Chapter 732 A Turn of Events <TOC> Chapter 734 Worries
Translator: SumTLMan
“Deputy Captain Helen, what should we do now? These monsters are holding us back, and we can’t get away,” Crew lead Nagi said anxiously. “The sea is still restless, and those evil creatures dare not come out yet. But if we remain stranded, we’ll have no chance.”
“What do you want me to do now?” Helen gritted her teeth. “First, let’s put all our effort into cutting these damned vines!”
Everyone knew that as mere mortals, they had little chance against these unnatural beings.
“Damn it, the vines have wrapped around the mast!” Just as the words were spoken, the ship trembled violently, accompanied by a loud noise. Helen looked back in shock to see a mast at the rear of the ship toppled down, crashing into the sea and causing huge waves.
“It’s over,” Helen muttered.
The faces of everyone on board were grim. With the mast broken, it was nearly impossible for them to set sail again. Repairing it would be their only hope, but looking around at the dark sea, the eerie vines, and the ever-present chill in the air, could they really repair the ship in such conditions?
The answer was no.
In the face of everyone’s despair, Captain Alvin stepped forward. His expression was grave, but at least he wasn’t completely disheartened.
Alvin: “Don’t worry about these things. Focus on clearing the vines. At the very least, we need to hold out until Sir Pat arrives.”
With renewed hope, the crew began to struggle against the vines once more, believing that the wise Sir Pat would surely find a way. Helen and Alvin exchanged glances. Could Sir Pat survive the onslaught of thirteen enemies? It was uncertain.
Even if he survived, could he find them in time and save them? That answer was even more unlikely.
All they could do now was keep their crew from losing hope completely. But they both knew deep down that their prospects were bleak, and hope was faint.
Helen closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “It will get better, everyone. Don’t give up! After we’ve driven away the vines, we’ll start repairing the ship when daylight comes!”
“Understood!” The sailors shouted in unison.
Clearing the vines was no easy task, as they seemed to have a life of their own and possessed incredible strength. All they could do was use their agility to hack away at them.
Although the vines would lose their vitality once cut, they soon discovered that as the ship was pulled towards the island, more and more vines seemed to appear, like endless weeds that grew back as soon as they were cut.
Moreover, the surrounding dense darkness and deathly aura continuously sapped their willpower. Towards the end, even though they continued to hack away with their swords, their faces grew stiffer, paler, and more listless.
Helen and Alvin both belonged to the kind of people with an extremely strong will. They were able to maintain their faith without being corroded, but seeing the expressions of the people around them, they couldn’t help but despair: “This is one of the most dangerous seas… Can we really survive?”
Even as they began to doubt themselves, the vines around the ship became more brazen.
A vine, larger and thicker than before, suddenly rose high, and wrapped itself around the crow’s nest in full view of everyone.
The crow’s nest was located on the ship’s main mast! If anything happened to the main mast, it would be enough to smash the entire ship!
“No!” Helen screamed.
But the vine wouldn’t understand the meaning of others, directly coiling its long tail, and with a “crack” sound, the main mast broke in the middle and fell towards the deck.
At this moment, Helen and Alvin were both on the deck, and the shadow of the falling main mast had already enveloped them.
“This is really the end…” Memories of the past years flashed through Helen’s mind: approaching middle age, all alone, all her memories were at sea, and in the end, she would be buried at sea. It seemed like her destiny.
The last thing that flashed through Helen’s mind was a lazy middle-aged man.
“Sir Pat… I’m sorry, I didn’t fulfill my promise.” Helen whispered softly, a crystal-clear tear slipping gently from the corner of her eye.
With a loud noise, everything around her suddenly became silent.
“Is it over? So, am I dead now?” Helen thought to herself, but she didn’t seem to feel any pain.
Helen tried to open her eyes, a faint hazy light flickering in front of her.
When she came to her senses, she found that Alvin, the captain, was holding a lantern with glowing stones, shining on her.
She looked around and found herself still on the deck, and the expressions of the sailors nearby suddenly became lively from their previous stiffness.
“I’m not dead? What happened?” Helen whispered doubtfully.
“Sir Pat saved us.” Alvin’s eyes were filled with excited tears, “He came to our rescue, and we are saved!”
Upon hearing this, Helen quickly looked up.
Under the dark clouds, a giant beast with a flaming tail was hovering in the sky. Every time it flapped its huge wings, flames would scatter, burning the nearby vines; and those flames seemed to be conscious, not touching the Cloud Conch at all.
“This giant beast… it looks like that… seabird?” Helen still remembered not long ago, when they parted with Sir Pat, the seabird flew into the sky and directly transformed into this half-eagle, half-lion flaming sky beast.
Helen raised her hand to shield the hair flowing across her forehead and took a closer look.
On the back of the giant beast, a man who seemed to emit flames all over his body was no longer his usual lazy self, and with a wave of his hand, the pitch-black, foul-smelling vines all turned to ashes.
At this moment, Helen, like Alvin, had tears slowly filling her eyes.
Sir Pat had once again pulled them back from the abyss of death, and this kindness would likely never be forgotten by any of them in their lifetime.
