Chapter 301 - Devilfish Stomach Labyrinth (II)

I am not someone who is very well versed with the creatures of the Aquagius's seas. I tend to avoid the sea part of Aquagius many times as they are very tricky to fight against, troublesome to meet, and can get dangerous if you don't know what you are doing. Most of the time if I ever visit Aquagius, I would just stay in the Insect Kingdom and the hostile island's parts. There are times I have faced Foreign beings but that is with a party before.

But there is one incident where I didn't expect my meeting with the creature before. And as unexpected it was before, it was also unexpected for me to see it here, but a different entity, same source.

[Fragment of the Sea God: Heart]

Type: NPC

HP: 50/100

Status: Curious

The Fragment of Sea God. Who would have thought that the Heart is currently residing inside the body of the Ice Devilfish, and in the stomach, no less? Still, this is not the same entity I meet in the past timeline, this is the heart, what I met in the past timeline is the brain.

"Master! Step back!" Lina pulls out her Morning Star and was ready to attack before I intercepted her charge.

"Calm down."

The wiggling entity is still moving in the darkness and although it looks like a mass of flesh and slime combined together, it is not a harmful creature seeing that it didn't have a hostile status and it didn't have a very high HP. Not only that but there is type info of the creature with NPC written next to it. 

"Ugh...what the heck is that Master? Is that a slime perhaps?"

"No...I think I can recognize that thing."

My eyebrows frown when I heard Tina recognize the Fragment of the Sea God.

"You recognize the guy?"

"Yeah. I think I have read one of the myths being told to us about Aquagius. If I remember correctly, that thing resembles the Fragment of the Sea God, and although its description about its looks are a bit different compared to how I pictured it is still the same."

A myth huh? Well, the Sea God is definitely something that exists in the legends of Aquagius and although I never actually see the actual Sea God, the fragments scattered around the world are said to help return the Sea God back to its prime. However, no one knows if it is the right thing to keep the heart around or not.

The Fragment of the Sea God: Heart just keeps moving like a slime. Since it was just the heart, it does nothing other than move like a slime. Nothing interesting at all and if you are just that bloodthirsty, one step of the thing and I can easily tell it will die immediately.

Despite my reasons not to get involved in this thing due to what I experienced in the past timeline about the Sea God's existence, I have no choice but to bring it along with us. From the looks of it, this heart might have something to do with the Kingdom of the Deep Sea and the approval of the people to help us over there against the Insect Kingdom.

"Tina-san, can you ask Cotton to allow us to store it on a container or something, its web would be perfect to encase this thing if we wanted to carry it.

Tina didn't ask why and went to Cotton and started talking in that foreign language I don't understand before Cotton seems to agree. She quickly spits out countless webs and creates a small container that looks like a glass bowl, a bit bigger than my hands but it's small enough that I can easily carry it with my own hands. Perfect to encase the small fragment of the Sea God.

Scooping the slimy thing and putting it on the bowl that Cotton made, the fragment is now possible to be placed inside the Inventory. It was easily done and one fragment is now in my possession.

After pulling the thing out and putting it inside my inventory, the darkness of the area also diminished and the previous light that seems to be getting absorbed from the flaming sword returns to normal. 

"So that darkness earlier around this area was caused by that thing earlier?" Lucia frowned.

"Seems like it. Anyways, we don't need to loiter around here anymore. With the thing that we need to investigate is already in our hands, it's time to continue pushing on. As much as we have to look for marvels, we can't just do that with the Ice Devilfish's digestion might be coming close."

The others nodded and we continue. I gave the place one last look before we depart. That place, perhaps it might be the stomach area of the Ice Devilfish but there is no doubt, the place looks like it was man-made.

...

A few minutes later, we didn't see anything much but we have indeed seen something else, and that should be these things.

"This boss... it has its own ecosystem inside its gastric organs?!"

As much as I want to convince myself that we are inside the stomach of a boss, the surroundings keep on trying to stop us from thinking about it whether we are just hallucinating or not.

"Master, perhaps we have crossed the otherworld already?" Lina scratches her head as she looked at the scenery before us.

"That shouldn't be the case. We didn't pass out which would suggest our lack of logical response on where we are. We are witnessing these things so it should be the same intestines of the Ice Devilfish," I explained.

"But Master, no matter how habitable your guts are, a creature's guts wouldn't look anything like this! This place is a literal winter forest already!" Lucia complained as she presented what was before us.

Yes, what was before us is a wide expanse of white grass, trees with snow, and a cold place that you would mistake it for already being the already winter time in here already.

Not only that but this time, it's no longer an uninhabitable place but a place full of monsters and currently foraging in the dense winter forest.

"This is causing me headaches indeed," I rub my temples for a bit after seeing what is happening.

"Should we look around? This is a new place so perhaps we will get an idea where to exit here?" Tina asked.

"There might be a possibility. Since this place is pretty unique, perhaps there is something that is akin to a secret around here. Let's try to look for that secret of some sort. We can't just ignore this place and say this place is busted. Perhaps due to this reason, we might find a clue on how this formed. But first, let's clean up the monsters around here."

Everyone agreed and we started clearing the monsters of the snowfield. It was much easier and even with us, we easily kill them without any problem at all. In just a few minutes of killing the monsters, we already cleaned up almost every single monster in the place.

Still, what is odd is that the monsters are no longer doing any respawns. I am also a bit confused as to why the monsters are either named White A, or White B. They retaliate but they easily died without any kind of resistance. They fight back against us once we do aggro its attention but other than that, it didn't do anything except roam around. 

"Master, everything wrapped up in here already. The monsters disappeared after they die and they didn't drop anything at all. They do drop a minuscule amount of EXP but that's about it," Lina reported.

"Already done in our side too, Master," Lucia shouted with Tina near her.

So I am not the only one who finds everything here pretty easy. Everyone easily dispose of most of the enemies which allowed us to safely check around the surroundings and check whatever the case here and there.

After the small clean-up, we gathered again around and discuss if there are anything we discovered at all.

"So, anything useful on your ends guys? I don't see anything eyecatching in here at my location. What about you guys?"Lucia and Tina shook their head.

The two might have shaken their heads but Lina didn't.

"I discovered something, Master. I don't know if there is something of the importance of this thing but perhaps you Master know what you are doing for a bit."

Lina then handed me a small notebook. It was a bit worn out and the cover is already smelling like mold and algae started to stick itself more than ever. I opened the notebook and it was revealed to be a small diary.

"A diary?"

"Yes, Master. I already checked the contents and perhaps it was indeed something that needed to be addressed to you.. There is also a map inside so perhaps we can talk about this."