Chapter 412: Touring the Triton’s Ark II
Arthur could sense the presences of multiple Transcendents clustered in the Military Headquarters building, with half of them being Divine Humans, while the other half, were gods.
Arthur took care to restrain his power so as not to alert them of his presence as he entered the towering Skyscraper.
On the Colonels’ ID was the man’s office number, so after studying how the other soldiers in the building acted, he figured out how to use the special elevators to get to the man’s office area.
When he entered the Elevator, some Two Brigadier Generals entered right after him and he saluted them like any Colonel would have done.
They acknowledged him with a simple nod and went back to their conversation. From it, Arthur heard that there was some sort of meeting ongoing at the topmost floor which all the Generals were to be present for.
This gave Arthur an Idea, and after leaving the Elevator, he walked towards the emergency exit and called forth the invisible scout to cloak himself once more.
’I think this might be my favourite summon.’
Arthur pulled on doors as he walked, but most of the doors belonging to the offices of Generals were locked, except for a select few which he entered and searched all over.
He checked files, and looked through their drawers and shelves, not caring for how he was scattering the place.
If he saw anything that seemed important, he took pictures with his phone.
After he was done ransacking the office, he used his time law manipulation to rewind the time of the room to the state it was before he entered.
Arthur did this for about four more General’s offices, and eventually, he found something that caught his attention more so than everything else he had seen all day.
"A Damage report? Starboard side?"
The boy sat down and began reading through the report on the General’s desk, and after a few minutes, he snapped the file shut and laughed.
"Finally, something good."
Arthur made a copy of this file without hesitation before rewinding the office’s time and taking his leave.
"To think that the Triton’s Ark was currently Damaged after a battle with a group of wild Level 800 Sea monsters! No wonder it had been stationary for a while; they want to make repairs."
Just this piece of information alone was enough for Arthur’s visit to the Triton’s Ark to be considered fruitful.
He made the decision to conduct an in-depth investigation, leaving the Military Headquarters and returning to where Colonel Shepley’s house was. Arthur returned the man’s uniform and undid the stasis he placed on him before jumping out and returning to the Academy City.
"It’s almost 6 pm, gotta be quick. Who knows if these guys lockdown the whole Island at night?
Even if they don’t, I’m sure it’d be harder for me to get past security then."
Arthur walked out the gates like normal and the security did not question him as they had seen him enter with the trio of girls earlier in the day.
If only they knew the young progenitor was thinking of how Sylvan could use the hole that had been broken in the Ark’s structure to easily gain access to it and use the maps that he had created to navigate to the Central Core of the Ark.
Unfortunately, they could not read minds so they were blissfully ignorant of these thoughts.
Arthur’s next order of business was to investigate the water around the Ark to see if it was indeed the source of the divinity that he had detected at Whitboro, as well as to see the Damaged Area of the Ark for himself.
He appreciated that Lucifer made him pick up Water Laws as he jumped off the Island and right into the ocean, wrapping himself in a bubble of water law energy to prevent the ocean water from flooding his lungs in an instant.
But besides that, now that Arthur was in the water, he could tell;
"There’s Divinity in this Water as well...the reason I could not sense it was the layer of concealment placed atop it!"
The concentration was quite low, so when coupled with the concealment on the water around the Triton’s Ark, Arthur could not tell it was there without entering the water himself.
"Now then, what about the source of the Divinity."
He headed towards the damaged area but before he reached it, he noticed giant large openings that looked like vents releasing what appeared to be a cloud of white smoke into the ocean.
’No... that’s not smoke.’
Arthur quickly rushed to get closer to the area to inspect what he was seeing, and upon arrival, he discovered it wasn’t ’white smoke’ but ’white sand?’.
"Why pour sand into an ocean?"
He asked himself this question as he used his energy to create a bubble and capture some of the white sand, before shooting back up to the ocean surface and sticking close to the Island fortress as he began inspecting it.
This inspection didn’t even take up to a minute as he quickly figured out what it was.
"Particles of grounded divine crystals! This is the source of the Divinity in the Water!"
Based on what he had seen while on the Ark and these grounded crystal particles, he was able to easily guess where they came from.
The Divinity Crystal Cores scattered around the Triton’s Ark.
Those Divinity Crystals worked like batteries, and using a battery analogy, the maximum capacity of energy they could hold decreased over time.
When it fell below the acceptable limit, they were replaced with new cores. The old cores were then grounded to pieces and those pieces were released into the surrounding ocean water and infused with divinity.
"There’d have been a possibility that the effect of infusing the water with Divinity was not on purpose—if there was not a layer of concealment law energy on the ocean surface, that is."
Arthur was sure that the Aramisians had 100% nefarious intentions for doing this, probably to prevent the demons from being able to launch underwater attacks.
He returned underwater and took some more photos before continuing his journey towards the damaged part of the Triton’s Ark.
Though his underwater speed was a lot slower than his land or airborne speed, it was still plenty fast. He did take care to avoid the sonar detection ranges from the Ark before finally finding where the damage was.
"That’s bigger than I thought..."
Considering the durability of the Triton’s Ark, Arthur didn’t expect this much damage. It was as if someone had punched a hole through the hull and then proceeded to drag their fist through it to form a 500-metre-long tear in the metal.
There was an energy field around it that prevented water from surging into the Ark but Arthur found that it was something Sylvan could easily break through after some analysis.
"Who told them to pick a fight with a Kraken?"
Arthur shook his head as he turned around and swam up to the surface, sending a mental command to the dinosaur-bird he had waiting for him above the clouds.
The dinosaur bird flew low and grabbed Arthur’s outstretched arms with its talons and lifted him up while flying away. Arthur then flipped himself over to the creature’s back and ordered it to fly back in Whitboro’s direction.
◇ ◇ ◇
There was quite an uproar when Arthur landed with the strange dinosaur bird, but when they saw Arthur atop its back, they quickly sent for the generals who came out to see him.
The boy gave them the grounded Divine Crystals he had collected and explained to them that this was the source of the divinity in the water, he then proceeded to inform them about the crack in the Triton’s Ark’s hull.
Alvey, Barron and Sylvan were gobsmacked by the amount of information the boy brought back, along with the detailed maps he created and the things he found in the Generals’ offices.
While Alvey already had those maps because of his meticulous planning, he was still impressed at how Arthur had managed to acquire such detailed maps and information about the layout of the area with the WMDs as well as the main Divine Crystal Core of the Triton’s Ark.
Some of the information Arthur brought was what they already knew, but he also came with some new things which they used to improve on their plans.
When Arthur had told them about the damage to the Triton’s Ark, Sylvan’s expression changed in a manner that allowed Arthur to instantly understand the man was thinking of the same thing he did.
◇ ◇ ◇
In the ensuing days, they diligently executed their plan adjustments and established contingency measures to mitigate potential setbacks.
Alvey successfully reconfigured several Demonic Energy bombs, converting them into formidable ’Anti-Divinity’ bombs, while Arthur refined the ’Blessing of Anti-Divinity’ spell, enhancing its effectiveness and potency.
Cargo ships were laden with essential supplies and armaments, the demon soldiers embarked on their vessels, and preparations were made for departure.
As they set sail, Airships ascended into the skies, soaring above the billowing sea of clouds.
Barron had them employ advanced concealment formations with using the laws of concealment and subterfuge, which allowed them to minimize their presence in both air and water, rendering detection by the Aramisians aboard the Triton’s Ark exceedingly difficult.
With their operations concealed, by the time the Aramisians suspected any anomalies, it would already be too late.
