Water filled the bottom part of the ocean, and the ship started sinking.

Rika flew just above it and inspected where the damage was done. There was a hole in the corner.

She had been in such situations many times before, but there was a John or his men to help her. Now she had to do it alone, without anyone to rely on. The fear of passing out shook her. Since nobody was there to catch her, she would be the first on the ship to drown.

‘He is there fighting a beast, all on his own. I, the mighty bird, should embrace any pain thrown at me.’

She encouraged herself, but the fear running in her feathers didn’t die down.

Rika lowered her head and bent over. Her claws moved over her eyepatch and she removed it. The eye patch was off, and instead of an eye, there was the relic, which belonged to one of the ten heroes.

The golden gem lit the room with a yellow light and in the middle were ten stars aligned together in the circle, glowing white. The two spectrums mixed together and were so bright, the dark blue colour of the ocean was dyed in their hue.

Rika took in some deep breaths and had to hurry. The water was soon going to fill the entire room, giving her no space to fly.

Among the ten stars engraved in the gem, one of them turned dark blue, just like the colour of the blue region. The border of the gem tuned in with the same colour.

Rika stared at the water beneath her. The stars in the gem rotated and the water beneath swirled, moving out of the hole. Not just that, the spilled-out water pushed the ship up, back to the surface.

She didn’t know a single spell of water magic, but with this relic, she commanded the water to move. Her will was enough to control a part of nature. Power surged in her body, but it took a toll on her physical and mostly mental state. After all, the relic never belonged to her.

Blood dripped out of her right eye, and the world around her spun. It became hazy and soon it turned blue. The power of the relic drowned her in her imagination, but the pain was too real. She felt water seep into her body. Cold and merciless, like how the ocean was.

But the mighty bird won. She pushed all the water out, and the ship was back onto the surface. She bit onto the spatial ring even more tightly and landed on the wet wooden floor.

The deep blue ocean choked her soul. Her claws digged onto the floor, to stop the pain, as she put the ring on the floor, and touched it with her beak.

From the ring, she took out a grey ball that perfectly fit in her claw. And like any other item, she imbued a little of her mana and threw it just beside the hole.

The ball hit the surface and expanded into a grey, slimy substance. It wriggled like a worm, covered the hole and hardened itself. Rika checked for other sections and there weren’t any holes, only some splinter of wood had come off.

The stars in the relic stopped rotating as Rika sat on the floor. She bit into her wings and stopped herself from fainting. But the physical pain still couldn’t overcome the mental one and the dizziness increased. She would faint and before that-

“I... need to check on him.”

Rika flapped her wings and flew to the deck. Because of the dizziness, she had no proper sense of direction and hit herself a couple of times on walls and ceiling.

Once she made it to the top and looked around. Levi wasn’t there on the ship. And she could hear a scream and the churning of flesh. She turned back and through her cloudy vision, stared in shock. An A-rank beast, a hydra, which dominated this part of the ocean, was now in flames and Levi, who did it, stood on top.

Even with her clouded vision, she captured Levi’s smile. Something she had never seen him do and hoped never would see it ever again, as fell onto the floor, landing head first.

******

Once he killed the hydra, the first thing he did was check on Rika, who fainted and put her to bed. He went back to the deck again.

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The ship started moving, as Levi placed the magical steering hands back on the helm.

He summoned the two lesser eyes, with the remaining mana he had, and patted them both.

Both squeaked and leaned into his hands for more.

“I will pat you as much as you want. But right now, we can’t afford to let our guard down.”

The lesser eyes understood what he meant. They flew away to keep an eye out for anything suspicious. The central eye was disappointed. It did weaken the hydra from A-rank to B-rank but at the end fight, when it took its last breath.

[Master, am I allowed to go and scout with those two as well ?]

Levi just nodded, but he didn’t look at his minion. The eye noticed Levi’s behaviour since he came back on the ship. He just stared at the brutal sight of the beast and her child. Their blood, intertwined with the moonlight, was reminiscent of his eye shade.

“Does this satisfy you?.”

The voice he never got tired of hearing annoyed him. His mother’s voice came to his mind whenever he tried to kill someone.

