Ashes Of Deep Sea

Chapter 248: Chapter 252: Deep Sea Silence

City-State floated rootlessly on the Endless Sea. Beneath the 850-meter “thick” base lay seemingly endless dark waters that grew only noisier and more visually incomprehensible the deeper one went. The first explorer to cross a thousand-meter depth in the sea went mad after rushing to the surface, leaving only one sentence for posterity—

“We all died there.”

This is what happened during the Frost City-State’s “Abyssal Expedition” as things gradually started to go awry.

Duncan fell into a moment of brief contemplation. He suddenly realized that even without delving deep into the Spirit Realm or the profound depths, just within this “real dimension” of the world, the dangers lurking in the Endless Sea were not few. After his brief contemplation, he then suddenly asked,

“What became of that explorer later?”

“He died quickly—rapid ascent and decompression took his life. He screamed and shouted for a while before dying from an embolism, at least that’s the cause on a realistic level.”

“A submarine with only one crew member?” Duncan asked again.

“It could only fit one person. Of course, this would amplify the explorer’s mental stress, but it was a necessary evil. On one hand, technology back then was limited, and on the other, such explorations were not suited for more people—beneath the deep sea, you can hardly be sure what might replace your companion next moment or if the noises you hear are real. So it might as well be better to dive alone, so you don’t have to doubt if there’s someone else in the submarine.”

“The deep sea, darkness, solitude, facing the bizarre unknown waters far from the civilized world—these could all be reasons for the explorer’s madness,” Duncan slowly shook his head. “But that’s not important. What’s important is … it still doesn’t explain why the Abyssal Expedition later turned into an extremely taboo topic.”

He stared into Tyrion’s eyes and continued, “So far, what you have described is just an exploratory mission gone wrong, and such missions happen every year. The Academy of Truth even actively invests in and encourages scholars and explorers to embark on these missions. There’s nothing taboo about it, nor should it be tied with ‘Homeloss.'”

“… Yes, if the plan had stopped at a thousand meters, then those incidents wouldn’t have occurred,” Tyrion shook his head, sighing in reminiscence. “After an accident with the third submarine, Her Majesty Lei Nora once ordered a temporary halt to the exploration. But a few days later, something happened that … gradually made the situation eerie.”

Duncan frowned, “An incident?”

“At the edge of the temporarily sealed test area, the third submarine suddenly surfaced.”

Duncan was stunned for a moment, then realized, “The second third submarine?!”

“Yes, the second,” Tyrion nodded. “It surfaced right before the Frost Navy soldiers and started flashing signals that it needed assistance with the hatch. The well-trained soldiers were confused at first, but quickly followed standard procedures to secure the submarine onto the platform. They then aimed twenty-seven rifles, two rapid-fire cannons, and a flamethrower at its hatch before a brave priest stepped forward, sprinkled Holy Water, and unlocked the hatch.”

Tyrion paused, then slowly said, “The hatch opened, and an individual… very similar to the explorer, came out.”

Duncan’s expression grew dark: “Very similar?”

“The facial features were close, but there were discrepancies in height and weight. He wore the uniform of the Frost Navy, but there were many issues with the details of the clothes. More importantly… the person who emerged from the submarine only remained alive for a short while on land before dying, without even managing to say a word. When the soldiers removed ‘his’ clothes, they found his flesh and the clothes seemed to be ‘grown’ together, with various incomprehensible wounds all over his body.

“After that, doctors and scholars from the church jointly examined the body; the Frost Queen also appeared to personally inspect the autopsy site. However, the conclusions of the examination were never disclosed—or rather, before they could disclose anything, the third ‘third submarine’ appeared.”

At this point, even Alice beside him, who had been quietly engrossed in the conversation, couldn’t help but speak out, “There’s a third one?!”

Tyrion glanced at Alice unconsciously, his expression a bit strange. He seemed uncomfortable with someone who looked exactly like the Frost Queen ranting and raving, but he quickly adjusted his expression, nodding lightly, “The third one, and not just three—after that, every twenty-four or forty-eight hours, another ‘Submersible Three’ would pop out from there…”

Alice listened in surprise to this bizarre “story.” After pondering for a moment, she suddenly blurted out, “So, you just needed to wait there, and you could have an endless supply of submersibles? And isn’t that thing called a ‘submersible’ also very valuable? More valuable than the Heretics?”

