Chapter 430 - 11. Ice Prince

Chapter 430: 11. Ice PrinceFisher swam upwards through the deep, dark waters, intending to return to the site where he had just discovered the ruins to check the extent of the damage to the hard-found All Things Warning Stone Tablet.

He glanced back one last time toward the deep sea below. The enormous mushrooms emitting bioluminescence were now completely out of sight, and of course, so were the group of Jellyfish Men who had been calling out to him with hands on hips.

Previously, Fisher had heard from Lingna about a demi-human race adept at weaving garments known as the Jellyfish Species, living above the Great Sea Vortex. He wondered if they were the ones he had just encountered; they certainly bore a striking resemblance to jellyfish, albeit their appearance was somewhat strange to the land-dwelling Fisher.

The profound ocean was exceedingly tranquil. Fisher felt that his earlier descent with the Siren took less than a minute, but now swimming back up from that spot took quite some time before he could see the edge of the cliff.

Above the cliff, the already disordered ruins had now suffered a catastrophe. Numerous fragments of stone pillars lay scattered on the ground, and Fisher hurriedly ran to the square where the All Things Warning Stone Tablet was placed, only to find that a dark stone, because of the Siren’s destruction, had left behind nothing but a small section of its base.

Fisher frowned, looked around but found no scattered fragments—it seemed they had been swallowed by that damn Siren...

He let out a sigh of slight disappointment, though he was not overly discouraged because Elliog had once mentioned that almost every human settlement had one of those things; if he couldn’t see its entirety here, there would be other chances later. Besides, Fisher could also ask Emhardt for more information about the All Things Warning Stone Tablet.

Fisher took one last look at the devout human prostrating on the ground at the base of the stone tablet, stretching his hands upward, and followed the direction of his worship. The Mother Goddess statue, like the half-shattered Vienna, continued to look affectionately down upon him.

The history of human faith in the Mother Goddess is so ancient and untraceable, after all, according to human myth, even humanity itself was her creation.

But according to the description on the All Things Warning Stone Tablet, humans were evidently at the very bottom of the Life Rank at that time. Their depiction of Life Rank was arranged upward from themselves, and the very name "warning" seemed to prove that the environment in which humans lived was not safe, requiring them to be constantly vigilant and protect against dangerous High Rank species.

If the environment of ancient times was unsafe, how did humans from the lowest end of the Life Rank overcome such a huge disparity and survive and develop to the present day?

At this thought, Fisher found that he could answer this question on his own because he was proficient in that very field.

"Magic..."

Perhaps, during some ancient period, humans discovered the secrets of Magic, learning how to use their own Magic Power to communicate with the world and use it as a means to contend with other races?

Traditional historical sources believe that humans stumbled upon magic by collecting and observing materials from magical creatures in the wild, while Kado’s religious views hold that everything is a gift from the Mother Goddess. Modern mages, led by the Gravity Magic Master, think that the emergence of magic was inspired by celestial phenomena and the demi-human race...

However, in the Soul Completion Manual, Wuzi mentioned that the magic used by the Dragon-man Species of the Dragon Court originated from human society, proving that humans thought up magic on their own. But how magic was conceived by humans remains a question.

Fisher, lost in thought, frowned and looked up to his revered Mother Goddess. However, the faceless statue of the Mother Goddess simply continued to look down at him with love, providing no clues.

"Puff!"

Amidst the vast ocean, Fisher suddenly burst out of the water, his mouth wide open, greedily breathing in the fresh air.

To tell the truth, even though Fisher could now breathe underwater, that sensation was truly indescribable. It felt as if every breath of air could only fill one-sixth of his needs, causing him a great deal of discomfort.

Moreover, during the battle, Siren’s blood had dispersed in the seawater, making the already scanty air seem tainted with waste, leaving Fisher unsure whether to inhale or not...

Anyway, Fisher was sick of breathing underwater. Only now did he start to feel grateful that he hadn’t been knocked unconscious by Moli and taken back to the sea; it would have been even more unbearable than death.

He took several gratifying breaths of air, then wiped his face before surveying the environment around him. All he could see was the undulating surface of the sea, with no sign of the Iceberg Queen that had brought him here.

Now this was a fine situation. The Siren had whisked him away to who knows where. If the Iceberg Queen couldn’t find him, was he expected to swim to shore on his own?

As he lifted his head to observe his surroundings, suddenly, a figure spread its wings like lightning across the sky. Just by those enormous wings, Fisher immediately recognized them as those of Ossie, the Second Officer of the Iceberg Queen.

"Ossie!"

Seizing what seemed like a lifeline, Fisher called out to her. Her figure paused slightly in midair, looked back at Fisher still in the sea, and an expression of unmistakable relief appeared on her sweet face.

