Under Lu Chen’s boots, the timber deck trembled with a dull, rhythmic hum.
Inside the open chest cavity of the dead helmsman, the mass of semi-clear snails had begun to turn.
Their crystal-clear shells grated against dry ribs, producing a sound like crushed glass churned in water.
Without pause, he stepped over the steering box, rolled his right sleeve to the elbow. Then he drove his bare hand into the dead man’s pelvic basin.
The viscera within were dry, paper-like, devoid of blood.
His fingers plunged past the shriveled bladder, following the line of the sacral bone until his fingertips brushed against something cold, dense, and throbbing.
It was nestled against the fifth lower-back vertebra.
A snail the size of an adult fist.
