Tourist shares the moment she held one of the world's most venomous creatures and didn't even realize

When you're on vacation, the last thing you expect is to accidentally hold one of the world's most deadly creatures, but this is exactly what happened to one unsuspecting tourist.

TikTok user @kaylinmarie21 posted a video of herself holding an innocent-looking tiny octopus that was half the size of her palm while on a trip in Bali.

However, when she later googled the creature and discovered what it was, her heart must have dropped into her stomach.

It was a blue-ringed octopus, which, per Ocean Conservancy, is regarded as one of the most venomous creatures in the world and contains enough poison to kill 26 people.

But perhaps most frighteningly, there is no way of knowing if you have been bitten until it's too late.

Watch the heartstopping TikTok below: 

"If a blue-ringed octopus does bite you, you need to get medical treatment immediately because their bites can be fatal in a short amount of time," the Healthline states.

Ocean Conservancy said of the deadly little sea creature's bites: "First, the venom blocks nerve signals throughout the body, causing muscle numbness.

"Other symptoms include nausea, vision loss or blindness, loss of senses and loss of motor skills."

"Ultimately, it will cause muscle paralysis - including the muscles needed for humans to breathe, leading to respiratory arrest. There is no known antidote, but victims can be saved if artificial respiration is started immediately."

Credit: Alamy

The video was captioned: "Going to Bali and unknowingly holding one of the most dangerous animals. Called my dad crying 3 hours later."

Needless to say, the video did not go unnoticed (though she was thankfully completely unharmed by the incident), and it has been viewed over 2.6 million times.

Thankfully, @kaylinmarie21 was able to see the funny side of the incident and she concluded her video by writing: "Cheers for still being alive."

"While we were there, we saw really interesting wildlife," she said in another TikTok video. "I remember when we saw this little guy swim up, we picked him up. There were about three of us passing him around and we didn't think anything of it.

"We actually saw another one similar, picked that one up as well," she said of the incident which occurred three years ago."

Featured image credit: Alamy / imageBROKER