Chapter One: Heaven's First Floor

  The old man of the Hong Bang tribe smiled brightly, under the gaze of many young people, bent down to open the lid of a bamboo basket, reached in and grabbed it directly, and when he came out again, his hand had an additional large green prawn about the size of a child's arm.

  The young men around him let out a burst of exclamations, such a huge prawn, many people really saw it for the first time in their lives, especially this prawn looked different from the others, not to mention its extremely large size, but also its head was born with an unusually strange shape, looking like a green-faced, ferocious and evil ghost face, plus at this moment it was extremely lively, its claws and legs were struggling and dancing wildly, and its mouth was making a sharp, ear-piercing "squeak" sound, which made it look even more ferocious, some of the younger boys who were timid didn't even dare to look.

  The old man with the red shell smiled slightly, turned his head and glanced at the large shrimp in his hand, saying: "This thing is called a ghost-faced shrimp. What you need to do is kill this sea shrimp, then peel off its shell and take its meat." As he spoke, he casually picked up a gleaming knife blade hanging from the edge of the bamboo basket, as if wanting to demonstrate in front of the many young people, but immediately the old man seemed to think of something, looked at the ghost-faced shrimp that was still alive and struggling in his hand, and a hint of disgust flashed across his face.

  The old man's eyes rolled, and the two shells on his body seemed to flutter twice. He put down the knife in his hand and threw it back with a flick of his wrist. A grown red clam man standing behind him subconsciously caught it, unsure what was going on. Just as he was about to ask, he saw the village chief of Red Clam Village smiling and stuffing the ghost-faced shrimp into his own hands, saying:

  "Sealord, kill this ghost-faced shrimp and let everyone in Ling Xiao Sect see how it's done!"

  The red clam tribe member named Haitan suddenly turned pale, just as he was about to open his mouth to decline, the village elder glared at him and shouted: "You won't kill, is that it?"

  The sea urchin cried with a sad face and said: "I'll kill, I'll just kill."

  He said, with a dejected look on his face, he walked forward a few steps, then squatted down in front of the crowd of young people and shouted: "Everyone take a good look! I'm only doing this once, just this once!"

  As he spoke, he tossed the ghost-faced prawn onto the ground and then stepped on it with one large foot. Although the ghost-faced prawn struggled desperately with its claws, it was unable to move after being pressed down by the sea urchin. The sea urchin furrowed his brow and picked up the sharp knife, saying: "This ghost-faced prawn's shell is hard, and can't be opened from the back. What you need to do is first slaughter this thing..." Before he had even finished speaking, his hand rose and fell, and the sharp blade seemed to flash a dazzling light as it stabbed directly into the joint of the ghost-faced prawn's neck.

  "Ah!" A few faint screams came out from the group of young people, with a hint of terror, and almost simultaneously, the ghost-faced shrimp seemed to let out a dying scream, and suddenly blood splattered everywhere, the amount of blood was extremely large, it splashed all over the place, even staining the sea urchin's body with many, and what's more eerie is that the color of the ghost-faced shrimp's blood was blue.

  The upper half of the sea urchin's body was stained with blue-black blood, and his complexion looked like he was about to die. However, the movement of his hands did not stop, and with a gloomy face, he pulled out the knife and continued:

  "First kill this ghost-faced shrimp, it won't struggle and move around, then look carefully, at the lower edge of the hard shell on the abdomen, there is a fine seam..." He turned the knife blade with a bad temper, directly inserting it into the abdomen of the ghost-faced shrimp. Suddenly, another wave of blue polluted blood splashed out, and then along the seam, slowly cut down, quickly peeled off the shrimp shell, revealing the white tender shrimp meat inside.

  Until now, Haitang's face had improved a bit, as if the white tender shrimp meat had a lot of healing effect on his mood. He threw down the knife in his hand, peeled off the shell and grasped the white tender shrimp meat with his hand, pulled it hard, and instantly took out the shrimp meat. Then he stood up in front of the crowd of young people and showed it to them, saying: "This is what we want."

