Time always flew when one devoted oneself to a task.
While the waves of the New World battered the reefs of Hachinosu, while the Four Emperors and the World Government were still playing their game of chicken, waiting to see who would blink first.
Ten thousand meters beneath the sea, under the light of Sunlight Tree Eve, another project had quietly reached completion.
Boer stood on the rooftop of Ryugu Palace, his short, silvery-white hair drifting gently in the current.
Beneath his feet lay a hundred square kilometers of newly added land. The new ground extended from Fish-Man Island's original bedrock, like petals slowly unfolding in the sunlight.
The foundations paved with basalt bricks were covered in green vegetation that Aramaki had accelerated into maturity. The grass glowed a fresh jade green in Eve's light, and the trees' roots plunged deep into the gaps between the bricks, anchoring this newborn land firmly to the continental shelf.
Above his head were two complete bubble membranes.
The inner bubble hugged the island's surface like a transparent skin, protecting every building, every street, and every life on the island.
The World Economy News Paper devoted four full pages of its front-page special edition to this epic undertaking.
The front cover featured a photograph.
Deep blue hexagonal patterns of light spread like a honeycomb, covering the entire sky above Fish-Man Island.
Where light and shadow crossed, a mother of the Fish-Man Race stood atop a coral reef, holding her young child.
The child stretched out a tiny finger, pointing at the blue light in the sky, unlike anything the child had ever seen.
The mother turned slightly sideways, her long hair streaming in the current, leaving only her silent back to the camera.
In the lower-right corner of the photograph, a line of small