91: Chapter 91 Return to Review, the Dilemma of Landing

The white light of the teleportation array flickered one last time on the stone wall of the Lords Mansion secret room, then extinguished.

The Array Pattern beneath Lu Changyuan's feet faded from blazing bright to dark red, then back to the original color of the stone surface.

The air in the secret room still carried that dry, scorching smell left by the residual heat of teleportation, like a heated stone suddenly being brushed by a sea breeze.

The first thing he did after steadying himself was not to step forward—it was to turn that dark gold Storage Ring on his hand a small half-circle and probe inside with his Divine Sense.

The six spheres of light membrane were still there.

The ten sealed jade jars were also still there.

He withdrew his Divine Sense.

Lu Hu was two steps behind him, one hand already touching the hilt of the blade at his waist.

The stone door of the secret room was tightly shut, the luminous stones on the walls emitted a faint, pale green light, and the old wooden table in the corner still held the nautical chart he hadn't had time to put away before leaving.

Everything remained unchanged.

"It's our place."

Lu Hu relaxed his grip on the blade hilt, his voice carrying a hint of the Qi he had just swallowed.

Lu Changyuan did not reply.

He walked to the old wooden table, took off the Storage Ring and placed it on the table, then took out the communication jade talisman given by Elder Tianji from his robes—the jade talisman was still warm to the touch, just as it had been when he first received it.

He tucked the jade talisman away close to his body again, and only then did he sit down at the table.

He did not immediately summon anyone.

Instead, he took the six light membranes out of the ring one by one.

The first light membrane landed on the table.

The light membrane dissipated upon touching the table, revealing a palm-sized coral inside.

It was completely transparent, with extremely fine starlike specks flowing slowly within it.

Lu Changyuan stared at those specks for a few breaths—they had brightened for the first instant after the light membrane dissipated, then dimmed, settling into a very slow, rhythmic pulsing like breathing.

He brought his hand to within two inches of the coral; his fingertips did not touch it, but a trace of extremely faint coolness reached his skin.

It was not ice.

It was the coolness of deep water churning up from the bottom.

He carefully placed the coral back on the table and took out the second light membrane.

Inside the light membrane was a dark cyan egg.

The eggshell was a circle larger than his two fists put together, and faint golden patterns were slowly flowing on its surface, like ocean currents, or perhaps some kind of extremely slow breathing.

Lu Changyuan gently touched the eggshell with the back of his finger.

It was cold.

Then he pressed his entire palm against it.

A faint pulsation came from inside the eggshell.

It was not a heartbeat.

It was something slower and heavier.

It was as if something in a very, very deep place had contracted, then relaxed.

Lu Changyuan closed his eyes.

During those few breaths while his palm was pressed against the eggshell, an image flashed through his mind—not an image, but a sensation.

Cold water, deep water, water so dark you couldn't see the bottom.

It wasn't the light blue of Blue Moon Island's coastal waters, where you could see the reef bottom while standing on the prow of a boat, but a depth so inky blue it was nearly pitch black.

There were no reefs, no seaweed, and no human voices or sound of oars around.

He removed his hand from the eggshell.

That sensation did not immediately dissipate.

It lingered in his palm for three or four breaths before slowly fading away.

"What is it looking for?"

Lu Hu had walked over at some point and was staring at the egg.

"Cold water."

Lu Changyuan said, "Very, very deep cold water."

He placed the egg back beside the light membrane and continued to take out the remaining items.

The seeds of the earth vein jade spike lay quietly in a jade box, the three golden grains at the tip of the spike shimmering under the luminous stone.

The seeds of the gold-patterned iron thorn vine looked like a tangled mass of dark iron wire, with a rough surface that felt as cold and hard as stone to the touch.

The cold marrow jade shell was only the size of a fist, and a pale blue light was slowly circling inside its translucent white shell.

The tide sound spirit bamboo was a segment of emerald green bamboo with natural silver runes on the joints; Lu Changyuan touched it, and the runes brightened very faintly—as if responding to something, but he didn't know what.

He lined the six items up on the table.

Then he sat back and looked at them.

Lu Hu looked at the items, then at him, and didn't make a sound.

Having followed him for so long, he knew this expression of the Young Lord—he wasn't dazing off; he was walking through every possible path in his mind, calculating how many steps could be taken on each path, which step would get stuck, going through everything before speaking.

After a good while.

Lu Changyuan stood up, covered the items with the six light membranes again, and returned them to the ring.

"Call Su Qingli, Chen Mo, and Leng Feng to the council hall."

Lu Hu turned and went out.

The windows of the council hall were open.

The sea breeze blew in from the direction of the Outer Port, carrying that distinct salty, fishy scent of Blue Moon Island.

When Lu Changyuan arrived, Su Qingli was already there—she was sitting in the second seat on the left side of the long table, with three account books spread out before her, writing something on the page footer with an old, balding brush.

Chen Mo sat opposite her, holding a coarse porcelain teacup in his hand; the tea had already gone cold, but he didn't drink it.

Leng Feng stood by the window, back to the window, one hand resting on the hilt of his sword.

Lu Changyuan sat down in the main seat.

Lu Hu closed the door and stood behind him.

"First, let's talk about the island."

Lu Changyuan began.

Su Qingli put down the brush and opened the top account book.

