Conquest Sea, on the route to Iweig.
On the vast ocean, a pilgrim fleet consisting of two cruisers, four destroyers, and three passenger ships, totaling nine vessels, was sailing majestically towards the Holy Mother's sanctuary in Iweig, undertaking a solemn and grand pilgrimage.
At the head of the fleet, on the flat foredeck of a cruiser cutting through the waves, a middle-aged officer with a clean beard stood. He was wearing a naval officer's uniform with religious elements and a Captain's hat adorned with the Light military emblem. His white-gloved hands were clasped behind his back, and his sharp gaze was fixed on the distance.
"Santos, take a look. Do you recognize that ship over there?"
After gazing into the distance for a while, the officer turned to a man dressed as a Vice Captain beside him and asked. The man was slightly taken aback, then also looked in the direction the officer was watching.
"That ship over there... it's quite large... looks like a cruise ship? Looking at the spelling on the hull... it seems to be the shining white pearl?"
The Vice Captain said while looking into the distance, slightly furrowing his brows, then continued.
"That doesn't seem right... If I remember correctly, isn't the shining white pearl the ship that's supposed to host the jewelry exhibition? When I was in Barcelona, I read in the newspaper that although this ship's destination is also Iweig, it set sail earlier than us. Logically, we shouldn't have encountered it, right? Mr. Jode, this seems a bit strange."
The Vice Captain said with a hint of confusion. Hearing the Vice Captain's words, the officer named Jode also spoke silently.
"Hmm... indeed, the shining white pearl theoretically shouldn't be here, but the situation on the sea changes rapidly, and anything can happen. The weather hasn't been good lately, so there's also a possibility of getting lost...
"In short, we'll continue to monitor the situation of that ship for now. If there are no other special circumstances, we don't need to worry about it..."
Jode said this. As a senior deacon of the Church and a naval officer with many years of sailing experience, he had encountered various maritime situations. Due to the complexity of weather, sea conditions, and ship conditions, incidents at sea are common. There are countless reasons that can cause a ship to be delayed, all kinds of them. Therefore, he didn't pay too much attention to the reason why the shining white pearl was here at this moment. Anyway, the other party was still far from his side.
Just as Jode was about to stop paying attention to the movements of the distant cruise ship, suddenly, a distant roar came. Hearing this sound, Jode was slightly startled. As an officer, he knew exactly what this sound was – it was an explosion!
"What happened? Why was there an explosion!"
Hearing the explosion, Jode immediately turned his head towards the distance again, looking in the direction of the cruise ship. According to the direction, the explosion should have come from there.
"Mr. Jode! Look over there quickly! There seems to be abnormal black smoke on the shining white pearl! It seems to be on fire!"
At this moment, the Vice Captain, who had been watching the cruise ship, shouted loudly. Hearing the Vice Captain's words, Jode's face became extremely serious. He carefully gazed at the distant cruise ship and indeed saw a few wisps of black smoke coming out of the portholes at the rear of the ship, which could be a sign of fire.
"It seems... they've had some kind of accident. Judging from the smoke from their chimney and their speed, it might be an explosion caused by a boiler malfunction. The fire was caused by the explosion... and the boiler malfunction affected the power, slowing their speed down more than expected, which is why we caught up..."
Looking at the condition of the distant cruise ship, Jode frowned and analyzed based on his experience, then immediately turned to the Vice Captain beside him.
"Pass on the order, the entire fleet slows down. The Boon hoists the signal flag and asks them what's going on?"
"Yes, Mr.!" Upon receiving the order, the Vice Captain decisively withdrew. On the deck, Jode still looked solemn as he gazed at the distant cruise ship.
...
Far from the Light Church pilgrim fleet, on the foredeck of the shining white pearl, the original Ebergrass Church's Mr. Costa and Massimo, after seeing the Church's warships on the distant sea, were all frightened and pale. After reacting, they immediately ordered the bridge to immediately operate the cruise ship to move away from the Light fleet. However, just as Mr. Costa's order was given, an unexpected situation occurred.
An explosion, coming from below the deck, deep within the ship's cabins, caused the entire ship to shake. Then the ship's course clearly dropped. Mr. Costa steadied himself during the vibration, then immediately turned to his subordinates beside him and roared loudly.
"What was that explosion just now! Go down and check it out quickly!"
"Y-yes, Mr.!"
Hearing Mr. Costa's stern command, an Ebergrass Church sailor immediately obeyed and ran into the ship's cabin. Then, Mr. Costa continued to stand on the deck, looking at the distant Church fleet with a solemn expression, while Massimo beside him spoke with some panic.
