Realm of Monsters - Chapter 685: Efficient

Chapter 685: Efficient

  “Fine. You want efficient, Gale? Cousin, with me,” Stryg said.

  Belle nodded and followed him to the edge of the deck.

  “Oh, no. Uh-uh. You aren’t throwing each other onto that ship!” Gale stomped over to them.

  “There’s no need. It’s the last warship. We can let loose,” Stryg growled.

  “Oooh.” Belle bared her blood-stained teeth in a wide grin.

  “What exactly are you two planning?” Gale’s voice dripped with suspicion. She had seen Belle hurl Stryg across the harbor, a feat that even with brown’s enhancing magic, should not have been possible. The strength that flowed within a titan’s blood amplified the might spell severalfold. 

  And what Stryg had done afterwards had been just as, if not more, surprising. He had somehow managed to keep a black shadow spell attached the entire way from the river to the ship; finally pulling Belle to him like an anchor in the end. It spoke of magical skill that went beyond that of a master mage.

  Both of these godlings were not to be underestimated, which only made Gale more anxious as to whatever plan they had in store now.

  The air suddenly grew thick with power as Stryg began to draw forth absurd amounts of blue mana from his heart. Belle could feel the shift in the air and mirrored his action, matching each iota of blue with her own.

  “What are you two doing…?” Gale muttered in disbelief. They were each putting out enough mana to rival an archmage. Gale prided herself on being one of the most talented mageborns of her generation. Though she was still a high-master mage, her mana reserves could contend with an archmage’s. But this, this was something else. Stryg and Belle were summoning all their chromatic blue mana, a single color, yet it matched Gale’s entire reserves.

  How much mana did these two possess?

  “Both of you, stop it. Handling this much mana at once will only spike your internal body temperatures. You’ll burn yourselves out in seconds if you don’t restrain yourselves,” Gale said.

  “It’s fine,” Belle assured her. Her golden eyes flared brightly and the cool touch of elemental chaos mana flowed into her veins, tempering the overload of heat.

  Stryg took a deep breath and furrowed his brow as he concentrated. Slowly, but surely, chaos answered from within his second heart. He exhaled a chilled breath even as beads of sweat formed on his forehead.

  “This doesn’t fix your problem. It only delays it,” Gale said. “Look at you both, your arms are shaking.”

  “As much as I hate to admit it, she’s right. We can’t hold all of this energy in for too long,” Belle grunted.

  “I know. Just follow my lead.” Stryg raised his arms and pointed his hands to the warship in the distance, palms flat. 

  The sailors on the warship had begun to load their ballistas, but instead of aiming at the Dragon’s Hoard, they were turning their weapons on the burning ship Stryg and the others were on.

  “We need to get out of here,” Gale urged. “This ship is already unstable. If you lose control of that mana, you’ll be without Blue for hours. Can either of you swim without torrent magic? Release whatever spell you’re trying to cast and abandon ship.”

  “Not yet,” Stryg replied.

  “Mm,” Belle grunted in agreement.

  “Damn you both.” Gale wrote red sigils in the air and began to form a makeshift shield around the three of them. “I can’t hold against enchanted ballista bolts for long.  Whatever you’re doing, do it fast.”

  “Almost there,” Stryg said.

  The warship lurched sideways as a ballista string snapped loose and a bolt slammed into their ship. The bolt flew past their heads and struck a mast, ripping the wood in an explosion of splinters. With a tortured creak, the mast toppled over into the sea in a giant splash, spraying water all over the deck.

  “We’re out of time! Stryg!” Gale yelled.

  “Now!” Stryg shouted. He and Belle threw their arms apart as though ripping open a curtain.

  The sea under the warship swelled to the sides, causing the vessel to rapidly drop. The waves grew larger all around the ship while it sank deeper and deeper, until the ship hit the harbor’s shallow sea floor. The ground was covered in a soft layer of mud, but the force of the drop, slow as it was, was too much for the warship. The hull cracked on impact, knocking the sailors to their knees.

  “Almost there!” Belle clasped her hands together.

  The giant swells converged upon each other, forming a dome of sorts over the now fallen warship.

  “And release!” Stryg gasped for breath and fell on the wooden railing for support.

  With no mana left to hold it up, the massive mound of water crashed down into the makeshift pit with the force of a thousand battering rams. The warship disappeared from sight without a single cry or sound to signal its end. It was simply gone.

  Gale could only watch in stunned silence. There was none of the finesse of a skilled archmage. They were throwing around large loads of mana like a child throwing paint, not caring where it landed, so long as it struck the canvas. In the end, magic had not destroyed the warship, rather, it was gravity.

  “Fuck, yes!” Belle threw her arms up in triumph while heaving for breath. “That was incredible.”

  “How is that for efficient?” Stryg gave a tired grin.

  “You call that efficient? You just spent all your blue mana in one strike and now you can hardly stand, let alone swim.” Gale planted her hands on her hips.

  “We dealt with them without making a mess,” Stryg frowned. “Isn’t that what you wanted?”

