Chapter 282: Uninvited VIP Guest
Translator: imperfectluck Editor: Pranav
The Military Sword Strait received its name for being long and narrow, shaped just like a sword. Its water currents surged at high speeds and sheltered numerous low-lying corals beneath the sea that could wreck any ship. Still, if this was a normal situation, there would be endless ships sailing to and fro in the Military Sword Strait. It was a sea route necessary to conduct sea trade with the Bardi Empire. Golden opportunities were here to be had.
The Military Sword Strait was also known as the Strait of Silver to the merchants who traded on these sea routes. One could double their personal wealth by conducting only three years of business along this route. Much profit could be gained.
Going west after passing the narrowest point of the straight would take you to the Mage Country, where you can buy and sell all sorts of magical ingredients and products. Going east would take you to the countries of the New Moon Alliance as well as numerous ports in the Bardi Empire. Simply transporting the local special products along this trade route was highly lucrative.
But the changing political situation in the Bardi Empire caused there to be much fewer ships sailing this strait. After the New Moon Alliance was conquered and annexed into the Bardi Empire, trade became profitable no longer. Another reason was that a battle between the Mage Country and the Bardi Empire might explode on the sea that separated them. It would be too pitiful to get accidentally caught up in the crossfire of such a fire, becoming cannon fodder.
However, this relatively peaceful area of the sea wasn’t quite so peaceful today. A medium-scale sea battle was occurring here. Yet neither side had anything to do with the main countries controlling this area.
Yep, they were neither from the Bardi Empire nor the Mage Country. It was a pure coincidence that they happened to be battling here.
One side involved two tremendous sea beasts. If Roland had been here, he would have recognized one of them, as she was an old familiar face. She was a seven-headed dragon that was glowing blue all over, while the other sea beast was a ridiculously strong and huge sea giant.
By now, you’re probably able to guess that this was that Queen of Storms who was always around, famously petty, and never able to let go of a grudge. In fact, she was basically half a God of Revenge in her own right.
Not only did these two sea beasts transmit her enmity, but they were also mediums for her divine power.
The Seven-Headed Sea Dragon’s heads roared at the sky, while the ethereal figure of the Queen of Storms appeared intermittently on the largest dragon head. She was currently summoning a storm to aid herself, and the sea giant was treading upon the ocean waves. Every time he smacked the sea with his gigantic battle hammer, a large wave over ten meters tall would smash into his opponent.
Currently battling with the two sea beasts were two gigantic combat airships. One was mostly constructed out of iron and steel, with fully outfitted mage towers and engineered cannons shooting endless amounts of cannon shots and magic spells. Meanwhile, the hydra skin around its deck was glowing but its use seemed to be in suppressing the wind and the waters. When the Seven-Headed Sea Dragon witnessed this scene, its eyes on all seven of its heads became blood-red. It let out an endless roar and even made the waves one meter taller than earlier. Its crazed state made it seem as if it had met the slayer of its father.
Alright then. Technically, there probably was some sort of connection. Nine-headed hydras were an evolved form of Seven-Headed Sea Dragons, and just based on the Borealis’s hydra skin and heart on its deck alone, that would probably make for a huge grudge between the two.
Top-level magical beasts were rare to begin with. Many of the same species would have some type of relation with each other. Judging by how much of a fervor that Seven-Headed Sea Dragon had worked itself into, perhaps that nine-headed hydra really had been its father or husband.
Since the Borealis was here in battle, it would be only natural that the other battling combat airship was its brother airship, the Mizar.
“Sigh, so difficult to deal with.”
On the deck of the Borealis, Marsolit, who acted as the entire command system for the Borealis, had a calm expression. He gave his commands in an orderly fashion and calm voice that echoed throughout the entire Borealis. Meanwhile, the temporary airship fleet commander, Pierre Papin (Runa Papa-san), [1] was quite tense and nervous.
The windstorm had already continued for over two hours. The moment the Seven-Headed Sea Dragon saw the Borealis, it started summoning windstorms as if it had gone insane.
With windstorms and large waves attacking it simultaneously, the dark clouds had already made this area of the sea into a pitch-black area where one would be unable to see the back of their own hand. These clouds not only covered the skies and blocked out normal vision but even hindered magical senses, making it obvious that these clouds were unnatural.
“This is no good. Decrease our engine’s focus on floating by 30%. We’re going to enter the sea. Tightly close all hatch doors. We’re diving!”
The continuous thunder and magical beast attacks made the Borealis choose to enter the ocean. Its broken parts on deck automatically began repairing themselves, and any cannon towers destroyed by the thunder began would soon be ready for combat. The underwater recovery natural talent ability of the nine-headed hydra helped restore some balance to this battle.
