Chapter 316: Chapter 274: The Old Gods Mansion, Deep Dive Church
Violet had thought she might glimpse some secrets of the New World and the source of contamination. Instead, she witnessed a completely unexpected turn of events.
"That really is the Lancaster flagship, the ’Blue Dragon King’!"
Byron had narrowly escaped sinking with it, fortunately surviving the ordeal. Now his father, Prince Edmund Lancaster of Solenberg, and his uncle, Mad King Henry VI, along with the other Lancasters who died in that catastrophe, might still be bound to it like earthbound spirits (Chapter 2)!
She worried she might be hallucinating due to the dream’s influence and quickly looked towards other parts of the shipwreck graveyard.
As expected, she saw the tattered remnants of the Hethings Strait Fleet, all flying banners of the White Rose.
That was the very First Submarine Fleet commanded by Norwich York, which had met its end in Iron Anchor Bay.
Their flagship, the second-grade ship ’King Edward,’ which had once carried a "Calamity," was clearly among them.
Violet was no clueless onlooker; she knew all too well that the culprit behind the destruction of both the First Submarine Fleet and the Blue Dragon King was the same entity—the Touch of the Kraken! It was originally brought from the Bantaan Archipelago to the Old Continent by the York Family and is now commonly referred to by various countries as the ’Northern Sea Leviathan Kraken.’ Last year, it had gone berserk under the influence of the ’Nail of Ruin,’ harboring deep animosity towards all betrayers. It ruthlessly hunted throughout the North Sea. Violet had seen with her own eyes how it captured its prey: attacking from dreams, extending countless tentacles to drag entire warships into another illusory underwater world (Chapter 94). Now that she could see them here again, it meant...
"This shipwreck graveyard, deep within the dreamscape, definitely belongs to the Calamity, the ’Touch of the Kraken.’ More precisely, to the Slumbering God from the murmurs just now—the one who, though dead, still dreams! ’Northern Sea Leviathan Kraken’ is merely a name given by humans. Just like ’Mother of Creation, Lilith,’ or ’The Serpent of a Thousand Faces: Hydra,’ these names can’t represent their true identities. Look at the ancient divine statues all over this city. Could it be that these extraordinary entities, including the Kraken, which died for unknown reasons many years ago, are actually Old Gods from long-gone eras—at least from before the Silver Era?" She drew a sharp breath. In today’s Old Continent, ’God’ is a proprietary noun, belonging only to The Shackled Creator. Even to have such a thought is an outrageous act of profanity.
Although Violet’s faith was in the Mad Hunt Deity, Woden, she was somewhat apprehensive of the Deep Dive Church’s maniacal Judgment Knights and Reformist Clerics.
She quickly suppressed her wildly racing thoughts.
At that moment, she suddenly held her breath and listened intently.
TOOT! TOOT! TOOT!
An irritating and nauseating, yet terribly familiar, chaotic flute sound pierced through the water and into her ears.
It was the sound of the Pied Piper’s Flute.
A large swath of the water above her head darkened rapidly as something unseen stained it pitch black. It was as if some colossal creature lurked in the shadows, emitting a sickly, deep growl and a terrifying, bone-chilling, putrid stench.
An ordinary person would likely go mad just catching a glimpse of it.
Subsequently, Violet saw numerous thick, grayish-white, decaying tentacles unfurling from the shadows, tossing what seemed to be a Church silver cross warship into the shipwreck graveyard.
Scattered around were the corpses of numerous Church Knights in white, cross-adorned surcoats.
Just like Byron had experienced, their eyes were tightly closed as they met death in eternal slumber.
Soon after, a second and then a third ship followed.
It made Violet wonder if the Church had finally had enough of the ’Touch of the Kraken’s’ ravages in the North Sea and had decided to act against it.
Quickly, these new arrivals to the shipwreck graveyard reopened their eyes, which now flickered with ghostly flames. Manning their Ghost Ships, they joined the chaotic fray.
The Blue Dragon King clearly became their primary target; they charged it fearlessly and en masse.
But the ’Blue Dragon King’ was worthy of its status as one of the greatest first-class battleships on the sea, and its ’Storm Knight’ ship spirit was likewise worthy of being called the world’s finest.
They maneuvered masterfully here, rarely meeting an equal.
A voice, though filled with a deathly chill, still thundered with commanding presence, echoing throughout the underwater city, "We were bullied by these scum when we were alive. If we’re still bullied by them in death, haven’t we died for nothing? Open fire! Destroy them!"
"By your command, Your Highness!"
