Chapter 1030
Chapter 1030
“An apparition vessel?”
Raon knit his brows in disbelief as his gaze settled on Paros.
“Just what are you getting at…”
To suddenly hear mention of an apparition vessel right when their discussion centered on the Blue Wolf made little sense.
“You there!”
Martha levelled the tip of her blade straight at Paros’s forehead, her face twisting in a sharp grimace.
“If you intend to babble fairy tales that wouldn’t fool a toddler, I’ll carve a trench right through your skull this instant.”
A blood-tinted bloodlust pooled along the length of her steel, carrying genuine murderous intent.
“Our patience is wearing thin at the moment, understand?”
Burren let loose a harsh breath and tightened his fingers into a tight fist.
“Think carefully about every syllable you utter. You won’t simply lose your life—you’ll suffer immensely before it ends.”
His lower lip was drawn tight between his teeth, vivid memories of Belder Harbor’s complete obliteration clearly weighing on his mind.
“…”
Runaan kept her placid stare fixed on the shivering Paros, her internal reactions completely unreadable.
“The wretch is simply spinning fabrications to preserve his own neck!”
Krein curled his mouth in disgust, urging them to butcher Paros without further delay.
“He possesses zero credibility. A so-called commander who readily abandons his crew just to slip away.”
Trevin moved his head in refusal, arguing that leaving such a man among the living served no purpose.
“I-It is the absolute truth!”
Paros frantically jerked his head back and forth, swearing by all that was sacred that a ghost vessel existed, even while cold iron pressed into his skin.
“I can swear to this solely because my own two eyes witnessed it!”
His frame shuddered uncontrollably as he insisted he had seen the phantom craft that laid waste to their docks.
“Very well.”
Raon gave a brief wave of his hand, signaling for Burren and Martha to draw back.
“I will permit your tale, so lay it out properly.”
Given that the current circumstances demanded every scrap of information they could gather, hearing what Paros had to say before passing judgment was entirely reasonable.
“Tch!”
Martha released an irritated click of her tongue and retreated a couple of paces.
“As you command.”
Burren inclined his head the moment the directive landed, stepping directly behind the captive captain.
“I-If I disclose every detail, will my life be spared?”
“Only if your words carry weight and truth.”
Raon offered a nod, telling him to begin his account.
“A-All right.”
Grasping that this stood as his solitary lifeline, Paros sank to his knees right before Raon.
“In truth, the initial disruption within the haven under my rule occurred roughly twelve months past.”
A muted wheeze escaped him, revealing that abnormalities matching their present plight had been brewing for an entire year.
“Rule, what absolute rubbish! You were robbing them blind!”
Martha scowled, demanding he use honest terms.
“D-During those early days, unlike the current catastrophe, whole settlements and ports weren’t wiped off the map; rather, individuals simply vanished in small clusters.”
“Vanished?”
“Indeed. To speak plainly, runaways are quite routine among the hamlets we govern… that is, bleed dry.”
Paros cast his eyes down, conceding that captives attempting to flee were an everyday occurrence in their territory.
“Naturally. You squeezed every coin from their pockets under the pretense of governance while offering nothing in return.”
Martha sneered, pointing out how sickeningly predictable his conduct was.
“Y-You speak the truth.”
Paros dipped his head, clearly recognizing that weaving falsehoods here was impossible.
“Under normal circumstances, the anchorages and towns we oversee have limited flight paths, whether through inland trails or ocean routes. Should ten wretches attempt an escape, we reliably capture nine. But…”
A heavy, troubled sigh slipped past his lips as he shook his head.
“Roughly a year back, catching those runaway captives… those people, became an impossibility. It was as if phantom hands had pulled them out of existence.”
Paros wrinkled his brow, recounting how dispatching scouts and trackers across the lands yielded not a single footprint or clue.
“Did this occur across every single village and port under your watch?”
“Precisely. Folk were not merely disappearing from a solitary outpost, but across the entire territory.”
He nodded, emphasizing that nothing of this nature had ever crossed his path before.
“And how did you respond?”
Raon tilted his head upward slightly, prompting him to detail his next move.
“Left with no other choice, we rounded up the remaining captives and tor-tortured them relentlessly…”
Paros dropped his volume to a whisper, throwing an anxious look toward Martha.