The windstorm and tremendous waves had constantly been buffeting the airship. Although it was supposed to be daytime, not a single speck of sunlight could be seen, and the airship’s furious shaking could make anyone out on deck fall into the sea. Even confirming the direction the airship was going in required a compass, and the most dangerous of all was still that maniacal petty Goddess above the clouds.
After luckily coming across her enemy, she discovered that one of her favorite pets’ skin was actually spread all over the enemy’s airship. The Queen of Storms who was always in a wild state to begin with went utterly out of control. She didn’t care how much of a price she had to pay for using so much divine power as she summoned endless thunder and torrential downpours.
If it was a normal ship, it would force any veteran sailor to the brink. After all, waves that were over ten meters tall would be capable of overturning even the largest and heaviest of ships. But they were nothing more than annoying tiny waves now that the Borealis had entered underwater. When deep below the waters, how scary the thunder and waves were became meaningless.
With most of the Borealis submerged underwater, it was forced to stop its cannon fire. Only the mage towers on its deck continued to toss out ice-blue crystals. In an underwater environment, only a few magic types would be able to continue performing at maximum power. After all, the Borealis wasn’t designed with underwater combat in mind, and the cannons weren’t stocked with waterproof ammunition specially designed for underwater usage.
“Report, #6 Storeroom is beginning to flood with water. There’s likely a tear that needs repairing.”
“Report, the starboard side #3 cannon has malfunctioned and can no longer be controlled. Recommend complete abandonment of #3 cannon.”
“#2 mage tower has been struck by thunder. All the mages have been recovered safely and no personnel has been lost. But it’s too passive to sit back and let them hit us!”
“A message from the Mizar: ‘Is that insane Goddess ever going to take a rest? She’s too tough to deal with, so hurry up and think of something. If the first airship becomes the last airship, wouldn’t that be so unfortunate?”
If it was only the two top-level sea beasts, it wouldn’t have been a problem for the two aerial battleships. However, since the Queen of Storms who recently promoted successfully in rank for her Godhood was going all out, no matter how strong the two floating airships were, they were still only at the level of mortals.
Not only that, the Seven-Headed Sea Dragon was willing to sacrifice an endless amount of its own blood to act as a medium by which the Queen of Storms could channel her divine power. This helped her to utilize more of her full power, and the endless amounts of thunder that she summoned forced both battleships underwater.
Still, being underwater meant that they could only passively receive attacks, which obviously wasn’t good. Nor were those top-level sea beasts going to be easy to deal with. As time passed, the Queen of Storms who was also the Mother of Sea Beasts would definitely have other subordinates reinforcing her, which would make the situation even more difficult.
The Queen of Storms had received an enormous increase in power after promoting in rank to a powerful Goddess. The two aerial battleships from East Mist were already having a hard time facing her endless attacks that seemed to stem from pettiness.
Numerous pieces of bad news were transmitted to Marsolit at high speeds. He immediately deployed repair personnel to the necessary locations and used his own control over the ship’s mana systems to try and repair the damaged portions of the Borealis.
While the living airship was doing its best to heal itself, the forehead of the overly muscular fleet commander’s forehead was glistening with sweat. Although Marsolit was assisting him, taking over the command of a mega airship fleet (of 2) was obviously too much to handle for a normal captain.
“Something heavy has struck our starboard side. It’s that damned sea giant! He tossed his battle hammer at us!”
On the bridge was a blueprint of the Borealis, and a large part suddenly lit up red denoting those areas which were damaged. The situation was rapidly descending in a downward spiral so Commander Pierre instinctively looked towards the other individuals on the bridge. The look in his eyes implored for assistance, an indirect cry for help.
“…Let us go out there and slay them! As long as we eliminate that Seven-Headed Sea Dragon acting as the Queen of Storm’s medium, the endless windstorms can be stopped.”
The young knight Madi requested to go out into battle. Madi was the leader of a medium-sized squad of the Aurora Knights. In order to deal with the situation that I had expected, the Borealis had taken an entire medium-sized squad of fifty Aurora Knights with it. Fifty Gold-ranked aerial knights were more than sufficient to slay a dragon.
The young knight had the confidence to win even in the face of the Queen of Storm’s fury and thunder. The Aurora Knights believed in themselves as the pride of the Mist Kingdom. Even in front of the fury of the Gods, they felt that they would still be able to obtain miraculous victories! Their young hearts would never fear any challenge; instead, they thirsted for adventure and challenges.
“What a joke! Trying to rush out there and ambush them in such a situation? It would be normal for more than half of you to die. Are you trying to force me to the brink here?”