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
Eerie green cannon fire flashed. No warship could withstand the combined salvo of 112 heavy cannons.
The defeated Ghost Ships fell silent, plunging into deeper layers of the seabed.
A small fraction of their spiritual essence was absorbed by the victors; the remainder fell into the temple behind Violet, becoming nourishment for the Kraken.
Clearly, this place was not only a shipwreck graveyard but also the ’stomach’ of the ’Northern Sea Leviathan Kraken,’ where it slowly digested its prey.
The Blue Dragon King had been swallowed into this place over half a year ago and had been fighting day and night ever since.
Defeat meant complete obliteration, without even the chance to become a ghost.
Violet realized the grimness of the situation.
The Blue Dragon King seemed overwhelmingly triumphant, but was there ever an undefeated general in this world? It might win ten or a hundred times here, but could it win a thousand, or ten thousand times? A single failure would mean utter doom. But trying to snatch people and a ship from the Kraken’s grasp is nothing but a fool’s dream. The entire population of Iron Anchor Bay’s Bayfolk couldn’t withstand it. Byron and I had to rally all the pirates, bounty hunters, and trading companies in the North Sea Region just to withstand the dream-pull of the Touch of the Kraken. How much formidable power would it take to pull out something that has already been swallowed? No, I must figure out a way to get back and tell Byron as soon as possible. Perhaps he will have a good idea.
Violet’s mind raced, desperately thinking about how to quickly notify him to awaken her.
Just then, she suddenly heard footsteps from the temple behind her, and a chill of alarm shot through her.
"Someone else is coming!"
In such an eerie place, the sound of leisurely footsteps could only mean one thing: an enemy.
The footsteps grew closer.
"What to do, what to do?"
It was only when she noticed the curse seal on the back of her hand that she remembered a possibly useful Calamity Curse. With decisive urgency, she shouted, "Fingers connected to the heart, transfer the pain! Byron, Byron, pull me up!"
The curse’s effect was to find a resilient companion who would voluntarily bear pain and injury for her; if the other party resisted, it would not work.
A shining golden anchor chain then materialized from within Violet and bit viciously into her own delicate arm.
Yet, she felt no pain, and her skin wasn’t even broken.
CRASH!
However, the thick golden anchor chain connected to her shuddered violently from the transferred agony, instantly pulling taut.
It then yanked her rapidly upward. A silver door adorned with fireworks, firearms, and leviathans burst open behind her, dragging her through its threshold.
The moment she passed through the gateway, her physical body, lying in the captain’s cabin of the Golden Deer, jolted. She suddenly opened her sapphire-like eyes.
The first thing she saw was Byron. He had just finished his tasks and returned, and was now looking at her with concern. His rolled-up sleeve revealed a small, bloody bite mark on his arm.
Without waiting for Byron to ask what had happened, she immediately exclaimed, "Byron, I just dreamt about the Blue Dragon King..."
「In the dreamscape behind her.」
Simultaneously, a young gentleman wearing gold-rimmed spectacles had arrived at the entrance of the temple from which Violet had vanished.
Looking at the still-rippling water, he furrowed his brow. "Strange, it seems someone has been here. But they didn’t trigger this city’s strict killing rules. Could it be one of the Deep Dive Church’s own, someone from the deep sea? At this time, which of our own would visit our Lord’s dwelling?"
After a dark millennium of cultural suppression by the Church, much knowledge from the Mythological Era had been lost to history.
The Transcendents of the Old Continent were only vaguely aware of the identities and divine names of those extraordinary entities.
But this young man—once a North Bay Bayfolk, now claiming to be a descendant of the Exiles—was clearly a believer in the ’Slumbering God,’ an Old God.
And he was not alone, but belonged to a secret organization called the "Deep Dive Church."
Having confirmed it was one of their own, he paid little further attention to who had come, instead looking down at the myriad Ghost Ships battling within the deep dream.
His expression returned to one of devout faith, and he murmured, "Once Balboa continues to promote the Mad Blood Calamity, creating more converts for our Lord, the priests of the Deep Dive Church can use these converts to anchor reality and perform the descent ritual, summoning more manifestations of the ’Touch of the Kraken’ into the mortal world. Then, at the right moment, our Lord’s true form will awaken and return. After the Mythological Era came the Silver Era. And destined to follow the Silver Era is the Spiral Annals, an age when the great seas will drown everything—an inescapable fate for all. Our ancestors made no mistake. We, the ’Exiles,’ are the prophesied children of the Mad Hunt Deity’s resurrection prophecy, destined to assist our Lord in ruling this world!"