Chapter 230
Chapter 230
Treasure Hunt (1)
While Nora continued her training together with Irena, Kairus repeatedly flew toward the target sea region.
“It finally feels like I’m breathing.”
Kairus’s expression as he flew through the sky looked relaxed. Whether Kairus had truly succeeded in mastering Moonwalk or not, there was no way to know.
The person who should have answered that question—his father—was already dead. Still, one thing was certain.
If the Kairus from before fighting Dana Watson fought against the current Kairus—
‘The current me would win.’
There was no room for denial that he had grown stronger than before. Honestly, the question Kairus truly wanted to ask now was something else.
“If Father were still alive.”
Who would have won? Comparing himself to a dead man was admittedly somewhat ridiculous, but he couldn’t help being curious anyway. And this curiosity would remain unresolved for the rest of his life.
“I’m almost there.”
A sea that froze over once winter came. Naturally, the seas that matched this condition were those located in the northern part of the Empire’s borders.
Spring weather had fully settled over Bennett, but the north of the Empire still remained chilly. It felt like the water barely avoided freezing.
Even in Kairus’s memories, the north of the Empire had always been like this. A cold land boasting temperatures around 5–7 degrees even during summer.
The northern reaches of the Empire were a place where even the ocean—saltwater filled with crashing waves—froze solid during winter.
“…Thinking about it again, it really was horrible.”
Kairus bitterly smiled as he recalled the memories of nearly dying in the labor correctional facility in the north of the Empire.
“I’m here.”
Maintaining a hover in midair, Kairus checked the map. It was indeed the Bascal Sea Region, his destination.
As for local specialties, there were all kinds of king crabs and shrimp. Creatures that thrived in cold waters lived there in massive groups.
‘Maybe I should bring back a few after the investigation.’
Thinking such pointless thoughts while staring at the sea, Kairus lowered his altitude and slowly scanned the ocean surface. What he needed to find were buoys.
“The damn buoys…”
There were too many. Just imagining checking every single one already made his head spin. Each buoy bobbing across the sea served its own purpose.
A sailor would probably be able to distinguish suspicious buoys with thoughts like, ‘Huh? Why is there a buoy here?’
But Kairus knew little about the sea. Meaning, even if a buoy floated in a strange place, he lacked the ability to notice it.
Of course, it wasn’t like there was no method.
‘Chains.’
He just needed to inspect the chains anchoring the buoys to the sea floor. The chain tied to the target buoy would obviously look different from ordinary ones.
There was only one problem—checking the chains took far more time than expected.
‘Does checking one take about thirty seconds?’
Hearing the number thirty seconds alone didn’t sound all that long. But considering the countless buoys scattered across the vast Bascal Sea Region, it already felt overwhelming.
‘Not like I’ve got a choice when I know nothing.’
If he had knowledge about the sea, he wouldn’t have resorted to such a brute-force method. But there was no point searching for knowledge he didn’t have now. Having made his decision, Kairus immediately began inspecting the chains.
“…”
The waters of the Bascal Sea Region remained cold. Kairus spent his time checking nearby buoys and examining each connected chain one by one.
The sun that had risen eventually set, and the moon rose over the night sea. Fishing boats working through the night busily moved around.
More time passed, until even those fishing boats vanished without a trace, and a dark dawn flowed in where it became difficult to distinguish sea from sky.
Morning came.
“Damn it, this is driving me insane.”
After arriving at a nearby village, Kairus ate a greasy breakfast of fried cod and french fries while staring at the sea.
It was wider than he had expected, and there were still countless buoys floating on it.
‘Is it because there are so many fishing boats?’
The cod flesh chewing inside his mouth was absurdly fresh. Unlike other regions of the Empire packed full of factories, this incredible place—where temperatures never rose above 10 degrees Celsius even during summer—had preserved nature remarkably well.
As a result, the fishing yields were enormous. There were massive numbers of cold-water species, including king crabs, lobsters, hairy crabs, snow crabs, and all kinds of shellfish.
‘The fishing boats….’
It seemed the fishermen had placed buoys to mark locations. More accurately, after finishing fishing in one area, they installed buoys there and left the spot untouched for a certain period of time without conducting further fishing.
On top of that, they also used buoys to mark the locations of fishing nets.
Every single one of those was something Kairus had to inspect. After finishing his meal, Kairus casually tossed the newspaper wrapping the fried cod and french fries into a trash can and steadied his mind.
‘This is something I have to do.’
Unless Nora joined them, the surest way to defeat Denver Hudson was to find his wife, Liriana.
And so, Kairus spent his time inspecting all 381 buoys one by one.
“…”
With a weary expression, Kairus approached the 381st buoy. He needed to lift it and inspect the chain.
“Well, would you look at that?”
The chain’s color was different. Sky blue.
Seaweed and barnacles had somewhat clumped onto it, but even so, it was obvious this wasn’t an ordinary object.
‘And besides.’
Even Kairus, who knew little about the sea, could infer that if seaweed and barnacles had attached themselves like this, the buoy had likely been installed quite a long time ago.
“…”
Kairus slowly scanned the surroundings. He already remembered the location anyway. He could return here anytime.
Now, all he had to do was confirm whether Liriana was really beneath this buoy.
“What’s that now?”
