Chapter 485: Mermaid
Even though what happened to Elysia looked funny, no one laughed or made fun of the incident in any way.
"Uoh! I'll give you a helping hand, Ely. I won't let you off the hook, bad fish. Come here and we'll feast on you!" Sylvia immediately helped Elysia to pull the fish up to the magic carpet.
Even though she didn't use any magic, her body's raw strength was still that of a Saint-level Devil Princess. The big fish had no chance to fight back and could only be drawn to an unknown place helplessly.
"Quickly put the big fish into this Space Bag!" Nell positioned herself while holding an open Space Bag. She didn't want the big fish to throw anyone into the sea because of its size.
"Ooh!" Sylvia pulled Elysia's fishing rod and slapped the fish into the Space Bag. After that, she breathed a sigh of relief. "Phew, that was close. Are you all right, Ely."
"Mm, I'm fine. Luckily, my master caught me swiftly. Otherwise, I might have been dragged into the sea and have no other choice but to let the big fish go." Elysia was also happy to see Sylvia's happy expression.
"But, wow, you've only been fishing for no more than three minutes and that's your first throw. This big fish is your first catch. Looks like we know who's the lucky girl here." Oceanid peered at the Space Bag in Nell's hand and gave an approving nod.
"I'll be catching something special later too. You all just wait. Ely, please share your bait like just now with me. I want to catch some fish too." Sylvia whimpered slightly at the request. She sat in front of Elysia and gave a pleading look.
"Sure, here." Elysia took out a box of tuna cutlets.
"Yay! Thank you. I know you the best, Ely, mwah." Sylvia received the box and gave a flying kiss with a wink.
"Ely, please share some with me too."
"Me too."
"I'm interested too."
The girls raised their hands to get a share too. They also wanted to catch big fish. And, of course, Elysia wasn't stingy about sharing.
Meanwhile, Vanessa looked to her net traps, then to the fishing bait box. She remembered that she and her master had bought a lot of food stocks of various variations for her. And this delicious fish cutlet was one of them.
Who would have thought that food for cats and tigers was also high in demand among the sparkling fish? Small slices of meat for big fish, a very profitable trade-off.
Elysia was not allowed to fish anymore because Elena forbade her. Therefore, she only asked the most knowledgeable about the underwater world. "Excuse me, what's the name of those sparkling white fish? You say that those fish are very delicious and only exist in this ocean, Sea God?"
"It's like you said. However, those sparkling fish don't actually have names. I just refer to them as sparkling white fish." Oceanid looked at the fish around him.
After that, he clapped his wing-like hands and made an announcement. "Due to their rarity, we will only hunt them for another thirty minutes, and without involving any magic at all. After that, we'll head to our next destination. Alright, everyone, good luck catching those fish."
"Eee!? I was just about to become a good fisherman. Thirty minutes is too short." Sylvia raised a protest, but she kept her hands busy for her first catch.
"I don't accept any complaints. With just the fish caught by Elysia, all of you can hold a feast. Thirty minutes is enough time for you to make the feast even more festive and big." Oceanid folded his arms with a determined expression.
With that, no one dared to raise their protest.
Elysia looked back to meet Elena's golden eyes. She still wanted to catch some of those fish as this was a rare opportunity.
Unfortunately, Elena responded with a shake of her head. "Just let them catch the fish. You just have to sit here with me."
"Okay." Elysia meekly nodded and leaned her body against Elena unconsciously. However, she blushed a little as two large soft pillows pressed against her back.
Even so, she sat quietly and watched everyone busily catching fish in their own way. She knew that Elena was palpitated because she was almost dragged by a fish into the sea.
"..." Elena didn't say anything and just hugged Elysia's tummy a little tighter. Her mood was being volatile for some unknown reason.
Rhea and Nell looked at each other. But the latter had some relief because Elena didn't punish her for any reason like the stated threat.
Rhea just shrugged her shoulders because it seemed like Elena was in a mood and needed some Elysia's comfort.
"So, how about your avatars, Sea God?" Rhea raised the topic of her concern.
