Chapter 120 – Deep Dive
The aircraft slowly landed beside Abyss No.1.
Accompanying them was a huge transport ship. As soon as Shi Yuan came down, he saw soldiers manipulating the transport robot, carefully transporting “Seeker 1” down.
It had been a year or two since Shi Yuan last saw “Seeker 1.” At that time, it was quietly parked underground in the main city, abandoned by people, unable to venture into space anymore.
After confirming the execution of the “Deep Dive,” the Alliance gathered the former staff of the space center. After tedious verification, debugging, and maintenance, it returned to the center stage after being frozen for many years.
After many days of absence, this cosmic escort ship still looked so beautiful, shining brightly in the light with its silver-white color. It was no longer awaiting the starry seas but the deep abyss.
A team of doctors was waiting for everyone.
Lu Tinghan and the others had undergone numerous health checks and had confirmed their good physical condition yesterday and this morning.
Before departure, there was one final simple check to ensure everything was in order.
Soldiers and engineers were busy adjusting the escort ship, Shi Yuan had his blood drawn, and someone measured his blood pressure while examining his senses, body, and limbs.
After 20 minutes, Shi Yuan received the examination report and wagged his tail as he handed it to Lu Tinghan, saying, “Look quickly!”
Lu Tinghan took it and glanced at it, patting Shi Yuan’s head. “Hmm, very healthy.”
Shi Yuan exclaimed, “Wow!”
He was very happy. He may not be strong, but he had always been a soft and healthy little monster.
Except for Shi Yuan, everyone else needed to take suppressants.
Shi Yuan watched as the transparent liquid was injected into their veins. Several people put on special combat suits – a combination of military and spacesuits, with a gray-white appearance that could adapt to low and high temperatures, different pressures, and resist some contamination.
Shi Yuan also received a set. His suit didn’t need to resist infection, so it was much lighter. The clothes were specially tailored to accommodate his tail, allowing him to wag it around.
Curiously, he began to study and walk around, hopping and jumping, adapting for a while before returning to Lu Tinghan’s side.
Meanwhile, the escort ship stopped 2 kilometers away from Abyss No.1 and was ready.
The ship’s door opened, and one by one, they boarded the ship. The soldiers and doctors saluted and bid them farewell. The cabin space was not large. Qi Hong sat in the front pilot seat, and the other four took their seats behind him, fastening their full-body safety belts.
Then, “Seeker 1” slowly took off.
It was a different feeling from riding an aircraft.
Shi Yuan couldn’t describe it, but he felt the escort ship was incredibly light, as if gravity had no effect on it. It floated effortlessly and swiftly into the air. With its engines, they flew through the atmosphere, easily crossing over the land and reaching the abyss.
Abyss No.1 was pitch black, with swirling black mist. Its former Abyss Watcher was long gone, and the gray-black watchtower stood alone in the distance.
Qi Hong stared ahead without blinking.
As part of the “Overlook” project, the Alliance had trained him and several others to become pilots.
He was the most talented among them, and now his colleagues were gone. They either lay in eternal slumber beneath the cold earth or had given up their dreams of the stars. But he, in the end, had boarded the escort ship and embarked on a journey.
Abyss No.1 was right before their eyes.
A boundless darkness.
Qi Hong took a deep breath and said, “Seeker 1, October 27th, 245, at exactly 11:00, request to execute the ‘Deep Dive’ plan!”
The command center replied, “Permission granted. Wishing you a safe journey.”
The escort ship hovered in the center of the abyss, with the blazing sun shining overhead and the vast wasteland stretching endlessly. The ship’s beautifully curved structure gleamed in the sunlight, while beneath it lay an unexplored world.
Then, it slowly descended.
The black mist engulfed its perfect streamlined shape, the thrusters, sensors, gunships, and patrol ship tails.
It disappeared into the abyss.
…
“Beep-beep-beep.”
“Beep-beep-beep.”
“Beep-beep-beep.”
Rhythmic sounds emanated from the sensors as concentric signal waves spread out, detecting nothing. The altitude indicated “-15.”
Silence filled the cabin.
The escort ship was fully enclosed, with no portholes. Holographic projections displayed the outside scenery on the walls, creating an immersive experience that allowed the pilots to see the outside world with ease. However, it also made the pitch-black darkness outside more terrifying, capable of devouring them at any moment.
