Shen Cong stood on the ridgeline looking down at the now-quiet crevice and turned the problem over in his mind.

The creature — part lizard, part earthworm, part salamander in appearance — was likely a mutation of the axolotl, a popular pet in the pre-apocalypse exotic animal trade. When he'd been researching the four-legged snake's species classification, he'd read broadly across amphibian and reptile literature and remembered coming across the axolotl's distinctive profile.

The axolotl's scientific name was Ambystoma mexicanum — a fully aquatic amphibian, famous worldwide for two things: its unusual appearance, and its extraordinary regenerative capacity. Lost limbs, damaged organs, even significant brain injury — the axolotl could heal what would be permanent damage in any other vertebrate. It had become a standard laboratory research organism precisely because of this. Its six external gill plumes were its most recognizable feature.

Running the comparison against what he'd seen, the match was reasonable. Same general body plan, same six feathered structures on the head. The main discrepancy: the creature in the crevice had no visible eyes. An axolotl had small black ones.

Those six plume-structures — external gills in the original species, now converted to Activity cores. Six cores, symmetrically arranged in pairs.

"Six-Horned Dragon," he decided, and named it on the spot. Then he took one more look at the crevice — several hundred meters of crack in the hillside, seven or eight meters across — and turned to leave.

Fighting the Six-Horned Dragon on its own ground was a problem. The crevice constrained his mobility too severely.

As for the Treasure Bees — they'd be safe enough foraging those climbing plant flowers. This was the Six-Horned Dragon's territory and the bees were far too small to register as prey.

On the way back, he stopped to dig up one of the blue canna plants — roots and all. The mimicry mechanism interested him too much to leave without a specimen. It was getting dark, so he didn't linger; he just excavated the whole plant and carried it back.

Back inside Great Vajra, the tension unwound from his shoulders.