Chapter 74 : The Plan
Chapter 74. The Plan
“Th-that… would that even be possible?”
“We won’t know unless we try, right? If you stay, I’ll come up with ideas somehow.”
“There is such a thing as a submarine. It’s a device designed to withstand the pressure inside the sea.”
“Huh? What’s that?”
There had been submarines on Earth as well, but his knowledge of the technology was only superficial.
This time, he was talking about something that had truly existed.
“I don’t know exactly what principles it runs on either. It was something that operated before what you call the ‘Great Catastrophe.’ And the turtles were the ones who used it.”
Strictly speaking, that technology too had been created by the ancient Turusains.
“…What?”
“It uses magic to decompress and pressurize things, and…….”
“Y-yes. Yes, yes.”
Listening to what Yul and Lucian were saying, it seemed oddly plausible, and Brodin nodded his head.
“Al-alright. Then I’ll remain a member.”
Lucian, having somehow talked Prince Brodin into it, turned his gaze to Frenda.
“You’re taking Introduction to Magic Engineering and Rune Script Derivations 1, 2, and 3, right?”
“Ah, yes.”
“Once you reach your second year, you’ll properly choose a field. Until then, this notebook will help.”
“A n-notebook?”
Lucian pulled out his own handwritten notebook from his bag.
At a glance, it was a terrifying volume. Reading through Lucian’s notes—written during the time he had been obsessed with studying—Frenda could tell they were extremely well organized.
“Th-this is so easy to understand?”
“Rune scripts are learned faster by doing them directly rather than studying them from books. The academy shop sells low-ranked magic stones cheaply, so buy some there and try them out.”
“Understood!”
After persuading Frenda in one go, Lucian turned his head toward Yera Mull.
“I’m good. I’m just staying here because it’s comfortable. It kind of feels like my old home.”
“This place is pretty tucked away, though?”
“My home was tucked away, too.”
Lucian tilted his head. Having gathered information up to now, he knew that Yera Mull was royalty from the small kingdom of Mull. Yet she claimed to have lived somewhere secluded?
“Is it okay if I come by sometimes to hang out?”
“Yes, of course.”
Yul took small sips of the distilled liquor. The alcohol content was higher than expected, but thanks to his reinforced body, he had become extremely resistant to alcohol.
Then he casually glanced at the carbuncle beside Yera.
“That thing… it’s not actually a carbuncle, is it?”
“That’s right.”
Yera replied with a languid expression.
“Like you, it’s using a Polymorph skill. More precisely, its entire race can use Polymorph as a racial ability.”
A race whose basic function was Polymorph? He had never heard of such creatures existing in the sea.
‘Even so, in that vast ocean, it wasn’t like you could know every race that existed.’
The orcas tacitly divided the Great Azure Ocean into their spheres of influence, but even so, they didn’t truly rule everything. Their numbers were far too small, and the sea was insanely vast.
* * *
After the strange club meeting ended, everyone dispersed. Lucian sniffled, on the verge of tears.
“I’m truly moved. To think our club can continue to exist.”
“…….”
This guy—using “having a leverage held by his seniors” as an excuse aside—it really just seems like he personally wants to keep the club going.
“Oh, Yul. About that catalyst material you mentioned that’s good for storing information.”
“You found something already?”
“There’s one thing I know. Do you happen to recognize this?”
Yul looked over the sketch. It felt oddly familiar.
“Hm? A giant clam?”
“Yes. Inside giant clams that come from the open sea, there are pearls.”
It was indeed the same giant clam the orcas used as shopping bags. Back when Yul had been an orca, he had even used a giant clam that the Tuania family had passed on to him.
“So the pearl is the storage medium?”
“No. That pearl is just a gem. But with a low probability, some of those pearls turn into Void Crystals.”
“Hm? Void Crystals?”
“Yes. I looked into records left by someone who was both a marine biologist and a mage. Under certain conditions, they become Void Crystals, and those apparently have an extremely large internal space that’s well suited for storing information.”
