The dim light reached only so far, illuminating a small patch around them. Beyond the outstretched fingers, curving inward like the bars of a cage, and the faint silhouette of the statue’s form, all Lazaru could see was darkness.
The darkness was suffocating, and so was the cold that surrounded them from all sides.
Looking around, Lazarus could no longer spot the silhouette from before.
It had faded before he knew it, and all that was left was the strange sea monster that lurked around them, its light casting a dim glow over the surroundings as it circled the area.
‘This is rather problematic.’
Lazarus’s gaze swept the surroundings.
He was trying to gauge his situation.
‘I’m slowly running out of oxygen. If I don’t move up in the next few minutes, it’ll be too late for me. But at the same time, I can’t fight this monster…’
It wasn’t as though the monster was incredibly strong. Judging from the fluctuations coming from its body, maybe it was nearly a Destroyer rank, but still not there yet.
This meant that it was still a Terror rank.
Lazarus was confident in dealing with such a creature, but… that was on land.
His skills were limited in the water. The time it took for him to chant a spell was longer, and the effectiveness of his spells was also lower.
There was a reason why An’as said that the pirates had dominance over the seas, even when fighting against higher-ranked opponents.
The world within the water was an entirely different world..
Within this world, he was a nobody.
An insignificant creature.
And then—
Flick!
The darkness returned, swallowing him up completely.
Lazarus felt his chest grow heavier as the darkness swallowed him, his gaze sharper than before as he lost all sense of the creature that lurked around him.
He stood next to one of the fingers, his hand feeling the smooth yet rough exterior.
‘Did it leave…?’
He looked around cautiously.
Even with [Mana Sense], he couldn’t detect a single thing.
Time continued to tick, and he felt the oxygen within his lungs depleted with the passing of the seconds.
A creeping dread started to settle within his mind.
However, he continued to remain calm and rational. He couldn’t panic. He couldn’t allow himself to panic.
This was a waiting game.
It was a game that was used to determine who had the most patience.
But it was also a disadvantageous game. He couldn’t afford to wait for long, unlike the creature which could breathe underwater.
Lazarus’s mind started to spiral as time continued to pass.
He was starting to feel the cold biting and latching onto his skin as he continued to bide for time, his mind churning with all sorts of ideas and thoughts.
But soon, time was up.
‘I have to move.’
He couldn’t afford to stay within the water for longer.
And so, nudging An’as next to him, he placed his hand over the tip of the finger and gently pushed himself up, his body floating into the darkness as he scanned his surroundings with extreme caution.
‘…Is it gone?’
Lazarus couldn’t tell at all.
He continued to drift up, his movements as slow as possible. He didn’t want to attract any unwanted attention.
He slowly and carefully started to move up the water, his chest tingling as he looked around him.
Everything was proceeding smoothly, but he didn’t lower his guard.
The silence around him left him completely unsettled. Furthermore, he didn’t know if the monster would show up or not.
He circled his arms around the water once more, moving up.
But just as he did…
Flick!
A pale light appeared beneath him, forcing his entire body to stiffen as he immediately stopped.
An’as, who had been following from behind, similarly stopped.
They both looked down and saw the massive form of the creature gliding beneath them. That’s when they also got a clearer view of the flickering light ahead of it, attached to its body by a long, rod-like extension.
A growing sense of unease settled in their bodies as they spotted the light, and just as An’as started to grow nervous, Lazarus’s gaze moved elsewhere.
With the monster still beneath, lighting up the seabed, his eyes finally caught sight of another structure in the distance.
He couldn’t see much, the light barely reached beyond a few feet, but it was enough to feel the immense scale of the place. Seaweed clung to the walls, and intricate patterns and lines were etched into the stone, depicting something he couldn’t quite make out.
Lazarus looked at the strange structure for a few seconds, engraving it deeply in his mind before slowly turning around and shifting his attention up.
He didn’t know if he had enough oxygen within his lungs to be able to make it up.
To make matters worse, he could feel the creature beneath them react to their every movement. The less they moved, the less it seemed to notice them.
They… had to go slowly.
One smooth and slow motion at a time.
That was exactly what they did as they tried to claw their way back towards the surface.
The monster beneath didn’t seem to notice them as they moved up, but at the same time, it almost felt as though it was aware of them.
Watching them.
This feeling never seemed to leave, even as they managed to get halfway up.