"For that, almost all of my avatars, except the contaminated ones have returned to me. I no longer need to worry if I am being chased by the contaminated ones. However, I have an unsolved problem." Oceanid put his hand to his chin while thinking about something.
"Problem? What kind of problem?" Rhea tilted her head slightly.
"Two of my avatars didn't respond to my signal at all. They seemed to just disappear with only a faint presence signal. I don't know what happened to them, but I know they weren't contaminated with curse energy." Oceanid tried to check once again by sending his divine signal to his two avatars, but he didn't get any response at all.
"This is strange. Did something unexpected happen to your two avatars? What could possibly have happened? Have you gone directly to check on their signal points?" Rhea also felt it was an odd thing. Something had clearly happened to the Sea God's two avatars.
"Not yet, the Goddess of Blessings suggested to me, we'll only go to check it out when everyone is gathered." Oceanid shook his head. Then, he looked at the girls and little beasts who were busy catching fish. "Now that you, Elysia, and the Goddess of Light are back. So, we'll go check it out after this sparkling white fish catch event is over."
"I see..." Rhea just nodded and was silent. After some deliberation, she just went over and sat next to Elena and Elysia.
Nell was indirectly also carried away because she was on her big sister's shoulder.
After a few moments of fishing for sparkling white fish, their catch became quite a lot for a big feast.
Unlike the incident an hour ago where everyone only kept their catch individually, they now threw everything into one Space Bag as if it belonged to everyone.
"Wow, I'm a lucky girl! Turns out, I just picked the wrong bait." Sylvia laughed happily after catching her twenty-fifth fish.
"Hmph, I believe that." Yuuki rolled her eyes.
On the other side of the deep ocean where Elysia's group was, a half-fish creature was swimming happily toward the beautiful and calming ocean area.
There were also two similar beings following from behind as if they were guarding the one in front.
"The daughter of mine, why did you swim so fast just to go to the white coral reef? Can't you calm down a bit and take a leisurely swim with us?" The red mermaid with a golden trident laughed dryly.
"Hum-mm~ I've been swimming leisurely. It's just that you guys are just too slow, father, brother. Keep swimming, keep swimming~" The pink mermaid hummed and kept swimming as if she had no intention of slowing down.
"Father, we better go after that little girl. She's too careless and I'm afraid she's too oblivious to danger if she swims too far out of our sight." The blue mermaid suggested with some trepidation.
"Hahaha. Why are you so worried, the son of mine? This is the secret and hidden territory of our clan. No foreign party can infiltrate our territory. There is only our clan and the local sea dwellers who have never swam further than our Lorelei territory." The red mermaid laughed as he patted his son's back.
"It's not wrong to be on guard. You taught me that no place is safe in this world, especially at sea." The blue mermaid swam faster to catch up with his little sister.
"Well..." The red mermaid just shook his head. Then, he also swam faster.
"Eh?" The pink mermaid stopped to see a group of sparkling white fish that seemed to be fighting for something.
"What might they be doing, hm? It's rare enough for them to huddle and fight over something." Due to curiosity, the pink mermaid decided to go there to find out what was going on.
Meanwhile, the thirty-minute time limit was up. Sea God clapped his hands to remind everyone. "Okay, time's up. Pull all your fishing rods and net traps because it's time for us to go."
Of course, everyone nodded in understanding and did as they were told, except for one girl.
"Eh, wait a minute. I feel like I just saw a half-fish creature over there. That's not my hallucination, is it? It's a mermaid, right? Yes, it's a mermaid, a pink mermaid on top of all that!" Sylvia narrowed her eyes and exclaimed enthusiastically while pointing ahead.
Everyone naturally became curious about Sylvia's sudden claim. They looked in the indicated direction. Sure enough, there was a pink mermaid swimming closer and closer near the white coral reefs.
"Hehe, it's like I said earlier, right? We will definitely meet mermaids even though they are very rare and hard to find." Sylvia chuckled and puffed out her chest as if she was feeling proud.