"Let the spirit-bearing ancestors bear witness! You—you come from the east of Deer Treasure? The white sea east of Deer Treasure? The great island in the sea?..."
"Let the ancestors bear witness! We come from the east! We are the kingdom of the King of the Lake, the vast continent shrouded by the Main God! We received the prophecy of Divine Revelation and crossed the sea to come here..."
The Chishima cold current flowed endlessly south, carrying the Arctic Ocean's icy chill to the edge of the Kamchatka Peninsula. Snow already drifted down on the peninsula in October, and by November the temperature had fallen below zero. On this frigid coast, in this bone-piercing cold wind, the two men by the bonfire were chatting with fiery enthusiasm, gesturing with hands and feet. Even though neither side could understand a single complete sentence from the other, relying entirely on gestures and drawings in the snow, both their faces were full of surprise and excitement.
"Ancestors! You—your boat actually came from the east of Deer Treasure, from the sea of Deer Treasure! Ah! You are not the Tent Tribe of northern Deer Treasure, nor the Island Tribe of southern Deer Treasure... You are... the Sea Tribe of eastern Deer Treasure! So that's it. No wonder you have big ships, no wonder you're different from them!"
"Main God! Deer Treasure? What is Deer Treasure? Is it the sea?"
Exploration Captain Zuwaro blinked, repeating the word that kept appearing in the other man's mouth. Hearing Zuwaro repeat it, however, Hunting Captain Mu Quan misunderstood slightly. He hesitated for a moment, reached into his thick deerskin robe, groped around for quite a while, and only then took out a long, narrow deerskin pouch and a deer-stomach water bag. Then he solemnly handed the two items