I blankly stared at the deep-sea creature, then raised my hand and commanded,

"Let there be light."

Even after a long while, the Abyssal Sea remained dark.

So I couldn’t do that, but was able to create life? Dumbfounded, I released the flopping flying fish.

It staggered at first, like a newborn deer, but then, it began swimming freely through the sea as if nothing had happened.

It looked like it was trying to escape me, but no matter how far it went, it remained within the range of my Tide Sense. And through my Tide Sense, I confirmed again and again that it was truly alive.

How was this even possible? Frowning, I repeated the same process and created a second flying fish.

-Flap, flap!

"..."

I released that one as well. This time, I intentionally made it a bit rougher. I didn’t carve out the blood vessels completely and left the eyes slightly clouded.

It wasn’t able to come to life now. It was just a sculpture and nothing more.

'Is it the precision?'

After experimenting a few more times, I reached a single conclusion.

"The seawater’s the cause."

Ultra-precise current manipulation. That part was essential.

But the thing that actually gave life to the sculpture was the seawater in this place.

Watching closely, I noticed that only after seawater flowed into the fish’s blood vessels did life take hold.

I felt half relieved and half horrified.

Because no matter how I looked at it, I had created life. Regardless of how strange this place was, it wasn’t something I wanted to be doing.

But I couldn’t stop.

'There’s definitely something here.'

This seawater just randomly created life for no reason?

That couldn’t be. Even if there was no reason, this was the only way I could cause any change here.

So I just kept going, creating as many as I could. I poured my heart and soul into this continuous process of creating flying fish.

-Flap, flap...

-Flap...

"Ugh..."

And it turned out to be far more tedious than expected.

The process of giving life required something almost like a perfect work of art. It had to be indistinguishable from a real living organism, otherwise, it wouldn’t come alive.

It demanded extreme concentration, so it tired me quickly. Thankfully, the distorted sense of time worked in my favor here.

Before long, the once silent Abyssal Sea began filling with fluttering flying fish.

And when their number reached 100…

Something changed.

"?"

At the very edge of my Tide sense’s range, I detected something that wasn’t a flying fish.

Curious, I focused on it and immediately frowned in disbelief.

"...What the hell is that?”

If it were a deep-sea creature, no matter how grotesque it looked, it wouldn’t be surprising. After all, I’d already seen countless horrifying things down here.

But this one wasn’t a deep-sea creature.

No, it wasn’t even a fish.

[Grrruuurr, Rrrrrgh...]

It had a straight horn running along its spine, making it a bit ambiguous, but if I had to classify it, it looked like a massive lizard. Foam bubbled at the edges of its mouth, and it glared sharply.

No matter how I looked at it, it had no gills. It didn’t even seem capable of breathing.

Still, it flailed wildly, trying to swim, struggling desperately to escape this Abyssal Sea. As I moved to get closer and examine it—

[Grgh?!]

"!"

This time the sea itself changed.

The pressure, which had been almost nonexistent, began to increase.

'All of a sudden?'

For me, this level of pressure didn’t matter much.

But for the lizard it clearly did.

[Geh-------]

The creature, which had been swimming just fine moments ago, was suddenly overtaken by pain.

Driven to the brink of suffocation in an instant, it thrashed wildly in an attempt to escape—but the Abyssal Sea showed no mercy to a land creature.

Crushed under the rising pressure, the lizard eventually went limp and stopped moving.

"..."

At the same time, the increased pressure returned to normal.

It was as if its sole purpose had been to kill that lizard.

I approached to examine the corpse, but then I realized that all other lifeforms had completely vanished.

'...Damn.'

All the flying fish I had created were dead, floating around lifelessly.

...They were crushed by the pressure.

Startled by the sudden turn of events, I stared at the fading remains of the lizard and fell into thought.

A land creature suddenly appeared in this Abyssal Sea without any warning. That clearly was unnatural.

There was only one logical conclusion. It was connected to the flying fish I had been creating.

So I started making flying fish again—

[Grrrrurr...]

As expected.

Once the number reached a certain number, the lizard appeared again.

