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Chapter 694: He Gave Too Much
Approximately two hours ago.
"Captain, we've arrived at the designated coordinates." On a small ocean ferry, the First Mate, who was constantly monitoring the radar system on the control panel, said to a burly man beside him. "However, the detection radar hasn't picked up any signals indicating the existence of an Island or anything similar."
The burly man, who was called Captain, simply nodded upon hearing this. He raised a pair of binoculars to his eyes, looking out at the boundless Sea Surface where nothing seemed to exist.
However, a man beside the burly man, whose style was completely out of place on this Ship and who looked more like an office secretary running errands than a crew member, spoke sternly to the First Mate who had just called out "Captain": "That's disrespectful to Mr. Anasis. You should at least address Mr. Anasis as 'Chairman'!"
"What does it matter, Socrates? Actually, I prefer the title 'Captain' over 'Chairman'," Anasis said, lowering the binoculars without finding anything and revealing a cleft chin as he laughed heartily. "When I first inherited the family business, I spent a lot of time sailing with my subordinates. Sea life, no matter how long it's been, still makes me feel so excited. Just hearing 'Captain' makes me feel several years younger."
"Mr. Anasis..." Looking at the World's Shipping Magnate before him, known for his consistently willful personality, Socrates, as his secretary, helplessly chose to give up. "Since it's your idea, alright. It's not like this is the first time you've been willful anyway."
"Just like this time, the 'Island Not on Maps, far from the world's noise.' Such an unrealistic illusion fundamentally couldn't exist, could it? Yet, you insisted on coming here single-mindedly."
"No way about it, Socrates. How does that saying go? I originally wanted to refuse, but Mr. Kagemaru gave too much. That's how it is."
Anasis laughed heartily, then turned around to look at the other two figures in the Room. "However, Mr. Kagemaru, we have now arrived at the destination, but neither the radar nor the naked eye can find the existence of the Island you mentioned."
"Compared to the meager transaction profit it is for you now, isn't it obvious that this is more about satisfying your own curiosity?" Behind Anasis, Socrates said in a low voice with a helpless expression, while the First Mate silently stared at the radar map and nodded in agreement.
They had been with Anasis for decades. They couldn't be clearer about Anasis's curiosity, which never allowed itself to be under restraint. In the earliest days, he liked secret treasures and artifacts from the Seabed. Later, he developed a liking for rare "curses," "magic," and similar items from around the World. Some time ago, due to that global event, he started becoming interested in things like "lost civilization" and "Mysterious Place."
Although he initially had no interest in the opponent when he heard that the famous entrepreneur Kagemaru wanted to rent a large exploration ship from their company, he suddenly became interested when the opponent revealed he was looking for the "Island Not on Maps," and even came along on the Ship himself.
At the back of the Room, an old man leaning on a cane heard Anasis's words and said with a smile, "Don't be impatient, Mr. Anasis. If you could find the Non-existent Island simply by sailing the Ship nearby, then This Island couldn't have been hidden for so long."
"To enter That Island, you need a small trick." As he spoke, the old man named "Kagemaru" turned his head to look at the young man standing beside him. "It's time for you to act, Amunaeru... Or should I call you by your other name now?"
"Well, in the face of truth, human individuals are so insignificant. Names are just simple appellations. As long as I know you're calling me, Mr. Kagemaru, that's fine."
The man wearing the mask said casually, but then spread his hand. "I still need to explain to you beforehand, Mr. Kagemaru, that I'm not sure how far my friend's research subject has progressed, or if he still considers me a friend with whom he can share knowledge. Everything is uncertain."
"No matter how uncertain it is, I have to try." Hearing Amunaeru say this, Kagemaru showed no intention of being dissuaded. After all, since they were already here, how could they not try? "Besides, you know, don't you? I'm already ninety years old this year."
"Watching my strength disappear from my body little by little, and the vitality and spirit of my youth decline daily and vanish, the closer my lifespan gets to its end, the more unwillingness I feel. Unwillingness to be buried and left behind as part of the abandoned old era, precisely at the moment when this World is becoming increasingly exciting."
