Tao Fu was a little dazed. His shipyard had suddenly transformed, and now there was also a group of... Ghost Boatmen.

Just then, he suddenly noticed something was off.

This Keel Ship he was building was clearly still a few final steps away from being finished.

But now, it seemed those steps had already been completed?

Tao Fu inspected it carefully and finally confirmed his suspicion. For the Keel Ship he was building, not only were all the remaining steps complete, but even procedures like waterproofing were all finished.

The only strange thing was that the color of the ship’s surface was slightly darker.

Tao Fu murmured to himself, "How did they do this..."

As soon as the words left his mouth, a faint blue phantom appeared beside him.

It startled Tao Fu so much he almost turned and ran.

Fortunately, at the critical moment, he remembered what his lord had said—that he was now in charge of this Ghost Ship Dock, and these were his employees. With that thought, he forced himself to calm down.

The phantom was holding an equally ethereal wooden bucket. It dipped the bucket into the black pool below, scooped up a full load of water, and poured it over the surface of the Keel Ship.

The black water trickled down the hull, and the ship’s color grew even deeper.

After completing this action, the blue phantom deliberately turned its head to glance at him before vanishing on the spot.

"..." Tao Fu was stunned. ’Was that... it... teaching me just now?’

’It was teaching me, wasn’t it!?’

He had been a shipwright for so many years, and it had been a long time since a "person" had guided him like this.

Tao Fu lowered his head, his gaze unconsciously falling upon the black water beneath the Keel Ship.

Now he finally understood what this black pool water was for.

’So it can be used as a waterproof varnish. All you have to do is pour it over the hull?’

"Now that I have employees, it’s time to get started." Tao Fu took a deep breath. ’The lord needs ships right now. With these Ghost Boatmen, I can speed things up and build more large vessels!’

Although many parts of the Ghost Ship Dock looked dilapidated, it had everything he needed. He did a quick check and confirmed that while the equipment looked worn out, it was surprisingly durable.

...

On the churning, turbulent sea, a wooden boat drifted.

The sky was dim, and the surface of the sea was pitch-black.

He Biao sat in the boat, accompanied by three members of the Alliance Association’s Team Two.

During the Giant Hyena Group attack, due to his poor performance and the heavy losses his members suffered, He Biao was stripped of his position as captain of Team One and demoted to captain of Team Three.

But late in the last map, many members of the Alliance Association’s Hunting Teams defected to the Qin Alliance, causing a drop in membership. After a reorganization, his Team Three was promoted to Team Two.

He Biao knew that he owed his current stable position mainly to Zou Jianghe’s support.

That was why he couldn’t refuse some of Zou Jianghe’s requests.

The waves lapped against the boat, oars sliced through the water, and the vessel moved slowly toward the island ahead.

"Brother Biao, it’s a little cold." One of the men said, his teeth chattering. Although he had put on extra clothes before leaving, the cold wind blowing on his hands gripping the oar had frozen his knuckles white.

"Just bear with it. We’re already halfway there," He Biao said.

"Mm..."

"Brother Biao, did you hear about that ’Borrow and Return Cards’ event the Qin Alliance is running? I heard they loaned out thirty or forty Cards at once. They’re really loaded."

He Biao just smiled and didn’t reply.

In reality, as a Hunting Team Captain for the Alliance Association, he could feel the changes between the two sides even more clearly.

But no matter what others said about Zou Jianghe, the man had always treated him well.

Besides, back when he was running errands for Zou Jianghe, he had inevitably offended some people, a few of whom had since joined the Qin Alliance.

On top of that, the Qin Alliance hadn’t made him an offer tempting enough for him to give up his current position and go join them. At least in the Alliance Association, by following Zou Jianghe, he still had a chance to snag a few more Cards. He probably wouldn’t get such a good opportunity with the Qin Alliance.

"Brother Biao, something feels wrong... really, really wrong." The voice of one of the men rowing had changed. "The oar suddenly feels heavy. It’s so hard to row."

"Me too. The current just now felt unnatural."

"Don’t be ridiculous, how could..." He Biao was about to cut them off when, suddenly, a current surged up beside the small boat, pushing it sideways for a short distance.

He Biao’s arm trembled, and his heart began to race.

He had a secret he’d never told anyone. When he was nine, he went swimming in a reservoir and was bullied by some older kids from the next village. They had forced his head underwater, and although he made it back to shore afterward...

He had thought he had long since forgotten the shadow of that incident.

But in that single moment just now, the memory from when he was nine surfaced in his mind—especially the empty feeling of his feet finding no purchase as he struggled in the water.

He Biao shut his mouth, trying to regulate his emotions.

The men on the boat tacitly stopped talking.

The moonlight was shattered by the ripples on the sea’s surface, leaving only the heavy breathing of the men on the boat.

They silently agreed to quicken their rowing pace.

They wanted to get to shore as quickly as possible.

One of them suddenly said, "If we row like this, are we making too much noise?"

"A boat this big has been on the water for this long. If it was going to notice us, it would have done so already."

SPLASH~

The sea ahead was suddenly pushed up, a large bulge protruding from the water’s surface.

But it vanished just as quickly.

The four men on the boat felt their hands and feet turn to ice.

In that instant, they saw a long, narrow Giant Beast.

It looked a bit like a shark, and a bit like a whale.

The glimpse was too brief, and with the dim surroundings, they couldn’t see it clearly at all.

UUURRRUUU~

From beneath the sea came a sound that was both low and deep, yet high-pitched.

Two seemingly contradictory descriptions, yet in that moment, they perfectly matched the sound.

It felt as if their very heartbeats had formed a Resonance with the sound.

The next second, the bottom of the boat jolted violently.

The hull trembled violently. One of the men lost his grip on his oar and, with a splash, fell into the sea.

Immediately after, the bow of the boat was thrust upward.

Something under the boat was pushing up with immense force.

"AHHHHH!!!!"

Someone on the boat could no longer control their emotions and screamed in terror.

"I shouldn’t have come here!"

The bow rose high into the air, then slammed back down heavily.

It threw up a massive spray of water.

’Good thing the boat’s structure is holding up.’

The men on the boat had barely breathed a sigh of relief when the thing under the sea rammed them violently from the side.

The boat was heaved upward, and the men on board fell into the water one after another, like dumplings dropping into a pot.

He Biao was instantly submerged in the freezing current. He forced his eyes open in the suffocating seawater.

Vaguely, he saw a pair of enormous, eerie green eyes.

...

「The next morning.」

A thin layer of fog drifted over the sea.

The wreckage of the broken boat had drifted with the tide and run aground on the mudflats.

A large crowd had gathered on the shore.

The family members had already cried themselves hoarse, their throats dry and their voices gone.

Surrounded by the crowd, Zou Jianghe stared at the wreckage of the wooden boat, his expression grim.

...

...