As Thea affirmed, the two middle stage Stellar ranks that were stationed here, didn't show any sign being able to feel Daimon, considering their carefree attitude as they strode through the air towards the area where the commotion between the magic beasts was still ongoing.
After stealing some glances to take mental note of a couple of doubts for Thea, Daimon arrived at the entrance of that underground river mentioned by Rita, which was basically a circular hole on the ground made as a rudimentary well.
'There are alarms and detection type arrays placed all over the tunnel that leads to the underground river, but they are unlike anything I had seen, the water itself has been engraved somehow so even if you can move through space without being detected, anything that touches this water will be analyzed'.
'Your clothes will prevent you to be detected, but the clothes themselves will be noticed instead, also I can feel some sort of connection between this well and something at north, as if it is sending information to that direction all the time, it's an array specially developed to prevent anything from coming out of this well without being detected'.
'My perfect detection range goes up to three thousand kilometers and I couldn't detect the anomalies of this well until we reached the proximity of this area', mumbled Rita with a self-disappointed voice.
She took pride on her detection skills, especially on the fact that Daimon relied on them, so she was boiling in anger towards the one who implemented this array that managed to almost bypass her senses.
Daimon wasn't surprised about the strange security measures deployed in the well, it was the sole water body in quite a big area, in a desertic environment which was obviously not natural, so of course it was perfectly controlled by whoever ruled this place.
'It's not your fault, this was done by someone who could even distinct people like me from others, the fact that you noticed before we fell into the trap is already a big victory for me, later you can ask for a reward but for now, how much of the water is affected, can you outrun it with your spatial movement skill?', asked Daimon, which made the undead head maid's eyes sparkle like stars, only for her to shake her head a second later.
'No, as of current I can at most cover a thousand kilometers at the time, but even I can't completely avoid detection in that distance from the main node of the array, I'm sure that at two thousand kilometers downwards, I'll be able to ignore this array even if I am still within its range, sorry...', she said to then add.
'How about I do it, it doesn't matter if they learn about me, the important part is that they don't know about Daimon, besides even if I can't bypass the detection, at least I can prevent the array from immediately sending information to that place at north, by the time they realize I was here, we would be long gone'.
Daimon slightly smiled, even if Rita couldn't find a perfect solution like she normally always does, she did have a pretty decent answer to their predicament, it involved exposing herself on his stead though.
'No, need for that, if the water is what I need to be wary off, then I just need the water to detect "nothing", besides the portal to this place was preventing anyone past the Lord realms from entering, so you are one of my bigger trump cards', said Daimon to the undead head maid.
Ignoring Rita who was smiling from ear to ear, Daimon closed his right hand to then open it producing a small drop of black inked water which floated above it.
With a gesture from Daimon, the floating drop of black water went ahead, the moment it posed above the well, the water in ten meters around it was pushed away, as Daimon expected it worked like a charm.
That drop of black water was indeed created through his mana, but there was no leaking as it was fully contained within it, the effect of pushing the water was not a spell but an effect of it, so the water was indeed touching nothing.
And with that Daimon simply jumped into the well, the drop of black water was stuck to his body and its ability to push water aside allowed him to dive into the well as if he was in free fall.
Compared to his previous travel, this one took more time as he had to cover two thousand kilometers to leave the area of influence in which Thea couldn't ignore the detection arrays of the island.
Surprisingly even after covering more than two thirds of such a large distance, he was still within a tunnel and hadn't reached open sea, on the other hand that was good since due to the reduced space, it was practically impossible for him to encounter a magic beast, also the tunnel was perfectly illuminated due to some blue crystals embedded on the walls.
'Those are too ordered to be naturally formed, why would they be so wary of the water when the magic beasts where inland, right Rita?', asked Daimon.
'Mm, there were no magic beasts on the ocean near the border of the island, and all the magic beasts I detected were land type ones', confirmed the undead head maid.
'Perhaps it has something to do with Thea', wondered Daimon, in any case he had nothing to do for the time being, so he focused on recovering the mana he was using to maintain the black drop of "Royal Water".
Luckily unlike other Star and Lord ranks, Daimon could recover while moving, since his magic core was similar in strength as the one of an Arch rank, so he didn't have to focus on gathering mana as it would naturally flow towards him, but he could speed up the process if he focused on it which is what he was doing.
...
After an hour of deepening into the tunnel, Rita's voice returned Daimon to the real world.
'We are out of the strongest influence area of the array, they won't be able to detect us now, even if we touch the water', she happily said as she created a dome sphere with her mana to isolate their presence from the outside world.
Unfortunately, he did keep the resent that the Hydra guy felt towards the woman that badly hurt him and the magic beast part also hated her, because it was treated as nutrients by Thalia so war was inevitable and that's how we arrive at the current situation, how does she know all that if it wasn't written on the pages as of course those things happened way after she had left Neptune, she told Thea about it in person.
"They have been fighting between themselves for more than a thousand years at this point, the canyon in which you appeared is a hatching ground created by Thalia to replenish her army as for that aggressive and unstable snake, it was a "spy" created by Travis to destroy them", said Thea to then add.