“Ordinarily, people will trade every scrap of information just to keep their breath, yet in this instance, they maintained total ignorance even as we severed their limbs.”
He groaned from the pit of his stomach, admitting that the situation felt entirely unnatural from that point forward.
“With fewer bodies remaining, our profits plummeted, and because of the brutal interrogations, the locals turned utterly hostile. Thus, we sailed away for a spell.”
Paros moistened his lips, explaining that they vacated their domain temporarily to pursue standard business.
“To put it bluntly, you resumed your thieving on the open seas.”
Burren let out a mocking snort, remarking on how the man continuously dressed up his atrocities.
“Y-You are entirely correct.”
Paros confessed without resistance, having surrendered any hope that deceit would aid him.
“After roughly thirty days of maritime raiding, boredom set in, so we left the larger squadron adrift on the outer waters. We turned back toward home aboard our solitary flagship…”
His pallid mouth quivered, the lingering horror clearly clawing its way back into his heart.
“That was when the apparition vessel crossed our path.”
A night swallowed by squalls and lashing downpours.
“Pick up the pace!”
Paros brought his heel crashing down upon the timber deck.
“Right away!”
“Y-Yes, Captain!”
Spurred by his roar, soaked crewmen threw their full weight against the rigging, hauling down canvas sails that whipped frantically under the gale.
“Where in the blazes did this sudden tempest come from!”
Paros glared out at the howling deluge that seemed intent on cracking the dark sky in two. The waters had remained glassy until moments earlier; in all his years roaming the sea, such an abrupt, violent storm was unprecedented.
Worse still, a thick blanket of milky vapor was rolling across the swells, choking off visibility until he could barely see his own hands. Navigating in such an environment was pure suicide.
‘Fortune has been rotting away of late.’
Over a hundred captives had slipped away from his havens, and his hunters had failed to retrieve even a single straggler.
To offset the financial bleeding, he had taken to the open waves for a month of pillaging, yet the haul had proved miserable. Just as they turned their prow toward home in foul spirits, this bizarre squall descended, stoking his rage to a boiling point.
‘Ultimately, replenishment is required.’
Whether to fill slave pens or force labor upon the fields, warm bodies were indispensable. He figured their subsequent campaign would require raiding the southern coastlines to abduct fresh stock.
“The port is dead ahead, so watch your spacing to avoid smashing into the shallows!”
Paros bellowed over the roar of the gale, fingers locked tightly around the salt-slicked rail.
“Ignite the signal lanterns and—”
“C-Captain! Over there, look!”
The deck officer rushed over, terror painted across his features, his trembling finger aimed toward the harbor swallowed by mist.
“What am I supposed to—”
Paros stalked forward with a scowl, only to freeze dead in his tracks.
“What manner of thing is…”
Stationed right outside the inlet they sought to enter, an ancient, weathered ship drifted through the milky haze, moving with uncanny serenity as if the tempest around it did not exist.
“Could it be an abandoned hulk?”
Occasionally, masterless vessels would ride the oceanic drifts into harbor mouths, and since no living spark emanated from the interior, he assumed it was merely salvage.
“It must be an unmanned derelict, Captain—our light signals receive no reply!”
The deck officer bobbed his head, confirming the vessel appeared devoid of life.
“Excellent. A hull of those dimensions ought to hold considerable plunder.”
Paros gave an approving nod, gesturing toward the shadowy silhouette.
“Board it and strip everything that carries value!”
“At once!”
Receiving the command, several crewmen vaulted straight into the churning sea without hesitation, swimming across and scaling the weathered flanks of the craft. Yet, the instant their boots touched the deck, their life presences vanished entirely, snuffed out like candles in the dark. Then, as though suddenly stirred into wakefulness, the eerie vessel shifted its prow, turning directly toward Paros’s ship and gliding forward.
“Hmm…”
Paros swallowed hard, his feet instinctively dragging him backward.
‘This is lethal.’
Watching that vessel drift closer without producing a ripple or a sound, an icy chill crept straight up his spine. A revolting, prickly sensation gripped his chest. The raw animal intuition that had kept him breathing and elevated him to a pirate lord screamed bloody murder, urging him to flee.
“What is happening? Why can’t I detect the boarding party…”
The deck officer stammered, his mind unable to grasp the silence.
