The Record of Unusual Creatures - Chapter 582

Chapter 582: The Strange Siren General

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

Everyone cautiously surrounded the siren general. The latter looked weak and like the mermaid princess in the fairy tale, it was hard to imagine she was the one who had caused the storm just now. The remaining turbulence in the air still reminded them the danger of this siren. There was still a gleam of golden light in the eyes of Lily; she appeared guarded as she bowed slightly. “Would she wake up suddenly and beat everyone up?”

“She’s already exhausted. Even if she goes crazy again, not much damage she could do,” said Shaqira, checking the status of the siren general. “She has scents of many places in the deep sea, as if she had wandered over a long distance before she made it here. The Shrouded Isle is still a thousand nautical miles from here.”

Nangong Sanba appeared a little shaken. “The sirens could be so brutal when they go mad; I thought they were all peaceful all this while.”

Y’zaks smiled with the corner of his mouth twisted upward. “Am I not usually quite peaceful?”

“It’s not that sirens don’t know how to fight, we just dislike fighting. We do have professional soldiers.” Shaqira said without looking. “If necessary, we can set off storms large enough to swallow several kingdoms at the sea; just that we are not fond of the land.”

As soon as Shaqira’s voice trailed off, the siren general’s tail suddenly twitched, then coughed violently. Under the eyes of everyone, the mighty siren slowly opened her eyes: her resilience was equally surprising.

Sorma immediately stepped forward to help hold Vanaessa up. “General, how do you feel? What happened in the deep sea?”

The siren’s eyes swept across the sky blankly, as if she could not see them. She murmured lifelessly. Hao Ren listened for a long while before he realized the siren was just repeating the same sentence: “… …crazy, our queen has gone crazy… our queen has gone crazy…”

Vivian bent over and checked her. “Her state of mind doesn’t seem to be normal.”

“General, can you hear me, general?” Shaqira shook the siren general’s shoulders. “I’m Shaqira, the messenger that set off a hundred years ago. We…we were ordered to return to Nasaton. What happened to the deep sea?”

When the siren general heard the name ‘Nasaton,’ ta light flashed across her eyes. She suddenly forced herself up and held Shaqira’s arms. “Don’t go back! Don’t go near Nasaton! It’s been contaminated! It’s been contaminated! The monster is in control of that place!”

“That’s exactly why we’re going there; to clean up the contamination,” Hao Ren stepped forward and grabbed Vanaessa’s hand. “Tell us about the situation in Nasaton.”

The siren general looked at the stranger puzzlingly. She was sometimes sober and sometimes confused, in an unstable state of mind. A layer of haze floated on her eyes, but she could still instinctively stay awake. She replied as in dream, “… Queen… she’s not our Queen. She has something else in her body. A devil has possessed her body… She ordered all sirens to return and forced us to draw the power of this planet. A giant whirlpool was forming on the protective wall of Nasaton… The monster is constantly occupying the hearts of more sirens. It spreads like a plague in our brains. I… I have it too…”

The siren general seemed to choke in her word as if she was strangled. She hugged her head in pain and seemed to be trying to force something out of her brain. “It’s in my mind! It’s here! It knows you’re coming! Go back and don’t go near Nasaton. Escape to the other side of the planet, where there is still a chance to survive…”

A big hand suddenly pressed on Vanaessa’s forehead, and the siren’s pain came to an abrupt end, as though she had been put to sleep by hypnosis. Y’zaks pulled back his hand and shrugged innocently. “I really don’t like the idea of demons be blamed for everything. It’s clearly the brain that is controlling the Queen of the Siren.”

“Is she recovering?” Nangong Wuyue used the tip of her tail tip to poke the siren general. “You’ve expelled the evil spirit out from her soul?”

“No, I’ve just forced her soul to calm down,” Y’zaks shook his head. “There’s a noise in her soul that was intertwined with her spiritual world. It’s not so easy to get rid of it. Maybe we need to find Nasaton before we can solve her problem.”

Hao Ren clapped his hands and stood up. “She just said that the monster knew we were coming. I’m afraid we have to hurry up. The brain can gather information through the ‘chess’ it controls.”

“What should we do?” Shaqira looked pale as she glanced down at the siren general who was asleep. “There will be more sirens tracking us down. Are you going to leave the general in this place, are you?”

“This is not my style, but it’s also unwise to bring her with along with us.” Hao Ren shook his head and pulled out the MDT. “Send her to the Kuiper shelter and dispatch several ‘little squids’ (autonomous robots) to take care of her. I hope we’d have done with the things here when she wakes up.”

The siren general was teleported to an unknown location under the watchful eyes of them. Hasse was careless as he saw it as a convenient spatial magic: Human shamans always had a lot of weird magical props and homemade spells. He felt that it was not surprising that a shaman who could walk with the Countess of the Crimson Moon must have his strength.

