After the battle ended, murky turbidity and pale blue bloodstains still drifted unsettled in the water.
Norris and Ming each grasped a mycelial tentacle from an oxygen-supplying Puchi, replenishing their mostly-depleted oxygen. The oxygen Puchis visibly deflated.
Ming's clothes had become near-rags in the all-offense-no-defense combat, yet his exposed skin showed no wounds.
Norris had several small cuts on his body, now already mostly healed under powerful regenerative ability.
Though he didn't have Ming's absurd [Physical Immunity], he possessed [Physical Resistance LV10]—ordinary attacks had difficulty causing him substantial harm.
The fishman guide was injured most severely.
When Norris had gone all-out to rescue Ming earlier, the fishman had fallen into a three-enemy siege.
By the time Norris remotely commanded the super Puchi to break the encirclement, one of the fishman's arms had already been severed. It was now using some dark green salve reeking strongly of seaweed and minerals, desperately pressing it against the stump to stop bleeding.
Norris swam over and, under the fishman's puzzled gaze, picked up the floating severed arm.
He thought to bring it back—perhaps they could try to reattach it for the fishman through mycelial symbiosis.
But judging by the fishman's current expression, it probably thought this human wanted to collect its limb, or... worse.
Language barriers were ultimately an obstacle.
The Mushroom Garden was better—Norris couldn't help but sigh internally.
There, even different species could communicate without barriers through the mycelial network.
The fishman, having hastily treated its wound, immediately struggled to the divine statue's base. With its remaining hand, it tremblingly stroked the pockmarked stone pedestal damaged by those monsters, emitting low, sorrowful "glubglubs" from its throat, as if mourning or confessing its failure to protect.
Ming looked up at that over-twenty-meter-tall female statue with tentacles for hair and a blurred face, asking curiously: "Who is this a statue of?"
"The Death God, Nevfrela, I think." Norris also looked up, his tone somewhat uncertain. "Didn't they say these fishmen worship this one? But... this is my first time seeing the Death God's statue with my own eyes. So that's what it looks like."
"What use are these gods anyway?" Ming was somewhat puzzled. "Back in the death match arena, I'd occasionally encounter those types who'd call for help from some Light God before dying. The Light God never came to save anyone. This Death God is probably the same, right?"
Norris shrugged. He held similar views.
Before meeting Boss, he'd barely counted as a casual Light God believer, but that deity had clearly never glanced at a small figure like him.
"Don't say such things in front of the fishmen," Norris reminded. "Before coming, Boss specifically instructed us not to provoke them over faith issues."
Ming immediately nodded seriously, his expression grave.
Boss's instructions must be strictly followed!
Norris and Ming didn't know that the one currently providing them oxygen was a specially-made Puchi with knight-level combat power.
Facing enemies of unknown strength, how could Lin Jun possibly throw Ming out then completely wash his hands of it?
The knight Puchi had been observing the battlefield the entire time. Only after confirming threats were within controllable range did it refrain from directly intervening, treating it as practical combat training for the two.
At this moment, Lin Jun's attention also turned to that Death God statue, but his perspective differed completely from Norris and Ming's.
[Inspiration LV8]
This statue... was flickering!
This was a first.
Not only the first time seeing this kind of soul that existed one moment and didn't the next, but also the first time seeing signs of a soul inside stone statues—purely inanimate objects!
Appearing inside the Death God's statue... could this actually be the Death God's own soul?
But Lin Jun had also observed statues in human Light God churches. Aside from being carved exquisitely and majestically, those stone statues were just stone—no special traces inside.
Lin Jun tried touching the statue with a tentacle. Unfortunately, nothing happened.
Norris and Ming below hadn't forgotten Lin Jun's mission.
The super Puchi's arms embraced together, restraining the last living seafood monster.
It was very fresh, struggling with great force, but unfortunately under the super Puchi's absolute power suppression, all resistance proved futile.
The three brought their captive cautiously back along the original route to the fissure entrance room leading to Puchi Dungeon.
This space had now completely transformed.
In the water, clusters of wide, flexible mycelial kelp swayed like an underwater forest. Glowing mushrooms grew along their edges, emitting faint blue, pale green, and light purple glimmers.
Overhead above, near the originally empty water surface, floated an expanse of mycelial seaweed like an inverted glowing grassland, similarly dotted with scattered points of light.
Each light point wasn't individually bright, but hundreds and thousands of light points gathered together were like moving the entire starry sky into the water—the galaxy suspended inverted, creating an extraordinarily beautiful dreamlike spectacle in these deep waters both strange and captivating.
If only that seafood monster being tightly bound by several mycelial kelp strands and dragged toward the depths of this "star sea" wasn't emitting such shrill, anguished screams, Norris might have more leisure to appreciate the scenery.
Beneath the monster's blue-gray carapace, mycelia wriggled. Plump glowing mushrooms tore through skin and flesh, forcibly protruding from gaps in the shell.
Pale blue blood and shattered muscle fibers were mercilessly expelled by newly born fungal bodies, mixing into the water.
The monster howled in agony, but the mycelia didn't pause at all.
Its four compound eyes that had originally flickered with blue light were replaced one by one. Swelling mushroom bodies burst the crystalline structures from within. Finally, four differently-colored glowing mushrooms slowly bloomed in those hollow eye sockets.
When the monster's last distorted, off-key wail finally ceased, transforming into a string of weakly rising bubbles, a lifeless mushroom puppet quietly floated in the beautiful "star river."
Norris silently exited the room, his stomach somewhat uncomfortable.
Ming watched with great interest, his eyes full of pure curiosity, as if viewing a special magic performance.
Lin Jun paid no attention to their reactions.
Because at this moment, he was completely immersed in a suddenly appearing strange vision.
...
The instant mycelia successfully parasitized the monster and established connection, this scene crashed into Lin Jun's consciousness.
Upon pitch-black, barren, flat earth, countless coffins were neatly arranged.
Row after row, column after column, orderly and precise, extending toward the horizon's edge until disappearing into distant blurred darkness.
At an extremely distant place where the earth seemed to meet even deeper darkness, a massive shadow vaguely stood—like a bizarrely-shaped mountain.
Lin Jun instinctively looked up toward this space's sky.
There was nothing there—no sun, moon, or stars. Only pure pitch blackness.
What the hell is this?
(End of Chapter)
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