No one knew what lay in the abyss. The descent of “Seeker 1” was incredibly slow. They had spent over an hour traveling 15 kilometers, fortunately without encountering any turbulence.
The only source of light came from the searchlights.
These specially designed searchlights could easily pierce through tens or even hundreds of kilometers on the ground. But now, as a dozen searchlights operated simultaneously, their beams dissipated within a few meters, swallowed by the rolling black mist.
“Beep-beep-beep.”
“Beep-beep-beep.”
The sound seemed endless and had a lulling effect.
Everyone was fully focused, while Shi Yuan turned his head to look outside the ship. He wagged the tip of his tail and began to daydream.
For the first time, he came into contact with another abyss like this, he didn’t know if he could consider them as kin. After all, they couldn’t communicate, nor did they transform like he did.
But just as he had a connection with the monsters, with their souls and blood intertwining and dancing on restless nights, Shi Yuan guessed that he might have a similar connection with these abysses.
They shared a common origin, both coming from a lonely distance.
“Beep-beep-beep.”
“Beep-beep-beep.”
Shi Yuan thought of a movie he had watched with Lu Tinghan.
The movie was about a submarine that submerged into the polar regions and headed towards a certain trench. The underwater world was so dark, and the submarine cautiously moved forward with its searchlights and radar, eventually discovering a sunken city.
The city was in ruins, but its grandeur could still be faintly seen. The divers became enthralled, wandering through the city, unaware that monsters from the trench were drawing near.
In the end, only one survivor returned to the surface to tell the story. Unfortunately, no one could find that sunken city again.
Looking at it this way, the abyss resembled the depths of the ocean. It was no wonder the project was named “Deep Dive.”
—And there were monsters too.
No one knew what lay beneath Abyss No.1, whether there was a mysterious kingdom or not.
Shi Yuan propped up his head, lost in thought.
He was so engrossed that Lu Tinghan reached out and pinched his palm, asking softly, “What are you thinking?”
“Nothing, really,” Shi Yuan replied. “I’m not nervous, just daydreaming, simply daydreaming.”
Lu Tinghan chuckled.
“Seeker 1” continued to descend. After half an hour, they reached a depth of -25 kilometers.
This was a particularly significant point, almost a milestone.
It marked the furthest depth reached by the Alliance’s probes and flying objects. Beyond this point, they lost all communication signals due to turbulent currents.
In other words, from here on out, they would truly be entering an unexplored forbidden zone, completely cut off from the command center and the surface. They would be on their own for the remainder of the journey.
“… ” Qi Hong took a deep breath. “Are you all ready?”
Everyone responded. He slowly pushed the control lever down—
Deep dive.
The pollution value on the screen escalated. The indicator light representing the communication channel changed from green to flickering yellow, and then to red.
The dispatcher’s voice in the channel grew fainter, as if swallowed by a shadow, dim and silent, only hearing them say, “Calling Seeker 1, please respond.”
“Calling Seeker 1, please respond.”
Academician Zhou Qian continued to answer, but the signal was disrupted, and the command center couldn’t hear anything.
They kept saying, “Calling Seeker 1, please respond.”
“Calling Seeker 1, please respond.”
“Calling Seeker 1, please respond.”
“…Seeker 1, can you hear us?”
The indicator light went completely dark.
At the last moment, a faint voice came through the channel, “…We are with you.”
The world fell silent, devoid of any sound.
Only the beeping of the instruments accompanied them.
-25 kilometers below sea level.
-30 kilometers below sea level.
-40 kilometers below sea level.
Deep dive.
To the depths of the abyss, to the beginning of everything, the depths of the nightmare, to the end of this century-long apocalypse.
Deep dive.
Upon reaching -55 kilometers below sea level, Academician Ke Zhengrong felt unwell.
The instruments monitored everyone’s vital signs and sounded an alarm: Ke Zhengrong’s infection value was rapidly increasing.
The escort ship and the combat suits significantly reduced the infection value of the abyss. But at this moment, the infection value outside the cabin skyrocketed, reaching an astronomical number. Even the strongest protection couldn’t completely block it, and the contamination index appeared inside the cabin.
