Probably because the "Sun" pathway rejected other traits, this miraculous item had reverted to a pure Beyonder characteristic, separating itself out from the material that had carried it.
"To possess a demigod-level miraculous item... that Rear Admiral wasn't an ordinary man."
Silas gathered up the burning black arm bone as he thought this.
He glanced around. The steamship had burned nearly to nothing; anything with spiritual properties, he'd already recovered, and there was nothing left worth his attention. Hmm?
He suddenly noticed what looked like a few sheets of paper on the wrecked deck.
That was strange. The ship had just been bathed in intense sunlight; under that kind of heat the hull itself had caught fire. How could a few ordinary sheets of paper have survived?
Puzzled, Silas walked over and picked up the pages.
They were ordinary paper with no trace of supernatural properties, as if torn from some kind of tome. Written across them, line after line, was handwritten text in the Ancient Feysac script.
Silas read through them briefly and found that the content looked like some kind of holy scripture. But going by the knowledge he possessed as a Secrets Suppliant, what was described on these pages belonged to none of the seven true gods currently in the world, nor to any evil god or hidden existence.
If anything, it bore some resemblance to the holy scripture of the Church of the Eternal Blazing Sun, though it wasn't quite the same either.
I think I've seen these pages before... They were the wrapping around that Level 0 Sealed Item!
The scene he'd witnessed earlier quickly came back to him.
"What's wrong?"
Antia's voice drifted down from above.
The massive black three-masted sailing ship sat right alongside, making the steamship look like a toy in comparison.
The angel lady had her arms propped on the ship's railing, looking down at Silas, and seeing something odd in his expression, called out.
"It's nothing."
Silas came back to himself and said this, gathering up all the seemingly ordinary sheets of paper. These pages couldn't be that simple, he thought; he'd keep them safe for now and study them properly once he had the time.
With that, the wrecked ship had lost all remaining value. He caught the wind and returned to the black three-masted sailing ship.
---
The Sonia Sea, Black Lake Island.
At the center of the island, a gathering of sea kings and pirate admirals was about to begin. Around the venue, pirates under the command of Nast, the "King of Five Seas," kept tight watch, driving off the idle pirates who'd come to gawk.
None of them dared voice any complaint toward Nast's men; all they could do was stand at a distance, watching the processions of kings and admirals and gossiping freely among themselves.
"Is that the Blood Reverend, Alexander Gascoigne? Doesn't look like it. And why isn't he wearing the red robe?"
"Yeah, I heard his robes were dyed red with blood..."
"You bunch of idiots, that's not the Blood Reverend at all!"
one of the pirates mocked. "That's his first mate, Anderson Hood, the strongest hunter of the Fog Sea! Looks like the Blood Reverend is doing the same thing as the King of Immortality, staying off the ship and sending a subordinate to represent him at this meeting instead."
"Anderson of the Fog Sea, huh, I know him. Somehow that guy went from being a pirate hunter to becoming the Blood Reverend's first mate, a pirate himself now."
"Tch, 'strongest hunter' is just a title, doesn't even compare to being first mate to a sea king. That guy clearly has a brighter future ahead..."
The pirates kept arguing among themselves, but their eyes were all fixed on the distance.
There, a wide channel cut through the island, connecting the open sea outside to the black lake at the island's center.
The venue Nast, the King of Five Seas, had set up sat at the center of the black lake, and the channel leading to it was under tight surveillance; only his own fleet, along with the ships of the other sea kings and admirals, were permitted to pass through.
"Stop staring at me..."
Anderson stood on the deck of the receiving vessel, an easy, relaxed smile on his face, though inwardly his nerves had already drawn tight.
Representing an absent captain at a gathering between the sea's major powers put a great deal of pressure on him.
He'd already made up his mind not to express any clear stance during the meeting; he'd simply record what everyone said, and if pressed, brush it off with something like "I'll pass that along to the captain."
The escort fleet didn't linger long in the channel; some invisible rule seemed to affect the ships, and before Anderson could quite make sense of the shifting distances, the ship beneath his feet had already arrived at the shore of the black lake.
It was then he noticed a house standing on the shore of the black lake, with several oddly shaped pirate ships anchored in the water beside it.
Among them, unmistakably, was the Golden Dream, the ship belonging to Vice Admiral Iceberg, Edwina Edwards.
So the gathering place for the pirate admirals was separate from that of the kings?
Nast sure has a lot of rules...
Anderson felt a flicker of disappointment. He'd been hoping to get some support from Edwina, but it seemed now he'd have to rely on himself alone.
Groups of pirates were disembarking from their ships, sizing each other up warily. From a distance, he could hear the host's voice: "...For this gathering, the Admiral of Stars is absent due to unforeseen circumstances.
The Vice Admiral of Ailment has already been apprehended. Would the five admirals please make their way into the venue and take their seats..."
Heh, the Vice Admiral of Ailment getting apprehended, that was our fleet's doing...
Anderson thought to himself privately, as the ship carried him deeper toward the center of the lake.
"The Admiral of Stars didn't come? That's unusual."
The Admiral of Blood, Senor, chuckled softly, a faint trace of regret flickering in his eyes.
"She was always the most enthusiastic one before. Not sure what's come up this time that she'd miss even a meeting like this..."
"Senor, since when have you cared so much about her?"
The Admiral of Hell, Ludwell, asked flatly, his voice carrying through his mask, cold as a winter wind.
"Heh, it never hurts to know a bit more."
Senor answered, then turned his gaze toward the Vice Admiral of Iceberg beside him. "Like you, for instance. Seems you're rather close with that Blood Reverend's first mate?"
"...None of your business."
Edwina drew her gaze back from Anderson's retreating figure and answered calmly.
"I'm just curious. All of you, why do you think the King of Five Seas invited the Blood Reverend? And bringing his man into the gathering of kings, doesn't that suggest he might be planning to accept the man as the fifth sea king?"
Senor went on.
His topic carried real weight; the Vice Admiral of Dusk, the Vice Admiral of the Deep Sea, and the others all fell into thoughtful silence.
"That's not something we get to decide."
Ludwell said. "If you're really that interested, you could raise your own strength to demigod level.
Maybe then Lord Nast would think more highly of you too, and invite you out to the center of the lake as well."
His words were meant as mockery, but hearing them, Senor only smiled faintly.
"I do hope your words come true." he said.