Her method of reporting was the same as before—no preamble, no beating around the bush, just stating the numbers directly.

The balance of Spirit Stones is over 2.86 million.

Most of it comes from berthing protection fees, custody contracts, and mortgage operations during the chaotic situation—the Outer Port sheds took in a large batch of cargo ships desperate for safe berths during the surrounding panic, charging five Low-Grade Spirit Stones per ship per day, which accumulated into a significant amount.

The 3,172 people on Black Reef Island have been divided into four groups according to spirit farmers, miners, shipwrights, and rough Array Master, and have been settled in the spirit field area, mining lines, Pier, and Workshop sheds respectively.

Of the first batch of 6,400 supplementary personnel, a little over 2,000 have arrived, along with 600 low-grade sea-carrying beasts and 47 small cargo ships that can be dismantled and repaired—the condition of the ships varies, and most need repairs before they can be put into the water.

The remaining 4,000-plus people will arrive in batches.

"Do the people who arrived have food?"

Lu Changyuan asked.

"Enough for three months."

Su Qingli said, "After three months, it must be replenished—either buy it or grow it ourselves."

Lu Changyuan nodded.

He looked at Chen Mo.

Chen Mo put down the teacup.

"The first batch of purification liquid produced eighty-seven small bottles; thirty percent was kept for our own use, and the rest has been sealed."

"The second batch is still being tested—the formula needs adjustment; the ratio of old sand last time was too high, making the liquid too turbid."

"How long to finish the adjustment?"

"Two more batches."

Chen Mo said, "It should be stable."

Leng Feng turned around from the window.

"The armor for the fifty cavalrymen has been replenished, and the seahorses are in good condition."

"On the side of the Outer Port broken reef plate, three sections of the reef cracked last week and need pile reinforcement."

"As for manpower—"

"That's enough."

Lu Changyuan raised his hand.

The room went quiet.

He placed the dark gold ring on the table.

"I exchanged for six items with Elder Tianji."

He took out the items one by one and lined them up on the table.

When the light membranes dissipated, everyone's expression changed—it wasn't shock, but that instinctive silence one has when seeing something completely incomprehensible.

Su Qingli stood up and leaned in to look at the transparent coral.

She extended a finger, hovering it above the coral without touching it, and withdrew it after a moment.

"It's cold."

She said, "It's absorbing the surrounding temperature."

"Starlight Coral mother branch."

Lu Changyuan repeated what Elder Tianji had said—one mother branch can spread thirty zhang of purified water area in a year, and in three years, it can clean up the seabed off the coast of Blue Moon Island that was polluted by the demonic tide.

Anything can live in purified sea areas.

Su Qingli's eyes lit up.

But she didn't speak immediately.

She picked up her brush and wrote a few words in the blank space of the account book, then looked up.

"Water temperature."

"What about the water temperature?"

"The water temperature at the Outer Port berths is barely enough."

She said, "But this coral needs a cold sea."

"Most of the coastal waters of Blue Moon Island are warm water layers; only under that narrow waterway on the north side of the Outer Port is there a layer of cold water churning up from the depths—whether it's enough, we have to test."

She pointed to the cold marrow jade shell.

"This one is even pickier."

"The mother shell must be attached to a cold spring eye to secrete cold jade marrow."

"It's not strange for there to be cold spring eyes in a cold water layer—but whether that cold water layer at the Outer Port of Blue Moon Island has any, I haven't explored."

"Is it possible there aren't any?"

Lu Hu asked.

Su Qingli didn't answer immediately.

She opened another account book—it was the hydrological record of the waters around Blue Moon Island, her own handwritten copy, with very small characters, but densely packed with every water depth, water temperature, current direction, and reef distribution.

She flipped through several pages.

"The cold water layer at the Outer Port is not large."

She said, "About three li long and half a li wide."

"The probability of there being a cold spring eye in such a small cold water layer—it's fifty-fifty."

Lu Hu stopped speaking.

Su Qingli's gaze finally fell on the dark cyan egg.

She didn't touch it, just looked at it.

"What does this one need?"

Lu Changyuan recounted what he had felt when his palm was pressed against the eggshell—cold, deep, dark water.

Only the cold of the ten-thousand-zhang depths would be enough.

Su Qingli was quiet for a moment.

She spread out the nautical chart at hand.

The waters around Blue Moon Island were densely marked on the chart—shoals, reefs, shipping lanes, current directions, each place circled with water depth numbers written.

She traced outward along the water depth markers on the chart with the tip of her brush.

Shoal.

Reef.

Shoal.

Warm water area.

Still a shoal.

The brush tip traced further and further.

It traced to the northwest corner of the chart, stopping at a place marked with only four characters.

Those four characters were—Fog Zone, Unsurveyed.

"The old nautical chart only marked the name."

Su Qingli's voice lowered, "No one has ever gone down there."

Lu Changyuan looked at that blank space.

He remembered that feeling when his palm was pressed against the eggshell earlier.

Cold.

Deep.

Dark.

"What is that place called?"

Su Qingli looked up.

"Cold Dragon Abyss."

The sea breeze blew in from the window again, causing the edge of the nautical chart to curl up.

Lu Changyuan reached out and pressed down on the chart, his fingertips landing right on the four characters "Fog Zone, Unsurveyed."

No one spoke.