Chapter 477

Chapter 477: Underwater Voyage

Under Duncan’s somewhat clumsy but careful control, the submersible slowly adjusted its heading.

The “base” beneath the city-state of Frostholm was like a wide, endless, rough, and strange sea cliff, slowly moving past in the dim water outside the porthole.

The sunlight falling from the sea surface above had already faded. In the water, only the beams from the three large searchlights in front of the submersible remained. Those beams cast huge patches of light on the “cliff” surface. Beyond those bright spots was nothing but unknown darkness.

A low humming and the hiss of valves that adjusted the pressure by themselves sounded in their ears from time to time. These dull, lifeless noises instead made them feel all the more… alone.

That was the loneliness that came when one person left the group, when the mind left the borders of civilization. It was the unease of sinking little by little into endless darkness, wrapped on all sides by boundless seawater.

Agatha grew quiet. She stood by the porthole and “stared” in one direction outside for a long time. After who knew how long, she finally broke the silence and said softly: “All the light is fading… but I can still ‘see’ the base of the city. It is still giving off a very, very faint light. It is the only thing I can see in this darkness.”

The world she observed was clearly not the same as that of an ordinary person.

“Do you know what I’m thinking about?” Duncan’s voice suddenly came from behind her.

“What are you thinking about?”

“I’m thinking that this might be how we look at the world,” Duncan said in a low voice, as if his words were blending into the humming of the machines around them. “The mortal world is like the sea. If we see all of civilization as one whole, then we are like this, sailing through a boundless sea abyss.

“Unknown darkness covers the whole world. From the lights of civilization, we carefully peek at the scenes that sometimes rise out of that darkness. We try to guess and piece together the shape of the whole world from those images that flash by. Yet we almost never have the chance to really know the full truth behind those lights and shadows—

“Behind one small fallen leaf there may be a whole forest. Behind one hard stone there may stand an entire mountain. A single vine slipping past in the lamplight may be only one outstretched tentacle of some mythical giant beast. Outside the faint light is the unknown. Even inside the faint light, what we see is only the shallow impression that the truth shows us at a certain place and a certain time.

“And as we make this careful voyage, there are some people who, by accident, look past the lights. They go mad. Some people try to widen the light. We call them pioneers. Many times there is not even a clear line between these pioneers and a Madman. As for the rest, they gather inside the ark of ‘civilization’, gather within the limited lights that are just enough to shine on the ground under their feet. They lower their heads and carefully draw back their gaze.

“They are called ‘ordinary people’.

“The part of the world that can be known and measured gives them a precious sense of safety, so they can no longer look toward the darkness outside the ark. But it is exactly these ordinary people, who make up most of the whole and are weak and powerless, who keep the whole ark running and even support those pioneers and Madmen.”

The sound of seawater being pumped into the ballast tank came from under their feet. The submersible slowly changed its angle and began to dive faster. In the window ahead, within the area lit by the searchlights, the uneven cliff kept rising upward. In the next second, the scene in that patch of light might turn into a stretch of empty dark water… or it might not.

Duncan drew back his gaze and looked around him.

Lights from the cabin ceiling shone down, bathing everything inside the submersible. After gazing at the darkness outside for too long, turning back to look at this cozy cabin really gave a deep, heartfelt sense of relief.

But the occasional creaks that came from somewhere on the hull never stopped reminding the people in the crew compartment that between this bright, comfortable cabin and hundreds of millions of tons of seawater outside, there was only one thin spherical shell of steel.

This fragile spherical steel shell had been hammered out piece by piece by countless ordinary people. Those artificers, who might never step even half a pace beyond the city-state in their whole lives, used their skill and wisdom to send this simple submersible down into the endless sea abyss beneath the city.

Agatha stayed silent for a long time before she spoke softly: “Actually… sometimes I feel lucky that my eyes can now see more than those of an ordinary person. Just like you said, we are all sailing in a boundless darkness. My eyes can now see a little farther into places where the light does not reach. But I also often feel frustrated, because compared to this endless darkness, that little bit of extra sight seems meaningless…”

“Yes. For this boundless sea, seeing a little farther is indeed hardly anything,” Duncan said softly. Then he changed his tone. “But for us, who are sailing in the darkness, even being able to see one meter farther is of great importance.”

He casually switched off the main lights in the cabin, leaving only the necessary lights on the control panel.

