Ocean Master

Chapter 139 - Speculations And The Reticular Activating System.

[You have eaten the meat of the Giant Squid: You have unlocked the basic profile information of the Giant Squid family.] 

[You have assimilated part of the Squid's magic essence: Your health points are slowly being restored at a rate of 10 HP/sec.]

Seeing this, a smile finally lit up Sebastian's sharky face since the encounter with the metal shark. He heaved a sigh of relief as this verified his theory about magic essence in Oceania creatures.

After a few minutes of digging into the Giant Squid's meat, it did not take him and Tosh much effort before they devoured the purple tier predator's meat.

After eating, Tosh asked for permission which he granted before going to a corner of another rock platform to sleep and rest. Though his participation in the previous battle was minimal, he still felt exhausted.

"I wish life can just be full of talking, talking and talking, instead of this hunting, killing, and getting injured. It's seriously so exhausting". Tosh muttered before drifting on into the sweet dreamy world of sleep.

Sebastian heard the shark's words but like before, he simply ignored it. As he spent more time with Tosh, he learned to just ignore his shenanigans as pursuing them would just give him a headache.

Though he felt tired too, Sebastian didn't drift into sleep like the other 2 sharks. He already saw enough of this world to be wary; he was ready to stay awake and act as the watch shark till both sharks woke up.

In his silent watch, a lot of things went through his mind, most dominantly induced by the battle encounter with the metal shark.

The strange metal shark, seeing it really shocked Sebastian so much that he didn't know how to react immediately which led to Shanks' current state. He was not too hung up on it though, that already became history.

On seeing the shark, the first thing that he thought was that it was a special machine created by Atlantians. 

This was more predominant after his previous speculations of the region where they found themselves being the base of operations of an Atlantian crew.

About the legend of Atlantis that he knew, he knew that it described the ancient city as a city that thrived technologically and magically so seeing a machine shark like this was not anything strange.

The only problem was that he knew that this metal shark was living. It was not a machine, but a living metal shark.

As his electroreceptors leveled up throughout his journey and as he got used to it, he discovered that through the electromagnetic signals, he could differentiate between a living and a non-living organism.

And this time, his electroreceptors said that the metal shark was living. This discovery boggled his brain so much which led to his slow reactions.

Is the Atlantis of this world so developed? Can they create living organisms? If they can, then doesn't that make them gods? From his memory, only a God could breathe life into an object to make it live.

All these speculations were so groundbreaking that he found it hard to believe himself anymore. Another speculation of his was that this shark had no relation to Atlantians.

After seeing so many strange predators in this world, his brain was more open to strange encounters. If there was a Necromancy King who birth the Death Dragons, why can't there be a Mechanic King who birth these metal sharks?

It felt absurd, but this was the only thing that he could think of after excluding the Atlantians. From his understanding of the little that the system revealed, Sea Kings were such monsters that any adaptation and mutation were possible to them.

The only annoying problem in his speculations was that he could not know if he was right or wrong, and it drove him nuts.

To prevent himself from flipping out and doing weird things, he forced himself to focus on another thing. After reincarnating into this world, he already found out that the longer he stayed, the more he was inclined to think like a shark.

Perhaps, if he still thought as fast, intelligent, and rationally as a human, the disaster of the metal shark would have never happened.

As an anatomist in his previous world, there was this scientific term that he got exposed to, 'the reticular activating system'.

This term was like the system that every sentient being was in control of and could use to regulate how their brain thought.

Through this system, sentient beings could consciously direct their brains on what to think every day. There were so many things that a sentient being encounter in a day that if the brain takes it all, it would literally explode.

That's why the reticular activating system was needed. Through this, the brain only sees and notices what the sentient being preferred.

After reincarnating as a shark, Sebastian already noticed that his reticular activating system was already changing with him, now filtering a lot of human things away to focus on the more shark-oriented things.

Things that he would have never missed as a human, he missed them now as a shark. And things that he might have never seen as a human, he could see them now as a shark.

For the shark clan, he already classified every shark there as a sentient organism. The ability to resist instincts, even to the mildest degree was what made an organism sentient. 

That was why he addressed Tosh and Shanks as he, not it.

The ability to create such an elaborate clan cave, put so many complicated facilities in place, and the system of shark points alone was all the evidence that he needed to confirm that his new friends or perhaps brothers were sentient.

In his previous world, they referred to humans as higher animals because of their sentient intelligence but he was no longer sure if in this world that would be still viable.

Perhaps, the only thing really separating the ruling Atlantians from the numerous creatures of Oceania was how sentient they were.

The sharks in the shark clan were sentient, but they were definitely not in that realm of being disciplined. Perhaps, it was because of that innate tameness and discipline in humans that enabled Atlantis to rule Oceania today.

As he thought, for some reason, he now wanted to meet the Atlantians.

With all these things thought of, his mind relaxed as he felt like a burden was suddenly off lifted from his shoulders. As he couldn't sleep right now, he started looking for things to think of.

Then, his brain immediately went to his new discoveries due to his panic and pressure induced by wanting to find a way to heal Shanks.

He perked up immediately because he was entering exciting territory.