Chapter 24: Ryuusen 2

For what it was worth, Parc had learned that the top deck of the ship wasn't quite high enough to turn water into concrete. Though, the moment he crashed into it he still had all the air thrown out of his lungs and it felt like at least two ribs were broken, maybe a few more.

'Ow…' he groaned mentally, letting himself simply float in the fluids that surrounded him, the shadow of the Ryuusen slowly moving further away as it continued its uncontrolled crawl down the river towards open sea.

'I need to help Bulat…' but his body did not want to move to let him give chase, it remained locked in place, wracking in pain. 'Just a few more seconds…' he gave himself at least that little bit of rest. It didn't help alleviate the burning pain inside him, but it at least gave his mind a few more moments to regain control of his functions.

Forcing the pain to the back of his mind, Parc slowly opened his eyes, immediately feeling the sting of the brackish water rubbing against his eyes. But he didn't let that bug him, compared to his injuries that was just a slight inconvenience.

He could see a few fish swimming around beneath him and a familiar glint resting on the bottom, one of his last two daggers. 'Ah… can't leave you behind…' he muttered to himself, kicking his feet to push himself through the water with a small stinging sensation in his right hip.

Reaching his hand out, he picked the dagger from the ground, kicking up a little sediment forming a cloud that lingered on the bottom before restuning back to the ground.

Parc's eyes quickly scanned the area around him to see if his other was anywhere in the water. Only to find it empty bar a few large stones and large bones from danger beasts that hadn't been completely eaten by the large creatures in the waters.

*Clank*

A clanking noise reverberated in Parc's mind, drawing his mind in one direction up the river. Having to strain his already blurry eyes to so much as get a clear enough sight of what he saw there.

*Cling*

There, drifting through the waters like a cluster of seaweed were three rusted chains all floating high into the water, drifting with the downwards current but connected to the bottom making them unable to drift down stream.

'Chains?' he though, kicking his aching body to force himself against the slight push of the currents. Why was he doing this? He had to get to Bulat. But something about this cluster of dull, rusted chains had grabbed his attention.

As he grew closer, he noticed that they weren't just waving downstream. No. They were drifting towards him, if he moved a little to the side, they would follow him. And once he got close enough to them for them to touch him, he felt them press onto his skin. 'Weird,' he thought, eyes following them down to where they were connected to the ground.

Eye widening just slightly when he saw it wasn't the ground they were flowing up from, but a skeletal arm that had emerged from the ground over the years of erosion revealing just part of a skeleton's lower arm, a lose fitting metal bracelet wrapped around the wrist.

It was wide and covered in small dark nubs on the top and sides, emerging from the areas inbetween the nubs, were the chains that were slowly enveloping his body.

Parc's mind began to race, was this a teigu? What other reason could the chains feel so unnatural. If so, it wasn't one of those known to the Revolutionary Army as it wasn't in the book that described them all. Then was it one of the lost teigu from hundreds of years ago?

The idea that he found one excited him. Reaching a hand out to it, his fingers gripping around the side of it and pulling with enough force to dislodge the bone's of the radius and ulna from the ground, the hand practically disintegrating from years beneath the water. Both the arm bones soon drifting out of the bracelet leaving Parc with an old, rested hunk of metal from which chains were growing.

Now that he had it in his hands, Parc raced to the surface. Finally feeling the repercussions of not having gotten to breath for minutes on end.

His head burst free from the water, gasping for air. Feet kicking to keep him up. In the distance he could see water dragons falling to bits as loud crashes resounded throughout the area. "Bulat." Parc muttered just as the crashes died down, the dragons of water falling to bits. Bulat and Liver's battle was quickly drawing to a close. And he couldn't be sure who was the winner.

"Shit," Parc lifted his hand that held the bracelet from the water, looking at it for a second, "maybe you could get me there faster."

With a slight hesitant breath, Parc curled the fingers of his left hand together, pressing them through the solid metal band. Pulling it over his fingers, his hand, and onto his wrist. Feeling an immediate strain in his mind as new sensations filled him. Like he had grown three new arms.

On his wrist, the rusted band began to shift, the rust flaking off, revealing beneath it a beautiful silver metal. The three dark nubs too fell off. Turning into small spinning golden orbs. Another new sensation wracked him as the chains shifted like snakes and wrapped every inch of his hand tightly before bursting apart, revealing a scaled gauntlet, the golden orbs position shifted, one the knuckles of his wring and index finger while the other found its position upon the underside of his wrist.

