The Dao Ancestor Taiji Fish had originally lost one of its fish eyes, leaving behind a bean-sized hole. Yet now, when Li Weiyi pulled it out of his collar once more, the hole disappeared and both fish eyes were present. One fish eye shone with a blue-green radiance while the other emitted a red glow.

Both dazzled brilliantly, as if condensed from the stars in the sky.

“Swish!”

The blue-green light and the red glow interwove like sheer veils. From a distance, one could see that the light of the two colors, spreading over the endless ice field, had gathered into a Taiji millstone dozens of kilometers in diameter, slowly revolving.

“It really is that lost fish eye of the Dao Ancestor Taiji Fish. Just as I suspected… just as I suspected…”

Zhao Meng had long harbored such suspicions. But seeing this miracle unfold before his very eyes still sent shivers through him. In awe and reverence, he kneeled and bowed deeply.

Li Weiyi looked upward at the mix of blue-green and red radiance, his eyes turning multicolored as he spoke in wonder, “Within these two lights, it seems to be inscribed some profound Dao writings and Buddhist scriptures. Senior Brother, did you see them?” Zhao Meng saw no such inscriptions.

Instead, he was filled with shock as he realized that the ice beneath him and Li Weiyi was cracking and sinking rapidly. Both were quickly falling into the Arctic Ocean, plunging thousands of meters down. It had been that moment earlier when the Nine Infants had shattered the ice cover here.

In their fleeing, the ice had collapsed, and in an instant the seawater rose above their heads, dragging them down toward the cold, suffocating depths. In the distance, the deformed, broken research vessel was slowly capsizing and sinking beneath the water.

“Crash!”

Though submerged in seawater, Li Weiyi was amazed to find that the surrounding waters glowed with blue-green and red radiance, clear and bright as if lit by an eternal divine lamp. Even stranger, the sound of canvas billowing in the wind and the deep, wooden creaks of swaying masts filled his ears.

Suddenly, an overwhelming, invisible force from a swirling domain slammed into Li Weiyi. It pulled at everything around him with wild, frantic force. Zhao Meng, a bear-like creature, the seawater, the ice cover—and even the sinking research vessel off in the distance—were all caught up and swept away by this force.

“Whoosh—” Li Weiyi felt his body shrink rapidly from his arms to his torso, as though he were being compressed in circles…

It was like falling from high up, like being weightless—but a hundred times more discomforting. The Dao Ancestor Taiji Fish hanging on his neck slowly floated to the level of his eyes, mysterious and full of unfathomable power. Immersed in the cold seawater, Li Weiyi’s mind slipped into a tranquil yet bizarre state, and his eyesight sharpened far beyond usual.

He clearly saw that on the newly acquired pale red fish eye of the Dao Ancestor Taiji Fish, there appeared swirling lines like mountains and rivers, as if a planet was unfolding before him. He recalled that such a scene was akin to the view he once saw through a telescope while studying the moon back in high school.

And even more astonishing was the sight of a bronze ship, no larger than a grain of rice, taking flight from the pale red planet. Shrouded under immortal radiance and nether fog, it raised its sails and began its journey.

“Whoosh!”

Again Li Weiyi’s body shrank suddenly as the sensations of weightlessness and dizziness returned. Once his vision cleared again, the once grain-sized bronze ship had become as big as a palm right before his eyes.

“Whoosh!”

The feelings of weightlessness and dizziness struck again. The bronze ship grew to the size of a fishing boat, and scenes aboard it came into view—masts with sails, remnants of phoenix corpse serpents, and rows of stone tablets like the Graveyard Forest—each detail impressing itself upon Li Weiyi like masterfully carved art, seared into his mind.

Where had the bronze ship come from? And why was it continuously growing?

No…

It wasn’t that the bronze ship was getting bigger, but rather that he himself was shrinking continuously, ring after ring, becoming minuscule. Li Weiyi could no longer tell what he felt at that moment. Reality and illusion blurred—science and myth, did this all result from his drowning, in the final throes of near-death hallucinations?

