158: Chapter 158 The Man in the Deep Sea (Happy New Year)

The stone door was forcibly blown open.

Minister Luo Lie led the elite pursuer squad and charged into the secret cave of the Zhenxiang Society.

Zheng Hongxin and dozens of high-ranking sacrificial personnel stood up one after another, looking at these uninvited guests.

Seeing the blood stains on their clothes and the smoking gun barrels in their hands, they instantly realized that the guards posted outside had all been dealt with.

"Is this the Saints Relic?"

Minister Luo Lie looked up at the truth stele standing tall on the altar, his eyes filled with curiosity and desire.

As he spoke, he strode forward. That arrogant Aura of regarding no one else provoked a sense of resentment among the members of the Zhenxiang Society.

"Halt!"

A high-ranking priest shouted angrily to stop him.

Minister Luo Lie turned his head to glance at him.

That person couldn't help trembling all over, and then, as if struck in the chest by an invisible giant force, his entire body flew backward.

Just at the moment when his back was about to be pierced by the spear-like sharp stalactites, a large-jointed hand grabbed his collar and dragged him back to the ground.

Minister Luo Lie's pupils shrank slightly as he looked closely.

He saw an old man appear beside the high-ranking priest as if teleporting, rescuing the person.

"You are Zheng Hongxin, the vice president of the Truth and Meditation Fellowship?"

Minister Luo Lie looked him over with curiosity: "I heard that thirty years ago you crossed hands with the first commander of the Special Investigation Team and managed to escape with your life by fluke. How much of your strength do you still retain now?"

Then he glanced at the other sacrificial personnel who were rubbing their fists and wiping their palms, and said with a hint of banter:

"Your Zhenxiang Society seems to be withering in terms of talent, just a bunch of crooked melons and cracked dates. Why not simply defect to our organization? With your strength, entering the board of directors is completely out of the question."

Zheng Hongxin remained silent, his body only faintly emitting a strange Aura.

Suddenly, his figure flashed violently, instantly dashing toward Minister Luo Lie.

Minister Luo Lie's reaction speed was extremely fast. Almost instinctively, he waved both hands and conjured a defensive telekinetic wall.

Within a mere 0.05 seconds.

Zheng Hongxin leaned forward and sprinted, crossing a distance of more than ten meters.

At the same time, the muscles on his arms bulged violently, tearing through his clothes and revealing blue-black skin.

Bang!

A punch struck the telekinetic wall, and a silent air wave rippled outward.

Everyone only felt their ears buzzing.

Minister Luo Lie, who took the heavy blow head-on, was shaken back half a step.

Seeing the leader start moving, the others reacted immediately.

The pursuer team members immediately raised their guns and opened fire at Zheng Hongxin.

The members of the Zhenxiang Society also swiftly pounced on the intruders.

The battle between the two sides was like an ignited powder keg, erupting instantly.

Facing the bullets, Zheng Hongxin dodged and maneuvered, turning around with a single punch to cave in the chest of an elite pursuer and send him flying backward.

It was as if he was expressing through his actions: You dare to touch my people, and I will kill your people in retaliation.

With such an attitude of starting to fight without a second word, Zheng Hongxin must have had a fiery temper when he was young.

Seeing that the bullets couldn't hit the opponent at all, Minister Luo Lie immediately issued an order:

"Get out of the way, let me handle him!"

As he spoke, his eyes bloomed with a deep blue light, locking onto the fast-moving target.

Immediately afterward, an extremely powerful force field instantly enveloped down, continuously squeezing and shrinking toward the center like a cage.

Feeling the solidification coming from the surrounding air, Zheng Hongxin immediately stopped in his tracks and said coldly:

"I'm just old, not dead."

Amidst his words, the muscles in his body expanded further, his hands and feet became abnormally thick, and patches of fish scales even appeared on the surface of his cyan skin.

He exuded a dangerous Aura all over his body, as if releasing a long-hidden power.

Then he abruptly broke free from the restraints of the force field, like a bullet being fired with a swoosh, rushing toward Minister Luo Lie with lightning speed.

"Bring it on!"

Minister Luo Lie's pupils shrank rapidly, gathering all his telekinesis to control the force field, defending himself while counterattacking the opponent.

Although somewhat surprised, he quickly steadied his footing and ignited a strong desire to battle.

He decided to match wits and skills with this legendary vice president of the Zhenxiang Society.

Neither of them cared about the sounds of slaughter coming from their subordinates around them, staring fixedly at the most dangerous enemy in front of them.

As long as the opponent was resolved, all problems would be readily solved.

Just when the entire cave fell into a melee and no one was paying attention,

the truth stele standing on the altar actually displayed a new video image.

That was a patch of pitch-black, silent, rippling seawater.

As the perspective extended deeper, azure-blue light spots could be vaguely seen twinkling like stars.

...

Bang!

A gunshot pierced the night sky, and was immediately drowned out in the violent storm.

On the bobbing and rolling fishing boat, several corpses lay strikingly, with blood flowing out gurglingly and spreading along the deck.

"Stop!"

Feng Kehai shouted sharply.