He instead glanced curiously at Vivian. “Your power seems to have declined slightly, Countess?”

Vivian’s expression stiffened up and smiled slyly. “It’s just fatigue, fatigue…”

Hasse did not ask further but said indifferently, “You look completely different from when you came and wreaked havoc in the European headquarter of the demon hunters back then.”

Vivian was a bit dumbfounded. “When did I wreak havoc in your European headquarter?”

At this time, a blue light flashed in Hao Ren’s pocket as the MDT had completed the escort mission. He patted his pocket and interrupted the conversation surrounding the old grudges of the two. “Let’s not talk about this now, we need to move quickly. Shaqira, Sorma, please speed up.”

The ice floe platform quickly melted into a bubble. They returned to the water to continue their journey. This time, the air bubble moved much faster than before. With the help of magic, the air bubble moved at several times of the speed of sound. At this speed, they should be arriving The Shrouded Isle in no time.

Hao Ren looked up at the shadows and lights gliding past them. He recalled the battle that had just happened a while ago and felt curious. “Where did the ghost ship come from? Do you think the sirens could summon the human shipwreck as a weapon?”

Shaqira shook her head immediately. “No, it was General Vanaessa. That was her combat form.”

Lily was shocked. “What? You guys can become… that kind of thing?”

“How many times have I said that the water is amorphous?” Nangong Wuyue seemed to be frustrated with the lack of the imagination of them. “We use water to shape our bodies, so anything that we have seen and completely submerged in water can be imitated. If necessary, we can also turn into reefs, corals, marine beasts, and of course, shipwrecks—all it takes is use water to sense its details.

Hao Ren was stunned, as he had never imagined these things.

Nangong Wuyue raised a finger and said, “If necessary, I can even transform into Kursk or Bismarck—because I have seen them in the water—but not warships in active service. I at most can transformed into their structure below the waterline. However, it’s somewhat meaningless, as I can’t understand the operation principle of that kind of thing. Therefore, in the end I still have to rely on my water magic in combat; even if I change into a nuclear submarine I wouldn’t be able to shoot out missiles and torpedoes. Only those who have real strength could become super warship and siren like me… mantis shrimp would be good enough.”

The atmosphere was so silent that you could hear a pin drop. Hao Ren scratched his chin for a long moment before he suddenly figured out something. “Wait a second. If that’s the case, those phantom ships recorded in human history are…”

“There are sirens that came out on patrol,” said Shaqira, poking her head into the bubble from outside. “Some people in Northern Europe like to say that siren had deluded the captain, ate the crew and controlled the empty ship and found more victims at sea. However, the actual situation is a bit different: the phantom ship is the siren itself, we use water to shape our body into that object, but we’ve never harmed anyone, we just find the sunken ships interesting, that’s all about it. Sorma, it’s your shift now.”

Everyone was speechless.

Lily held her arms and pondered for a while. The she suddenly grabbed Nangong Wuyue’s tail and said, “When on the way back, can you change into USS Lexington?”

Nangong Wuyue rolled her eyes. “…oh god, spare me!”

After swimming in the water for some time, Sorma finally came back in and reported to everyone. “We’re near The Shrouded Isle.”

Chapter 583: Twenty Thousand Miles Under the Sea

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

The air bubble slowly rose to the surface of the sea. As the surrounding seawater receded, Hao Ren found himself in an unusually calm water. He looked around and noticed that there was a dark, turtle-shaped isle not far from the left front. There was nothing on the small isle, but the isle was clear, airy, and not shrouded by any fog, as he had thought.

“You called this place The Shrouded Isle?” Lily looked at the black isle with surprise as they slowly approached. “Looks like there is no fog.”

“Look around,” said Shaqira, pointing at the sea around with the tip of her tail. “You see any reference? Even a wave?”

Vivian’s eyes widened. “Nothing at all… This water surface is unbelievably calm, not even a ripple can be seen!”

The entire visible area of the sea was so calm to the point of bizarre. From afar, there was not a single object of reference on the sea. The seawater was calm like a perfectly polished mirror without the slightest wrinkles. Skylight was uniform in any direction, and the sun was in the top centre of the sky as if its position had been precisely calculation. The sunlight shone evenly which added even more bizarreness to this water.

The small black island not far away was the only alien colour between the sea and the sky. Other than that, the entire world seemed to be a monotonous blue and white, and the boundaries between the sky and the sea were vivid. This was undoubtedly not a natural phenomenon.

“Are we still on Earth?” Hao Ren patted on his pocket and said in an almost murmuring voice. The voice of the MDT then rang in his mind. “Checking the coordinates… The current position is still on Earth. Only that there is a layer of something similar to the enchantment that had changed the natural landscape in the area. It has obvious artificially traces of encryption, but we have already entered it once, I have confidence to crack the law of entry into this place.”

