The night was heavy with salt and mist. The waves crashed against the Perupalem shore like the heartbeat of the Earth itself, slow and unending. Inside the dimly lit control room of the nearly completed CosOcean facility, Dilli stood facing the wide observation window. Behind him, his father and great-grandfather waited silently, sensing that what was about to be said would redefine everything they thought they knew about their boy.
The soft hum of the generators filled the pauses between the roaring waves. Dilli turned, his young face illuminated by the blue light of the holographic projection hovering between them — a rotating model of the Earth.
"Father… Tathayya," he began, his voice steady, almost solemn, "the purpose of CosOcean isn't just to build ships or design navigation systems. Those are only the sails — not the wind that drives them."
Gadhiraju frowned slightly. "Then what drives it, son?"
Dilli's hand moved through the hologram, zooming in on the deep blue expanse covering most of the planet.
"This," he said. "The ocean."
The room fell silent except for the whisper of the tide outside.
"Seventy-one percent of our planet is covered by water," Dilli continued, his tone turning sharp with conviction. "And yet, humans fight over the twenty-nine percent that is land — mining it, drilling it, killing each other for it. They've mapped every street, every valley, every inch of desert. But this—" he pointed again to the glowing blue expanse— "this remains almost untouched. Ninety-five percent of it unexplored. Ninety-five percent of Ocean that no one truly owns."
Tathayya leaned forward, his wrinkled hands gripping his cane. "You mean to explore it? That's not easy, Dilli. Even nations fear what lies beneath."
Dilli smiled faintly. "Exactly. That's why it's mine to claim."
Gadhiraju exchanged a stunned glance with the old man. "Dilli… what do you mean by claim?"
"The land has too many eyes on it, Father. Too many kings fighting for the same crown. But the sea—" Dilli's voice dropped to a whisper— "the sea keeps her secrets. She hides what mankind has lost, what it never found, and what it has not yet imagined."
He gestured again, and the hologram shifted to display shipwreck sites across history — glowing dots scattered across every ocean.
"Three million shipwrecks," Dilli said softly, his eyes gleaming. "Three million vessels swallowed by time — each carrying wealth, gold, artifacts, and secrets. The total estimated value of what's lying in the ocean's graveyards? Over a hundred billion dollars. And that's just the known wrecks."
Gadhiraju's lips parted, speechless.
Dilli went on, his words now flowing like the tide — calm but unstoppable.
"And then, there's the unseen wealth — the dissolved gold in seawater. Scientists estimate over two quadrillion dollars' worth of gold floating in the ocean — untapped, unreachable. But one day, with the right chemistry, the right engineering, and the right machines — I'll pull it out."
He turned to face them fully now, his small frame outlined against the moonlit window. "The land gives less and costs more every day. But the ocean gives everything if you know how to ask."
Tathayya exhaled slowly, the lines on his face deepening. "Dilli, do you realize what you're saying? You want to challenge nature itself — to rob the sea of its secrets?"
Dilli's gaze softened, but the fire in his eyes did not. "Not rob, Tathayya. Understand. The ocean is not chaos; it's order we haven't learned to read yet. I'll build ships, submersibles, and oceanic stations not just to sail the surface, but to descend beneath it — to build machines that can think, breathe, and move like the creatures of the deep. To filter the ocean — not for fish, but for fortune."
Gadhiraju slowly sat down, his expression torn between awe and disbelief. "Dilli… you're talking about something no empire, no navy, no nation has ever achieved."
"Because they all feared the cost," Dilli replied. "But fear doesn't build futures — it buries them. Everyone is fighting over the 29% of land, while the 71% of the Earth — the real kingdom — lies waiting. I'll build CosOcean to conquer the world no one dares to claim."
The old man chuckled under his breath, shaking his head. "You're trying to eat a mountain with a mouth the size of an egg, Dilli."
Dilli smiled faintly. "Maybe, Tathayya. But if the mountain is made of gold… even an egg-sized mouth is enough to start."
The wind howled outside as lightning flashed over the sea, casting the three generations in a single silhouette against the storm-lit glass — the dreamer, the doubter, and the witness of a destiny too vast for the land to contain.
And as the thunder rolled across the waves, the name CosOcean etched itself not just into the walls of the laboratory — but into history, as the seed of a revolution born from the depths.