Saying this, Kagemaru coughed twice and glanced at the long black hair outside Amunaeru's mask. "That's really good. You're also almost ninety years old, aren't you? If I could use that technology of yours, wouldn't I have no need to come here?"
Hearing Kagemaru's exclamation about aging, Amunaeru shrugged. "No way about that either. To be honest, completing human transmutation even once is already a miracle in alchemy. Among all the Alchemists I know, I'm probably the sole person who has completed human transmutation. Even so, the 'me' of today is an existence full of flaws and must cooperate with another research subject."
'However, although I knew at that time that the 'Sage's Stone' could actually be completed and wasn't just a fleeting illusion, who would have thought that the truth of the 'Sage's Stone' would actually be...'
'The goal of coming here this time is both to confirm if there's any other possibility of completing the 'Sage's Stone' and to slightly repay Kagemaru's kindness for funding me for decades.'
Without speaking the words in his heart, Amunaeru sighed, called out, and turned to walk out of the Room. "In short, Mr. Kagemaru, and if you want to explore the Island together, Mr. Anasis, you too, come with me."
"If we're going to That Island, we'll have to transfer to a small boat."
As is well known, corresponding to the different uses in numerous professional fields, ships can be freely customized and modified into different ships designed for different use scenarios, such as icebreakers specifically strengthened in the bow and power system for use in polar regions, or research vessels specialized for stability to protect internal equipment and samples.
And the so-called "exploration ship" is naturally specially designed for explorers to sail and explore globally. It largely belongs to the something of limited use category of "poor people can't afford it, rich people don't need it," but it still has all the necessary configurations, including a small speedboat specifically for landing on Islands.
Besides Kagemaru and Amunaeru, Anasis and Socrates also left the exploration ship together on this speedboat. The First Mate remained on the Ship with dozens of other crew members to manage the anchored exploration ship, waiting for the four to return.
But honestly, the First Mate didn't think it would take much time from his heart. He suspected that after the speedboat had gone a short distance, the masked guy with Kagemaru wouldn't be able to keep up that pretentious trick anymore.
Actually, Amunaeru, standing at the very front of the speedboat facing the sea wind, was holding four test tubes containing unknown liquid in his hand, muttering something under his breath.
As he finished his chant and poured the liquid from the test tubes in his hand, the liquid in the test tubes ignored the gale and actually converged into four circular formations in front of Amunaeru, continuously expanding and overlapping.
Immediately after, Kagemaru, Anasis, and Socrates witnessed an incredibly shocking scene — As if a curtain had been pulled open in the air, a mass of mist that had appeared at some unknown time enveloped their speedboat. Then, a boundary appeared in the sky, and before their eyes, as if they had entered another World, a massive Island suddenly appeared!
"It actually exists!"
Socrates was somewhat dumbfounded. "'Island Not on Maps' is real!"
"Oh oh oh, I'm completely excited! I can't wait to land on This Island and explore!" Anasis controlled the speedboat with one hand, continuing towards the suddenly appearing giant Island, while using the other hand to hold down the hat on his head, his expression full of excitement. "Although Duel Monsters, especially the duel with young Hayato back at that time, was also very interesting,"
"But as a man of the Sea, the excitement of discovering a New World is truly unique!"
While excited, Socrates couldn't help but rant: "A Mysterious Place in the Indian Ocean. If I didn't know that movies are all fake, I'd almost suspect there might be a giant gorilla dozens of meters tall on This Island."
Anasis said with a smile, "That's a pity, Socrates. We don't have a beauty here worth that gorilla climbing the Empire State Building to fight off planes."
Compared to Anasis and Socrates, Kagemaru was relatively less excited. Even so, Kagemaru's face, covered in age spots, was slightly flushed. "Amunaeru, is This Island the location of that Alchemist who studied under the same master as you, but unlike you who primarily researched the 'Sage's Stone,' primarily researched 'human transmutation'?"
