The illusion of death was tightening its grip.
Two crew members were on the verge of losing consciousness, their bodies twitching purely from oxygen deprivation.
Unnoticed by anyone, Bob, the sonar engineer confined to the submarine’s stern, was in the worst state of all.
Sprawled across the floor, his injured body convulsed violently, his face turning an ashen purple from hypoxia.
“Damn it…”
Tony had also reached his limit.
Darkness crept rapidly across the edges of his vision, and the burning agony in his lungs threatened to incinerate his remaining sanity.
With every passing second, he could feel his brain cells dying off in droves.
Right then, a strange wave of warmth washed over his side, dispelling part of the icy sensation of drowning.
Tony turned his head with great effort and saw Leon Hall’s hand resting on his shoulder.
“Its very existence is a form of corruption,” Leon’s voice pierced through the dying illusion, ringing clear in Tony’s ears.
“A form of spiritual erosion.
If this continues, everyone will suffer brain death.”
“We have to capture it!”
This was no ordinary creature.
It was the source of all these bizarre phenomena—a spreading cancer!
Tony grasped the meaning almost purely on instinct.
“But…
how do we…” Tony forced out the words with difficulty.
“Trust me this once, Mr.
Stark.”
Leon released his grip and stepped into the submarine’s narrow central corridor.
He glanced around, his gaze sweeping over the crew members who were still twitching on the deck.
“I need a moment to set up a barrier.
Until I finish, find a way to stay alive.”
With that, Leon closed his eyes.
He raised his right index finger and began tracing an invisible pattern in the air with a slow, deliberate cadence incomprehensible to ordinary mortals.
No light radiated from his fingertip.
Yet through Tony’s vision—warped by oxygen deprivation and sheer agony—it looked as though invisible threads were extending from Leon’s finger, interlacing and weaving through the air.
The symbols formed by those threads completely defied any known human geometry, as if every stroke and turn contained some intrinsic cosmic rule.
Immediately after, an ancient, obscure, and rhythmically occult language—Hermes—was chanted in a low voice from Leon’s lips.
“I isolate threats; I safeguard tranquility.”
“I here implore the gaze of The Fool.”
“With my spirituality as a wall, I construct a sanctuary here!”
As the final syllable fell, Leon snapped his eyes open! Visit g.com for the full chapter.
He slammed his right hand, imbued with invisible runes, firmly against the floor!
*Hum—*
A transparent barrier, invisible to the naked eye yet distinctly perceived by the soul, rippled outward from him like an inverted bowl, instantly encompassing the entire interior of the submarine!
Wherever the barrier passed, it felt like a gentle spring breeze.
The suffocating drowning sensation clamping down on their throats, the bone-chilling cold, the asphyxiation crushing their sanity…
In a single instant, it was thoroughly purged!
“Gasp—haah!
Haa—”
Inside the submarine, the four men nearest to Leon—apart from Leon himself—gasped in unison as if hauled out of deep water.
They doubled over, desperately gulping in the precious air.
One engineer even collapsed to the floor, dry-heaving and weeping uncontrollably—the most primal catharsis of facing mortal terror.
“Just now…
what was that…” The pilot’s face was pale with the terror of a survivor.
Tony leaned against the control console, panting heavily.
He stared intently at the somewhat pale Leon, then glanced through the viewport at the bizarre octopus still swimming leisurely outside, his mind racing.
“Was that thing projecting a ‘field’?” Tony asked raspily.
“And your ‘barrier’ blocked it out?”
“You can think of it that way.” Leon nodded, his tone grave.
“However, it is not a ‘field,’ but a ‘symbol.’ It is one of the materialized manifestations of this world being eroded.
As long as it exists, this spiritual pollution will continuously intensify and expand in range.
Today it only made us ‘drown.’ Over time, every living creature in this entire sea might drown to death.”
Hearing this sent an unprecedented chill through Tony, sharper than the drowning sensation from before.
It was not mere fear of death, but the shudder of a top-tier scientist whose entire understanding of reality had been fundamentally shattered.
Leon delivered his final conclusion: “We must take this ‘source of pollution’ with us completely.”
“A mobile source of pollution…” A terrifying gleam flickered in Tony’s eyes—the unmistakable fanaticism of a scientist.
“Marine life drowned more than 2,000 meters beneath the ocean…
I can’t even fathom how those words go together.
Catch it!
I want to take it apart and see what makes it tick!”
He spun around immediately and barked at the console, “What are you standing around for?
Turn on the external monitors and filter out those damn blue patterns!
Extend the sub’s main mechanical arm and grab it using the A-3 deep-sea containment cage!”
“B-but sir, that thing…” The engineer looked at the screen, lingering dread in his voice. Get faster updates on novelping.com.
“Our consultant’s ‘wall’ is keeping it out!” Tony roared.
“Right now, it’s just an ordinary octopus with a bit more muscle!
Execute the order!”
A massive mechanical arm carrying a mesh containment cage forged from high-strength titanium alloy thrust out from the flank of the *Explorer*.
Like the talons of a giant eagle, it lunged toward the eerie Lava Octopus!
The octopus seemed entirely unaware of the danger, continuing to wave its tentacles curiously within the searchlight’s beam.
The mechanical arm closed in with pinpoint accuracy.
The containment cage snapped open, enveloping it in an instant!
“Closing containment…”
Just as the alloy mesh was about to seal shut, the Lava Octopus, which had seemed harmless all along, finally appeared to realize its trapped fate!
It did not physically struggle.
Instead, the blue patterns across its body erupted in a blaze of blinding radiance!
*Hum—!*
The Wall of Spirituality Leon had erected flickered violently under the sudden spiritual impact!
It was only a split-second fluctuation!
“Aaargh!”
The boundary between heaven and hell was razor-thin!
Inside the submarine, the two crew members who had just caught their breath were struck again by that horrific drowning sensation, letting out shrill screams in unison!
Their pupils dilated instantly, as if their souls were being dragged into the abyss!
Tony grunted, feeling as though an invisible hand had clamped onto his heart, halting his breathing once more!
“Hold steady!”
Leon let out a low growl, his face pale as he poured every drop of his remaining spirituality into the barrier without reservation!
The violently flickering invisible wall finally stabilized on the brink of collapse!
The sensation of drowning receded once more like the tide.
“Warning: Containment cage closure encountering resistance!” Jarvis’s voice chimed in.
“Force it closed at maximum power!” Tony gritted his teeth and roared, knowing this was the decisive moment!
*Creak—BANG!*
With a heavy metallic thud, the titanium alloy mesh snapped securely shut!
At that moment, the blue glow on the octopus’s skin dimmed instantly, as though its power source had been cut.
All bizarre spiritual fluctuations vanished.
“Target…
successfully captured,” Jarvis announced in a steady tone, marking the end of this surreal battle.
Silence settled over the submarine, broken only by the ragged, heavy breathing of the survivors.
Tony Stark stared at the now unremarkable creature trapped in the cage on screen, then turned to look at Leon Hall, who was leaning against the bulkhead with fine beads of sweat dotting his forehead.
The look in Tony’s eyes was complex beyond measure.