The Eternal Farmer: I Trade My Harvest for Immortality

Chapter 300: Demon Dragon Boat

Fortunately, Jiang Chen wasn’t a greenhorn on his first dive. He wasn’t paralyzed by the residual terror radiating from the colossal demon dragon skeleton. He kept a steady hand on the wheel, smoothly piloting the Demon Wood Boat closer to the fossilized behemoth.

As the distance closed, the sheer, crushing pressure emanating from the ancient apex predator grew suffocating. If any other deep-sea creature had stumbled into this abyss, they would have fled in absolute, instinctual terror.

Jiang Chen, however, acted as if he were pulling into his own driveway. He casually glanced toward the spot where he had previously salvaged the lightning-struck wood. Seeing that the area had been completely picked clean, he turned his full attention back to the massive dragon skeleton looming ahead.

Just then, the deck of the Demon Wood Boat beneath his boots violently shuddered.

Before Jiang Chen could react, the artifact autonomously initiated its primary offensive protocol. Thousands of thick, root-like wooden tendrils violently erupted from the hull. They shot through the water like harpoons, tightly wrapping around a section of the fossilized ribcage.

The roots immediately began to churn and pulse. The boat wasn’t attacking the skeleton; it was eating it. It was methodically breaking down the fossilized calcium and residual draconic essence, siphoning the energy back into the hull.

Jiang Chen raised an eyebrow, genuinely surprised, but not alarmed.

He knew the Demon Wood Boat possessed a rare, heaven-defying trait: Devour and Grow. Essentially, the artifact could consume high-tier organic or spiritual matter to force its own structural evolution.

What truly surprised him was that the boat considered the hyper-dense, fossilized demon dragon skeleton to be edible. During his first expedition, the boat hadn’t reacted to the skeleton at all. Perhaps his own recent Cultivation breakthroughs had finally supplied the artifact with enough latent Qi to attempt such a massive digestion process.

Regardless, Jiang Chen wasn’t complaining.

Leaving the skeleton to rot in the abyss was a complete waste of resources. If the Demon Wood Boat could successfully assimilate the draconic essence, it might unlock new passive effects or even a unique combat ability.

The only downside was the speed. Breaking down a thirty-three-meter dragon skeleton was a monumental task. Based on the current rate of absorption, Jiang Chen estimated it would take at least an hour to finish the meal.

Not wanting to sit on his hands, Jiang Chen stepped off the deck and into the freezing black water.

If he possessed a Water Spirit Root, he could have casually cast a water-repelling seal and simply walked across the abyss floor. Lacking that, he had to rely on his dense physical Cultivation to push through the crushing pressure as he swam toward the rear of the skeleton.

Reaching the massive tail section, he found exactly what he had seen on his first dive: a dark, sprawling subterranean cavern stretching out behind the dragon.

It was a massive, naturally formed aqueduct leading deeper into the bedrock. Where it went, he had absolutely no idea.

Any hot-blooded protagonist in a Cultivation tale would have immediately drawn their sword and charged blindly into the unknown cavern seeking fated encounters. Jiang Chen, however, possessed a hyper-rational survival instinct.

Factoring in the unknown depth, the crushing water pressure, and his lack of a Water Spirit Root, he made the only logical decision: he turned around and swam back to the boat.

He missed the absolute security of the armored hull.

Returning to the deck, he settled in to wait. As the hour passed, the colossal demon dragon skeleton was systematically dismantled and devoured until absolutely nothing remained of the ancient beast.

As the skeleton vanished, the Demon Wood Boat underwent a violent, terrifying metamorphosis.

The hull completely shed its wooden, organic appearance. Thick, heavy layers of biological armor erupted across the deck. They formed into massive, interlocking dragon scales, each the size of a man’s palm. The edges of the scales gleamed with a razor-sharp, silvery-white metallic luster.

At the bow, the wood twisted and sharpened into a massive, spiral-grooved dragon horn. Deep within the grooves, a sickly, emerald-green flame constantly flickered and danced.

At the stern, a massive, muscular dragon tail sprouted. Supported by three thick, articulated vertebrae, the tail was webbed with translucent, highly durable membrane.

Finally, a complex, pulsing network of crimson veins—looking exactly like a biological circulatory system pumping liquid blood—spread across the entire exterior of the ship.

The artifact had completely transcended its wooden origins. It had become a biomechanical nightmare.

Jiang Chen immediately pulled up the System interface to check the new specs.

Artifact: Demon Dragon Boat

Effect 1: Top-grade Wind Control

Effect 2: Top-grade Water Repelling

Effect 3: Top-grade Sturdiness (Dragon Scale Armor)

Effect 4: Devour and Grow

Special Effect 1 (Apex Predator): Automatically locks onto the exact coordinates of any active Demonic Aura within range.

Special Effect 2 (Dragon’s Breath): The bow-mounted horn can discharge a concentrated blast of Draconic Flame.

Special Effect 3 (Phantom Scales): Engaging stealth mode turns the entire hull semi-transparent, rendering it nearly invisible to the naked eye.

Jiang Chen let out a low whistle.