“This is the Shrouded Isle. The fog isn’t on the isle but in the entire space,” Sorma swam around them, introducing the only entrance to the world of the sirens. “Only passing through several right nodes that can we see The Shrouded Isle which is right in front of you. Any other route would lead to an everlasting dense fog when approaching this area of water. Even the most advanced ships of humankind will find themselves sailing around in a large circle before they have to double back. Many seafarers are not easily fooled; they have recorded the dense fog in this area, so we have to change the pattern and induced position of the dense fog from time to time. Those explorers are difficult people; we don’t know what makes them so interested to come to knock on our door.”

“Only diving from the shore on the side of The Shrouded Isle can we enter Nasaton. The water body around the isle is the most critical ‘node’ to go to Nasaton,” said Shaqira, who swam over to hold Nangong Wuyue’s hand. “Little sister, remember the current information that have just passed?”

As a siren, Nangong Wuyue was able to sense the ‘route’. She nodded and looked surprised. “I didn’t realize that my hometown was so well hidden… It’s so much more awesome than I’ve thought. No wonder I couldn’t find the City of the Sirens before.”

“Perhaps your mother kept you away from Nasaton was to protect you. But being unable to return to your hometown is also unfortunate,” Sorma had also swum up. “From now on, you can freely go in and out of this place, bring along those of your friends who are here today but not others. Though Nasaton seems to be in trouble now, you’re welcomed home anyway, young sister.”

The three sirens turned and leapt into the water. Their scales glittered in golden light under the sunlight. Lil Pea poked her head out of Hao Ren’s collar and observed the outside world before she jumped down joyously and tried to catch up with the three ‘sisters’. From time to time, the little one jumped out of the water with excitement along the way, like a dolphin twirling in the air and said hello to everyone. “Water! Lots of water! I like this place!”

This vast expanse of sea seemed to have given the little one a sense of familiarity with her hometown. She had been unusually excited since a while ago.

Hao Ren, on the other hand, stepped on the foam and water under his feet following closely behind the three sirens as they slowly approaching the black island. Nangong Sanba looked at the island and seemed to have noticed something that arouse his interest. He raised his hand and said loudly to the sirens in the distance, “Can we go to check out the island?”

“No problem,” Shaqira’s voice was heard from the front. “But don’t stay there for too long!”

They set their foot on the black turtleback island, which was not recorded on any chart, and its shape was not exactly a natural creation as if the whole island was formed as a whole piece of metal device with huge but no-so-deep grooves covered the surface. Lily bent down, touched the black cold ‘floor’, and exclaimed in shock. “It’s warm!”

“There is an energy reaction in the depths of the island,” the voice of the MDT rang in the minds of Hao Ren and others. “It is a part of a giant spherical device that is exposed to the water. The sphere floats in the water and I have found that there are one-hundred thirty-five pipelines connected to the bottom of the sea, which may be a system that interacts with the thermal energy of the seabed. This device itself is the source of the fog enchantment.”

There were also some sparsely distributed artificial things on the black island, which shaped like corals clumping out of the ground, but their surface is glimmering with fluorescence light. Y’lisabet curiously poked one of the ‘corals’ and it immediately emitted a melodious sound of the wind chime.

Then the face of the little girl was burned black and blue.

Y’lisabet was joyous. “This is so fun!”

“I thought sirens would only use magic…” Hao Ren looked at it all in surprise. “I didn’t expect they also made this kind of thing.”

“Why can’t they have automatic facility and magic at the same time?” Vivian asked. “And as a race that hasn’t been disturbed by the outside world has been developing in the deep sea for ten thousand years, how could they not have built something to watch their backyard. After all, they are the earliest civilization of the planet in a sense.”

At this time, a sound of water came from behind them. Shaqira got onto shore and called everyone. “Are you guys ready to dive?”

They took the air bubble and went down the deep sea. During the descent, Hao Ren and others kept their eyes into the direction of The Shrouded Isle and saw what the MDT had described about how the ‘isle’ really looked like underwater. It was a huge sphere, and its part below the waterline was more complicated. Below the centre line of the sphere were many protruding glimmering lights that appear to be dimming with a certain rhythm as if responding to the undersea current. At the bottom of this giant sphere was a large number of black lines like deep-sea cables, which were scattered deep into the water and eventually disappear into the endless darkness.

This was not a technological invention, but a huge magic device—but for the earth’s civilizations, it was no different from advanced alien technology.