Excitement flittered through Parc's chest, it was actually a teigu, and it didn't reject him. "Oh, I'm going to have fun figuring out what you can do," he chuckled. 'But for now,' he looked to the Ryuusen which was now a decent bit away from him and was certainly moving faster than he could swim. 'How about you help me get over there.'

Instinctively, Parc held his left hand out in the direction of the ship, grinning widely when in the blink of an eye three pure silver chains burst forth from the golden orbs. The two ontop of his hand barely a centimetre thick while the one on the bottom of his wrist was much thicker, about the same as that of his daggers handle.

The chains snaked through the water, crashing against the water like diving serpents, extending further and further as the orbs glowed a golden light, continuously producing the links of chain from wherever they were being stored.

Parc's lips curled up as he saw the three chains crash into the hull of the ship, locking into it. Gripping his hand around the bottom chain, Parc tugged back, putting some mechanism into motion that dragged him through the water, the orb on his wrist swallowing the thick chains one by one.

"HOLY SHIIIIIITTTT!" He shouted at the surprising amount of speed and the pain of his bones being smacked against the water again and again as he essentially became a skipping stone. With a small flick of his wrist he was sent just a bit into the air, enough for him to maneuver his body upright before coming back down onto the water surface. Legs trembling under the sudden feeling of him using the heels of his shoes as a make shift surfboard.

'This would be so much cooler if I knew what was going on!' he internally screamed, gulping when the wooden hull of the Ryuusen came rushing for his body. 'This is going to hurt,' he groaned, curling his gauntleted hand into a fist, shutting his eyes just as it came into contact with the hull. Surprisingly not shattering his arm into fragment, instead doing just that to the hull, sending him rolling into the interior of the ship. All the chains coming loose from the ship, swiftly retracting into the orbs of the gauntlet.

He didn't have time to think about his dizziness, he could hear sharp slashes of air from above and more crashes, Bulat and Liver were still fighting but he could tell it was swiftly coming to an end. Pushing himself to his feet, Parc grunted, not noticing the gauntlet retracting back into the teigus inactivated form of a simple silver bracelet.

***

"Bulat!" Parc shouted bursting through the doorway that led into the staircase to the lower decks.

The fight had come to an end from what he saw, Bulat was kneeling on the ground, blood leaking from all around his unarmoured body. Unable to keep Incursio awakened anymore. Liver in much the same situation, lying on his back, the cuts around his body leaking blood onto the deck.

"I adored her…" he heard Liver mutter, "she saved me… and for that reason…" Liver pushed himself up, lifting a finger to point at Bulat with a manic grin, "I will be giving her your life!"

Bulat's arms trembled as he suddenly coughed up a mouthful of blood. "Bulat," Parc quickly rushed his way to Bulat's side, only for Bulat to hold a hand up, stopping him from assisting him up.

"that syringe... the was a poison in it?"

Liver laughed, "there is no antidote. Your already dead, Bulat, there is no escape." Liver's eyes fluttered, eyes rolling to the back of his skull, "I'll…" his voice grew weaker, "going on ahead…" he keeled backwards, life leaving his body.

"A tie, huh?" Bulat snorted, turning to look Parc in the eyes, "yo," he said, shifting his body to sit on the deck. "Was worried about you- Guhah!" he coughed out another mouthful of blood.

"Shit, I was slow." Parc clenched his fists into balls.

"Ah, don't worry about it. Just good enough that your alive…" Bulat waved him off. He ould feel his body weakening by the second. Reaching to his side he gripped onto the the handle of Incursio's key form of a sword, holding it out to Parc, "do me favour will you… make sure someone good gets this…"

Parc was silent, there was just nothing he could say. Both he and Bulat knew that whatever was coursing through his veins wasn't something that they could get rid of at a moments notice. Not in the middle of nowhere on a ship of near unconscious civilians.

Gently picking Incursio from Bulat's hands, Parc said, "I'll do just that… Aniki."

Bulat smirked, ""takes dying to get you to call me aniki. Should have done this sooner…" Bulat began to wobble. "Take care of the others for me… will you?..."

"Of course I will," Parc gripped incursio's handle tightly, watching as Bulat's eyes fluttered shut.

"I'll… be watching over you guys…"