Nangang Underground, submersible control hall, brightly lit.

The light from gas lamps and electric lights made the entire hall as bright as day. A massive, egg-shaped submersible was suspended by steel cables at the top of a slide leading to the sea. Undead engineers were busily working everywhere, carrying out final checks and adjustments to prepare the submersible for launch.

Next to the steel frame platform securing the submersible, Duncan sat calmly in a chair watching everything. He was waiting for Tirion's subordinates to get everything ready. These undead, with their strange, ugly, even terrifying appearances, seemed enthusiastic, even faintly joyful and excited. A bald, burly man with a nervous and apprehensive look on his face walked over from a short distance and bent awkwardly in front of Duncan: "Um… Captain, it's good to see you."

Duncan looked up at the burly man, who was wearing a sailor's shirt, had a shiny bald head, and skin as pale as a corpse. He compared the information he had previously learned in his mind and nodded slightly: "You're Aiden, you've been following Tirion since the days of the Lost Fleet."

"That's me!" Aiden grinned immediately. "You remember me?"

"Don't remember," Duncan shook his head. "Sorry, I don't remember most things. The subspace damaged my memory. I heard about you and the other first-generation sailors of the Sea Fog Fleet from other people."

"Don't apologize, don't apologize." Aiden immediately looked more uneasy, shaking his head as he said, "It's… good that you're back. Everyone misses you."

"More like afraid, right?" Duncan smiled and glanced around the hall. Many eyes instinctively flinched away from his gaze.

"It's alright, I'm only using an avatar now. If my true body came here, I'm afraid most of the sailors wouldn't be able to work in peace,"

"Most of the people here are second-generation, they are indeed more afraid of you," Aiden scratched at his shirt buttons awkwardly.

"After all, their first encounter with you…"

"I know, the Frostwind Encounter half a century ago..." Duncan sighed softly and said casually. As he spoke, Tirion walked over quickly.

"The submersible is ready, Father."

"Oh, looks like it's time to set off."

A smile appeared on Duncan's face. He got up from the chair and walked with Tirion towards the platform used to secure the submersible. The submersible, which embodied the wisdom and hard work of countless people, was waiting quietly. The circular hatch on its side was open. Beyond the thick watertight compartment, the light illuminated the structure inside the sphere. It didn't look spacious. Apart from many dazzling pipes, valves, and consoles, the space for people to move around in seemed to accommodate at most three or four people.

Duncan observed the submersible's condition and took a step forward, but then he suddenly stopped, as if sensing something, and looked in a certain direction. A swirling gray wind suddenly swept into the hall and rapidly spiraled towards the submersible platform, condensing into a figure in front of Duncan, Tirion, and the others.

Agatha's figure stepped out of the gray wind—still dressed as the blind nun in a black robe and with long, flowing hair.

"I want to go with you." Without wasting words, she spoke directly after arriving in front of Duncan.

"You want to submerge too?" Duncan looked at Agatha with some surprise.

"Why?"

"Because I want to see with my own eyes what's beneath Frostwind," Agatha said calmly and firmly.

"As the protector of this city, I cannot stay in the safety of the cathedral and wait for your results, and…" She suddenly paused. After a few seconds of silence, she raised her head and, through the thick black cloth, stared into Duncan's eyes, "Moreover, this is the city of the Frostwind people, the affairs of the Frostwind people. In the submersible we built, there must be at least one Frostwind person, just… let me go down on behalf of Chief Executive Winston and the past chief executives of Frostwind to take a look."

"A reasonable reason, and you should already know the risks of doing so. Since you are prepared, I won't try to dissuade you," Duncan nodded, then turned to look at Tirion.

The latter quickly reacted and said, "The submersible is designed to accommodate up to four people, so there's no problem with two people going in, but…"

"It doesn't matter, I don't need to breathe either," Agatha said softly, interrupting Tirion.

Tirion was stunned for a moment and stepped back: "Alright, then there's no problem."

Duncan smiled. He stepped to the hatch of the submersible and turned to offer his hand to Agatha: "Very well, let's go."

He and Agatha climbed into the submersible. The heavy circular hatch slowly closed. Two strong undead sailors walked onto the platform and tightened the locking mechanism of the hatch from the outside. The heavy steel isolated the inside and outside of the submersible. The narrow crew compartment became quiet, with only the occasional hum from some machines and pipes. There were no seats in the crew compartment. Duncan and Agatha stood in front of the console, holding onto the iron pipes on either side that served as handrails. Through the extremely thick and sturdy glass porthole embedded in the side wall, they could see the undead sailors around the platform releasing the steel cables used to secure the submersible and releasing the safety pins on both sides of the steel frame.