[Grrrgh, Kgh?!]

This time, I snatched the hissing creature by its nape using currents.

If it appeared a second time, it would likely appear a third.

In other words…

"Guess I’ll start with a dissection.”

It was time to tear apart the only anomaly I had and savor it fully.

*t*t*

After some time—in this place where even time itself was distorted, the Abyssal Sea had filled with chunks of ice.

"Let’s see…”

Now that even rough creations could gain life, I absentmindedly created flying fish with one hand while focusing my thoughts.

It was always the same. 100.

Whether it was flying fish or anything else. Once I created 100 living bearings, a lizard would always fall.

And not just any lizard. It was the exact same individual as before. That much was certain. Not even the arrangement of its scales differed from the previous one. I had dissected it several times, so I could even say that its internal organs were identical.

Its behavior, and the outcome, were always the same.

The moment the lizard appeared, the pressure increased.

And as a result, it would be crushed to death on its own. Just like my flying fish.

Then everything reset, and it all started over from the beginning.

In other words…

"What is this?”

I had no idea what the hell was going on.

Why creating 100 flying fish caused a lizard to fall and put on a suicide show, and then when I made another 100, the exact same one repeated the exact same thing.

I hadn't only repeated the same process either. At one point, I tried keeping the lizard alive, but it didn’t change much.

The pressure kept increasing until it died anyway, and even I had limits to how long I could protect it.

It was a confusing situation, but one thing was clear.

'So the mid-layer wasn’t lying.'

At first, I thought it had trapped me in some strange space, unable to kill me, unable to let me roam around alive.

But that didn’t seem to be the case.

This space clearly had a purpose. The way it granted life. The way it created endlessly repeating scenarios once certain conditions were met.

If so, then there was a direction to follow.

Just as the mid-layer said, I was currently undergoing some kind of qualification test.

It was a bizarre test, so I didn’t know the rules or conditions, but if I passed, it meant I could reach the deep layer, right?

And since the number of attempts seemed practically unlimited, there were countless ways to try.

"No, maybe I should stop making these.”

I released about 10 flying fish I had made and this time started creating different sea creatures instead.

If there were just a few, it would be fine, but handling 100 creatures at once was troublesome.

If possible, it would be better if at least some of them could survive the pressure without my protection. So, recalling from memory, I began creating a variety of different sea creatures.

Jellyfish, turtles, pufferfish… Before long, instead of deep-sea creatures, it ended up being mostly ordinary fish.

'For some reason, I don’t feel like making those things.'

Well, anyone who wants to recreate those deep-sea monsters while living here is probably insane.

Soon, the sea was filled with far more variety than when it was just flying fish.

For this attempt, I decided not to protect any of them from pressure and instead observe which ones survived the longest. And with that, I created the 100th lifefrom.

[Grrrugh—]

The moment I did, the lizard appeared again.

Ignoring it, I focused on observing the creatures I had made.

The first to die were, as expected, the flying fish. They were crushed the moment the pressure rose even slightly.

Next were the puffer fish. Then the lobsters. Then the anglerfish…

One by one, they were crushed.

Surprisingly, the last one left alive was a roughly made jellyfish.

Even as it looked like it might burst at any moment, it endured, right up until the moment the lizard died.

Thinking it was impressive, I waited for the pressure to return to normal.

But even after several minutes, the intensified pressure didn’t subside.

"...?"

The lizard’s corpse, which should have disappeared, also remained.

It began moving somewhere as if it were meant to.

Closely watching it, I finally realized it was sinking.

There was now a clear distinction between up and down.

...Did I pass the test? Thinking that, I followed the corpse, but nothing really changed.

It just kept sinking endlessly, with no visible end.

Still, a change in this situation was a good sign.

"So that’s how it works, huh?”

I didn’t know what exactly it was trying to test, but I understood the method.

You create deep-sea creatures, then a land creature is dropped into this place, and the pressure increases.

If even one of the lifeforms I created survived that pressure, I would pass.

They were simple rules. I still didn’t understand what it wanted from me, but the rules were clear.