Assimilating the skeleton hadn’t just changed the boat’s aesthetic; every single base stat had been upgraded to the absolute Top-grade threshold, and it had gained two lethal offensive and stealth capabilities.

“Coming back to the Black Dragon Pool was the smartest thing I’ve done all year,” Jiang Chen muttered, a deeply satisfied grin spreading across his face.

The massive skeleton was gone. In its place rested a sleek, biomechanical pleasure barge shaped exactly like an apex predator.

“With this kind of firepower,” Jiang Chen noted, running a hand along the pulsing crimson veins of the rail, “I probably won’t even need to draw a weapon down here.”

With a focused thought, he commanded the Demon Dragon Boat forward.

The artifact shot into the dark cavern. The moment it moved, Jiang Chen noticed a drastic change in the hydrodynamics. The water didn’t just part around the hull; it actively fled, as if the ambient environment was terrified of the draconic aura radiating from the scales.

Furthermore, the newly grown, webbed tail at the stern acted as a biological propeller. It violently whipped back and forth, propelling the massive vessel at terrifying speeds while generating almost zero acoustic turbulence.

From the outside, it looked exactly like a resurrected demon dragon silently hunting through the abyss.

The boat plunged deeper and deeper into the uncharted aqueduct.

For the first few miles, there was absolutely nothing. Just endless, crushing black water. Not a single plant. Not a single fish.

The absolute barrenness put Jiang Chen on high alert. The total absence of prey usually meant a terrifying apex predator had claimed the territory. Even heavily armored inside the Demon Dragon Boat, he couldn’t afford to be arrogant. This was the deep Black Dragon Pool; anything could happen.

After descending roughly two thousand meters, the narrow cavern abruptly ended, opening up into a sprawling, subterranean expanse.

Jiang Chen stared out the viewport in shock.

It was an underground sea. The dark, nutrient-rich water stretched out endlessly. And unlike the barren tunnel, this sea was teeming with life. Massive, bizarrely shaped deep-water fish lazily swam through the gloom.

“Wait,” Jiang Chen muttered, doing the geographical math in his head. “Did this tunnel just connect the Black Dragon Pool directly to the Black Lake?”

He quickly dismissed the theory. The compass coordinates were completely wrong. While the water shared the same dark, heavy consistency as the Black Lake on the surface, this was undeniably a separate, massive subterranean reservoir.

While the fish swarming outside weren’t the priceless, glowing Dragon Carp, their sheer size and pristine, deep-water environment guaranteed their meat would be incredibly tender and rich in ambient Spirit Qi.

Jiang Chen rubbed his hands together, his pragmatic, farming instincts taking over. “This is perfect. I just dug a massive, empty lake in my personal space. I need water, and I need livestock to balance the ecosystem.”

Why bother spending Spirit Stones buying fry at the market when he could just poach an entire ecosystem for free?

He pulled out the Hydro Orb and channeled his Qi. The artifact flared, generating a massive vortex that began violently siphoning millions of gallons of the black water—and any fish unlucky enough to be caught in the current—directly into its spatial reservoir.

While the Orb drank the sea, Jiang Chen kept the Demon Dragon Boat moving at a slow, exploratory crawl.

Minutes turned into an hour. He still hadn’t seen the bottom of the sea, nor had he spotted the opposite cavern wall. The scale of this subterranean reservoir was truly staggering.

Feeling the Hydro Orb reach its absolute maximum capacity, Jiang Chen paused the exploration.

With a thought, he vanished from the bridge of the boat, instantly reappearing hovering high above the newly excavated lake in his dimensional space.

Down below, the five original Dragon Carp were swimming in tight circles, looking up at him expectantly. They clearly thought it was feeding time.

Instead of a shower of Top-quality Spirit Rice, Jiang Chen inverted the Hydro Orb.

Whoosh!

A torrential waterfall of heavy, black water violently crashed into the basin, instantly flooding the lakebed. Caught in the deluge were dozens of the massive, subterranean fish he had just poached.

The five Dragon Carp scattered in panic as the torrential black rain battered the surface. But the moment the dark, nutrient-rich water settled, their panic turned to sheer, unadulterated ecstasy. The black water perfectly mimicked their original, deep-sea habitat.

They darted through the expanding lake, playfully chasing the newly introduced fish, looking happier than they had in months.

Jiang Chen watched the water level rapidly rise. Emptying the entire Hydro Orb had only managed to fill the massive lake to twenty percent capacity.

“It’s going to take a few more trips to fill this thing,” Jiang Chen noted, mentally adjusting his schedule.

Before teleporting back to the real world, he casually tossed a massive handful of Top-quality Spirit Rice into the lake, ensuring the new arrivals were well-fed.

With a flash, he reappeared on the deck of the Demon Dragon Boat, deep in the subterranean sea.

He walked to the bow, looking out into the gloom to determine his next heading.

Suddenly, his eyes narrowed.

Looming out of the darkness, standing entirely alone on a jagged, submerged plateau, was a massive, ancient stone tablet.

Faint, glowing characters were carved deep into the weathered stone.