Chapter 90: Life or Death, It Doesn’t Really Matter (1)

Deep Sea Fish Hunting Specialty Broadcast

EP.90 Life or Death, It Doesn’t Really Matter (1)

Whooooosh-

Parang’s consciousness hurtled through an endlessly long tunnel at tremendous speed.

Strangely, it felt exactly like swimming underwater, and even though the scenery looked the same in all directions, there was a palpable sense of velocity.

‘This one’s even longer than before.’

To avoid boredom while staying still, Parang roughly organized in her mind what she had seen in the previous memory.

The most concerning thing was, of course, Alice’s condition.

‘What on earth happened…’

The image of Alice that Parang had seen was closer to that of a spirit or ghost rather than a human.

Those tentacles that had bound Alexandra, the ability to create Capulus, and even her attitude as if she knew the future.

It seemed unlikely that they would meet Alice in the same state as when they had first parted, even if they were to reunite.

‘No. I should be grateful just to be able to meet her.’

How desperately everyone had longed for a reunion with her, with their friend. Whatever Alice’s appearance might be, Parang was okay with it.

‘We’ll be able to meet again soon, right?’

Alexandra’s memory was clearly from long ago, and the Alice living in it was also quite the Alice of the past.

Parang couldn’t know what had happened to Alice in the meantime, but she decided to think that way.

That they would be able to meet soon.

Anyone would have thought the same.

‘And, um…’

The next most concerning thing after Alice was, of course, Han Siwoo.

‘What on earth is he thinking…’

The person she thought she’d be least likely to get involved with in her life was now giving Parang the biggest headache.

What his plan was, why the original story was neither completely twisted nor followed exactly but subtly changed at an ambiguous level.

How much he knew, whether he was alive or dead, damn…

Parang clutched her head again.

‘If I’d known it would be like this, I should have paid more attention…’

They say karma accumulates without one’s knowledge, and indeed, those words were not wrong.

‘Next is the ascension ritual, and also…’

As she was frantically organizing various thoughts that came to mind, she suddenly saw the end of the tunnel.

‘Am I entering Alice’s memory now?’

Parang swallowed hard.

It had been a while since she felt this nervous.

And then, whoosh!!

The dark view suddenly filled with light, and Parang emerged from the tunnel.

‘Huff… huff… this is…’

She quickly surveyed her surroundings.

‘This is… this is… huh…?’

“Where… is this…?”

What appeared before Parang was a long, spacious hall stretching far ahead.

The floor was made of marble, polished so brightly that it was hard to tell whether it was a mirror or stone.

On both sides of the walls, Doric marble columns stood in a row.

The sight of these columns, standing tall towards the ceiling without a single deviation, emphasizing their flawlessness, gave a sense of pressure even to Parang, who had seen all sorts of sights with her own eyes.

In the center, a luxurious black carpet stretched out as expansively as the hall itself, and similarly, solid black curtains hung at various points along the walls.

At a glance, it was hard to tell whether this was underwater or on land, but Parang immediately knew that this place was underwater, specifically at the bottom of the sea.

‘Those, those are…!’

What Parang saw there wasn’t just marble and curtains.

‘S-statues…!’

About thirty to fifty statues, statuettes, were kneeling in two rows along the hall at regular intervals.

The statuettes Parang caught sight of were roughly ten thousand. Just by looking, one could tell whether they were just kneeling statues or statuettes.

‘What on earth is this…’

The existence of these things meant that this place was indeed underwater.

‘Is this somewhere in the Hive, or is it an Object?’

As far as Parang knew, there was no Hive that looked like this. However, there had been instances of ‘hidden spaces’ discovered in the previous South China Sea Hive.

Well, regardless of where this place was, its purpose seemed clear.

Parang hadn’t just read hunter stories. Of course, she had read numerous fantasy novels as well.

And the scene unfolding before her eyes now was an exact replica of the ‘audience halls’ that typically appeared in those fantasy novels.

And if this place was an audience hall, that meant if Parang turned her head here…

‘Ali…ce…?’

She would be able to see the queen’s throne.

‘This, this is…’

Actually, she had expected this. The space Parang had fallen into looked like an audience hall even as she was diving, and this was Alice’s memory after all.

If there was a place where Alice might be in this place, Parang knew it could only be the throne behind her.

However, actually seeing it was quite different from just imagining it in her head.

‘Huh…!’