When the air bubble submerged down to a certain depth, it changed course and began to move in a direction away from The Shrouded Isle. Hao Ren had noticed some bright light flashed from time to time on the outside. It could be a bioluminescent deep-sea creature, or simply some kind of ‘signpost’ set by the sirens. Lil Pea had found it interesting to wandering outside and was now swimming around the outer wall of the air bubble. From time to time, she would leap in and out of the opening in the water barrier, and Rollie would lay besides the opening guarding carefully. She was responsible for preventing Lil Pea from falling. This cat knew that if she did not take good care of the fish, the fish would not just beat her but also not give her small dried fish for the rest of her life…

“We should be now crossing over to a spatial layer,” Y’zaks suddenly sensed something as he looked up at the dark water wall above him. “I feel something has changed… The magic of the sirens is brilliant; they have made the spatial layer so smooth and almost imperceptible.”

“So people who accidentally stumbled into it could hardly get out of it by themselves. You would have entered into an endless water world before you know it,” said Shaqira who was next to him. “Though we have never provoked anyone by living peacefully in our little kingdom, every year there are still many careless adventurers trespass into here. They would certainly get lost in this layered and invisible deep-sea maze. We’ve sent many sirens to patrol the area and tried our best to help, but inevitably, there will be some unfortunate ones. However, I’ve been away from here for a hundred years, and I don’t know if there have been humans here since then.”

At this time, a flash of light appeared on the front of the air bubble, and Sorma’s voice was heard from the front. “You can now see the wall of Nasaton.”

Chapter 584: Nasaton

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

A group of light gradually appeared before them as they gathered in front curiously looking at the distant scenery. As their preternatural eyes adapted to the surrounding environment, the mysterious deep-sea scenery finally appeared before their eyes.

Lily and Y’lisabet could not hold back their awe and let out their exclamation. “Wow—”

Flat white sands of the deep sea spreading endlessly, and a large number of spherical devices that shimmered and dangled in the water forming strips of light like roads. In the centre of these lights was a huge city.

The city was of oval shape and looked like a gorgeous shell piled up on top of each other. At the edge of the city was towering glowing wall. The wall was made of some white artificial material with a light-green crystal decoration. On every side of the wall was inwardly inclined half-moon-shaped guard plate. Light was shining out of the half-moon shields and eventually extended into a shield-like enclosure that shrouded the entire city. On the inner side of the city wall were a large number of tower structures of different heights. These ‘towers’ were beautifully shaped like some artistically exaggerated shellfish. Each tower was inlaid with a huge luminous pearl. The light they emitted illuminated the city and the waters around the city.

Those who first saw this deep-sea city were amazed at the fact that there was such a wonderful scenery on the seabed. Hao Ren started to analyse the city as if his occupational habit had struck again. “Totally sealed structures. Those metal guards and shield completely shrouded Nasaton. It seems like…”

“What’s wrong?” Vivian asked her.

“Not quite like a normal city,” Hao Ren shook his head slightly. “A closed city like this is difficult to expand. They have to demolish the old walls if they want to expand the city, or they planned the eternal form of the city from the very beginning with no plan expand it? Sirens are water creatures, and their city is full of water. So why is it necessary to shroud Nasaton with this shield?”

“Defend against enemies?” Vivian’s brow knit together. “There had been many such closed city-states in ancient times, and the otherworldings”divine city’ was also accustomed to using shields to protect themselves. Of course, modern humans no longer use wall to protect themselves.”

“Even city walls wouldn’t have to be so tightly wrapped, and why would a group of queens of the deep-sea need to guard against enemies from the outside?” Hao Ren asked. “Which races from the surface could come to this place? Which small creature that could come to this place and threaten the sirens?”

“It will be all clear when we go in.” Y’zaks interrupted his discussions with Vivian. “We’re in approaching the seabed.”

Hao Ren nodded and took out several life-support collars from his dimensional pocket and distributed to each of them. “Use this, just in case the sirens in Nasaton not welcome us.”

Then he looked up at Hasse. “You guys need this, no? This thing will allow you to breathe in the water. In case thing goes wrong, Shaqira and Sorma may have no time to look after you.”

“Demon hunters are capable of operating in deep water,” said Hasse. “I’m not used to these things.”

Hao Ren shrugged his shoulders, motioned Rollie over, and put the collar on her. He suddenly felt as if he should not bring along Dumb Cat: though she had eaten the golden apple, theoretically, she should have a bit of supernatural ability, but this fellow… I’m not sure. This fellow had not even had as much experience as Lil Pea.

However, after thinking for a moment that if there was any situation, he could just throw this Dumb Cat into the portal and teleported it to the Petrachelys, or he could even throw her into his dimensional pocket away from danger. Therefore, he worried no more.

Rollie touched the new collar on her neck happily. She thought it was a gift for herself. Seeing her expression, Hao Ren knew that it would be impossible to get the collar back later. The cat-maiden nudged Hao Ren’s arm and said, “You’re wearing the collar too, Big Boss Cat? You know this is fun too? I will have to walk you in future?”

