I Became an Evolving Deep-Sea Creature Chapter 127

Chapter 127. The Northern Village

He briefly considered yanking the spear out right away, but then changed his plan, deciding it would be better to face whoever was responsible and punch them once.

Since he had stopped by the Arctic for the first ti in a while, he had also planned to explore the Frost Dragon Mountains.

But before that, he would have to deal with this ice pillar. Yul sent a signal through Communion to Lucian below.

Wouldn’t it be enough to block the dripping blue liquid before it touched the air?

Yul extended his Telekinesis toward the falling liquid.

‘Hm?’

It didn’t move at all. It seed that a completely different force was interfering.

Looks like I’ll have to handle it myself.

When he brought one of his fins close to the liquid from above, the fin froze solid on the spot.

Before he could even feel pain, it had already frozen stiff. When Yul tore off the tip of the fin with his own strength, it snapped off like a falling icicle.

‘That hurts. This won’t work from above. I’ll deal with the ice pillar falling below.’

He manipulated the upper part of the falling ice pillar with Telekinesis and cleared it away.

‘This isn’t ordinary ice. Sacred power is imbued in it.’

Whoever had made it, the power within was trendous.

A massive floating stone hanging in the air, bleeding ultracold blue blood. And a spear made of frost driven into it.

Yul beca curious about what on earth had happened in the Arctic during that ti. It also gave him one more reason to see the face of whoever had started this trouble.

Down below, Lucian soon noticed that the ice pillars falling from the sky were scattering to the sides, leaving a clear gap in the middle.

“Over there!”

“No pillars are falling over there!”

As the sailors and officers navigated through the pouring ice pillars, they soon saw Yul descending from the sky.

‘Lucian! Can you see where I’m looking?’

Since the island he knew was soon coming into view, Yul conveyed the direction through his thoughts.

'I see it. It's that way.'

'Yeah. I'm heading down.'

Soon, Yul descended, and the awe-inspiring creature that had soared into the sky, splitting the ice pillars, shrank into a human form. Seeing it, everyone felt reverence.

“O-Oh, you’ve arrived.”

“Give so clothes.”

“Y-Yes, here they are.”

He curled his fingers, received the new clothes, put them on, and then folded his arms.

After that, both the officers and the sailors seed to beco more cautious in how they treated Yul, but he didn’t pay much attention to it.

After sailing across the empty Great Azure Ocean, they finally reached the two islands that lay before the Arctic.

“The large island is Castaway Island, and the small one is Penguin Exile Island. They existed even before the Heaven and Earth Resonance.”

At Yul’s words, the navigators recorded the information about the islands.

“Th-The Heaven and Earth Resonance… that refers to the Great Catastrophe, right?”

“That’s what humans call it.”

"Understood. Why do they have those nas?"

“Captain Étienne Drake of the Kingdom of Frangia was shipwrecked around here. And Penguin Exile Island… when the penguins were waging war among themselves, the other orcas and I evacuated them to that island.”

“…?”

“Penguins?”

“Penguins live in the Arctic. Didn’t you know?”

“N-No, we didn’t.”

The navigators wrote with bewildered expressions and glanced at each other.

“They have wings and walk on two legs, and they even founded their own kingdom.”

One of the sailors who had been scrubbing the deck overheard and spoke up.

“Are penguins creatures that look like chickens?”

“But he says chickens founded a kingdom.”

“You idiots! Hurry up and scrub the deck! Hail scattered everywhere!”

The boatswain, Blanc Muhari, smacked the sailors, bringing their chatter to an end.

Lucian looked at Penguin Exile Island through a telescope and spoke to Yul.

“This island is extrely barren.”

“Huh? Really?”

Before the Heaven and Earth Resonance, it had been an island with quite a few things on it, but it seed the waves had swept everything away.

“On the other hand, Castaway Island? That side seems to have so resources. If we were to use one as a port of call, it would be that one.”

Castaway Island was relatively large, so perhaps the damage there hadn’t been so severe.

In any case, the route of the Golden Sea Chart continued heading north.

"But regarding the compass position... this isn't the Arctic location I used to know."

“Is that so?”

"It's a bit of a distance from the Penguin Kingdom."

He wanted to check what had happened to the Yanskal Kingdom of the penguins, but it would be difficult to confirm imdiately. Still, it seed to be a neighboring region, so it might be fine.

The Strellock anchored in the nearest bay, and after lowering boats, the sailors all headed toward the Arctic.

The Arctic was not a world of pure ice. Below the tree line, trees that could survive in tundra regions grew.

Spruce and larch, along with shrubs like crowberry, grew there. There were also trees of this world that Yul did not recognize.

As soon as Yul got off, he said,

“I’ll fly around and scout the area.”

“Understood. We’ll search nearby.”

Yul flew high in human form using Telekinesis.

He could revert to his true form and roam around, but it would stand out too much, and telekinetic flight wasn’t bad either.

After using Telekinesis so often, he had beco completely accustod to it.

While flying around, Yul noticed sothing tallic glinting between the trees.

When he descended to look, there was a trap there. A tal trap, and since no blood stained it, it seed no prey had been caught yet.

Seeing such traps, there was a high probability that intelligent beings lived nearby.

After flying a bit farther, he discovered a clearing among the trees nearby. A village.

