Arthur Stone didn't seem worried, saying, "Those things are formed under special magnetic fields, but there must be something real behind them. As long as we avoid that real thing, our submarine won't suffer physical damage. But it's hard to predict what impact strong magnetic field interference will have on the submarine's equipment and personnel safety."
"What are you talking about?" Ivan asked.
Arthur Stone said, "It's a pyramid."
"Pyramids?" Boris's eyes widened. "Are you kidding me? We're on the edge of the South Pacific Basin. Are the Māori descendants of the Ancient Egypt?"
"Do you know where we are right now?" Stone asked.
"Of course I know." Boris glanced at the nautical chart and the navigation system. "We're currently around 150 degrees west longitude and 30 degrees south latitude, on the eastern edge of the South Pacific Basin. A little further north is the Tubuai Islands."
Stone nodded and said, "You can imagine, if you draw a straight line from here to the center of the Earth, what's on the other side of the Earth?"
Boris conjured a globe in his mind, imagining a straight line passing through their location and crossing the Earth's center. He murmured, "The corresponding longitude and latitude are 30 degrees east and 30 degrees north. That should be..."
He rummaged through his memory. For people like them who spent their lives at sea, they could remember the location of every island, but their geographical knowledge of the mainland was pitifully limited.
"That's Egypt," Ivan said.
Boris seemed to connect the dots and said, "Don't tell me the Egypt pyramids fell off the other side of the earth."
"It's not that it will fall down, but they built an exact replica on the other side of the world," Stone said.
"Who did this?" Boris asked curiously. "I don't believe those pharaohs would sail warships all the way to Polynesia."
"That's hard to say. Maybe they were the ones who made those stone figures on Easter Island," someone said.
"Come on, I might believe you if you said Stonehenge, but Easter Island? Forget about it."
"But Easter Island isn't far from here, is it? Aren't all the miracles in the South Pacific the work of the same group of people?"
Everyone chatted amongst themselves, except for Ivan, who remained silent. He looked at Stone, knowing that he probably wouldn't say anything more; after all, if anything happened, none of the people on this submarine would escape.
" Ivan, the magnetic interference is getting stronger; they're getting closer and closer."
"Full speed ahead, head in the direction with the weakest magnetic interference, and charge forward at full speed," Ivan ordered.
"Should we float to the surface first?"
The speed of this old-fashioned submarine is much slower than that of modern submarines. If it could surface and then sprint, its speed would increase by at least three knots.
"It's too late," Ivan said.
"Okay, full speed ahead."
Everyone stopped joking and became serious, even Boris, who usually had a playful expression and a fiery temper.
The submarine headed towards the area with the weakest magnetic interference at a speed of thirteen knots.
If someone could see the deep sea at this time, they would see a ring of transparent, inverted pyramid-shaped objects shimmering with a light blue light, suspended in the Deep Blue water like an iceberg.
A dark, old submarine, like a giant whale, silently rammed into those strange things.
The suspended inverted pyramids were also moving and merging at an extremely fast speed, seemingly about to devour the submarine.
" Ivan, the magnetic field detection is completely malfunctioning; it seems we're surrounded by a powerful but chaotic magnetic field!"
Fortunately, our instruments and equipment did not malfunction in such a magnetic field!
" Ivan, the sonar is picking up information! There's something ahead!"
What is that?
"It's an iceberg!... No!... It's not an iceberg, it's a pyramid, an upside-down pyramid! Just like the ones we see on the surface of the sea!"
"Turn the rudder! Get out of its way!"
"Yes, left rudder 25, forward 3!"
" Ivan, it seems we can't avoid it; it's still right in front of us!"
"Could it be another one?"
"No, the sonar shows only one."
"..." Ivan looked at Stone, but Stone was lost in thought.
"We're about to crash, Ivan!"
"Turn the rudder again!"
"Left rudder twenty!... Oh my god, it's still there!"
"Retreat! Retreat three steps immediately!" Ivan made the decision on the spot.
"Yes, emergency retreat."
"That guy seems to have caught up with us!"
"Ignore it, keep backing up!"
"Yes, continue retreating!"
"Hooray!" the sonar operator exclaimed. "Looks like we've shaken it off."
The crew cheered, no longer as tense as before. But Ivan remained uneasy; how could such a massive creature suddenly vanish from sonar detection?
Sure enough, the person in charge of sonar soon shouted in panic, "It's behind us!"
Ivan immediately ordered, "Turn the rudder, take an emergency third step, full speed ahead!"
The crew followed orders. Although they were all veterans, the submarine's constant changes in speed and direction made everyone inside feel their blood surging, as it had been many years since they had experienced anything like this. Ivan looked at Stone and found that his face showed no change in expression, as if he had just been eating breakfast at the table.
" Ivan, it's ahead!"
"Use torpedoes, blow it up, Ivan!" Boris roared. "Any closer and it'll be too late!"
Ivan had no other choice, so he steeled himself and ordered, "Launch the torpedoes!"
"Yes, launch the torpedoes!" Boris exclaimed excitedly, his face turning bright red.
The torpedo is much faster than the submarine, reaching speeds of 40 knots, or about 20 meters per second. According to sonar detection, after the change of direction, the distance between the torpedo and that thing was about two kilometers, and it could hit the target in less than two minutes.
But just about a minute later, the sonar observer exclaimed, "It's dodged!"
"What?"
This thing can dodge torpedoes? That means it's manned or autonomously piloted. Such a large object, hovering on the seabed, capable of traveling at around twelve knots at a depth of 900 feet—which country and Tushu manufactured this bizarre submarine?
The crew members were puzzled.
Ivan didn't think that far ahead, because getting any closer, beyond the safe distance, and then launching the torpedo would be tantamount to suicide.
" Boris!" Ivan roared, "Launch all the torpedoes! Cover the front of the submarine at a 60-degree angle in all directions! Let's see where he can hide!"
"Well done, Ivan! You've got guts!" Boris shouted excitedly.
The submarine kept adjusting the torpedo launch angle, and all thirteen remaining torpedoes were launched.
"Damn it!" exclaimed the crew member in charge of sonar.
"What's wrong?"
"That guy's gone!"
"What?"
"Not only is that guy gone, but our torpedoes are gone too!"
How is that possible?
Is the sonar malfunctioning?
"It's... possible. But..."
"But what?"
"It seems... it seems the torpedoes are back... thirteen... yes, it's our torpedoes... oh my god, our torpedoes are heading our way! They're going to attack us!"
"What did you say?" Boris roared.
"Get out of the way!" Ivan shouted. Being hit by a torpedo was no joke. Underwater torpedoes are far more powerful than surface-exploding missiles; a single torpedo could destroy a destroyer.
"We can't avoid it, Ivan! Thirteen torpedoes from thirteen directions, blocking all our routes."
The command cabin was deathly silent, save for the beeping alarms from the sonar detectors and the thirteen green dots on the instrument screens, all converging toward the center.