The ten frogmen split into five pairs and went down into the sea one after another. Xu Hang had planned to have Ye Yuan go down with one of the groups, but Ye Yuan refused. How else was he supposed to act alone if he went down with them?
To do a good job, one must first sharpen one's tools. This saying was especially fitting for frogmen. Looking at their professional diving equipment, Ye Yuan knew that every set cost a fortune.
After changing into a diving suit, strapping on an oxygen tank, putting on diving goggles and a mask, and wearing fins, Ye Yuan was even given an underwater propulsion device. He had not brought one himself; it was simply too heavy.
Once he entered the sea, Ye Yuan truly did not want to outfit himself like this. This entire set of gear weighed at least several dozen pounds.
But there was no helping it. Otherwise, how could he explain staying underwater for so long?
After moving away from the frogmen, he swiftly swam toward the seafloor. A glance at his wristwatch showed that he had already reached waters 130 meters deep.
Since there was little pollution here, the seawater was exceptionally clear, though the light was somewhat dim. That posed no difficulty for Ye Yuan. His underwater vision was now excellent. Ordinary people could only see a few meters ahead, but he could see objects dozens of meters away.
Ye Yuan clearly watched fish and shrimp swimming below him. A small sea snake swam past him, more than two meters long and looking rather ferocious.
Sea snakes were generally venomous, and their venom was highly potent. Ye Yuan directly put the sea snake into his space and exchanged it for 60 points.
His main purpose here was to search for those black-red stones.
At a depth of 150 meters, ordinary frogmen had generally already reached their limit. Very few people could withstand the water pressure at this depth.
The scenery here was simply too beautiful.
The plants were abundant and colorful, in shades of purple, red, green... Their forms were equally varied, from tiny diatoms to giant kelp dozens of meters tall.
Ye Yuan had no time to keep admiring the underwater scenery. He began carefully searching along the seabed sand. Before coming down, the frogmen had reminded him that the stones had been buried beneath the sea sand all three times and were only discovered after someone stepped on them. Naturally, Ye Yuan did not need to work that hard.
He fully spread out his senses, covering an area dozens of meters around him. Hmm, nothing. He moved elsewhere and kept searching, but there was still nothing. He changed locations again. Without realizing it, Ye Yuan had already reached the edge of an underwater trench.
Looking at the trench, Ye Yuan suddenly had a bold idea. He found a reef, tucked his oxygen tank into a crack in the rock, and took off his fins. He kept only his diving goggles and mask, placing everything else inside the reef.
He charged straight into the pitch-black trench. At first, there were still quite a few small fish swimming around him, but they became fewer and fewer. Gradually, he could only occasionally see a few large creatures. By now, he could rarely see any fish at all.
The mysterious underwater world always contained things beyond our expectations. When Ye Yuan dove into the darkness a thousand meters below the surface, he saw a huge dark-red plastic bag in the distance.
At first, Ye Yuan paid it no attention. But in the blink of an eye, the red plastic bag actually began moving on its own. After observing it carefully, Ye Yuan realized that it was not a plastic bag, but perhaps some dangerous marine creature.
This creature resembled the Kongming lanterns people usually released into the sky. At that moment, a strange fish swam past the "plastic bag." The "plastic bag" wrapped itself around the small fish, then slowly contracted until it enclosed it completely. The fish visibly disappeared as it was eaten.
Ye Yuan knew that thing was dangerous and quickly moved away. He had no idea what that "plastic bag" really was; his knowledge base had nothing on it. He would search online after returning to see if he could identify it.
After moving away from that "plastic bag," Ye Yuan sensed a stone not far ahead that closely resembled the one he was seeking. He immediately swam toward it.
Brushing aside the sea sand, he discovered that it was twice as large as the piece the middle-aged man had shown him. He placed it directly into his mesh bag and continued searching.
The frogmen had searched for so long without finding anything, perhaps because they had not gone deep enough. Ye Yuan knew Xu Hang had kept many things from him. Otherwise, he would not have concealed the stone's purpose.
Ye Yuan searched this stretch of sea for a long time and found three such stones in total. The latter two were both quite small.
In the end, Ye Yuan decided to leave the large one for the country and keep the two small ones as payment for his labor. He put them into his space without exchanging them for points for the time being. Ye Yuan was afraid that the system might unlock some new function at such a depth, leaving him unable to deal with it. It was better to wait until he returned to shore. He would avoid conducting dangerous experiments on the seabed whenever possible.
The time was about right. Ye Yuan returned to where he had left his equipment, put it back on underwater, and then returned to the warship. For anyone else, changing equipment underwater would have been utterly impossible, but Ye Yuan felt even more agile in the sea than he did on land.
On the ship, all ten frogmen had already come up to rest. Xu Hang watched the sea anxiously.
"Colonel Xu, where did you find a guy like this? Not only did he insist on acting alone, he didn't return on time either. Nothing could have happened to him, right? A wild operator like him shouldn't have been brought here in the first place." One of the frogmen spoke mockingly.
"Shut up."
Seeing that Xu Hang did not look pleased, the frogmen exchanged glances and said nothing further.
At that moment, the surface churned with splashes as Ye Yuan emerged directly from the water.
The weight in Xu Hang's heart finally lifted.
He knew Ye Yuan was an excellent swimmer, but that was only a guess; he had never truly seen it for himself. If anything had happened to Ye Yuan because of this mission, he would have had no way to explain it to Ye Yuan's family.
Ye Yuan was pulled aboard, and a navy soldier helped remove his equipment. He took a bottle of mineral water and drained it in one gulp.
Ye Yuan had only been putting on an act. Otherwise, after carrying several dozen pounds of equipment underwater alone for so long, how could anyone believe he would come back up without a single problem?
"Did you find it?" Xu Hang asked, not holding much hope.
Ye Yuan took the larger stone from the mesh bag he carried with him and handed it to Xu Hang.
"Take a look. Is this it? It was hard to see down there, but I thought it looked right, so I brought it up."
When Xu Hang saw the stone in Ye Yuan's hand, his eyes went wide. He knew what it was used for. It was extremely useful to martial artists like them.
Ye Yuan's stone was even larger than the three previously salvaged stones combined. Xu Hang had commanded this salvage operation, and his superiors had already promised that if they found anything this time, he would receive a portion for himself.
With such a large "stone," he could receive at least a five-centimeter piece. That would make his cultivation speed three to four times faster than others' over the next year or so.
Xu Hang walked over to Ye Yuan and burst into laughter. "You're still the best. All those frogmen searched for so long, yet together they found less than you did alone." The frogmen beside him glanced at the stone in Xu Hang's hand. The one who had mocked Ye Yuan earlier lowered his head in embarrassment.
P.S. Thanks to brother 08a for the reward.
Before you continue