by Hyougetsu
However, the Terror of the Deep proved to be a far more fearsome foe than I had anticipated.
“Admiral, look over there!”
One of the engineers pointed to the surface of the water. A few of its tentacles were wriggling ominously. There were a total of three of them visible. The same three we’d shot harpoons into. Shit. I’d totally forgotten octopuses could cut off their own tentacles in emergencies. However, the fact that it was willing to sacrifice its tentacles meant we had it cornered. After detaching its tentacles, the Island Kraken attempted to flee. It was clearly desperate. Garsh turned to me with a look of panic.
“Oi, admiral! Shouldn’t you be sending your kentauros out right now!?”
“I can’t, the water around it’s been turned to poison. We won’t be able to attack it until it leaves this area.”
Besides, the kentauros had no way of attacking the parts of the Kraken that were underwater, and the mermaids weren’t fighters. If I’d had another sodium bomb, I could have used that. Our only option now was to chase it and keep harrying it with the kentauros until it slowly bled to death. I’ll chase you to the ends of the Earth if I have to. You’re not getting away from me, you octopus bastard! Just as I thought that, the air around us suddenly grew cold.
“Is it just me, or did it get colder?” A sailor muttered. The fog around us began to sparkle, then dispersed. No, not dispersed. Froze. The frozen dew particles dropped into the sea, causing the fog to clear up. Weather like this was unthinkable in the southern sea. Kurtz’s breath came out in white puffs as he muttered, “Sir Veight, is this...”
“Yeah, it is.”
Our beloved Demon Lord had arrived. No one else could create this phenomenon. Not that anyone asked you to show up.
“It would appear I arrived in time after all.”
Gomoviroa descended from the sky, landing lightly on the flagship’s deck. While everyone else was shivering from the cold, she looked perfectly warm despite the thin dress she was wearing. I supposed that made sense, since she was the one absorbing all the heat.
“Master! Hey, Master!” I whispered furiously. She turned to me and floated over.
“What is it?”
“Are you sure you should be out on the front lines like this?”
Overprotective as she was, I’d expected her to show up, but that didn’t make her entrance any less surprising. Master grinned and replied, “Right now I am nothing more than a wandering old sage.”
Who do you think you are, Gandalf?
“I will eventually need to reveal my identity to humans. If such a reveal is inevitable, it would be better to make a grand entrance.”
“Are you sure you’re not just trying to copy the wizard in the story I told you a while back?”
“For even the very wise cannot see all ends.”
“Now’s really not the time to quote cool-sounding lines.”
The Island Kraken was still trying to flee. Master floated off the flagship and alighted atop the sea.
“You shall not escape me.”
Master tapped her staff to the water, and the sea began to freeze.
“Wh-What in blazes...”
“So this is a demon’s magic...”
“Holy shit, I’ve never seen so much ice in my life!”
“Is she a fairy?”
I guess if you live this far south all your life, ice would be a pretty rare sight. Entranced by Master’s performance, the sailors forgot their fear of the Island Kraken. At the end of the day, Master’s specialty was necromancy. She wasn’t very good at other forms of magic. Freezing this much water this fast would be impossible if she were using normal magic. However now Master had become a thermodynamic vacuum, capable of sucking in any and all forms of energy. She was converting the sea’s heat energy to mana, and then using that mana to cast a cooling spell. The heat that was lost thanks to the cooling spell was then absorbed by Master, giving her more mana. Thanks to that infinite loop, Master could freeze as much of the sea as she wanted. Once she was finished, our esteemed Demon Lord turned to me with a smile.
“I had always wished to try this at least once. Theoretically it was possible, so I wished to make sure it could be done in practice.”
“You sure are devoted to your research...”
Just don’t go overboard, or you’ll plunge the world into an ice age, Master.
The field of ice spread out in a circle, with Master at its center. The Island Kraken’s reef and our ships were both trapped in a sheet of ice. Meanwhile, the octopus’ tentacles were trapped below. There was nothing it could do to protect its head, the reef. This was our chance to finish things.