Hao Ren showed no time to bother with the cat. He pushed the cat-maiden away and said to her, “Remember what I’ve told you before leaving home? We’re going for an adventure; you would listen to me and follow what I do. If worse comes to worst I’m going to send you back home.”

The cat-maiden quickly nodded.

The water bubble slowed down and slowly came near to the mysterious city of the deep sea and hovered over the lamp strips. The water bubble broke silently and the seawater began to pour in but was isolated by their personal body shields or magical effects. Shaqira quietly swam to a large black rock nearby, motioning everyone to come. Through some magical trick, she made it possible for everyone to talk to each other in the water. “Look at the glowing lights in front? It’s the dividing line between the city and the wilderness. Usually there should be a lot of sirens out of here… but now nobody is here.”

“There’s an air of tension around here; I can smell a certain negative scent,” Y’zaks frowned. “Perhaps your queen is forbidding the sirens to come out.”

Lily stretched her neck and looked up for a long while before she suddenly pointed to space above Nasaton. “What is that?”

Hao Ren looked in the direction where Lily was pointing and saw a layer of light-blue film over the city, and there was a massive maelstrom just outside the film—the maelstrom was translucent like a projection, but the MDT said after performing a remote sensing that the phantom maelstrom was gradually materializing. It could have been there for a month, and the day of its complete transformation might be around the corner.

The scale of the maelstrom was almost the size of the city below. Hao Ren looked at the weird phenomenon in awe, and could not imagine what this thing was for, but it was clear that only a lunatic would make such a thing in his own backyard!

“That…that’s the location of the protective wall!” Shaqira saw also stunned seeing the maelstrom. Bubbles were foaming out of her mouth when she spoke. “There is a portal outside the protective wall?”

“Your general had mentioned a maelstrom before she passed out. I’m afraid this is it,” White Flame suddenly said from behind. She was silent all the while to maintain her ‘normal’ demon hunter demeanour, but this time, she could not help but asked, “What are you going to do to?”

“God knows,” said Sorma as she came out from her horror. “No, we must enter the city immediately. The maelstrom needs the magical power of a large number of people to form; the Queen must be drawing a lot of energy from the planet… No, it could be worse…”

“Okay, so now anyone has any plan?” Y’zaks hummed and said, “Nasaton should now be heavily guarded. We must quietly enter the city and then quickly capture the Queen of Sirens without alarming the guards, if possible. It’s best to hold up all her close officials. We also need to prevent them from launching something that would blow everyone up indiscriminately, such as detonating the maelstrom. I can feel the power of that maelstrom. It’s no less destructive than the curse that tore Helcrown apart from the Obsidian Plain. Once it blows, it’s hard to say how many of us would survive; probably we don’t even have time to react.”

“Besides, we also have to control that gigantic brain,” Hao Ren reminded. “This is the most important thing. The Queen of the Sirens is just a puppet, and no one knows there are how many such puppets out there.”

Hasse had been listening indifferently, but when he learned that these aliens really wanted to stop the crisis, he also joined the discussion. “The most appropriate solution is to control all of them at the same time or, even better, kill the brain immediately and capture the Queen alive. I just overheard Shaqira said that you had an encounter with the gigantic brain before. You know what it is? How powerful is it?”

“It’s a kind of monster from … an alien planet. It floats and moves at a speed human could barely attain. With its dozen of tentacles and strong physical strength, it could perform spatial spells. However, the nastiest thing is its mind control ability, where it can shakes even the strongest will, and the longer the fight is, the severe the influence will be,” Hao Ren chose the most careful wordings to explain. “I’ve just killed the… avatar-like one. I don’t know how strong the real one can be.”

Hasse listened quietly before he finally nodded his head and said, “Looks like head-on attack would be a problem. Surprise attack is the way, if can.”

“The biggest problem now is how to get into the city,” Hao Ren exhaled, looking up at Nasaton. He then turned to look at Shaqira for a moment. “Now it’s all your show.”

Chapter 585: The City of Chaos

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

Shaqira peeked from behind the black boulder and looked into the Nasaton’s direction; her facial expression was getting worse. After a moment, she turned around her head and said, “That’s unexpected… I’m afraid getting in isn’t going to be easy.”

The corner of Hao Ren’s eye twitched. “What’s wrong?”

“See the light blue barrier outside the walls of the city?” Shaqira pointed shield of Nasaton with the tip of her tail. “That’s the city’s aqua dome, and The Tarani Crystals on the wall are glowing. That shows that the aqua dome has been possessed. In this case, the shield is connected mentally with the Queen. Anything that passes through the aqua dome the queen will feel it. She will find that you’re not siren, and then she would use the aqua film to cut the intruder into pieces.”

Lil’s was wide-mouthed. “…how it works?”