“You have lost sight again, Seiko. This isn’t who you are”

“I don’t even know who I am.”

Levi replied. His tone was bitter, distant, not like the Seiko she knew. The stench of burnt meat, and the fishy smell of blood, tempted him to keep looking at what he did.

The mother hydra, and its offspring, were close to each other. Even though all strength in the mother hydra was lost, it still held onto the dead corpse of its son close to its chest.

‘I lost control, again, like always.’

The lust for blood won over him today. He suppressed it for two years, meditated, and worked to death as a means of distraction. In tough periods, he shut himself in a room for days, and starved himself to replace his craving for kill with hunger.

And because he was so busy in this world, the thought of carnage never came up to him. Even when he killed a human for the first time.

He knew killing humans was “bad” for moral and legal reasons. Villains killed, heroes saved, a typical fantasy lore. Everyone in real life wanted to be a hero or was forced to be one.

But the psycho found a hole in that philosophy. Murdering humans was bad. What about other animals? They have emotions, feelings, a meaning to exist, but unless they weren’t human, that meant he could do the work of a villain.

Seiko then worked in a local butcher shop from the age of 15. At first, he worked as the receptionist and the accountant. But Levi’s enthusiasm towards the skill of butchering impressed the shop owner, so he took Levi under his wing and taught him everything.

Though he never killed one, because the animals in the Japanese butcher shop would have already been killed in the slaughterhouse. He only got to play with the corpse. But just by being able to cut the meat, see the tendons, the flesh tear apart satisfied him.

However, that only lasted for a while. He craved for more. Not just being able to cut, but kill.

. Watch the fear in the animal’s eyes, as it squirmed in pain, and witness its last breath.

And the moment he thought of it, he stopped working in the butcher shop and quit, without any explanation to his butchering master.

After that, Levi realised he would never allow himself to have a pet. Never….. cause the fantasies in their mind should never come to fruit.

Levi took in a deep breath and turned away from the corpse. After all, there was no point in crying over spilled blood. He sat on the floor and wanted to take a quick nap but -

[Master, there is a ship heading straight towards us]

He wasn’t getting any time soon. He sighed and looked back, his eyes unable to see the ship .

‘The port hasn’t reopened, that’s for sure. Is……. it Nino? Did she travel far just to catch me?’

His body shuddered over the thought of Nino courting his death. Nobody would stop The Executioner, if she wished to get on a ship. Instead, people would provide her with the luxurious ship in the town and the best crew for her safety.

‘I thought you were ahead, with the lesser eyes? Why are you at the back?’

[No, I am in the front]

Levi was confused. None of the ships had departed while he was at Barl, and even if they did while he was away, the news would get to him.

Travelling to the blue region of Rivera wasn’t an everyday thing. A crew would have to go through a series of official documents, preparation, gathering the strongest of forces, with experience and a lot of money as well.

‘Are you sure it isn’t an illusion used by one of the sea beasts to lure humans?’

Nino, coming for him, was more believable than a ship returning from the blue region.

[No, it is a ship, not just an illusion. The ship is invisible. I accidentally passed inside the ship.]

The central eye had spotted a beast and got closer to the ocean. Since it was invincible, it could take the risk of getting closer to the monster and weaken it. Even if the beast attacked, the central eye was intangible and nothing would happen to it. As it got closer to the ocean, near the beast, its surroundings changed from night to the wooden walls.

Now Levi could tell who the ship belonged to.

‘Smugglers.’

“Check the other rooms as well.”

Levi ordered.

The central eye turned left and passed through the wall. The room was dark, with a desk in the corner and a small shattered glass magic lamp on the floor.

Even with no light, the central eye could see because of the night vision it possessed.

[Master, there is a large cage in the middle of the room, and it is protected by a magic circle underneath it.]

Levi sighed, because the worse was happening. Smuggling of goods and items was bad, that even led to death sentences, but a large cage, protected by a barrier, meant what they were smuggling was a living being.

‘What’s inside it?’’

He asked with his fingers crossed.

[Three mermaids, all female, alive]

The central eye replied. It heard a long, tired sigh release from Levi’s mind itself.

‘I would rather fight ten hydras than deal with this.’