When Yul had caught giant clams himself, it was usually to eat them, and even if a pearl came out while eating, he would often just crush it with his reinforced jawbones—so he hadn’t known the details.
“I’ll look into it later.”
He might have to step away for a bit and go find a Seaborn that specializes in eating giant clams.
‘Huh? Did I just say Seaborn instead of sea creatures?’
As he stayed Polymorphed as a human, he could feel his terminology and way of thinking changing. He couldn’t tell whether that was a good thing or a bad thing.
* * *
Yul had been receiving quests every time he Ascended for quite some time now.
They had existed when he was an octopus, during his time as an orca, and even when he became a member of the Deep King Tribe.
This time, however, there were so many quests that he didn’t even know where to begin.
It was time to go through them one by one. The objective was to complete five quests.
– Establish ‘Communion’ with intelligent beings, share experiences with them, and reach the highest level of Communion.
First, this quest was one Yul was already in the process of completing.
Because it overlapped with other quests, he had chosen it as the one to deal with first.
Now then, shall he look at the next quest?
– Defeat every Mythic-rank creature in existence other than yourself and ascend to the position of the absolute strongest.
‘Mythic rank creatures…….’
Two figures immediately came to Yul’s mind: the Sea God Kaidron and Abysarion, Lord of the Abyss.
He still didn’t know whether those two had become Mythic rank beings or not. It was also possible that, separate from them, some entirely different creature had reached the Mythic rank. In any case, this wasn’t an urgent quest for now.
– Discover information about your original species, Xenoia, and learn the whereabouts of your ‘siblings’.
This quest was the most meaningful of all.
“…I have siblings?”
Well—no, wait.
Yul knew that he had originally been born as a parasitic organism called Xenoia. The defining trait of Xenoia was the diversity of their evolution.
If some drifted and fed on organic matter, others developed legs or tail-like appendages.
And Yul did not consider them his siblings. They were different creatures to begin with.
‘Were there others besides me who survived the Deep-Sea Mermaids attack?’
The deep-sea mermaids had harvested Xenoia as if they were fishermen gathering shellfish. The Xenoia who survived them would each have gone their own way.
‘But what is Xenoia, really?’
He had never seen a parasite called Xenoia mentioned in any document or record. It probably didn’t exist in human records at all.
‘If anyone had records, it would be the ancient marine civilization—the Turusains.’
The Turusains were a race that had already gone extinct. They had even converted their final survivors into Syrendrons to resist, yet still couldn’t avoid destruction.
‘Maybe the ancient Turusains’ records still exist somewhere.’
Just as the turtles had built submarines using ancient Turusain records, perhaps those records still existed somewhere, and among them, information about Xenoia.
It was even possible that there were Turusain ruins that hadn’t collapsed yet. The ocean was so vast that there was no way Yul could have seen all of it.
-Descend into the deep sea and eliminate at least one powerhouse of the deep sea.
‘A powerhouse of the deep sea,’ huh…… Yul recalled hearing that even when sea creatures boasted about being one of the Great Powers, they still wouldn’t dare challenge the true powerhouses of the deep sea.
‘Hm? Come to think of it, that wording is a bit strange.’
Yul realized that Mythic rank creatures and deep-sea powerhouses weren’t necessarily the same thing.
‘If there’s a being that’s both Mythic rank and a deep-sea powerhouse, wouldn’t that clear two quests at once?’
For now, it was only speculation.
-Gather believers who have faith in you and raise your divinity to ‘Lower Rank’.
This was a completely new type of quest. Becoming an object of faith. Yul thought that if he could move his main body, playing the role of a god wouldn’t be difficult. Once the seal was lifted, it would be possible.
- Find one fallen race and restore it.
At first, this one was puzzling, but after thinking it through, he understood. It said ‘fallen,’ not ‘extinct’, so it likely meant saving a race that had once flourished but had declined to the brink of collapse, and restoring them.
This, too, might be doable alongside the quest to gather believers.