  “No, Stryg. I wanted you to think before you act. Something, it seems, neither of you is capable of,” Gale sighed.

  Their ship groaned and began to sink, the broken mast and fires finally taking their toll.

  “Get on the water, I’ll carry you both. Freya and the others are all at the rendezvous point by now.” Gale didn’t wait for a reply and dove into the water.

  “I thought it was pretty cool,” Belle nudged Stryg’s arm, then dove in after Gale.

  “…Thanks,” Stryg mumbled and rolled off the railing. He didn’t have the strength for a proper dive and simply let himself fall into the water. He searched for the sunken warship, but all he found was a cloud of mud and debris.

  It didn’t take long until he felt the waters twist and turn around him, before pulling up for air. Gale was at his side, manipulating the sea at her beck and call. Belle’s head bobbed out of the water next to them. Like Stryg, she was covered in blood, but the seawater was making quick work of it.

  Belle gave a little wave and grinned. Gale grabbed them both in a swirl of water and ferried them through the harbor, into one of the many branching rivers. The town was up in flames to their left. People’s cries echoed across the water. Most were of panic, some of terror, others of pain.

  “Was this your plan? To burn down the entire town?” Gale asked.

  “…I thought they’d be able to put out the fires in time,” Stryg admitted.

  “It was a foolish plan. Many people are going to die now. The ones that don’t will be homeless,” Gale said.

  Stryg looked away from the burning sight. “This is war,” he muttered.

  “The Sylvan are at war. Not House Veres or Hollow Shade,” Gale said.

  “I am Veres and Sylvan.”

  “We didn’t come here to fight a war, but rather to help Tauri’s brother avoid one. This is a rescue mission. A quest to protect another’s life. Not burn down an entire town. We’re not marauders. I need to know that you understand that, Stryg,” Gale said.

  “War comes whether we want it to or not. It is our choice how we face it,” Belle added.

  Gale didn’t want to bother arguing with a child of the goddess of war, nor did it matter. Belle was not her charge, Stryg was. “Stryg, do you understand what I am saying? Do you understand what you’ve done to this town?”

  “So what if a town of orcs dies? People die. Their mortals. They are bound to die,” Stryg muttered.

  Gale frowned and reached through the water to pull him close. “Since when did you become so callous to the deaths of hundreds?”

  “He’s a child of Death. It’s sort of in his nature,” Belle noted.

  “He’s also half-mortal,” Gale snapped.

  Belle raised her hands in mute surrender.

  “I killed hundreds of valley warriors during the siege of Hollow Shade. I never heard you complain about it then,” Stryg said.

  “Because those were warriors,” Gale said. “I don’t agree with your methods on how you dealt with the sailors on those warships, but at the end of the day, that is battle. But what you did to that town was not a battle. Those orcs didn’t deserve to have their homes burned down.”

  “Says who?” Stryg growled.

  Gale frowned. “Stryg… What happened back there with the dockmaster and the others?”

  “Their spiteful, arrogant wretches,” Stryg scowled. “They thought goblins were nothing more than animals to be slaughtered. They don’t care what happened to Lunis. They take pride in its fall. Well, I was there, Gale. I saw my great-grandmother’s memories as if I lived them. I saw Lunis burn. I saw my people butchered by the thousands. So, if these orcs want to praise the warlords of old and follow in their footsteps, I say let them burn.”

  “Stryg…” Gale glanced at Belle, “Do you agree with him?”

  Belle stared at the sun in the sky for a long while before answering. “I never saw the razing of Lunis. I wasn’t there with Stryg and the dockmaster. But Stryg is my friend, he’s family— what little I have left. So if he goes to war against Murkton, I’ll stand by his side.”

  “Thank you, Belle. That means a lot,” Stryg smiled.

  She grinned, “We titans gotta stick together, right? Otherwise, Lunae and my mom are going to murder us for leaving Hollow Shade.”

  “Yeah, don’t remind me,” he chuckled. His face turned somber when he turned to Gale, “I’m sorry if I went too far, I’m not very good at gauging when I do. I trust you, Gale. You’re more of a sister to me than my own. So, if you tell me to stop, I will.”

  Gale sighed, “Stryg, I swore to be your Shield and Shadow for as long as I shall live. We are bound together. You will always be my first priority, whether I marry or have children, that will not change. That is the oath I swore to you. I remind you of this because I want you to know that I would go to war for you without hesitation if… If that is what you really want. 

  “But as lord of House Veres, it is your duty to lead our people into war only if it’s for the good of our House. So I ask you, is this really what my lord commands? War? If so, I will send a message back to Hollow Shade and Lord Gian will rally our armies to meet us in Murkton.”

  “…No,” Stryg said slowly. “I do not wish to bring our people into another war. I just… I think of what Lunae said to me. I think of what I saw in Stryga’s memories. If they haven’t changed, if the people of Murkton are as bad as this dockmaster and his men, then maybe Lunae was right. Maybe Murkton deserves the Sylvan army’s wrath.”

  “And if they don’t?” Gale asked.

  Stryg shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. Lunae is going to wipe out the city either way.”