Oceanos exchanged glances, and then Parang stood up.
She was heading to get what was needed to find the Titan.
“I’ll get it. Wait a moment.”
Parang quietly made her way to the most secluded room on the first floor.
When she opened the door, a long staircase leading down appeared, ending with another door.
Parang grabbed the doorknob after descending the stairs.
A rushing sound of water could be heard from beyond.
As she opened the door, a strong smell of fish hit her from the dim underground room.
Simultaneously, the sound of rushing water grew louder.
Feeling along the wall, she flipped the switch, and a massive aquarium appeared.
It was a structure that continuously circulated seawater.
Parang cleansed all the other aquariums in the house herself, but this one was different.
She hated this space. Just having such a place in her home made her uncomfortable, so she shoved it into the darkest, least noticeable corner.
She dove into the tank.
Inside were eight human-sized statues with heads, arms, and legs broken off, tightly bound, leaving only the torsos.
After hoisting one onto her shoulder, she came back out.
When she returned to the living room, everyone in Oceanos was ready to dive.
They lined up at the dock right in front of Parang’s house.
“Let’s go.”
All six of them dove into the sea simultaneously, moving in perfect unison.
It was a flawless dive, with barely a ripple breaking the surface.
For some reason, the face of a precious comrade who always dove alongside them flickered in front of Parang.
Splash—! Shua—…
The refreshing feel of the seawater enveloped Parang’s entire body.
The sensation of her air-borne self sinking into the water.
The exhilarating rush of coolness.
That’s why Parang loved to dive.
However, at this moment, she couldn’t entirely enjoy the sensation.
It was partly because she was carrying a statue the size of a person on her back, and partly due to the complicated feelings swirling in her mind.
Parang watched as Diego’s entire body was covered by a decompression suit.
It appeared, as if from a movie, like a nano suit; a black mass materialized from nothing and transformed into the thick suit enveloping his body.
After about thirty seconds, Diego’s familiar appearance underwater came into view.
“Let’s go.”
“Okay.”
They dove deeper and deeper.
Their destination was the toothpaste tube objet where Parang first spotted the Titan.
Given the circumstances, they swam down in silence.
“Ah, there it is.”
Before long, the toothpaste tube objet revealed itself before them.
Current depth: 2.1 km underwater.
A bright inner glow shimmered from within.
Probably a mediocre Monster Fish made its nest inside.
Elvira snapped her fingers, and a magnificent explosion erupted from inside the object.
Inside, parts of the Monster Fish, along with gunpowder, would be scattering everywhere.
It wasn’t Okeanos’s egg.
They went further down, deeper still.
The difference from earlier was that this time they were looking directly down as they descended vertically.
At 2.7 km depth.
The deep blue void that had filled their vision was fading, replaced by darkness.
It was the floor. The bottom of the East Sea.
Footprints were imprinted there.
Things unimaginably large and heavy had crushed the floor, etching enormous footprints.
Centered around the largest footprint were noticeably smaller footprints—four in total.
That’s what could be seen from above.
If they went lower, they would likely find more tiny footprints and even smaller human-sized ones piled around.
That’s right.
The Star-Titudes travel in groups.
Usually, a Magnus, about 100 meters tall, plays the leader role, and Mediums, around 10 meters tall, along with human-sized Parbums, form the group.
And a Titan, about 1 km tall, leads a few Magnuses.
It said that under the Titan Parang saw that day, there must’ve been hundreds of small Star-Titudes.
Looking at the direction they were heading, it was towards the west.
That’s where the Titan was.
Okeanos moved again.
#
How much time had passed?
The footprints that had been leading west suddenly stopped.
Where there should have been footprints, only a round and bizarre pattern remained, evoking thoughts of a mystery circle.
It was a sign they had arrived.
Parang set down the headless statue she had been carrying on her back.
Thud, crack.
A slight crack appeared on the ground.
As expected, it was a subdued Parbum entity.
While it may be called subdued, it was merely a mindless bundle tied up with its limbs and head cut off.