"As far as I know, he has been on This Island for almost fifty years and has never left. As long as there are no accidents, we will definitely find him here, as long as there are no accidents. However, regarding whether the matter will succeed or not, you need to make mental preparation beforehand."
Amunaeru stepped down from the bow of the Ship and glanced at Kagemaru.
What he didn't know was that there's a saying: If there are no accidents, then accidents are about to happen.
Just as the speedboat carrying the group was heading towards the small island, Anasis, who was steering, casually adjusted the hat on his head, but the corner of his eye caught a firelight on the horizon. Subconsciously, he raised his head, but saw an airplane falling towards the Sea Surface from the horizon!?
"Boom!"
The airplane crashed into the sea so quickly that Anasis had no time to react. He just saw the airplane smash directly into the Sea Surface, creating a large fireball. Fortunately, the location where the airplane crashed was very far from them, even outside the mist covering the small island. Anasis and the others were not affected by the airplane's crash, merely slightly startled.
"Seriously, that scared me to death. That's why I like Ship and not airplanes." Patting his chest, Anasis said with a startled expression, "See how dangerous flying is? You see airplane crashes all the time. Why don't you see Cruise Ship sinking?"
"Probably because something like the Titanic incident is equivalent to a dozen airplane accidents at once." Beside him, Socrates answered without hesitation. "Oh, not necessarily. One airplane like the Twin Towers incident is probably enough too."
Amunaeru and Kagemaru didn't appreciate Anasis and Socrates' dark humor. After seeing an airplane crash nearby, Kagemaru wore a regretful expression: "What a pity. I wonder how many young people lost their lives on that airplane just now. So much lifespan wasted like that."
Amunaeru, however, raised his head to look at the sky and said after a moment of silence, "It's not necessarily wasted. Actually, the people on the airplane seem to have parachuted. Look, over there."
Kagemaru looked in the direction Amunaeru was pointing and saw several parachutes opening in mid-air. They seemed to be passengers who had parachuted from the airplane that had just crashed. And judging from the direction the parachutes were moving, those people seemed like they were coming to This Island here?
Seeing Kagemaru's confusion, Amunaeru spread his hand. "It's probably because I just lifted the domain on the Island that shielded it from unrelated people. To enter This Island, I exposed it for a short period of time, so those people with nowhere else to go chose to land on This Island."
"So, will those people influence us?" Kagemaru said, frowning. He was very concerned about this action and didn't want to see any accidents occur.
"Well..., I'm not too sure either, but I don't think my friend would care too much. Although, I haven't seen him for almost ten years. I don't know how he is now." Amunaeru's tone was very flat, which made Kagemaru feel a bit anxious.
Thinking that the Alchemist on the Island might get angry because they brought too many irrelevant people intruding, and in a fit of pique, refuse to exchange knowledge regarding "human transmutation" and "Sage's Stone," causing him to lose the hope of extending his lifespan, Kagemaru's breathing couldn't help but become heavy.
He had been funding Amunaeru's alchemy research to extend his life a long time ago, but this guy had never been able to produce results effective for him for decades. First, he said that the "Sage's Stone," which he primarily focused on, was impossible to complete. Then, he said that "human transmutation," which had succeeded once, had no hope of a second success. Although he always felt that this guy was hiding things and unwilling to give him the real goods, considering that he couldn't let the investment from earlier years go to waste, Kagemaru couldn't fall out with Amunaeru.
And when Amunaeru said he had an Alchemist friend, Kagemaru gained new hope, his last hope. If he couldn't obtain the possibility of eternal life from the Alchemists of today, then he would probably only have the option to create something called "Phantasm Beasts" based on the knowledge from that ancient book he once obtained. He just didn't know exactly what the so-called "Phantasm Beasts" were.
Kagemaru's gloomy gaze was fully seen by Amunaeru, but he said nothing. Only after the speedboat finally arrived at the shore did he lead Kagemaru towards the center of the small island, to find his "friend."
