The Mysterious Green Moss-Head

Two days was neither long nor short.

After confirming there was a ship ready to depart, Li Mingyuan spent the following days either training his body or checking and replenishing supplies, asking nearby villagers with seafaring experience what else he might be lacking.

There was no need to say much about physical training.

As his physical energy increased, the amount of chakra he could refine would gradually rise as well.

Supplies were even more important. Although Li Mingyuan was a transmigrator with no experience at sea, he at least knew the basic fact that poor nutrition could cause scurvy.

This would be his first voyage in his life. He took it extremely seriously, but he also worried whether the things he had prepared would prove useless. After much deliberation, Li Mingyuan ultimately decided to seek the villagers' advice.

Needless to say, the villagers were very welcoming toward their benefactor. Not only did they enthusiastically answer his questions and tell him about commonly used items aboard ships, several seasoned fishermen even shared their experiences at sea, benefiting Li Mingyuan greatly.

And so, everything went smoothly on Li Mingyuan's end as time steadily moved forward.

In the blink of an eye, only the final night remained before departure.

Night fell.

Li Mingyuan lay on his bed, gazing out the window as usual.

Unlike the clear skies and white clouds of the past few days, dark clouds had begun gathering since morning. By now, the sky had completely darkened, accompanied by an indescribable dampness and oppressive low pressure.

It looked like it would probably rain tomorrow.

If he was unlucky, they might even encounter a storm.

In Li Mingyuan's understanding, this was about the worst possible day to choose for setting sail. At best, it would affect the voyage; at worst, the ship would be destroyed and everyone aboard would die.

Yet despite the clearly unsuitable conditions, Li Mingyuan was surprised that when he noticed the strange weather during the day, he had gone straight to the harbor to find the captain again and ask whether the departure plan had changed. But the captain still insisted on sailing on the originally scheduled date.

Even Li Mingyuan, an outsider when it came to sailing, specifically wondered whether his lack of experience meant he simply could not read the weather at sea. So he asked again whether it would rain tomorrow. The captain answered that it would definitely rain, yet still had no intention of changing the departure time, merely telling him to remember to prepare his daily necessities.

With the captain insisting so firmly, Li Mingyuan became curious instead. What kind of business did this tiny cargo ship have to conduct that it had to sail out in such terrible weather? Even he was considering postponing his trip for fear that the ship might sink into the sea, yet these people still intended to depart according to plan.

He had a bad feeling, as though a shadow was being cast over his coming journey.

"This is the last day I'll get to lie in this bed."

Li Mingyuan's gaze turned distant.

"I haven't even been here that long, but now that I'm leaving, I really do feel reluctant."

It was, after all, his first place to settle down after transmigrating. Leaving so suddenly made him feel a little lonely. The villagers had welcomed him so warmly and helped him in every way. Once he left this village, he probably would not receive such treatment elsewhere.

No matter what, he hoped the village would prosper more and more after he left.

Perhaps one day, he would have the chance to return and see this place again.

With that hope in mind.

Li Mingyuan closed his eyes and began his final night of rest in the village.

The next day.

Just as Li Mingyuan and the captain had expected, rain began falling from the sky, and it was no light rain.

Fierce wind and rain battered the buildings, slapping endlessly against the windows.

Braving the rain, Li Mingyuan wore a pitch-black raincoat and dragged his suitcase alone through the streets. Unlike usual, the town now seemed somewhat deserted.

That suited Li Mingyuan just fine.

It saved him from having to say goodbye.

His personality was a little troublesome. He could act impulsively when fired up, and sad scenes could make him grieve, but all of that only applied when he had already become emotionally invested.

Having to make some sort of farewell with people he barely knew made him feel awkward.

Though the villagers saw him as their benefactor, Li Mingyuan himself only felt that he had acted on impulse. He had no real sense of being anyone's benefactor.