“D-Deploy every man! Send every last hand across. Move!”
Paros dug his fingers into the officer’s shoulder, ordering him to throw the entire crew onto the approaching vessel.
“U-Understood.”
The officer signaled with his arm, turning to rally the deck.
“All hands, storm that ship!”
He stepped forward to lead the charge himself, barking directives at his subordinates.
“Hup…”
The very instant the crew surged forward to clamber onto the phantom vessel, Paros pivoted, dashed toward the stern, and slid silently into the churning ocean.
‘There is no doubt.’
That hull was no ordinary craft. A lifetime on the tides exposed a sailor to endless ocean folklore. That vessel matched the flesh-consuming ghost ship told of in childhood terrors. Regardless of whether it was truly a phantom, survival demanded his immediate escape. His primal premonitions had never once led him astray.
‘Ugh…’
Paros plunged into the freezing depths, disregarding whatever slaughter unfolded above. Having refined an aquatic internal art, he descended to dark depths where surface silhouettes vanished, rationing his breaths to a microscopic trickle. Only after his lungs screamed from total exhaustion did he cautiously drift back toward the surface air.
“The ship… it’s gone…”
His flagship had vanished down to the last plank of wood; the dozens of crewmen who sailed beneath him had ceased to exist, leaving not a single floating carcass behind.
‘Just as my gut warned.’
Paros expelled a ragged, trembling breath. While surrendering the pride of his fleet was a bitter pill, survival superseded all material losses.
“I will reach the docks first and rally… wait, what?”
His eyes bulged in shock as he paddled toward the landing.
“The… the port…”
Cox Port, the fortified sanctuary he had occupied for over a decade, looked as though centuries of ruin had washed over it in minutes.
The primary stone pier where hulls moored was broken into jagged teeth, while the town beyond had been flattened into unrecognizable rubble. It appeared as though a towering tidal surge had plowed through every structure without mercy.
“What madness is this…”
Paros gulped air and hauled his soaked body onto the stone remnants.
“Is anyone alive?”
His shout echoed across the devastation, but not a single human presence answered. Even the mongrels kept by the townsfolk were absent.
“Now that I recall…”
He remembered how the unnatural fog rolling off the phantom ship had completely swallowed the port earlier.
“Was it truly an apparition vessel?”
Considering how it consumed a warship and obliterated a sprawling harbor in under an hour, it could only be the legendary phantom of the deep.
“Blegh!”
The sheer psychological horror proved too much, and Paros dropped to his knees, retching bile into the seawater lapping the shore.
“Ugh…”
Wiping the foul saliva from his lips, he lifted his gaze—only to lock eyes with the Blue Wolf resting atop the sea’s surface.
“W-What in the world is that now!”
As Paros shrieked and scrambled backward, the beast pinned him with a piercing, unblinking glare before dissolving down into the dark water.
“Huk!”
Crushed beneath the sheer weight of dread, Paros’s eyes rolled white, and his consciousness snapped as he collapsed upon the stones.
“That… that marked the final occasion I beheld the apparition ship, yet…”
Paros managed a difficult swallow, casting a wary glance toward Raon.
“Identical catastrophes kept befalling the remaining harbors under my charge.”
A tremor ran through him as he maintained that every ruined dock was the craft’s doing.
“Hmm.”
Raon stroked his jaw thoughtfully, studying the pirate whose terror was palpable with every breath he took.
‘If his words hold true…’
Then it was not the Blue Wolf that eradicated those coastal settlements, but an entirely different entity.
—Nonsense!
Wrath protested loudly, waving his arms.
—That oversized hound could easily be in league with them, couldn’t it?
‘That remains a distinct possibility. Even so…’
Raon pressed his lips together, his eyes drifting over the tranquil horizon.
‘Humans are undeniably pulling the strings here.’
Whether the master of that vessel was taming the Blue Wolf or the creature trailed them of its own accord remained uncertain, but mortalkind, rather than restless spirits, stood at the core of this tragedy.
“Hearing his account actually makes him seem more believable.”
Martha scowled, giving Paros’s forehead an irritated jab with her fingertip.
“This rat tried to slip into the water today as well, shoving his subordinates forward as a shield.”
She offered a mocking smirk, noting that dragging him back from the ocean required chasing him into the waves.