Yet, Pierre didn’t dare to accede to this young knight’s request. It wasn’t that Pierre didn’t believe in the Aurora Knights’ capabilities. With fifty Aurora Knights working in tandem to rush the Seven-Headed Sea Dragon, they would definitely have high chances of victory. But Pierre knew even more that Aurora Knights were a precious resource. If some Aurora Knights were killed off in such a chaotic battle by the Queen of Storms’ thunderbolts that contained her divine power, Roland would surely skin him alive. It was evident that this strategy would end in a significant amount of Aurora Knights’ deaths, even if it was a winning one.
From the very start, Pierre’s imploring look for assistance wasn’t aimed at Madi. Madi was only the sub-commander of a more major personage who was currently pretending to act dumb and watch a show. Only she was the highest in-name leader of the Aurora Knights.
But since she was continuing to act dumb, Pierre, who was being forced to the brink, could only steel his resolve and beg for help. “Your Highness, what do you think of the current situation?”
The true leader finally acted astonished, as if she had just woken up from a dream.
“You’re asking Reyne? Reyne doesn’t know anything about naval battles. How about we just try running? I don’t know. Would those two big sea beasts really just let us go?”
Reyne spoke a bunch of gibberish that nobody believed—she even stuck out her tongue and spoke in the third person, trying to act cute. This princess that resembled Princess Peach so much in physical appearance had actually learned how to act cute, which, indeed, possessed its own charm. But right now, Pierre only wanted to spit out a mouthful of blood, especially on her face.
After the Port Victoria incident was discovered, I gave the order for the Mizar and the Borealis to take the sea route and head straight for Port Victoria to support me. This would give me an extra retreat option later on and also provide aerial cover to attack Port Victoria if needed. I would gain many flexible options.
As for why I chose to take the sea route instead of a land route? The airspaces of the Bardi Empire and the Mage Country were both dangerous forbidden zones. Upon entering them one would attract a barrage of trouble. Passing through smaller countries’ air spaces was far easier, but these two countries possessed dragon knights and high-level archmages respectively. Unidentified flying objects would not be left alone.
This was similar to my previous world. There, one could fly through African airspace as one pleased, unchallenged, as most African countries didn’t possess air forces of their own. However, if a warplane suddenly entered, unannounced, into a major country’s airspace… well, it would suffice to say that only its wreckage would remain.
Originally, everything had been proceeding smoothly. But the moment the Borealis and Mizar entered this area of the sea, the petty, grudge-remembering Queen of Storms noticed them and proceeded to personally come looking for them along with her two sea beasts.
Out of boredom, a certain princess had forced Pierre into becoming the overall aerial fleet commander instead of just the Mizar. Because of that, and the fact that she wanted a commanding position for herself sans the responsibility that came along with it, Pierre was roaring in his mind: “You—could you possibly make others suffer more than this? Stop learning how to be unreliable from His Highness Roland!” Yet it was unfortunate that he could only continue to act pitiful on the surface and, on the inside, pray for Reyne’s sympathy.
The final individual on the bridge was a complete and utter VIP. After his sudden arrival a few days ago, it had become Princess Reyne’s main task to accompany him in chatting and drinking tea.
However, Pierre didn’t even dare to speak up to this seemingly young guest of theirs, and this was in spite of the fact that he was well aware that this person had the power to turn the entire situation around. Since he saw how Princess Reyne still displayed that “innocent expression” of not wanting to do anything at all, Pierre could only grit his teeth. Yet just as he was about to continue dishing out commands, the VIP guest, who had boarded their airship halfway into the trip, spoke.
“Oh my, little Angie is just so much. She’s always messing around with the young ones, not caring about being unsightly. No wonder her reputation keeps getting worse and worse. You can all be my witnesses. She was the one who attacked the airship that my incarnation was in of her own volition. All I’m doing here is justified self-defense.”
Everyone around him nodded eagerly as they all looked forward to receiving his assistance. After all, this person’s true power was a mystery to them. Reyne, however, couldn’t help but laugh because of an entirely different matter.
“Angie? A name that means angel? There’s far too much of a contrast. No wonder she never uses her own name, and even her Goddess name is just her title.”
Angie, a name that meant ‘angel’ or an ‘angelic girl.’ This was an extremely common name in many human countries. Yet when used for the Queen of Storms, who was famously petty and notorious for forever holding on to a grudge, it seemed to serve a stark contrast.
“Young one, you dare laugh at a True God’s real name? Aren’t you afraid of a divine punishment?”
The black-robed young man was smiling, but his smile didn’t contain any threat. The past few days this girl before him had been constantly trying to test him. As for himself, he had, of course, been trying to test the person behind her: the legendary person whose feats matched—or even surpassed—that of Roland’s.
“I’m not afraid. My Brother Roland will protect me.”
Even though Reyne was dealing with one of the top-level existences in the world, she remained as direct as always. With her experience, she had gotten used to dealing with all sorts of existences.
