Chapter 976: Advanced Eel Fishing

"Is that a giant eel corpse sailing through the air?," Zhen Jin asked his brothers.

"Yup."

"Is...is that a good thing or a bad thing for us?," Zhen Lao followed up.

"I don’t know..."

The elders of the Zhen Clans couldn’t help but to stare in disbelief at the sight of the airborne eel carcass. Their respective leaders had only been down there for a couple of minutes at most, and they had already found some form of trouble.

Then again, it was probably for the best, due to the [Abyssal Lands] being kind of...incredibly shitty. Evidently, having to be away from the sun and the concept of daylight for more than twenty-four hours was enough to drive most people mad.

Then again, that could’ve been the [Chaos] talking.

Back to the matter at hand though, the aforementioned giant eel corpse managed to capture the attention of the Zhen Clan elders long enough that they all just stood around and watched as it fell from the sky and essentially flopped onto the deck of their fishing vessel like...well, like a dead fish.

Once the initial shock had left their systems though, the Zhen Clan elders tried to figure out their next move/determine if they needed to get their leaders and get the fuck out of the area.

Based on what they were seeing so far though...they were in the clear.

"Well, it appears whatever the hell this fish is, father has managed to jam the bottom of it’s skull into it’s own brain. Gruesome way to go, but damn that is a hell of a lot of brute force," Zhen Hou commented as he studied the obvious wounds on the eel’s body. "On that note though, do you guys from the main branch got any idea what this thing is?"

"It appears to be the juvenile form of a creature native here called a [Luminescent Wolf Eel]. These eels are about as friendly as...well, hungry wolves."

"Huh..."

"On the plus (?) side they’re pretty delicious when cooked right."

"Always a plus."

"On the downside, they hunt in massive schools."

"They hunt in...uh oh."

At the mention of these massive eels being pack hunting creatures, all of the branch clan elders immediately went to the side of the ship to see if things were as bad as that little nugget of information implied.

More specifically, they went to the side that was in the same direction as where that eel had come from.

"Anybody see anything?"

"In a place as dark as this? Not really, no."

"Unhelpful."

"Wait...over there! Where the bubbles are!"

"Ah...oh. That doesn’t look good..."

Despite being covered by perpetual darkness, the Zhen Clan elders could still sense movement in the shadow water below, especially when it came in the form of what appeared to be a giant swirling, bubbling vortex, filled with glowing spots of bioluminescent lights.

On top of the visual spectacle though, the Zhen Clan elders could sense that the minimum power level of the participants in this swirling pool of eels was about 3rd tier to 4th tier.

This, normally, wouldn’t be a big issue if it was an isolated target in an environment that the branch clan elders were used to fighting in, it was a whole other story now that there was a school of them and in an environment that they all had middling experience with in dealing with.

Which was, wholly ironic due to their heritage of being from Roaring Tiders raised on Stampeding Bison.

However, the branch elders didn’t end up feeling too bad about their inability to participate, once they saw that the main branch elders weren’t making a move either.

If anything, it appeared that they were undergoing the task of storing away the recently acquired eel corpse and preparing to receive more.

"Uh…aren’t you guys worried that they might be in over their heads right now?"

"As her son, yes I’m worried that my mother may have gotten in over head," Hero Elder Zhen Xun Po replied while working to remove the aether beast core from the eel’s corpse. "As someone who is very cognizant of the fact that she is an Aether Emperor and if things were really bad, she’d be manifesting her [Avatar] right now…no not really."

"That…huh."

Evidently, the branch clan elders had gotten mildly complacent over the years due to not having to deal with any opponents that were stronger than Aether Grandmasters, or singular 4th tier beasts at most, so the concept of someone being able to one-shot such a horde of monsters that required careful coordination on their end was…mind boggling to say the least.

Then again, due to certain unspoken developments, the branch clan elders may have to get used to dealing with such high level opponents sooner rather than later.

But for now, there was a pressing issue they had to address.