End of Chapter
Approximately two hours ago.
"Captain, we've arrived at the designated coordinates." On a small ocean ferry, the First Mate, who was constantly monitoring the radar system on the control panel, said to a burly man beside him. "However, the detection radar hasn't picked up any signals indicating the existence of an Island or anything similar."
The burly man, who was called Captain, simply nodded upon hearing this. He raised a pair of binoculars to his eyes, looking out at the boundless Sea Surface where nothing seemed to exist.
However, a man beside the burly man, whose style was completely out of place on this Ship and who looked more like an office secretary running errands than a crew member, spoke sternly to the First Mate who had just called out "Captain": "That's disrespectful to Mr. Anasis. You should at least address Mr. Anasis as 'Chairman'!"
"What does it matter, Socrates? Actually, I prefer the title 'Captain' over 'Chairman'," Anasis said, lowering the binoculars without finding anything and revealing a cleft chin as he laughed heartily. "When I first inherited the family business, I spent a lot of time sailing with my subordinates. Sea life, no matter how long it's been, still makes me feel so excited. Just hearing 'Captain' makes me feel several years younger."
"Mr. Anasis..." Looking at the World's Shipping Magnate before him, known for his consistently willful personality, Socrates, as his secretary, helplessly chose to give up. "Since it's your idea, alright. It's not like this is the first time you've been willful anyway."
"Just like this time, the 'Island Not on Maps, far from the world's noise.' Such an unrealistic illusion fundamentally couldn't exist, could it? Yet, you insisted on coming here single-mindedly."
"No way about it, Socrates. How does that saying go? I originally wanted to refuse, but Mr. Kagemaru gave too much. That's how it is."
Anasis laughed heartily, then turned around to look at the other two figures in the Room. "However, Mr. Kagemaru, we have now arrived at the destination, but neither the radar nor the naked eye can find the existence of the Island you mentioned."
"Compared to the meager transaction profit it is for you now, isn't it obvious that this is more about satisfying your own curiosity?" Behind Anasis, Socrates said in a low voice with a helpless expression, while the First Mate silently stared at the radar map and nodded in agreement.
They had been with Anasis for decades. They couldn't be clearer about Anasis's curiosity, which never allowed itself to be under restraint. In the earliest days, he liked secret treasures and artifacts from the Seabed. Later, he developed a liking for rare "curses," "magic," and similar items from around the World. Some time ago, due to that global event, he started becoming interested in things like "lost civilization" and "Mysterious Place."
Although he initially had no interest in the opponent when he heard that the famous entrepreneur Kagemaru wanted to rent a large exploration ship from their company, he suddenly became interested when the opponent revealed he was looking for the "Island Not on Maps," and even came along on the Ship himself.
At the back of the Room, an old man leaning on a cane heard Anasis's words and said with a smile, "Don't be impatient, Mr. Anasis. If you could find the Non-existent Island simply by sailing the Ship nearby, then This Island couldn't have been hidden for so long."
"To enter That Island, you need a small trick." As he spoke, the old man named "Kagemaru" turned his head to look at the young man standing beside him. "It's time for you to act, Amunaeru... Or should I call you by your other name now?"
"Well, in the face of truth, human individuals are so insignificant. Names are just simple appellations. As long as I know you're calling me, Mr. Kagemaru, that's fine."
The man wearing the mask said casually, but then spread his hand. "I still need to explain to you beforehand, Mr. Kagemaru, that I'm not sure how far my friend's research subject has progressed, or if he still considers me a friend with whom he can share knowledge. Everything is uncertain."
"No matter how uncertain it is, I have to try." Hearing Amunaeru say this, Kagemaru showed no intention of being dissuaded. After all, since they were already here, how could they not try? "Besides, you know, don't you? I'm already ninety years old this year."
"Watching my strength disappear from my body little by little, and the vitality and spirit of my youth decline daily and vanish, the closer my lifespan gets to its end, the more unwillingness I feel. Unwillingness to be buried and left behind as part of the abandoned old era, precisely at the moment when this World is becoming increasingly exciting."