  After finishing speaking, the sea urchin looked down at its own blue-blooded appearance with a bitter face, sighed and retreated. When passing by the village chief of Red Clam Village, it was even more like losing its parents, with a worried and bitter face.

  The village chief of Hong Bang just smiled and walked forward, taking the shrimp meat from Hai Dan's hand. He said to the young people: "Everyone, take a closer look, we have everything here, ghost-faced shrimp are everywhere, you only need to take out 100 such shrimp meat and give it to 'Hai Xing'." He pointed to the Hong Bang girl standing behind him, who looked a bit shy. "100 shrimp meat can be exchanged for one Ling Jing, this transaction is worth it!"

  "Ugh!"

  Suddenly, a strange noise came from the crowd, and everyone turned their heads to look, only to see that it was a pale-faced girl who ran to the side with a retching motion, and it was He Xiao Mei.

  Shen Shi, Sun You and Jiang Hongguang were all startled, although the scene of the red clam tribe's slaughter was a bit bloody earlier, but He Xiaomei's reaction was so intense that it was beyond the expectations of these three young men.

  They were just thinking of going over to comfort her when they heard that the surroundings seemed to be contagious, and suddenly there were also several girls who looked similar to He Xiaomei, all making nauseous expressions.

  One person's overreaction didn't seem like much, but a group of people acting this way suddenly made the atmosphere somewhat eerie. Some young men who had seemed unaffected now looked unwell too. Looking at the puddle of blue polluted blood and the discarded remains of the ghost shrimp on the ground, it all seemed to have a chilling flavor to it.

  He Xiaomei retched for a while, but didn't actually throw up anything. Her face was deathly pale and frightening, and she panted for a long time before smiling wryly at Shen Shi and the others surrounding her. "I'm not going to make it," she said. "I've been afraid of these things since I was little, and I just can't take it. Let's go back to Baihe Hall and look at some other tasks instead."

  He didn't wait for Shen Shi and the others to react, and quickly walked towards the outside of the village.

  Shen Shi and the other two were at a loss, Jiang Hongguang hesitated for a moment, looked again at He Xiaomei's back as she walked to the village entrance, and said: "I also think this task is not good, I'll leave first."

  After that, he also left quickly, looking at his back was catching up with He Xiaomei, walking side by side with her, with a few points of concern on his face, as if comforting her. He Xiaomei looked at him and nodded casually, seemingly still not recovering from the stimulation just now.

  Sun You looked at Shen Shi and said: "Shen Shi, what do you say?"

  Shen Shi hesitated for a moment, his eyes scanning the bloody stain on the ground. After a brief silence, he spoke softly, "I want to take another look."

  Sun You was taken aback for a moment, clearly somewhat surprised by Shen Shi's choice. However, after hesitating for a moment, he nodded and said, "Then I'll accompany you to take another look. Anyway, there's no good task to return to Bai He Tang now."

  Shen Shi nodded and turned his head to look aside.

  The dozen or so young people who had originally gathered around here, after the bloody scene of killing and dissecting shrimp just now, looked a bit unnatural at this moment. The previous curiosity and confidence also decreased a lot. After a while, several girls in the crowd took the lead to leave, followed by five or six boys who seemed unable to accept such things, and they gradually left the village after gathering together for a discussion.

  As the young men walked away one by one in silence, the faces of the villagers standing under the altar with a strange sea beast statue didn't look good. The old village chief's face was already unable to smile.

  At this moment, still standing in the original place, including Shen Shi and Sun You, only five young men were left. Shen Shi glanced to the side and suddenly froze, seeing a familiar face not far away, it was actually Hou Sheng, who had a conflict with him on the day he joined the sect for no reason.

  Xiao Pangzi Hou Sheng also saw Shen Shi standing here, and at first he was also stunned for a moment, then glared at him with an angry gaze, apparently still dissatisfied with Shen Shi.

  Shen Shi let out a hum and turned his head away, not bothering to look at him, feeling only that it was pointless.

