In the field of vision of Albert, the Eastern's first mate, whirlpools appeared one after another beneath the thirteen ships following the Eastern.
The tremendous suction dragged all thirteen ships straight down to the bottom of the Inner River.
Within a breath, the ships had vanished.
And not a single person aboard escaped.
The sight defied everything Albert knew.
Nothing in the seamanship he had studied could account for whirlpools like these.
Never mind why the Eastern had just sailed through unharmed, while the pursuing ships were swallowed by whirlpools as soon as they entered those same waters.
The sharply defined boundaries of the whirlpools swallowing those ships were impossible enough on their own.
And once they had swallowed the ships, they disappeared.
It was as though...
Someone was controlling them!
Albert froze as he reached that conclusion.
Just then, Barry "Big Mouth" clapped Albert on the shoulder again.
"The world's a big place.
Our Big Boss is known as the Medium of South Los. You know what that means.
Mediums always have something to do with all that supernatural stuff.
Maybe the River God is an honored guest of our Big Boss, and just held a one-of-a-kind ceremony to see him off on his voyage?"
Barry "Big Mouth" spoke with a grin.
Albert instinctively wanted to say that was impossible.
But with the words on the tip of his tongue, the young first mate looked at Barry's grinning face and felt that perhaps it really was true.
For a moment, the first mate began questioning everything he knew.
The pitiful-looking lady, Yura, was questioning everything too.
When Albert, the Eastern's first mate, shouted, "That's impossible!" she had cried out the same thing in her heart.
As she watched her accomplices' ships sink one by one, her heart sank with