Those who participated in the project were all outstanding individuals with a higher resistance to contamination than ordinary people.
The two academicians were no longer young, but they possessed knowledge and physical strength, which was truly rare. However, adverse reactions still occurred.
Ke Zhengrong injected himself with a suppressant to bring down the infection value.
It was a temporary solution.
If the Alliance’s speculation was correct, the concentration of black mist and infection values would actually decrease at the bottom of the abyss, enough for them to survive for several years.
The problem was that they didn’t know how far they were from the bottom of the abyss, and whether Ke Zhengrong could hold on until then.
At minus 62 kilometers below sea level, Ke Zhengrong injected the suppressant again.
The high dose of suppressant had side effects. His heartbeat accelerated, and his breathing became rapid.
“Take it easy,” Lu Tinghan told him. “Don’t inject again unless absolutely necessary.”
Ke Zhengrong replied softly.
Lu Tinghan reached out to feel Ke Zhengrong’s body temperature. It was fluctuating, sometimes cold and sometimes hot. His condition wasn’t great, and his vital signs were fluctuating.
At this moment, they could only resist hard, believing in the adaptability of the human body and Ke Zhengrong’s willpower.
Fortunately, when they reached minus 67 kilometers below sea level, Ke Zhengrong began to recover slightly, and everyone breathed a sigh of relief.
“Beep, beep, beep.”
“Beep, beep, beep.”
-70 kilometers below sea level.
-75 kilometers below sea level.
-80 kilometers below sea level.
Upon reaching minus 81 kilometers below sea level, the sensors emitted urgent beeping sounds.
A massive shadow passed by in the 4 o’clock direction, unimaginably huge, like a mountain. And it had astonishing speed, leaving the sensor’s monitoring range within 13 seconds.
Everyone held their breath.
They had known there were monsters in the black mist, and they finally encountered one.
Lu Tinghan commanded the ship, changing its position and continuing to dive in another direction.
Then, different monsters passed by them.
Whether it was the camouflage of the escort ship, the lack of desire to attack from the monsters, or the abyss itself frightening them, they weren’t attacked temporarily.
Shi Yuan looked hard, but he couldn’t see clearly what the monsters looked like. They glided by like ghosts, occasionally under the spotlight, revealing jade-green scales, long tentacles, and distorted faces, only to disappear in an instant.
At minus 110 kilometers below sea level, they surpassed the deepest trench on the planet.
Ke Zhengrong injected the suppressant again, suppressing the infection value.
Zhou Qian also began to feel slightly unwell.
There was a medical kit under the seat, but more medicines were stored in the storage compartment behind. Lu Tinghan was in charge of commanding and couldn’t leave, so Zhou Qian wanted to get up and retrieve them herself.
Shi Yuan said to her, “Let me do it.”
He glanced at Lu Tinghan, and Lu Tinghan nodded at him. So he unbuckled his seatbelt and struggled to bring the large medicine box over. Zhou Qian selected a few types of medicine, and she and Ke Zhengrong shared them.
Shi Yuan put the medicine box back.
The storage compartment was only three or four steps away from his seat, but the further he walked, the lighter his footsteps became.
Shi Yuan: ?
He took another half step, and his whole body floated up.
Shi Yuan: ?!
It wasn’t just him.
All objects floated upward. They had been fixed in place, some not moving at all, while others floated up a few centimeters.
Gravity seemed to have disappeared.
The holographic projection revealed the view outside. Clusters of lights, varied in shape like planets, dimly glowed, suspended all around and slowly rotating, emitting twinkling starlight.
“What’s happening…” Qi Hong murmured, “What is this…”
The surroundings brightened, and the monsters became visible. Schools of fish swam, and giant beasts roamed. The birds spread their beautiful wings and stretched their bodies in the black mist of the abyss. Each one was indescribable but seemed to travel amidst the starlight.
—Looking at it like this, it seemed that this escort ship had finally arrived in the universe.
A bustling universe filled with exotic creatures.
Shi Yuan floated lightly in mid-air.
It was his first time experiencing something so novel. He spread his arms and tail, free from the concepts of up, down, left, and right. He was among the stars, strolling through the Milky Way.
He exclaimed, “Wow!”