-Find the location of the All-Purpose Dawn Artifact.
-Find Paradise Everworld.
These two, he had absolutely no idea about. The All-Purpose Dawn Artifact? Was it some kind of special relic, like a Regulator?
Paradise Everworld? No clue at all.
-Reach at least 3 of the six Sky Islands and comprehend the overall structure of the Sky Islands.
This quest also required his main body to awaken. They were at such extreme altitudes that even split bodies couldn’t reach them.
-Meet a believer of the Right Hand of Creation.
He knew what the Right Hand of Creation was—the being said to have created this world. It appeared in the spells that used the four Regulators, and Yorum had mentioned it as well.
But who its believers were, and how to meet them, was entirely unknown.
‘Most of these problems require bringing out my main body.’
And that was the problem.
To do quests, his main body needed to move, but it was sealed.
→ To break the seal, he needed to move.
→ So he used a loophole and created split bodies.
→ Through the split bodies, he established Communion.
→ To be released from the seal, he had to max out the Communion level.
→ Only after that could the quests truly begin.
That was the order of operations. In other words, he hadn’t even taken the first real step yet.
Right now, maxing out the Communion level was the top priority, and aside from that, there was essentially nothing else he could actively complete.
Still, he couldn’t ignore everything else entirely.
Later on, there were quite a few quests he couldn’t complete on his own, so he needed to build connections and a foundation in various places.
More than anything, he needed people who could investigate things on his behalf.
‘I should hire professionals for this. A professor would be ideal. Even an academy student with a lot of free time wouldn’t be bad.’
Yul didn’t dislike academy life, but he felt the need to finally deal with matters he had put off for far too long.
‘What happened to my ship?’
The vessel Yul had hired—he had set it up to conduct trade autonomously, but he had no way of knowing what had happened to it afterward.
An expedition to ancient ruins, a battle with Timur of the Sea Dragon Tribe, and then the Heaven and Earth Resonance. After that chain of events, he had spent nearly ten years sealed.
And then he had come to check on Ian, which was how he ended up at the academy.
He decided his next destination would be the Kingdom of Frangia. He didn’t really need to attend academy classes anyway.
The Communion level wouldn’t gain experience during that time, but it was something that needed to be done regardless.
Yul met Lucian in the cafeteria. After establishing Communion, they could immediately sense each other’s location just by thinking about it.
“Lucian, I’m going to be away for a bit.”
“Huh? Where are you going?”
“The Kingdom of Frangia. I need to check on some old connections.”
“The neighboring country?”
“That’s right.”
Considering Lucian’s safety, there wouldn’t be anything particularly threatening as long as he stayed at the academy. And besides, this place wasn’t even on the mainland; it was an isolated island.
“I’ve heard that Frangia still hasn’t recovered from the effects of the Great Catastrophe. The country is said to be in chaos. Aragon is the same.”
“I see.”
Britain was fine, but only because of Ian’s sacrifice. Other coastal nations, it seemed, still hadn’t overcome it.
“Yul, if you end up going to the capital of Frangia, could you buy me a book? I’ll pay you back.”
“I’ll handle the money. What kind of book?”
“It’s at a bookstore called Labellum in the capital, Lotharingia. It’s on the western side of the city, in a tucked-away alley of the area called Shop Street No. 23. The book’s title is The Gray Baran. What I really need is the card tucked inside The Gray Baran.”
“That sounds suspiciously specific.”
“Actually, I solved a problem.”
“A problem?””
“Yes. There was a puzzle-like cipher in an old-looking archaic manuscript. When I solved it, that exact information came out.”
“Isn't it fake? It's an old archaic script, so why would it have the location of a modern bookstore?”
“That’s possible too. If the bookstore doesn’t exist, or if the book’s already been sold, you don’t have to buy it. I’m not completely sure either.”
Lucian said that if he ever had a chance to visit Frangia himself, and if the bookstore existed, he had planned to buy the book then.
“Well, if I find it, I’ll buy it for you.”