105: Delivering your package 3,000 meters away from your face! During a category 17 typhoon!

"Distance to target... three thousand meters."

In modern naval warfare, this distance is practically equivalent to a face-to-face kiss.

Under normal circumstances.

If two hostile warships met at this distance, their radar warning receivers would have been screaming like stuck pigs long ago.

The trajectories of missiles and artillery would weave an airtight net of fire in the sky.

But at this moment, there was only a deathly silence—of course, this "silence" was relative.

To the outside world, this was the ultimate cacophony.

Gale-force winds of eighty meters per second, carrying hundreds of millions of tons of seawater, played a symphony named Destruction upon the sea.

The roar of crashing giant waves reached a hundred and forty decibels, enough to drown out the growl of any engine in the world.

The black iron ghost traveled through this chaos.

It didn't struggle to cut through the waves like a conventional warship, nor was it tossed up and down mercilessly by them.

Wrapped in the faint blue light of [Fluid Control], the pitch-black warship seemed to transform into a giant drop of mercury.

It followed the rise and fall of the waves, gliding silently through the deep valleys of thirty-meter-high swells.

When a wave crest powerful enough to crush steel came crashing down.

The blue force field would guide the water, letting it slide as gently as silk past the sides of the hull without kicking up even a single unnecessary splash.

No cavitation noise.

No wave-making resistance.

It blended perfectly into the storm, becoming a part of the ocean.

"This feeling... is too eerie."

Inside the Command cabin, Old Chen looked at the hull attitude data displayed on the holographic screen and couldn't help rubbing the goosebumps on his arms.

Even though a churning hell lay just outside the window.

Walls of white foam roared frantically just a few meters away, yet the interior of the ship was so stable that not even a cup of coffee would spill.

This extreme contrast gave one an unreal sensation, as if walking on the edge of a dream.

"This is the best camouflage."

Jiang Ran sat in the command chair.

His hands hovered in mid-air, seemingly fine-tuning the Biological Force Field surrounding the ship through a nerve interface, as if he were playing a piano.

"At this distance, their passive sonar can only hear the roar of the ocean."

"For a sonar operator..."

"...distinguishing a ship with absolutely no cavitation noise that moves with the ocean current from a hundred and forty decibels of frantic background noise..."

The corners of Jiang Ran's mouth curled up slightly, revealing a coldness unique to a hunter:

"That is harder than hearing the buzz of a mosquito's wings at a heavy metal rock concert."

On the screen, the giant red dot representing the "ship" was pitching violently with the huge waves.

It was like a giant there, dead drunk and vomiting uncontrollably.

It was completely oblivious to the assassin who had already quietly slid to its feet and was aiming a blade at its femoral artery.

"Keep fire control radar silent."

"Preheat the main gun's electro-optical targeting system."

Jiang Ran stared at the red dot, his voice as gentle as if he were coaxing a child to sleep, yet carrying a lethal chill:

"Since they can't hear us, we'll walk right up to them and tap them on the shoulder."

"Give them a surprise."

..."Bleargh—!!!"

Inside the twenty-thousand-ton "ship" Amphibious Assault Ship, a nauseating, sour stench filled the air.

With every strike of a thirty-meter-high wave...

...this steel behemoth would let out an overburdened groan, then be tossed up and dropped violently like a roller coaster.

In the sonar room, Petty Officer First Class Zhao Liang gripped the vomit bag fixed to the table, feeling as if he were about to throw up even his bile.

His face was sallow, and his forehead was covered in cold sweat.

Through his military headphones, the clear underwater background sounds of the past were gone.

Instead, it was a performance of death metal played by the impact of hundreds of millions of tons of seawater.

"Zzz... Boom... Crash..."

That continuous, hundred-and-forty-decibel white noise made his eardrums ache and felt like his brain was about to explode.

"Damn it... how much longer is this hellish weather going to last..."

Zhao Liang looked up, cursing under his breath.

He suddenly saw an extremely discordant peak pop up on the waterfall display in front of him, which was otherwise filled with static.

That... was an anomalous signal.

It was less than three kilometers away from the ship, within the so-called "absolute defense perimeter."

"Sir!"

Out of professional instinct, Zhao Liang subconsciously wanted to press the alarm button, but his trembling finger hovered in mid-air as he hesitated.

The signal was too strange.

It had no propeller cavitation noise, no engine vibration frequency, and not even the sound of metal cutting through the water.

It was like a giant ghost, or... "Another false alarm?"

The tired and irritable voice of the Sonar Supervisor came from behind him.

The usually dignified officer was also leaning against the wall, trying his best to suppress the urge to vomit.

"Report... I saw a transient echo."

Zhao Liang pointed at the peak on the screen that was about to disappear and said uncertainly:

"Distance three thousand meters, bearing 095. Large volume, but it's moving."

"Three thousand meters?"

The supervisor glanced at the screen, which was almost entirely garbled data, then looked out at the giant waves capable of swallowing skyscrapers and let out a scoff:

"Soldier, use your brain."

"In these sea conditions, even a nuclear submarine wouldn't dare surface to that depth."

"As for surface vessels... ha, unless it's a ghost ship, it would have been smashed to pieces by these thirty-meter waves long ago."

"But..."

"No buts. That's the echo of a rogue wave's impact, or a false signal reflected off undersea rocks."

The supervisor waved his hand impatiently; the spasms in his stomach made him just want to end this meaningless conversation:

"Turn up the threshold."

"Filter out this damn clutter."

"Stop bothering me with these neurotic reports; the officers on the bridge are busy praying this ship doesn't capsize."

"...Yes, sir."

Zhao Liang bit his lip and withdrew his finger from the alarm button.

He also felt it was impossible.

Common sense told him that no man-made object could survive eighty-meter-per-second hurricane winds and thirty-meter waves, let alone perform a stealthy infiltration.

It had to be an illusion, a ghost created by the ocean.

So, he tapped a few keys on the keyboard.

"Signal determination: Sea clutter."

"Processing method: Filter out."

As he hit the enter key, the peak representing death on the screen vanished instantly.

The sonar room returned once more to that unchanging, despair-inducing, noisy white noise.

They didn't know.

At the very moment they personally erased that signal, the Grim Reaper had already crossed the final threshold and raised his scythe... "Everyone, wake up! Hard to port! Steer right into that wave! Don't let it hit the broadside!"

Inside the spacious bridge of the "ship," the Captain's hoarse roar even drowned out the sound of the wind outside.

He gripped the handrail tightly with one hand and wiped the cold sweat from his face with the other, his eyes bloodshot as he stared into the pitch-black chaos ahead.

This wasn't a battle; this was survival.

Inside this twenty-thousand-ton steel behemoth, everyone was like an ant in the stormy waves.

Every nerve was strained to the point of breaking, just to survive the next second under nature's wrath.

As for vigilance?

Don't be ridiculous.

In conditions where even searchlight beams were instantly scattered by the gale and radar screens were whiter than the vision of a snow-blind patient.

No one would care if there were enemies around.

Unless that enemy came riding a dragon.

"What... what is that thing?"

A Lookout who was struggling to wipe the condensation off the porthole...

...suddenly seemed possessed, pointing at a patch of darkness to the front right, his voice trembling out of tune.