Chapter 749 — Returned to the Deep... but the Deep Does Not Want You

The storm priest paused abruptly, and his expression grew graver still.

"Also, Your Holiness, this time we discovered something else..."

"Say it here."

"I fear there are already brethren who have fully transformed," the storm priest said, lowering his voice. "On the eve of our departure from Hurricane Isle, a soldier on night watch said he saw several figures moving along the shore—covered in scales, with fins on their backs and arms, what seemed to be gills, gliding over the sand on tails between serpent and fish, and soon leaping into the sea. Since only one soldier saw them, I cannot be sure it was not a hallucination born of nerves or the magical turbulence."

Hearing the storm priest's account, Pontiff Saul could not help but glance once more at the bodies on the stretchers.

"It sounds very much like the result of this terrible mutation deepening further."

"Yes."

"Those who fully mutated simply leapt into the sea, without speaking to you and without attacking anyone?"

"Yes. That is what the night watch reported."

"...I understand," Pope Sol said softly after several seconds of silence. "Everyone has worked hard. Go and rest for now. As for what comes next... we will discuss it once you are rested."

"Yes. Thank you for your concern."

The Storm Acolyte lowered his head and twisted his neck somewhat unnaturally.

Suddenly he felt a faint itch in the skin around his neck.

As if... scales were about to grow there.

...

On this endless ocean, raging storms were the norm, yet calm safe zones still existed, and the colony ship Antavien, together with the Eo continent where the ship had crashed, was one of them.

Around the Antavien crash site and across a considerable expanse of surrounding sea, storms seldom ran wild; days of clear skies or gentle drizzle made up the majority, and deadly magical turbulence almost never appeared.

This anomaly had once filled the sirens with curiosity. Through long years of later research and exploration, the deep-water technicians put forward a conjecture: in ancient times, during its crash, the Antavien had engaged nearly all its engines in emergency retro-thrust, and the immense energy released had at the time melted almost a quarter of the Eo continent and punched through part of the continental shelf, permanently altering the seabed structure near the coastline. Perhaps it was in this process that the local magnetic field had undergone a permanent change, indirectly causing the shift in the magical environment, and thus carving out so vast a safe region within the storm-ravaged Endless Sea.

For the sirens, the greatest benefit of the fine weather near the Antavien was that they could bask in the sun to their hearts' content in a place where clear skies were common.

Only, in the midst of fine days, accidents were bound to happen.

At the Antavien crash site, on the western coastline of the Eo continent, upon the sirens' sunbathing grounds, Pythia frowned slightly as she regarded the uninvited guests who had occupied the beach.

Those creatures—very much like humans, yet bearing the obvious traits of deep-sea dwellers—ran to and fro across the sand (or rather, slid to and fro on smooth, scaled tails), utterly unself-conscious, and in high spirits.

Pythia turned slightly to the side and asked her personal handmaid in a low voice, "Rosalia, what on earth is the origin of these... creatures?"

"It isn't clear yet. They are all far too agitated right now; I simply cannot find one calm enough to talk to," replied Rosalia, the deep-sea handmaid, her long tail tracing back and forth across the sand, plainly displeased—for she saw that her usual sunbathing spot had been taken as well. "But Master Hathaway says this agitation should gradually fade, and they ought to calm down enough to speak with us."

"So the witch says... then we wait for these creatures to calm down. Don't clash with them for now—better to avoid a mess we can't clean up later. Everything can wait until contact is established," Pythia said, rubbing her forehead. "By the way, did she say what these creatures should be called? Surely there must be a race name or a designation?"

"I truly could not find a matching name in the existing databases," Rosalia said, while her tail had already begun rapidly poking pits into the sand—she had seen the one occupying her own private sunbathing hollow start to coil its tail and sleep inside it, which infuriated her beyond measure, though she dared not vent it before the queen. "So Master Hathaway gave them a name..."

"Oh? What name?"

"The Master calls them 'naga.'"

(Mother of mercy!)