In fact, it appeared to grow the higher up they went.
Ba… Thump! Ba… Thump!
In the silence, Lazarus could feel and hear his own heartbeat. He unknowingly started to speed up his movements, trying his best to get to the surface even faster, but it was also in that moment that he felt something squirm beneath him.
‘Oh…’
Lazarus’s heart tightened as he spotted a black vortex beneath him, squirming as it headed rapidly in their direction, the faint dot of light within the vortex growing brighter as it approached them.
His heart nearly leaped out of his throat when he saw just how fast it was moving, and it was also then that he realized that the monster was finally coming for them.
‘….!?’
An’as was the first one to move, the area around him squirming with bubbles as he shot up.
His speed was fast, but nowhere near as fast as the rapidly approaching gigantic creature beneath.
Looking at it and looking up, Lazarus knew that it was impossible for him as well.
There was simply no way for them to outrun it.
An’as, who saw this, started to panic even more, his mind racing as he looked at Lazarus, who remained still in the water.
‘What are you doing!? Go up! Shit!’
His pupils dilated when he saw the massive creature rapidly approach them.
‘Fuck! I shouldn’t have come here! Why did I even bother following him!? Shit! May the Goddess of Light protect me!’
While panicked, An’as kept his eyes on the merchant, who remained still in the water. This drove An’as crazy, especially when the monster was now a few meters beneath them, its maw open and its sharp teeth pointed.
‘No!’
An’as internally screamed as he saw the monster about to swallow up the merchant, but that only lasted for a brief moment.
It was right as the monster was about to swallow Lazarus when An’as saw the merchant take a single step forward, his entire body shooting down shortly after.
Thump!
A muffled ‘bang’ echoed in the water shortly after as the merchant landed directly onto the creature’s sharp tooth.
‘Wha…’
An’as was shocked to see the merchant’s actions.
But things were far from over. The moment the merchant settled himself on the monster’s teeth, he flicked his hand, and over several dozen thin threads appeared, each one shooting from out of his arm and tightening around the monster’s teeth.
The entire process was extremely quick, and in a matter of seconds, the monster’s teeth were covered in thin threads.
By the time the creature had time to react, it was already too late as Lazarus clenched his hand, forcing its body to slowly start to shut.
But things weren’t over.
The moment the monster noticed something amiss, its body jerked and flicked, seemingly trying to force Lazarus away, but as if one step ahead, Lazarus kicked himself up and pressed his hand against the monster’s head.
An’as watched as several purple runes formed around Lazarus’s palm, settling themselves deep into the monster’s body.
‘Curse Magic?’
An’as recognized the runes in an instant. From their purple color and complexity, it looked like some sort of advanced spell.
The entire process lasted no more than half a second as Lazarus pulled his hand away, kicking his body away as the creature jerked and squirmed in the water, its pale light flickering in and out continuously.
Lazarus stared at the creature for a few seconds before looking back up towards the water surface and moving up.
An’as could only float in the water, completely stunned by what he had just witnessed.
That…
While he was already aware that the man before him was no regular merchant, the scene before him had left him utterly speechless.
However, he couldn’t remain speechless for long, as this wasn’t the right time for that.
Without the threat of the monster, making it all the way up was not very hard. They both managed to reach shortly after, as their heads popped out of the water.
Splash!
“Haa… Haa…”
An’as took heavy gulps of air the moment he popped out of the water, his body turning to what felt like jelly.
Even though he didn’t do anything particularly taxing, he felt incredibly tired by the experience.
He wanted nothing more than to go back on land.
And yet, thinking about what he had managed to witness beneath the water, he understood that it wasn’t the time for him to rest.
“We should quickly report what we’ve found to the temple. With their help, we might be able to—”
“Enough with the temple.”
Lazarus’s calm voice cut him off before he could finish his sentence as his gaze appeared to be scanning the waters beneath, and his brows were furrowed tightly.
An’as blinked his eyes.
What was he looking at?
“Take a deep breath.”
The merchant said, pressing his hand over An’as’s shoulder.
“Eh?”
Before An’as even had the time to scream, his entire body was sucked deeply into the water.
The darkness swallowed him again.
But not for long.
As soon as he regained his bearings, he spotted a massive body lying on the seabed, its form twitching relentlessly within the pale, dim light that surrounded them.
An’as’s eyes widened.
‘That’s…!’
