Dragon 3: Tide of the Black Moon (1)

"No, we are not that rash. Since everything is just speculation, the safest way to go before having a more definite conclusion is of course to survey the underwater robots remotely. But every time the underwater robots approached that seabed they lost control, and we recovered the underwater robots to find their circuitry inexplicably fried. This added to the evidence that what was on the sea bed was a dragon embryo, because legend has it that ancient dragons would unfold some kind of field to protect themselves during the hatching process, and those who stepped into their field would experience fatal hallucinations. Biologically speaking, hallucinations are all down to the fact that the cerebral cortex is stimulated, and the easiest thing to stimulate the cerebral cortex is electricity."

"Is it the field of the embryo that makes the underwater robot's circuitry burn out?" Manstein said.

"That's what we think, but we don't want to send anyone down there yet. If it was indeed the embryo's field that fried the underwater robot's circuitry, then its stimulation of the cerebral cortex would be quite frightening, and although all of my students are of 'A' blood, I'm still not sure they can counter the embryo's field. In the illusion created by the dragons, only the most strong-willed hybrid species can maintain their sense of self, but where there is a gap in the mental defenses, they will be overwhelmed by the illusion. This has all been documented in the archives of the Secret Party." Schneider said, "But this time the school board intervened, they ordered us to dive as soon as possible to confirm the target, they reasoned that they could not sit around and wait for the embryos to hatch, at this time something had to be done even if it was risky."

"The dive was a resolution of the school board?"

"Yes, today they sent you to stop the Dragon Abyss plan, back then they were the ones who made the Greenland plan."

"Under pressure we made the dive plan, we procured the most advanced diving bell of the time from Germany, it was a kind of all-metal diving equipment, metal is an excellent conductor of electricity, it can form an electrostatic barrier, it should weaken the influence of the embryonic field. Everyone on the dive team was wrapped in a fine metal mesh all over their bodies and given oral neuroleptic drugs. They were all of the finest hybrid species, and we felt that with full armor they should be able to resist the interference of the embryonic field. And there are six people on the dive team, so if one person has a situation, the other five can forcefully take him out. To kill that dangerous embryo, we also made special underwater rifles for the dive team, using bullets ground from the Sage's Stone, that kind of weapon is deadly to dragons.

"Although it was a dangerous mission, the trainees were excited, the young people were fearless and the opportunity to get up close to the dragon embryo was as exciting as the chance to visit the Kingdom of God.

"The weather was unexpectedly good on the day of the dive, and the six members of the dive team went down in three diving bells, with me providing support from the ice. Initially, everything went well, the currents were calm, the marine life was calm, and they even observed beluga whales. But when the depth reached 170 meters, the leader of the dive team suddenly shouted in surprise over the communication channel that they saw a door. This was very strange, because the seabed in that area was 300 meters deep, and their depth was 170 meters, meaning they were still 130 meters from the bottom, and the visibility at the bottom was very low, when they saw the door, could it be that the door was suspended in the middle of the seawater?

"I was alerted and worried that they had blundered into the embryonic realm and were starting to hallucinate. They were talking excitedly about the door in the communication channel, which was a total violation of the communication rules. They should not be talking in the communication channel, underwater communication must be short and clear to avoid misunderstanding. I ordered them loudly to stay away from the door. I didn't know if the door existed, but my gut told me it couldn't be opened. But they did not respond to my call at all. All I heard was their rapid breathing, interspersed with strange murmurs, like someone chanting some kind of scripture in an extremely deep well, sighing as they did so. Then the leader of the group said in a tone of awe, 'Open the door! The door is open!' But then the group leader suddenly said, 'No! Don't go in!' Then there was a lot of gunfire the dive team fired underwater rifles, and the sound of paddling and the sound of rebreathers, which indicated that the dive team had left the diving bell was fighting something, and the situation was very confusing, and someone was shouting in the channel, but because of the current interference, I couldn't hear it clearly at all.

"I originally instructed the dive team never to leave the diving bell, because the electrostatic barrier in the diving bell is their important protection, but why they disobeyed my order, there is still no perfect explanation. Five minutes later the communication was broken and we could no longer receive signals from the depths of the icy sea. I decided to forcibly recover the diving bells, which were safety cables connected to the icebreaker. But we retrieved the safety cables, only to find that they had been cut, with dive knives, and judging by the fibers at the break, the same dive knives we had issued to the dive team. They had cut the safety cable themselves.

"I just went crazy and decided to dive to rescue them myself. There were no more extra diving bells, but I was confident in my fitness and I could dive to 300 meters deep without my harness. I dived to a depth of 170 meters and reached the waters of the accident, but I did not see the door nor the bodies, the water was clean, with no trace of blood, but in the communication channel, I heard the sound of gunfire. At that time, the surrounding water temperature had fallen below zero degrees, is too cold seawater, this water as long as a little stirring will quickly freeze. That's when I suddenly became aware of something right behind me, and it kept swimming silently after me!

"Originally with it so cautious predator would not be detected by me, but the super cold water was stirred up by me and froze extremely fast, within seconds I saw a thin film of ice open up in front of me, reflecting the spotlight on my diving helmet, and I saw black shadows in the thin ice, like totems on ancient frescoes! It was so light, with its long, thin tail swinging slowly in the seawater, like a butterfly flying without making a sound. That's when the spotlight stopped working because of the low temperature and it was pitch black around me, I thought I was going to die, the embryo suddenly hatched and it was the one that killed my students! It was right behind me, and I was so close to it, yet there was nothing I could do about it. One becomes extraordinarily bold in desperate situations, and I suddenly remembered that I was still holding a Russian-made APS underwater assault rifle."

"The special underwater rifles were given to the dive team to use. What I was holding was just an ordinary aps with ordinary bullets loaded in it. But since I had an app I couldn't just sit back and wait for it to happen, I turned and fired blindly into the darkness and I smelled the strong smell of blood and I did wound it!"

"How could aps wound a dragon type? That thing can only be used against frogmen, it can't even kill a bigger shark." Manstein said, "And 170 meters is well beyond the applicable depth of apps."

"I don't know, but there was a strong smell of blood coming in from the edge of the oxygen mask, and I had no wounds on me, so it could only have been the dragon that was injured," Schneider said.

"I could feel it right in front of me, I was face to face with the wounded dragon type in the darkness, very, very close, but I couldn't see it.

"It spat at me, and in an instant, my oxygen mask cracked to pieces, and the cold stream with the dragon's blood rushed into my airway, as if directly into the depths of my soul, and I lost consciousness. At this point, my companion on the ice noticed that I was no longer responding to calls and activated the recovery system, and the safety cable raised me to the surface. When I came out of the water, I was frozen in a piece of sea ice weighing several tons, like a frozen fish sold in a supermarket.