Tirion's voice came from a small device in the corner of the submersible's control panel: "Father, Ms. Agatha, can you hear me?"

Duncan went to the console: "Yes, loud and clear."

"Alright, I won't say much about the operation of the submersible. Its functions are actually very simple, you shouldn't get it wrong. I'll talk about what happens after entering the water now."

"The submersible's power is provided by a small steam core and a generator connected to the steam core. In theory, it's enough to operate until all deep-sea missions are completed, but if the steam core or generator fails, there are two batteries at the bottom of the cabin that can keep the submersible running for about two hours…"

"There are three sets of high-power searchlights outside the cabin, but their effect is limited in the deep-sea environment, so please be careful when operating; in addition, the underwater resistance is very high, and the propulsion system's power can only allow the submersible to move slowly, which also needs to be noted."

"The communication device of the submersible has an effective range of only three hundred meters, so after the depth exceeds three hundred meters, we will no longer be able to talk like this, but your power or Ms. Agatha's psionic resonance should not be affected."

"Also… although I may be worried too much, even you, please pay attention to the dangers in the deep sea. If you encounter something wrong, please surface immediately. The lever in the upper left corner of the console is for emergency surfacing. Pulling it will directly discard the ballast structure at the bottom of the submersible and open the buoyancy spheres on both sides of the hull… In the worst case, abandon the submersible. With your strength, you can directly teleport back with Ms. Agatha. Machines can be rebuilt…"

Duncan listened very carefully to Tirion's reminders. To be honest, this "former Cold Sea pirate" was indeed a bit long-winded. In Duncan's opinion, many of his instructions were unnecessary, but Duncan still listened patiently to every word Tirion said.

Only after the other party finished speaking did he say in a deep voice, "I understand, begin."

Outside the submersible, in the command seat at the end of the hall, Tirion took a light breath, then nodded to his subordinates beside him.

"Open the sea valve!"

"Flood the passage!"

"Disconnect the submersible's external cables, prepare to release the locking hooks!"

A low rumble penetrated the steel hull of the submersible, echoing weakly in the spherical cabin. A slight vibration came from underfoot, accompanied by the creaking and grinding of the hull on the outside. The sea valve was opened, and in the passage below the facility that led directly to the sea, seawater was rising rapidly and gradually reaching the predetermined level. The last two steel cables above the submersible began to creak and release downward little by little.

Duncan and Agatha first felt a shaking, then sank downward. After a brief moment of weightlessness, the submersible entered the water. They began to sink along the inclined passage and quickly moved towards a sea opening on the outer edge of Nangang, guided by a series of slides. Outside the porthole, seawater surged, then gradually plunged into darkness. In the darkness, they could only occasionally see a flash of light. Those flashes became faster and faster, and the vibration of the submersible became more and more intense.

And finally, all the vibrations returned to calm. Outside the porthole, there was only an endless deep blue that was gradually fading away. Sunlight shone through the seawater above, casting moving, alternating columns of light and shadow outside the window. In the gradually darkening seawater, bubbles rose from outside the hull.

Accompanied by the reflection of the afterglow of the sunlight, they resembled some kind of marine creature shrouded in psychedelic colors.

Agatha seemed to be attracted by the "scenery" outside the porthole. She slowly left the cockpit and came to the porthole, holding onto the handrail. She curiously leaned over, and her eyes, which had become empty and hollow behind the thick black cloth, stared blankly at the deep blue that was rapidly sinking into darkness.

"What can you see?" Duncan asked casually as he familiarized himself with the levers and buttons on the console, which were not very complicated.

"Light, all kinds of faint light," Agatha said softly, as if talking to herself, or as if she was intoxicated by the illusion.

"They flow like rivers, forming vast, complex, yet orderly currents… But in reality, it's already dark outside now, right?"

"There's still a bit of residual sunlight, but it will be completely dark soon," Duncan manipulated the submersible to slowly turn at an angle.

"How about now?"

"A 'screen' of incredibly immense light—faint, but filling my entire vision," Agatha said, her tone seemingly filled with awe.

"What is that?"

"That is Frostwind," Duncan said calmly. His gaze passed through the porthole. Under the increasingly faint sunlight and the submersible's high-power searchlights, an incredibly wide and rough, mottled "cliff" stood silently in the seawater. "It is the foundation of the city-state."