“Water is amorphous, it can turns into the shape of a human, or a city. The Tarani Crystals can enlarge the mental power of the Queen and make the aqua dome an extension of her body. This is the key to her ability to control the entire city,” said Sorma before she sighed again. “This was supposed to be the last resort for the Queen to protect the city when the city was in danger, but little did we expect it’s been used to confine its own people now.”

Y’zaks scratched his chin. “This kind of thing will consume a lot of energy. Can the queen always connect her mind to the aqua dome? Doesn’t she even need rest?”

Shaqira shook her head. “The Torrent Core bears most of the magical energy consumption. The queen is standing above the Torrent Core. Her magic and energy are endless. Oh, the Torrent Core is the energy core of the city. It’s located inside the royal palace.”

Hao Ren smacked on the forehead. “My god, why did you people create so many high-tech thingies? Can you just be a mermaid?”

At this time, Lil Pea bravely swam to the outside. Looking from afar, she appeared like a small fish thanks to her small size. She swam low on the sands to the back of another boulder before she suddenly turned back as if she had seen something. Dad-dee, there’s something there! A big boat!”

The little one could not say it clear enough. No one could make head or tail of what she meant. Therefore, they decided to go and check it out for themselves. Shaqira controlled the current to form a barrier that could interfere with the perceptive ability of the sirens to a certain extent, shielding the team as they moved to the back of the boulders. Lil Pea immediately nudged Hao Ren. “That!”

“Oh my god…” Hao Ren was surprised by what he saw on the distant beach. “How did that thing come here?”

A black steel object with a rusty, ruinous, wreckage was lying on a sand bank a few hundred meters away. It had a huge hole in the middle, and this hole could be the reason it sank. In addition, the porthole, thruster, tail rudder, and superstructure were still clearly visible. Nangong Wuyue stared at the torpedo launch tube on the front of the thing for a long moment before she pouted. “It’s a Soviet submarine. Model unknown.”

“Have you ever seen this thing?” asked Shaqira, surprised. She had been hiding in the mountains after she surfaced. She knew very little about modern human weapons such as submarine and warships—except coastal artilleries.

“I saw it a few times while swimming, but I didn’t dare to get near,” Nangong Wuyue nodded. “This thing might have got lost at the nearby sea and wandered here by accident. Such an old submarine wouldn’t be able to withstand the water pressure in the deep sea.

“It was dragged here,” said Nangong Sanba, who suddenly pointed to the sand bank behind the old submarine. There was a huge gully behind it and according to the water and grass near the gully; it might have been lying here for many years. “Do sirens like to collect human ships?”

“No, usually we will throw these things into the trenches, or push them onto the coastline of humans—depending on whether we’re able to move them,” Shaqira shook her head, then flinched abruptly. “Wait a second, somebody is coming!”

They quickly hid themselves. The water body in front of the submarine suddenly warped before a stream of water quickly converged into a figure; it was a siren in the form of a sea snake. The siren’s hand held a polearm glowing in bright blue light, with a gigantic aquamarine in the middle of the crescent blades. She raised her polearm in front of the submarine and began to sing an old incantation in a weird and creepy tone before she stuck the polearm in the sand. “Get up, it’s time to work!”

A cloud of smoke-like dust immediately circled around the submarine. Then there were dozens of shadows coming out of the hole in the submarine and the nearby sand. These figures were wrapped in tattered military uniforms that looked more like shrouds. Although the figures were physically intact, the skin and muscles were blue and grey as in dead body. Some of them had also swollen and weird wounds from which fine sand was flowing out.

Hao Ren stared at all of this in shock. Undoubtedly, these soldiers were not normal living people. Their chests were inlaid with a grey-blue crystal, which was why they could move.

These controlled fighters stared blankly at the siren. Their muscles twitched slightly as if the rebellious thoughts remained tenaciously deep inside them. However, the crystals on their chests continued to resonate with the polearm in the hand of the siren. These people were unable to resist. The siren standing in front of them was obviously not free either: her eyes were dark and the expression on her face was stiff like the dead. This suggested that her condition was far more serious than that of the siren general. This siren had thoroughly lost its freewill, and now become a remote-controlled machine that faithfully carried out orders.

The siren raised the polearm and swam into the distance. “Get to work.”

This horrifying group of figures left the submarine. Hao Ren, who was hiding in the shadows, awed there for a long moment until Shaqira gritted her teeth and broke the silence. “How could the Queen allow this? This isn’t in keeping with the tradition of the sirens!”

“It’s not the queen. It’s that brain.” Vivian placed her hand on Shaqira’s shoulder. “We’d better go and take a look at it. I got a weird feeling of the work that the siren mentioned.”

Shaqira nodded silently and followed the scent left behind by the siren in the water.

