Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Fang Ning swam freely in the sea. It was currently the beginning of summer in September when the weather was already hot. Swimming in the sea was extremely refreshing.
When he was young, his hometown had a river, but he was never allowed to go down to play.
That was because there were many pits that were dug, and the undercurrent engulfed several innocent lives before. Thus, he had been a duck that never touched water before.
Fortunately, this swimming skill was something the loach… no, the True Dragon was born with.
After Fang Ning swam for an hour, the System finally reacted.
“You’re playing around again… You look so energetic now, so why do you still need to transform? If you don’t go to the trench, I’m gonna seize you.” the System said gloomily.
“I’ll go, I’ll dive now.” Fang Ning hurriedly kept his playful attitude.
Besides, this matter was urgent. He would still have many chances to transform into a loach, no… dragon, in the future.
“Show me the location of that oceanic trench on the System Map. I’ll go along that direction.” Fang Ning instructed.
“I can’t. The underwater world is not displayed on the System Map.”
“It’s not displayed? Then why were you in such a hurry to come here alone earlier? You even said something ‘you already know the location’, and that it was unnecessary to bring Daqing along.” Fang Ning wondered.
“I don’t know the path… but I can ask the fish.” The System said plausible.
“Hmph, can you speak fish? You plan to ask the fishes for directions?” Fang Ning said in disdain.
“There’s one type of fish language I definitely know how to speak…” Sir System said inexplicably.
Afterward, Fang Ning heard a ‘kaka… kakaka… ka…’ sound which spread out in all directions in the sea.
“You really…” Fang Ning was extremely speechless.
Nevertheless, it was quite effective.
Before long, he saw a group of familiar fish swimming over from the distance.
The black and white dolphins flanked the twelve-limbed octopus and swam towards him quickly.
The Giant Octopus Twelve Arms had changed a lot since the last time Fang Ning saw it.
It held a dark black bag on one of its arms and dragged an unconventional small cabin half floating on the sea with another arm.
“Ey, Big White, it’s just a white pond loach. Its limbs are incomplete and its swimming posture is hideous. One look at it and I know it doesn’t have any wisdom. Let’s just tear it apart and eat it. It’s definitely fat and tender.”
The black dolphin stared at Fang Ning’s two-meter long pond loach body while speaking, drool dripping down its mouth.
“You’re right, Old Black…” the white dolphin’s drool was longer.
“My dolphin brothers, don’t be like that. This brother pond loach sent a message to us earlier. I could tell that it wants to ask us for directions, so it should be an intelligent creature. You can’t eat it.” The Giant Octopus hurriedly stopped the dolphin brothers.
Damn it, how dare they call the True Dragon a pond loach right in front of him… they cannot be forgiven.
Fang Ning did not wonder why they could speak the human language. It only angrily swam over and beat the two dolphins out of the sea with two flicks of his tail.
The two dolphins, both seven to eight meters long, perched precariously in the air several dozen meters high, and broke the water surface with two splashes.
They flopped belly up at the same time, stars circling above their heads, unable to say anything.
Since the octopus was more polite, as well as the precious game book’s lackey and mount, Fang Ning did not do anything to it.
“Hss!” Twelve Arms grew frightened and hurriedly took a few steps back. Its arms waved around wildly in a defensive position.
It exclaimed, “You’re just a two-meter-long pond loach. How do you have such great power?”
“Are you afraid now? Don’t think a True Dragon can’t be a pond loach… Ey, I’m disappointed in you! How dare you take the True Dragon to be a pond loach? You have no respect for me!” Fang Ning rebuked angrily.
“Ah, senior dragon is too unfamiliar. I’ve only ever seen a Great Azure Dragon and only how to find it familiar, so I could not tell that you were a True Dragon too. I hope you forgive us.” Twelve Arms was truly frightened and said honestly.
“That’s more like it. Right, I sent you a message to ask you about that location. Do you know where it is?” Fang Ning was not the type to argue a point to death, so he let the matter go.
Besides, who was it who made his capabilities shallow, and caused his transformation to lack in power and majesty?
No one dared to mistake the System’s Azure Dragon for a pond loach…
“I don’t know,” Twelve Arms answered honestly.
“If you don’t know, why did you swim over to me so quickly…” Fang Ning was extremely speechless.
“Please calm down, senior. I know an old deep sea Octopus Granny who should know where it is.” Twelve Arms hurriedly explained.
“Oh, I’ve wronged you.” Fang Ning considered, and took out a leftover Sacred Beeswax Pill from when he was persuading Daqing.
“I’ll give you this Dragon Clan Honey-flavored Pill as payment for showing the way.”
Saying this, Fang Ning held out his hand, and the pill wobbled over to Twelve Arms.
It hurriedly used an arm to grasp it, and solemnly kept it into its bag.
Fang Ning grew curious and asked, “Aren’t you going to eat it now? This pill will help improve your power. Its effects will decrease the longer you leave it out.”
Twelve Arms said, “Senior Heavenly Book loves precious items, so I wish to show some filial piety to it. It hasn’t returned for a long time, so I want to keep some and surprise him.”
“Ah, excellent. You really are an honest and good child. Continue on like this, you’ll definitely be rewarded.” Fang Ning understood the reason as soon as he heard it and greatly encouraged.
