The Informal Tomb Raiding Diary: She is the occupant of the tomb!-Chapter 115: There’s Something Under the Ship
An unmanned, unpowered ship can still drift away quietly and quickly. Besides using bio-power, I can’t think of any other possibility.
That is to say, something is pushing it along.
"The hole in the ship’s bottom doesn’t look like it was made by a cutting tool. It seems to have been punctured by an external force and then forcibly torn open," recalled Bi Shi. 𝒻𝘳𝘦𝘦𝘸ℯ𝒷𝘯𝘰𝑣ℯ𝑙.𝘤𝑜𝘮
"That definitely means it’s not man-made. Something from the sea tore open the bottom and went inside," I immediately speculated.
"Did you look at the bottom of the ship when you were in the water?" Qinghan asked.
"No, I was busy escaping for my life. I only glanced back once to check if those things were catching up."
Apparently, Qinghan and I had the same thought. The ship wouldn’t just grow legs and walk away unless it had legs underneath.
"I want to go have a look. Can you still find that spot?" Qinghan knew the chance was slim, so his tone was light, as if casually asking.
"No, the sea is covered in fog. If it weren’t for the light on the mast of this ship, Mary Su and I would have turned into floating corpses at sea."
"Who is Mary Su?" My mind was on other matters, but upon hearing the unfamiliar name, I instinctively asked.
"He Su!"
"Oh, haha~" Lord Priest’s character is becoming more eccentric, even coming up with nicknames for others. My inner self was delighted, though thinking about whether her character breaks doesn’t concern me. Why am I foolishly amused?
Qinghan wants to see if he can rescue some people. But without coordinates, recklessly getting off the ship will surely lead to losing direction ourselves, let alone rescuing others.
If they could make some noise, it would be fine; but now everything is silent, punctuated only by the sound of waves.
The cabin is no longer dangerous, yet none of us suggested staying inside. We sat on the deck, looking at the mist beyond the railing.
No daylight, only darkness. The way forward is unseen, and hope never arrives.
A ship trapped here will ultimately sink, and those on board will be buried at sea. This area could indeed be the Sea of Sunken Ships that He Su mentioned.
The phone doesn’t work, and there’s no power. We are trapped on the ship, and even the sense of time passing begins to blur. This feeling is all too familiar, akin to passing the time counting hairs in a tomb.
Gradually, time becomes unobservable, unsure if outside it’s day or night.
Yet, fortunately, there are people around to chat with now. The elite man escaped misfortune by being on the cruise with us; he and He Su are still sleeping.
Bi Shi spoke about the person who led the cruise here, pondering what their purpose might be and who that person could be.
"She mostly sleeps and is awake only briefly; she falls asleep at crucial moments, so there’s no chance to clarify," I sighed heavily.
"Actually, there’s no need to wait for her to wake. The person she knows, whom you don’t, must be someone she recognizes. Moreover, that person, who can make her angry, is surely a close, trusted person," Qinghan analyzed.
"Wait! You said someone around her..." Hearing these words, I suddenly recalled something.
At night in the bar, I accidentally saw the man by He Su connect with a woman in the restroom.
That woman seemed to hand something to the man, suggesting a plan.
This sea area is like a tomb. Bringing the cruise ship in is either to feed the creatures on the Ghost Ship or trap us here, as I can’t think of another benefit.
"Sending people to feed those things?" Bi Shi heard my speculation and fell into thought.
Of course, the premise of this speculation is that they can accurately locate this sea area, which is not easy. If the area’s position were fixed, someone would have researched it long ago.
Qinghan went to the medical room, found two bottles of glucose and saline, and hooked them up to the elite man, while Bi Shi went to wash with He Su. Coming up from the sea without washing would leave a strong seafood smell.
I’ve always been skeptical about the ’lights’ Bi Shi mentioned. While they were busy, I climbed up the mast alone. The cruise ship mast is more like a tower; there’s a ladder to climb.
Once up there, I found only the signal light, out of power. As I casually held the railing, I grasped a handful of sticky liquid.
Looking closer, I discovered transparent mucus stuck on this height of the mast.
The mucus carried a ’salty fresh’ sea flavor. I followed the mucus’s trail down to the railing on the other side of the deck, where a crawling mark stretched out beyond the railing.
I ran back into the cabin, then headed to the rooms below deck, finding some windows also smeared with mucus.
Evidently, something came from the sea, climbed the mast, and even emitted light, guiding Bi Shi.
The trail has overlapping and separate parts, so it likely lingered on the mast and then crawled back to the sea along the same path.
This discovery proves there’s life in the sea. The calm is only a facade. Whatever climbed up the mast and descended, it definitely isn’t a mantis shrimp or a tuna.
I felt the need to inform the others, so I was about to head to the cabin door when suddenly there was a noise behind me.
Behind me is just the deck railing. Hearing the sound, I didn’t immediately turn back, instead taking a few steps forward. The sound followed, emitting a slippery dragging noise.
It felt like a wet bar of soap tracking me. Once it was close enough, I abruptly turned and stomped down hard.
Smack—
My foot came down, splattering mucus everywhere. Looking down, I saw I had stepped on something resembling a sea cucumber.
Only it was thicker, about the size of a jungle python, and extended beyond the railing, with no clear indication of its length.
I stepped precisely on its head, and the mucus sprayed was as red as blood.
Moreover, the mucus seemed bioluminescent, emitting a faint red glow.
At that moment, the entire cruise ship shook. I didn’t think I had such tremendous force, where one stomp could make the ship rock thrice.
The head of the burst sea cucumber swiftly recoiled beyond the railing. Clearly, this amount of damage didn’t affect its movement nor prove fatal.
I wiped the red mucus off the sole of my shoe and quickly headed back into the cabin, calling for Qinghan and Bi Shi. Qinghan was in the kitchen counting the food; I told him I just stomped on a gut-like thing and that trouble might be brewing.
"The ship just rocked a moment ago."
"Yeah, I stepped on that intestine-like thing once, and the ship rocked. So I suspect there might be something big under the ship, and that intestine is probably just one of its tentacles."
"If that’s true, then we’re in trouble."
"What are you afraid of? We’ve got me here! I’ll go down and test if Karmic Fire is effective underwater."
"Tie a rope; if it doesn’t work, abort mission, and I’ll pull you up."
"Got it~"
If the large creature underneath flips the boat in a rage, we won’t escape misfortune, so we must act before it does.
The sea creatures living here struggle for basic needs; to them, we are a windfall. How could they let us go?