If he were truly expected to put himself in the role of a benefactor, it would at least have to be something like a war to save a nation. He would have to throw Dual Kamui into battle, fight an Emperor-General-level opponent in a fierce battle, collapse in exhaustion after a thoroughly satisfying fight, and successfully save the kingdom beneath the sunlight. Only then might he truly identify with the title of benefactor.

What he had done now was still far from enough.

He boarded the ship.

For one final look, Li Mingyuan turned back toward the village.

Amid the sound of rain, the receding harbor merged with the gloomy sky until the two could no longer be distinguished.

"Goodbye, nameless little village."

Li Mingyuan murmured softly.

Dark clouds blanketed the sky, and the storm stirred towering waves.

As the cargo ship surged onward, the raging sea split into a long white trail, advancing toward the front of the waves.

Li Mingyuan's journey had begun like this. He wondered what sort of sight awaited him beyond the storm.

However.

Just as Li Mingyuan had set off.

At the same time, elsewhere, aboard a ship that had gone to sea slightly before his.

Joseph and Johnny were also sailing through the storm.

The ship they were currently on was merely a fishing boat that happened to be headed their way and had given them a ride. Its speed naturally could not compare to that of a cargo ship. Thus, although they had noticed early on that the weather might be bad, they had still failed to leave the rainstorm's range in time.

At this moment, like Li Mingyuan's cargo ship, they too were trapped in the stormy sea.

"Whoa!! This is bad! Why haven't we sailed out of the storm yet?! We're only on a fishing boat! How can we possibly withstand a storm like this?! At this rate, the boat's going to capsize!"

"If you have time to complain, then hurry up and row with us, idiot!"

Amid the panicked exchanges between the fishing boat's captain, Joseph, Johnny, and the others, the fishing boat bobbed precariously like a leaf that had fallen into a toilet, seeming as though it might capsize at any moment.

No one knew how much time passed in that situation. Eventually, the rain began to ease, and the violent wind that seemed capable of overturning the fishing boat at any moment gradually dispersed.

Soaked by the drizzling rain, Joseph and Johnny panted as they collapsed onto the fishing boat, overwhelmed by the feeling of surviving a disaster.

"We only wanted to go to a nearby island. Why did it suddenly turn into this?"

Johnny stared blankly and muttered, "Could it be that both of us have had terrible luck lately?"

"Who knows? I want to ask that too."

Joseph leaned against the side of the boat. Looking at the dense black clouds above, he barely had the strength to answer.

However, at that moment, he did not know whether it was merely an illusion.

Joseph suddenly noticed that directly ahead of him, there appeared to be a boat even smaller than their fishing boat, drifting along the edge of the storm. There seemed to be a faint figure aboard it.

Was it an illusion?

Or had he really seen it?

"Hey! Look over there! Is that a small boat over there?"

Joseph straightened up and hurriedly dragged the still-dazed Johnny over to the side of the boat, looking in the direction he had just seen.

"What are you doing? I don't have any strength left at all... Huh!? What is that?!"

Johnny's eyes instantly widened.

After seeing what seemed to be a boat, he was even more shocked than Joseph, nearly dropping his jaw. "There's actually a small boat sailing at the edge of the storm?!"

At that moment, Johnny could no longer sit still.

He staggered to his feet, lunged forward, and hurriedly grabbed the fishing boat captain nearby.

"Uncle! Help us one more time! Could you sail the boat over there? Please! I think I saw a boat over there!"

Caught off guard, the fishing boat captain kicked Johnny away. He glared at the two of them, beard bristling. If these two bounty hunters had not caught quite a few wanted criminals nearby, he would never have slowed himself down to give them a ride, only to nearly drown in the rainstorm. And now, after things had finally quieted down for only a short while, they were causing trouble again.

Still, remembering the favors he had received, the fishing boat captain had no choice. After arguing with Joseph and Johnny for a while longer, he finally let out a long sigh and steered the boat in the direction Johnny had pointed.

And so, before long.