“Thank you for your affirmation. I’ll bring you to the Octopus Granny now.” Twelve Arms was incredibly excited. It just received a compliment from a True Dragon. That was a great achievement of an octopus’s life.
In human myths, True Dragons were the natural masters of the sea. Most sea monsters also recognized that point.
Without it, everyone would want to hug a thick thigh.
Afterward, when the black and white dolphins woke up, they turned on their bellies and became well-behaved, not daring to look at Fang Ning.
Twelve Arms watched them and brought the pond loach Fang Ning down to the deep sea.
The black and white dolphins stayed behind with the excuse that they were not good at entering the deep sea.
Twelve Arms considered, then handed over the floating little cabin it was pulling over to them.
“What’s in there?” Fang Ning asked curiously.
“Ah, it’s one of my human teachers. He’s been a little tired lately, and is resting inside now.”
Fang Ning stopped asking any more questions and followed Twelve Arms all the way to the deep sea.
…
The scenery of the ocean depths was completely different from those on land.
It was pitch black almost everywhere, so there was nothing to see at all. Visibility was extremely low.
Fang Ning had to rely on his strong eyesight to barely see the scene a few meters around him with the ray of light transmitted from above. It was very inconvenient.
Thinking about it, he told the System, “Give me some light…”
Before long, his round pond loach head lit up… just like a 50-watt light bulb, illuminating up dozens of meters of the seabed around him.
Suddenly, he could see a lot of the deep sea. There were mountains all around as well as crisscrossing oceanic trenches.
Occasionally, there would be large patches of seagrass growing. Their long leaves moved along with the current and grew upwards as much as possible to try and get a glimmer of sunlight.
“Alright, Sir, you’re getting better at screwing with me… I know, you want me to quickly return to the System Space, but I won’t fall for that.” Fang Ning said angrily, with a large light bulb on his head.
“I only made the most reasonable arrangement, I wasn’t deliberately trying to mess with you. You should use your own body to prevent yourself from becoming moldy.” The System flatly denied.
Time passed quickly while they discussed.
Twelve Arms brought Fang Ning to a large group of seamounts.
It twisted and wound around, and arrived at a cave.
“Kaka…” It started calling.
Before long, the same response was heard from inside the deep cave. Fang Ning’s skull hurt.
“Sir, could you translate that?” Fang Ning asked with a hopeful tone, and added, “Translate it into human words.”
“Great and merciful Octopus Granny, I’ve brought a True Dragon here and wish to ask you about a location. The deep and dark…”
The System was quite amazing this time. It did not give Fang Ning the original number sounds.
“Oh, honest people are the best. You don’t have to worry about it tricking us into some demon’s lair…”
Fang Ning said in appreciation, but before he even finished, the situation suddenly changed!
The sea around them churned and the temperature rose sharply. A ferocious octopus suddenly appeared from the cave!
Its body was hundreds of meters in size and it stared at the white pond loach with icy cold eyes while completely ignoring Twelve Arms standing beside him.
“Hehe, I never thought I’ll have the fortune to eat a young dragon. I wasn’t mistaken. You really are a blessed little octopus to be able to make friends with a young dragon.”
The Giant Octopus cackled madly, completely ignorant of how terrifying the thing before it was!
It could not be helped. Ever since Fang Ning transformed into a pond loach, it did not look intimidating at all. Even the two dolphins wanted a piece of him, much less this Giant Octopus demon.
Twelve Arms immediately stepped up to stop it, “Octopus Granny, intelligent creatures must not eat each other. That’s a rule of heaven. You cannot eat this dragon.”
The Giant Octopus glared coldly at Twelve Arms and said disdainfully, “What rule of heaven? Where did you hear nonsense like that again?”
“Ah, it was something that senior Heavenly Book told me. I heard that the humans had a rule about not eating creatures that could speak. I asked senior Heavenly Book, and it said that this was one of the future rules of heaven.”
Twelve Arms stood its ground and said firmly.
“You’ve been brainwashed by the humans. We’re sea monsters. How can we become stronger other than by eating powerful creatures?” The Giant Octopus said contemptuously, “If you don’t move away, I’ll eat you first. I wanted to wait till you become bigger before eating you, but you’ll be a bad appetizer for now.”
“Eh?” Twelve Arm’s body shook at its words. It instantly felt like it had suffered another heavy blow.
Before, when it first met this old octopus, it seemed like it was close to dying of starvation.
Twelve Arms was kind enough to catch fish for it, but it did not expect that once it became a demon, that it would have the intention of eating it instead!
Fang Ning found this very normal. The terrestrial demons on Earth evolved from predatory beasts. How would they have any humanistic concepts or moral thoughts?
They naturally acted according to their original habits. The strong ate the weak, the weak ate the worst, and the cycle continued.
The System hurriedly said, “What now, the battlefield is here. Hurry and come back. I never thought that there’ll be the chance to get some extra rewards on the way. This octopus would definitely have at least tens of millions of experience points. It seems I should open up a new market.”
“Hehe,” hearing the System say this, Fang Ning looked at the self-righteous Octopus monster and shook his head.
You only see that eating others will make you stronger, but you never considered that others are also watching you…