Arthur held the ship in a bottle in his hand, watching it bob steadily inside, he couldn't help but recall the past.
When he was young, he would go to sea countless times with his father, sitting on his family's small sailboat.
Once, on a bright morning, their little boat reached a bay where his father would fish to supplement the household income.
His father was a lighthouse keeper, and that salary wasn't enough to support a wife and child.
The Sea King's mother might have been the Queen of Atlantis underwater, but she was an unemployed wanderer when she skipped work to the land, without even legal status.
And little Arthur was almost of school age, all of which required money.
People living by the sea had only one solution, to rely on the sea.
"Father, look quickly, there's a new bay over there."
Arthur sat on the bow deck of the small boat, pointing excitedly to a golden patch of the sea and shouting to his father.
But his father, who was steering and preparing to anchor, just shook his head: "We've fished here before, it's just the sunlight making it look different, this isn't a new sea region."
Arthur was a bit disappointed, he looked at the sea under the bow, where the golden glints of light illuminated his face.
"I want to sail like the sailors of old, those kinds of journeys where you don't know what you'll discover."
His father patted Arthur's head, knowing this was merely a child's fantasy.
He was a lighthouse keeper, a fisherman, and a sailor; he wasn't going to foster any groundbreaking thoughts or artistic ethos in the child.
He chose to tell the child only the facts.
"Our ocean is only this big, everything has been charted on the maps, Arthur, there's no longer any unknown sea regions, in fact, Earth offers no more... surprises?"
As he spoke, Arthur's superpower activated.
He wanted an unknown sea region, spoke to the sea, and countless schools of fish answered Arthur's call.
Countless whales and dolphins, even sharks and sea turtles, surrounded their small boat, began to swirl underwater, welcoming a Prince of Atlantis, the son of the sea.
Arthur didn't quite know what was happening at the time, he just pointed at the big fish in the water for his father to look.
"Dad, we've got fish! Can't we still find an unknown sea region?"
But his father knew, ever since he picked up his mother from the seashore years ago, that over these years, Arthur ultimately exhibited the traits of the Atlanteans.
His father had no intention of casting nets, he couldn't take Arthur fishing anymore, these fish below weren't to be caught.
So he didn't answer Arthur's question, and Arthur never got an answer to his question from him again.
................
The tremor of the stealth plane landing brought him back to reality, the landing caused a slight displacement, and the ice layer below was not very firm.
Diana jumped off the plane, surveying her surroundings in the cold wind.
There were some strange circular marks around, as if huge cylindrical ice blocks had been taken, leaving only big pits.
Firestorm stated that he would scout from the air, fully aware of his second-line hero status, which meant that when acting with the top-tier giants, he had to take the initiative to play a supporting role.
"It has stopped acting." Arthur placed the bottle in his hand, extending it to Diana.
"We're close, the target is nearby." Diana tugged at her cape, her breath forming a white mist in the air: "I know Poseidon's trickery, all the pirate treasure maps are like this, finding the island where the chest is buried is easy, but to find out exactly under which tree the chest is, you'll have to search slowly."
Arthur shrugged, being the son of a sailor, how could he not have played pirate games?
He had even seen quite a few real treasure maps, indeed, just like Diana said, the treasure location is either marked with a skull or a pair of bones, and the topographical description is always imprecise.
Firestorm descended from the air, hovering in front of the two, he took a look at a few large pits, discovering what lay below.
"Guys, this is a graveyard of ships, all frozen beneath the ice layer."
"Here? You do know that even though Antarctica is covered with ice and snow, it's still a continent, right?" Sea King scratched his beard, the warm breath causing it to freeze slightly here.
Firestorm spread his arms, one of his hosts is a university professor after all, such an obvious thing couldn't possibly be unknown to him?
"I'm well aware, and with Antarctica's average elevation being 2350 meters, it's the highest continent on Earth, but this is the reality, if there really wasn't an unknown eighth ocean once upon a time, then someone must have dumped these ships here."
Diana nodded, Firestorm's second hypothesis seemed more plausible, they indeed had been dumped here.
She approached a deep pit, leaned over and peered below, under dozens of meters of ice, was a half-destroyed galleon.
If the gods wanted to dump ships on the Antarctic continent, they could do it, though she now knew they were all ancient sorcerers, their powers were still formidable.
If Poseidon wished, he could use a tsunami or giant waves to wash any ship from any corner of the Earth to the top of Mount Everest.
However, now that Deathstroke replaced Hecate with the Inverted Man, what effects this would have, even Diana couldn't say.
