This dagger, which had originally belonged to Luke, was currently undergoing a silent and drastic transformation.
The dull, dark blood-red hue that had once clung to its surface had completely faded away.
In its place was a cool, pale glimmer.
Elias was all too familiar with this texture; it was his own spirituality.
“Interesting.”
He had never expected that the Gluttonous Stomach, after consuming his spirituality, would actually feed it back into his containment objects.
Previously, he had assumed it only affected the performance of the charms.
For after that incident, he had repeatedly taken out his other containment objects to inspect them.
There didn't seem to be any effect.
But looking at it today, it seemed there was more to it!
This had clearly used that spirituality to alter some mechanism of the weapon's operation.
Did this mean that any containment object in his possession could be enhanced simply by tossing it into the stomach?
With this thought, he reached into the Gluttonous Stomach and pulled out another old friend.
The sea cucumber-shaped elemental revolver.
On the grip of the revolver, a faint white spirituality indeed flowed slowly within the exquisite owl carving; it had clearly received nourishment from the stomach as well.
However, the barrel of the gun still drooped flaccidly, making it entirely impossible to aim and fire.
“What is it?”
Old Ed asked from within the bracelet.
“Do you really think of this freakish stomach as some kind of weapon repair shop?”
“Maybe it is?”
Elias consoled himself.
“One must always have dreams. What if a miracle happens?”
“Besides, look. Isn't my spirituality already attached to the gun body?”
“Even in the worst-case scenario, even if this thing can't shorten the elemental gun's cool-down period, it should at least cause some peculiar changes once it recovers.”
Old Ed smacked his lips, his voice still dripping with skepticism.
“To be honest,”
“I never heard of the Gluttonous Stomach possessing such an ability when I was alive.”
“I really don't know where that damned John managed to find this thing.”
The old ghost paused, adding with the confident tone of someone who had seen it all:
“But one thing is certain: even if this stomach can truly repair your elemental gun, it will take plenty of time.”
“Just like that cutlass in your hand.”
“Don't forget, when you were fighting back in Hastings Port, this blade was still in its dead state, craving human blood.”
“Uh-huh,”
Elias responded noncommittally in his mind.
“But at least until we're sure whether this spiritual feedback will ultimately bring me a positive effect or some sort of negative consequence, we'll just have to make do with this for now.”
Elias gripped the Thorn Cutlass, which had vastly changed in texture, his eyes flickering in the dense fog.
“So far, the attributes it has displayed are all beneficial, and that's enough.”
For once, Old Ed didn't argue.
During this internal dialogue between man and ghost, Elias's feet had already stepped onto the slippery gravel beach of the reef.
Lowering his stance, he followed Malcolm and the sailors at a steady pace, heading toward the interior of the small reef.
Overhead, the cold moonlight shone at an angle on the towering lighthouse, split cleanly in two.
The light pierced through the mist in the air, creating a Tyndall effect with clean, geometric lines.
The light pierced the fog, casting distorted shadows upon the jagged, rocky ground.
Since the main flame of the tower lamp was currently extinguished, the only source of illumination for the entire reef was the faint moonlight filtering through the layers of fog.
This lent a bizarre and surreal quality to the rocks and puddles within a radius of several hundred meters.
“Stop,”
Malcolm, who was leading the way, suddenly whispered.
His boot stepped into a puddle of water, the surface shimmering with an unsettling deep crimson.
Soon, following the path highlighted by 【Moon Vision】, they spotted the unfortunate crew member who had been sent flying behind a nearby reef.
A glaring trail of blood stretched from his initial point of impact, leaving a dark red streak several meters long across the rough ground.
Fortunately, he no longer had to suffer.
He was already dead as a doornail.
A flying-fin fish-man was currently squatting beside the corpse.
Its bizarre hands were brandishing the steel cutlass scavenged from the sailor, attempting to dismember the corpse using the most primitive of methods.
The sounds of bones snapping and flesh tearing echoed clearly in the dead silence of the thick fog.
However, this bloody picnic did not last long.
Years of supernatural perception allowed the beast to detect something amiss the instant the group drew near.
It turned its head stiffly.
A pair of emotionless, fishy eyes stared dead at Malcolm's face.
“Attack!”
Without a single word of nonsense, Malcolm's voice erupted instantly like a suppressed volcano.
