Four people clutched their muskets tightly, and led by the glowing stone, they walked slowly and quietly into the depths of the tunnel, only stopping when they reached a giant passage that drained into the Coco River. The water flowed quickly below, and it was about a meter deep; they paused their steps here, not rashly moving forward.
"Boss, shall we go down?"
Upon hearing the question from behind, the leading man gestured with a quiet "shush" and then gently tossed the stone out. The stone hovered in midair, glowing once again, but this time, it wasn’t the walls around them that flickered with purple light but the rushing waters below.
"It’s right beneath the water!"
The boss’s pupils contracted, and he immediately raised his musket and fired a shot downwards,
"They’re right beneath us!"
After their shot, a gigantic blue crab suddenly burst out of the water beneath. A female, clothed in some kind of seaweed garment, clutched her abdomen in agony, visibly bleeding pale blue blood.
The woman in front of them had long pink hair, and looked somewhat like Lingna, sharing around sixty percent resemblance, only the crab part of her was much larger and stronger, and deep blue spots were beginning to grow on her face.
She gritted her teeth, gave a pat to the big blue crab beneath her, and the crab suddenly lifted its body, sending a jet of water and foam towards the Hunters above.
The Hunters’ rings on their hands suddenly lit up with a flash of light, and from the rings, illusory threads burst forth, pulling them down from the tunnel while they fired at the demi-human and the crab below.
The musket shots sparked like fireworks against the huge crab’s hard shell. While they didn’t penetrate, they obviously caused great pain to the giant creature,
The female riding atop the crab almost tumbled down due to instability, but she had too many wounds, most of them from musket bullets. She was at her limit and tried to command the big crab to leave, but countless illusory threads had already entangled her and the crab beneath.
"Huh, is that crab below not a demi-human? Why is there only one?"
"How should I know? The other one hid in its arms earlier, and we didn’t mark it with the tracer round; no idea where it’s run off to..."
As the demi-human below could no longer resist, the boss of the Hunters heaved a sigh, jumped down, shone a light on the female demi-human struggling within the threads, then curled his lip and said,
"Doesn’t matter, we’ll just take this one back... Kill that crab; it’s too big to carry."
"Don’t you dare kill Haru!"
Just as his men were about to make a move, a young, naive voice echoed from the tunnel above, but by the time they looked up, a figure had already plunged down from the tunnel, the silver blade on his hand sweeping through the illusory threads like a tail in midair.
He cut through some of them, but many more shot out from the different Hunters around.
At the same time, countless Light Blades, like bees, sprang from the hands of the figure, disrupting the Hunters trying to draw their guns.
In just a brief encounter, by the time the figure stood atop the big crab, all four Hunters had simultaneously fallen into the water.
The newcomer was Fisher.
"Wait a second! Buddy! Hold up!"
In the water, the Hunter quickly gestured a sign of surrender, struggling to stand up from the bottom, and started to negotiate with Fisher,
"Buddy, this matter with the Hunters is all about money! If you can top what we’ve found with these two demi-humans, we’ll concede. How about this, we’ll split the bounty evenly, you take one hundred fifty thousand euros, and we four split the remaining one hundred fifty thousand, okay?"
Thinking Fisher was a Bounty Hunter who had come upon the news, and seeing all four couldn’t beat Fisher, the boss made a quick decision and tried to ease the atmosphere.
Fisher glanced at him, not intending to attack, and said,
"You guys can go, these two demi-humans won’t be taken by you today..."
The boss was slightly startled but forced a smile while raising his hand and motioning with his eyes to his partners and then slowly backed away,
"Alright, alright...life is more important than anything; what you say goes, we’ll leave through the waterway behind..."
Fisher watched the other party quietly, making no extra movements.
As the man walked away, he spoke out, and the light was thrown into the water, causing the boss’s face to slowly blur and become unclear.
"Buddy, by rights, those two demi-humans were our find, and I’m already being more than fair by offering to split it with you... I didn’t expect you to be so rapacious, coveting all the money... Do you understand that three hundred thousand is an amount for which we would give our lives?"
From above the tunnel, Lingna’s warning voice came, but before the sound reached, Fisher had already moved.
Behind him, a Hunter pulled out a very small musket from his bosom and aimed at Fisher. As the gunshot exploded, Fisher had already dodged.
But behind, another brawny man shouted and charged at the crab, firmly grabbing Fisher to prevent him from any further action.