"Thief K... it's that Thief K! Running into the Church's fleet inexplicably in this place, and then an explosion just happens inexplicably at this time! All of this must be that Thief K causing trouble behind the scenes! He might want to use the Church's fleet to escape from this ship!"
Massimo shouted angrily like this. Mr. Costa's expression also became even more serious after hearing Massimo's words. Indeed, judging from the current situation, all of this should be Thief K's secret mischief. Although he didn't know what method the other party used, the sudden appearance of the Church fleet and the timing of the recent explosion were too coincidental, with a strong sense of premeditation. Therefore, it was reasonable to suspect Thief K now.
"Thief K... what are you... plotting now?"
Gazing at the distant fleet, Mr. Costa murmured. At this moment, passengers who were startled by the explosion gradually appeared on the deck. They began to consult the crew members with uneasy expressions, while the crew members, under Mr. Costa's instruction, appeased the passengers back to their cabins.
After waiting a little longer, an Ebergrass Church sailor covered in dirt ran frantically from the cabin to the deck and reported to Mr. Costa.
"Mr. Costa! The cause of the explosion is clear! It happened in the boiler room! Two boilers exploded! It's a mess down there now! And I don't know if the explosion affected the transmission, but the entire ship has stopped, completely without any power! Some areas also caught fire, but it's not big, and they've already started to extinguish it!"
"What... boiler explosion? Shouldn't we have our people guarding the boiler room the whole time? How could something happen!"
Mr. Costa spoke sternly to the sailor in front of him. As the power core of the entire ship, Mr. Costa not only sent his subordinates to guard it closely but also had people patrol there frequently. Nothing should have gone wrong.
"Th-the specific reason I don't know! When I went to the boiler room before, everything was fine there! The workers were shoveling coal and Hama and the others were supervising there. Now when I go back, it's been blown to pieces! The workers who escaped said they heard an abnormal sound from the boiler and sensed danger, so they all ran out before the explosion. And Hama and the others said before the explosion that they saw something suspicious and went to investigate and left, and then they disappeared!"
The sailor continued to report to Mr. Costa in a panic. Listening to the sailor's report, Mr. Costa's brows furrowed deeper and deeper. It was clear that the suspicious figure he mentioned was Thief K. He should have been the one who tampered with the boiler room, causing the explosion. And Hama and the others who went after him probably met a tragic end since there was no news of them.
After listening to the sailor's report, just as Mr. Costa was about to say something, Massimo beside him suddenly spoke again.
"Hey! Costa, look at the Fanatics fleet! They're signaling!"
Listening to Massimo's words, Mr. Costa continued to look at the distant fleet. After a slight pause, he chose not to use his ability to see, but instead took out a small telescope from his pocket to observe. He then saw that the flagship leading the distant fleet had already hoisted a combination of signal flags with distinct colors and shapes on the flag rope. As the Captain, Mr. Costa could naturally interpret the meaning of these signal flag combinations, which was to inquire about their situation.
Seeing the signal flags displayed by the distant fleet, Mr. Costa couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief. The fact that the other party still had the patience to inquire about their ship's condition meant that his and Massimo's identities had not been exposed. The Church temporarily did not know about the heresy on their ship. They were just conducting a routine inquiry about the distressed vessel.
'Since that's the case, we can still send them away...'
Mr. Costa thought so, and then he immediately turned his head and shouted to his subordinates on the deckhouse.
"Those Fanatics haven't discovered our identities. They are just inquiring about us with signal flags after hearing the explosion. We can respond similarly and tell them to leave."
"Bins! Have your men immediately arrange to hoist the flag in response! Tell them that our ship encountered a fault within the acceptable range and can resolve it ourselves! Tell them not to waste time coming over."
"Yes, Mr.!"
The Vice Captain on the deckhouse quickly responded to Mr. Costa's words. After seeing his subordinate's response, Mr. Costa breathed a sigh of relief and then continued to look at the distant Light fleet. At this moment, he hoped that the fleet would leave immediately after seeing their signal flags.
Situations at sea change constantly, and a ship is an extremely large and complex system, so various faults are expected. Most of these faults can be resolved on their own, even if some look quite scary. Therefore, Mr. Costa's reply was not a problem. Under normal circumstances, the Church would leave directly after seeing this response.
At this time, Mr. Costa was already calculating in his mind. After the Light fleet saw the signal flag and left, he would try to restore the shining white pearl's power system, then correct the course, and continue to sail the ship to White Tears Island.
If the power system could not be restored, Mr. Costa would have to resort to the last resort, slaughtering the ship! By killing all the passengers, he would find Thief K hidden inside, kill her, and reclaim the deep blue heart. Then, he would collect enough food from the just-slaughtered ship and take the deep blue heart in a lifeboat to White Tears Island.
