Magical Girl's Knight Brother

Chapter 681 The Ocean Today

The deep, inky blue sea was dispelled by the first hint of dawn on the horizon, as the golden sun struggled to break free from the horizon's grasp, scattering countless fragments of gold across the undulating waves. The salty yet refreshing sea breeze, brimming with vitality, dispersed the suffocating, leaden fog and stench of decay deep within Bermuda.

In this magnificent morning light—

Boom—crash!

A massive, menacing ghost ship, its hull scarred by battle and glowing with an eerie green phosphorescence, suddenly awakened like a colossal beast that had slumbered at the bottom of the sea for millennia. With overwhelming force, it burst through the surface of the sea and soared into the sky.

The massive ship's hull swept up a waterfall of seawater, which, under the rising sun, refracted into countless brilliant rainbows. It resembled a giant steel whale leaping out of the sea, or a black missile breaking free from the abyss, crashing heavily onto the shimmering surface of the ocean and stirring up towering waves.

It was the Queen Anne's Revenge.

"Ha, finally back!" Tangcao was the first to rush to the bow of the boat, spreading her arms wide to welcome the sea breeze and the rising sun, shouting excitedly, her little face beaming with the joy of surviving a disaster and the excitement of returning to the world. "I've never liked the morning sun so much."

After experiencing the dark and gloomy world of dreams, seeing the sun again always stirs up emotions. Although Tang Zijun felt that Tang Cao meant that she usually doesn't get up early, since for Tang Cao, a night owl, the sunrise means it's time for her to go to sleep.

Xiao Xiao and Afran stood side by side on the ship's railing. Although they looked tired, their tense nerves finally relaxed, and they revealed relieved smiles.

The ghostly sailors on the ship seemed to sense the change in their environment, and the eerie green flames burning in the skull's eye sockets seemed to brighten and become more active.

Amidst this joyous atmosphere of surviving the catastrophe, a figure sits on a gun emplacement at the stern of the ship, seemingly out of place in his surroundings.

Poseidon.

His figure had shrunk to about three meters tall, no longer the giant phantom he once was. Now, he was more like an energy entity composed of concentrated dark blue seawater and condensed fragmented starlight.

He sat quietly on the cold cannon platform, his swirling, deep blue eyes no longer filled with divine power, but with an indescribable complexity and a deep sense of unfamiliarity, as he quietly and extremely slowly scanned the once incredibly familiar scene before him.

The ocean is now completely unrecognizable.

This is one of his areas of expertise.

It is the boundless land where He once ruled over all directions and listened to the worship of hundreds of millions of sea creatures.

In the sea breeze, one can still faintly detect a trace of the salty tang of one's homeland; the golden rays of the rising sun, shining on the sea, once reflected the glory of riding in a golden chariot.

The sound of waves crashing against the ship's hull was like the soft chanting of an ancient sea siren, awakening echoes slumbering deep within its memory.

Familiar, yet utterly unfamiliar.

His gaze pierced through the sea, seeing not only the deep waters but also sensing the strangeness deep within the soul of this ocean. The once abundant and pure vitality and primal wildness that filled the ocean had now become thin and mixed.

Deep in the ocean, there is a kind of filth that I have never felt before, cold and carrying the smell of metal corrosion and chemicals, which, like a maggot clinging to the bone, erodes the very essence of the ocean.

Countless faint yet sharp, chaotic, industrial-rhythmic sonic booms, engine noises, and drilling sounds came from all directions, brutally tearing apart the ocean's ancient tranquility and rhythm, causing a sense of unease.

Even in that transcendent perception, the will of this ocean seemed weary, murky, and filled with silent sorrow.

This is His ocean.

But it is no longer the same.

Like a wanderer who has been away from home for thousands of years, He finally returned to his beloved hometown, only to find that his homeland had been completely changed by the torrent of time. The huge gap between the familiarity rooted in his memory and the cold reality before him stirred up an indescribable sense of loss, bewilderment, and even a trace of sorrow at being completely abandoned by the tide of the times in his ancient soul.

He reached out his hand, as if wanting to touch the warm morning sun.

Tang Zijun walked to his side without disturbing Poseidon's gaze; he understood the alienation and awe that transcended time and space.

"Here..." Poseidon's hoarse voice finally broke the silence, trembling slightly. "Is this the ocean now?"

The rising sun painted the ghost ship's battered hull and Poseidon's profile, rendered in light and shadow with an ancient Greek flair, obscuring his expression.

Tang Zijun glanced at Him and sat down beside Him. "Yes, this is the ocean as it is now. I don't know what the ocean was like in mythological times, but it must have been more bustling than it is now, right?"

"The ocean of mythical times..." Poseidon murmured, as if reminiscing about something. "I rarely visited this planet before. Back then, we disdained to communicate with humans. We preferred to receive offerings and beautiful women from humans on Mount Olympus rather than in the mortal world... I haven't seen this ocean again in a long time. Perhaps, as you said, the ocean is too quiet now."

"What do you mean by quiet...?"

"Laws, child, the power of the laws is waning. The power that once gathered on this planet has become incredibly thin. I can sense that the laws belonging to the ocean have spread to other planets. Many gas giants and planets covered by oceans are sharing these laws."

"Is this a good thing?" Tang Zijun asked.

"I'd like to answer your question too, but unfortunately, I don't know," Poseidon gently shook his head. "We seized those powers for ourselves and were bound by them, but that's all history now..."

"My child, do you know that I once thought we were the masters of the world? Compared to us, the Sumerians, though ancient, were weak; the Egyptians were powerful, but too young; the Norsemen had some tricks up their sleeves, but they were busy with their civil war; and as for the East... those beings with supreme power actually ended up participating in human wars. This is something we ridiculed and despised. But, as it turns out, we were short-sighted after all."

"This planet, in the end, was still controlled by humanity—and without the help of any laws. This would have been unimaginable when my brothers were still alive." Poseidon shifted his gaze to Tang Zijun. "So I don't know if this is a good thing, but at least humanity persevered, didn't it?"

"That's true." Tang Zijun shook her head.

Whether it was due to Poseidon's inherent personality or because mortals' records of him were mixed with too much personal emotion, Tang Zijun felt that there was a significant contrast after this encounter.

He originally thought Poseidon would be a stern, decisive, and extremely wicked old man. In fact, when Tang Zijun first saw him, he was already prepared to fight, since most of those who survived from the mythological era should be madmen.

But facing Poseidon now, Tang Zijun felt that this guy was not bad. Perhaps it was because the world had changed too much, or perhaps it was because he had lost his godhood. At this moment, Poseidon gave Tang Zijun an almost peaceful feeling, just like the shimmering sea in front of her.

After watching the sunrise with Poseidon for a while, Tang Zijun called Avran over once the sun was fully up. "Ahem, Miss Avran, I'm afraid I have something I need to discuss with you."

"No need to be so polite, Mr. Tang Zijun. This isn't the first time we've worked together to save the world, is it?"

Afran smiled at Tang Zijun, and without the other party needing to speak, she already knew what Tang Zijun was thinking.

"You want to take the Queen Anne's Revenge with you, right?"

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