Is That A Wisp?

Krune looked at the skin of the fish he recently killed, stretching it a bit to see its toughness. He then nodded as he muttered, "This can work."

Not long after doing that, he began stitching it on the platform he had made using the body of the worm-like fish, making it flatter and even. Unsurprisingly, he was slowly but surely turning it into a boat, little by little using the flesh, bones, and skin of the fishes he obtained. 

He was primarily using the bones of the large fishes he had hunted over the month to form the walls of the boat. He then filled them with the flesh of the fishes he had caught, those whose taste he didn't like but had obtained in excess. 

Once he made sure to fill in between the bones, Krune used the tendons of a couple of tough fish varieties to tie them together. He then sewed the skin of the fishes over them, giving the entirety a rigid texture.

It was a work in progress. It seemed like it would take him a lot of time before he would be able to complete the boat. Thankfully for him, as long as the structure remained in contact with the water, it wouldn't even deteriorate. 

The worm-like fish was 5 meters long and a meter wide. So, when he stitched its body together after eating some of its flesh and taking out some of its bones, it resulted in a platform that was around two meters in length and width. Surprisingly, it still maintained a meter in height. 

It wasn't elongated like a boat at all. Then again, Krune had no other choice. Hence, he decided to just build it accordingly. After all, it wasn't as if he had any intentions to row it. He wanted the weak waves to carry it forward, so he left the design as a simple square. 

To curb his boredom, Krune was constantly working. At times, he hunted whenever a school of fish came closer to the surface. At times, he just continued to swim while immersing his body in the water, banking on the beneficial properties of the water to heal himself faster. 

He couldn't remain in the water for too long, though. After all, he wasn't an aquatic creature. If he remained in contact with water for too long, his body cells would bloat up, turning them soft and weak, making it easy for him to get injured with the slightest touch. 

So, he had to remain on the boat for most of the day and dry himself under the sunlight. The sunlight that appeared with no source in sight did confuse him at the beginning. He did ponder about it for the first few days and nights. 

But after that, he quickly gave up on it, intending to focus on his survival first. He began to take it for granted, treating the sourceless sunlight as the norm. At present, he had created a small raised platform around the edges of the platform made with the worm-like fish. 

It spanned a height of 10 centimeters, with the ends covered by peeking bones. There were a couple of bones the size of his hand that he had taken out from some of the larger fishes. They served as the base for the walls of the boat. 

As he was idly pondering over the ways to better the construct, he noticed the number of fishes around him had increased all of a sudden. They were the very same type of fish that tried to bite him just now. 

They had a body spanning a meter in length, sporting a jaw at the front similar to a crocodile, able to clamp on their opponents. They were fairly dangerous due to the fact that their skin was tough. Krune had only fought against them a couple of times in the past month. 

In fact, it was their skin that he stitched on the outer surface of the boat construct. After all, they had the toughest skin among all the fishes he had encountered. 

"Usually, there aren't more than 5-6 that swim as a group," Krune frowned as he muttered to himself, feeling a sort of mental exhaustion where he didn't wish to think hard. His eyes faintly widened in surprise as he noticed the fishes increase in number, numbering past thirty. 

Most of them were swimming in the ocean above, seemingly in a hurry. They then leaped out of the ocean and plunged into the ocean below, hurriedly trying to escape. Even though it was daytime, Krune was unable to see anything beyond a depth of 10 meters. It had always been the same. 

Immediately, he tracked the direction they were fleeing from, facing his palm towards them as he unleashed his Neon Radiance. The neon beam he radiated illuminated to a depth of 20 meters, allowing him to inspect a greater range. 

He soon frowned as he saw more and more of the said fishes swimming about frantically.

"Damn it!" Krune leaped into the water and hurriedly paddled forth, swimming away as he saw a massive shadow appear in the ocean above. As the fishes jumped into the ocean below, it also followed suit, chasing after them. 

For the first time since he laid eyes on it at the start, the massive shadow appeared in the layer of water illuminated by the sunlight, causing Krune to gulp as his heart thumped in fear. He swam at a faster pace, bursting with all the strength left in him. 

