"What the hell is this?" he asked.

Tess had drawn many monsters on the huge map they had brought back from the cave of the Bolt dwarves, and he remembered each one well, but none of them looked like this!

Even the "well-informed" ice dragon could not find the answer from its memory, and could only rely on its intuition to answer: "...... Anyway, it's best not to get touched by those tentacles. ”

The waves were surging and the huge anemone slowly sank beneath the surface. In the wind and rain, the boat that the elves were riding in was still desperately running, like a small fish flying on the crest of the waves. When the translucent tentacle poked out of the sea again, it enveloped almost the entire ship, but the moment it touched the hull, it retracted sharply - bright electric light flashed around the hull, outlining clear runes.

"That's amazing!" Ed was so amazed that he wanted to jump up and cheer for little Terry.

However, the "anemone" did not give up. After a few attacks, the runes around the hull visibly dimmed.

The ice dragon swooped down again.

It still hovered at the stern of the boat, but it was getting farther away. It immediately dawned on Ed that it wanted to lure the unknown monster away from under the ship.

He held the Staff of Eternity alof, and the soft light radiated from the waves of water at the head of the staff, growing brighter and brighter, illuminating the heavens and the earth like sunlight piercing the clouds.

He had just wanted to attract the monster's attention, but he had revealed something unbelievable to him—the anemone was large enough, but beneath the surface of the sea there was a much larger shadow, like a fish, but the edges were changing like waves, and it was difficult to discern the exact shape.

"You...... See?"

His voice trembled involuntarily.

Compared to the anemone, the ice dragon was already as small as a clownfish, and compared to that shadow...... They're as small as shrimp.

"Most of the monsters in the sea are quite large," the ice dragon said calmly, "but most of them are quite stupid." ”

This was probably true, for the monster had apparently abandoned the ship and chased after them instead—even if they flew in mid-air that it couldn't reach.

The ice dragon flew high and low, leading it farther and farther until the ship was no longer visible...... until it is far from the fairway.

Then Ed extinguished the light of the Staff of Eternity, and the ice dragon soared into the air.

The monster surfaced, as if lamenting the food it had not been able to reach. The strange flower bloomed on the dark surface of the sea again, but the body under the flower was still not revealed. When it sank into the sea, Ed even regretted whether it was because he didn't have a thrilling battle with this rare monster, or because he hadn't seen enough of the soft and mysterious blue.

They caught up with the elves' ship. The starlight at the top of the mast had also been extinguished, and in the fierce wind and rain, Terry sat on the lookout and waved at them, smiling brightly.

"Didn't you cut off a tentacle?"

When Ed landed on the deck, Currill staggered over, wiping the rain from his face and smiling aloud, "I heard that this thing is delicious when boiled!"

Ed thought for a moment, and with an indescribable expression, he burst out laughing—after finally getting out of danger, the little half-elf was not only not the slightest tired, but full of energy...... Even a little over-the-top.

“...... Did you find the boat?" Ed guessed.

"Nope. Correll shook his head, still laughing, "But I guess those pirates won't be able to go into the water for a while—after that anemone swallowed up several of their ships." ”

Looking at his triumphant smile, a bold guess popped up in Ed's head: "That thing...... Did you deliberately induce it?"

Correll nodded: "Well, thanks to your friends!"

.

As the storm was about to subside, the Unicorn finally caught up. Bertram, who was thanked, was stunned by the half-elf's almost insane audacity, and it took a moment to silently give him a thumbs up.

The giant sea monster was discovered by the Unicorn during an adventure a few years ago. It's terrifyingly big, but in a sense, it's actually quite harmless.

"Have you ever seen a sea slug?" Bertram gestured to Ed, "it's usually only so long, and it's mostly extremely brightly colored, and it's being raised and played with on Rainbow Bend Island...... It's just that a normal sea slug, which you look like a sea anemone, should grow around the place where it excretes, but the monster grows on its head, and in the middle is its mouth, which opens up with a circle of sharp teeth, and it is easy to swallow a whale into it. And those tentacles are poisonous, and they can't break free if they are caught......"

When they saw the monster at the bottom of the sea, it was slowly pumping a shark into its mouth, ignoring them who were so small that they couldn't even fit their teeth. The bottom of the sea is covered with the bones of various fish - it obviously doesn't move much. It lives far from shipping lanes and islands, and very few fishing boats go that far, so it poses little threat to humans...... Maybe that's why they survived.

Bertram actually wanted to try to eradicate it at the time, in order to "eliminate the hidden dangers" and to satisfy the pride of being an adventurer...... or vanity. But Jancy, who had dived to the bottom of the sea with him, was very resolute in stopping him.

"It didn't hurt us, it didn't even hinder us. Later, the Brie told him, "'Growing too big' should not be a reason for any animal to be killed for no reason." ”

Bertram glanced at Corell, and retold it word by word, and the half-elf, who had already learned Jancy's self-ashamed frankness and integrity, avoided his gaze and argued a little weakly: "It was the pirates themselves who alarmed it......"

But it was also he who lured the pirates to his habitat after hearing Terry casually mention that "there's a big guy nearby".

In fact, he didn't know what the pirates had done, and the huge monster seemed to be completely enraged, and after swallowing a few pirate ships, it still refused to return to the bottom of the sea, and chased after the remaining ships...... So, the black sail led it to the channel to Rondi Island.

It was an extremely busy shipping lane...... And the monster couldn't tell the difference between black and white sails.

Correll had to clean up the trouble that his audacity had caused. Terry tried everything he could to lure the monster away from no one again, but the sudden storm nearly made them themselves food.

"It's a pretty rare experience. The half-elf said.

Around him, his elven companions had expressions that were indescribable, but there were also faint smiles in their eyes.