Chapter 78: The Hunt – Part 3

Chapter 78: The Hunt – Part 3

"I guess we won't be seeing each other for a few days. I'll miss our morning 'practice,'" I say to the bird, and I see Hukarere's face cramp, holding back a smile.

"So will I," she whispers and glances towards Kaata.

Paraaone and Oritiki remain on our ship while the rest of the Celestial Horns fly over to the Floater to get some sleep. Hukarere retires to her bed, and the night shift handler takes over.

The girls drag Hana into the tent and make her strip down completely so that they can clean off every single drop of blood from her armor. Nobody wants to go to sleep hugging a stinky dragonkin.

The golems come up to the bridge, and I let them pilot while I simply keep watch. We'll be just following the Floater for now, so it'll be easy piloting even with the mist since the Floater has bright blinking lights for us to keep track of it.

Alissa climbs up to the bridge and gives me a hot cup of honeyed Tonique tea.Cheêck out latest novels at novelhall.com

"Thank you, my love," I say and caress her cheek as I take the cup.

"I think I should stand watch with you. If you go to sleep without me, you could have a nightmare," she says, and her butt gently wiggles as her tail tries to break free from her armor.

"Yeah, I think that'd be for the best," I say and force a slightly sad smile.

I've been neglecting this issue, but right now would be a bad time to test it again.

I drink my tea while leaning against the railing, and Alissa offers me some jam-filled cookies.

"You're going to spoil me if you keep this up," I comment with a wry smile.

She giggles adorably and snuggles up to me, resting her head against my chestplate. "Everyone deserves to be spoiled with love," she replies and kisses my cheek. "I'll spoil the others too when I have the time."

I finish my mouthful of the cookie and say, "But don't exhaust yourself, okay? Remember to be mindful of your own condition and not just think of others all the time."

"Yes, yes. I still remember our talk about the two rules and overworking."

I finish my cup of tea, and she stores the tray of cookies away, then we just keep snuggling there for a long while.

The handler tells us to send over a summon to the Floater, so we exchange birds. The Carrier and the Winch will try to follow us, but since they're much slower, they'll definitely be left behind.

The Floater's bridge is smaller, but very similar to the Carrier's, except that there's a yellow [Beam] crystal positioned right beside the [Wind Shield] crystal below the captain's chair. Nohopu and Kurii, his beagle-headed female XO, aren't on the bridge anymore, so everything is completely quiet now.

The lights of the Floater can only reach a few hundred meters ahead, revealing nothing but white mist. The only sounds I can hear are those of the sleeping girls and the whistling wind coming from the elementals constantly blowing air into our sails.

Cloud Snakes are a notable danger in this area, so we're relying on the Floater's strong crystal light disrupting the monster's [Hide Presence] along with theirs and Alissa's [Sense Presence] detecting the monsters before they can attack.

Small fireflies start to appear, attracted to our crystal lights. These are manaflies, and if these cute bugs are around, then there could also be Ploms nearby. I tell the spirit elemental to check on our crystals every once in a while in case those mana-sucking rodents try to sneak into our hold again.

Oritiki spreads her wings and slowly floats up towards us. She stops right outside the bridge and asks, "How are you holding up? Not too scared of the Leviathan, are you?"

"As long as we keep our shields up, we seem to be safe," I calmly reply.

She smiles faintly. "Yeah, that's what makes the Leviathan so difficult to deal with. We can perfectly defend ourselves from it, but to actually kill one takes a lot more than that."

"If our shields go down, would you be able to defend us from both of them?" Alissa asks.

Oritiki nods gently and answers, "Sure, no problem. In case they try to attack, we can definitely give them a mortal wound, but it'd cost us most of our mana, so we'd only do that in an emergency..." She suddenly frowns, and her expression becomes serious. "Though, that albino's mirror is a bit of a problem."

"It can counter your... special attack?" I ask with a raised eyebrow.

"Partially. It seems to be more of a physical mirror than something... more 'abstract,' so it should still heat up if we unleash our [Beam]s at it, but it'd be a huge waste of our mana."

"If it learns how to deflect the [Beam] instead of scattering it, then we'll have a real problem," I say and point to the dark line burnt across the ship's deck.

Oritiki stares at the line in thought for a moment and says, "Yes, that's problematic. It seems that it'd be easier to just tire it our first with your dwarf's... special magic."

Alissa frowns slightly and says, "That could prove difficult since she has to maintain eye contact with the monster for it to work, and I believe that the albino won't be so easily lured into attacking us, right?"

Oritiki rubs her horn. "Hm... yes, I see. Perhaps she can stay on the Floater's bridge during the battle?" She turns to look at us.

"Then it would just stop attacking the Floater and attack us, instead, or even simply run away."

Oritiki's non-existent eyebrows knit in worry. "You're right, the albino is too smart to engage us long enough for that eye magic to work. Unless we enrage it..." She shakes her head. "Anyway, we should at least finish off the normal Leviathan; that'd be a massive blow to their strength."

