Chapter 366: The Amalgam of Genius and Stupidity [Part 1]
Lung didn’t drink God’s Tear immediately despite his attraction toward it. He wasn’t in a position where he could act without thinking things through.
Who are these people? How are they living in an underwater city? There were too many questions that still needed an answer.
Cillin glanced at his surroundings. Including the people watching them from inside the buildings, the number of watchers had grown to three hundred or so. It sounded like a lot until you considered how big the underwater city was. Assuming that their birth rate was equal to that of a standard human’s, there should be a lot more people than this.
“How are you related to the Xi Family?” Cillin asked.
The old man was growing worried since Lung still hadn’t drank the God’s Tear, but Cillin’s question immediately drew his attention away. In fact, everyone close enough to hear the question was looking at him in surprise as well.
Cillin had told Lung about the connection between the Xi Family and the Aurelios only. Therefore, neither him nor his subordinates knew much about them. They were curious to hear what Cillin had to say as well.
A look of deep respect passed through the old man’s features. It was directed toward the Xi Family, not Cillin.
“The Xi Family is our benefactor!”
“Benefactor?”
“Yes. Our ancestors were faced with a calamity a thousand years ago, and it was them who had lent them a helping hand. We might not have existed without them.”
The look in the aquatic people’s eyes reminded Cillin of a faithful worshiper.
Suddenly, Lung recalled something and asked, “Excuse me, but what is your surname?”
“We do not have a surname per se, but you may call us the Moor.”
“The Moor?!”
Big Rock, Pascado and more turned slack-jawed. The Moor was a legendary race that only existed as bits and pieces in historical records. They were known among experts as the amalgam between genius and stupidity. And now, these people claimed that they were that legendary race?!
Cillin knew a little about the Moor as well. He had read about them while going through some sector’s history books. The Moor was one of the older families of Sector H, and every single one of them was a natural tamer. It was said that their children could communicate with giant sea beasts before they even learned how to run.
At present time, few people believed the accounts because they only existed in legends. Moreover, there was no existing photographic or videographic evidence. It all vanished along the race’s destruction a thousand years ago.
However, the Andrea Family had always believed in the Moor’s existence. It was because their forefathers’ handwritten accounts on the Moor had survived to this day. That was why Lung and his subordinates were as stunned as they were.
According to their forefathers’ accounts, Moor was their racial name, not surname. It meant “sea” in an ancient language.
The Moor was unusual even among all the races that were native to Sector H. They were innocent, stubborn, and very single-minded. Their complete lack of tact had led to them creating many enemies for themselves. Just like the experts had commented, the Moor was an amalgam of genius and stupidity. They were so talented that they could communicate with any sea beast without a hitch, but they were also so foolish that they could offend an entire hall of people in under an hour.
They didn’t understand social climbing, tact, or reservation. In a sense, they were less like a human and more like an animal. The reason they nearly went extinct a thousand years ago was precisely because they had offended a powerful group by accident. Their enemy had driven them into space and, according to historical accounts, destroyed them all. Obviously, that wasn’t true anymore. From the looks of it, the Xi Family—their best generation to be exact—had not only rescued them from extinction, but also wiped away traces of their existence so that everyone believed that they were gone.
Lung examined the aquatic people—no, the Moor around him closer than ever before. Who would’ve thought that the race everyone thought was extinct would be hiding at such a place?
The crowd was growing bigger still, so Cillin suggested, “Why don’t we find a better place to speak?”
“Yes, yes, that makes sense,” said the old man before taking off somewhere. He didn’t say “follow me” or beckon Cillin’s group to join them, but after a few steps he shot them an annoyed look and said, “What are you waiting for? Come on!”
Lung gestured for the others to follow with his chin. No one was offended because they already knew not to judge the Moor by a normal human’s standards.
The old man led them into one of the hemispheric buildings. The decor was barebones, and the majority of them were carved out of rocks. It wasn’t primitive in the slightest, however—the rocks were all precious ores!
When Wheeze looked in from the front door and saw multiple highly-priced ores just sitting in the middle of the living room, it could barely stop itself from clawing them toward itself. After all, they represented heaps and heaps of fish biscuits!
The interior design was simple to the point it was practically minimalistic, but the technology behind them could only be described as astonishing. How could they not? Not only did the Xi Family automatize everything despite Sea Paradise’s environment, they managed to do this a thousand years ago. On a side note, nobody believed that the Moor were the ones who pulled this off as a matter of course.
After they entered the living room, they were treated to a brief summary of the whole story.
A thousand years ago, the Xi Family had traveled to Sector H to study the sea beasts and tamers. They were looking for appropriate research participants and environments when they ran into the Moor, who happened to be in the midst of their worst disaster. After rescuing a little less than 30 people—the Moor was a small race with a tiny population of only several hundred, so they really had been a hair’s breadth away from true extinction—the Xi Family drove their destroyers into Sea Paradise so that the remaining Moor could take revenge by their own hands. In the end, they were successful. Their sea beasts had devoured all of their enemies.
After that, the Xi Family built an underwater city and invented an anti-interference system. It wasn’t perfect, however. Building the underwater city alone had pushed them to their limits, not to mention that Sea Paradise’s unique environment meant that even they weren’t able to incorporate most of the technology they knew. Thankfully, they ultimately succeeded in building the underwater city and completed their own research.
On the day the Xi Family was about to take their leave, the new Moor chief promised them that they would stay in the city and keep watch over God’s Tear until its next successor was found. It was the only way they could repay the Xi Family not only for saving them from extinction, but also giving them an entire underwater city without asking anything in return.
Just like that, a thousand years passed by.
True to their word, the Moor never left the underwater city in order to keep their promise. On a related note, the reason the Predators occasionally went to the sea surface when they didn’t have to was to bring back some “souvenirs” for the Moor. It was their way of showing them the sea surface and alleviating some of their burden.
The old man pointed at the bottle in Lung’s hand. “And now you’re finally here. Our watch will be complete when you consume God’s Tear and complete your evolution.”
“You’ve never used this for yourselves?” Lung asked.
“Of course not!” The old man said matter-of-factly. “Why would we do that? It’s not for us.”
Pascado and the others couldn’t help but exchange strange looks with one another. It looked like the Moor truly was as… eccentric as the legends claimed. If this was any other family at all, they would’ve consumed God’s Tear as soon as eight hundred years—no, as soon as the Xi Family took their leave.
“No, seriously. Don’t you understand what you were holding? It’s God’s Tear, man. The ‘tear of a god’, man!” Pascado insisted.
That pissed off the old man a little. He had the feeling that Pascado was looking down on his IQ. He slapped the table hard—Wheeze visibly winced when he did this—and yelled, “Of course I know! My race has guarded God’s Tear for a thousand years, and I, the chief, am tasked with protecting it more than anyone else in my race! You think my knowledge of God’s Tear is in any way lesser than you people?!”
You’re completely missing the point! Everyone under Lung’s employ thought at the same time.
There was a line about God’s Tear in Genesis Mythos that went something like this: “Touched by the god’s tear that melted into the sea, the sea beasts decided to give Him their undying loyalty.”
In other words, God’s Tear was the power that allowed a person to control any sea beast including the overlords that were said to be impossible to control. With that in mind, how were these people not tempted in the slightest?! If it was just the chief then whatever, but their entire race was like this for multiple generations across a thousand years! How was this possible? Did they have literal shit for brains? How can they be… so… infuriating?!
“Cough!” Lung had to slap himself to keep from losing control. It wasn’t his fault really. As someone who was born to a family of merchants, he simply wasn’t capable of imagining the neural makeup of a Moor’s brain.