As he had tied his two long weapons, the club and the pike on his hands, they were also dragged into the water as he escaped. Thankfully for him, they didn't constrict his movements too much, getting dragged in the water without much resistance, thanks to their streamlined shapes. 

Krune continued to paddle as he glanced over at the side, watching the figure of the massive shadow being illuminated by the sunlight. 

It was shaped like a whale, spanning a length of 25 meters and a width of 8 meters. Followed by a massive flap of its tail, it exited the ocean above and fell into the ocean below, causing a massive splash of water that displaced some of it into the ocean above. 

Krune frantically paddled with his limbs, struggling to move as he noticed his body was being pulled backward at an alarming pace, "No…no...nooooo!"

The humongous whale-like creature had opened its mouth, revealing a massive jaw filled with jagged teeth. Wriggling inside were tentacles that emerged from its throat, acting as feelers for the prey it would have caught. 

It had crashed into the waters right next to the school of fish it had been chasing. At the very moment it opened its massive mouth, it created a vortex as the water gushed right into it like a flood. 

The currents it created were so strong it pulled in all the fishes swimming away from it, including Krune that was ten meters away from it. Even though he tried to swim away with all his might, the vortex didn't seem to end. 

After all, the whale-like fish seemed to have evolved in such a way that it was able to filter out all the water instantly and eject it immediately, causing it to be able to maintain the vortex without its body bulging.

This turned it into a disastrous predator that could hunt for prey like an unending vacuum cleaner that searched for dirt. 

It seemed that the whale-like fish had considered Krune as its snack as well, moving a bit closer towards him. The increase in suction pulled in Krune, sending him flying into its mouth. 

Krune had no other choice but to comply, pulling his hands backward as he grabbed hold of his two long weapons. The current in the water was too powerful, preventing him from even reacting as he was sent in helplessly. 

While moving over it, Krune defended himself with the two long weapons, crouching as he defended his body, reducing the area of contact. Even then, he scraped himself a bit against its teeth. The force behind the currents even crushed the two long bones that he was depending on to defend himself. The whale-like fish's teeth were even stronger than the worm-like fish's bones.

In any case, he managed to survive. As for the other fishes that were pulled in along with him, all of them were on death's door after being cut by the whale-like fish's sharp teeth. Krune slammed into the back of its throat, grabbing hold of a tentacle within to prevent himself from being sent further inward. 

After sucking in all the fishes in the surroundings, the whale-like fish noticed the float and the boat Krune had created. They were made from fish, so in its eyes, it was food as well. It sucked in both of them, closing its mouth when it was done as it continued to swim away. 

"Ugh." Krune jumped and landed on the floor of the whale-like fish's mouth, dodging the boat that flew towards him. The water levels swiftly reduced until there was none within the chamber as Krune emitted light from his body, using it to look around. 

He noticed the injured fishes that were twitching on the floor, bleeding while suffocating. Without any water, they couldn't live for long. Moreover, the blood they shed was instantly absorbed by the surface.

Krune grunted, bleeding all over as he was also injured by the whale-like creature's teeth. The two long bones he had created had been destroyed into pieces. At the very least, they protected his life. He then looked to his side, noticing one of the fish twitch before turning still. 

It had suffered a gash on its stomach, one that almost severed it into two. Unsurprisingly, it swiftly died. Though, when Krune intended to pick it up to eat, a tentacle shot forth, latching onto it before pulling it into the throat. 

One after another, the tentacles picked up the dead fishes and sent them inside the throat. Moreover, thanks to the neon light he emitted, Krune noticed the tentacles acting weirdly before a couple of them spat out tiny spheres.

When he noticed what they were, Krune almost vomited out of disgust. Thankfully for him, his experience in the sea allowed him to build up a lot of resistance against the gore and wriggly-ugly. 

The spheres grew more than twenty legs each as they moved towards the fishes that were still alive and hadn't been injured at all. Upon reaching them, they revealed mouths that expanded greater than the width of their bodies, clamping on the fishes to kill them. 

It seemed to be an internal defense mechanism of the whale-like fish to kill all the prey it ate. And, upon seeing the alive Krune, they began to charge towards him.