The energy stored within Hecate remains, it hasn't been retrieved yet. She can vaguely sense some shadows, but for now, she cannot use them.
As for her divine power, it's still there, and using it doesn't seem to incur any cost, which she finds strange.
What is this? Because magic power has merged into the bloodline, has the Inverted Man temporarily let her go?
Diana temporarily casts aside these confusing thoughts and focuses on the task at hand.
She looks at Sea King, who is clearing ice from his beard, and Firestorm, who continues burning without producing any heat, and explains the reason for their presence.
"I once heard of this place, it's a legend to me as well." She touches her ear: "It is said Poseidon hid the key to the Tomb of the Gods in the belly of an ancient ship."
Sea King furrows his brow and turns his ear as if he hasn't heard clearly: "The tomb of what?"
"The gods, those truly killed or forgotten, it's their netherworld." Diana sighs, unsure how to continue: "I even think that place might not be in our cosmos."
"Wait, I thought gods couldn't be killed, just losing a human host or something... Is Poseidon truly dead?"
Diana rolls her eyes, knowing Mera's hardships, but explaining everything is quite exhausting.
"That was the case before, but now it's clear our enemies have found a way to kill gods, ha, Deathstroke even schemed to kill a cosmic concept, and the Justice League is still treading water."
Sea King observes Diana's expression and decides not to ask further, he thrusts his trident into the ice next to him, leaning to look into a few holes below.
"There's Maori people's rafts, and Nazi submarines, they're all here. What exactly are we looking for?"
Firestorm points to several hundred more large holes, Wonder Woman is clearly in a bad mood, but he explains: "If I'm not mistaken, you're also looking for a ship with a mixed style of Atlantis and Amazon."
Sea King understands, his rugged face showing some excitement: "So the strange building we found on the ocean floor, with both Amazon River and Atlantis styles, is Aryan's villa?"
Firestorm smirks: "Actually, that's the starting point for the deduction of what kind of ship to look for... But interpreting it that way is fine."
Just then, it seems Batman has finished some surgical business, he contacts Sea King via the Justice League communicator.
"Arthur, report your progress."
Arthur glances at the large pit beside him, there are at least a thousand ships from different eras, needing excavation and search beneath the ice, while Diana's face seems as lifeless as a zombie.
"Actually, Batman, I'm now 'as if falling into an ice cave.'
..............
Batman expressionlessly cuts off communication, Arthur has learned idioms, this needs to be noted down.
Learning idioms equals learning Chinese, learning Chinese equals starting to understand Chinese culture, where in the process might one see books like The Art of War.
From this, Batman deduces Arthur's intelligence might grow, he needs to be prepared for some necessary steps...
Though that matter has low priority, he hasn't been idle while Deathstroke and his group are in action.
He has calculated the location of Luthor and others' lair, and dispatched the 'rapid response' team consisting of The Flash, Superman, and Heroic Adam.
The three are now near Indonesia in the Banda Sea, on a tropical island called Honest Island.
It was originally just an ordinary island, dense forests, and a mountain range.
But later, some things emerged from underground, it's uncertain what they are, maybe Molten Titans, but ultimately died there.
Since then, some lava-formed elemental creatures began appearing on the island, they have low intelligence, very dangerous, calling themselves the Volcano Race.
Currently, Superman and others are being besieged by the Volcano Race, extremely hot lava being wielded or sprayed by those fiery elemental creatures, used as weapons to combat the heroes.
Superman shattered some of the volcanic people, but more are emerging from the volcano's magma.
"Look, more enemies are coming out of the giant corpse's stomach." Superman points to the giant corpse assimilated into a volcano with the volcanic crater right in the stomach area.
Barry quips: "Your description is quite disgusting."
Batman contacts them: "Superman, status report."
"Could you give me a second? We're a bit busy right now." The three are surrounded by hundreds of scorching stone elements, defeating them is essential before any further investigation.
Batman is silent for a moment: "Okay, I've given you six seconds, report now."
For the combination of Superman and The Flash, along with Adam flying at light speed in the cosmos, that time is more than sufficient.
Hundreds of volcanic people have already been smashed to bits, the heroes reached the vicinity of the volcanic crater, using scientific instruments and superpowers to trace the Destruction Legion's whereabouts.
Barry searches the entire island, seeing no obvious leads with the naked eye, he responds to Batman's question during his downtime.
"Things are 'hot and bustling' here, hehe."
Batman merely squints his eyes, why has idiom speaking become trendy recently?