"Still haven't figured it out?"

Li Chengjun glanced at him, raised the muzzle of his gun, and pressed it against the head of a collapsed Zhenxiang Society member nearby.

Then, there was another bang.

Blood splashed, and the bullet hit the target's temple.

"You..."

Feng Kehai was so angry that he couldn't speak.

Li Chengjun's crazy posture simply didn't leave him enough time to think.

Seeing that he raised the gun muzzle again, seemingly choosing the next target, he hurriedly agreed:

"Fine, I'll cooperate with you!"

Hearing these words, Li Chengjun's face instantly broke into a smile:

"It's good that you've figured it out. Cooperation is beneficial to everyone; I'm not a born murderer after all."

"How about this, the ancient remains salvaged later will be split 7-3; I take 7 and you take 3. That's very fair and reasonable..."

As he spoke, it was as if his face changed expressions, and he affectionately patted Feng Kehai's shoulder, discussing the matter of diving into the sea for salvage operations with him.

At the same time, the others also began to make preparations.

A support frame was raised on the side of the ship, turning on a huge searchlight of 200,000 lumens aimed at the seabed.

Such intense light was sufficient to illuminate the deep water area about 150 meters away from the sea surface, ensuring the safety of underwater operations.

Ten pursuer team members wore full sets of diving equipment and carried special weapons for underwater use, standing in formation by the ship's rail.

Unlike the members of the Zhenxiang Society who were all proficient in swimming, their preparations were very thorough.

Because he didn't trust Feng Kehai, Li Chengjun decided to stay on the boat to personally supervise the hostages and equipment.

His subordinate Awakened A-Jie had already woken up, and was responsible for leading the team into the sea.

The main task was to supervise the Zhenxiang Society's treasure salvage personnel to work honestly and prevent them from escaping taking advantage of the opportunity.

Three Zhenxiang Society members only wore simple diving suits, put on hook ropes, and plunged straight down with a dive.

Seeing this, the pursuer team members also jumped into the sea one after another.

The sea surface rolled with waves, like a beast released from a cage, rushing forward turbulently.

A moment of carelessness could easily cause one to be overturned by the waves and lose control of their body.

However, once diving underwater, the violent sea began to become docile.

The searchlight illuminated the area close to the sea surface brightly, as if forming an unobstructed path.

Moreover, the deeper they dived, the smaller the signs of seawater fluctuation became, appearing increasingly silent.

No matter how big the wind and waves were, below 30 meters they basically had no impact at all.

At this time, apart from the splashing sounds caused by the divers' own swimming, almost no other sounds came through.

A-Jie and the ten pursuers followed behind the three Zhenxiang Society salvage personnel, constantly swimming toward the seabed fissure.

Suddenly, an unusual sound like water waves being cut open came from around them.

Everyone immediately looked toward the source of the sound, only to see pairs of glowing green eyes emerging in the dark seawater.

Faintly, dark green scales flashing with a dim luster could also be seen.

It was the mermen who had been attracted over.

A-Jie and the pursuer team members immediately felt their hearts tighten, their muscles tensing all over.

Perhaps due to the searchlight's light being too bright, they merely hid in the darkness, lingering constantly without rashly launching an attack.

Seeing this, the three Zhenxiang Society salvage personnel immediately made low, strange chirping sounds in their mouths.

Then, those mermen seemed to hesitate for a moment before turning around and swimming toward darker waters.

A-Jie breathed a sigh of relief, thinking to himself that fortunately the Special Envoy was thoughtful, otherwise a fierce battle just now would have been inevitable.

Thinking of this, he immediately perked up, deciding to make up for his faults with outstanding task performance and redeem his impression points in the Special Envoy's heart.

Afterwards, he pressed the muzzle of his gun against the back of the Zhenxiang Society member swimming in front, coercing them to continue diving downwards.

The searchlight's light shone into the seawater, forming a cylindrical "tunnel of light" that guided the direction forward.

Without any errors, first release, internal content, check one by one!

However, due to seawater scattering, as the depth increased, this "path of light" began to become dim and blurry.

A large number of tiny plankton floating within it made the entire passage look even more like a fluttering ribbon.

A-Jie stroked the water waves hard with both hands and poked his head out to look down.

He could vaguely see the white volcanic ash rock layer and a pitch-black fissure lying across the seabed.

That was where the destination was.

A few minutes later.

Stepping on the volcanic ash rocks, everyone finally arrived at the target location.

A-Jie exhaled a bubble from his diving mask and glanced at the glowing diving depth gauge on his wrist.

It showed that the water depth at this location shockingly reached 53 meters, which was equivalent to the height of an 18-story building.

He raised his head, looking at the pitch-black sea surface and the channel exit which only had a single point of light left, feeling his heart thumping involuntarily.

Looking down again at the bottomless fissure, he developed even more deep-sea phobia.

He always felt that a huge fish or unknown creature would rush out and swallow him in one bite.

At this time, A-Jie suddenly remembered a very important matter.

Where on earth were the "ancient remains" mentioned by the Special Envoy?

He cast his gaze toward the three Zhenxiang Society salvage personnel, finding that they were also looking around, appearing somewhat bewildered.

