"A whole Xianzhou General was sitting right there as a judge in the Grand Celebration, and now he is diving into the water as an ordinary contestant just like us?"
March stared at Himeko, her eyes still round with disbelief. "Is a General even allowed to spend his work hours playing video games?!"
"Oh, I actually heard Fu Xuan complaining about this exact thing," Stelle chimed in with a grin. "She said Jing Yuan dumped every scrap of official paperwork onto her desk so he could slack off and have fun. Who would have guessed he was sneaking into the game?"
Stelle crossed her arms, nodding wisely. "The Luofu has been swamped with cleanup work lately, and they are short on hands everywhere. Fu Xuan figured she might as well put us to work, so she keeps sending commissions to the Express crew. Every time we check in, she is grumbling about him."
If everyone was drowning in work together, that was one thing. But seeing the acting General buried under stacks of documents without time to catch her breath, while the actual General was off enjoying a digital beach vacation, was enough to drive anyone mad.
Jing Yuan even had the perfect excuse ready, claiming he was still recovering from battlefield injuries, which left Fu Xuan completely powerless to stop him.
Knowing that Jing Yuan was commanding the disguised Xianzhou squad, the Trailblazers agreed on one thing right away: steer clear of his waters.
Their little tricks might fool ordinary players, but trying to pull a fast one on the Dozing General was asking for trouble.
The Express crew split up to work their respective angles.
Before long, whispers spread across the reef zones. Rumors claimed that a mysterious, disguised strike team was picking off scavengers from the shadows, striking with such clean precision that nobody could track where they had vanished.
"Hey buddy, spot's taken."
Down in a dense kelp forest, players were getting smarter. Even while the main forces clashed over sunken chests, teams left two or three scouts hidden in the brush to guard their flanks against ambush.
A scout from the IPC corporate squad had swum down to set up a watch in the tall kelp, only to find a figure wrapped head-to-toe in green seaweed blocking his path.
"Never thought I would bump into someone with the exact same idea," the corporate player said, stepping into the kelp without the slightest hesitation. "This spot is huge. Plenty of room for two people to hide. Perfect chance to slack off on guard duty."
Stelle blinked behind her seaweed mask, thoroughly confused. Was this guy here to rob people, or was he just taking a nap? What was the difference between slacking off during an ambush and just doing nothing?
"Honestly, we have to thank that phantom crew running around jumping people," the corporate scout muttered, leaning back against a rock. "If they hadn't started ambushing teams out of nowhere, the squad leaders would never have ordered guard patrols, and I wouldn't have this golden excuse to sit here doing nothing."
Stelle hadn't fully pieced together his logic yet, but Dan Heng, watching through the kelp fronds a few yards away, figured it out instantly and sent a quick message to her terminal.
Glancing at her screen, Stelle got the picture and leaned in with a conspiratorial whisper.
"Right? We should really send that crew a thank-you note. So, brother, how many scouts did your squad send out? Our side planted three. Want to see if you can spot where mine are hiding?"
"Oh? Now you are talking! That sounds way more fun than staring at open water. Let me take a look."
Standing guard in complete silence was the most boring job on the map. Stelle's little game instantly hooked him, and he began scanning the seabed like a gamer looking for hidden snipers in a shooter.
"Are they tucked behind that jagged reef and that pink coral over there?"
The scout pointed into the distance with an uncertain squint. Stelle followed his finger; sure enough, two shadowy figures were crouched in the shadows, though they definitely weren't Dan Heng and March.
"Whoa, brother, you are sharp! How did you spot them so fast?"
"Heh, that was barely half my usual skill," the scout bragged, sticking his chin up proudly.
"Fair enough, my turn to guess!" Stelle tapped her chin thoughtfully, playing along. "You are running with the corporate fleet, so your buddies should be around this sector... Are they behind that sandbar and that big boulder to the left?"
Stelle pointed to two random, empty spots.
"Way off! Haha, looks like my crew knows how to stay out of sight after all."
