Chapter 540

Chapter 399: Signal

“Hey! Costa, quickly check on the Deity follower fleet! They’re raising signal flags!”

Listening to Massimo’s words, Costa continued to gaze at the distant fleet. After a brief pause, he chose not to use his ability to observe and instead took out a small telescope from his pouch to look. Soon, he saw that the leading ship of the distant fleet had hoisted a combination of distinctively colored and shaped signal flags on its flag ropes. As a captain, Costa naturally understood the meaning of these signal flag combinations, which were inquiring about their condition.

Seeing the signal flags raised by the distant fleet, Costa couldn’t help but breathe a slight sigh of relief. Since the other side was patiently asking about their ship’s condition, it meant that his and Massimo’s identities hadn’t been exposed. The Church still didn’t know about the heretical anomaly on their ship; they were merely conducting routine inquiries about the accident.

“If this is the case, then we can still send them away…”

Costa thought to himself, then immediately turned to shout to his subordinates on the deck above.

“The Deity followers haven’t discovered our identity; they’re just asking us with signal flags after hearing the explosion. We can respond similarly to make them leave.”

“Bins! Have your people immediately arrange to hoist the flags in response! Tell them my ship has encountered a fault within acceptable limits and can be resolved on its own! Tell them not to waste time coming over.”

“Yes, sir!”

The first mate on the deck above quickly responded to Costa. Seeing his subordinate’s response, Costa relaxed and continued to gaze at the distant Radiant fleet. At this moment, he hoped that the fleet would immediately depart upon seeing their signal flags.

The sea conditions were ever-changing, and ships were extremely large and complex systems. Therefore, various malfunctions were common, and most could be resolved on their own, even if some looked quite serious. So, Costa’s response was reasonable. Generally, the Church would leave directly upon receiving such a response.

At this moment, Costa was already calculating. After the Radiant fleet saw his signal flags and left, he would attempt to restore the propulsion system of the Shining White Pearl, correct the course, and continue sailing toward White Tear Island.

If the propulsion system couldn’t be restored, then Costa would have to resort to his final measure—massacre! By slaughtering all passengers, he could find the thief K hiding among them, k*ll her, reclaim the Deep Blue Heart, collect enough food from the recently massacred ship, and escape with the Deep Blue Heart in a lifeboat to White Tear Island.

Although two thousand sacrifices were lost, at least the Deep Blue Heart remained. He could wait for the next opportunity. Though he and Massimo might face severe punishment, as long as the Deep Blue Heart was safe, the punishment wouldn’t be too unbearable. At most, it would be execution.

But if even the Deep Blue Heart was lost…

Thinking of the failure and the loss of the Deep Blue Heart, Costa shivered. In his mind, the Deep Blue Heart must be recovered; otherwise, the consequences would be unimaginable.

While Costa was contemplating this, the Radiant Church’s flagship on the distant sea hoisted new signal flags in response. Upon seeing the other side’s actions, Costa carefully scrutinized the new flags. However, when he finished interpreting the meaning of the new signal flags, his expression suddenly darkened.

On the Radiant flagship, the newly hoisted signal flags roughly indicated “Our ship and fleet will provide full rescue.”

“Full rescue… rescue what?! I’m telling you to get lost! Go as far away as possible!”

Seeing the model flags hanging high on the distant Radiant flagship, Costa couldn’t help but curse out loud. He didn’t understand why, despite clearly stating that they could handle the situation and didn’t need interference, they were still coming. What was this talk about “full rescue”?

Fuming, Costa almost grabbed the telescope, then looked up at the flag ropes of the Shining White Pearl. When he saw the signal flags hanging on the ropes, he froze in place.

The combination of signal flags hanging on the ropes now expressed a completely different meaning from what Costa had ordered—”My ship encountered a fault within acceptable limits and can be resolved on its own.” Instead, it conveyed an opposite meaning.

“My ship has suffered a severe accident, with fire and serious flooding. Abandon ship is required. Request rescue. Large number of personnel on board.”

Seeing the signal flags floating above him, Costa’s face turned pale. At this moment, what he most wanted to do was jump up and tear down the flag ropes to throw the d*mn signal flags into the sea. But reason told him he couldn’t do that. At this very moment, countless pairs of extraordinary eyes with enhanced vision were watching them from the Radiant fleet. Any abnormal movement on their side could result in the g*n turrets turning their way.

It was too late to change the signal flags now. If they hung signal flags with opposite meanings consecutively, it would be strange if they weren’t suspected. Once suspected by the Radiant, no one on their side might escape.

“Hey, Costa, what does their flag mean? You said something about rescue? Didn’t you tell them to leave? Not only did they not leave, but they seem to be moving closer!”

At this moment, Massimo, who was beside Costa, asked with confusion. Listening to Massimo’s words, Costa gritted his teeth and didn’t directly respond to Massimo. Instead, he shouted angrily at the deck above.

“Bins! What’s wrong with the flags you hoisted!”

Costa roared like this, but no sound responded after his roar. At this moment, Costa felt something was amiss.

“Something might have happened to Bins. We should hurry over!”

As he spoke, Costa quickly walked towards the deck. Although Massimo was somewhat confused, he immediately followed. Thus, Costa led Massimo up the deck and climbed to where the flag ropes were connected.

Then, in the cabin near the connection point of the flag ropes, he found the body of Bins, along with two other sailors’ bodies. Including Bins, there were three in total, all of whom were his Sea Abyss followers. Each had a horrified expression, wide-eyed and dead on the ground. Visible wounds were either around their necks or hearts. Initially, it could be judged that the three had been assassinated, killed with a single strike.

Looking at the scene before them, both Costa and Massimo couldn’t help but open their mouths in shock. They knew that among the three, including Bins, there was one Black Earth and two Apprentices. To silently eliminate these three, the opponent was an extremely professional assassin… Only a highly skilled Extraordinary Being of the Shadow could achieve this.

“This… This is… Did the thief K do this?”

“Mm… Probably so. Currently on the ship, only she could do this… It seems we were completely outmaneuvered. She not only calculated the arrival of the Church fleet, which destroyed the boiler, but also anticipated our plan to hang flags to make them leave. That flag wasn’t hung by Bins… It was hung by her… Bins had already been killed by her before…”

“Hmph… Completely played by her, that guy!?”

Costa clenched his fist and slammed it against the cabin wall, gritting his teeth. Just as Massimo was about to say something, he suddenly noticed something unusual about Bins’ body. One of Bins’ hands was tightly clenched for some reason.

Seeing this scene, Massimo frowned and squatted down. Then, he pried open Bins’ tightly clenched hand and unexpectedly found a button from clothing in his palm!