The next moment, without a response, she turned around and flew towards Fisher, her strong bird feet gently grasping Fisher’s outstretched hand, lifting him out of the water.

As soon as her talons touched his skin, Fisher instantly felt the sensation of feathers on her claws. He looked up at Ossie with a puzzled expression, seeing her cloaked figure completely revealed from this angle, and then, Fisher saw that underneath her cloak, Ossie was wearing very little—just a thin sailor’s shirt.

It was then that Fisher realized that Ossie, belonging to the Grey Bird Species, had a physique quite different from the tall and slender women of Female Country. Ossie was a bit... well, plump, looking soft and round, which matched her cute and sweet appearance and was the type that Nali Gentlemen fancied.

Fisher hadn’t even looked at her for more than two seconds, but in the next moment, her flight suddenly experienced violent turbulence, shaking so much that Fisher almost once again tumbled into the sea.

It turned out that Ossie felt shy from being seen by Fisher and subconsciously wanted to stretch her wings to cover her embarrassing figure, but she forgot she was still in flight. The absence of one wing caused her to lose control and start plummeting toward the sea surface.

She quickly spread her wings again, unable to pay attention to the body beneath her cloak, focusing on flying. However, a faint cherry hue started to color her fair cheeks,

"Sorry..."

"Sorry."

Ossie and Fisher, who had averted his gaze, apologized at the same time. Afterward, they looked at each other in surprise, causing her to hurriedly look away in panic, and then she stopped talking.

After about seven or eight more minutes of flight, Fisher’s view finally returned to the Iceberg Queen resting on the sea surface. Unknowingly, he had been taken quite a distance by the Siren.

At this moment, the deck of the Iceberg Queen was a complete mess, with many crew members looking worriedly at the ship’s surface covered in ice debris. Alagina sat on the steps beside the deck, bandaging her right hand, while Pahetz stood by her side, grinding her teeth and glaring at the sea,

"That despicable, vile bastard dared to attack us from the sea floor, and even managed to land a hit—completely embarrassing us. I really..."

"Back... back..."

Pahetz’s words stopped abruptly upon hearing the sound of Steel Blade beside her. She turned her head to glance into the distance, her expression changing immediately as she burst into laughter,

"Captain, Fisher and Ossie are flying back!"

Alagina, who was bandaging her wounds, hurriedly looked up at the sky upon hearing this and finally saw the unharmed Fisher. The chill on her face from her pain began to melt away somewhat, and she walked briskly to the edge of the deck.

Ossie flew above the deck, placed Fisher down, and then quickly flew up to sit on top of the mast. After settling down, she covered herself with her hefty cloak, turned her head away, and fell silent.

"Are you hurt?"

Fisher shook his head to scatter the water droplets from his hair, which had grown somewhat longer over the time of not being cared for during the return to Saint Nali. He looked toward Alagina’s right hand, half-bandaged revealing bruised skin, and asked.

Unexpectedly, no response came after his inquiry. He looked up puzzled, only to see Alagina, noticing the dampness of his hair, swallow saliva unconsciously. When Fisher’s gaze met hers, she embarrassingly raised her left hand to rub her nose and spoke in a flustered manner,

"No... it’s not serious."

Alagina didn’t want Fisher to think she was a lecher, stealing glances at him when his white shirt got wet, so she explained it this way.

Pahetz and Fisher exchanged a look at her swollen, purplish fingers, not knowing how to comment on her stubbornness, and decided to change the subject,

"Is this the consequence of just now using the Ice Prince itself?"

Before, Fisher had heard from Emhardt that the Ice Prince was designed for the Phoenix race. It was normal for Alagina, a human, not to be able to handle it. But was it an exaggeration to nearly freeze the entire hand to the point of ruin just by using it once?

"Yes, and... just now, the Ice Prince seemed a bit abnormal, as if something nearby was attracting it..."

"Attracting?"

Fisher looked toward the direction of the Captain’s Room with confusion and then realized that the lousy book, Emhardt, was lying on the roof of the Captain’s Room, playing dead. Fisher opened his mouth, about to say something, when suddenly a crew member at the bow shouted,

"Captain... Captain! There is an island ahead!"

"An island? Where did an island come from nearby? Let me have a look!"

Pahetz, in disbelief, exchanged glances with Alagina. Although they hadn’t strictly followed the merchant fleet’s route, they were at least near it—one that would have been fully explored for safety reasons.

But now, the crew was saying an island had suddenly appeared?

Pahetz quickly grabbed a telescope and ran to the bow, looking forward through it. There, amidst the vast ocean, a medium-sized island emerged,

"Damn... there really is an island..."

As Alagina puzzledly looked in that direction, her back suddenly began to heat up. She subconsciously reached to touch it, only to feel the reaction from the tattoo that linked her with the Ice Prince, as if it were a reminder—that it wanted to go to that island...

"Ice Prince?"