Chapter 259

Chapter 259: One Survivor

Lou Yun hadn’t expected Leng Cangqiong to suddenly pose such a question after a long period of contemplation, and thus couldn’t help but freeze momentarily.

Just then, Lu Da, who was standing nearby, suddenly squatted down to closely examine the fish. After a moment, he said, "This is a dace. Its flesh is extremely tough and tasteless to eat, like chewing wax. Those of us who live by the sea year-round wouldn’t take it as food. They mostly dwell in the middle layers of the seawater. And one this big would have to live deep down, at least over ten meters."

Reaching this point, Lu Da looked into the distance before returning his gaze and shaking his head. "If it died in the sea, its corpse shouldn’t have been washed this far inshore by the waves. But if it died after coming ashore, it couldn’t possibly have made it this far inland either—it has no legs. Truly strange. Why would there be a dead dace here?"

Leng Cangqiong then pointed at several corpses lying beside the dead fish. "If I’m not mistaken, they must be your people. Look at their bodies—no wounds or injuries. Judging by their expressions, they didn’t die from physical harm but from suffocation!"

As Leng Cangqiong spoke these words, something suddenly stirred within Lou Yun’s mind, a flicker of insight. But the thought was like a fleeting spark, vanishing before he could grasp it.

Suddenly, Chang Xiang’s voice rang out in Lou Yun’s mind: "Kid, there’s still one living person on the island!"

"Where?" Lou Yun’s heart leapt with immediate joy. Anyone still alive could tell them what exactly had transpired on the island.

"Inside an underground passage right under the main residence!"

Lou Yun recalled immediately. Early on, Mei Yuanmu had told him about a passageway in the former main residence of the Qiu family. This passage led straight to the seabed. Following it down would take someone into the ocean itself, and nearby was a spiritual crystal mine—the Qiu family’s primary source of wealth.

Lou Yun had never been there himself, as he held little interest in spiritual crystal mines. He had left all such matters to Mei Yuanmu to manage.

Only Chang Xiang, endowed with such formidable spiritual perception, could likely sense a presence still hidden within that passage leading to the sea bottom.

Prompted by Chang Xiang, Lou Yun could wait no longer. He urgently addressed Leng Cangqiong and the others: "There’s someone alive!"

With that, his figure blurred as he dashed towards the main residence. After a brief moment of stunned silence, Leng Cangqiong and the others hurried after him.

The five arrived at the main residence, with Lou Yun leading the charge inside. Now, his own spiritual perception could detect human energy emanating from the underground passage.

He swiftly located the entrance to the passage, concealed beneath a rug. Lou Yun kicked down hard with his foot. A loud thud echoed, and simultaneously, a small ball of flame shot out from the tunnel entrance at an alarming speed, heading straight for Lou Yun’s face.

If anyone knew fire, it was Lou Yun. Although the flame’s appearance was sudden, it couldn’t harm him. Crucially, when he saw the flame, a smile touched his lips. He reached out and gently caught it in his grasp, calling out, "Feng Yang, come out! It’s me, Lou Yun, your big brother!"

Lou Yun had given Feng Yang a common weapon he forged himself, one imbued with a Weapon Contract. Named ‘Mulberry Fire’, this weapon allowed its wielder to channel their spiritual energy into it to generate flames. Seeing this particular flame shoot out, Lou Yun instantly knew who was hiding in the tunnel.

After Lou Yun’s voice faded, the tunnel stayed silent for a moment. Then, a voice, clearly choked with tears yet full of disbelief and hope, sounded: "L-Lou Big Brother? I-It’s really… really you?"

Lou Yun shouted back, "Yes! It’s me! I’m back!"

Finally, a figure scrambled out of the hole. It was Feng Yang!

However, Feng Yang was covered in grime, his face and body bearing numerous scrapes and wounds, his clothes torn in several places. When his eyes confirmed it was truly Lou Yun before him, his lips quivered, tears flooding his eyes. He cried out hoarsely, "Big Brother Lou! You’ve finally come back!"

Feng Yang was only sixteen, an inexperienced boy who had never faced storms. Seeing him reduced to such a terrified state vividly spoke of the sheer brutality of the battle that must have occurred on the island.

Lou Yun burned with the desire to know what disaster had befallen the island immediately. But seeing Feng Yang’s pitiful state, he couldn’t bring himself to demand more. It was Leng Cangqiong beside him who spoke, his voice cold and sharp: "A grown man, supposedly with backbone! Shed blood, not tears! What’s there to cry about? Truly spineless!"

Feng Yang knew full well who Leng Cangqiong was and had deeply feared him before. Being scolded now, he dared not protest. He quickly suppressed a sob and wiped at his face roughly with his sleeve, smearing away the tears.