“Kentauros squad, charge! Smash that reef to smithereens!”
Firnir led her men down the gangway and charged. As she galloped forward, she pressed a small switch on her spear, and a sharp blade popped out of one end. It appeared she’d installed some gimmicks into her weapon. That folding blade looked like the work of Thuvan’s engineers.
“Let’s do this, guys!”
“RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”
From the looks of it, the other kentauros had all switched out their weapons for axes, which they whirled over their heads as they ran. I remember Firnir had told me axes were the kentauros’ traditional weapon.
“Wait, Firnir! I told you not to strip in public!”
I really wish she would do something about that bad habit of hers. At any rate, the kentauros surrounded the Island Kraken and started hacking it to death.
“DIEEEEEEEEEEEE!”
“FOR MY ANCESTORS!”
Axes rose and fell, cutting off chunks of the reef. Any section that fell to the frozen ground was then kicked away by a kentauros hoof. Fired up as they were, the kentauros were avatars of destruction. I watched the reef grow progressively smaller through my telescope. Though I called it a reef, it was more like the octopus’ shell. And from the looks of it, it was made of the same material as a clam’s shell. While everyone else was hacking off chunks, Firnir was running around stabbing her spear into the Island Kraken’s more vulnerable spots. Still, this Kraken was a tough nut to crack. Right around the time the kentauros’ war cries were growing hoarse, one of their messengers came up to me.
“I bear a message from Chief Firnir! She says that the core of the monster’s shell is too thick for the kentauros’ weapons to break through!”
“What!?”
I hadn’t expected its shell to be that strong. Looking over, I saw that a good portion of the kentauros were standing off to the side to catch their breath. If those muscle-bound freaks were that exhausted, that meant we’d need a bomb or something to punch through that shell. As if sensing my thoughts, Kurtz turned to me and said, “We have no more explosives.”
“I see...”
We’d brought only a small amount of gunpowder with us, and that gunpowder was needed to light signal flares. We were also out of ballista bolts, so there was only one option left. I flipped through my grimoire and double-checked the spell I wanted to use. I then turned to Beluza’s sailors and said in a voice quiet enough that Kurtz couldn’t hear, “Alright, I’ll handle this myself.”
“Are you serious, admiral!?”
Though the sailors looked shocked, it was standard among demons for the general to show off their valor at the very end.
“I’ll be using magic, don’t worry. Anyway, I want you to launch me using the catapult.”
“What!?”
“Look, just hurry up and do it!”
If the demons caught wind of what I was attempting they’d stop me for sure. I clambered into the catapult’s bucket and transformed.
“I’ll adjust myself in the air, so you don’t need to worry about aiming. Just launch me at full force. As long as you get the direction right, I’ll be fine.”
“A-Aye-aye, sir!”
The sailors readied the catapult and bent the arm back as far as it would go. Just then, Kurtz, who was readying another signal flare, glanced back. The mom
ent he saw me his expression froze.
“What are you doing!?”
Crap, he saw me! I turned to the sailors and yelled, “Do it!”
“Aye-aye!”
They released the rope, and I shot through the air. It felt similar to when an elevator dropped sharply, but with the sensation dialed to eleven. It was like I was floating. I crossed my arms and legs to reduce the amount of friction caused by air resistance and loosed a war cry, “AWOOOOOOOOOO!”
While the speed and pressure made me a little dizzy, it actually felt good to fly this fast in my werewolf form. Now then, I better cast the spell before I crash.
The spell to walk on water was a derivative of body strengthening magic, and to use it, one first had to know how to control their weight. There were other techniques incorporated into the spell as well, but manipulating weight was the most important one. In order to learn how to walk on water, aspiring mages first learned how to change their weight. However, the spell to manipulate one’s weight put a lot of strain on the user’s body, so it wasn’t very useful by itself. That being said, what if a mage decided to multiply their weight to a few hundred kilograms while they were hurtling through the air? Wouldn’t they make for quite a powerful cannonball? Assuming, of course, the technique didn’t kill the user.
