The Red Tears sailed through the deep sea, its blue searchlights piercing the darkness.
Dozens of large searchlights illuminated the surrounding waters. In this environment, it was quite conspicuous.
Sephiroth and the others watched the deep-sea scenery on the bridge through the panoramic displays.
"Heavenward! Heavenward! Look! That fish has a transparent head!"
Yamato was the least composed of them, bouncing around excitedly. Whenever she spotted some unusual deep-sea species on a screen, she hurried over.
"Hmm... look closely. Its eyes are inside its head, right under the top of its skull..."
This was Sephiroth's first time reaching waters this deep, too. It rather reminded him of watching deep-sea science documentaries in his previous life on Blue Star.
"Umm-these fish are so ugly... not elegant at all."
Having served as Regent for four years, Isabella did not bounce around like Yamato, but her eyes were shining just as brightly.
"Deep-sea fish... they just grow however they like..."
The others were excited to varying degrees, but they were considerably more composed than those two.
Everyone on the Red Tears' bridge offered their opinions on the deep-sea creatures, looking like a tour group visiting an aquarium.
...And this strange "church" piqued the curiosity of some sea kings, too.
Because of their physiology and their deep-sea environment, sea kings possessed mental capacity comparable to humans, but lacked human intelligence.
Only the colossal sea kings, who had accumulated experience over long ages, could be considered "wise."
Most other sea kings had roughly the intelligence of illiterate human teenagers, with temperaments tending toward savagery.
Still, after spotting the Red Tears, they merely watched from a distance.
Their survival instincts told them that anything bold enough to shine such bright lights in the deep sea might be difficult to mess with.
But this "strange glowing thing"