Although over two thousand sacrifices would be lost, at least the deep blue heart would still be there, and they could wait for the next opportunity. Although he and Massimo would be severely punished, as long as the deep blue heart could be preserved, the punishment should not be unacceptable, at most it would only be execution.
But what if even the deep blue heart was lost...
Just thinking about the outcome of the mission failure and losing the deep blue heart made Mr. Costa shiver. In his mind, the deep blue heart must be recovered, otherwise, the consequences would be unimaginable.
While Mr. Costa was thinking this, at this time on the distant sea, the Shining Light Church's flagship raised new signal flags in response. Seeing the other party's action, Mr. Costa carefully gazed at the new flag being raised. However, when he finished interpreting the meaning of the new signal flag, his face couldn't help but sink suddenly.
On the Shining Light flagship, the newly raised signal flags roughly meant "Our ship and fleet will provide full assistance."
"Full assistance... Assistance my ass! I'm telling you to get lost! Get as far away as possible!"
Seeing the signal flag hanging high on the distant Shining Light flagship, Mr. Costa couldn't help but curse directly. He didn't understand why they came over directly when he clearly said they could handle the accident and didn't need their intervention! And what did they mean by full assistance?
The enraged Mr. Costa almost put down the telescope, then looked up at the flag rope leading to the shining white pearl. And when he saw the signal flags hanging on the flag rope, he was directly stunned in place.
The meaning expressed by the combination of signal flags hanging on the flag rope at this time was not at all what Mr. Costa had previously ordered to be expressed as "Our ship encountered a fault within the acceptable range, which can be resolved on its own." Instead, it was a combination with a completely opposite meaning.
"Our ship has encountered a serious accident, with fire and severe flooding, requiring abandonment of the ship, requesting assistance. There are a large number of people on board."
Seeing the signal flag fluttering above his head, Mr. Costa's face turned ashen. What he wanted to do most at this moment was to immediately jump up and tear the flag rope and throw this damn signal flag into the sea, but rationality told him he couldn't do that. At this moment, countless pairs of eyes with extraordinary vision were staring at them from the Light fleet. If they made even the slightest abnormal movement, the turrets over there might turn towards them.
It was already too late to change the signal flag now. If they hoisted signal flags with opposite meanings twice in a row, it would be strange if they weren't suspected of having a problem. Once they were suspected by the Light, no one on their side might be able to escape.
"Hey, Costa, what do the flags they hoisted over there mean? What did you just say about assistance? Didn't you say you wanted them to leave? It feels like they not only didn't leave, but are also approaching us!"
At this time, Massimo, who was next to Mr. Costa, spoke to him with a puzzled expression. Listening to Massimo's words, Mr. Costa gritted his teeth. He didn't respond directly to Massimo, but instead roared angrily towards the deckhouse.
"Bins! What's wrong with the flag you hoisted!"
Mr. Costa roared like this, but after his roar, no sound responded to him. At this moment, Mr. Costa felt that something was wrong.
"Something might have happened to Bins over there, let's go quickly!"
Saying this, Mr. Costa walked quickly towards the deckhouse. Although Massimo was a bit confused, he immediately followed. Just like that, Mr. Costa led Massimo, climbing up to the deckhouse and reaching the location where the flag rope was connected.
Then, in the cabin near the flag rope connection point, he discovered the body of the Vice Captain Bins. Including Bins, a total of three sailor bodies lay on the floor of the cabin. They were all his Ebergrass followers. Each of them had a horrified expression, their eyes wide open, dead on the ground. Visible wounds were either on their necks or on their hearts. It could be initially determined that all three should have died from assassination, killed instantly with one blow.
Looking at the scene before them, both Mr. Costa and Massimo couldn't help but open their mouths in astonishment. They knew that among these three people, including Bins, there was one Black Earth and two Apprentice. To be able to silently kill these three people, the other party was an extremely professional assassin... Only a highly skilled "Shadow" Extraordinary could do this.
"This, this is... Thief K did this?"
"Hmm... probably. On the ship right now, only she can do this... It seems we were completely calculated by her. She not only calculated the arrival of the Church fleet and the destruction of the boiler, but also calculated that we would hoist the flag to deceive the Church fleet into leaving. That flag just now wasn't hoisted by Bins... it was hoisted by her... Bins was killed by her before this..."
"Hmph... We were completely played by her, that guy!?"
Mr. Costa punched the cabin wall fiercely, saying through clenched teeth. And just as Massimo on the side was about to say something, he suddenly saw that Bins' body on the side seemed to have a slight abnormality. For some reason, one of his hands was tightly clenched.
Seeing such a scene, Massimo frowned and squatted down. Then he pried open the tightly clenched hand of Bins' body, and then he was shocked to find a clothing button in his palm!