"I used the coordinates left behind in the black pages to arrive at this place, since the legacy left behind by her was supposedly here, of course I kept my guard up and it also helped that appeared in the middle of one of their main battlefields, where those two were actually fighting against each other and it was then she told me all that".
"Let me guess, she wanted to take over your body", casually said Daimon which made Thea softly snort, not at him but at the situation back then.
"Not exactly, she wanted to extract my Void Devouring Python lineage from me as in her words, that would be enough for her to create a perfect copy of her original body, naturally she tried to convince me that it wouldn't kill me and that she would be able to restore my lineage over time, she even promised to teach me the secrets of the Neris family such a legacy spells and knowledge about the space if I helped her, but...", Thea stopped talking for a moment while she stole a gaze at her spear before saying.
"I always wondered how come my mother had such a strong lineage but at the same time had a frail body, it was because before leaving she gave a significant amount of blood to a weak snake race that she was sure couldn't assimilate it".
"Unfortunately for her, Ryner was smarter than what she believed, he knew about it and thanks to the darkness lineage of the Hydra guy, he wasn't completely enslaved to her, so he passed the message orally to the next patriarch and so on, my father knew about it but didn't pass it on to Olander because it ended with my mother...".
"That snake ended up filtering and passing on that blood until my mother appeared, she was able to endure the pressure to a certain extent so she attained a human form and ended up marrying my dad, then both lineages converged in me, so she secretly despised me and didn't want to see the "monstrosity" created due to the mix of the two lineages, her plan was using me but even dead, Ryner got back at her, the moment she approached me my spear automatically attacked her and a message left behind by him was sent to my mind".
"He engraved an array inside his own bones to protect his descendants from Thalia just in case, to then leave them behind with the instruction for them to be used as parts of the magic weapons used exclusively by the leaders of the Ryner clan", she said.
Daimon couldn't help but look at Thea's spear with respect, Ryner found a way to protect his offspring against someone that managed to fend off against a system user, hundreds of thousands of years after his death, it was worthy of admiration.
"I guess you had to escape after that but why did you hide in the ocean?", asked Daimon, which made the empress proudly smile.
"Yeah, one wanted to kill me and use my lineage for her benefit and the other wanted to kill me to prevent that, so after defending against their attacks to prevent being surrounded by their armies I fled to the ocean",
"Thalia's army excel on flying combat and her closest officials have the ability to move through space, though they are trash for me, for her enemies who can't keep up they are a nightmare, her fortress is a floating castle".
"Travis's army on the other hand are adept in fighting on the land, while his army is nearly half that of Thalia's which is understandable considering he has been active for less time than her, the races that follow him are extremely aggressive, they can take on two enemies on the same rank without any problem, his base is on the only piece of land big enough to be considered a continent in this planetoid".
"As to why they don't control the sea, that's because even before Thalia arrived, there was life in this place, and just like it's theorized to have happened in a lot of planets, they originated on the sea and due to the unnatural increase of "danger" inland they remained on the ocean instead".
"So, this isn't a two-way war but a three way one, two invaders who ruled over the land and the skies and lastly the natives who ruled the seas", she said.
"Oh?", Daimon expressed his interest on Thea's words with a low sound, that explained why there was such a complicated and massive detection array deployed around the only water source that he could find inland and also why the environment of the island was changed to a desert instead of a tropical paradise as it should have been.
A humid environment would naturally gather and produce a rich water mana that would empower the natives, so it was forcefully changed.
"Luckily I was able to have a decent conversation with them, I have a sea magic beast's lineage in the form of Ryner clan's blood in me after all so they were able to trust me, it also helped that their scouts saw me being attacked by both, Thalia and Travis", said Thea as she cutely stretched her arms, to then add.
"It's thanks to the deal I made with them that I can move through space without being detected as long as I am inside a water body, the range of my special movement practically doubled as well~".
"I see, I guess that's why this portal looked different than the ones I have seen you using before and also why it looked slightly familiar to the one used by that old black armored shark mermen", said Daimon referring to Galen, the portals used by him used a mix of water and space mana and so did the one from which Thea appeared.
Of course, there was a huge difference in quality, which meant that the natives of this planetoid weren't related to the Black Prison Megalodon, they just used the ocean as a way to enhance their portals and Thea was allowed to connect her portals to their dimensional tunnels, that was it.
"Okay, since it will be my first time seeing those "natives" who are our allies in this place, let's bring a present for them", said Daimon as he gazed upwards.
"Mm, I agree, things will be way easier with that, sentient guards from that crazy woman are really hard to take hostage, the arrays displayed on the near body waters of the outposts where they are deployed, sent a distress signal too fast, which prevents them from being taken by surprise, but you seem to have a way to bypass that", said Thea with interest shinning in her eyes.
'As I thought, Daimon's value far surpasses that of a whole army, not to mention the drinks created with his tri-colored water are amazing, and he is one of my generals~', happily thought the empress.