The flying-fin fish-man let out a piercing screech, abandoned the mangled corpse, propped its tail on the ground, and began to crawl laboriously toward them over the moss-covered rocks.
Its ground mobility was an absolute disaster.
It didn't even manage to crawl three paces.
Lightning, fire, radiance, and spiritual ammunition transformed instantly into a torrential downpour, completely blanketing the creature without reservation.
Intermingled among them was thunderclap ammo.
The dense elemental ammunition wove a massive web of death in the air.
Before long, the flying-fin fish-man was turned into a sieve on the spot.
Accompanied by a dull, explosive boom, red blood mixed with fine scales and organs erupted in all directions, splattering everywhere.
Shreds of flesh clung to the surrounding reefs, dripping mucus with soft, wet plops.
Standing near the middle-rear of the line, Elias had to tilt his body to avoid a fresh piece of fish belly flying straight at his face.
And up ahead,
the first mate, Malcolm, showed no emotion on his face. He stepped blankly over the shredded corpse
and walked straight up to the remains of the deceased, nameless crew member.
Malcolm exhaled slowly, bent down, and with his right hand flat, lightly tapped the center of his forehead with his fingertips.
Then, his hand moved in a straight line, coming to a steady rest over his heart on the left side of his chest.
This was likely the prayer gesture of the spawn of the Raging Sea.
For those who made their living on the ocean, dying in the sea was merely a natural return to the raging waves.
Malcolm did not linger long either. Soon, he led the group onward toward the heart of the lighthouse on this reef.
Along the way, this group of sailors, harboring a bellyful of rage, were like a mobile, merciless seafood harvester.
They hadn't gone far when another human scream echoed from the fog ahead.
Another flying-fin fish-man, which was pinning down a sailor, didn't even get the chance to look up
before it was blown into flying fish entrails by the following crossfire.
“Give him a hand!”
Fortunately, their luck was slightly better this time.
The pinned second-class sailor was still alive. Although his entire left arm had been slashed into a bloody mess by the fish-man's bone spikes, his mind was still clear, and he was spitting out the foulest Hope County curses.
“Sir... I can walk!”
Spitting blood from his mouth, he struggled to stand, attempting to keep up with the main force to rescue their surrounded captain.
But just as he put weight on his calves, Malcolm's muscular arm blocked him.
“Don't move.”
Malcolm turned and nodded at two crew members who had sustained minor injuries.
“You, and you. Take him back to the ship immediately.”
“Guard the Nightgull well. If we can't hold out here, fire the cannons once you receive our signal.”
“Aye, sir!”
The simple tactical division and dispatching were quickly completed, and the remaining men continued to close in on the massive shadow at the edge of their vision.
Just as everyone neared the lighthouse,
a terrifying sound of tearing energy ripped through the thick fog.
It wasn't a standard supernatural spell; it was lightning in its purest form.
A low, rolling thunder boomed from high above.
A wild gale began to swirl and tear frantically at the center of the dense fog, churning the surrounding mist.
Elias suddenly noticed that everyone's hair and beards were standing straight up!
The air was thick with the scent of ozone from high-voltage electrical arcs.
Fine, concentrated strands of blue current danced between the raised tips of hair and the brass buttons on their clothes.
Static overload.
“It's the captain.”
A look of relief finally washed over Malcolm's grim face, illuminated by the electric glow.
“Follow me!”
Through the gaps in the fog torn open by the howling wind, the group moved into the gravel clearing in front of the lighthouse.
Less than two meters away from old Crowley, the flying-fin fish-man that had sent him flying had already been reduced to a charred, black heap.
Faint blue electrical sparks occasionally flickered on its surface.
The old man was currently holding his flintlock pistol steady—the weapon he usually kept tucked at his waist, which Elias had previously mocked as a “medieval fire poker.”
The dark muzzle was aimed directly at the uninvited guest standing in the shadow of the lighthouse.
It was a figure clad in a cloaked coat.
A high-ranking member of the Mist Veil Society.
And outside the perimeter surrounding the two of them,
there were at least five or six normal fish-men wielding rusted cutlasses and sharp harpoons.
Hearing the dense footsteps behind him,
old Crowley's lips curled into a savage grin.
“You've finally arrived.”
Rate on N.U.
