Parang dove deeper toward the Hive, again and again.
The light, which had been faint below, grew brighter, clearer, and sharper.
After descending about 1 km, the surroundings were so bright it was hard to believe this was the deep sea.
“Thank goodness we’re in such a remote part of the ocean. If it were close to land, the damage would be unimaginable,” Parang said while tapping on their phone, fiddling with the camera settings.
They adjusted the brightness option to the lowest.
In the blink of an eye, the screen darkened, and the once-blinding light returned to being faint.
“This should be easier on your eyes. Your retinas are precious, after all.”
– Wow, that girl knows that
– Oh my
– See you
“If you think you’re the one who just typed that, go ahead and do ‘that’.”
Silence lingered until one chat appeared.
– The ocean is truly dangerous.
– Hahahahahahaha
– LMAO
“Keep it up until we reach the Hive.”
With that, Parang pulled something from their cartridge.
Sunglasses.
It seemed a stretch for Parang to endure the brightness of Drake Hive with bare eyes.
A short trip wouldn’t be a problem, but spending the whole day exploring was a different story.
They flipped their sunglasses on, and the atmosphere became something else.
In a black bodysuit glowing with blue neon, various devices attached to their arms and shoulders.
With the sunglasses on, they looked like they came straight out of some cyberpunk world.
Parang already exuded a mysterious vibe, which amplified the effect.
They continued to descend, further and further down.
They surpassed a depth of 2 km, and the viewers could finally glimpse the rough appearance of Drake Hive.
And it was clear that this sight shattered the viewers’ common sense once again; no need for explanation.
“This is Drake Hive. We call it the ‘graveyard.’”
True to its name, Drake Hive resembled a cemetery.
Something green, made from who-knows-what, sprawled out in squares, claiming to be grass, surrounded by walls.
This wasn’t the familiar Korean-style oxygen but looked like the graveyards from American movies.
But the insides were in complete disarray, as if someone had deliberately torn it apart or caused a ruckus.
Not a single gravestone stood properly, nor was there a single well-buried coffin.
The gravestones were all twisted or uprooted, scattered haphazardly.
Some were flipped upside down, while others piled up to create mounds.
What about the state of the coffins? It’s worse — some were visible on the surface, while others were completely out of the ground, standing upright or at odd angles.
And everywhere, on every coffin, gravestone, and throughout the ground, strange symbols spread out evenly.
It was as if someone had cast a spell; bizarre patterns in a riot of colors glowed brightly on everything.
They looked like letters, or pictures, or perhaps the traces of something crawling, twisted and sometimes straight patterns painted across the chaotic graveyard, glowing.
Getting even closer revealed the presence of monster fish.
Eels peeking out between gravestones, unidentified fish bustling around inside coffins, and snakes appearing and disappearing among the grass.
Cemeteries are usually eerie but also sacred spaces for honoring the dead.
So when a cemetery appeared so maliciously twisted before their eyes, some viewers expressed discomfort.
That only indicated how terrible the state was.
– Is this really pretty?
– It’s a bit off, isn’t it?
Yet, it remained a fact that the colorful and radiant light was dazzlingly beautiful. A handful of viewers even agreed with Parang’s comments about beauty.
– Well, it’s not a real cemetery anyway.
– I think it just looks pretty.
Parang ignored the chatter and continued down, reaching the cemetery.
Now, they had to find Marian’s body.
Fortunately, Drake Hive is on the smaller side among the hives. Unlike the East Sea, which required three days for exploration, it could be explored in just one day.
Of course, while small, it was still a hive. With that in mind, it meant spending the whole day would be necessary.
Drake Hive’s area is about a third of the Train Hive, approximately 13 square kilometers — about the size of four Yeouido islands.
From above, it didn’t feel that large, but standing in front of it, it felt impressively big.
Each of the resting tombs was almost the height of a building.
But the viewers were focused not on the overwhelming size of the hive but on something else.
– So what’s that? What’s glowing?
