Chapter 247: Chapter 251 “Abyssal Depths
Listening to Tyrion’s narrative, Duncan fell into brief contemplation. Half a minute later, he raised his head and spoke thoughtfully, “So, she initiated a ‘Deep Abyss Project’ to satisfy her own desire for exploration, but the essence of this project isn’t actually about exploring so Subspace, but just… literally ‘diving into deep water’?”
At this, he paused, feeling that sothing was peculiar about the whole affair, “But if that was all, how did Holoss get involved in the project? The Subspace Holoss went to and the deep sea that the Frost Queen wished to explore are two entirely different concepts; surely, the rebels couldn’t have failed to understand that…”
Tyrion didn’t answer directly but instead suddenly posed a question, “Don’t you find it strange? If it’s just about diving into the water to explore the depths near the City-State, what’s so ‘forbidden’ about that? Port builders and nearshore fishern from the City-States often dive into water for work. It’s quite common to dive ten or even dozens of ters in the safe waters. Why has the Frost Queen’s ‘Deep Abyss Project’ beco a taboo?”
Duncan’s gaze grew serious, “…How deep did you dive?”
“Very deep, very deep. I don’t know the exact depth Her Majesty eventually reached because I’m not a scholar myself. I was rely involved as a naval commander and only in so peripheral assistance. Moreover, during the latter part of the plan, I no longer directly participated. But as far as I know, before the project started becoming… ‘wrong,’ their manned subrsible had already reached a depth of at least one thousand ters underwater and was continuously breaking that record.”
One thousand ters underwater…
...
Duncan quickly sorted through his knowledge—on Earth, this seemingly insignificant number is actually the limit of many advanced military submarines, and most military submarines can only dive to four or five hundred ters. As for those “extre deep-dive records” that reach several thousand or even nearly ten thousand ters, they are usually achieved by specially designed deep-diving vessels in a short amount of ti, require extraordinarily high-spec equipnt, and often only unmanned equipnt can be used.
At that ti, the Frost Queen’s manned subrsible had already reached the threshold of “one thousand ters”. Considering the industrial level of half a century ago in this world, even with the assistance of Transcendent powers, this was an astonishing number.
And behind this astonishing number… evidently ca so even more “astonishing” things.
Tyrion had just ntioned that the project started to gradually beco “wrong,” and Duncan hadn’t missed that phrase.
He looked at Tyrion, his expression turning solemn, “I would like to know the details of the entire exploration plan—you tell as much as you participated in.”
Perhaps because he had already answered many questions and had already adjusted to this manner of conversation, Tyrion didn’t hesitate for too long this ti. He fell into his mories and began to speak slowly:
“…Aside from the Frost’s Deep Abyss Project, the recorded conventional diving depth for humans, or what is called ‘safe water depth,’ is one hundred and fifty ters, and it is confined to nearshore areas—our plan also started at this depth, and everything went smoothly until we reached three hundred ters.
“It was already very dark. The sunlight from the surface couldn’t penetrate such a depth of water, and the high-powered lights carried by the subrsible could only illuminate a small area. To explore the ‘appearance’ of the island below the City-State, and to avoid so of the dangerous ‘creatures’ from the far offshore, such as the deep-sea offspring, we directed the subrsible to dive along the coast and move close to the island’s nearshore area. I still rember the scenes described by the explorers when they ca up…
“He said that underneath the island lay a column, ugly and rough, covered with thick calcareous deposits, with so bizarre organisms dwelling in the nooks of the deposits. Besides the ‘column,’ there was nothing else, just pitch darkness.”
“The island underneath is a column?” Duncan couldn’t help interrupting Tyrion, “Not a gradually expanding support structure, but a column?”
“Yes, at least that’s the case with Frost,” Tyrion nodded, “Is there a problem?”
Duncan shook his head, “…No problem, continue.”
Tyrion organized his thoughts and resud his previous recollection, “That was the scene observed at about three hundred ters deep, which was also the limit of the first subrsible. After realizing this depth was far from sufficient to explore the deep sea, the Queen ordered scholars to build a second subrsible. This subrsible was very successful; it plunged straight down to a depth of eight hundred ters. And through the half-ter-thick high-strength glass, the explorers saw… still a column, a perfectly straight column.