The moment I figured it out, I started creating life again. This time, there was no reaction until I reached 200 jellyfish.

And exactly at the 200th, something different from the lizard fell into the sea.

[Ki–]

It wasn't a fish either. It looked like some kind of cephalopod mixed with a centipede, with about five heads. Its faces were disturbingly human-like.

The creature suffered the moment it fell, but it endured far longer than the lizard.

Even under pressure that crushed all the jellyfish.

"...Damn."

The lizard had probably just been a tutorial to teach the rules of the test.

Even after all the jellyfish died, the centipede thing kept living for quite a while.

I tried forcefully keeping one jellyfish alive, but after the centipede died, when I released it, it immediately burst under the pressure.

Then the pressure weakened again. So artificially keeping them alive didn’t count.

"What do you want me to do?”

Trying to understand the examiner’s intent, it seemed like I was supposed to create stronger deep-sea creatures. Something that could withstand the pressure.

But then why throw in those pitiful land creatures? After thinking it over, I gave up on solving it the conventional way.

The goal was to create a strong deep-sea creature.

I had a way to go about it.

But well, it was slightly underhanded.

*t*t*

The creatures that fell into the Abyssal Sea all had two things in common.

1. They weren’t fish.

2. The longer the test continued, the longer they survived.

I wasn’t sure about the first point, but the second was a serious problem.

The lizard died immediately after falling, thrashing around. The centipede that came after lasted much longer, and the one that appeared after that was able to move around just fine—

And now, it was clearly showing hostility.

[Screeaeeeeek—!!!!]

This time, it was something that couldn’t even be classified as an animal. A massive eyeball covered in writhing black hands—it lashed out wildly.

Its target was obviously me. Even in this Abyssal Sea, its speed was terrifying. Enough to imagine how strong it must have been outside.

But just before those hands could reach me, they trembled and stopped.

The creature glared, trying to understand the unknown force binding it, the water pressure.

Not mine though.

"Worth the blood."

I watched with satisfaction as the various deep-sea creatures, not tinged red, tore the eyeball apart.

There was only one way I knew to create strong deep-sea creatures.

To feed them good things.

In other words, I gave them my blood.

Sometimes, seeing them desperately try to devour me, I even get curious about what I taste like myself. Just how effective was it—?

Seeing how the ones that consumed my blood were naturally using pressure and currents, it was clearly far beyond just effective.

Of course, they endured the pressure just fine.

Now, having created over a thousand lifeforms, I fell into thought.

'So I just keep repeating this?’

A test was supposed to have a purpose.

But right now, I had no idea what qualification this was meant to evaluate.

Still, maybe I’d understand if I kept going.

Thinking that I created the 1000th lifefrom.

"..."

Then a chill ran down my spine.

A familiar sensation tore through my mind. An instinct screaming that I needed to run right now, and a cold, rational voice telling me running would be meaningless twisted together into something deeply unpleasant.

This wasn't something like a centipede, or a lizard, or some unknown creature. This was a real threat.

Something I had expected, at least a little, to encounter in a place like this—

Well, a fragment of it anyway.

[...]

[...]

Unlike the previous ones, it wasn’t alive.

But the deep-sea creatures scattered in fear from that broken piece of a body. They fled as far away as possible from the slowly sinking fragment, bleeding into the sea.

It was the correct reaction. That fragment, No…that leg—

"...An Outer God."

There was no mistaking it.

Its sheer size, enough to make you think it was a sinking continent, and the sensation that made your heart stop.

Only then did part of my confusion clear up.

The purpose of this test.

Why did this place seem so forgiving?

It was because what came next absolutely wouldn’t be.

Why was I given so many chances to retry?

Because soon, a test would come that I could not attempt more than once.

Why did a fragment of an Outer God fall into this place?

— Because next time, it wouldn’t just be a leg.

I clenched my fist and looked upward, toward where it had fallen from.

There was only one question this test was asking.

"...So it wants me to prove it.”

Could you, the one who seeks to reach the place where the Outer Gods dwelled, survive them?

That was all it had ever been asking.