As the flames surrounding the Cloud Conch dissipated and no vines dared to appear within a hundred meters, Angel slowly descended from the sky.
With a sound like rubber expanding, “puff,” accompanied by thick white smoke, Toby transformed from the “Griffin of Fury” into a soft, adorable little seabird in an instant.
Seemingly uncomfortable without clothes, Toby immediately burrowed into Angel’s chest pocket. When it flew out again, it was wearing a cow costume — this was also something Angel had crafted on a whim during these days, complete with magical runes for dust and waterproofing.
After praising Toby in a low voice, Angel turned to look at the Cloud Conch, which was in complete disarray.
“In the blink of an eye, it seems a lot has happened,” Angel sighed and approached Helen, whose eyes were shimmering with tears.
Not knowing if it was guilt, remorse, or some other emotion, Helen lowered her head and whispered softly, “Sir, I have disappointed you.”
Angel waved his hand, not saying anything, and instead asked Captain Alvin, “This sea area isn’t Summer Dew Ridge, is it?”
Alvin shook his head helplessly, “The hurricane changed direction halfway through. We didn’t catch the wind to Summer Dew Ridge, but were blown into another sea area instead…”
At this point, everyone around, whether it was Helen or the sailors, showed a gloomy expression.
“Where are we?”
Alvin hesitated for a moment, and his quivering lips uttered a name.
“Sea of Ghosts?” Angel turned his head, looking towards the dark depths of the small island. The malicious gazes had not disappeared due to Toby’s previous fire but had grown more numerous.
At this moment, crew lead Nagi suddenly shouted, “The hurricane is completely gone, and the waves on the sea have stopped!”
With the emergence of this statement, a white figure emitting a pale light suddenly burst out from the island amidst the darkness. A terrifying face, with pale eyes, stared at the Cloud Conch.
Was this… a ghost?!
Not just one, but an entire island of ghosts floated out one after another. If viewed from above, the pale white orbs looked like fireflies, even somewhat beautiful. But up close, one could feel the terrifying cold wind and the malicious thoughts that made people lose their minds.
Facing the seemingly endless swarm of ghosts, the sailors on the ship all showed expressions of horror, shivering with fear. Helen also gulped nervously. She remembered that Sir Roman had once said that these mindless, bloodthirsty beings called ghosts were terrifying creatures even he couldn’t handle.
If Sir Roman couldn’t deal with these ghosts, and there were more than one of them—countless ghosts as far as the eye could see—Helen felt dizzy, having just escaped the jaws of danger, only to find herself plunged into an even more terrifying abyss.
Was it their destiny to fall here today?
At that moment, a cold, clear voice suddenly sounded, “It seems we’ve arrived at an extraordinary place.”
Helen quickly turned her head. The speaker was none other than Sir Pat by her side. For some reason, Helen could detect a hint of excitement in his words.
“My Sir, these are not ordinary souls; they are ghosts. What should we do now?” Helen tentatively asked.
Angel leaped to the bow of the ship, gazing at the ghosts that flickered like phosphorescent lights, the corner of his mouth curling up in a smile. “It’s perfect that they’re not souls! Ghosts? I just happen to need some ghost resources. If they were souls, I wouldn’t even know what to do with them.”
Angel threw the hunchbacked man onto the deck. “Toby, you watch this guy. I’ll take care of these ghosts.”
With that, Angel pulled the Prelude of Death from his bracelet and aimed it at a group of nearby ghosts.
The ghosts seemed to sense that the humans in front of them were preparing to attack them. Originally planning to slowly devour these unexpected prey, they couldn’t hold back any longer. They let out a furious roar, their white eyes surrounded by vein-like patterns, and screamed with a chilling, horrifying sound.
The people on the ship immediately showed signs of dizziness.
Angel seemed completely unaffected, aiming at the ghosts and firing a shot.
It was as if ripples appeared in the air, extending outward. Before the ghosts could react, nearly a dozen of them turned into wisps of smoke and disappeared.
By this time, Helen had somewhat regained her composure. She saw this scene unfolding outside, her eyes wide with astonishment.
Didn’t Sir Roman say that even he would have difficulty dealing with these ghosts? Why, under Sir Pat’s attack, were these ghosts effortlessly dispatched like cutting grass, without the strength to fight back?
Could it be… that Sir Pat is actually much more powerful than Sir Roman?
Helen suddenly remembered that not long after setting sail, she had inadvertently learned Sir Roman’s evaluation of Sir Pat: useless.
Now that she thought about it, wasn’t he the one who was actually useless?
While Helen was lost in her thoughts, the sailors around her began to cheer. They had initially believed they were doomed, but it turned out that these ghosts were nothing in the face of Angel. Their spirits, which had plummeted, soared once more, even more excited than when they were first rescued!
Helen looked back and saw that Sir Pat seemed to have become addicted to the slaughter. In a short time, he had killed hundreds of ghosts, still unsatisfied. He wielded a strange weapon and charged directly into the pile of ghosts.
As he killed the ghosts, his weapon also unleashed a massive burst of flames, scorching the foul-smelling vines.
The blaze was dazzling, the sound of gunfire deafening.
As everyone was still immersed in this masculine romanticism, Angel had already returned to the side of the ship.