Chapter 550: Return 2

Lightning sparked in the dark, cloud-laden sky, and a red comet fell towards the ground with its long, long tail. This meteor was too small and too weak, so nobody could have noticed it at all.

The meteor pierced through the clouds amidst the clapping of thunder, rushing into an estate on the earth, that was what had once been the Vanderman Estate.

Barroom!!

With a clap of thunder, everything in front of him vanished in an instant.

Garen's eyes went black, and he was suddenly no longer standing in the forest town from before.

In the next instant, it was as though he was being yanked by an unbelievably huge force, his whole person turning into a blood-red meteor, flying into the sky of the inner world from the surface of the ground.

Red flames burned around his body, forming a thin layer. Looking down through the layer, the ground became further and further, smaller and smaller.

The Door to Heaven in the sky became larger and larger, closer and closer. The pitch-black mirror surface in the center was like a huge mouth of darkness, as though waiting to swallow him up.

But strangely, a sense of familiarity surged into Garen's heart.

He paused, giving up the energy he had gathered in order to struggle and escape, and instead felt that familiar sense closely.

"The Black Smoke Pot...:"

That was the feeling he had when he was leaving, pushed out of the Secret Technique World by the terrifying force of the volcano.

Everything changed so fast, that it was like a dream.

From meeting the Divine God Palace Master, to the sudden change in the inner world now, Garen was completely not mentally prepared for any of it.

Whoosh!

In an instant, the meteor shot into the Door to Heaven.

Instantly, everything around Garen turned completely pitch-black, there was no light whatsoever, when he turned around to look, there was not even the Door to Heaven's white light, it was equally nothing but endless darkness there.

His whole body was covered by a crimson-red flame. That flame seemed to be coming from inside his own body, gentle and warm.

The darkness around him slowly changed, turning into the limitless and vast starry space.

Countless silver twinkling stars were scattered all over the universe, and the nearer blue and white planets flew past him quickly like bowling balls.

Garen could feel his speed pick up, becoming faster and faster. The blue stars around him all had long silver threads behind them, brushing past him constantly.

He had actually been sent straight out of the planet by the Door to Heaven, and under its immense protection, he was sent flying alone in an unknown direction. It was all happening so fast, much faster than even when he arrived.

Countless stars twinkled and flowed past him, the time passing slowly.

After goodness knows how long, Garen suddenly saw a pale blue planet ahead of him grow closer and closer, becoming larger and larger. Soon, it took up his entire field of vision.

The planet was being magnified in front of his eyes at a high speed, and just ahead was the pale blue ozone layer, just as the red meteor that was Garen nearly touched the ozone layer, a pitch-black whirlpool suddenly appeared in front of him, swallowing him directly.

The whirlpool rapidly vanished, and the universe continued on as though nothing had ever happened.

*******************

Between two of the three continents, the Fivestar Continent and the Azure Continent, on an unknown stretch of sea.

A scarlet-red meteor appeared in the air above the ocean as though it had teleported there.

Boom!!

A wave several tens of meters tall suddenly erupted in the middle of the big blue sea.

The white pillar of waves rose high into the air, and then scattered down with a whoosh.

A ton of seawater was spinning, forming a huge deep-blue whirlpool that was several hundred meters deep.

In the middle of the whirlpool, a tall and lean blonde-haired man was standing above the water's surface quietly, his eyes closed tightly, his arms lightly drawing a circle around him.

The deep-blue walls of the whirlpool around him abruptly reached out two tentacles of water that looked like snakes, twining gently around his waist, and lifting him up lightly.

The deep-blue whirlpool shattered explosively, a large current of water surging out to form a wave several meters wide, surfing under the figure's feet and using the momentum of the whirlpool to take him towards the distant sea.

Just then, Garen's eyes were closed, and he was rapidly checking the side effects of this journey through space. His attribute pane was clearly showing the changes in his body's condition right now.

Compared to the last time, when his body had been destroyed in the flames, this time, with the help of the Door to Heaven taking the initiative to send him off, as well as his power being much stronger than it was before, he had somehow only sustained extremely light injuries. His organs had internal bleeding to different degrees, but after channeling his secret technique for a bit, these wounds had been completely frozen up.

Opening his eyes abruptly, Garen looked at this blue ocean far, far away, from a distance.

Everything was an endless sea of deep-blue, but in the direction of the ocean surface that Garen was looking it, there seemed to be a hint of a white dot.

It was a white cruise ship, a steel cruiser!

There were even words printed on the side of the cruise: Fivestar Continent General Merchant's Alliance, Farsea Company.

Those were the Weisman words that Garen was absolutely familiar with.

In that instant, the images from back then appeared in Garen's brain one by one, the ambitious Weisman Empire had set a trap for the peak-level elite fighters who entered the Black Smoke Pot Island, and eventually released that terrifying explosive that seemed to be an atomic bomb.

The Immortal Palace, Behemoth Gate, the Number One Divine Warrior...

The memories and images were flashed past Garen's eyes like a temporary illusion.

