Chapter 265: Chapter 263: Parts Riot
"Tie him up for now. We’ll decide what to do when we get to the village."
Jeff was still uneasy after hearing the Fishman’s explanation. He decided to keep him tied up as they headed toward the village together.
Seeing they were heading back to the village, the Fishman repeatedly tried to persuade them to flee, but all he got in return were contemptuous looks from the others.
"Something’s happened in the village, and all you can think about is running away?" a Fake Fishman demanded.
"You haven’t seen those parts. You don’t know how terrifying they are, so of course you’re not thinking about running. Once you see them, you won’t be able to escape even if you try!" the bound Fishman retorted anxiously.
Hearing this, the Fake Fishman paused for a moment, then raised a finger and pointed to the large cluster of parts hovering over Mo Ling’s head.
"Aren’t those them?"
"This is different..."
"How is it different?"
"..."
After that exchange, the bound Fishman stopped his incessant chatter. However, he still dragged his feet, hiding in the middle of the group and nervously peeking around, as if worried a part might come flying out of nowhere.
But what happened next soon made his fish-like eyes go wide.
He watched as parts from the village, which had been flying over to attack the group, suddenly changed course before they could get close and plunged into the cluster above Mo Ling’s head.
Soon, the strange phenomenon attracted more suits of armor. They gathered together, surrounding the group.
Seeing the armor, Jeff and the others immediately summoned currents of water to form a barrier in front of them.
But the armor’s attention didn’t seem to be on the weak Fishmen at all. Instead, they all stared in unison at Mo Ling in the center of the group.
By now, a dense, dark cloud of parts had gathered over Mo Ling’s head, making him extremely conspicuous.
The Fish Swarm’s channel buzzed with activity again.
"What’s going on with that account? Can the race on this island not only take our bodies, but our accounts too?"
"I don’t know. I looked up the account name. It’s a bit strange. It’s called ’Visitor 500’?"
"What does that mean? When did we ever have an account like that? I tried to look up its info, but it says my permissions are insufficient."
The Fish Swarm channel was in an uproar. The ancient Fishmen had no idea where Mo Ling came from or how he had such permissions. The suits of armor just floated in the air, not daring to make a reckless move.
Meanwhile, Mo Ling watched these ancient Fishmen discussing among themselves as if nothing was wrong and silently opened the account management interface.
He found that whenever the suits of armor appeared before him, he could clearly see the account names on them.
Right now, each of the floating suits of armor had a conspicuous name above its head.
"Fish Swarm 234."
"Fish Swarm 163."
"Fish Swarm 736..."
It seemed that, based on account level, the names above their heads were different colors, like a bunch of gaudy hats. They were very jarring and clashed with the menacing appearance of the armor.
Soon, Mo Ling found these names in the account list.
’Let’s see if I can delete them.’
Selecting one of the accounts, Mo Ling found the familiar delete option. Without hesitation, he chose to delete it.
Among the suits of armor surrounding the group, one suddenly began to act strangely.
A deep red light shone from the gaps between its parts.
"What’s wrong with you?"
The other suits of armor immediately noticed something was wrong and asked in confusion.
"This looks like... an account deletion!" one of them finally recognized.
Hearing this, the previously nonchalant Fish Swarm instantly fell into a panic:
"Why did he trigger an account deletion? What happened?"
"Did he betray the Fishman Race?"
"When did he join us? Were there any anomalies before this? Did he do it himself?"
"I don’t know. His account information is completely gone now..."
The panicked Fish Swarm scattered, watching helplessly as the red-glowing armor exploded into individual parts, and the Fishman body within fell to the ground.
The scattered parts were about to fly toward Mo Ling again, but he managed to control them in time, freezing them in place.
’They don’t seem to have ever experienced this before.’
Mo Ling watched the ancient Fishmen with some confusion.
Account deletion seemed to be an utterly terrifying event for them.
The ancient Fishmen no longer maintained their encirclement. After snapping out of their daze, they hastily tried to scatter and fly up into the sky.
Right now, reclaiming their bodies seemed to have become unimportant.
But no matter how fast they fled, they couldn’t outpace Mo Ling’s actions.
Locking onto the names, Mo Ling went on a deletion spree through the list. The suits of armor in the sky that were trying to escape all froze in place, and their bodies began to glow red.
The few remaining suits of armor watched their companions freeze one by one. Finally realizing what was happening, they whipped their heads toward Mo Ling.
"You did this! Visitor 500!"
"I know you can hear me! Who are you?!"
As they questioned him, the few suits of armor ejected parts that quickly formed a barrier in front of them, blocking Mo Ling’s line of sight. The function that allowed him to see their names was instantly nullified.
’They can do that?’
Mo Ling was taken aback. It seemed these Fishmen knew how to prevent account deletion.
However, this wasn’t a difficult situation for Mo Ling to handle.
Pushing the account management interface to the side, Mo Ling opened the parts control panel and ordered the parts forming the barrier to scatter.
Immediately after, he completely locked down all nearby parts, preventing the few remaining suits of armor from controlling them any longer.
"Insufficient permissions! Everything is ’insufficient permissions’!"
The ancient Fishmen’s terrified voices once again echoed in the channel.
"No, wait... you have the highest authority!"
The moment those words were spoken, Mo Ling instantly deleted the accounts of these last few ancient Fishmen. After a few CRACKLES in the channel, it fell silent.
The suits of armor exploded again, and several Fishmen fell to the ground, dazed. Jeff had his people tie them up.
"Jeff?"
After coming to his senses, one of the bound Fishmen seemed to recognize Jeff.
Mo Ling also remembered this Fishman. He was one of the ones hauling cargo at the docks. Because he wore nothing but a single leather belt, Mo Ling had an unusually strong impression of him.
Unlike the first rescued Fishman, this one didn’t panic. After assessing the situation, he quickly calmed down.
"How many more suits of armor are in the village?" Jeff asked bluntly.
"Not many, but they’re very powerful. They have a lot of parts around them..."
Halfway through his sentence, the Fishman with the belt looked toward Mo Ling.
"Just like that one over there."
"He’s a human friend. Don’t worry."
"Understood."
This Fishman seemed to trust Jeff completely, not doubting his words in the slightest.
After glancing around, the Fishman told Jeff, "The remaining suits of armor are all gathered around the library."
Hearing the Fishman’s tip, Jeff nodded at him, then signaled for everyone to press on, and they quickly swarmed toward the library.