Up above the Arctic Ocean, a satellite was recording an abnormal scene that could shake the whole world. Centered on the Longji research vessel, within a radius of dozens of kilometers, the seawater and the ice cover were being pulled and devoured by an eerie force, disappearing quickly into nothingness.

Even the shattered research vessel and the giant beast Nine Infants that had fled tens of kilometers away were drawn in. They hadn’t vanished into thin air, but rather, under the influence of the bronze ship’s field, had fallen into a microscopic world. …

The numb cold and suffocating sensation of drowning in seawater seemed to last several days, yet also passed in just an instant. With a loud “thud,” Li Weiyi crashed heavily onto an unknown surface.

The repeated bouts of weightlessness and dizziness, combined with heavy bleeding and that crushing fall, left him, despite his extraordinary physical strength, all disoriented and his vision going dark. Thankfully, as he fell, there had been a noticeable cushioning of air, and the ground below was not hard.

“Such soft, yielding soil—what kind of place is this?” he wondered.

Li Weiyi had landed face up, creating a person-shaped depression nearly a foot deep. He was wracked with pain all over and could not move, unaware that he had landed on a grayish-white mound nearly seven or eight meters high—a grave mound of sorts.

The ancient, grand bronze ship was not something of the mortal world; it resembled a divine mountain, a towering peak laid on its side. Mast after mast, like heavenly pillars of divine wood, jutted from the structure. Meanwhile, sails like dense clouds of dark mist were hidden in the gloom, billowing impressively in the wind.

On the deck, vast and eerie, stood stone tablets weighing tens of thousands of pounds each and sprawling clusters of high grave mounds, countless in number, evoking an overwhelming sense of desolation and loneliness. Li Weiyi had landed atop one of these grave mounds.

The soil piled up there was ashen, like bone ash or lime, but sticky enough to be unmistakably earth. His back, the back of his head, and his left arm—which had been torn by the bear-like creature—ached terribly. Every part of him felt weak and numb, and even his eyelids refused to move.

“No… I’m still alive.”

The moment that thought emerged, his eyes suddenly flew open. All around him, the sky was low and laden with thick, dark clouds that filled him with bewilderment. How had he survived his plunge into the Arctic Ocean?

He remembered that in his last moments he had seen hallucinations: the blue-green and red radiance, the fish eye of the Dao Ancestor Taiji Fish transforming into a planet, and even a bronze ship setting sail… Just as that thought crossed his mind, Li Weiyi saw the Longji research vessel crash down from the dark, heavy clouds above.

Its enormous hull tumbled, shedding fragments and human silhouettes as it fell, accompanied by screams and wails. Its descent slowed gradually, as if the immortal radiance and nether fog that wrapped the bronze ship had dispelled the vessel’s gravity.

Boom!

The research vessel struck the ground not far away with the sound of twisting and breaking metal. The entire bronze ship trembled, and the shock reverberated deep within Li Weiyi’s heart. His scalp went numb; his inner self was filled with absurdity and tension.

He strained to support his body, yet failed. The piercing cry of an infant rang out, high and shrill, echoing across the land and sky.

High above, in the thick clouds, the body of the Nine Infants—a creature more than two hundred meters long, all covered in scales with a torso like a giant ox, and with nine heads wailing in protest—fell down. Li Weiyi felt an icy chill all over because he was positioned directly below the falling Nine Infants.

Had it crashed down, even with the mysterious force cushioning its fall, he was certain to be shattered to pieces. As the falling Nine Infants saw the bronze ship below, its expression shifted from terror to delight, its cries turning from wails to laughter, as if it had awaited this moment for countless eons.

“Swish!”

Then, out of the thick clouds emerged a gigantic golden claw even larger than the body of the Nine Infants. It suddenly burst through the darkness and grabbed the creature. The claw, as if forged from pure gold, radiated metallic strength and power.

It was so sharp that it easily pierced through the Nine Infants’ body. Behind the clouds, a terrifying, colossal shadow appeared, emanating an aura that threatened to devour the skies and the earth—a beast vast enough to roam the universe.

Yet, upon seeing the bronze ship below, it flapped its mighty wings away in evident deference and vanished into the endless, murky chaos.

