VESSEL - Extinction Countdown 957: Alien Mound Elder Eon

Ye Shisan barely recognized Yi Qing. A sleek black bodysuit hugged her form, rippling as she sprinted. A strange headset, like VR goggles, masked her eyes.

“My sensors detect odd energy in the restroom! Don’t just stand there—get You Long’er out!”

Before Ye Shisan could act, the women’s restroom door creaked open.

He gritted his teeth and kicked it wide. Bang! Inside loomed a massive gray thing—spindly legs dangling like antennae, swelling upward to choke the ceiling.

It was a cluster of strange bone mounds, bound by gray and white spider-like webs, some small, some huge, sprawling across the ceiling. Greenish-brown slime oozed from the seams, dripping steadily, coating the floor.

Before Ye Shisan or Yi Qing could react, fiery red hair dangled from the doorway.

Ye Shisan charged: “It’s You Long’er!”

“Ye Shisan, hold back!”

Yi Qing followed, drawing a sleek pistol—Thunder.90Pro, a low-recoil, high-capacity upgrade of the Thunder.50, able to pierce an adult elephant or shred light armor.

Ye Shisan burst inside and froze. You Long’er was encased in slime, her lower half swallowed by a bone mound.

“Let her go!”

His shout halted the mound’s advance. From its seams, writhing, worm-like greenish tendrils shot out, spiral maws snapping: “Who’re you?! Mind your business!”

“He’s Ye Shisan. And you?”

“Who am I? Yeah, who am I? Argh! Who am I?!”

“I’m starving—eat him!”

“Flesh! Blood! I want his brain!”

The tendrils babbled, answering themselves, then surged toward Ye Shisan.

He dodged, and the floor and walls sprouted holes where they struck. These snake-like tendrils moved like lightning, each with a mind of its own, punching through concrete. A graze would bore through flesh.

Outside, Yi Qing panicked. The cramped restroom left no room to move. She drew a dagger: “Ye Shisan, catch!”

Clang! Her titanium-alloy Twist Dagger, near-indestructible, was sliced clean in half midair.

Yi Qing peered inside, chilled. Ye Shisan crouched, wreathed in faint mist, surrounded by a dozen writhing tendrils—severed by his Heart Demon’s unseen edge?

She stepped back, pressing her earpiece: “0193 requesting support! Number Two’s gone rogue! Repeat—”

Ye Shisan’s voice cut through: “Yi Qing, this is your ‘keep me alive’ plan, right? Work with the military?”

Yi Qing stared: “You… you…”

He grinned: “Dunno why, but when I nearly died, Pseudo-Spirit kicked in. Seems I can trigger it awake now.”

Yi Qing exhaled, barking: “Stand down! Repeat, stand down!”

Ye Shisan stood tall. Countless needle-thin tendrils sprouted from the ceiling’s bone mounds, but none dared approach too closely. They weren’t stupid.

He stepped under You Long’er, upside-down, only her head free. Freeing her meant slicing the bone mound open.

He raised a hand, bellowing: “Cut!”

The tendrils flinched, shrinking back.

Nothing happened.

He swung his arms, shouting: “Cut!”

Still nothing. The tendrils flinched again.

Ye Shisan gave up—he couldn’t control Pseudo-Spirit.

The tendrils, doubtful, surged like tides, rallying, but none dared charge to their doom.

Ye Shisan grabbed a restroom mop, snapped off the head with a stomp, and brandished the stick, tapping each bone mound, with a faintly mocking tone: “Which one’s Elder Eon? Come out! Old Pi called you the scariest. I ain’t impressed!”

Yi Qing grew wary: “Ye Shisan, who’s Elder Eon?”

“One of Old Pi’s personas—an alien thing, fed on his other personas to survive. Now Old Pi’s dead, it’s holed up in the women’s restroom. Some lecherous alien freak, maybe?”

“What? How many personas did Old Pi have?”

“He said they kept growing, once hitting a hundred. After a ‘persona massacre,’ they kept twelve. Elder Eon ate the rest—and any new ones.”

As they spoke, the tendrils retracted. A thick, scarred tendril, intertwined from countless tiny worms, slithered forward, stopping ten feet from Ye Shisan—a muscled, snake-like mass, its head as big as a man’s.

Yi Qing tensed, aiming her gun. One move, and it was eating a bullet.

Ye Shisan eyed the creature: “You Elder Eon?”