Shrouded Seascape

"Hahaha!" Charles laughed boisterously upon hearing his first mate's question. It was rare to see him laugh like this. "Are you talking about what Doctor said about how I wouldn't live past forty? He lied. Otherwise, he would have been more frantic than me. I mean, just think about his fiery temper."

"Really…?" Bandages seemed a bit unconvinced.

Charles seemed to have thought of something, and his smile faded. He sounded a bit emotional as he said, "Do you still remember the secret that he tried to say on his deathbed?"

"I only found out after Linda examined me the other day. The so-called secret that would make me resent him was probably the fact that he lied when he said that I wouldn't live past forty. He was actually just trying to scare me.

"If he were still alive today, he'd be a hundred years old now. He's so old, but he actually pulled off such a childish joke. I guess they weren't lying when they said that the older a person gets, the more childish they become."

Bandages' lips curled up into a faint, stiff smile upon recalling that scene. "Hahaha… hahaha… it is... actually funny..."

Charles turned to look in the direction of Laesto's grave and said, "He was such a good doctor that I'm convinced he knew when he was going to die. However, he did not tell me that and remained silent until the end.

"He timed it well, and he succeeded at using his own death as a prank. Of course, I don't know if he cut himself off on purpose or if it was an accident. Either way, that was such a brilliant prank.

"Once I find myself on my deathbed one day, I'm going to pull the same prank. I'm going to make someone feel like dying to know the answer."

"You... very much… feel like someone..."

"Who?"

"Your late persona… Richard..."

Charles' smile faded. He looked at the distant sea and nodded gently. "Actually, Richard was just me—an extremely cheerful version of me. Let me tell you a secret—on the surface world, my personality was exactly the same as Richard's."

The atmosphere between the two became a bit somber.

"Forget it. Let's not talk about what happened so long ago. Anyway, the people are here, but where are the ships?" Charles asked.

Just as Bandages was about to answer, a massive, strange-looking island appeared before the docks. It was an artificial island made out of scrapped ships. Once home to notorious pirates, it was none other than Sottom.

"Hope Island... has run out of warships... so... we talked to… the Governor of Whereto... and recruited... her Sottom… for this… expedition," Bandages replied.

Looking at the rows of cannons protruding from Sottom, Charles nodded and replied, "Alright, that thing is massive. Gather everyone and prepare to board.

"By the way, Bandages, we're not going to do anything complicated, so you don't have to come along this time."

Bandages turned to stare at his captain. In the end, he said nothing and merely nodded before turning around and walking into Hope Island's Second Street, which led directly to the central district.

For some reason, Bandages' disappearing figure looked a bit dejected in Charles' eyes.

"Daddy, what are you looking at?" Sparkle asked, walking up to Charles. She had just teleported Sottom to Hope Island.

"Nothing." Charles shook his head, "Let's get on board."

The two of them soon found themselves inside 134's former residence. The pirates operating Sottom stood neatly in a row with eyes full of fear. They lowered their heads, not daring to meet Charles' gaze.

Charles could still remember how these pirates had fired their guns and hurled explosives at him during his previous visit to Sottom to acquire a nautical chart.

In stark contrast to what had transpired long ago, the pirates before him had become meek and quiet.

Once the people outside had boarded Sottom, there was a flash of white light, and the massive artificial island vanished from Hope Island's docks.

When the pirates of Sottom came to their senses, they found that the glaring sunlight had disappeared. They were once again shrouded in the perpetual darkness of the Subterranean Sea.

Moreover, the air was cold—cold enough that white mist emerged from Charles' mouth as he ordered, "There's something odd with the temperature. Switch on every single searchlight!"

Moments later, more than ten beams of light pierced the darkness, and a massive iceberg covered in white snow was revealed before everyone.

Charles cast a dumbfounded gaze at the iceberg. He had never seen an iceberg back when he was still being held captive in SITE 6. He took out the nautical chart and glanced at it before turning to look at his daughter next to him. "Sparkle, are you sure this is SITE 6? Is this really the place that I told you about?"

"Yeah, that's right. We're here. As for why it became like this, I'm not too sure. Maybe a containment breach happened inside the site or something," Sparkle replied.

Charles passed down the order to circle the massive iceberg, and a colossal corpse suspended in midair soon came into view. The sight of it meant that they were definitely in SITE 6.

The people on Sottom clutched their heads in pain upon clapping their eyes on the distant corpse of a Divinity. In response, Charles hurriedly sounded the retreat.

Charles' brows were furrowed in contemplation. It didn't matter where the iceberg had come from; they wouldn't be able to progress unless the iceberg was cleared.

There was a splash as Charles jumped into the icy cold sea. The scene down below made Charles' frown become even tighter. The iceberg wasn't floating freely in water and was actually connected to the seabed down below.

Unfortunately, it had also engulfed SITE 6, which was an underwater site. In other words, they'd still have to clear the iceberg if they wanted to access it from down below.

Charles emerged from the sea, completely drenched.

"Dad, I found one solution to this," Sparkle said, waving her index finger. "Give me a moment."

Before Charles could ask anything, Sparkle turned and ordered everyone to retreat from the deck and enter the cabin down below. Sparkle's orders told Charles everything he needed to know, and he easily deduced Sparkle's solution.

Swoosh!

There was a flash of white light, and a massive, glaring halo appeared above the colossal iceberg. It was none other than Dawn One, which had been hanging above Hope Island.

Charles' eyes narrowed. He looked at it through a monoscope and saw Lily floating in the middle of the massive inverted triangle within the glaring halo.

"Mr. Charles!" Lily exclaimed. Her figure emitting a golden light carved a gold streak of light as she flew across the sky like a shooting star, crashing into Charles' chest.

"You can take full control of Dawn One?" Charles asked, holding Lily in his hand.

"Mmhm, I can. The light coming from this friend of mine feels really comfortable for me. It's like the same light from inside of me, which is why I can borrow its power," Lily replied.

Charles muttered a few words to Lily before the latter flew up and returned to the massive inverted triangle in the sky.

Once Sottom had moved to a safe enough distance, Lily closed her eyes and focused on the warm sunlight around her.

Dawn One trembled slightly and descended slowly onto the iceberg. Its circular figure became extremely dazzling. The light from it became so radiant that just closing one's eyes wasn't enough—one had to turn one's back to it.

Beneath the scorching and radiant sunlight, blocks of ice the size of cars slid off the iceberg and crashed into the boiling seawater down below.

Cosyjuhye's Thoughts

That reveal... I don't how how I should feel about it. But at the same time, why does it feel like that's not the actual truth???

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