A slender black shadow skimmed past the Trieste, like a giant eel swimming through the abyss.
The three people in the cockpit held their breath at once. Cold sweat slid down Lu Mingfei's temple and dripped onto his collar, but he did not notice.
"What was that just now?" Lu Mingfei's pupils constricted sharply, his voice lowered to almost a whisper, as though afraid of waking something.
"Dead Servant..." Chu Zihang stared at the receding black shadow, his Adam's apple bobbing. "A Dragon-form Dead Servant."
His voice was equally low, so low that it was almost lip-reading.
Outside the window, more and more specks of gold appeared. Those lights rose from the deep sea, slow yet resolute, like a silent army of the dead lining up to march. There were no fewer than a hundred at a glance.
"So many Dead Servants, where did they come from?" There was a tremor in Lu Mingfei's voice. "Could there be a Dead Servant nest in Takamagahara? But we didn't see a single one just now..."
At that moment, Minamoto Chisaki's voice came through the communications channel. "Those aren't Dead Servants. They're Corpse Guardians. The ancient Hybrids who built Takamagahara had part of their vitality preserved through alchemy after death, then were buried vertically in the foundation as guards. Ancient Dragon fetal blood nourished them and brought them back to life."
Lu Mingfei froze for two seconds, then suddenly said, "Ancient Hybrids? Doesn't that make them the ancestors of your Eight Clans of the Serpent?"
There was a moment of silence on the other end.
"When I was being chased by the Ninja Army you sent at the Peninsula Hotel, I gave them quite a few greetings," Lu Mingfei said gloomily. "If they know down there, they should be pretty happy to see