Second World

Jack placed the long metal bar in his left hand perpendicularly to the monster's mouth, so the two ends of the bar touched the black shark's upper nose and its lower jaw. In this way, the shark's mouth couldn't reach him for as long as the bar held. He was instead pushed back following the shark's charge.

At the same time, Jack stabbed the knife in his other hand repeatedly into the shark's face. Damage numbers appeared but a glance at the shark's HP bar told Jack that this knife's damage was pitiful.

He accumulated mana manipulation into the knife and performed One-word Thrust. The martial art accurately hit one of the shark's six eyes. This wound finally caused it pain. It stopped its charge and swam away.

Jack took the reprieve and resumed swimming to the cage. Luckily, the shark's charge was slightly at an angle. The charge had pushed Jack further up and closer to the cage.

Jack continued to monitor his surrounding using his mana sense while approaching the cage. The water up here was not as dark, so he could see better, and so did Naomi. Jack saw Naomi inside the cage turning wide eyes and pointing at something behind him.

Jack's mana sense also sensed it then. The black shark was back.

Jack swiveled back and used the same tactic. The long pipe again protected him from getting bitten. The charge this time slammed him into the cage. The force of the impact caused his metal pipe to bend. It couldn't perfectly stop the shark anymore.

The shark bit down at Jack's hand that was holding the pipe.

"Arrhh…!" The pain caused Jack to let go of the pipe. His HP also went down by almost thirty percent.

Jack slashed using One-word Slash powered by mana manipulation. He was again targeting the shark's eyes. He missed the eyes this time but the slash still forced the shark back.

Jack readied himself to face the shark again. He propped his back to the cage, ready to use the cage to push himself away when the shark came. He gripped his knife tight. This was the only weapon he had now.

The shark swam in a circle before coming at Jack again.

When Jack was ready to push the cage to dodge, the shark suddenly changed direction. It swam up. Jack looked in the direction it was swimming and saw a slice of bloody meat there. The first shark was still up there munching on another meat.

The others had seen the appearance of this second shark and now threw two pieces of meat at the same time.

Jack gave the ones up there a thumbs-up. He wasn't sure if they saw it, though.

His hand went into his pocket. He had a brief fear that the key had fallen out of his pocket during his brawl with the shark. He was relieved when his hand touched the hard metal key.

He took it out and went to the cage's side with the keyhole. He inserted the key while Naomi looked expectantly from inside the cage.

The key turning was slightly heavy, which made the process slow. Jack also found that he had to turn the key several times, not just one time like a normal key. He thought this must be intentional. The sick designer of this game simply enjoyed watching people struggle.

But without the sharks harassing him, it was only a matter of time until the cage was unlocked. A click was heard every time Jack turned the key one time. After ten clicks, one side of the cage finally broke open.

Jack gave the signal for Naomi to hurry. This time she understood the gesture.

But since Naomi couldn't swim, Jack had to carry her. The two headed to the opposite side of the pool from where the others were feeding the sharks.

On that side, Stefan was reaching for another meat but found his hand empty. He looked back at Winson who was in charge of taking the meat out of the ice box.

"There is no more…," Winson said. The appearance of the second shark increased the consumption of meat.

Stefan looked inside the water. He saw Naomi was already freed and the two were halfway to the surface already. But one of the sharks who didn't get meat was now heading toward them. From its speed, it might get to Jack and Naomi before they reached the pool's edge.

Everyone watched with apprehension as the black shark swam at high speed. Its massive and deformed dorsal fin cut through the water as the shark swam close to the surface.

Because Jack was carrying Naomi, his swimming speed was not fast. His mana sense hadn't sensed the incoming shark, but he saw it while swimming. He tried not to panic. But with him carrying Naomi, he didn't think he could make it to the pool's edge before the monster arrived.

When his mind was rushing for a solution, he heard a splash and saw something had fallen into the pool on another side.

It was Kramer! The boy had run to the side close to where Jack would be coming out from. He jumped into the pool and was now making big splashing waves to attract the shark.

Because Kramer was slightly closer, the shark turned to him instead.

'No!' Jack wanted to shout but couldn't since he was underwater. All he could do was tried his best to quickly bring Naomi out of the pool before helping Kramer.

Kramer saw the shark coming at him. Seeing his plan work, he quickly turned around to get out. But he underestimated his movements underwater. He couldn't move that fast. Even though he was still close to the pool's edge, it took him a longer time than he wished.

Panic set in. He turned back and saw the shark was only a few inches away. Its large mouth opened and was about to swallow his small body whole.

A hand suddenly grabbed his shirt. He then felt himself pulled by something with incredible strength. He was yanked out of the water just as the black shark arrived and slammed into the pool's edge due to its speed.

He fell hard on the floor. Still panting and edgy, he looked up at his savior.

It was Master.