Though the heavy winds and waves that An Li had been worried about didnât occur, exposure to the scorching sun quickly destroyed her once-flawless skin, causing dry cracks to appear all over her hands and face. Everyone wore life jackets and sat inside the rubber lifeboats while the gentle waves inevitably and occasionally sprayed them. There was no need to scoop water out of the boats, as would typically be done, because the sun would eventually evaporate the water anyway. Wet skin was more prone to flake and crack when it dried, leaving white salt stains everywhere.
A lifeboat could support ten people, but since they had to make room for food and water, only eight people were on board.
An Liâs boat was a little better off since, other than the captain and chief mate, everyone else was in possession of special abilities. Their food was all gathered together as well, thus no disputes occurred after they survived the beginning of the journey, and the rowers had finally synced their movements so that their boat could actually move forward.
The rotation was four people for about an hour of rowing, and none of them dared to stop. After just one night, An Liâs arms were already so sore she could barely lift them.
Frankly, they hadnât been all that impressed by Li Shao before, but now they had discovered his usefulness.
The problem, however, was that although this guy had great strength, his technique was horrible. Things like accidentally oversteering the boat left or right were trivial issues; breaking the entire wooden oar was a whole other concern.
âHonestly, I donât think weâve even rowed out that far!â
âSame! I still feel like that silhouette way over there is the Thalassa Goddess! â
âThe ocean is like a desertâ thereâs no markers other than the sun! Maybe weâve been turning in circles this entire time despite all our efforts!â
The people on the other lifeboats also began to complain. In all honesty, they had even more weight on their shoulders because they were doing everything in their power to keep up with An Liâs group, whose strength they believed in. Nobody dared to fall behind. They didnât trust their companions on the boats either; in order to protect the food and water they had left, they barely got any sleep. No one could bear such stress for long.
There were at least ten lifeboats that had followed them off the Thalassa Goddess.
By dawn, there were only six left behind them.
Falling behind because people couldnât keep up was one reason, but it definitely wasnât the only one. As for the other possibilities⌠Who knew what had really happened?
For example, the Han father and son had stayed quiet at the beginning, yet they were later forcing some of the normal people to hand over their food at gunpoint. An Li didnât do anything about it because, really, who had the time and energy to attend to others at this point? If they couldnât find an island some time soon, it wouldnât matter how powerful their special abilities were. Once they ran out of food and water, what could their abilities do? Dry out the sea? Help catch fish?
âWeâre not completely lost since Iâm following the currents southeast, where there are generally plenty of islands. However, the problem now is the fact that there are absolutely no fish anywhere near the surface.â
Li Shao rolled his eyes upon hearing the captainâs words, grumbling, âAnd you have X-ray vision that can see whatâs going on underwater?â
The captain didnât grow angry but instead pointed to the oceanâs surface and continued, âWe havenât seen any seabirds for a whole day and the movements of the waves have been quite even. If there were any schools of fish, they would definitely draw in their natural predators. But the waterâŚâ
Is deathly still.
***
Xia Yi didnât leave the shoal island.
It wasnât because the place now had food, nor was he too enchanted by the merman; instead, it was because within half an hour of eating that raw sardine, his stomach had begun to churn painfully. As he lay on the rocks, beads of cold sweat formed on his forehead.
I thought sardines werenât poisonous!
Xia Yi tried to vomit out the piece of fish heâd eaten as the colour quickly drained from his face.
Cold fingers caressed his face, causing Xia Yi to instinctively turn away. Even during a time such as this, he still didnât like to be touched.
The merman had no need to give him something poisonous on purpose. If it wanted him dead, then those sharp nails were more than enough to slice his neck open, which wouldâve been much easier too. Are humans not supposed to eat sardines raw?
Xia Yi curled himself into a ball. There were no doctors on this barren island, so it was impossible for him to have his stomach pumped, and now that heâd ingested something poisonous, there should be the end for himâ these were the remaining thoughts on his mind as he grew paler and paler from the immense pain.