  The village head of Hong Bang saw that the five young men were still left behind, and his face suddenly relaxed, as if he had let out a sigh of relief. He hurriedly walked over with a smile and said: "You guys are really insightful, this job is actually not difficult at all, earning spirit crystals is so easy, you won't find a second job like this on Qingyu Island, believe me..."

  Before the words had fallen, someone on that end seemed to be unable to bear it any longer. A figure flashed by and with a "plop" jumped into the sea water. Then in the water, he desperately scrubbed himself, washing off the blue bloodstains on his body. At the same time, he loudly complained without restraint:

  "It's so smelly, it's so smelly, it's so smelly..."

  The old man with the red shell smiled stiffly, then burst out laughing, waved his hand as if nothing had happened, and stretched out a finger to attract the eyes of the five young men again, chuckling: "One hundred shrimp meat for one spiritual crystal!"

  "Bang bang bang bang......"

  Five large bamboo baskets were somehow brought out by the Hong Bang tribe and placed on the beach, with a sharp shrimp knife hanging from each basket. The Hong Bang people then dispersed one after another, leaving only a girl named Haixing behind. However, it was clear that she too disliked the ghost-faced prawns. Although she stayed behind, she stood far away from the five baskets of ghost-faced prawns, her bright red shell fluttering slightly at her waist, setting off her delicate and lovely face.

  Five young men looked at me, I looked at them, and slowly walked to the beach, one standing in front of a cage of ghost shrimp, only to hear the sound of the tide in the sea water, a burst of "hiss" sounds came from the bamboo cage, making people's hearts involuntarily feel some fear.

  At that moment, none of the five people dared to squat down and grab the ghost shrimp in the bamboo cage. After a while, it seemed that Xiao Pangzi Hou Sheng was still the bravest. He gritted his teeth, suddenly lifted the lid of the bamboo cage, and reached in to grab the shrimp. But as soon as his hand went in, he let out a loud cry:

  "Oh no!"

  Several boys next to him were startled, and Hou Sheng jumped up, his arm waving wildly. It turned out that a ghost-faced prawn had clamped its claws on his fingers, which looked very painful.

  The red-clad girl starfish behind also looked surprised, and hurriedly ran over, saying: "Be careful, grab the back shell of the ghost shrimp, so you won't get pinched by it..."

  Hou Sheng finally got rid of the ghost-faced shrimp, hugging his bleeding fingers and gritting his teeth in anger: "Why didn't you say so earlier!"

  The starfish's face turned red, lowered his head and said in a low voice: "I... I didn't think you wouldn't understand..."

  Several young men rolled their eyes, and when Hou Sheng looked at the ghost-faced prawn again, he couldn't help but feel a chill in his heart. Just then, a sudden noise came from beside them, and everyone turned to look, only to see Shen Shi standing by a bamboo basket, having somehow pulled out a ghost-faced prawn from it. The prawn's claws were frantically waving in front of him, its face twisted into a ferocious expression that made one's hair stand on end, while its mouth emitted an ear-piercing shriek.

  Sun You felt a chill in his heart, thinking that he should just forget about it and go back to change tasks, but suddenly found Shen Shi's gaze had become somewhat strange at this moment.

  That friend who had known each other for only a few days, the expression on his face seemed unexpectedly calm, he looked at the ghost-faced shrimp in front of him calmly like that, but for some reason, the ghost-faced shrimp suddenly struggled more fiercely, dancing with its hands and feet, and screaming shrilly as if it wanted to penetrate into people's bones.

  A moment later, under the gaze of several young men, Shen Shi suddenly slammed the ghost-faced shrimp to the ground, just like the sea urchin before, and stepped on it with one foot. With an expressionless face, he raised the blade in his hand, and with a swift motion, the bright blade flashed through the air, casting a faint, mournful glow that seemed to reflect off the young men's faces. With a "plop", the blade stabbed directly into the ghost-faced shrimp's neck.

  "Hiss..."

  A shrill scream, large clusters of blue-black blood suddenly spurted out, like the huge waves of the sea beside him, bursting in mid-air, splashing Shen Shi's head and face, and the bloody smell instantly spread everywhere.