Chapter 41: The Garden of the Gods

“Uh…”

With a pain that felt as if it could tear her soul apart, Nitira woke up once more.

Her still-groggy mind was a bit muddled, but after a moment of bewilderment, she opened her eyes wide and recalled everything that had just happened.

“Stop it, Father! Please, just stop!”

She suddenly lifted her head, looking at the strange and towering figure at the table in the secret chamber. She instinctively tried to move, only to realize that several resilient tentacles, extending from the ceiling, were binding her limbs, hanging her in a large letter “T” from the room’s height. Not only could she not move, but the Book of Truth, which had suddenly appeared beside her, was held firmly in the other party’s hand.

“You’re not this kind of person! I beg you, don’t let yourself be deceived!”

Ignoring his daughter’s sadness and anger, the merman, former leader of the Mingjiao tribe, King Willipol Mingjiao, turned his head back. His face, still somewhat intact, remained impassive as he retorted.

“Deceived? Do you think I’m deceived? I clearly obtained the truth from the Book of Truth, yet you… still think like this?”

“Father, we really don’t need to…”

Willipol suddenly raised his hand, interrupting the young Mingjiao maiden’s frantic words, disappointment flickering across his face.

“Nitira, you are my favorite child. Among all my offspring, only you inherit the most bloodline. Only you are qualified and capable of doing this. I thought that after learning the truth, you would definitely support my decision. Ha, I didn’t expect it to turn out this way…”

“Do you think it’s acceptable to just muddle through, to live as a puppet and captive livestock in this cursed garden of the damned? Is that what we, who once received such glory and blessings, ought to do? Doesn’t the noble blood that flows within you cry out against this betrayal and shame?”

“I ask you, why do the Mingjiao tribe weep!?”

King Willipol’s voice grew louder with each word, more commanding and resounding, as if even in his grotesque and twisted form, the aura of a king had not diminished in the slightest.

The princess stood dazed for a moment, then fell into a long silence.

It seemed that King Willipol’s words truly stirred something within her, or perhaps it was simply the ingrained obedience from her father’s mighty presence and upbringing that made her hesitant to voice a denial at that moment.

But ultimately, the sense of responsibility as a princess and her independent values compelled her to provide her own answer.

“Father, I understand your thoughts and can grasp your intentions, but… as leaders and rulers of the Mingjiao tribe, while we enjoy the power of life and death, we also bear the responsibility of protecting our kin and the sea people, do we not?”

“Our people, the millions of beings in the Emerald Sea Region, trust and support us because they believe the Mingjiao tribe can lead them to a better future. But what you are about to do will push everyone into the grave of the deep sea. Is it truly the right course of action?”

“In the face of adversity, we can find a way to resolve it, not resort to the crazy and completely unknown self-destructive act of going down with the ship! To pin all hopes on a god that has long since died, on something we don’t even know what it is…”

“Shut up! You’re blaspheming!”

King Willipol snapped at the girl. His already undulating tentacled face was now visibly twisted with rage, the shadowy darkness swirling in his deep-set eyes akin to the gloom of the ocean’s depths.

“Nitira, I am truly disappointed in you…”

“Ha… naive and foolish child! Do you think I, or the ancestors before me, have not tried or struggled? But what was the outcome? Even to this day, we remain trapped in this garden, afraid to let Him know that you and I here have learned the truth!”

“For a thousand years, over a thousand years, this ocean has repeated its tragic cycle under His shadow, in the garden He created. In this so-called Ghost Sea, the corpses of the sacrificed have filled the seabed, pushing islands that should have long been submerged back to the surface for us to see!”

“Is this what it means to be children of the ocean? Like ignorant fools, we worship a god that has usurped the rightful owner, offering faith day and night that should be in prayer for safety, unaware that every bit they offer with devotion will ultimately materialize into the abyss devouring all life!”

“Wake up, Nitira Mingjiao! You, I, all living beings in the Emerald Sea Region, everything in this garden has already lost its future! It has already died time and again! Your cherished future and responsibility are nothing but food that will ultimately be devoured by Him!”

“You are already dead!!!”

“What!?”

King Willipol’s roar struck like thunder, instantly piercing through the depths of the girl’s soul, filled with a sense of tearing. Memories that should not be remembered, ones that did not belong to her, surged forward like a tide at this moment, turning her complexion ghostly pale.

“I… am dead?”

The former king of the mermen couldn’t help but snicker.

“Remembered? Remember those memories abandoned by the ocean outside the garden, a past that should not belong to our current selves?”

“Now you are transcending, thus the locked causality returns once more. This… is a gift from Him. Now that you’ve regained everything, do you still think our future holds hope?”

“I… n-no! No, no, no!!!”

Unable to respond to her father’s reproach, the girl’s once-clear ocean-blue pupils trembled violently, not from the shaking of her inner will, but from witnessing and recalling her own multiple “deaths,” suffering a nameless horror shock psychologically.

The first death in her memories happened when Nitira was seven years old.

At that time, she had just begun to recall things and was trying to experience her first dive into the ocean, practicing the swimming techniques every merman must master, accompanied by a close attendant.

However, before she could feel the wonder and longing for the ocean, a powerful undercurrent from an unknown source suddenly surged upward from the depths of the sea, scattering everyone apart.

With the Mingjiao tribe’s innate swimming skills, the little princess managed to surface from the tumultuous waves with great effort, but this resilience only led her to deeper despair.

She witnessed a scene that made her tremble all over, almost impossible to describe with fear and horror.

It was a colossal tentacle, larger than the entire island, seemingly reaching into the sky.

It swept across from afar, splitting the inner island of the Royal Court and the two outer islands into shards, crashing down into the sea like shattering a delicate pearl.

Then, more terrifying tentacles surged from all directions, with the remaining outer islands following suit, shattering, wailing, and sinking into the deep sea.

The East Sea Pearl, the proud home of the Merman tribe, was completely annihilated in just a few minutes.

   

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