In the vast ocean, sunlight streamed down. As the light penetrated the water, its intensity gradually diminished with depth in the area before me.
Near the seabed, the light was dim, and the visible area greatly reduced. Beyond a dozen meters, it was a deep darkness.
This was still a near-shore area, not even reaching the edge of the near-shore region, yet the sea fish here had significantly increased in length and volume.
Many solitary sea fish were over a meter long, possessing sharp teeth and massive bodies.
As for the schooling sea fish, their numbers ranged from fifty to sixty, even reaching one to two hundred.
Most of them were full of sharp teeth; even a sea fish three to four meters long, if surrounded by them, would be reduced to a skeleton in moments.
Splash.
The surrounding sea fish suddenly scattered, swimming away in fright.
Whoosh.
A figure charged forward, seizing a large pomfret about a meter long. With a single bite, more than half of its body vanished without a trace.
It tore and devoured the pomfret's body with large gulps.
This was a Dusky Shark, commonly known as a tiger shark, over three meters long, with a spindle-shaped, powerful body.
It gnawed at the pomfret, its gaping mouth revealing multiple rows of sharp teeth that exuded a terrifying aura.
In just a moment, it had consumed most of the pomfret, leaving behind its large head and broken bones.
This pomfret weighed about twenty-two jin, and the part consumed was around fourteen to fifteen jin.
For a massive tiger shark, nearly three and a half meters long and weighing close to eight hundred jin, this pomfret was far from enough.
It slowly rose, intending to continue hunting.
But at this moment, the pomfret's head slowly fell.
Plop.
The fish head landed on a large, pitch-black stone, making a soft sound before rolling off and landing on the sandy ground beside it.
But in that instant, the black stone moved, transforming into a black shadow and shooting upwards.
Boom.
A massive body broke through the water, lunging at the shark.
"Hmm?"
Sensing the disturbance in the water, the shark immediately detected the other entity. Seeing its larger size, it showed no fear and instead charged forward.
It curved through the water, avoiding the black fish's head, and circled towards its flank, near the bottom.
The black fish, following the tiger shark's movement, slowly turned its body, but it was a bit slow, allowing the tiger shark to reach its side, less than five meters away.
Whoosh.
The next moment, the tiger shark shot forward like a sharp sword towards the black fish, aiming for its abdomen.
What does its large size matter?
This tiger shark felt no fear. It had caught much larger fish before; as long as it targeted a vital spot, it could easily kill them.
The tiger shark rapidly closed the distance, instantly reaching the black fish's abdomen, its massive jaws opening wide, ready to bite.
But at that very instant, the black fish's enormous body suddenly writhed. Its powerful form twisted, and its huge tail lashed out.
Bang.
Before the tiger shark could react, its tail struck its upper jaw. The immense impact caused its body to lurch.
In that moment of stagnation, the black fish twisted again, its body darting out, breaking through the water and charging towards the shark's flank.
How could it be as slow as it was just now?
As the tiger shark just managed to stabilize itself, the black fish was already by its side, opening its maw and biting into its body.
Crunch.
Its massive jaws closed, directly biting into the tiger shark's side.
The tiger shark, once bitten, thrashed its body, but its movements, combined with the black fish's closing jaws and body twists, directly tore off a large chunk of its side.
Bang.
A large portion of its body vanished instantly. The bitten area seemed to explode, and a mist of blood erupted into the seawater, small pieces of flesh drifting away.
As the blood mist rose, the tiger shark flipped over and lost all signs of life.
Gulp.
The black fish swallowed the torn flesh. Opening its large mouth, it lunged forward, biting again and tearing off another piece of flesh, which it swallowed.
The tiger shark's corpse slowly descended towards the seabed. The black fish followed closely, intending to capture it.
But the next moment, the black fish suddenly jolted, its body abruptly moving backward as it swam away into the distance.
Whoosh.
The black fish had moved four or five meters away when a swarm of deep blue fish surged forward, numbering two to three hundred. They instantly covered the shark's body.
Crunch, crunch.
The sound of gnawing echoed as the tiger shark's corpse disappeared at a visible rate.
