Chapter 51: Lost at Sea

The vast, boundless sea stretched endlessly before them. Four enormous spiritwood rafts floated alone, tethered together by long vine ropes.

In the days just after leaving the island, the four rafts were alive with laughter and cheerful voices. Everyone spoke excitedly about their dreams of cultivating immortality, discussing how they would become immortals once they found the spirit island and the immortal village.

But after a month, silence had settled over all four rafts. The warriors’ spirits had sunk, their faces etched with worry and helplessness. No one wanted to talk about their dreams anymore; they didn’t even know how many days they had left to live on the sea.

Several of them bore cloth bandages soaked in blood, evidence of recent and serious injuries.

“The route says there should be a reef island in this area!”

“Why can’t we see it?”

“The sailing speed in this map refers to large sailboats.”

“With rafts like ours drifting so slowly, it could take two or three months to reach it—if we ever do!”

On the central spiritwood raft, seven or eight warriors clustered around a rolled-up sea chart, glancing from the map to the endless expanse of water, their faces anxious and tinged with despair.

These warriors—Ye Mo, Gao Jian, Lin Zhi, Mo Ling, and others—were the survivors who had escaped the island, now lost in the vast sea.

Ye Mo felt helpless; the sea chart contained detailed routes and landmarks, but the Eastern Sea was so immense and featureless. None of them were sailors; their martial skills gave them no advantage here, and every day of drifting left them more uncertain of their position. Aside from watching the sun rise and set to judge direction, they had no other means of navigation.

To them, the four rafts seemed to be stationary, unmoving amid the endless waters. Whether they were drifting off course or not, they had no way to tell.

Though they hadn’t encountered dangerous storms, their dwindling supplies of food and fresh water gnawed at their nerves. The anxiety was indescribable.

Suddenly, a surge of snowy white waves erupted around the rafts, and countless silver fish, half a foot long, chased the foam.

“Careful! Sea blade fish!”

“Hurry, raise the serpent-scale shields! Back to back, no gaps—hold fast!”

Panic seized the warriors as they pressed together, shields raised, backs to one another.

The silver fish darted toward the rafts, leaping from the waves like blades, arcing across the air with terrifying speed.

Hundreds struck the serpent-scale shields in a barrage of blows that made their teeth ache, bouncing back into the sea. A few struck the rafts, their knife-edged mouths leaving deep gashes in the wood.

A cry rang out as one warrior, unable to cover his whole body with the shield, was pierced through a gap, blood spraying as he screamed in pain.

The frenzied fish circled the rafts, searching for a moment to attack.

Everyone’s scalp tingled; this was not the first time they had faced these dreadful sea blade fish. Hundreds or thousands of them, with razor-sharp mouths, could easily perforate any warrior with hundreds of holes. Some had already died to these fish, others badly wounded.

They were grateful the spiritwood rafts were so sturdy; if not, the sea blade fish would have destroyed them all. If they fell into the sea, they would stand no chance.

A silver fish leapt, undeterred, straight for Ye Mo.

His eyes were cold, his heart steely. With a flick of his sword, golden light flashed, and the fish was cleaved in two by the Golden Spirit Sword, its halves landing on the raft.

At last, those sea blade fish, finding no way to breach the rafts’ defenses, swam off and disappeared.

The warriors exhaled in relief.

Ye Mo picked up half a piece of raw, bloody sea blade fish, chewing slowly to absorb its meager nutrients; the taste was harsh and metallic. The other half was divided among the warriors.

Their supplies of food and water would last only another month or two, and the immortal village was nowhere in sight. Even unpleasant sea blade fish had to be eaten to stave off hunger.

The shadow of death hung over the survivors.

The endless drifting, the despair of never finding the immortal village, and the recurring attacks from vicious sea creatures wore down their bodies and spirits, leaving them exhausted.

Another half a month passed in this anxious, hopeless state.

Many began to lose all hope, unable to see any future.

Even Ye Mo, calm as he always was, now had worry etched on his face.

He had no solution.

In this situation, they were simply waiting for death to arrive on the open sea.

There was nowhere to dock or resupply. Even with strict rationing, they could not hold out much longer. When the food and water ran out, they would have to hunt dangerous sea beasts for sustenance—a battle against near-certain death.

Once, he and over a thousand warriors had set out together; now, barely thirty remained alive on these four rafts. Even those few could be swallowed up by the Eastern Sea at any moment, their bones lost forever.

Ye Mo felt a deep bitterness and helplessness.

Even as a peak ninth-level body refinement warrior, famed in the martial kingdom and throughout the royal city, his power was meaningless before the vast sea. He could barely survive by hunting small fish, but the others could not.

“Ship—!”

“Look! There’s a large sailboat coming from behind us!”

“We’re saved! Hahaha!”

Suddenly, someone shouted, and the cry startled all the warriors on the rafts.

That wild call was like a ray of light in the darkness of despair. Warriors scrambled up from their weary positions, gazing toward the horizon, elation filling their faces.

At the boundary of sea and sky, tall masts appeared, and soon a large sea vessel emerged on the horizon.

White sails billowed from the masts, rippling in the wind.

The ship seemed to spot their rafts, adjusting its course to approach them.

“It looks like a merchant ship!”

“We set out on just such a ship, searching for immortality in the Eastern Sea!”

“Heaven never closes all doors!”

“That ship must hold hundreds! If we can get their help, we’ll survive—and maybe find the spirit island and the immortal village!”

Seeing the familiar shape of the ship, the warriors shouted, waving their arms, some falling to their knees in tears.

This ship was so much like the one they had sailed on months ago from their homeland, searching for immortality, though it was slightly smaller.

That ship, destroyed by the storm, had carried their brothers, sisters, friends, and loved ones—now forever separated by death, leaving only these few survivors. Many warriors were moved to sorrow.

But this ship brought them hope in their darkest hour—a chance to live, a ray of dawn.