The tremors beneath the sea had stopped.
But what the earthquake had unleashed could not be stopped.
That force had already been released. At eight hundred kilometers per hour, it tore through seawater, rock strata, and everything in its path—its speed undiminished, its power undiminished, silent as a colossal beast that had lurked for a thousand years and had finally opened its eyes.
The surface of the sea began to move.
At first, it was only a faintly raised ridge of water, as though the ocean had turned over in its sleep. No one would have given it a second glance.
But that ridge rose higher and spread wider, until it became a black wall of water that stood up from the horizon and marched toward the land, step by step.
The people on the Sumeru Platform noticed it.
When the first tremor arrived, Caesar was leaning on the railing, gazing out over the distant sea. A dull impact sounded beneath the ship, and the entire platform jolted violently, as though something enormous had rammed it from below.
"King of Corpse Guardians?" He frowned. "Still alive?"
His first instinct was to think of the dragon-shaped Corpse Guardian Erii had forced back into the sea. It had indeed been driven off, but who knew whether it might return and destroy the ground beneath their feet from underwater?
But the second tremor immediately overturned that guess.
Because the Sumeru Platform began to tilt.
This was no slight swaying. The entire platform had listed thirty full degrees to port. Caesar only avoided falling by grabbing the railing. His eyes remained fixed on the deck beneath his feet as countless possibilities raced through his mind—
What kind of creature could lift this floating fortress through brute force alone?
None.
No such thing existed.
Which