Lou Yun placed a firm hand on Feng Yang’s shoulder. "Feng Yang, my brother is right. Men do not solve problems with tears. So, don’t cry. Tell me, what happened on the island after I left?"

"Mm!" Feng Yang nodded forcefully and began recounting the events.

Approximately five days ago—which was ten days after Lou Yun and Leng Cangqiong left the Divine Weapon Island—an alarm suddenly blared from the patrol unit.

The alarm echoed across the whole island. Led by Mei Yuanmu, everyone rushed out to respond. They discovered hundreds of people flying in the sky. Leading them was a powerfully built, burly man wearing a triumphant smile. While others might not have recognized him, Mei Yuanmu immediately did: it was Mo Linsheng, the Island Master of the Domineering Island!

Truthfully, a few days after Lou Yun’s departure, the scouts Mei Yuanmu had dispatched to the Domineering Island for intelligence had failed to return. Mei Yuanmu had already felt a sense of foreboding. But with both Lou Yun and Leng Cangqiong, their two strongest protectors, absent, there was little he could do. It was just a feeling—premonition alone couldn’t justify mobilizing the entire island for battle or abandoning their home altogether.

Mei Yuanmu could only hope his feeling was wrong and that Lou Yun and Leng Cangqiong might return early. But now, seeing the densely packed figures in the sky and spotting Mo Linsheng, Mei Yuanmu knew he had been deeply mistaken.

Regrets were futile now. His immediate priority was minimizing casualties. Deeply etched in his mind were Lou Yun’s parting words: As long as we preserve our lives, all is not lost. In any situation, life holds far greater value than anything else.

Therefore, Mei Yuanmu secretly issued a command to everyone: If conflict erupts, no one must recklessly fight to the death. If you see an opportunity to flee, take it! If escape is impossible, do not resist fiercely. Surrender immediately if necessary—preserving life was paramount!

Yet Mei Yuanmu hadn’t entirely despaired at that moment. He remembered he still had those close to Lou Yun by his side: Lou Yun’s sworn brothers and also Shui Lingluo. Besides Lou Yun, no one knew the true strength of these three individuals. Mei Yuanmu saw them as his last, best hope.

Hearing this, Lou Yun couldn’t help but interrupt Feng Yang’s story: "Right! Wen Hou, Tie Sha, and Shui Lingluo! What about those three? Couldn’t they, acting together, hold off Mo Linsheng and his men? How many powerhouses does Mo Linsheng possess? I thought he was the sole one at the Heaven-level realm?"

Faced with Lou Yun’s rapid-fire questions, the calmness that had briefly settled over Feng Yang dissolved. His expression became frantic again. He shook his head vigorously. "Big Brother Lou! Your sworn brothers… they truly are worthy brothers! But that Shui Lingluo… that bitch! She was the key to why our Divine Weapon Island fell!"

"What?" Lou Yun was stunned for a second before asking sharply, a hint of sternness in his voice. "Feng Yang! What do you mean by that?"

In Lou Yun’s heart, both Wen Hou, Tie Sha, and Shui Lingluo were friends who had risked life and death alongside him; they shared life-or-death bonds. He would tolerate no slander against them. Hence his fierce challenge to Feng Yang’s words.

Leng Cangqiong, standing alongside, spoke with unnerving calmness. "Third brother, let him finish. Actually, I thought of her even before this."

Lou Yun stiffened again, baffled by Leng Cangqiong’s statement. But just then, the elusive thought that had flashed through his mind when he first saw the dead fish resurfaced.

That dace hadn’t beached itself ashore at such a distance by accident. It had been brought there deliberately by human action, hauled out of the sea. This, combined with the clearly identifiable corpses of Divine Weapon Island men nearby—men who hadn’t died from wounds but had suffocated—formed a pattern Lou Yun knew well. Shui Lingluo’s terrifying talent was manipulating seawater.

Putting these suspicious points together led to one terrible conclusion that Lou Yun recoiled from accepting—a reality he hadn’t even wanted to contemplate.

The reality was this: both the dead fish and the suffocated corpses had been killed by Shui Lingluo herself!

Lou Yun flatly refused to believe there could be another member of the formidable Shui family under Mo Linsheng’s command—someone else who could control seawater at whim.

Therefore, among all humans present, only Shui Lingluo possessed the capability. From that terrible distance, she had commanded a column of seawater to erupt from the ocean depths. In the process, a hapless dace swimming nearby had been caught, stranded far inland on the beach. But the crucial point was her motive: Shui Lingluo hadn’t been using the seawater to aid the Divine Weapon Island defenders against Mo Linsheng’s forces.

On the contrary, she had been using it to assist Mo Linsheng’s faction against the people of the Divine Weapon Island!