CHAPTER 60: FIRST WAVE (1)

The students, who had been laughing and teasing one another only minutes ago, felt the shift instinctively. Conversations died mid-sentence; as the music of the evening seemed muffled, swallowed by a growing unease that the human mind could not rationalize.

Before they could even understand what was happening, a rift appeared above them, slowly turning into a door-like appearance, floating above the top of their head.

Ling Yu’s gaze was fixed on the horizon. The currents of the ocean moved differently now. The patterns of the waves were subtly irregular, as if some immense hand were pushing and pulling from below.

Her pulse quickened, not with fear, but with recognition.

"System, check what’s going on?! Why is it suddenly occurring before the time limit ended?" Ling Yu was not afraid of confronting the monsters, but she had to prepare to ward them off.

[System Alert!]

[Abnormal Rift Detected. Host in proximity to sea-based anomaly.

Probability of aquatic threat: Extreme.]

She didn’t need the System’s words to know what was coming. In her past life, these warnings had been too late; too many had perished before she realized the magnitude of the threat.

Students crowded at the railings, pointing at a disturbance in the water a few hundred meters ahead. At first, it seemed innocuous, a ripple here, a shimmer there, but the tremor beneath the ship’s hull suggested otherwise. The ocean wasn’t simply moving.

It was actually growing.

The water bulged upward like some living, undulating beast, and then, without warning, a jagged tear split the very air above them.

The rift was not a natural phenomenon. It hovered like a door in the sky, a luminous frame floating against the deepening twilight.

Ling Yu’s eyes narrowed as she assessed its structure: swirling energy, deep indigo at the edges, fading to a violent emerald at the center. Time itself seemed to stretch and distort as the rift stabilized above the deck.

There is no way she didn’t recognize this thing.

"This... isn’t supposed to happen yet," she muttered under her breath. "The countdown isn’t over... the System obviously showed that 23 hours remain before the start. Why is it coming early?"

As Ling Yu was lost in thought, Ru Feifei, who was standing near her, grabbed Ling Yu’s sleeve. "Yu-jie... look! Something’s coming out of the water!"

"Evacuate everyone from the railing!" Ling Yu yelled out as she pushed Ru Feifei away from the deck. Scared by her scream, some of the students ran off to a safe distance, while others were speculating whether it might be some giant whale.

Their ship was not too far from shore, but it was neither too close nor too well. As a result, there were no signs or a reasonable explanation of that thing being a whale when it was getting nearer at such a fast speed.

The nearer they grew, the more understanding Ling Yu got of them. Because it was not only one, but coming as a whole team!

The first creatures emerged subtly.

From the disturbed waters, the outline of a dog-sized fish became visible, its scales reflecting the ship’s lights in jagged flashes. Its coral-like teeth jutted out at impossible angles, a natural weapon designed for tearing and shredding.

The monster’s appearance was nastier than that of the sea terror, Piranha. So much so that it made a few of the female students shriek out in fear and disgust, while some of them fainted on the spot.

"Damn it! Stop shouting! Making sounds will attract those monsters to attack us!" Ling Yu yelled at the girls with an annoyed look on her face as she scolded them. There was no time to indulge them in this place.

Those things looked about the same as she remembers.

Dog-sized fishes with jagged coral teeth, their bodies were a blend of mottled blues and sea-green, with glowing red eyes that gleamed like molten gemstones. Each movement of the monsters was precise, predatory, and coordinated.

When it came to teamwork and tearing apart things weaker than these, these things were nastier than any other. The most problematic side of these monsters was none other than those sharp teeth gleaming out of their mouth.

"It looks like a flock of Piranha, but are they really Piranha? Why is this group so big and strange?"

The students were now staying away from the deck, standing in the middle of the ship. While He Xun and his friends were keeping a sharp eye around them, Ru Feifei was staring at Ling Yu with a worried look as she saw the girl was finding something.

Those teeth were the reason they could rapidly chomp, capable of tearing through wood, leather, and even reinforced armor. And if they detected blood, the swarm would enter a state of uncontrollable aggression, increasing their speed and coordination.

’There is no way they won’t attack just because they retreated from the deck.’

Ling Yu pursed her lips as she was looking hard for the Gate that was supposed to show up somewhere around the ship.

Because the system window had already opened up before everyone on the ship.

[System Initialization]

A translucent blue screen materialized midair, floating just inches from their faces. The words burned into vision, impossible to look away from. Some screamed, others staggered back as if to escape it, but the screen followed, locked to their perception.

+

[New Rift Detected]

[First Wave Event: Active]

[Location: East Sea – Sector 11]

[Objective: Survive the Initial Raid]

[Timer: 00:29:57]

+

The ship instantly erupted into chaos.

"What the hell— what is this?"

"It’s... It’s like a game interface?"

"No, no, no! This has to be some kind of AR prank, right? Like a hologram?"

"Shut up! It’s not going away, it’s in my eyes!"

Students clawed at the air, waving their hands through the translucent blue panel as if they could swat it away like a mosquito. Others squeezed their eyes shut, but the words were burned into the backs of their eyelids. Panic swept through the group like wildfire.