They followed from far behind the ‘dead squad,’ and after a short swim along the beach, they turned into a beach with many grey and white porous rocks. It was already very close to the outer wall of Nasaton. They must be careful not get spotted by the sentries on the high walls of the city, but the white porous rocks around them could act as cover. Vivian suddenly frowned. “I could sense the smell is much stronger here.”

“I felt it too, it was the smell of the dead,” Hasse whispered. “Keep your eyes open.”

Rollie had been following Hao Ren from behind obediently. She must have grown up a lot. After a short swim, she suddenly poked Hao Ren’s arm. “Big Big Cat, there.”

Hao Ren ducked and peeked from behind a porous rock and was shocked to see a large construction site!

There was a large open area surrounded by porous rocks, where construction works were on going. The dead were working under the supervision of the siren. They were World War II sailors in tattered a variety of military uniforms, dark blue skin with stiff faces. Their chests were inlaid with grey and blue, spooky crystals. Hao Ren could barely recognize the clothes. However, Lily had recognized some as the British, the Soviets and the Americans—they were all the Allied soldiers.

Considering that, there had never been eyewitness’ reports of sirens attacking human warships, these soldiers should have sunk into the sea during the war and been ‘collected’ by the sirens.

A dozen or so sirens holding polearms were patrolling the nearby space. Under their watch, the dead were assembling some metal twigs that shaped like corals and installing them in some huge, deeply buried, silver-white pillars in the ground. The silver-white pillars spread far out to the other end of the site, and appeared neat like a weird metal forest.

The MDT had read an amazing energy level from those devices.

“These things can cross the spatial layer, and their lower portion must be nailed deep in the earth,” said Y’zaks, whose voice sounded serious. “They are extracting the energy of the earth’s core… But I can feel its energy flow isn’t complete, there should be some other devices connected to them.”

“There’re not only dead people here,” said Nangong Sanba, who suddenly pointed to the other side of the open space. “Look over there.”

Looking into the direction Nangong Sanba was pointing, another group of slaves were working under the watch of the sirens—it was a group of aliens, sturdy werewolves, pale vampires, and shadelings with dark and twisted limbs.

Obviously, they were all living people.

Chapter 586: The Truth of Nasaton

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

The “porous rock site” was a large area where more than a dozen teams were busily installing energy broadcast antennas and extraction devices. Each such team had a siren supervising and dozens of slave labourers. Due to the huge rocks and complex terrain in the area, there were many monitoring blind spots. It seemed the sirens were not very alert too because they did not seem to think that enemies would appear suddenly near their homes. Their carelessness gave the enemy a chance.

A pale vampire, whose teammates were busy on the edge of the site, was assembling metal twigs under the watch of the siren supervisor. The vampire looked at the sirens holding a crystal polearm swimming slowly in the distance, but he had more will of revolt. He knew no one could escape from this place, even though the open waters were just twenty meters away behind him. Even if the siren wet to let them go, no one could make it out through the layered, invisible maze and reach the surface alive. He looked around; there were two werewolves in his team. This situation was depressing to a Blood Clan. However, after the initial days of conflict, all races in the teams had come to grip with reality. He was now standing with the werewolves in peace, and even the deceitful shadelings would no longer think of doing anything stupid.

The siren supervisor glanced at him expressionlessly. The vampire and the two werewolves bluntly glared at the siren but did not stop the work at hand. The supervisor was only to check on their pace of work and indifferent to their impertinent gaze. She nodded with satisfaction before moving on to another rock like a snake.

“Brainless idiot.” The two werewolves whispered in unison.

The vampire lowered his head and focused on the most delicate step of the assembly process, but at this moment, a strange female voice suddenly sounded in his mind. “Which family are you from, young Blood Clan?”

The vampire looked around crawly. He noticed something strange in the shadow of the boulder in the distance, but the voice in his head stopped him. “Keep doing what you’re doing, young Blood Clan. Just answer a few questions; I’ll see if we can find a way to help you.”

The young Blood Clan felt the power of the higher Blood Clan from the voice that directly went into his mind. He respectfully asked in his mind. “Who are you, my elder? I’m Bruce from the Nordic Abram family.”

“You should have seen my name in your family genealogy. I’m Vivian, the elder of Blood Clan.”

After a few minutes of exchange, Vivian turned her head around and Lily immediately came up to her. “Battie, what is the situation? What happened to these people? How did they get here?”

Vivian nodded. “As expected, it’s about the day of return. Many otherworldling families believed in the day of return and then gathered all the races together before they were held up and sent here. However, the number of those being held is not many so far. These Blood Clans and werewolves were only captured in the past recent years. Looks like the Queen of the Sirens had only lost her mind completely a few years back; she has not managed to launch a large-scale attack on the surface.”

“It’s fortunate that we’ve found out early,” said Shaqira, forcing a smile. “What are they doing here?”

