Shrouded Seascape

Charles' heart filled with stupefaction as he glanced at the shark next to him. Just what kind of creature was capable of taking down a three-meter-long shark without making any noises?

Don't tell me... Charles' pupils shrank. He turned, and his gaze fell to where he had seen the massive skeleton. The location was engulfed in darkness, and he couldn't see anything.

Under the immense pressure of the sea and the threat of the unknown, Charles couldn't make a move. No matter what that thing was, he had no intention of going back. In the end, he pointed at the sharks and gestured with his hand for an encirclement.

A tinge of grief fleeted across Feuerbach's face. He opened his mouth and let out a soundless scream. The waters quivered, and the sharks surrounded the two in no time.

They had decided to make the sharks stay within arm's reach; no matter what, the same fate that had befallen the missing shark couldn't be allowed to fall on the remaining sharks.

Charles and Feuerbach picked up the pace as they made a beeline for their destination. Charles' eyes danced about, and his gaze fell on the unnerved sharks. The missing shark and the surreptitious gaze told Charles that there was something dangerous here, so he didn't dare to let his guard down.

The most dangerous job in the Subterranean Sea was becoming a crew member of an exploration vessel. The sea was dangerous, after all.

However, there was a place more dangerous than the sea—the seafloor.

Soon, Charles reached his destination. But before they could descend to the seafloor, all of them, including the sharks, froze.

The water beneath them churned, attracting the attention of both Charles and Feuerbach. They looked down and were astonished to find corpses—corpses belonging to many different species had formed what looked like an eerie clump of corpses.

The clump of corpses was rotating; it started slow, but it picked up the pace and was spinning uncontrollably in just a few seconds. Charles' eyes narrowed. He saw corpses wearing white coats through the gaps in the clump of corpses.

Those corpses were definitely the corpses of the Foundation members, but there was something wrong here. It had been a long time since the Foundation vanished from the face of the Subterranean Sea, so how come the deceased Foundation members looked like they had hardly decayed?

It was a burning question, but Charles didn't have the luxury of time to ponder over the answer to his question. His plan was to avoid attracting attention and prevent any engagement with the rotating clump of corpses. Charles relayed his plan to Feuerbach with flag semaphore, and the two soon floated up.

The distance between them and the clump of corpses slowly widened. Charles was about to lose sight of the clump of corpses when the clump was abruptly torn open, revealing the figure of a fifty-meter-long giant fish covered in tentacles. The three colossal eyes on its head stared straight at Charles. They had been discovered!

The fish swung its tail, and the surrounding corpses moved according to its will, as though it was controlling them with some ability. The corpses lunged at Charles and Feuerbach.

Of course, Feuerbach had no plans of greeting Death just yet, so he ordered the sharks to swim to the surface to avoid the oncoming attack. Unfortunately, the giant fish was too fast. It swam with an overwhelming intensity, and in less than a couple of seconds, it appeared before Charles.

The fish's mouth, filled with sharp teeth, was wide open as it rushed toward Charles, creating a horrifying sight. Charles even saw half-digested corpses in its mouth.

Gritting his teeth, Charles whipped out the Lightning Rod. Seawater was a better conductor of electricity than fresh water. Unfortunately, Charles couldn't say for sure if the relic would even work against the terrifying creature before him.

To make matters worse, activating the relic while he was so close to it and was surrounded by seawater was tantamount to seeking death. Charles was confident that he would end up on the cusp of dying if he were to activate the relic.

However, Charles was in a life-or-death situation, and he had nothing else to rely on but the Lightning Rod.

Bright arcs of electricity jumped about the Lightning Rod as Charles braced himself to fire an attack, but the oncoming fish abruptly came to a screeching halt. It seemed badly frightened as it swung its tail and fled, even abandoning the clump of corpses.

Charles could already hear the loud sloshing of water in the distance, but Charles couldn't calm down. They were about to clash, but the horrifying sea creature abruptly turned around and fled. It didn't make any sense.

Charles' puzzled and bewildered gaze fell on Feuerbach next to him, and his heart constricted. Feuerbach was trembling incessantly like an aspen tree, his gaze filled with despair as he stared at the space behind Charles. That was when it finally clicked to him...

Charles gritted his teeth and whipped around. A towering skeleton of at least a hundred meters in height loomed over him. It looked down at him as if it were some kind of god, and its empty eye sockets were transfixed on Charles.

Charles trembled uncontrollably, and he felt sick. His brain couldn't quite grasp what it was looking at, and he wanted to stop trembling, but his brain had dedicated all of its resources to comprehend the shocking scene before him.

The massive skeleton in front of him was the same skeleton he had seen earlier, but something had changed. Its left eye socket was supposed to be empty, but squirming objects flickering dimly in the darkness had filled up the cavity.

They were tentacles, flickering a dim glow. The writhing tentacles were riddled with eyes emitting a greenish hue resembling pus. The eyes kept on bursting beneath the immense pressure of the sea, but they regenerated as fast as they were obliterated.

Charles realized it just then—the eyes had dragged the colossal skeleton over to him and had been hovering behind him.

What is it trying to do? Does the surreptitious gaze belong to it? Damn it, I need to find a way out of this predicament! The cogs in Charles' mind turned frantically and went into overdrive to find a path to survival.

A green eyeball popped out of the indescribable cluster of eyeballs. It tumbled about in the icy cold waters, seemingly in the process of adjusting to the immense pressure and the change in temperature. 𝒻𝘳𝘦𝘦𝘸ℯ𝒷𝘯𝘰𝑣ℯ𝑙.𝘤𝑜𝘮

Soon, the green eyeball hardened, and beneath the horrified gazes of Feuerbach and the sharks, the green eyeball that measured fifty centimeters across floated over in front of Charles.

The green eyeball flipped, and its cross-shaped pupil stared deeply at Charles.

Charles saw his own reflection in the eyeball, and extreme fear instantly gripped his heart, immobilizing him. However, the intense desire to survive blossomed in Charles' heart almost at the same time.

Swoosh!

A dazzling light pervaded the seafloor. Charles had taken out a Mirrorbox, blinding everyone, including himself.

"Run!" Charles yelled hysterically at the top of his lungs.

The paralyzed red sharks spurred into action, and they frantically flapped their tail fins in a race to reach the surface.

The rapid decompression made Charles feel as if he had been struck by a hammer; his ears rang loudly, but he had no time to think about the ramifications of such a rapid ascent.

He gripped the Lightning Rod tightly. Whether it would work against that creature or not had yet to be seen, but he had nothing else he could rely on here.

Charles felt as though he was beneath a rushing waterfall as the seawater above him threatened to overwhelm him during the ascent. Charles felt like a second lasted an eternity, and it was his first time being so mindful of the passage of time.

Swoosh!

The sharks broke through the surface and landed on the Narwhale's deck, startling the lounging sailors. The sailors quickly recovered their wits, and they were about to approach the sharks when more sharks broke through the surface and landed on the deck.

The horrified sharks shook frantically in an effort to get as far away as they could from the edge of the Narwhale's deck. The sight baffled the sailors, but Feuerbach forced himself to stand up and run toward the trembling sharks.

He stroked them gently with his hands in an effort to assuage their terror. The baffled sailors could only stare blankly at the bizarre sight. They had no idea what had happened, nor they had any idea what to do.

Even First Mate Bandages was bewildered. He knelt on one knee and stared at Charles quivering in agonizing pain while clutching his chest. Charles wanted to speak, but words wouldn't come out of his throat.

He frantically patted Bandages' shoulder and stared wide-eyed at the latter.

Bandages nodded quietly and stood up. He rushed over to the bridge, and the Narwhale quickly departed.