“It doesn’t look like a penguin village.”

The houses were not sized for penguins. When he went closer to examine it, humans were living there.

They were tall northerners, each looking well over two ters in height.

Their skin was extrely pale, and sowhere on their bodies, they had blue tattoos.

Seeing Yul fall from the sky, they shouted in shock.

“A man fell from the sky!”

Even the speech of these remote humans was translated.

“Call the village chief!”

“You there! Don’t move!”

They drew massive swords made of bone from their waists.

The northerners used weapons made of bone or tal.

“I have no intention of fighting.”

“Whoever you are, if you want to prove those words, stop where you are and wait for the village chief.”

At the words of the large warrior, Yul stopped as instructed. Soon, the village chief appeared from inside.

He had white hair and a thick white beard.

Though he looked like an old man, he possessed a sturdy body and broad shoulders like a warrior.

“They say soone fell from the sky?”

“Over here.”

"You... who are you?"

“I ca from beyond the southern seas. I have no intention of fighting. I just want to talk for a mont.”

“From the southern seas….”

The northerners looked at each other in astonishnt.

“Then wouldn’t those fellows know well?”

“Right. Hey, where are those friends?”

“They went hunting today.”

After listening to their conversation, Yul asked back,

“Those fellows?”

“They’re also people who ca from the south.”

Before long, the n who had returned from the hunting grounds ca into view. Yul’s eyes widened in surprise. Among them was a familiar face.

“Huh? Marchand?”

“Who are you? Do you know ?”

“I’m Yul.”

“…??”

“I look like this now, but I used to be an orca.”

“…!?!?!?”

It was Captain Thibaut Marchand, who had sailed the seas with Yul ten years ago. He seed to have adapted to the Arctic, wearing thick fur clothing and carrying weapons.

“Before the Heaven and Earth Resonance, we lost contact, didn’t we? You were alive? What happened to your crew? Was your last route the Arctic?”

“I-Is that really you?”

“Of course. When we fought the Hive, you helped from afar.”

Watching him speak about sothing only Yul would know, Marchand was so shocked that he dropped the pouch he had been holding.

“R-Really?”

“Yes. But how did you end up living here? You’ve aged a lot.”

“Uwaaaaaah!”

The grown man wailed and rushed at him, so Yul simply let himself be grabbed.

Seeing that sight, the village chief and the others in the village also lowered their weapons.

* * *

As Yul had expected, Marchand’s final voyage had indeed been Arctic trade.

Marchand, who had been moving under orders from the Sun King of the Kingdom of Frangia, said that while he was heading north to unload cargo, he saw that enormous wave shooting up into the sky.

There was no ti to unload the cargo or anything. They imdiately brought the ship to the nearest unexplored area and fled inland.

Then a colossal tidal wave surged in and completely smashed the ship to pieces.

Many of the sailors died as well, and Marchand barely managed to escape northward.

He had thought he would freeze to death without even being able to reach the penguin kingdom, but instead, he discovered this northern village that lived in the region.

“We stayed in the northern village for quite a long ti. There was no word from you, Lord Yul, and we wondered if our holand might have sent a ship to the Arctic, so we ca to the coast several tis to check. But it was useless. Still, we kept waiting for you to co.”

I see. Yul finally understood where the faith that had remained in the Arctic originated. It seed that Marchand and his n had been waiting for him.

“Then, well… as ti passed, several of us died, and our numbers dwindled. The technician who knew how to build ships died around that ti.”

"I see...."

While Yul had been asleep for ten years, they must have fought a desperate struggle to survive.

“So we settled in this northern village, Snorheim. It was an unavoidable choice. Fortunately, I’m a mage, and the rest of the sailors were quite capable fellows. Oh, right. Co here.”

Marchand beckoned with his hand. Having married a northern woman, he had fully settled in this village and even had a child.

A child who looked about five years old glanced at Yul cautiously before coming to sit beside Marchand. Standing beside them was a young woman who looked even taller than Marchand.

“Didn’t you have family back ho?”

“I had a wife, but… I couldn’t find any way to return. My wife in my holand probably thinks I’m dead.”

So he remarried.

Moved by the unfortunate story, Yul spoke.

“Do you want to return to your holand? If you wish, I can send you back.”

“…I have a family now.”

“Is that so?”

“No, to be honest, that’s just an excuse. Perhaps the youthful spirit I once had is gone. I’m a middle-aged man now who fears change.”

Marchand was already in his fifties. It had been more than ten years since he had road the seas under the na Blue Shark, and the Le Céleste now slept beneath the Arctic waters.

The rest of the sailors, except for him, had each settled into northern villages as well. So had disappeared sowhere in the Arctic, while others had tried to build crude ships to return to their holand, but contact with them had been lost.

Everyone assud they now lay beneath the cold Arctic sea ice.

After all, the rescue ship had never returned.

“A ship from the Kingdom of Britain is here. One of my companions is the captain. We plan to exchange so things with the village and ask a few questions.”

“The village chief has assigned to handle that. Ask whatever you like.”

“In that case, I’m planning to ask about the Arctic after the Heaven and Earth Resonance.”

“Hm. That matter, is it?”

Marchand knew in detail about the events that had taken place in the Arctic over the past ten years.