Chapter 40: Leaving Crab Island

Arriving at the edge of the beach where the group of humans were fully focused on catching the sun crabs trying to hide by digging into the sand, Scaly began to slow down as she slowly began sneaking towards the wooden object that the humans had arrived on. Using all of her strength to resist jumping out to eat one of the delicious sun crabs scuttling across the sand in an attempt to find a good spot in the sand to hide from the humans.

After fighting her inner desires for a good five minutes, she managed to safely arrive at the edge of the beach where the wooden object was located and was just about to climb on board when she heard the sound of someone appearing behind her-

"Hm? What was that? I could swear I saw something by the ship just now… Did one of the crabs perhaps manage to escape into the water?"

Barely managing to dig into the sand and partially hide underneath the wooden thing that seemed to be called a ship, Scaly could not help feeling a shiver run down her spine as she peeked up at the human that had appeared beside the ship.

[Human, Great Axe Warrior, lvl 23]

Although she had no idea how strong the human was, she could clearly feel that he was far stronger than her. Especially when she noticed the massive axe that the human carried around with him.

If such a large weapon hit her, she had a feeling that her scales would pose no challenge as they would be cleanly cut through!

"Haaa… Whatever, a single one escaping doesn't matter." Not aware of the fact that he was being observed by a small lizard that had hidden beneath their ship, the human holding on to the massive great axe quietly let out a sigh as he turned around and left to catch more of the sun crabs.

Creak~

Seeing the powerful human leaving, Scaly immediately took the chance to dig into the ship from below. Soon finding herself inside a rather spacious place filled to the brim with different cages containing different monsters. Most of them being the sun crabs that she was familiar with.

[Giant Sun Crab, lvl 3]

[Description: The evolution of the normal sun crab. Far more delicious and difficult to find. Only a sun crab that had the chance to bask under the sun for 10 years has the rare chance to evolve into a giant sun crab.]

Spotting a particularly large sun crab among the many cages filled with sun crabs, Scaly couldn't help silently swallowing her saliva as she unconsciously began approaching it.

Just… Just a single one won't hurt… Right?

Convincing herself that the humans wouldn't notice a single crab missing, Scaly silently slipped inside the cage of the giant sun crab-

Ptsh-!

[Gained 200 Exp]

And before the larger counterpart of the normally small sun crabs had a chance to react, Scaly's sharp claws had already pierced through its head. Killing it in a single strike.

Chomp~! Chomp! Chomp!

Knowing that her time was limited, and she had to hide the evidence of what had happened before the humans returned to the ship, Scaly wasted no time as she chomped down on the far larger sun crab with a content expression on her face.

Not only did the larger sun crab give her far more exp compared to the smaller sun crab, but it also tasted far better than the smaller sun crabs. Truly a delicacy that left her wanting more after she finished the last bit of it.

Unfortunately, there was only one giant sun crab inside the ship. Leaving her to clean up the cage and find a place inside the ship where she could hide herself when the humans returned.

Creak-!

In the end, close to half an hour passed before she heard the sound someone walking on the wooden deck above-

"Hmph! Why is it always me who has to carry these things down here? Is it just because I'm the strongest?!"

And only a second later, the familiar axe wielding human appeared from a door at the end of the ship's inner compartment with several large cages filled to the brim with sun crabs while complaining to himself.

Bang!

"That should be it. Now we should have gathered enough for this month…" Muttering something to himself as he put down the cages with the sun crabs, the human with the axe wielding human turned around and left the place without bothering to look around the place. Clearly not fond of staying below deck for longer than necessary.

Creaaaak~!

Not even a few seconds later, Scaly felt the ship starting to move as it officially left the beach with the sun crabs and returned to the sea-

Pssss~

However, only a few seconds after the ship returned to the sea, the sound of water rushing into the ship could be heard.

Hm? That is… The hole I made?

Noticing the place where the water was rushing into the ship from, Scaly could not help tilting her head to the side with a curious expression on her face. Not fully grasping what was happening, as this was the first time she had ever been on a ship.

In her eyes, the water rushing into the ship was not something to be scared about. Instead, just a curious thing that was entertaining to watch during what she perceived to be a journey that would at least last take half an hour or longer to complete.

Psssss~

Like this, she observed the water slowly filling the space over the next half hour, as the weak stream of water coming out from the hole ended up becoming more and more powerful-

Craaack-!

Whhooosh!

Until the wood couldn't bear the pressure and broke apart, creating an even larger hole for the water to enter the space at a far faster pace compared to before.

Is… Is this perhaps a bad thing…?

It was also at this point that Scaly finally realized that it might not be a good thing for the water to rush into the ship…