“I watched him throw himself overboard without a second thought too.”
Burren let out a humorless breath, clearly baffled by the man’s sheer cowardice.
“I… I concur…”
Dorian raised his hand tentatively, his pupils darting around.
“His story rings true.”
He nodded, explaining that his Mind’s Eye caught no trace of deception in the pirate.
“Indeed. Deceit is absent…”
Runaan blinked slowly, having detected the same genuineness.
“I-I swear it is the unvarnished truth!”
Paros breathed a desperate sigh, seeing a glimmer of survival now that the others lent him credence.
“What were the wolf’s dimensions when it first crossed your sight?”
Raon signaled toward Paros with a light gesture of his finger.
“Well, back then, its size hardly differed from an ordinary mountain wolf.”
Paros scratched at his scalp, recalling that the beast initially resembled a typical predator.
“Yet with every fallen harbor and vanishing settlement, its frame grew steadily larger.”
He shook his head in lingering disbelief, explaining that it eventually reached the proportions of a sprawling residence.
“And following that?”
Raon tapped lightly against the wood of the deck, urging him to continue the sequence of events.
“Mere days later, an adjacent harbor met the exact same fate. However, the phantom vessel did not reveal itself again; once the mist receded, only flattened timber and empty ground remained.”
Paros let out a low rumble of misery, noting that the craft itself stayed out of sight from then on.
“So, realizing the situation exceeded your capabilities, did you attempt to evacuate the remaining populaces?”
“N-No, not quite.”
He offered a weak, ashamed whimper.
“I feared the apparition vessel might trail our scent if we herded the common folk along…”
Paros glanced left and right nervously before forcing the words out.
“I… I took flight with only my remaining pirate fleet, steering in an alternate heading.”
Sniffling miserably, he admitted he fled exclusively with his buccaneers, terrified that carrying the townsfolk would betray the fact that he had survived witnessing the ghost craft.
“You absolute piece of trash!”
Martha gnashed her teeth, seizing Paros by his scalp.
“I-I possessed no alternative! We simply sought survival…”
Paros pressed his forehead against the deck, claiming it was his solitary recourse.
“So when you returned, every outpost and haven you were meant to shield was reduced to ash?”
“T-That is so.”
He kept his head bowed, the weight of his disgrace finally showing.
“We assumed they had turned north after clearing out our waters, yet somehow they slipped southward toward this place…”
Paros looked toward Lawaine, admitting they merely intended to secure one final haul of plunder before vanishing completely.
“Now that we have extracted every detail, may we dispose of this garbage?”
Martha ground her molars, eager to separate Paros’s head from his shoulders herself.
“H-Hold on a moment! You explicitly promised to spare my life provided I gave reliable intelligence…”
“A creature that discards his own men like worn rags warrants zero trust.”
Raon flicked his wrist, granting Martha full discretion.
“Move. A swift end is far too lenient for you.”
“P-Please, wait—”
“Silence your maw and walk.”
Declaring that spilling his filthy blood would only soil their clean deck, Martha vaulted over the railing into the ocean, dragging Paros down with her. Raon listened to the fading wails of the pirate, his thoughts settling into place.
“The puzzle pieces are finally aligning.”
The reason behind their ten-day silence was now evident. Judging by Paros’s testimony, the conspirators navigating that phantom vessel had gone to ground upon realizing he was patrolling these waters. If they were to be coaxed out of hiding, the identity of Sword Emperor Raon Zieghart had to completely vanish from this ocean.
“It seems…”
Raon’s lips curved upward into a subtle smirk as his eyes fell upon Lawaine and the assembled warriors.
“We have some theater to prepare.”
“Phew…”
Martha released an irritated breath, slumped in the shadows of a ramshackle drinking den.
“This is mind-numbing.”
Following their interrogation of Paros, Raon orchestrated a false departure back toward Zieghart while secretly returning by sea, scattering the warriors of the Light Wind Palace to slip quietly into neighboring harbors. Yet, contrary to their expectation of a swift re-emergence, neither the Blue Wolf nor the ghost vessel had surfaced after a full month. The enemy was cautious to an extreme degree.
‘Have they abandoned these waters entirely?’
She worried they might have relocated to distant shores, spooked by the formidable reputation of Sword Emperor Raon Zieghart.