Parang took a sharp breath.

Whether this was fortunate or unfortunate.

At least Alice wasn’t existing in the worst form Parang had imagined.

That is to say, she wasn’t in a state where her body was completely twisted, sitting regally on the throne like a true queen, looking down on the monsters.

However, since it wasn’t a dramatically better sight either, Parang was just a bit taken aback.

Pop-pop-pop-

She was floating inside a cocoon filled with purple liquid.

Thump- Thump-

That cocoon, made of a black membrane, was filled with purple liquid and had grown on top of the marble throne.

Thump- Thump-

As if crying out to let everyone know it was alive, the cocoon pulsated steadily, revealing the silhouette of a woman lying peacefully inside.

‘Damn, I can’t see the inside properly…’

As Parang was examining the cocoon, changing angles here and there,

‘Wait, do I really need to do this?’

Realizing that she was in a state close to an astral body, she simply plunged her face into the cocoon.

And inside that cocoon.

‘Hup…!’

She made eye contact with Alice.

Eyes so wide open it was chilling, eyes emitting a fierce aura along with a purple glow.

‘H-how…!’

Startled, as Parang was about to quickly pull her body back, she discovered something.

‘Wait, this is…’

[ Status Window: Alice Melville ]

‘Status window…’

Looking closely, Alice wasn’t making eye contact with her.

She was just looking at the status window that had appeared in front of her eyes.

The status window was positioned where Parang had stuck her face in.

‘That scared me…’

After catching her breath for a moment, Parang changed her position and read through Alice’s status window.

[ Status Window: Alice Melville ]

[ Personal Skill: Deep Sea Para!&$^!*# ]

[ Skill information cannot be confirmed. ]

[ Penalty information cannot be confirmed. ]

[ Skills ]

[ Clairvoyance(S), Fish-eye Lens(S), Splend@$& … ]

[ Abnormal Status ]

[ Fusion, Mutation, Restraint, Binding ]

‘Hmm…’

As there was constant static noise interfering with the letters making it hard to read, Parang slightly furrowed her brow and struggled to read it.

‘Fusion and mutation, huh…’

It seemed clearly related to this damaged status window.

Could it be that because she had fused with and mutated into another being, even her status window had been eroded?

Thinking about it that way, it certainly seemed to look like that.

Parang looked at Alice with a pitying gaze.

Mixing with and mutating into an unknown being must surely be an unimaginably painful experience.

‘If only then, just a little more…’

Swish swish.

Parang forcefully shook off the thoughts that were about to lead her down a bad path again, and refocused on the memory.

Then she saw something that wasn’t visible before.

‘This is…’

As she turned her gaze away from the status window and Alice’s eyes, she saw numerous threads restraining Alice.

Those purple, vein-like things weren’t just binding Alice, but seemed to be constantly injecting something into her arms and legs where they were embedded.

Parang’s insides boiled with anger.

Contextually, it seemed certain that whatever was flowing into Alice’s body through those was related to the ‘fusion’ or ‘mutation’ mentioned in the status window.

‘What on earth is this…’

Judging by the statues kneeling outside, this place seemed to be related to the statues, or more broadly, to the eye that controlled the statues.

‘Then what’s being injected into Alice…’

Though she didn’t want to accept it, it was probably related to that eye, or possibly even a part of it.

‘But how on earth did she escape from here?’

Alice was visibly in a greatly weakened state.

Just as Parang was about to ponder how she could have escaped from this place when she looked too weak to even break free from the cocoon, let alone evade the statues outside,

Rumble rumble-

‘Huh?’

Rumble rumble-!!

Just as she thought she heard the ground rumbling somewhere.

Boom!! Crash!! Rumble rumble rumble!!! Thud thud thud!!!!

“Ugh, aah!! W-what is this!!”

Suddenly, with a thunderous boom, the cocoon containing Alice began to shake violently.

Alice seemed as surprised as Parang, her eyes widening even more than before.

The startled Parang went outside the cocoon to check the situation, and saw that the hall where Alice was located was shaking fiercely as if it was about to collapse entirely, and the statues that had been kneeling motionless were now running around in all directions, seemingly confused and not knowing what to do.

“W-what on earth is going on…!!”

And amidst that chaos, very carefully.

Crack- Crack- Rip-!!

Tearing through the cocoon that had grown on the throne, Alice Melville’s eyes gazed out at the outside world.