I Killed the Hero and Took His Achievements-Chapter 45: The Silence of the Deep
[Location: HMS Profit Margin - Underwater Mode]
[Depth: 12,000 Meters (The Abyss)]
We had dived past the Bathypelagic Zone1. Past the point where sunlight could reach, and where normal creature exists.
We were finally in the Hadopelagic Zone1. The pressure outside the ship was overwhelming. The reinforced ship that was mixed with True Ice and Adamantite, groaned under the sheer pressure of the deep ocean.
CREAAAK. "Ship integrity is at 85%," Sparky’s voice was strained. "Boss, if we go any deeper, we’re going to turn into a meat paste."
"Hold steady," I ordered. I looked out the reinforced viewport. Outside was darkness. An absolute suffocating blackness. Except for the bioluminescent jellyfishes that were floating like ghosts in the dark.
"Why are we here yet again?" Ahri whined while her ears were flattened against her head. "I hate the dark, and I hate the wet."
"We are here because the sonar earlier picked up an anomaly," I said. I pointed at the radar. A massive blip was pulsing at the very bottom of the trench. It wasn’t moving nor biological.
"It’s a form," Sylvia noted while analyzing the readings. "It’s geometric, not natural."
"The Star-Forge was just a factory," I explained. "But every factory needs a power plant. It’s probably the Abyssal Core."
Out of the blue, the ship rocked back and forth violently. It wasn’t a monster nor a current, but it was a psychic wave. "AAAAHHH!" Seraphina shrieked while clutching her head, she then fell to her knees. "The voices! They’re screaming piercingly!"
Ahri seethed while her eyes were dilating wildly. "Make it stop! Make it stop!"
Even Sylvia, with her Dragon Soul, she looked pale and nauseous. "It feels like... we’re drowning, drowning in misery."
I detected it too. It was like a pressure, and a whisper that wasn’t words but a pure unfiltered depression. Give up. Sink. Sleep. Die. It was like an excessive voice and an oppressive pressure.
[Mental Attack Detected.]
[Source: Old God (Rank ??).]
[Willpower Check: Passed.]
Luckily, I got a passive skill that I acquired from Vault of Forbidden Knowledge. It was the [Mind of the Abyss] skill.
I stood firm and rigid like nothing had happened to me. "Sol," I said calmly. "Status report."
"I CANNOT COMPUTE THIS SIGNAL. IT IS NOT A DATA. IT IS... AN EMOTION? IT IS EXCESSIVELY OVERLOADING MY LOGIC CIRCUITS. ERROR... ERROR..."
"It’s fear," I said. "Fear of the deep." I walked to Seraphina. She was bawling on the floor. "Get up, Saintess."
"I can’t... the darkness... it’s trying to eat me..."
I grabbed her chin and forced her to look at me. "Look at me."
She opened her tear-filled eyes.
"The darkness isn’t eating you, you are the light." I slapped her hard. SLAP.
"Ow!"
"Focus. Pain is real, and the voices are fake. Cast [Holy Aura]. Now."
Seraphina blinked her eyes, the shock brought her back entirely. She nodded shakily, then she raised her staff.
A bubble of golden light expanded massively around us and the ship. The psychic pressure receded slightly. The whispers became a dull buzz.
"That’s better," I said.
"Sparky, take us down slowly."
The ship descended.
13,000 Meters.
14,000 Meters.
We finally reached the bottom. We saw it. It wasn’t a power plant, but a temple. It was a massive cyclopean form which was made of black stone that seemed to absorb light from our ship.
It was covered in incantations that could hurt the eyes just to look at it. In the center of the temple, chained to the floor by massive anchors... It was a Giant Eye. Just an Eye, no body nor mouth. It was the size of a colosseum. The pupil was a vertical slit of pure void. It was staring down at us.
[Boss: The God of the Trench (The Watcher)]
[Level: ???]
[HP: ???]
[Status: Bound/Eternal.]
"It’s... it’s looking down at me," Ahri whispered while looking terrified.
"It’s looking down at all of us," Sylvia corrected. "It sees our souls."
The psychic wave hit us again, stronger this time. YOU ARE NOTHING. YOU ARE MERE DUST. SINK COMPLETELY INTO THE BLACK. The ship’s lights flickered, then died. Total darkness. Only the Eye was visible, glowing with a malevolent violet light.
"Systems offline!" Sparky yelled in full panic. "The Mana Core is drained completely! It’s eating our energy!"
"It’s not eating energy," I realized. "It’s eating our hope."
The air grew cold. Ice began to form on the inside of the windows. Seraphina’s holy light dimmed to a candle flicker. "We’re going to die here," Ahri whispered. She curled into a ball. "We’re going to die in the dark."