‘This waiting is utterly pointless.’
Having recently tasted rapid refinement during her private clashes with Raon, being forced to sit idle in a coastal backwater with nothing but rolling waves to look at drove her mad. Martha set her empty tankard down with a sharp clatter and made her way back to her quarters.
‘I can’t endure another day of this.’
Just as she prepared to cycle her internal energy, she paused, reached into her dimensional pouch, and withdrew a dull gray communication sphere, feeding it a thread of aura. The crystal flared with a gentle cerulean luminescence, projecting Raon’s features.
[This is outside our scheduled contact. Did something occur?]
Raon tilted his head slightly, curious about the unexpected transmission.
“Just how long must we rot in these places! It’s been an entire month!”
Martha pinched her nose in frustration, complaining that her joints were growing stiff from sheer inaction.
[You are well aware that certain assignments require a year of patience.]
Raon wagged a finger in reprimand, noting they were far from the conclusion.
“It’s far too dull! Let me at least remain at your side!”
Martha groaned, noting that proper training was impossible in her current setting.
[By my side? It becomes rather inconvenient if your affections run that deep.]
Raon shook his head lightly, teasingly advising her to rein in her sentiments.
“That wasn’t my point at all! I simply want our sparring sessions!”
Martha flailed her arms, her cheeks flushing bright crimson.
[I am merely teasing. I know it is difficult, but hold your ground a bit longer. They will show themselves.]
Raon reassured her, certain that the crew guiding the apparition ship would inevitably break cover.
“What gives you such certainty?”
[Beings that consumed over ten ports and villages within a single year cannot resist their hunger forever. Their next move is imminent.]
A confident, knowing smile crossed his face.
“Tch…”
Martha ran a hand through her dyed crimson locks.
“Fine, then…”
Raon was the master she had chosen to pledge herself to. When he spoke with such absolute conviction, she could only yield.
[Once this matter concludes, I will spar with you until you are thoroughly satisfied.]
He held out his palm, offering a firm promise.
“You had best not walk that back.”
Martha wrinkled her nose playfully and extended her pinky toward the glowing crystal.
[What on earth are you attempting? An oath through a visual projection?]
Raon simply waved the dusting cloth in his hand, looking as if he were merely tending to his sphere.
“Ugh…”
Martha bit down on her lip, heat rising even higher across her face.
[Our fierce Miss Rakshasa remains quite youthful at heart.]
Raon offered a quiet, amused chuckle.
“B-Be quiet! You really… wait?”
Martha stopped short, her head snapping toward the exterior window.
[What is it?]
“An odd disturbance just echoed from above.”
Midway through their exchange, a brittle noise resembling shattered crystal had resonated through the sky. Judging by the commotion below, the townsfolk had registered it as well and were spilling into the streets.
“I will step out to inspect it. Wait, Raon?”
Martha addressed the crystal to signal her departure, but the transmission had severed without warning.
‘Could it be…’
Swallowing a lump of tension, she strode out of the quarters. A sea of thick, pale vapors was rapidly blanketing the settlement, and cutting through the outer waters was an ancient, decaying vessel cloaked in heavy mist.
‘The apparition ship…?’
The colossal hull seemed half-real, drifting as though it did not belong to the mortal realm, devoid of any wake or creaking timbers. Precisely as Paros had recounted, no word fit it better than a ghost craft.
‘They… they actually took the bait!’
Just as Raon had foreseen, their patience had shattered within thirty days, drawing them straight into the snare.
‘Spirits my foot…’
It was time to unmask the occupants. Martha pressed herself against the rear timber of the building, keeping only her eyes trained on the vessel docking against the stone pier. The moment the timber touched the landing, an alabaster gangway descended from the deck. The very first presence to emerge from the mist-shrouded vessel was an ominous figure clad in a white robe embroidered with crimson patterns.
As his feet touched down upon the stone, a thick, nauseating stench of iron and gore washed across the sea breeze. Spotting that distinctive attire, Martha abandoned all caution and vaulted straight out from her concealed perch.
“Of course. Only you vile mongrels could orchestrate such slaughter.”
Her sword cleared its sheath with a harsh rasp, her eyes burning with an intense, bloodthirsty crimson gleam.
“White Blood Religion!”
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