We agreed to set sail, so you'd become the ruler of the deep sea?

Chapter 10 A great harvest!

Chapter 10 A great harvest!
In the captain's cabin, which was filled with seawater.

Several highly decomposed corpses floated haphazardly, their skeletons faintly visible beneath the dark green adipocere.

"hiss……"

It's only because Xia En's body is a projection; otherwise, he wouldn't even dare to imagine how unpleasant it would feel to personally come into contact with the seawater soaked with corpses.

"The fact that they were only highly decomposed, rather than completely turned into skeletons, suggests that they had been dead for about one to three months."

"Because we were in a relatively enclosed cabin, we were not eaten clean by fish, shrimp and other creatures."

Xia En forced himself to calm down.

Use the various thoughts in your mind to dispel the nausea and discomfort of facing a rotting corpse.

"What's strange is why they're all gathered in the captain's cabin?"

"And they don't even have heads?"

With a quick glance, Xia En noticed the common characteristics of these corpses.

Every corpse looked as if it had been chopped off by a guillotine; its head was gone, and not even a skull was left.

The ship's cabin was dark and gloomy; the murky seawater flowed slowly; and a headless, rotting corpse lay gathered together...

To be honest, the scene was truly eerie and bizarre, like the site of some kind of evil ritual.

But after a brief moment of panic, Shane quickly calmed down.

It's just a projected body anyway!
If things don't work out, we can always start over. What's there to be afraid of?

The brave ones will be starved to death, and the timid ones will be starved to death!
After figuring this out, Xia En's thoughts became clearer instantly, and he became bolder. He suppressed his nausea and reached out to touch the corpse.

The sensation from his palm was wet and sticky, almost like shoveling manure while wearing gloves, but after a while, Shane actually made a discovery.

A tiny short sword was acquired.

Blackstone Short Sword

[Quality: Rare]

[Type: Weapon]

[Description: A short sword made of peculiar black stone, extremely sharp, unaffected by seawater, and has a chance to inflict the "Withered" or "Rotten" status upon attack.]

The power of the Blackstone is calling me.

"nice one!"

Xia En's eyes lit up.

Clearly, this black stone short sword can be considered an extraordinary weapon.

In my memory, this weapon was very popular on Duke Island, and could fetch at least ten silver snake coins.

Silver Serpent Coins +10!

With this prompt appearing, Xia En became more alert and touched the object even more enthusiastically.

What is looting a corpse compared to the lure of money?
Make money, don’t be shabby!
Then, he pulled out several weapons he carried with him.

However, after soaking in seawater for so long, most of them are covered in rust and don't fetch much price.

The items of slightly higher value are two pieces of jewelry of average quality and a well-made pocket watch.

Although the underwater voyage has a limitation of only being able to bring back one piece of loot, with Shane's extraordinary wisdom, he had already figured out a way to circumvent this limitation while fishing yesterday.

Having restrictions does not mean I have to comply.

After looting the corpses, Shane's gaze fell on the tables and cabinets in the captain's cabin.

The best stuff is yet to come!

On the captain's desk, the most eye-catching item was a peculiar black box.

It feels heavy to the touch; I wonder what's inside.

Since it was submerged in seawater and couldn't be opened to inspect, Shane temporarily placed it with the other spoils of war.

Immediately afterwards, Shane found a bulging money bag in the cabinet.

He weighed it in his hand and figured that if it contained silver snake coins, there should be no fewer than thirty.

Silver Serpent Coins +30!

Another windfall!
Having tasted success, Xia En buried himself in a fierce search, striving to maximize the gains from this underwater voyage.

……

Time flies.

The joy of a bountiful harvest is always fleeting.

[Ship Soul Power LV1: 7/100] Seeing that the effect of the Ship Soul's protection was about to dissipate, Shane decisively stopped and put the looted spoils into a sack.

Then, his consciousness briefly returned to his body on the ship, and he threw a sturdy fishing net into the sea.

After finishing this task, Shane switched back to the perspective of his projected body and left the shipwreck with a bag full of spoils.

Due to the weight, the ship's soul power was consumed slightly faster than expected.

Xia En also used [Seawater Manipulation] to accelerate his ascent. Just as he put the sack into the fishing net, the projected body shattered with a "poof".

[Submarine mission over!]

As soon as he exited the submersible mode, Shane couldn't wait to scoop up the fishing net and drag the sack onto the deck.

"This method really works!"

Xia En's face lit up with joy as he looked at the bulging sack.

This was the truancy strategy he came up with, perfectly utilizing the stealth mechanic.

Based on his experience from the previous two dives, Shane discovered that the panel seemed to have a rather peculiar way of judging the loot collected during dives.

For example, it wouldn't consider the sack filled with Shane as "a trophy," but it would see the sealed black box and the crab with its broken claws as a whole.

Therefore, the best way to avoid the restrictions is to cooperate with the main body or other crew members on the ship.

"However, I can only operate in a single thread now, and I can't really multitask and control the main body and the projection at the same time."

"Moreover, this method can only be used in shallow waters."

"Once we reach the true deep sea, the process of surfacing alone will be enough to exhaust the ship's soul power."

"At that time, we still had to cooperate with the salvage crew to carry out underwater operations."

Several thoughts flashed through Xia En's mind as he returned to the captain's cabin with the sack and emptied out all the spoils inside.

Ding-dong-dong—

The weapons and money bags clashed together, producing a crisp and pleasant sound.

"Get rich, get rich."

Xia En looked pleased, a smile playing on his lips, and began to tally up the spoils of this underwater voyage.

There are 36 silver snake coins readily available, as well as more than 300 copper Na coins.

The currencies issued by the Seven Seas Federation are ranked from lowest to highest value as copper Na coins, silver snake coins, and gold dragon coins, with the exchange rate between each pair generally fluctuating around 1:100.

In fact, there were also many copper coins scattered in the shipwreck.

However, Shane noticed that many of the copper coins had already shown signs of rust and would depreciate to some extent. Coupled with the time constraint, he did not consider them as his primary target.

Besides coins, there are also—

Nine weapons that are not completely rusted.

Thirteen miscellaneous ornaments.

While taking stock of these odds and ends, Xia En felt as if he had become a judge on an antique appraisal show, or an old farmer weighing rice, his heart filled with the joy of a bountiful harvest.

In total.

The profits from this dive alone amounted to at least seventy silver snake coins, enough to pay off one-fifth of the debt.

If you worked on the island, you probably wouldn't earn this much in a year.

—Of course, this excludes certain industries that make money particularly quickly.

"I've only salvaged one shipwreck, and I've already made this much."

"Beneath the sea, there are indeed countless treasures hidden!"

Xia En licked his lips excitedly, feeling that life was getting more and more hopeful.

At this rate, paying off the debt will be just around the corner!

Then, Shane turned his gaze to the strange black box.

His intuition told him that there was something good inside.

Xia En picked up the old key he found in the shipwreck cabinet and inserted it into the lock.

Click!