“Of course, in comparison to the radius of the City-State itself, this ‘column’ that was at least eight hundred ters long was still very short proportionally. It’s less like a support column and more like a neat disk-shaped base, above which an island was perched.”
“Afterward, we constructed the third subrsible. Because of technological limitations, this subrsible had far fewer improvents than the second one. It had to descend cautiously to challenge the record set by the second subrsible, and it was during this slow, ter-by-ter descent that we discovered sothing.
“The ‘pillar’ beneath the City-State is actually only eight hundred and fifty ters ‘long.’ There’s nothing below that.
“The entire structure is floating in the seawater.”
Tirian paused, then looked up into Duncan’s eyes, “Now you understand why I said earlier that it resembles less a pillar and more like the base of a disc?”
Duncan furrowed his brow tightly. He didn’t speak but swiftly sketched the entire structure in his mind based on Tirian’s description—
People of the deep-sea era “lived” within the City-States, these isolated islands in the sea that initially gave Duncan the impression of being cramped and tiny, but in fact, as functional and self-sustaining living spaces, these City-States were bound to have a substantial “size foundation.” Although there were also so smaller islands, most of the large cities that could be nad had “foundation radii” reaching tens or even dozens of kiloters in size. Frost, once the largest City-State in the Chill Sea, would not be smaller than these figures.
In contrast to this vast sea structure was its underwater “base,” which was “only” eight hundred and fifty ters deep—explorers who first saw parts of the City-State underwater at a depth of three hundred ters and imagined it as a pillar reaching straight “to the seabed”. However, in actual proportions, the “pillar” resembled a thin disc more closely.
The massive City was set atop this “disc.”
Just as Tirian had described: the whole structure was floating in seawater.
But once this model materialized in his mind, Duncan was overwheld with imnse doubt—
Were all City-States like this?
If every City-State was this way, floating without foundations, then how were they so stable? If it was said that the City-States’ “sturdiness” ca from their size, then what about the relative stability between the City-States? How could that be explained?
The waves of the Endless Sea were turbulent, yet these “floating islands” had never changed their positions. Why was that?
Duncan voiced his doubts, but Tirian simply shook his head, “We also wondered about this, but in the end, we couldn’t figure it out, and compared to what happened later… the question of ‘how the City-States float on the sea’ beca irrelevant.”
“What happened later?” Duncan couldn’t help but beco curious, “What happened? What exactly did you see in the deep sea?”
“After that… the third subrsible continued to challenge the depth limits. It took us nearly two years to push the record from eight hundred and fifty ters to nine hundred and fifty ters. As you can imagine, during this descent, the subrsible was gradually moving away from the City-State’s ‘base’—rember what I said at the beginning? To avoid problems in the remote sea areas, we had the subrsible descend in the ‘nearshore safe zone’ close to the coast. Throughout the process, the subrsible was always close to the City-State and its underwater ‘structure.’ But as the descent continued and the explorers moved away from that ‘base,’ things started to go awry.
“Hallucinations, visual and auditory, feelings of inexplicable lights in the sea, the sensation that soone was knocking on the hull, or even turning the handles of valves outside— the deeper it went, the more severe these episodes beca, and even the explorers who underwent special training and had strong will started to feel imnse pressure with each descent while the protective effects of the holy oil, sacred scriptures, and consecrated cloths they carried beca increasingly less evident.
“Of course, up to that point, it was all within our expectations—exploring the unknown always requires facing challenges of the will. Scholars who explore the Spirit Realm and the profound sea areas often encounter these issues, so we continued, only enhancing the explorers’ ntal protection according to the strictest standards.
“The problem happened while attempting to reach one thousand ters from nine hundred and ninety ters.
“The third subrsible suddenly sent out an ergency ascent signal, then, as if mad, it emptied its ballast tanks and rushed to the surface. The explorer inside seed utterly oblivious to the fact that this rapid ascent could take his life. When he surfaced, he had gone mad. As the hatch opened, he scread and shouted in the sun, desperately trying to tell us sothing terrible, but after a torrent of incoherent, jumbled words, he said the only lucid sentence:
“‘We all died there.'”
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