Beginning with the Ubume Bird-Chapter 528 - 24: Bottomless Abyss (Part 1)

Woo Woo Woo~

The chimney spewed thick black smoke as a steamer with a natural wood hue floated on the water’s surface.

Named the Dans, this paddle steamer frigate boasted 350 kilowatts of power and a cruising speed of 15 knots. It belonged to the Flang Machinery Fishing Company and was usually used for hunting catfish, transporting them to a cannery for sale. But today, the sailors aboard the Dans faced a bit of trouble.

"Heave!"

Five or six sailors shouted as they tugged at the deep blue giant net. The water under the net roiled incessantly. Finally, a blue-green Pig Dragon, trapped tightly and over two meters long, broke through the surface, clawing and flashing its teeth through the net at the sailors on the ship.

Just as the Pig Dragon was about to be hoisted from the water, a sudden wave crashed over, rocking the boat and throwing the sailors off balance. The Pig Dragon rolled, dragging the net with it, and vanished beneath the surface, not to be seen again.

The captain, with his pipe in mouth, frustratedly removed his hat’s brim and cursed vehemently, "It’s that damn thing again."

Throughout the entire day, the Dans caught only a scattering of juvenile fish. The usually plump and lively catfish swarms that thrived in this season had inexplicably disappeared.

Out of ten attempts to cast the net, seven or eight resulted in catching these strange, hefty crocodiles. Initially, the sailors thought they were just ordinary Mississippi crocodiles, but they soon realized something was amiss.

Firstly, these blue-green crocodiles had no webbing between their toes, and they were fast and cunning in movement. The ship’s nets could hardly contain them; they repeatedly bit through the Dans’ fishing nets, causing the company to suffer significant losses.

And before today, the captain of the Dans could swear he had never seen such odd crocodiles before, but overnight, these blue-green behemoths had taken over the entire river basin.

This would be a catastrophic blow to Flang Machinery Fishing Company, no, to the entire fishing industry of San Francisco!

"Perhaps I should consider a change of career,"

said the captain with grizzled temples and a wry smile.

Suddenly, burbling bubbles surfaced on the river, accompanied by a hissing strange sound.

A thick jet of foul blood spewed forth like a fountain; the Pig Dragon’s hollow eye sockets surfaced, followed by its blood-stained ghastly white bones. On closer inspection, several hand-sized, copper-green strange fish, no thicker than half a finger, were clamped tightly onto the bones.

The strange fish were copper green all over, with a streak of blood on their underbellies. Even though the Pig Dragon was picked clean of flesh, the strange fish continued gnawing tenaciously at the bare Dragon Bones, seemingly trying to suck out the marrow. The hissing sounds were from these fish gnawing on the bones.

The old captain frowned, he had just picked up the telescope from around his neck, when suddenly, the river’s surface erupted like a boiling pot, spewing bubbles everywhere. One after another, the white bones of Pig Dragons floated up, filling the river channel, creating a spectacular scene.

"My God..."

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No sooner had Dorothy left in a disheveled state than Cha Xiaodao swaggered in, teasing Li Yan, "What’s ’Don Juan’? You sell CDs and you understand plays?"

"Eavesdropping?"

Li Yan picked up a piece of a broken mirror from the ground and held it in his hand, thoughtful.

"I was just standing outside; you all talk so loud. Should I go deaf just to avoid being accused of eavesdropping?"

Li Yan’s smile faded, and he spoke earnestly, "Xiaodao, be cautious these days."

"What’s up?"

Li Yan shook his head, "Hard to say, my eyelids won’t stop twitching. Just be alert. We can’t stay here much longer, and we don’t need any more trouble."

"When is it ever not you who causes the trouble?"

Cha Xiaodao was unconvinced.

Li Yan was about to say something more when he suddenly experienced a bout of shortness of breath.

A wail like thunder exploded in his mind, the voice of the Pig Dragon King.

"Lord Governor, save me!"

Li Yan looked up, "Found it."

"A crack at the bottom of the river?"

Cha Xiaodao also felt a surge of excitement.

"You can’t make full use of your abilities in the river, why not wait here for my news?"

With seven tenths of Cha Xiaodao’s skills pertaining to flames, asking him to go underwater was indeed troubling for him.

"Alright, be extra careful—if you get driven back to Yan Fu, I’ll take care of the rest for you."

Both men carried the Summoning Gold Medallion on them, so there wasn’t a large chance of life-threatening danger. That’s why Cha Xiaodao could joke around with Li Yan so casually.

"Keep an eye on Dorothy; she should be delivering the book this afternoon. Also, take good care of Chang Yu, we’ll talk when I return."

Li Yan was always quick to act. As soon as he saw Cha Xiaodao nod to indicate there was no problem, he drained the teapot and immediately set off for the riverbank.

The dark riverbed of the Mississippi River, not quite ten meters deep on average from the surface, was filled with rugged huge rocks, but no fish were to be seen, making it appear lifeless and desolate.

The mud and sand at the bottom were loose, and the footprints Li Yan left were quite obvious. Suddenly, when Li Yan stepped down, he felt a brittle sensation. A white feeding appendage burst out from the mud, snapping shut and tightly grasping his foot, pulling him vehemently into the sand!

Li Yan’s gaze hardened, and the surrounding water rippled. When the appendage couldn’t pull him any further, a jet stream of pure black Disaster Water formed into a sharp arrow, and surged down into the feeder that had grasped his foot.

In about four to five seconds, the pulling force relaxed, and Li Yan, with the water rippling underfoot, surged forward. The appendage, sticking to his shoe, dragged out a ten-meter-long, white segmented worm’s corpse from the mud, its flesh completely corroded by the Disaster Water, leaving only its intact shell which, surprisingly, still looked somewhat delicate.

Having killed the white worm, Li Yan glanced at the soles of his feet. The "Stubborn thousand-layer sole" boots had been pierced with several large holes by the feeding appendage and were no longer wearable.

"What rotten luck," Li Yan cursed inwardly.

For the current Li Yan, who could briefly hover in the air or create glaciers to push off from, the boots had lost most of their value. But even a mosquito’s leg is still meat, and no one would be in good spirits after such an attack.

The sharp feeding appendage of the worm he had just encountered could penetrate flesh instantly, and its pulling force was strong enough to topple a racing shark. Such an exaggeratedly strange creature was something Li Yan had not encountered before and should not be here.

Along the way, Li Yan occasionally saw the newly-cleaned bones of Pig Dragons, which, upon their arrival, had been fiercely invulnerable, unable to find a natural predator in this river region.

Clearly, the release of the Pig Dragon King by Li Yan triggered some terrifying changes.

As a Water Lord Species, the Pig Dragon King communicated telepathically with Li Yan. Following the Pig Dragon King’s calls for help, Li Yan finally arrived at a forest of reefs where the remaining herd of Pig Dragons was taking refuge.

The Pig Dragon King, with a body that could change in size and now four meters long, was deep red in color. It was almost eaten halfway through, missing the bones of its front and hind legs on one end, with countless tiny wounds on its body trembling and gaping in the water. The Pig Dragon offspring around it were all severely injured. Even the two golden Pig Dragons he had brought from the Yellow Sea had one dead, while the other was barely alive, its eyes dull and lifeless.

"Lord Governor, you have to take charge for me! Waaaah!"