New King? Courting Death!

(~˘▾˘)~~(˘▾˘~)

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Somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean.

Elite warriors of Atlantis rode on gigantic, lobster-like beasts, patrolling vigilantly outside an abandoned undersea temple.

Inside the palace, seven majestic statues, several tens of meters high, gathered weapons together.

Beneath the weapons were rows of ancient thrones overgrown with seaweed.

"King Nereus.

What urgent matter that makes you summon me here so urgently?"

Orm, with his golden hair and clad in black armor, drifted through the water, exuding an innate sense of nobility and authority with every movement. His towering figure seemed to possess a power that even the ocean feared.

The current King of Atlantis had a hint of impatience on his brow.

This meeting place did not sit well with him. It was where the former Kings of Atlantis had convened the King's Council before the trident was lost.

The King of Atlantis was indeed the true ruler of the Seven Seas, and no one dared to defy his orders, even if he looked down upon the monstrous races beyond Atlantis and Xebel, thinking they could not be considered Atlanteans at all.

"There is an urgent crisis that forced me to call you here."

Nereus' face darkened, and he looked as though he could drip water with his gloomy demeanor.

In just a short while, these two would become father-in-law and son-in-law, but their tones didn't carry that sentiment. It might be because neither of them placed much importance on the upcoming marriage in their hearts, instead focusing on the changes brought after the marriage.

"My daughter has been abducted from the royal palace."

"Mera?!"

Upon hearing that his fiancée was in trouble, Orm's anger flared.

"Who in the Seven Seas dares to abduct my fiancée!"

Even though he had agreed to the marriage as a means to gain Nereus' support and allow the imperial power to truly control the Seven Seas again, he couldn't deny his genuine affection for Mera, the most beautiful gem of the ocean, with whom he had grown up.

Most importantly, everyone knew that Mera was Orm's fiancée.

"I don't know.

But the person who kidnapped my daughter left a message for you."

Nereus waved his hand, and the disheveled Vulko was brought in by Xebel warriors.

"Orm.

The one who abducted Mera left a message.

He said to prepare yourself because when he returns, Atlantis will have a new king."

Under the icy gaze of Nereus, Vulko, in a despondent tone, delivered the message.

He was entirely caught up in something he was innocent of, but that was no longer important. His plan to make Mera bring Arthur back to the underwater and ascend the throne had already fallen apart.

That powerful young man had disrupted everything he planned like a shark that broke into weak waters, making the directions of the sea no longer clear.

"New King? Looking for death!"

Hearing those words, Orm's eyes flared with rage, and his aura of murderous intent sent shivers through those present. He clenched his fists, and ripples spread through the water.

Outside the palace, the sea creatures on patrol cried out in fear and unease, as if a school of small fish had sensed the wrath of a raging whale.

"The King of Atlantis cannot be provoked.

Whoever he is, I will tear him apart!"

"Summon the army for me! Even if you turn the Seven Seas upside down, you must find him!"

The fact that his soon-to-be-married fiancée had been abducted was indisputable. The King of the Seven Seas ordered in anger, and the warriors outside the palace lowered their heads and obediently went to carry out his command.

"Vulko, what is going on? What made you come to Xebel?"

This couldn't have been orchestrated by Nereus, who proposed the marriage willingly. Orm shot a pair of icy, angry glares at Vulko, his voice low and furious.

He wanted to know the detailed sequence of events. Who was that guy who was reckless and bold enough to challenge him?

…

At the bottom of the deep-sea trench.

Before her, there was a dazzling and mysterious vortex of magical power that had an unknown effect.

Mera couldn't fathom where the man in front of her got his confidence from, as if he had seen the trident inside with his own eyes.

"Wait a minute, are you saying that the deep-sea giant Karathen is inside?"

She suddenly remembered something, her body trembling.

"The same sea monster Karathen that the first generation of Atlantis kings, who wielded the sacred trident, feared?"

Mera's bright eyes widened, and she tried to turn away but was caught within David's force field. Where could she escape to?

David, with a calm expression, manipulated the gravity shield and entered the swirling blue light.

In an instant, everything spun around them as if time and space were shifting.

Whoosh!

Without warning, they were in a serene, shallow blue area.

A shield appeared.

Whoosh!

The water was disturbed as a giant mosasaur, nearly twenty meters in length, whipped its powerful tail and swiftly approached, opening its bloodthirsty maw filled with razor-sharp teeth.

Seeing a dinosaur that should only exist in the Cretaceous period, David curiously glanced at it.

Like a crocodile rolling in power, it stirred the currents of the ocean floor. The fierce deep-sea hunter couldn't bite through what seemed like a high-density rubber ball and couldn't even budge it.

It was as if it were trapped in space, twisting and turning but unable to move an inch.

Soon, the little creature in the monster's eyes unleashed a power beyond its imagination.

David extended his hand and, with a simple gesture, the water, which could easily be pushed aside by its fins, solidified as hard as steel. A tremendous force squeezed inward.

The mosasaur, filled with incomprehensible fear, widened its eyes. In the next second, its skull was crushed like a brittle cookie, blood oozing from its mouth as it sank to the ocean floor.

Without even looking at the effect of his action, David broke through the surface and ascended above.

In mid-air, pterosaurs soared overhead, and it was a magnificent little world. However, what loomed above was not the sky but clusters of glowing crystals.

"Where is this?"

Mera was stunned. Is this a cave? 

But how could a cave be so vast, stretching as far as the eye could see, with islands, mountains, and a whole ocean?

"This is the world at the Earth's core."

David surveyed the area below as a group of small velociraptors dashed across the island's beach.

Dinosaurs that were already extinct on the outside still thrived in this secluded world.

A female figure holding a harpoon emerged from a rocky cave, dressed in a full set of armor made from fish skin plucked from the trench people's bodies. Her helmet revealed long, grayish-white hair.

She cautiously hid behind the rocks, observing the two sudden arrivals in the Earth's core world.

"The Earth's core world? That's... a person?"

Mera glimpsed at the figure and expressed her uncertainty.

For some reason, the eyes beneath that helmet felt familiar to her, and she frowned.

David lowered his protective shield and stepped onto the beach.

"Are you... are you Mera?"

The figure, from Mera's naturally red hair and faintly recognizable childhood features, recognized Mera and approached in astonishment.

"Who are you? How do you know my name?"

Mera couldn't understand why someone living in this isolated world would know her, but the voice gave her a sense of déjà vu.

The female figure removed her helmet, revealing a face with delicate features, aged with wrinkles at the corners of her eyes, but it was not difficult to see the remnants of her youthful beauty.

"Queen!"

Mera exclaimed.

She had actually seen someone who was supposed to be dead, Atlanna, the late Queen of Atlantis.

"Weren't you sacrificed to the trench tribe?"

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(~˘▾˘)~Don't forget to send your power-stones!~(˘▾˘~)