Chapter 95: This Must Never Be Known by Anyone Else

After a brief hesitation, she still brought the mouth of the bottle to her lips. Faintly, she seemed to catch a whiff of the peculiar scent that belonged to her brother-in-law, and a trace of color actually rose to her otherwise pale cheeks.

Still, Qin Xin did not drink much. After only two sips, she meant to close the cap again, after all, no one knew when land might be found, and every drop of fresh water was precious.

Then, all at once, she made a move she had never expected of herself: she held the open bottle toward Song Yan's mouth. "Brother-in-law, you should have some too."

"Won't there be Xin'er's saliva on it?" Song Yan teased.

"No, there isn't." Qin Xin's cheeks burned even hotter.

"Ah, what a pity." Song Yan said it half in jest, half in earnest, then took the bottle, drank a sip, and returned it to Qin Xin. "Keep the water safe."

Qin Xin took the bottle by instinct and shot him a glare. "Brother-in-law, you're teasing me again."

"Ha ha!"

Song Yan burst out laughing, and there was even a hint of smugness in his laughter.

Hearing him laugh, Qin Xin felt both shy and indignant, yet the gloom in her heart was driven away by his laughter. For a moment, she looked at Song Yan with a dazed expression. Even trapped in such a desperate situation, he could still keep this kind of composure. Truly remarkable.

Night fell, and a sky full of stars appeared overhead.

The churning waves gradually quieted as well. Aside from the sound of Song Yan's swimming and their breathing, everything around them fell into a profound stillness.

They swam on for a while when Song Yan's gaze suddenly fixed on a direction, and his expression darkened.

"Xin'er, hold tight to me," he said in a low voice.

"Brother-in-law, what happened?" Qin Xin's tone turned panicked. She did not think for a moment that he was asking her to hold him for any frivolous reason.

"Several sharks have come, but they're nothing to worry about," Song Yan said calmly. He stopped using his hands and swam only with his legs to keep his balance.

The sound of water splitting the dark came to them, and the three sharks had already drawn within less than a hundred meters.

Eighty meters.

Sixty meters.

Fifty meters.

Closer.

"Go!"

With a sharp command, Song Yan sent the bronze flying sword streaking out like lightning. In an instant, it pierced straight through the skulls of the three sharks.

Immediately, a great deal of blood gushed from their heads.

"Let's go!"

After recalling the bronze flying sword, Song Yan infused true essence into his limbs. At once, his swimming speed increased tenfold.

The smell of blood would draw more sharks, so they had to leave this area as quickly as possible.

Seeing Song Yan straining to swim, Qin Xin's heart, for reasons she could not explain, tightened with a sudden ache. In a soft voice, she said, "Brother-in-law, why don't you leave me and escape on your own?"

Smack!

Song Yan slapped her firm little bottom and chided her, "What nonsense are you spouting? Do you think your brother-in-law is that kind of person?"

"Brother-in-law, you..." Qin Xin blushed fiercely. "You're taking advantage of me again."

"Heh heh."

Song Yan gave a mischievous laugh and said nothing more, continuing to swim.

At last, after half an hour, Song Yan's speed began to slow. In those thirty minutes, he had at least covered over a hundred miles; he should already be beyond the sharks' hunting grounds.

But just when he began to relax, his skin tensed again, because he felt that the water beneath him was somehow not quite right.

A thought flashed through his mind, and he activated his clairvoyant power to look beneath the surface. To his shock, he found a colossal creature already less than a kilometer away, and from the look of it, he and Qin Xin had become its target.

"Go!"

He once more unleashed the bronze flying sword, sending it straight at the beast.

The creature's entire body was covered in dark black scales, but even that could not withstand the sharpness of the bronze sword. With a soft sound, it pierced into the creature's head. Worried that it might not be dead, Song Yan manipulated the sword to shred the inside of its skull into a bloody ruin.

After retrieving the sword, he resumed swimming.

But at that very moment—

"ROAR!"

A furious bellow, brimming with colossal rage, burst from beneath the water, shaking Song Yan and Qin Xin's eardrums until they buzzed.

"Brother-in-law, what was that?" Qin Xin asked in terror.

"I don't know."

Song Yan shook his head, his clairvoyant gaze still fixed on the seabed.

A monster tens of times larger than the one before was shooting toward them like lightning.

The creature he had just killed was already a giant, as tall as a two-story building and with a body dozens of meters long.

But this roaring beast was at least as tall as a ten-story building, and its body stretched hundreds, nearly a thousand meters.

"Damned it, what is this thing? No, we can't stay on the surface!"

Song Yan acted decisively. He released the bronze flying sword, enlarged it tenfold, then carried Qin Xin on his back and leaped aboard.

"Let's go!"

With a thought, the flying sword shot diagonally into the sky.

"Ah, brother-in-law, how did we start flying?" Qin Xin exclaimed in utter astonishment.

Boom!

At that moment, a pillar of water at least ten meters thick erupted into the air and slammed straight toward Song Yan.

Song Yan's expression changed abruptly. The power of that water column had already surpassed the full-force strike of the ninth level of the Innate Realm, and he was so alarmed that he quickly controlled the sword to dodge aside.

But to his surprise, dozens more water columns shot up around them in succession, blocking every path of advance and retreat. At the same time, an incomparably powerful force of suction rose from the sea, dragging him and Qin Xin downward by sheer force.

Below them, that monster had already opened its vast, dark maw, waiting for them to throw themselves into its jaws.

"To hell with you!"

Song Yan cursed under his breath and activated his spatial stasis power.

The instant the power was unleashed, a pocket of space formed around them, and that irresistible suction vanished along with it.

"Go!"

Spatial stasis lasted only three seconds. How could Song Yan dare waste even a moment? He drove the flying sword upward with all his strength, sending it tearing into the heavens.

Three seconds later, space returned to normal. The giant beast, finding Song Yan's figure gone, let out several earth-shaking roars of fury toward the sky.

Now already several thousand meters above the sea, Song Yan cast a lingering glance down at the beast below, his heart still pounding. Then he continued urging the flying sword onward, transforming into a streak of cold light racing into the distance.

That beast's strength had far surpassed the ninth level of the Innate Realm; it had probably reached the Foundation Establishment stage. He had never expected that such a terrifying creature could still evolve in this world.

"Brother-in-law, is the giant sword beneath our feet a magic treasure?" Qin Xin asked curiously.

The Mountain and Sea Divine Palace could also forge magic treasures, but the ones they made came in only two kinds: one for offense and one for defense. They had nothing like this bronze flying sword, which could both attack and fly.

Moreover, in this world, the power cultivated in the middle dantian was not as pure as true essence. If one used such energy to drive a magic treasure, at most only thirty percent of its power could be brought out.

Song Yan nodded. "Yes."

After flying several hundred miles, Song Yan lowered both his altitude and speed, and used his clairvoyant power to search for islands.

Unfortunately, his luck was truly poor. He had exhausted the true essence in his lower dantian completely and still had not found a single island.

Hastily, he popped several Nourishing Essence Pills into his mouth and switched to controlling the sword with his middle dantian. Since the flying sword had already been exposed, Song Yan was unwilling to give up without finding an island.

At last, heaven did not fail the earnest. Just as the true essence in his middle dantian was about to run dry, he finally saw an island.

At once, his spirits lifted, and he increased the speed of the sword.

Thank you for the tips from Flowing Rogue Lord and td83141167.