That was none other than the outlandish patterns etched across all of Drake Hive.
Now that Parang had descended to the ground, the viewers finally could see those inexplicable symbols up close.
Upon examining the patterns closely, the viewers concluded:
– What the heck is this?
– How is it even structured?
They had no clue, as their expectations of it being mere fluorescent algae or corals missed the mark entirely.
The reason? These patterns were absolutely not something that occurred naturally.
The patterns were burning.
As if the dry earth were cracking, the ground and tombs were split open, and the muffled sound of flames crackling erupted from within, sending sparks flying.
While viewers in confusion bombarded Parang with questions, tragically, Parang had no answers.
Of course, how could they? Parang didn’t know either.
The mystery lay in the fact that those objects, considered invincible in the hive, were cracked.
What burned within was also a mystery.
Was something even burning, or was it really burning? That too remained uncertain.
In Oceana, there are biologists but no geologists.
So it was just, “let’s wait and see.”
Parang honestly admitted they didn’t know.
The speed of the incoming chat surged wildly.
Yet Parang, strangely enough, was not focused on the chat.
They were looking at something else.
#
If something is glowing in the deep sea, look away.
If you keep your eyes on it, something bad is bound to happen.
This was true in almost all situations and something Parang had warned viewers during their broadcasts many times.
While not all monster fish that emit light exert mental attacks, it’s safe to say that every light-emitting monster attacks mentally.
So when light appears in the deep sea, the rule is to get out of there immediately.
“Just don’t go to the deep sea. You know what I mean?”
This line was always added afterward as a template.
One could think, ‘So is Drake Hive just full of glowing mental-attack monsters?’
Like how undying or ghost monsters appear in dungeons rich in negative energy, or golems in rocky areas.
However, that wasn’t the case. In fact, very few mental-attack monsters existed in Drake Hive.
This was mainly due to the very nature of a hive. An environment where mental-attack monsters struggled to survive.
Parang had explained this once during a broadcast.
And this tendency was even more pronounced in Drake Hive.
Why?
The answer lay unequivocally in the environment of the hive.
As Parang has repeated countless times, mental attacks by monsters usually occur through light.
And for a mental attack to take effect, the target must be able to focus on the light.
It’s easier to understand by recalling the cases of Galecus and Yuna.
But what if, just for a moment, Galecus emitted light in Drake Hive?
Then Galecus’s attack would face a critical problem.
Why?
Because the light wouldn’t be visible.
Blended among the strong and colorful lights around, Galecus’s light, along with that of other glowing monsters, would be entirely undetectable.
So much so that they couldn’t even discern if something was glowing or not.
Thus, the monsters that attack mentally using light get eaten long before, and the ecosystem of Drake Hive is dominated purely by monsters that rely on brute force.
Or monsters that exert tremendous mental attacks through means other than light.
“Hmmm…”
Parang gazed at a bizarrely wriggling eel monster in the distance.
While the viewers might not have noticed, Parang, having lived with monsters for years, picked up on it immediately.
That monster was currently enchanted. By the symptoms, it appeared to have fallen victim to Krino.
This was the very monster Parang had shown while interrogating Government Wen, Hwang Dahye.
If Krino was nearby, continuing the broadcast would be challenging. It seemed prudent to search at the outskirts and wrap up the broadcast.
Parang locked the screen to a first-person view.
This was a precaution to protect the viewers.
– Ugh, why the first-person view?
– This is not good.
The chat room, as expected, was in an uproar. After all, every time Parang locked the screen, it did not lead to a pleasant experience.
Yet, Parang paid it no mind. One day, they would appreciate Parang’s thoughtfulness.
If they didn’t, that was their loss.
“I’ll make sure you have a clear view.”
Parang rose slightly and swam over the grass.
By the way, this grass was 5 meters tall. Walking at the bottom felt like a stroll in the woods, with monster fish peeking out periodically from between the grass.
Regardless, exploration began.
Parang slowly moved through the archway and entered Drake Hive.
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