Ripple Overdrive

Morel tapped the table.

"Have you had enough?"

Everyone fell silent.

Morel pulled over the sea chart and pointed his pipe at the outer edge of the Old Trench.

"We can't stay here."

Bai Zhu immediately agreed.

"I'm with you."

Milluki put the chip fragment into a sealed bag.

"What about the Mechanical Fish?"

Milluki reactivated the backup terminal and tried to connect.

Only a few faint signals remained on the screen.

Several Mechanical Fish from three groups had already gone offline.

The others were being pushed off their original routes by the current.

Milluki looked terrible.

"We'll be lucky to recover half of them."

Morel did not hesitate.

"Recover whatever we can. Cut loose the rest."

"We're heading for Ring Island first."

Bai Zhu looked at the chart.

"The place you mentioned, where the continental shelf can block those huge things from the deep sea?"

"Yeah."

Gela Jiang looked out over the sea.

"We can still make it if we leave now, but don't use high-power propulsion."

Morel nodded.

"Low-noise sailing."

The Purple Smoke Soldiers redistributed themselves between the bridge and engine room.

The warship grew quieter.

Milluki connected the backup terminal to the secondary console and immediately slipped back into work mode.

Bai Zhu stood beside him, not daring to interrupt.

He looked at the chip inside the sealed bag.

Several Black Gold patterns suddenly surfaced on the chip's surface.

They were extremely fine.

They flashed only once.

Bai Zhu spoke at once.

"Young master. Um, I think I saw your chip light up."

Milluki lowered his head.

"What lit up?"

"It looked like Black Gold. I saw it."

Milluki immediately took out a watchmaker's magnifying glass, put it on, and aimed it at the chip.

"You're sure you saw it? I didn't see a damn thing!"

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