Those cold fingers continued to stroke his cheeks and even gently shook his body.
He could just barely crack open his eyes to see the obviously panicked expression of the merman, a creature without the concept of concealing emotions.
It probably didnât know that the fish was poisonous.
He was dying, and if there was a person⌠Ok fine, it didnât have to be a âpersonâ⌠but he hadnât known that having a living being stay beside him and worry for his life was such a happy thing.
Siren was stunned.
Just then, this humanâs breathing had rapidly increased and dark crimson blood was flowing from the corner of his mouth. The mental waves that represented life were gradually weakening; when they disappeared, the person would be dead.
Yet there was this sudden feeling that made the merman bored and even discouraged it from getting closer?!
âWas he happy? Even in utter bliss?
What kind of human felt like this when they were near death?!
Usually, their devastation, fear, and resentment would draw merfolk to them even if the dying men were far away.
Or perhaps, did he regard âdeathâ as something to be happy about?
The merman retracted its hand as an odd anger began to surge within.
This would not do. It wasnât easy to discover a human who did not hear its song at all and had few loathsome scents. Now he was dying while having this feeling that it did not like one bit.
With a clean swipe to its pale wrist, blood flowed out.
The merman moved its wrist closer, wanting to force Xia Yi to swallow the blood.
But Xia Yi had already begun to convulse and had zero consciousness left.
In the end, the merman had to suck a mouthful of blood before prying open Xia Yiâs mouth with its tongue to allow it to be poured in. This felt different compared to the first time. The merman realised that the human was poisoned when it tasted the black blood in his mouth. Though it couldnât fathom why sardines were poisonous to him, it continued to feed as much blood down Xia Yiâs throat as possible.
The bitter taste of blood was originally difficult to swallow, much less for Xia Yi, who was at the border of unconsciousness because of pain. All he wanted to do was throw the poisonous fish back up, so it was a hassle to get him to swallow.
The cut on its wrist had started to clot by the time the merman raised its head again.
Streaks of black and light red blood were smeared across the previously colourless lips.
The icy fingers felt Xia Yiâs neck and, though it was still covered in cold sweat, his breathing seemed to have settled at a calmer pace.
Splash.
A silver tail could be seen disappearing into the ocean.
Other than the soft, fine sand, only startled little fish were scattered in the clear, blue sea.
The merman reached out and grabbed a sardine with ease. Tearing open the fishâs stomach, the merman sniffed at the meat.
There was indeed the faint smell of something unpleasant.
A smell that didnât belong to fish.
Sea monsters, and even many other sea creatures, wouldâve been completely fine even if theyâd ingested this thing, but if the victim was a fragile human⌠Well, he was still lying unconscious back on the island!
The merman furiously threw the dead fish into the sea.
This time, the infrasonic waves were audible even tens of nautical miles away.
âNereus! Where did you find these fish?â
The Lionâs Mane Jellyfish shot up from where its big-eyed emperor fish were giving it a massage, completely puzzled and at a loss. âIn the ocean⌠obviously!â
âGululu hahahahaha!â
âYou shut up as well! It has been so long and yet you still have not crawled here!â
ââŚâŚâ
âAbyss, go find something edible. Make sure that it is consumable for âhumansâ! If problems arise again, I will use your tentacles instead since humans can definitely eat octopuses!â
âWhy not Nereus?â The octopus was confused. The jellyfish had so many tentaclesâ surely it wouldnât matter if a few were gone.
âMust I remind you that Nereus is covered in venomous stingers?â
The big octopus jolted upwards. âBut Iâm venomous too! Extremely venomous!â
âThen Eurybia goes! It is not venomous!â
âHuh?â
A certain squid was curled up at the bottom of the sea, rolling all over the place because it wasnât yet accustomed to the tropical waters; its barbed tentacles were hooked onto nearby shoals and left deep gouges on the rocks. Why was it just mentioned? What did any of this have to do with it? It didnât remember talking at all?!