As I flew, I used hardening magic, muscle strengthening magic, and damage enhancing magic on myself. With this, I’d be able to withstand the impact without causing undue damage to my skin or joints. Plus, this magic made my kicks and jabs stronger. I made minute adjustments to my trajectory by changing my posture as necessary. All that was left now was to make sure I magnified my weight right before impact. As I reached the height of my ascent, I took aim at the Island Kraken’s head and dove.
The kentauros had spotted me now. I could see Firnir looking up at me in shock.
“GET CLEEEEEAAR!”
As I shouted that, I increased my weight to the maximum my strengthened bones could withstand. With how much mana this drained, I’d only be able to maintain this state for a few seconds. Back when I’d first become Master’s apprentice, I’d used this spell to kill a boar monster, so I knew it worked. As I fell, I heard Firnir shouting something to me, “Vaito, what the heck are you doing!?”
Just a little physics experiment.
“AWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”
I shot my leg out for a kick the moment I fell onto the Island Kraken’s shell, hitting it with maximum force. My abnormal weight, the speed of my fall, the power of a werewolf, and the added strengthening magic I’d used all came together to strike the octopus at a single point. With how much destructive force I’d packed into my attack, I doubted anything on Earth could withstand it. The shell the kentauros couldn’t break no matter how hard they tried shattered in an instant. Before my might, it was as fragile as an eggshell. All of my senses went momentarily numb as pieces of the Kraken’s shell rained down around me. When they returned, I realized I’d sunk waist-deep into what was left of the outer parts of the reef, and was standing on something squishy. Thanks to my strengthening magic, my legs were unharmed. My neck stung a little, but it wasn’t a huge deal. The squishy thing I was standing on was likely the octopus’ body. I guess this is it’s weak point, since it tried so hard to defend it. It was time to end this octopus once and for all.
“DIE!”
I sunk my talons into the Kraken, cutting into its soft skin. The moment I pierced its body, it started thrashing about. I can’t believe it’s still got this much energy left. I heard Firnir yell something from above me.
“You really are crazy... Men, follow Vaito! Let’s finish this!”
“UWOOOOOOOOOH!”
“Support the Vice-Commander!”
A one-sided slaughter followed. The Island Kraken writhed in pain as the kentauros hacked away at it. My attack had cracked its shell beyond repair, and even the kentauros’ hooves were enough to shatter the rest. As time passed, the hole in the reef grew larger, until finally the Kraken’s entire head was exposed. Without its sturdy defenses, the Kraken was helpless against the horde of kentauros.
“Ancestors guard me!”
“This is for my friend, you monster!”
“Die, you damned octopus!”
As we continued pounding on the helpless Kraken, my eight werewolf guards joined the fight. Since the sea was frozen, they’d been able to walk across it. The Garney brothers were the first to arrive, and they shoved me aside so they could start ripping into the Kraken.
“Oi, Veight, we’re here to help!”
“Leave this to us!”
I was grateful they were eager to assist, but the octopus’ head was cramped enough with all the kentauros, so I really didn’t need more helpers.
“Shut up! Stop trying to hog the spotlight! Go clamming over there or something!”
“Hey bro, what’s this clamming thing Veight’s talking about?”
“Hell if I know! Get outta my way, Nibert!”
Next to arrive was Monza.
“Boss, you know Fahn’s gonna chew you out for this, right?”
“Don’t you dare tell her what happened! I’ll knock your lights out if you do!”
“Haha, my lips are sealed!”
We jostled each other around as we continued gouging out the Kraken. Unfortunately, our rampage ended up indirectly damaging the fleet. Though the Kraken was still trapped in the ice, it managed to break a few tentacles free and started lashing out.
“Firnir, you take care of those tentacles!”
“What!? Come on!”