"No," I said. My voice was calm, unusually calm. I walked to the ship airlock.
"Boss?!" Sparky screeched. "You can’t go out there! The pressure! The God!"
"The pressure is just a weight compression," I said while putting on my helmet. "And the God?" I looked at the massive Eye. "He’s just another tenant who still hasn’t paid the rent." I cycled open the airlock.
[Trait: Bane of the Deep.]
[Effect: Water Pressure Immunity.]
I stepped out onto the ocean floor. The sea silt whirled around my boots. I was like a mere ant standing before a mountain.
The Eye focused on me. TINY THING. YOU DARE TO WALK IN MY DOMAIN? The voice bursted out into my skull. It wasn’t sound, but it was a direct neural vibration.
"I dare," I projected my thought back. I walked closer to it. The water around me turned dark. The tentacles of shadow reached out from the Eye, it was trying to grasp me.
I HAVE SEEN EMPIRES RISE AND FALL. I HAVE SEEN THE STARS BURN OUT. I AM THE END.
"You’re a colonist," I interrupted. I stopped right in front of the massive pupil. "You’re sitting on my geothermal outlet."
YOURS? I AM ETERNAL.
The psychic pressure increased. It felt like my brain was being squeezed into a pulp. My HP began to drop. [HP: -500/sec (Mental Damage).] I didn’t flinch.
I activated my Void Ring. "You think you know darkness?" I muttered. "You think you know hunger?" I opened my mind. I didn’t use a shield, but I used an attack.
[Skill: Mind of the Abyss.]
I projected my own psyche into the God. I showed him my Greed. Then, I showed him the infinite and bottomless pit of my ambition.
Finally, I showed him the timeline where I killed the Hero. I showed him the timeline where I ate the stars. I showed him a hunger that would consume not just the world, but the universe, the multiverse, and the gods themselves.
The Eye widened open. The pupil dilated in complete shock. The God looked into the Abyss, and the Abyss (Me) stared back. WHAT... WHAT ARE YOU? The voice trembled.
"I am the inevitable," I said. I raised my hand. The Void Ring flared up. "Now. Get out of my property. Or... I will eat you too."
The God recoiled in horror. The massive chains were massively rattled. For the first time in eons, the God of the Trench felt Fear.
It realized that I wasn’t bluffing. I would consume it, turn it into stats, and liquidate it into coins. LEAVE ME BE. TAKE THE POWER. JUST LEAVE. A crack appeared in the temple floor. A beam of pure blue mana shot up.
[Item Detected: The Abyssal Anchor.]
[Grade: Mythic.]
The God was offering a tribute. A bribe to make me go away. I walked over and picked it up. It was heavy, a miniature ship anchor that was made of black metal that absorbed light.
"Pleasure doing business," I smirked wickedly. I turned my back on the God. The psychic pressure vanished instantly. The ship’s lights flickered back on.
"Boss!" Sparky’s voice came through the comms. "The systems are back online! The energy drain stopped completely!"
"I handled the negotiation well," I said while walking back to the ship airlock. I re-entered it. The girls looked at me like I was a ghost.
"You... you talked to it?" Sylvia whispered.
"We came to an agreement." I tossed the Abyssal Anchor to Sparky. "Hook this up to the engine."
"What does it do?"
"It connects the ship to the planet’s core gravity." I walked to the ship bridge. "Take us up, Marina."
"But Boss," Marina hesitated. "We’re still at the bottom of the ocean."
"Not for long." I whacked my hand on the main console.
[Skill: System Override.]
[Target: Atlantis City Foundation.]
[Action: Detach.]
RUMBLE. The ground shook uncontrollably. Outside, the entire city of Atlantis, massive bubble, coral towers, foundations... all cracked loose from the seabed. The Abyssal Anchor hummed. It reversed the gravity.
"Hold onto something!" I shouted. The city began to rise, slowly at first, then faster. We were lifting an entire metropolis. It shot up through the water columns. From darkness faded to blue, the blue faded to light. BOOM. We breached the surface. Water cascaded off the city’s shield like a waterfall.
But we didn’t stop, we kept rising into the air, then into the clouds. Atlantis wasn’t a sunken deep water city anymore. It was now a Sky Fortress. I looked out the window at the clouds that were passing by. "Now," I said while looking at the stunned faces of my crews. "We have our first mobile base."
Or in midnight zone; is the part of the open ocean that extends from a depth of 1,000 to 4,000 m (3,300 to 13,000 ft) below the ocean surface.Or the Hadal Zone; it ranges from around 6 to 11 km (3.7 to 6.8 mi; 20,000 to 36,000 ft) below sea level, and exists in long, narrow, topographic V-shaped depressions.
