Shadow Seer (Rogue Merchant Book #3): LitRPG Series by Roman Prokofiev (english reading book TXT) 📗

give us complete and reliable information about your sword. Then we turn off the stonejammer, and you can return home.”

And another team of hunters will take care of you, I finished his thought. What a tantalizing offer! Out of the blue, I charged at them, trying to knock down the seemingly relaxed Pandas, but they effortlessly dodged my attack. However, my maneuver was worth it—I was standing right next to the water. The shadow sphere had eight minutes remaining; I had to hurry. I climbed over the railing and froze, teetering on the edge, the black water glistening just a step away.

“Do you want to take a swim?” Pinprick snickered. “Go on then! See you at the next resp point!”

“Swimming? I don’t mind, but only in company,” I replied and raised my left hand, drawing their attention.

“Listen up, Pandas! Option three: each of you pays me fifty thousand, and I let you go. Ten seconds to decide!”

“They did tell me you were cocky,” Yota said, nodding. “Too bad, you don’t have the speed to match your wit.”

I wasn’t going to fight them or test out Mirror Skin. Plan B that Thrainul had affectionately nicknamed “Lunacy” had been born only a short time before and was pure madness. However, I had wanted to do it ever since seeing the Guardian.

I stepped back and fell down, barely making a splash. The black water burned me with icy cold but only for a few seconds, as after that, an Air Bubble helpfully provided by Fayana surrounded me.

The dark malachite waves closed up above me, and I slowly sank, hovering in the deep while blanketed by two spheres—the shadow shield and the bubble that allowed me to breathe.

“What is he hoping to achieve?” Pinprick said derisively. “He’ll die as soon as his invincibility wears off.”

“He wants a beautiful death,” Ran Dom said, snickering.

“Maybe he’s going to swim beyond the stonejammer’s range,” Yota observed, thoughtful. “But we’re ready for that. Tell Mancurt to submerge!”

Impenetrable darkness surrounded me. Deep in the Sea of Terror, visibility decreased to several feet in front of me. I had to activate Shadow Sight to see anything at all. Everything around me immediately cleared up, and I was falling through grey mist thick as oatmeal. A giant crinkle loomed far below, almost out of my sight. Something stirred inside of it, and my gut told me that it was one of the canyons that the locals called chasms. That’s where the Guardian came out of last time.

Who lives in a pineapple under the sea? I drew Aelmaris and fired two Bolides almost straight down toward the spot where I had sensed movement.

Fire and water were opposing elements. An ordinary fireball would have immediately died out, but True Fire was the quintessence of pure all-devouring energy. Leaving a vapor trail behind them, the bolides flew toward their target, and I watched them leave until their bright sparks disappeared in the dark.

A large shadow descended on me from above—the Barracuda was rapidly descending in my wake. Hadn’t they smelled the trap yet? It was high time to vamoose.

Something flashed in the chasm, momentarily illuminating the dark cliffs of the gorge. The bolides had reached their target. I held my breath—the next minute would decide the success of my enterprise.

Yes! Giant yellow eyes lit up in the depths of the underwater rift, and writhing tentacles appeared on the edges of the fault. Dread increased by two points. The disturbed Guardian was rising from the chasm!

They still had a chance to survive if Mancurt had the sense to feign being a dead piece of iron like Thrainul. Or did they? Glowing rays beaming out of the squid’s eyes ravenously scoured the expanse like two giant searchlights. Time moved with agonizing slowness, and at last, they reached the Barracuda, which was drilling through the water, headed down. As soon as it saw its prey, the Guardian leaped out of its chasm, swiftly closing in.

Six minutes. Nine-plus million points of damage. That’s how long the Shield of Shadows would withstand, and I hoped that it would be enough to survive the Guardian’s attack.

It was impossibly, inconceivably big. It was hard even to imagine a creature of such size. Next to him, Mancurt’s submarine was a sliver, and I, an unimportant speck of dust. I saw the Barracuda turn around, ignite both engines, and try to escape. So it had finally sunk in! A trail of water rose behind the aft, but it was too late. The Guardian’s colossal tentacles connected, cutting off the escape path, and a few of the smaller tendrils coiled around the metal hull, crumpling the armored plates like playdough. Deformed and mutilated, the Barracuda couldn’t last longer than ten seconds in the ghastly knot of the tentacles. The Guardian easily tore it into several pieces and hungrily sucked the water into its giant maw, swallowing the remains of Pandorum’s ship.

A powerful current swept me up and pulled right into the monster’s maw, which reminded me of an entrance to a railway tunnel. The debris of the hull, parts, and human bodies swirled next to me. Some of them were surrounded by protective spheres and air bubbles like mine, still hoping to survive.

Four minutes! The crimson wall of the pharynx flew past me, studded with rows of translucent teeth, each the size of a cliff. The monster slugged us down like plankton unworthy of being chewed. Unable to resist the furious current and surrounded by pitch darkness, I fell inside the Guardian.

Chapter 15

I WAS ABOUT TO LEARN what the monsters of Sphere looked like from the inside. I couldn’t say that being there was especially exciting, but the creators of the Guardian, whether Svechkin himself or the procedural AI, had done their best to make everything look realistic. The swirling current dragged me down a crimson ribbed tunnel, spitting