Feeling an unknown sense of dread washing over her upon realizing that she would most likely end up in the dark waters with the baby kraken in another few minutes, Scaly could not help going over all the ways she could think of to keep herself from falling into the water.
Even more importantly, she currently didn’t have enough mana left to avoid another attack if the baby kraken decided to emerge again and try to grab her with its tentacles.
For now, she was completely helpless as she slowly glided closer and closer to the surface of the dark waters. Using what little mana she had left sparingly to keep herself at least a hundred meters above the dark waters to at least make it seem like she wasn’t about to run out of mana to sustain her wind magic.
Unfortunately, when she had made it around ninety percent of the way to the landmass, her mana ran out and she found herself slowly gliding closer and closer to the surface of the water, causing the feeling of dread she felt when facing the baby kraken to start rising as she already imagined how she was about to get grabbed by one of those massive tentacles before being dragged into the dark waters.
Luckily, even when she waws only a dozen or so meters above the surface of the water, the baby kraken showed no signs of appearing. Meaning that it had most likely ignored her after she had managed to successfully escape earlier, something that she felt eternally grateful for, as she really wasn’t in a state to face off against such a terrifying monster at the moment. Even just dodging it had burned through most of her strength.
Fighting the baby kraken... Even after she went through another evolution, Scaly felt doubtful whether or not it would be possible for her to fight it. After all, the description had made it clear to her that the baby kraken was part of an exalted linage of monsters that were even stronger than dragons in the water...
Splash-!
Filled with a profound sense of fear of the dark waters as she slowly got closer, she inevitably ended up landing in the water around ninety-six percent of the way to the landmass she had been aiming for. Only leaving her with around four percent of the remaining path to travel through the water.
However, given that her speed in the water was several times slower than her speed gliding through the air and the fact that she had already exhausted most of her mana, the remaining four percent of the journey would undoubtedly be the most difficult part and at the same time also the par of the journey that was going to take the longest.
Not to mention, she also had to start worrying about being attacked by the monsters in the underground ocean now that she was in the water without any land nearby.
At the very least, one positive thing about her current situation was the fact that she had not spotted any monsters in the waters around her after landing and surveying her surroundings. Allowing her to safely start swimming towards land for now without having to engage in any battle with the monsters lurking in the dark waters of the underground ocean.
If she really did happen to encounter any monsters, she hoped that it wouldn’t be something like the baby kraken that she had barely escaped from earlier, but instead something like the fatty yellow cave fish she had been eating for the past week.
At least when it came to the fatty yellow cave fish, she had confidence in being able to fight them in the water even without any mana left after having trained against them for a week at this point in time.
Even faced with a small school of fatty yellow cave fish, she felt confident in holding her own relying entirely on her physical strength and sharp claws.
Splash~ Splash~
Swimming through the seemingly empty open with that kind of mindset, Scaly rapidly began to close the distance between the landmass and herself without encountering anything more than a few lonesome fatty yellow cave fish and other fish of similar strength. Soon enough, getting close enough that she started feeling confident in being able to rush to the landmass if needed.
However, it was also when she got closer to the landmass that problems started appearing, one of them being the number of fish and other monsters present, as their numbers grew at a terrifying rate the closer to the landmass she got.
Not only that, but she also clearly noticed that the strength of the fish monsters grew as well.
From the weak fatty yellow cave fish at around level 12 to 15, larger fatty yellow cave fish above level 20 began appearing and that too in large numbers.
If not for the fact that these monsters were cautious of her and decided not to attack her, she would most likely have already been overwhelmed by the sheer number of monsters present in the water.
Even then, this didn’t make her the slightest bit relieved, as she understood that the reason for this was because these fish monsters were cautious of something far more dangerous and didn’t want to waste their strength fighting with her.
Getting closer to the edge of the landmass, she wondered what it was that made these stronger fatty yellow fish so cautious, while at the same time also wondering why they still decided to move closer to the edge of the landmass if there was something that dangerous there.
Though, thinking about how the fatty yellow cave fish had approached the small island she had been living on for the past week even after knowing about her existence, she quickly realized why, as these fish should be approaching the landmass for something like mating or laying eggs of the next generation... At least that was what she guessed herself into believing, as she couldn’t really find any other reason why they would risk their life on approaching somewhere they had obviously deemed to be incredibly dangerous.
At the very least, because of this truce that seemed to have had an effect between her and the fatty yellow cave fish, she could swim alongside them as she got closer and closer to the landmass before she finally spotted the monster behind the clear hesitation and fear of these fatty yellow cave fish-
Rooar-!
[Heavenly Lake Serpent, lvl 32]
And what appeared was a rather familiar monster, one that she had come down to the underground ocean to search for, a heavenly lake serpent, the natural enemy of the fatty yellow cave fish!
Wait! Why is it coming in this direction!?
However, before she could feel any joy about having discovered where the heavenly lake serpents were hiding in the underground ocean, she realized that one of them was currently rushing towards her- Or more specifically the school of fatty yellow cave fish she currently found herself inside of.
Swish-! Splash~ Splash~
Not wanting to get swallowed by a heavenly lake serpent just after she had managed to find them after much difficulty, Scaly used all of her strength to kick her small legs in the water to avoid the heavenly lake serpent rushing towards her.
Unfortunately, even if she kicked her legs with all her might and swam as fast as possible, there was no way for her to outmatch the speed of the heavenly lake serpent that had long since adjusted to the water and had speed even surpassing that of a fatty yellow cave fish that spent all of its time swimming in the water.
Its over...
Knowing that there was no way for her to escape and having no mana to mount a proper defense against the heavenly lake serpent, Scaly could not help feeling helpless as she watched the heavenly lake serpent open its mouth as it got closer.
At least, I won’t go down without a fight!
Narrowing both of her eyes as she thought this to herself, Scaly fully prepared to tear apart the heavenly lake serpent with her claws and try to cause as much damage as possible before being digested. Even planning to see if she could dig her way out of the heavenly lake serpent once she was swallowed.
Whoosh~!
However, before she had even finished preparing herself mentally, the heavenly lake serpent rushed straight past her. Ignoring her completely as it went for the fatty yellow cave fish that had already managed to escape rather far away from where she was at the moment.
Clearly, in the eye of the heavenly lake serpent, she wasn’t even worth swallowing. Instead, she had been completely ignored, as it went for its favorite food that was about to run away.
"..."
For some reason, seeing this, Scaly could not help feeling a bit conflicted on the inside. Part of her wanting to complain that she was far more delicious than those fish, while another part of her felt thankful that the heavenly lake serpent had decided to ignore her.