“What… what is this place? Am I really still alive?”

In shock and confusion, Li Weiyi gradually began to lose consciousness. Blood kept seeping from the wound on his arm, mixing with the ashen soil beneath him. Strangely enough, the blood crept along the earth, gradually flowing faster, as though being drawn down into the grave mound.

“Li Weiyi! Li Weiyi…”

Zhao Meng’s urgent shouts echoed through the mist-filled graveyard forest. As he ran desperately searching, soon he finally discovered Li Weiyi at the top of one of the grave mounds. He lifted him out from the human-shaped pit.

Not a trace of blood was left in the soil of the pit. Only Li Weiyi’s face remained, pale as paper.

After slinging Li Weiyi over his shoulder, Zhao Meng noticed on a stone tablet standing before the grave mound a string of wind chimes made from white-boned material, swaying in the breeze and chiming crisply, lending an unexpected touch of charm to the forbidding silence of the dark night. …

Li Weiyi’s consciousness returned as if from a long, dream-filled journey lasting many seasons. His tired awareness, once fragile as drifting silk threads, gradually reassembled. The sound of waves lapping against the shore reached his ears, and he felt a cool breeze on his face.

Slowly, he opened his eyes. His vision, initially blurry, sharpened.

“Finally awake. You really have the physique of an athlete. I thought you wouldn’t hold on!”

Qi Shanshan smiled gently, a hint of surprise in her tone. Then, she turned and walked toward the door. Although Li Weiyi only saw a graceful white back, he knew it was Doctor Qi, who had departed with the team.

“He's awake, but still very weak…” came a voice from outside.

Doctor Qi’s voice, unclear whom she was speaking to, said something that Li Weiyi couldn’t quite make out. Li Weiyi took a look around. The bed beneath him appeared to have been dismantled from the research vessel.

The room itself was built from fragments of the vessel, resembling a spacious tin shed cluttered with abandoned scraps lying about. A blood bag hung from a wooden pole, and a needle was attached to his right arm, steadily transfusing blood.

Inside the tin shed lay another six people—some with broken legs, others half-paralyzed from the fall, and some still unconscious. Through the makeshift door of the shed, Li Weiyi could see the side wall of the bronze ship just a few meters away.

The copper on the side wall was thick with rust, evoking both an ancient charm and the sense of abandonment that comes with centuries of neglect. He could hear the rhythmic crashing of sea waves, and feel the faint vibrations of the waves striking the hull. The wind itself leaped over the bronze wall and flowed in through the door.

“Everything we experienced earlier wasn’t a hallucination—it was all real?”

Li Weiyi muttered.

“Of course it’s real. We’ve apparently fallen into a completely unknown sea world—a microcosm, it seems…” came a cool voice from the doorway before Cai Yutong herself arrived.

Along with Qi Shanshan, dressed in her white medical attire, the two tall and striking women entered. Li Weiyi’s heart skipped a beat.

“Microcosm? What does that mean?”

“I’m not entirely sure either; it’s all what the higher-ups have been saying—something about Buddhist relics, microscopes, and bronze ships. They seem to have known some of the inner details long ago,” explained Cai Yutong in her normally detached manner.

She placed her finger on Li Weiyi’s forehead and nodded approvingly, “It’s a good thing the fever subsided, otherwise my three days of blood we gave you would have been wasted.” Qi Shanshan immediately teased, “Oh come on, now you’re trying to claim credit? Even during the transfusion, you couldn’t keep your true intentions hidden.”

Qi Shanshan and Cai Yutong had been roommates during their undergraduate days in the Chemistry Department, both lauded as the darlings of their class. Their relationship was as close as that between best friends. Even when things weren’t smooth, they were always indirectly competing with one another.

Later on, one went on to study medicine while the other delved deeper into the field of chemistry—without any rivalry to share—and their bond grew stronger. This Arctic research expedition had come about because Qi Shanshan learned some information from Cai Yutong, and as a best friend she “commanded” her to recommend her to the higher-ups.

Practical and skilled at seizing opportunities, Qi Shanshan was determined to strive for success.

(The End of This Chapter)