“…Perhaps there’s more than just Brother Roland who will protect you. Well, I suppose you’re lucky since I just happened to need to find Roland to discuss something. And, even for my incarnation, it’s impossible for me to descend directly in that location…”
While casually chatting and smiling, the black-robed young man twisted his hand, causing a white rose to materialize in midair. Then, with a flick of his finger, the flower began to wilt; its petals floated off and vanished in midair.
Reyne—or, more accurately, Karwenz—contemplated much about this little action. While it appeared quite simple, as if he hadn’t done anything at all, it also seemed like he did a lot, as in that instant, some of the world’s rules had been completely distorted, and certain things were forced into the Cycle of Reincarnation.
As if the brink everyone was forced to had been nothing but a joke, the windstorms in the sky instantly transformed back into white clouds and a blue sky. Bright sunshine returned in the very next second. The only thing that still proved how the maniacal Queen of Storms was still around was her pitiful wailing and angry roaring that everyone could hear.
“Ayer!? Why!? Ahh, why would you be here? This is a plot, a plot against me… Don’t, don’t, don’t! Don’t kill me!”
Nobody knew what Ayer did, but everyone could hear the Queen of Storms’ pitiful wails along with her shock and disbelief. The next instant, the windstorms calmed down, and peace and quiet were restored.
The two sea beasts froze on the battlefield in stunned disbelief. When Angie, the Queen of Storms, escaped at top speed, these two unlucky fellows naturally became sacrificed.
The next moment, apart from Death God Ayer’s incarnation’s chuckling, only Reyne’s voice could be heard.
“Everyone’s worked hard today. Let’s do just a little more, and we can feast on a sea dragon buffet tonight. Right, remember to leave behind the sea beasts’ useful parts as they’ll be perfect for leveling up and perfecting the Borealis. Also, remember to obtain any materials with divine power that you can. Brother Roland will definitely praise me for being careful to not waste anything!”
According to the Gods’ laws, even a True God’s incarnation wouldn’t be able to attack as he pleased. The stronger a God, the more this was true. But since the Queen of Storms had attacked the airship that Ayer was on, it was basically equal to a direct attack on him personally, which made her truly unfortunate.
And now that both sides’ True Gods had exited the battle, what remained was only a battle between mortals.
Right now, the Seven-Headed Sea Dragon who had lost the Storm of Queens’ divine power didn’t even have the energy to escape. Its earlier maniacal actions had used up all of her life energy. The sea giant, on the other hand, had been dragged into the deep ocean waters by the Mizar where a cruel battle was currently taking place.
As everyone got busy, Ayer lightly touched the three scrolls on his waist, causing various divine colors to flash and disappear in an instant. He breathed a sigh of relief at discovering that everything was still normal.
These scrolls were made of unidentifiable materials, and the mana waves coming from them indicated that they were no mere ordinary objects.
As for the Queen of Storms’ belief that this had been a plot against her, that was simply her thinking too much into things. We couldn’t have possibly invited Ayer over just to deal with her. The fact that Ayer was on this ship had truly been just a coincidence.
True Gods’ incarnations wouldn’t easily appear in front of mortals’ eyes. This time, Ayer risked breaking taboos by appearing here—it was obvious that there was something important. Due to the Undead Planes’ cutting off of certain divine avenues of communication, Ayer had been unable to directly appear before Roland using their contract. This was the way he thought of by which he could reach Roland personally.
Something that was important enough for Ayer, who almost never went anywhere, to go to such great lengths was evidence of how significant this matter was.
Mortals had mortals’ frustrations while True Gods had frustrations of their own. This time, the True Gods were intending to make a major gamble. If everything succeeded, perhaps the entire world’s situation would undergo a complete upheaval, which was why Ayer personally came to the mortal plane.
“How about joining us? If our plan succeeds, things would surely become difficult for you.
One of the Main Gods of Order actually invited one of the Main Gods of Chaos to join him. However, Reyne (Karwenz) shook his head. By this point, there was no need to even test the waters. The nature of Chaos itself had determined that it would be impossible for Karwenz to participate in this plan.
“I’m not interested. We have our own ways of having fun as well. Besides, I really do want Roland to become stronger.”
“You actually still have brotherly feelings for him?”
“No, I just want myself to not be bored when I defeat him completely.”
“Aren’t you afraid of losing?”
“That’s fine, too. As long as I had fun, the result wasn’t important to begin with.”
“That’s why I hate you demons. All you know is to fight and kill every day, and you act far too willfully. Even your acts of robbery involve zero finesse… yes, that was a quote from Roland.”
“Ha, that’s indeed his style. That’s why I really hate those hypocrites of the Order Faction that act so nobly every day… that’s a quote from Brother Roland as well.”
“That guy, he really dares to say so much.”
“Indeed.”
Notes:
[1] TL/N: A euphemism for the fact that he’s still wearing the magical girl uniform.