A small boat and the figure of a man soon appeared before the three of them.

He had short green hair, three golden teardrop-shaped earrings in his left ear, a white T-shirt on his upper body, dark green trousers below, and a dark green bandanna tied around his left arm.

What was particularly noticeable was the long sword at his waist, sheathed in white.

The man lay on the small boat. Though he was completely drenched by rain and the bottom of the boat had accumulated a great deal of water—so much so that it would not have been surprising if it sank beneath the sea with the wind and rain the next second—he still looked utterly unconcerned, lying in the center of the boat with his hands behind his head, fast asleep.

Listening carefully, they could even hear him snoring.

Seeing that this was not an illusion but a real sight before them, all three of them gaped in shock. They could not believe that someone would dare take such a tiny boat out in weather like this. Even more absurdly, he was asleep?

How the hell could he sleep!?

"What are you thinking?! Wake up! You'll die if this keeps up!"

Thinking back to how his group had barely managed to break through the storm, then looking at the man before him, Johnny could not hold himself back. He grabbed the man by the clothes and shouted excitedly, "You're sailing this wreck of a boat through a rainstorm. Are you insane?!"

"...Huh?"

"What? You're too noisy."

After Johnny's relentless efforts, the man was finally awakened.

He opened his sleepy eyes and looked at them with a face full of irritation. "Who are you?"

"That's what we want to ask! Who the hell are you?! You actually dared to sleep in a storm like this?!"

Joseph was nearly in tears. What kind of monster was this guy?

But no matter what, now that they had confirmed it was not an illusion, they could not simply stand by. If this continued, the small boat beneath the man would definitely capsize.

Barely pulling himself out of his emotions, Joseph turned to look at Johnny. By coincidence, Johnny looked back at him at the same time. The two nodded in mutual understanding.

"No matter what, now that we've found you, we can't pretend we didn't see you."

"Come aboard with us. We'll give you a ride to a nearby island!"

Joseph extended his hand toward the man in the small boat and said anxiously, "Come on, grab my hand!"

Hearing this, the man yawned and finally understood what was happening.

However, he did not take Joseph's outstretched hand.

"Oh, so you're good people."

"No wonder you've been nagging nonstop since earlier."

He slowly rose from the small boat.

The man swept his gaze over the waters near the fishing boat. Beneath the dark clouds, the sea looked pitch-black and unfathomably deep. Only the area illuminated by the fishing boat's lantern could be seen—the water rippling continuously from falling raindrops, and indistinct outlines moving beneath the sea.

"Still, your fishing boat doesn't seem all that much safer than my little boat, despite what you said."

"Perfect. I'd feel bad just boarding like this."

The man grinned. "While I'm at it, I'll help you deal with that tail."

Joseph had not yet understood what the man meant.

Suddenly, the sea around the fishing boat began to churn the instant the man finished speaking.

The next second.

A massive shadow shot straight up from beneath the surface!

"W-What!?"

Joseph and Johnny looked up in shock.

A gigantic creature with two lion heads and a serpentine body like a sea snake, dozens of meters tall, emerged from beneath the waves. The waves it kicked up alone made the fishing boat rock violently.

Then, facing the incomparably tiny fishing boat, the monster opened its huge bloody maw and lunged toward them with terrifying speed, almost like lightning.

"It's a sea beast—!"

Joseph and Johnny's belated cries of alarm finally rang out.

But at that moment.

The man who had been beside them just moments ago had vanished without anyone knowing when.

With the long sword in its white sheath at his waist, the man moved faster than the sea beast. He first leaped swiftly onto the fishing boat, then used the top of the boat as a foothold and explosively launched himself high into the air.

Shing!

A flash of blade light.

The man abruptly drew his sword and slashed fiercely at the giant beast's head.

In that instant, too fast for even a blink, the rain seemed to freeze, sound seemed to vanish, and the only sight left in the world was the blade light unleashed by that slash.