"Knock Knock"

The "elemental roughcasts" that had once appeared in the Frost Deep Sea had now appeared in these border waters, near the "holy land" of the Annihilation Cultists. The fact itself carried an eerie, terrifying air, yet it was not entirely unexpected.

After all, the Abyssal Lord was the thread linking all of this together.

Morris crouched beside the humanoid roughcast, took out a slender metal sampling probe, and carefully drove it into the latter's arm. The probe met an extraordinarily tough outer layer—clearly far tougher than the skin of humans, elves, or Senjin people, yet somewhat elastic, like a dense, durable kind of specialized rubber.

He applied more force and broke through that tough "skin." The sampling probe rotated half a turn within the humanoid roughcast's arm, and when he pulled it out, it brought out some black, mud-like substance.

Familiar black slurry, but it seemed to have lost its vitality. There was not the slightest sign of wriggling or changing shape.

"I'm starting to feel a little sick..." Shirley frowned deeply. The filthy black slurry made goosebumps rise on her skin and reminded her of the chilling events that had occurred in Frost—the replicas breeding in the fog, the Ancient God tentacles constantly spreading upward from the deep sea, the living sludge surging through pipes and sewers...

Yet A'gou beside her seemed completely unaffected. The Abyssal Hound curiously moved close to the humanoid roughcast and sniffed around it in circles, as if it had discovered something. Every so often, it would stop and think for a while.

Shirley immediately looked disgusted. "A'gou, what are you doing? Don't you think this thing is disgusting... Hey, don't rub your head against it..."

"A'gou, did you find something?" Vana asked sternly from nearby.

"I wouldn't call it a discovery. This is also