From far away came the echoing sound of approaching warships. When he checked the direction the sound came from, it wasn’t just a warship.
It was warships.
“Well, makes sense. A bastard floating around in the sky while searching the sea.”
There was no one besides Kairus capable of pulling off such a stunt. And currently, Kairus was the son of the most dangerous traitor in the Empire.
After learning that Kairus was here, the Imperial Navy had gathered every vessel they could mobilize from nearby waters.
And finally, today, they had arrived before Kairus.
“Took you long enough.”
After all, this was only the third day since Kairus had begun working in these coastal waters.
Which meant it had taken them three days to gather the more than fifty warships visible over there and arrive here. At the same time, it was rather pathetic.
— Your location has now been completely identified, traitor Kairus! Surrender peacefully even now!
The amplified shout boomed magnificently through the air. Perhaps because the words were backed by countless warships, confidence filled the voice.
Kairus wore an awkward expression before slightly moving his sword. Several pieces of cloud floating in the sky descended from high above toward the sea following his movement.
As he moved his hand a few more times, the clouds swayed back and forth before transforming into enormous letters.
A sentence carrying a clear meaning was written across the air, using clouds as ink and the sky as paper.
[Stop throwing your lives away and go home while I’m still pretending I didn’t see you.]
Anyone aboard the warships could see it.
— This is your final warning. Surrender peacefully.
Then the warships aimed something toward Kairus.
“Crazy bastards. They’re loading harpoon cannons just to catch one person.”
Dozens of enormous harpoon cannons aimed directly at Kairus. They were not weapons made to be fired at humans.
Military harpoon cannons were on an entirely different level from the harpoon cannons used by civilian whaling ships. Since their purpose was to sink warships, the speed and weight of the projectiles differed by anywhere from several times to dozens of times.
There were also some relatively small harpoon cannons… but most of the smaller harpoon cannons mounted on warships were rapid-fire models.
“One final warning, huh.”
After muttering that, Kairus stroked his chin while looking at the buoy he had checked.
‘Even an admiral probably wouldn’t know.’
The odds that they knew about Liriana were low. After all, it was information criminals in Bennett had managed to obtain by exploiting a rare opportunity.
And merely revealing her existence would expose the Guardian of the Nation’s weakness.
[Too late now.]
After manipulating the cloud letters floating in the air into a new sentence, Kairus increased the output of Veil of Plumed Mist.
The turbine noise transformed into the sound of jet propulsion, and at the same time, violent storm winds crashed across the sea.
— Fire!
Together with the shout, countless harpoons of varying sizes and weights shot toward Kairus.
“Well now.”
The gunners operating the harpoon cannons had no intention of accurately hitting the flying Kairus. They were indiscriminately firing with the intent of blanketing the area around him with harpoons.
Hundreds of harpoons flying in at terrifying speeds were crushed by the descending winds and plunged vertically into the sea.
Perhaps they were harpoons wasted in the most worthless way imaginable.
And this navy—
would be annihilated in the most worthless way imaginable.
The flying Kairus broke through the sound barrier and simultaneously pierced straight through one of the warships.
A massive hole was left in the warship where Kairus had passed through, and seawater began flooding in through it.
“Let me help you a little.”
While continuing his flight and looking at the damaged warship, Kairus swung his sword widely, and wind pressed down upon the vessel.
“So then… for a ship to sink quickly.”
The hole in the ship simply needed to align perfectly with the vessel’s waterline. Then air would escape while seawater rushed inside.
Adjusting the strength of the wind crushing the ship, Kairus made it so only about half of the hole he created remained submerged beneath the sea surface.
Before long, the warship failed to withstand the incoming water and sank as it was.
‘Five minutes.’
It had taken five minutes to send a single warship to the bottom of the sea. The mere fact that one person had sunk an entire warship was already a horrifying emergency from the Imperial Navy’s perspective.
But to Kairus, it wasn’t a particularly satisfying result. There were too many warships. He needed to deal with them faster.
“In the end, there’s only one option.”
There was a limit to how quickly he could deal with them by physically crashing into them, so he had to manipulate the climate and wipe them out in one strike. Though if he did that…
‘Today’s investigation is basically ruined.’
Still, that was fine. He had already memorized the buoy’s location, so he could simply return after finishing things here.
For now, he needed to focus on wiping them out.
“Conveniently enough, there’s plenty of water.”
There was no need to rupture underground water veins. An absurd amount of water already existed beneath his feet.
‘Though now, I could probably create it directly.’
Still, using the surrounding environment to create cumulonimbus clouds was far more efficient.
If he used Nimbus’s method, he would end up creating clouds from saltwater, and even Kairus didn’t know what kind of variables that might produce.
So Kairus decided to boil the water instead. He thrust his sword into the sea, and the moment he converted Veil of Plumed Mist’s output directly into heat, an enormous amount of steam erupted.
That steam rose straight into the sky and transformed into cumulonimbus clouds. The clear sky that had contained only a few scattered clouds was instantly swallowed by dark storm clouds.
With a rumbling roar, torrential rain poured down while waves surged wildly in every direction.
Only then did the warships hurriedly begin preparing to retreat, turning their hulls around.
“And now you try?”
Their decision had come far too late. Kairus had no intention of letting them go.