“Feeding energy to the maelstrom; that growing thing is devouring the energy of the planet every day,” replied Vivian. “These metal pillars are only part of the system, and the rest of their components are inside the city of Nasaton. The sirens have built a huge magic device to control the energy collected. Those sirens yet fully controlled were forbidden from going out. They were used as the ‘stabilizer’ of the magic device that drew energy from them. The situation inside is not much better than the slave labourers outside.”

“I did not expect the deep sea has deteriorated to this extent,” said Hasse. “Have you found a way to enter Nasaton?”

“Of course, and it’s surprisingly simple,” Vivian smiled. “Follow behind the human soldiers; Nasaton is open once a day, as those dead soldiers are sent to a facility in the city centre where the crystal in their chests would be recharged. During this process, the dome will not respond to foreign living beings, so we entered.”

Hao Ren was surprised. “Is it as simple as that? The sirens won’t do anything?”

“See the eyes of the siren?” Vivian pointed to a siren, which was patrolling on the edge of the open space. “Its eyes had completely turned black. This is a possessed siren. They have lost their ability to think and could only act on according to their natural instinct. A few years back, a revolt broke out in Nasaton, since then, all the out-going personnel were replaced by these completely possessed sirens. They are stronger than the ordinary sirens, more obedient to the command of that gigantic brain, but the downside is that they lack intelligence and it’s easy to trick them. All we have to do is to grab some sand from the sand bank near the submarine, hold it in the hand, and then follow the slaves into the city. While doing this, don’t get in the way of the siren overseers and they won’t alert the gigantic brain, as they will only treat us as workers on the construction site. Of course, what’s going to happen next once we’re in is hard to tell, so, improvise—our primary goal is to enter the city.”

Lily shook her ear. “I can’t fathom it…wouldn’t that gigantic brain be afraid intruders?”

Vivian smiled. “Well, common sense tells that no one would be able to find Nasaton. The city doesn’t need to be fortified. The loophole is quite normal.”

Hao Ren nodded and said to Vivian. “Well, you and Lily stay on guard here. Let’s us go to the submarine first.”

Though a day in Nasaton was two hours shorter than the surface world, it felt that time crawled. Vivian had learned as much as possible the situation in the city of Nasaton through the mind exchanges with several Blood Clans. However, these slave labourers also knew little about the city. It seemed that they could not possibly rely on this information to get the safest infiltration method. Therefore, they had no choice but decide to let Shaqira lead the way.

The first team of dead soldiers had completed their work today. A sirens overseer ordered the dead back to Nasaton, and the other nearby dead leaving the site. When the last group of people left the site, the small team quickly followed closely from behind.

Following the dead of the Second World War, Hao Ren and others passed through the city shield without incident.

In front of them was an elegant and peculiar city of the deep sea—

Nasaton had an incredible sense of ‘wholeness’. All buildings here seemed to be a part of a larger facility. The city’s ground was like single piece of cast and all buildings were ‘installed’ on this piece of ground. Most of the things here appeared like shells and corals. The elegantly curves of the houses and the towering coral towers of different heights gave the impression that this was a deep-sea palace in the fairy tales—although weird, it was exquisite like a piece of artwork.

Only now that this elegant city had become dead and gloomy. All doors and windows were shut, streets devoid of any siren activities, and the clear seawater was filled with a depressing air as quiet and dull as a ghost town.

“It wasn’t like that when I left…” Shaqira looked sadly at the state of the city. “It used to be a lively and peaceful place. The sirens always like to swim around these pillars and sing… but now all has changed.”

“Don’t worry, everything will be fine as soon as we kill that monster brain,” Hao Ren comforted the depressed siren. “The situation isn’t too bad. Though they are under control, at least they’re alive.”

In order to avoid bumping into other patrolling sirens with higher thinking ability, they did not follow the dead into the city centre. Instead, they turned into another road to their destination: the Palace.

Shaqira had remembered some of the most inaccessible paths in the city. These places were close to the water-circulation pipeline of Nasaton. Usually no one would have noticed and it was much safer to move from here.

They were now advancing along a huge alloy pipe, which was buried in a groove that was more than ten meters wide. The groove itself was the best cover. Shaqira led the way as she touched the pipe around her. “When I was young, I would usually sneak out and play around the pipes, climb into the water inlet, and then transform into a gush of water inside, and circle the city before spouting out from the outlet on the other side of the city.”

Hao Ren was attracted by something else.

He looked at a nameplate on the pipe trough, which was written in twisty siren language. The translation was like this: Nasaton. Fourth Water Circulation Pipe. 3-Bar Pressure.

On the way earlier, he also saw more signs that could tell about the city. He finally figured out it was from those nameplates and simple maps of the facilities.

“Your city is a spaceship?”