Saying this, Kagemaru coughed twice and glanced at the long black hair outside Amunaeru's mask. "That's really good. You're also almost ninety years old, aren't you? If I could use that technology of yours, wouldn't I have no need to come here?"
Hearing Kagemaru's exclamation about aging, Amunaeru shrugged. "No way about that either. To be honest, completing human transmutation even once is already a miracle in alchemy. Among all the Alchemists I know, I'm probably the sole person who has completed human transmutation. Even so, the 'me' of today is an existence full of flaws and must cooperate with another research subject."
'However, although I knew at that time that the 'Sage's Stone' could actually be completed and wasn't just a fleeting illusion, who would have thought that the truth of the 'Sage's Stone' would actually be...'
'The goal of coming here this time is both to confirm if there's any other possibility of completing the 'Sage's Stone' and to slightly repay Kagemaru's kindness for funding me for decades.'
Without speaking the words in his heart, Amunaeru sighed, called out, and turned to walk out of the Room. "In short, Mr. Kagemaru, and if you want to explore the Island together, Mr. Anasis, you too, come with me."
"If we're going to That Island, we'll have to transfer to a small boat."
As is well known, corresponding to the different uses in numerous professional fields, ships can be freely customized and modified into different ships designed for different use scenarios, such as icebreakers specifically strengthened in the bow and power system for use in polar regions, or research vessels specialized for stability to protect internal equipment and samples.
And the so-called "exploration ship" is naturally specially designed for explorers to sail and explore globally. It largely belongs to the something of limited use category of "poor people can't afford it, rich people don't need it," but it still has all the necessary configurations, including a small speedboat specifically for landing on Islands.
Besides Kagemaru and Amunaeru, Anasis and Socrates also left the exploration ship together on this speedboat. The First Mate remained on the Ship with dozens of other crew members to manage the anchored exploration ship, waiting for the four to return.
But honestly, the First Mate didn't think it would take much time from his heart. He suspected that after the speedboat had gone a short distance, the masked guy with Kagemaru wouldn't be able to keep up that pretentious trick anymore.
Actually, Amunaeru, standing at the very front of the speedboat facing the sea wind, was holding four test tubes containing unknown liquid in his hand, muttering something under his breath.
As he finished his chant and poured the liquid from the test tubes in his hand, the liquid in the test tubes ignored the gale and actually converged into four circular formations in front of Amunaeru, continuously expanding and overlapping.
Immediately after, Kagemaru, Anasis, and Socrates witnessed an incredibly shocking scene — As if a curtain had been pulled open in the air, a mass of mist that had appeared at some unknown time enveloped their speedboat. Then, a boundary appeared in the sky, and before their eyes, as if they had entered another World, a massive Island suddenly appeared!
"It actually exists!"
Socrates was somewhat dumbfounded. "'Island Not on Maps' is real!"
"Oh oh oh, I'm completely excited! I can't wait to land on This Island and explore!" Anasis controlled the speedboat with one hand, continuing towards the suddenly appearing giant Island, while using the other hand to hold down the hat on his head, his expression full of excitement. "Although Duel Monsters, especially the duel with young Hayato back at that time, was also very interesting,"
"But as a man of the Sea, the excitement of discovering a New World is truly unique!"
While excited, Socrates couldn't help but rant: "A Mysterious Place in the Indian Ocean. If I didn't know that movies are all fake, I'd almost suspect there might be a giant gorilla dozens of meters tall on This Island."
Anasis said with a smile, "That's a pity, Socrates. We don't have a beauty here worth that gorilla climbing the Empire State Building to fight off planes."
Compared to Anasis and Socrates, Kagemaru was relatively less excited. Even so, Kagemaru's face, covered in age spots, was slightly flushed. "Amunaeru, is This Island the location of that Alchemist who studied under the same master as you, but unlike you who primarily researched the 'Sage's Stone,' primarily researched 'human transmutation'?"
