Hidden genius: Black belly snake

Chapter 184: Itadakimasu Part3

Splashing and thrashing within the azure lake of the ancient labyrinth was a gigantic Epic-grade glow worm.

Even though the beast looked as if it was struggling, trying to cope up with Xander's incessant attacks, its thick defenses and high cultivation base helped it smoothly deal with him.

Even after fighting for a little over ten minutes, neither side seemed to get an upper hand on the other and the fight was almost at a standstill.

But this in itself was considered a victory for Xander since he was still at the Demi-God realm, while an Epic-grade beast possesses the strength and power akin to a Deity realm expert.

Xander was only able to achieve this much because of this near-perfect cultivation path. 

His soul strength, mental strength, physical strength, and his mana core were all fundamentally strong, rooted stably in the Emperor realm. 

This was the reason he was able to go toe to toe with the Deity realm Epic-grade beast.

While these two were busily fighting it out, inside the enormous glow worm, a small snake slithered inconspicuously moving from one segment of the glow worm's intestine to another segment, progressing slowly and steadily.

The glow worm's anatomy was very similar to that of a normal worm, but at the same time, it was very different as well.

It had a huge mouth with two rows of big canine teeth lining the top and two rows lining the bottom of the mouth.

The other important organs of the worm, including its brain, heart, mana core, and soul core rested in the head and neck region, below which the rest of the worm was mainly the stomach and intestines.

But between these two sections, there was a thick chunk of sturdy flesh and muscular barrier, protecting the sensitive organs of the worm.

There was also an inbuilt mana barrier providing additional protection.

Tang Yue had first tried poking and prodding at this thick intersection but to no avail. Nothing moved and she couldn't even make a dent.

She didn't mind though since this was not really what she was interested in. Her plan was rather to come out of the other end of the worm.

Tang Yue's main problem with this route of escape was the vigorously oscillating and vibrating internal cilia or hair-like protrusions from the stomach lining of the worm, which probably extended all the way to its anus, moving the food along periodically whilst it got digested.

Well, it was hair-like from the gigantic worm's perspective but not really from Tang Yue's perspective.

Even a single thrash from that spiny rod-like structure could send her flying left and right, and then she would be inadvertently caught in the vicious cycle of one cilium flinging her to the next. 

It would be near impossible for her to gain her balance back. 

Tang Yue did not have any doubts regarding this mechanism as she had just witnessed a huge bolus of mashed food or something go through the same thing.

This was why she was currently in her serpentine form, which made it slightly easier for her to evade these oscillating rods.

The next thing which stood in her path of freedom was the intestinal lining itself. 

It kept undulating up and down, secreting tons and tons of extremely corrosive digestive juices.

Even though her body was covered with enhanced scales and rare-grade armor, the acid had still managed to seep through to her skin in certain spots and it was only a matter of minutes before it completely got to her skin and melted her altogether.

As if this was not enough, the undulations also kept pushing her here and there, trying to jam her into the network of the spiraling rods protruding both from the top and bottom.

Tang Yue gulped. She nervously gazed at the huge mess of flinging and slinging muscular flesh bundle. 

This was the ultimate obstacle course that stood between her and her freedom and being alive again!

"Let's do this." Tang Yue hissed.

She slithered to a somewhat safer spot and started her course from there.

Tang Yue casually extended her forked tongue out before squirting out a jet of her new paralyzing poisonous venom. 

Almost immediately the flesh in front of her slightly became sluggish and less complicated, since the venom reached the nerve bundle lying underneath that spot. 

The rod protruding from that area as well revolved with a much slower speed. 

The only thing which Tang Yue still had to look out for was the highly corrosive strong stomach acid, but without the other shenanigans, this was a lot less threatening.

Evading a medium-sized drop of liquid falling from the ceiling was not really that difficult.

"Heh." The snake grinned, feeling excitement and energy surge within her. Her method was without a doubt working.

If she could continue to push on like this, within no time she would be near the rear end of the monstrosity.

She could almost imagine the worm's face when she inevitably shoots out of its butt, alive and whole!

Just for the sake of that, this mucous covered hell was definitely worth it!

"Aha Ha Ha!" 

The snake grinned and slowly and steadily inched along the intestinal segments of the glow worm, one fraction of a segment at a time.

Even though it was quite taxing and cumbersome, everything was proceeding smoothly and she was quickly able to progress from the upper intestine to the middle intestine.

But almost as she reached there, a giant tremor shook the entire worm, probably from Xander's attack, that had nearly catapulted her back to the starting point.

Tang Yue tightly coiled herself around one of the spiraling rods in the nick of the time and somehow managed to avert this disaster.

Otherwise, all her hard work would have gone down the drain.

The snake breathed a sigh of relief and hissed loudly, before carefully uncoiling herself and moving on to the next section, repeating the whole process all over again.