Throughout the journey here, it had struggled so much that Parang’s shoulders ached.
Okeanos had found through various trials that Star-Titudes summon nearby Star-Titudes when destroyed.
To be more precise, one could say they “awaken” them.
“…I’ll start.”
“…Okay.”
Parang was already in her transformed state thanks to her personal activation.
Calling for the Kraken wouldn’t do any good, but it greatly enhanced the power of her other skills.
She wrapped water around her hand, forming a water bomb, and placed it against the Parbum’s sternum.
Womp—!!!
In less than a second, about ten explosions occurred in succession.
The Parbum’s body disintegrated in an instant, scattering everywhere.
Pieces, or rather, shards would be the correct term.
Sharp fragments flew in all directions, showering Okeanos, yet they merely stared at Parang without blinking.
Thud— Thump— Bang—
The pieces that seemed capable of slicing through a human body and turning it into chopped meat, instead bounced off as if hitting elastic and sturdy rubber.
And then, BOOM!
With the final explosion, a red aura burst from the Parbum.
In Parang’s hand was now a blood-red gemstone.
The surrounding fragments had long since vanished.
As Parang casually tossed the gemstone to the ground, a skeleton doll crawled out from the earth, grabbed it, and disappeared somewhere.
And right as it disappeared with the gemstone, the ground began to tremble.
Rumble, rumble, rumble.
Of course, it wasn’t an earthquake.
It was the sounds of things crawling up.
From down below.
From the abyss of the deep sea.
Parang’s expression hardened.
Everyone’s expression hardened.
The Titan they were about to break now was the ninth Titan they had hunted.
The emptiness felt after already breaking eight Titans had been felt by them throughout their entire bodies.
They had smashed, crushed, and melted away each of them.
But they couldn’t even find the shadow of a precious comrade who had been dragged down underwater by the Titan.
One by one, as each Titan faded away, terrible pain swept over them.
Emptiness, disappointment, futility, despair, sorrow.
And a longing that pierced to the bone.
They understood that hoping meant nothing.
So they packaged their expectations in anger.
‘Even if we break this Titan, Alice won’t come back.’
‘I’ve come down here for revenge.’
‘The feelings churning in my heart right now are anger and determination.’
However, no matter how much they tried to package their emotions, no matter how much they tried to lock them away deep in their hearts.
Standing here on this trembling ground, a single sentence crawled up from the depths of consciousness and revealed itself.
‘This time, perhaps.’
They might find a trace of her.
And so, once again, they would take down the Titan.
They would flail against the returning emptiness and longing.
And if the next Titan appeared, they would leap into the sea after it.
Everyone knows this is a meaningless act.
They all understand they will face only pain, with no reward.
However, the option of ‘giving up’ has long since been erased from their minds.
Since the moment Alice left them in that manner, they had only one choice remaining.
To sorrowfully wail and stir up this damned wide sea.
This was the reason why none of them hesitated to leap into this treacherous ocean,
And the reason all of Okeanos could remain so tightly connected.
So this time too, with unseen tears streaming down, they plunged into the sea.
Once again, as they smash that monster, maybe this time
the trace of their missing comrade will finally appear.
Unable to erase such thoughts from their minds.
Creeping— creaking—
Grasp!!!
A white arm burst through from behind Parang, breaking through the ground.
Smooth, solid, heavy white rock.
It crawled up as if it were in the prologue of a zombie movie.
Accompanying such a deadly movement, an expressionless statue emerged—truly bizarre.
Parang placed her hand on the Parbum’s chest as it pushed its upper body above ground, attempting to extricate its lower half.
BOOM!!!
It exploded just the same, fading away into light.
The ground began to tremble with even greater ferocity than before.
Now was when the real beginning was.
Crack, snap, creak, creak.
Countless statues began to crawl up from the ground.
Some were large, some small, and some were so massive they couldn’t be captured in a single glance.
Okeanos quietly glared at those cursed entities.
They couldn’t see each other’s eyes, but they knew.
The gaze of the comrades standing beside them mirrored their own perfectly.
…The battle had begun.