"As far as I know, he has been on This Island for almost fifty years and has never left. As long as there are no accidents, we will definitely find him here, as long as there are no accidents. However, regarding whether the matter will succeed or not, you need to make mental preparation beforehand."
Amunaeru stepped down from the bow of the Ship and glanced at Kagemaru.
What he didn't know was that there's a saying: If there are no accidents, then accidents are about to happen.
Just as the speedboat carrying the group was heading towards the small island, Anasis, who was steering, casually adjusted the hat on his head, but the corner of his eye caught a firelight on the horizon. Subconsciously, he raised his head, but saw an airplane falling towards the Sea Surface from the horizon!?
"Boom!"
The airplane crashed into the sea so quickly that Anasis had no time to react. He just saw the airplane smash directly into the Sea Surface, creating a large fireball. Fortunately, the location where the airplane crashed was very far from them, even outside the mist covering the small island. Anasis and the others were not affected by the airplane's crash, merely slightly startled.
"Seriously, that scared me to death. That's why I like Ship and not airplanes." Patting his chest, Anasis said with a startled expression, "See how dangerous flying is? You see airplane crashes all the time. Why don't you see Cruise Ship sinking?"
"Probably because something like the Titanic incident is equivalent to a dozen airplane accidents at once." Beside him, Socrates answered without hesitation. "Oh, not necessarily. One airplane like the Twin Towers incident is probably enough too."
Amunaeru and Kagemaru didn't appreciate Anasis and Socrates' dark humor. After seeing an airplane crash nearby, Kagemaru wore a regretful expression: "What a pity. I wonder how many young people lost their lives on that airplane just now. So much lifespan wasted like that."
Amunaeru, however, raised his head to look at the sky and said after a moment of silence, "It's not necessarily wasted. Actually, the people on the airplane seem to have parachuted. Look, over there."
Kagemaru looked in the direction Amunaeru was pointing and saw several parachutes opening in mid-air. They seemed to be passengers who had parachuted from the airplane that had just crashed. And judging from the direction the parachutes were moving, those people seemed like they were coming to This Island here?
Seeing Kagemaru's confusion, Amunaeru spread his hand. "It's probably because I just lifted the domain on the Island that shielded it from unrelated people. To enter This Island, I exposed it for a short period of time, so those people with nowhere else to go chose to land on This Island."
"So, will those people influence us?" Kagemaru said, frowning. He was very concerned about this action and didn't want to see any accidents occur.
"Well..., I'm not too sure either, but I don't think my friend would care too much. Although, I haven't seen him for almost ten years. I don't know how he is now." Amunaeru's tone was very flat, which made Kagemaru feel a bit anxious.
Thinking that the Alchemist on the Island might get angry because they brought too many irrelevant people intruding, and in a fit of pique, refuse to exchange knowledge regarding "human transmutation" and "Sage's Stone," causing him to lose the hope of extending his lifespan, Kagemaru's breathing couldn't help but become heavy.
He had been funding Amunaeru's alchemy research to extend his life a long time ago, but this guy had never been able to produce results effective for him for decades. First, he said that the "Sage's Stone," which he primarily focused on, was impossible to complete. Then, he said that "human transmutation," which had succeeded once, had no hope of a second success. Although he always felt that this guy was hiding things and unwilling to give him the real goods, considering that he couldn't let the investment from earlier years go to waste, Kagemaru couldn't fall out with Amunaeru.
And when Amunaeru said he had an Alchemist friend, Kagemaru gained new hope, his last hope. If he couldn't obtain the possibility of eternal life from the Alchemists of today, then he would probably only have the option to create something called "Phantasm Beasts" based on the knowledge from that ancient book he once obtained. He just didn't know exactly what the so-called "Phantasm Beasts" were.
Kagemaru's gloomy gaze was fully seen by Amunaeru, but he said nothing. Only after the speedboat finally arrived at the shore did he lead Kagemaru towards the center of the small island, to find his "friend."
End of Chapter