The inside of the submersible dimmed. Yet, with the contrast in lighting, the beams from the powerful searchlights outside seemed even brighter in the darkness beyond the porthole. Within those patches of light, the details on the surface of the “cliff” also grew clearer.

“The world you describe is almost hopeless, yet your attitude always seems optimistic,” Agatha said. “That… surprises me a little.”

“I describe a hopeless world to you because the world is indeed that bad,” Duncan said casually. “My attitude is optimistic because I am an optimistic person. We can’t change this world, but our ‘attitude’ belongs to us.”

“I didn’t expect you to have this kind of personality, and I didn’t expect you to be so sensitive,” Agatha said, and a faint smile seemed to appear on her face. “Yes, I keep forgetting by accident that you were once the greatest explorer in this world.”

Duncan only smiled and did not answer. His gaze fell on the scene outside the porthole. Using the beams from the searchlights, he carefully watched the “cliff” that was slowly rising.

It looked like stone in texture, with parasitic growths on its surface that were like seaweed and coral.

But such a vertical structure, such a neat “base”, did not seem like something that formed naturally no matter how he thought about it.

He steered the submersible forward with care and stopped at a very close distance. Then, a little clumsily, he found a certain control lever on the panel and released the mechanical arm mounted at the very front of the submersible.

In the light, the mechanical arm slowly unfolded. The sharp tool at its end touched the “cliff” ahead and tapped and scraped it lightly.

Some fragments slowly fell through the water.

But inside those fragments there seemed to be an even harder structure.

“I have always been curious about one thing,” Duncan suddenly said, breaking the silence. “For so many years, in so many city-states, people have always dug deep underground—whether for mining, building underground facilities, or just for research. Has no one ever dug through this ‘base’?”

Agatha paused. The question seemed a bit out of place to her, but after a short moment of thought she shook her head. “As far as I know… there has never been such a case of ‘digging through’. The underground is dangerous. The lower you go below sea level, the higher the chance that strange changes appear in the darkness. Even with the protection of steam and fire, spiritual corruption and bizarre accidents in the mines happen every year. Not to mention anyone who would dig downward with the crazy idea of ‘boring through the city-state’ itself. And besides…”

She paused again to sort through her memories, then went on: “And even for those who really did dig down with such a crazy idea, it seems no one has ever succeeded. I once heard that the Academy of Truth tried this. Their conclusion was that, once you reach a certain depth, the drill can no longer go any farther. The deeper you go, the harder it becomes, until even the toughest, most advanced drill bits all break.”

“The deeper you go, the harder it gets?” Duncan frowned and turned to look at the mechanical arm that was tapping on the “cliff” outside the porthole. It had already knocked off some of the growths on it. After those loose fragments fell away, the inner layer of the cliff showed a darker, denser structure.

He could not tell whether it was rock or metal.

But its surface seemed to have faint, regular patterns on it, like… the ridges and grooves on the skin of some living creature.

Duncan worked the mechanical arm, trying hard to scrape some samples from that dense black layer, but it was all in vain.

The arm did not have enough power, and that black material was even harder than he had thought… was it some kind of “shell”?

All sorts of guesses rose in Duncan’s mind. He even came up with some bold plans for probing it. But in the end he forced down his curiosity and began steering the submersible onward into the Deep Sea.

After all, his main goal on this trip was to explore the “Colossal Unknown Entity” directly beneath Frostholm. When he did not even know if there would be a second chance to make a Deep Dive, he could not waste the submersible’s precious operating time halfway there.

With more noise coming from the ballast tanks, the submersible kept diving.

After an unknown length of time, they finally passed the “fault” beneath the city’s base.

Very suddenly, the “cliff” inside the range of the searchlights came to an abrupt end. That huge patch of light seemed to be swallowed by darkness all at once, and an endless mass of dark water rushed in to take its place.

Even the strongest searchlights could not find anything to shine on in such empty, boundless water. Duncan could only see a vague edge where the light faded, stretching away outside the porthole. Inside the light and outside it, there was not a single point of reference.

This feeling of being buried in a huge darkness and sinking ever deeper was far more oppressive than facing that strange Great Hollow deep in the Boiling Gold mine.

Agatha also gripped the handrail in front of her a little more tightly in nervousness.

The last faint light in her “field of vision” had vanished.