Tyrion had been immersed in his memories just a moment ago, but Miss Doll’s questioning had abruptly broken his train of thought, leaving him with his mouth open, struggling to gather his emotions back up, “That…we never considered that…”

“Don’t mind her, her way of thinking is unusual,” Duncan glanced at Alice and said seriously to Tyrion, “Continue, what happened next?”

Tyrion regained his composure, organized his thoughts, and continued, “After the third submersible surfaced, it also sent out a signal requesting to open the hatch. This time, the soldiers had some experience, they dragged the submersible to a more tightly secured area, and after the priests had set up a large amount of Transcendent protection, they finally opened the hatch. And this time… what came out was a grotesquely swollen, deformed humanoid monster that barely resembled an ‘explorer.’

“That monster also didn’t survive in the air for more than three minutes.

“The fourth submersible brought forth a constantly wriggling mass of flesh, this time not even a human outline was discernible.

“When the hatch of the fifth submersible was opened, nothing emerged—soldiers at the site went forward to check and saw only a suspicious dark-red sludge in the cockpit, which had a faint life response.

“The sixth submersible contained just a small amount of black fibrous dry matter, resembling an incomplete neural structure or a dried blood vessel specimen…”

As Tyrion continued to recount, Duncan’s expression grew increasingly serious, and even Alice beside him seemed to sense the change in atmosphere, becoming solemn and alert.

In this increasingly solemn and somber atmosphere, Tyrion slowly said—

“The seventh submersible, which to my knowledge was the last, was empty.”

“Empty?” Duncan raised his eyebrows slightly, then shook his head, “That makes it even more disturbing.”

“Yes, empty, which makes it even more disturbing. It’s completely out of control now; we must find a way to end it,” Tyrion said gravely, “but fortunately, ‘Submersible Four’ was finally completed. It was originally the successor model to Submersible Three, but the construction was halted after the ‘One Kilometer Incident’. However, as one Submersible Three after another surfaced, the Queen ordered the rapid assembly of ‘Submersible Four’ to use it to find out what exactly was happening in the waters at one thousand meters deep.”

Tyrion paused, as if some details were missing from his memory, he organized his words before slowly continuing, “I don’t remember the specifics of Submersible Four; it was hastily completed, and the Frost Navy was only responsible for part of it. I know it was bigger than Three, could accommodate three people, and had a sample chamber—scholars originally planned to use it to collect specimens from the deep sea, if there were any specimens to be collected.

“The day after the seventh ‘Submersible Three’ appeared, the Frost City-State’s constructed Submersible Four was launched into the sea. It carried a scholar, a military officer, and a powerful priest—we could no longer worry about the risks of ‘multi-person exploration’ at that point. Avoiding the appearance of an eighth ‘Submersible Three’ was paramount.

“Submersible Four descended smoothly toward one thousand meters deep. The priest inside used Spiritual Energy to maintain contact with the surface. Perhaps because the new submersible was more robust, their journey went smoothly, and they confirmed the sight of the ‘base’ of the City-State observed by previous explorers. But soon, the communication became intermittent, and after reaching a depth of one thousand meters, barely any sounds from the deep sea could be heard in the small church on the platform.

“However, fifteen minutes after losing contact, the priest on watch in the small church suddenly heard sounds from the deep sea again. They first heard a scream, which was emitted by the priest, yelling in a terrified tone to warn others, saying, ‘Don’t look! Don’t think!’ followed by the officer’s voice, which was a roar, and then, a deafening explosion.”

Tyrion raised his head, looking into Duncan’s eyes.

“Submersible Four had detonated the explosives,” the pirate stated slowly, “They had packed the sample chamber with high-energy explosives to handle ‘the ultimate dangerous situation.’

“Then, everything was over, Submersible Four never resurfaced, and no more ‘Submersible Threes’ appeared before anyone’s eyes again.”