Firnir pulled a face, but I put my foot down.
“Your spear’s better suited to cutting up those tentacles than anything we’ve got! Now hurry it up!”
Firnir reluctantly shouldered her spear and rounded up a few of her men.
“Fine, if you say so! First platoon, on me! Let’s cut those tentacles down to size!”
Firnir and the 40 men she’d handpicked to join her on the flagship galloped back toward the tentacles.
It took another half hour to finish the Island Kraken off. Finally though, the infamous Terror of the Deep breathed its last, and its bloated corpse lay limp in the water. Blue blood and black ink spilled from its body in rivulets, staining the shattered ice around it. It smelled repugnant and looked worse. After a while though, the tide began to return, and it washed away the octopus’ fluids. A breeze swept past us, blowing away the putrid stench. I gulped in a lungful of air, savoring the sea air’s salty tang. The Island Kraken’s magic had been completely dispelled.
“Looks like it’s finally over. We did it, everyone!”
The werewolves and kentauros around me nodded in satisfaction, then cheered.
“Woooooooo!”
“Long live the Demon Lord!”
“Thank you for this blessing, ancestors!”
Monza and the Garney brothers smiled and shook their heads.
“Haha, that monster was nothing!”
“I guess werewolves really are the strongest!”
“That’s great and all, but I really want to take a bath now. I’m covered in monster blood.”
I was glad to see my werewolves were in high spirits too. The octopus had lost its buoyancy after death, and half of it was already underwater. From what I could tell, its shell had served as its air bladder as well. Without it, it sank. At this point, this section of the sea had become so polluted with various substances that I didn’t want to touch any part of it.
“Alright, guys, let’s go back. Be careful, though. Sharks might show up to feed on this thing’s corpse.”
I cast water-walking magic onto my werewolves, and we all trekked back to the flagship. On the ship, everyone was twirling their cap or bandana, or whatever they had as they cheered us on. We’d won. That realization finally hit me. Kurtz glared down at me from the deck. He clearly wanted to say something, but I pretended I didn’t notice.
As always, the clean-up looked like it would be the hardest part. While pre
paring for battles might be fun, cleaning up after them wasn’t.
“Dragonkin engineers, collect samples of the water around here! After we’ve discovered how far the poison’s spread, pour in the antidote!”
In case of accidents, we’d brought a sodium hydroxide neutralizer with us. We wouldn’t be needing it, so I figured it’d be more eco-friendly to fix the damage we did to the sea. The remaining ice would melt in time, so we didn’t need to do anything about that.
“I want Beluza’s sailors working double time on ship repairs! Meanwhile, all canines work on recovering all the harpoons and rope we can!”
Canines loved picking up trash, so I’d left that task to them. They slid joyfully across the ice, retrieving everything within their reach.
“We’ve completed testing and detoxifying the water, sir.”
One of Kurtz’s engineers brought me a few strips of purple cloth as he said that. The cloth worked in a similar manner to litmus paper. Going off the color this dragonkin was showing me, the sea was mostly neutralized. We wouldn’t be able to completely erase the effects of our battle, so this was good enough. If anything, the Island Kraken’s fluids were more polluting to the sea right now than anything we’d done. If it had been a squid, I could have retrieved at least its ink to eat, but octopus ink tasted nasty.
“By the way, Sir Veight, what shall we do with the Terror of the Deep’s corpse?”
I guess if we just left it, it’d become a hazard, huh? Maybe I should have Master disintegrate it. Though I felt like even if we left it, other fish would eat it soon enough.
“I’m still thinking on how to deal with it, so if you have any ideas I’m all ears.”
One of the novice engineers timidly said, “Sir, Beluza’s viceroy is saying he’d like to take it back with him if possible.”
“Seriously!?”
What did he want with a giant octopus? Don’t tell me you’re planning on eating it!? The engineer’s voice grew tinier as he added, “He wants to show the people of Beluza proof of their victory.”