Sound of a dozen or so more eels dying from either piercing wounds or blunt force trauma as they get launched out of the water

Namely, the sheer amount of butchering they had to perform as dozens upon dozens of giant dead eels came falling down on them like the world’s worst rainstorm.

"Wait…are some of those eels…alive?"

"Yes, yes they are."

Correction, the sheer amount of butchering and taming they had had to perform as dozens upon dozens of giant eels came down on them like rain.

"Well…at least I can say this wasn’t a boring hunt…come on brothers, let’s apply our craft with vigor, shall we?," Zhen Long prompted.

"Aye!"

While the branch clan prepared themselves to practice a trade they’ve done their whole lives, the main clan were preparing for, well, storing everything.

"Hero Elder, I hope you know that this wasn’t the purpose of the [Myriad Marble Garden]," the Wisdom Elder complained while preparing the aether treasure in question.

"I am aware, but it’s the matriarch’s orders."

"But why though?"

"That…hmm…"

At this moment, Zhen Xun Po decided to make a mental note in regards to asking his mother’s intentions as of late.

…Speaking of..,

"Haha! I’m about twenty eels down, dear nephew! How are you faring?!"

"I’m only at ten eels, how are you doing this?"

"Because I got six arms and I know how to use them, baby! Pay close attention, because you might be able to do this too!"

"Oh! Okay!"

Due to his past history with his aunt, Zhen Shi fully expected that her proposed contest of killing giant glowing wolf eels was nothing more than a means to amuse herself. After all, she was the same woman who once purposely showed up to a duel two hours late for the sole purpose of pissing off her opponent.

However, part way through the context, Zhen Shi realized something.

"Come on now! Sharpen your killing intent and you can pierce through their defenses with a single punch too!"

"Right!"

The weird energy surrounding his aunt Zhen Xun Tian was the same weird energy he and his grandson have been manipulating, [Chaos]. And that, in this entire span of fighting these wolf eels, that was the only type of energy she was manipulating.

"You gotta keep this in mind dear boy, when fighting hordes like this, you gotta be able to move freely."

In other words, she had been giving him an entire crash course on how to use [Chaos], well...how she understood it.

Zhen Shi was fairly certain he wouldn’t be able to make a whole bunch of tentacles made of ink to attack, but...he had his own trick.

For example, when an unexpected 5th tier Wolf Eel showed up out of nowhere, he managed to harpoon the bastard with a [Chaos] construct that vaguely resembled a sea serpent.

"Hahaha! That how you do it! Now let’s end this!"

"Right!"

Zhen Shi and Zhen Xun Tian continued to fight/fish [Luminescent Wolf Eel] after [Luminescent Wolf Eel]. The two of them collectively forgot how many they killed until about fifty eels deeper.

Once they reached that mark though, something big made itself known.

The rest of the [Luminescent Wolf Eels] suddenly scattered in multiple directions, leaving Zhen Xun Tian and Zhen Shi floating in the middle of dark water all alone.

"Krrr...."

"Oh...shit."

"NOW WE’RE COOKING WITH OIL!"

For all of five seconds.

From the distance, the aura of a Sixth Tier [Luminescent Wolf Eel] made itself felt by the two Zhen Clan patriarchs, as a show of force.

Unfortunately, to the now blood crazed leaders of the Zhen Clan, this show of force was nothing more than a big ass signal.

A signal that told them exactly what they wanted to hear.

"I do believe we found our capture target."

"Yup."

Emboldened by a clear and present goal, the two leaders of the Zhen Clan went surging forward. As they did, [Chaos] and aether began to condense around them into the forms of giant sea monsters.

"Now then, let’s give this bastard a proper Zhen Clan greeting! [Kraken Barrage!]"

"Agreed! [Serpent Piercer]!"

"Krrrr!"

Once both parties were in range of each other, all hell broke loose.

...

"That’s a fuck ton of bubbles..."

"Yeah...help me with the processing of these eels, would you?"

"Right. Sorry, sorry."