight down, Jiang Luo suddenly noticed something odd about the sides of the corpse's throat.