These fish were entirely purple, mostly twenty to thirty centimeters long, but possessed sharp teeth and enormous mouths.
These purple fish swarmed the tiger shark's corpse to feed, but a small portion, about seven or eight dozen, pursued the black fish.
The purple fish approached the black fish, surrounding it and beginning to gnaw at its body.
Zzzip.
However, their teeth, upon touching the black fish's scales, couldn't penetrate at all.
A few of the fish attacked the black fish's belly, the connection point of its tail fin, and its eyes and barbels.
Click.
The black fish's belly was still covered in scales, thick scales that blocked the fish's bites.
The sea fish that attacked its head were met with a gaping maw.
Crunch, crunch.
Purple fish were bitten to pieces and swallowed, disappearing before its eyes.
With a single bite, the black fish consumed five or six purple fish. In an instant, over twenty purple fish vanished without a trace.
Splash.
The other purple fish in the distance, which had been surrounding the tiger shark, had already completely devoured its body and were now lunging towards the black fish, like a purple vortex.
Can't afford to mess with them, time to go.
Sensing their approach, the black fish didn't linger. It swam off into the distance, becoming a black silhouette and disappearing without a trace.
Some purple fish continued the pursuit, but after a hundred meters, they were all left far behind.
Phew.
The black fish swam until it reached a distance where the seawater gradually became brighter. It then entered a trench and submerged itself, hiding within.
These purple fish are really dangerous.
The black fish couldn't help but think. This was Xia Qiu, after evolving again.
At this moment, Xia Qiu's body length had approached four meters, and its weight exceeded 1200 jin.
Its head was massive, its forehead bulging high and extremely hard.
Its upper and lower jaws protruded, with a huge gape. Its mouth contained six layers of teeth; the front teeth were sharp, while the rear teeth were flat.
Six barbels, the longest nearly seventy centimeters, were distributed on the sides of its mouth, giving it a more sensitive sense and allowing for slight control.
Xia Qiu's physique had become more robust, no longer laterally compressed or oval-shaped, but fusiform. Even its underside was covered in black scales.
The scales had molted twice more. As the depth of the sea it entered increased, the light dimmed. The scales' transformation first went from silvery-white to dark gray, and then completely to black.
The scales were still ctenoid scales, but they were now much larger, each the size of an adult's palm, and extremely hard.
Xia Qiu's dorsal fin had become more muscular, with protruding, very hard spines that now possessed offensive capabilities.
Its pectoral fins were like scythes, and its tail fin was broom-shaped. Combined with its fusiform body, they provided powerful propulsion.
Now, Xia Qiu was immensely strong. As long as its size wasn't overwhelmingly inferior to a single opponent, Xia Qiu had nothing to fear.
Even a shark nearly five meters long could be killed by Xia Qiu.
However, the only thing that troubled Xia Qiu was small-sized but numerous schools of fish.
If the school's numbers were below a hundred, there was no need to worry. Even if it sustained some injuries, it could recover quickly.
But if it encountered a school of two to three hundred, it had no choice but to flee.
Like the purple fish just now, unique to the world of One Piece, they were very aggressive. Sixty to seventy could be handled, but two to three hundred meant it had to leave.
In this sea area, despite many dangers, Xia Qiu wouldn't face life-threatening peril as long as it was careful.
Yet, Xia Qiu felt a sense of boredom.
It had been in this world for a month and a half, growing from a thirty-centimeter fish to four meters.
The speed of its growth was incredible, even surpassing other sea fish it had encountered.
Xia Qiu had overlooked its own evolutionary speed and adapted to its identity as a fish.
But the thing it did most daily was travel from shallower waters to deeper areas, hunt, then return, digest, and rest, in a continuous cycle.
It was simply too monotonous.
Such a life held no hope, stirring no interest in continuing to live.
Xia Qiu wanted to communicate with others, to see the world, to witness more magnificent scenery.
Within Xia Qiu's heart, a desire for adventure slowly began to form, but the fear of danger extinguished Xia Qiu's thoughts.
Not strong enough yet.
Xia Qiu moved its body, concealing itself in the trench, and began to rest.
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Translation by: randomtranslator.com
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