"So this is what the Iberians call the great sea?"
Using the body of a winged beast, Kashchey descended onto the sandy shore.
He wanted to see it for himself.
It was said that beneath the waves, a race calling themselves the Aegir had built a city under the sea. Kashchey was eager to take a look.
For this venture, he had made thorough preparations.
From the skin of that small, fragile winged beast poured forth tens of thousands of black serpents. The poor creature, unable to endure, had long since lost all trace of life.
Quite literally, it split apart.
To ensure the vessel could bear the bulk of his will, Kashchey had reinforced it with Laterano Arts and ancient Kazdelian rites. Every vein of the beast had been strengthened, each one carrying within it countless black snakes.
And yet, even so, the burden far exceeded what such a creature could ever withstand.
Of course, Kashchey was careful enough to leave part of his will behind on land, a safeguard against complete annihilation.
The snakes converged, weaving together into a nameless, humanoid shape, and slipped silently into the sea.
On his journey through the depths, he encountered many strange, otherworldly beings.
Suppressing his aura, he crept toward one that looked the most formidable—massive, powerful, awe-inspiring. Without hesitation, he burrowed into its mind.
You live. I live. Therefore, you are me.
Just as Kashchey prepared to seize control of the body, he realized it was far more intricate than he had anticipated.
And then came the assault—countless external consciousnesses pressing against him.
No… not an attack. This was simply the creature's natural state of being.
Looks like I've kicked an iron wall this time.
Never before in all his [memories] had Kashchey encountered something like this. It felt as though he were being crammed full of countless, tangled minds.
Devour. Adapt. Evolve. For the swarm. That seemed to be the essence of it.
Sensing danger, Kashchey considered abandoning part of himself—severing the threads already entangled with this creature—so the rest of his will could slip away, cutting his losses.
But then, the true owner of the body finally noticed the intruder.
"An unfamiliar… kin?"
Uh…
In an instant, Kashchey's escape was sealed.
He was trapped inside.
If it were only the creature's core consciousness, he might have been able to forcefully break through, perhaps even consume it.
But the nature of this mind was far too strange—like a central web connecting countless lesser sea beasts.
There was no way he could stand against such a vast network of wills.
At least I left myself a few backups outside.
Though he regretted the portion of his power that would be left behind here, Kashchey remained calm. After all, this was not the end of him.
Meanwhile, the sea creature—called Ishar'mla—was equally puzzled.
Never before had it encountered this kind of "kin."
And yet, the intruder's intent had been clear: I am one of you. For the swarm. Devour me quickly.
Moreover, the other carried the same aura as itself.
Ishar'mla naturally assumed that the being before it was a special kind of Seaborn—just like itself.
"Fusion. Evolution. Kin."
And it seemed to be the sort of kin willing to offer itself up in sacrifice.
Just as Ishar'mla prepared to merge with Kashchey, however, a wave of resistance came from the other side.
Sensing this rejection, Ishar'mla abandoned the attempt.
In its view, since the other was also a higher Seaborn, it should not perish so carelessly.
To live was to make a greater contribution to the Swarm.
And yet… Ishar'mla had never encountered a Seaborn whose thoughts shifted so rapidly, so unpredictably.
Because of their partial mental link, Ishar'mla could clearly perceive Kashchey's thoughts.
But most of those thoughts lay far outside anything within Ishar'mla's comprehension.
Thus, it could only communicate in the limited way it understood:
"Why, earlier, did you abandon life to offer yourself—yet now resist your end, kin?"
---
Meanwhile, Grim chose to remain in waterdrop Village for a while longer.
He needed to confirm Ishar'mla's condition, and whether the Seaborn race had truly come ashore.
The implications of such a thing were far too great.
"But if I recall correctly, I had already deceived Ishar'mla, coaxing it and its followers into a state of stability. So why have they surfaced now?"
Kashchey was deeply puzzled. But aside from the initial shock of the news, he did not feel particularly afraid of Ishar'mla's landfall.
After all, it would not kill him—it would merely transform his life into something entirely "new."
Besides, the Seaborn had always held a very loose definition of kin.
And their coexistence was, at least from Kashchey's perspective, strikingly harmonious.
Willingly self-sacrificing, never engaging in civil strife—in such a selfless environment, Kashchey had once thrived like a fish in water.
The only real problem was the Seaborn's bodies themselves. They were terribly troublesome to control, requiring his full concentration.
On one occasion, he had even completely possessed a Seaborn that had willingly offered itself to him—only to nearly lose himself, transformed into a mindless fanatic devoted solely to the Swarm.
There was no way he could invest the whole of his will into a Seaborn vessel.
Maintaining his body on land while keeping control over even a single Seaborn required enormous energy—and even then, he could barely manage it.
The only reason it worked at all was because that particular Seaborn had been separated by Ishar'mla and given over to him, its role being to help mediate his control.
Otherwise, under the influence of Kashchey's will, its evolutionary path would have strayed wildly—down dangerous, harmful lines.
After all, Kashchey could scarcely grasp the instinctive, adaptive process by which the Seaborn evolved.
And yet, he found that because of his communication with Ishar'mla, the Seaborn were now evolving at an alarming, unnatural speed.
To prevent them from advancing onto land, Kashchey had constructed an environment carefully designed to suppress their expansion as much as possible.
He was very skilled at creating such conditions—ones of ease and satisfaction.
But Ishar'mla was different. Unlike the others, this one he could not keep in check.
For his earlier attempt at seizing Ishar'mla had been effortlessly dissolved by the being itself.
And it was dissolved in a way that seemed almost unconscious.
Even the fragment of will Kashchey had left behind when attempting to shed his shell had been completely absorbed by Ishar'mla.
To prevent Ishar'mla from undergoing hyper-accelerated evolution through further contact with him, Kashchey had eventually fled.
He hadn't even spared the time to visit Aegir's city.
---
"So, Grim, you're interested in the knight's treasure as well?"
Surtr asked idly, her tone steeped in boredom.
The two of them walked openly behind Grani, the chief of Waterdrop Village, and a hulking figure entirely encased in heavy armor.
Strangely enough, none of the three ahead seemed to notice their presence.
Despite their close proximity—and despite the fact that the two were speaking at a perfectly audible volume—there was simply no recognition of them at all.
This was the source-arts ability of Grim's vessel—Presence Erasure.
It allowed the target's presence to fade from awareness, to the point that even the effects caused by the target would be unconsciously reinterpreted by others as if they had nothing to do with them.
"Miss Surtr, the stories that unfold along the journey… those are part of the charm of traveling."
If only Ishar'mla weren't lurking nearby while we enjoyed the show.