"Man, not even close," Stelle sighed with exaggerated defeat. "Come on, brother, give me a hint. Where are your guys actually hiding? Teach me their tricks."
"Hmph, since you asked nicely, they are right over there..."
Without a single shred of suspicion, the corporate scout pointed out every single ambush position his teammates were holding.
"Hehe, thanks a ton, big brother," Stelle whispered, her voice dropping into a cheerful chill. "Since you love slacking off so much, allow me to send you straight to retirement."
"Wait, what do you mean—"
Before the words could leave his mouth, March and Dan Heng lunged from the kelp behind him.
Their Pokémon unleashed a point-blank volley, knocking the scout and his partners flat before they could even draw a breath. Under the match rules, the sudden knockout triggered the system, instantly booting the scout from the server in a flash of light.
"Phew! If we didn't take him out right then, I was going to burst out laughing on the spot," March wheezed, shaking the seaweed off her shoulders as she caught her breath.
"Move quickly," Dan Heng said, keeping his tone crisp and focused. "We take out the remaining lookouts he pointed out, then hit the main cluster with a fast strike before they notice he is offline."
In a team-wide server, players stayed connected through voice channels. When a scout stopped responding, the main squad would realize something was wrong in minutes.
The three knew their window was tiny. Every fleet on the map was on high alert, and defenses would only tighten from here on out. Catching another break like this was unlikely, so they needed to pull the missing coordinates from this raid.
Unfortunately, their luck was slightly off.
While the surprise strike caught the corporate team flat-footed and yielded a pouch of minor notes, the single crucial coordinate map they needed wasn't among the loot.
"You three are here?"
Just as the trio slipped away from the search parties into a secluded underwater cavern to sort through their haul, a young voice echoed from the entrance.
Dan Heng recognized him in a heartbeat: it was Yanqing beneath a disguised avatar.
Others might disguise their faces with cosmetic skins, but Dan Heng had crossed blades with the boy before. That crisp, razor-sharp sword intent humming in the water was something no avatar skin could ever mask.
The three immediately pocketed their papers, dropping into defensive stances.
Yanqing didn't care about their hostility. He simply flicked his wrist, tossing a worn cloth pouch straight to them through the current.
"This is from our leader. He told me to hand it to you."
Leaving those words behind, Yanqing turned on his heel and swam away without lingering for a second glance.
The three shared a wary look before Stelle stepped forward, carefully opening the pouch.
Inside rested a full set of parchment fragments, detailing the exact missing coordinates for the Heart of the Ocean.
"Why would the General just give this to us?" March asked, scratching her head in complete bewilderment.
Dan Heng stared at the map, deep in thought.
"Maybe he just wanted to make the game a little more interesting?" Stelle suggested with a shrug.
Dan Heng found the idea ridiculous at first, but looking back at Jing Yuan's habit of being rock-solid in real crises while playing the eccentric prankster during his downtime, it sounded exactly like something the General would do.
"No point guessing his motives," Dan Heng said quietly. "Let's regroup with Himeko and Mr. Welt first."
Receiving the alert, the crew gathered at their designated staging point.
With Welt and Himeko analyzing the parchment fragments, they quickly mapped the four reference coordinates to four distinct islands across the outer perimeter. Tracing the lines between them, they realized the exact center where the four vectors crossed marked the resting place of the relic.
Without wasting another second, the crew set off in high spirits.
"Is that really the Heart of the Ocean?! It looks ten times more gorgeous than the promotional art they showed before the match!"
Relying on their Water-type Pokémon to tow them through the crushing depths, the group reached the floor of the deepest oceanic trench, where a radiant, azure jewel sat cradled in an ancient pedestal, glowing like a piece of the sky fallen to the sea floor.
"March, take it quickly!" Welt urged, checking the interface markers. "Our diving oxygen reserves are running thin. We need to secure the prize and ascend."
"Right, got it!"
Knowing every second counted, March reached out, lifting the Heart of the Ocean from its stone cradle and sliding it into her sealed treasure pack.
A server-wide chime echoed across the entire sea:
Attention all players: The Heart of the Ocean has surfaced!
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