His figure moved, falling into the water, and rapidly swimming towards the steel cruise ship.

********************

On the white cruise ship

Lindsay Whitman hugged a novel about legendary figures as she yawned out of boredom, leaning on the rails by the side of the ship, she yanked her hair that was growing longer, her long dark brown hair gone from ear-length to falling over her shoulders, flying messily in the sea breeze and irritating her.

The high noon sun was rather piercing to the eyes, but felt warm and cozy on the skin, making her whole body feel relaxed and comfortable.

She was only twelve years old, but she followed her father out to sea a lot, sailing the seas between the Azure Continent and the Fivestar Continent, selling all sorts of ceramics, silks and tea leaves for the company. Ever since her mother died in an accident when she was three, she had been living her life on cruise ships.

On the wavy white ship deck, several sailors were carrying large buckets of water and washing the floor.

This was the stern of the ship, and underwind as well, so the sea breeze blowing from ahead brought with it the aroma of fragrant and spicy stir-fried squid.

Lindsay could not help but swallow some saliva.

She wanted to resist her hunger, but her saliva kept coming, making her empty stomach feel all the hungrier.

She was not pretty, and she had bad skin, her features coming from her ship captain of an old man, so she had thick brows and large eyes, thick lips and a short nose, with none of a girl's gentle beauty. Her figure was not nice either, slightly chubby around her waist, and her skin was absolutely dark, after so long living on the sea, all her skin had been baked into a glowing dark brown color, although it looked healthy, it was nothing like that fair silkiness she desired for so much.

"Excuse me." Suddenly, a clear man's voice came from behind her.

Lindsay instantly turned around, and as soon as she saw the person behind her, the pupils in her eyes dilated rapidly.

This person was completely soaked from head to toe, and was clambering over the railing to climb onboard from the side of the ship, all his clothes were completely dripping wet, and plastered tight to his skin. Even more strangely, there was some seaweed left on his body.

"Y-y-y-y-you..." Lindsay felt her voice shaking, but she could not control herself. She pointed at the other person, her whole body shaking.

This was the deep sea! The deep sea!!!

There was not even an abandoned island without several thousand nautical miles of here, and even sailing alone, it would take more than ten days before they saw any land! More than ten days before seeing land! What did that mean?

Wasn't this deep sea area a part of the ocean that you could see either whales or sharks, either sharks or eels, and nothing at all else?

Oh! My God! Could this be the legendary humanoid sea monster? Humanoid sea monster!? How could I have stumbled across one of those legendarily terrifying things, wasn't that something only the main characters in those legends came across? Without a world-ending divine weapon, or a super precious sword, anybody who met one of these would die without a question!

Wait! What if this wasn't a sea monster, but was instead a fairy tale mermaid prince? She wouldn't be that unlucky, would she?!! They said mermaid princes loved eating children under the age of fifteen the most, and they would skewer them with iron poles, eating one in each bite, and usually putting away more than twenty a day...

It's over... it's over, it's all over...

"Excuse me..." Garen looked at the little girl in front of him, watching her face go green and then white, and was suddenly slightly confused. "Could you lend me a set of clothes? I'm a traveler who got in trouble, the passenger vessel I took from Stonecliff Continent was in a storm, and I was tossed overboard, thank goodness I met you guys."

The little girl pointed at him woodenly, her chest rising and falling drastically, but when she heard these words, she finally recovered her senses.

Phew...

She released a long breath.

"So you're a traveler who got thrown overboard... You... you scared the heck out of me... Don't you know that climbing up the side of someone's ship suddenly from the middle of the sea isn't something just anyone can do?"

"Sorry, my young friend, I gave you a scare." Garen smiled apologetically.

His aura as an upper-level noble from the Totem World, as well as his own beautiful looks and behavior, made Lindsay's heart skip a beat.

He spoke very good Weisman, it was just that his vocabulary was slightly outdated here and there, sounding slightly awkward and unnatural, but that gave this man an even stranger sense of charisma.

"Are you a Grandmaster of Combat?"

"Grandmaster of Combat?" Garen paused slightly, it had been a long time since he heard this term, and he felt something strange yet familiar surge into his heart.

The other crew members had also noticed the situation over here by now, and more than ten crew members dressed in white who were nearby picked up their weapons and started surrounding them. Their expression all held a slight wariness and caution.

The weapons they held in their hands included shovels, harpoons, large webs, but were mostly long silver machetes and fish guns.

"Lindy! You come over here first!"

A sailor with a large beard yelled towards Lindsay. His gaze on Garen was extremely nervous and wary, as though he was not seeing a person, but a terrifying ocean beast.

More crew members surged out of a tower in the distance, and they surrounded a middle-aged man in black clothes and a round cap, that person was holding an intricate silver handgun, his expression dark as he jogged over to them.

"Don't worry, I have no ill intentions." Garen smiled as he raised both hands. "I'm just a traveler who was thrown overboard, I floated for several days before I was just lucky enough to encounter your ship."

Just then, some of the other passengers onboard the ship also came out of their cabins, watching the action from afar.