Several pursuer team members raised the flashlights in their hands and shone them into the distance.

In the endless darkness, the blue light described was indeed faintly flickering in other marine directions.

A-Jie was puzzled in his heart, so he made contact with the sea surface via the underwater walkie-talkie.

On the fishing boat.

After receiving the message, Li Chengjun knitted his brows and looked at Feng Kehai:

"Isn't this your primary salvage location? How come not even a single piece of ancient remains has been found?"

"I don't know either."

Seeing that his eyes were somewhat unkind, Feng Kehai hurriedly explained: "According to past experience, this is the best location for salvage, absolutely without error. Perhaps it's still early..."

"Wait, what is that?!"

Before he finished speaking, A-Jie's slightly surprised voice came from the walkie-talkie again.

Down from the sea surface, in the seabed fissure more than fifty meters deep.

Treading water, everyone came to the edge of the cliff and poked their heads out to look down in unison.

The searchlight's light penetrated here, and there were still a large number of unscattered light particles illuminating part of the scenery beneath the abyss.

Everyone's sight kept probing downward along this "tunnel of light", finally landing at the end where light and dark intertwined.

They shockingly discovered a mass of unknown substance emitting a blue fluorescent glow gathered there.

That light was dreamlike, wispy and ethereal, forming a wonderland-like Tyndall effect.

In the surrounding dark waters, there were also many demon-like dark green figures wandering everywhere.

Those were the mermen in the deep sea, entangling and surrounding each other, as if guarding something.

If one gazed carefully, they could also see a vague humanoid figure dimly visible amidst the mermen and blue light.

What was going on here?

Looking at such a bizarre scene in the abyss, almost simultaneously, everyone's heart suddenly skipped a beat.

A-Jie used the rifle held in his hand to poke a younger Zhenxiang Society salvage personnel beside him.

The young man showed fear on his face and shook his head vigorously.

Obviously, he really didn't know what on earth this situation was.

A-Jie frowned slightly, and then described the bizarre scene he saw to the Special Envoy through the walkie-talkie.

"Use the infrasound gun to drive away the mermen, and hurry up and salvage the thing!"

Li Chengjun's command entered his ears through the walkie-talkie, his tone appearing very urgent and stern.

Helpless, A-Jie could only comply.

The oxygen storage in the air cylinder was not much, and continuing to delay was definitely not a good idea.

The other team members had also long received the order, successively taking out their weapons and making battle preparations.

One of the team members even raised a rifle with a special shape, aiming at the mass of blue light in the abyss.

Hum—

As the trigger was pulled, the muzzle did not fire solid ammunition, but instead emitted a high-intensity directional infrasound wave.

The low-frequency harmful sound waves propagated rapidly in the seawater, forming tiny ripples in circles that spread and reached a depth of over 150 meters.

The swarming mermen immediately emitted low, sharp hissing sounds, and then scattered with a roar.

Afterward, the truth of the thing emitting the azure-blue light was finally revealed.

That was...

Pieces of huge skeletons resembling monster remains were suspended in the pitch-black abyss.

The azure-blue light emitted was so peculiar that looking at it for a long time vaguely gave a stinging sensation.

Everyone's eyes lit up with wild joy in their hearts.

This should be the legendary ancient remains!

A-Jie immediately urged the Zhenxiang Society members to go down and salvage it quickly.

Driven by necessity, the three Zhenxiang Society members had no choice but to take a risk and continue diving deeper.

Just at this moment, a sound like surging tides came from the seabed fissure, or like thunder rolling and echoing in the silent and empty abyss.

Rumble—

The sound wave drove the heavy seawater, stirring up layers of water waves that scattered the turbulent undercurrents and blew those ancient remains far away.

Seeing this, everyone couldn't help feeling a bit anxious.

However, the next second, all of them froze in place.

Because right at this moment, the hazy figure previously hidden within the blue light cluster was fully revealed.

Moreover, it became extremely clear.

That was a completely naked young man.

He stood quietly in the abyss, suspended in the seawater.

The light shone down by the searchlight fluttered like a ribbon, gently stroking the exquisitely sculpted muscle lines on his body like a work of art.

Manifesting an indescribable masculine aesthetic and a serene Concept.

He looked like the sea god in an ancient Greek sculpture, or like a standing Buddha statue.

Those driven-away mermen returned one after another as if summoned by something.

Circling around him, they were like the demons serving as Protectors for gods and Buddhas in legends.

And this "tunnel of light" extending down from the sea surface was set up precisely to welcome his birth.

A merman attached itself to the man's ear, whispering softly.

It seemed to be waking him up, or perhaps telling him something.

The dark abyss that ordinary people could not reach, with light added to his body and demons surrounding him, made this scene filled with a strange divinity.

It also made everyone who saw this scene shudder involuntarily, feeling an indescribable interweaving of fear and anticipation.

Just at this moment.

The man suddenly opened his eyes, his gaze piercing through layers of seawater like substance, shooting toward everyone.

The update was a bit late. Wishing everyone a smooth job, successful career, and a happy life in the new year!