"Do you think they have any monsters in reserve?" I ask.

She shakes her head. "They shouldn't. Before we crushed the Lancers, they should've sent any monsters they had in reserve, it'd be a complete blunder to not do so. I think that they only have the surviving Kite Dragons and disposable small monsters left."

"The albino did wait until the other Leviathan was wounded before joining the battle," Alissa comments.

"The blue Leviathan was probably trying to lure one of us away from the Carrier so that they could fight them two-on-one, but it seems that their plan failed spectacularly," Oritiki replies.

That's most likely because they didn't expect our ship to have [Wind Shield].

I nod and rub Alissa's ears in thought as I say, "So, we've already crushed them, and now, we're going in for the finisher."

"Exactly. Now you can see why we were so confident about this expedition," she says with a hint of pride in her smile.

At around 3:30 AM, two other horns arrive to replace Oritiki, and we wake up Roxanne and Hana to stand watch in our place. Alissa gives them some Tonique tea, and we drift off to sleep in our plate armor, which is even more uncomfortable than sleeping in our scale armor.

Today is the 18th.

Alissa wakes me up a little later than usual. The first thing I see today is my sex slave swallowing my cock as I cum down her throat. Not even two layers of armor will keep her from claiming her morning cum.

Roxanne increased her [Water Magic] by 1 (now 1+29). Lina increased her [Throw] and [Cursing Magic] by 1 (now 4 and 10+5).

Also, today is Ciel's birthday. She's now twenty-two years old.

I call Aoi back into the tent with Yunia, then we surround Ciel and say in unison, "Congratulations, let this year be better than the last."

"Gih gih."

Ciel blushes and looks down, gushing with a smile.

I grab her hand and pull her towards me, then I immediately steal a tongue kiss. It doesn't last long because there's a line of eager women waiting to kiss her.

First up is Lina, obviously; then Alissa because she has a crush on my foxy lady; then Hana because she has to assert her dominance; then Roxanne, just because; then a lick from Aoi; and Yunia starts to seduce Ciel again by first kissing her hand, then staring deeply into her eyes with a gentle and sultry gaze.

"You age like Eia. The longer I spend with you, the further you let me see," Yunia says to Ciel in a deeper voice than normal, then kisses her lips.

"Uh... u-uhm... thank you..." Ciel says in a weak voice, stunned for a moment, then she starts chuckling.

I'll have to get Yunia to teach me how she does that.

"This isn't the most romantic place for a birthday, but we'll definitely compensate you accordingly," I say and give her hand a squeeze. She breaks out of Yunia's spell and turns to me. "Your gift will be that we allow you to ask anything from us once."

Yunia sends me a glance. She's not part of the [Bind] yet, so she's a bit concerned about what this "anything" might entail.

Ciel raises her eyebrows, then her gaze softens, and she looks around. "Hm... thank you, really, but I'll wait until we're in a better 'place' to claim my gift."

Lina scooches closer to Ciel, then grabs her hand and says, "For me, you don't have to wait. I'll always do whatever you need me to."

"Awn..." Ciel's heart bleeds a bit at that, and she gives Lina a tight hug. Their armor clinks as the plates rub against each other.

I call for a quick group hug, then we leave the tent.

We're up a little later than usual to compensate for the time we spent awake on watch.

Once we emerge, the Horns on the bridge bow respectfully and say that they have nothing to report; all they had to do was observe the golems during their watch.

We offer some breakfast to them, but they say that they'll eat the Chimeras' provisions so as to not burden ours, then they leave.

Ciel tells us that the Floater killed two Cloud Snakes during her watch. The Trinity Cannons are silent, so they only noticed that it had fired after they sensed the mana that was emitted.

Motherfucking hell! This little shit is tenacious!

"Yunia! Prepare [Chain Life]!" I order. Two of the beams leave burnt lines on our ship, and one of them even wounds a wind elemental, so I yell at Nohopu's bird, "Watch it! It's deflecting the spells towards us!"

The mirror fragments disperse into dust, then the monster suddenly closes its eyes and writhes about in agony. Its white, ethereal flames cover its face, then it instantly calms down.

The flasks worked, but the fucker just fucking cleansed itself!

Now free of the allergens, it immediately turns around and charges towards the Floater.

The squirrel captain slams his fist down against his gaudy chair in frustration. "Just what is that endurance?!"

"FOUND IT! EIGHTY DEGREES EAST!" The sniffer suddenly screams.

"PREPARE [DISCHARGE] AND RAM IIII~T!" Nohopu bellows.

"Hold back on your magic! You'll give away that you've already found the trail if you engage it fully!" Hihiriwa warns Nohopu.

"Understood! Belay the [Discharge]!" Kurii orders.

"Charge the mana, but don't fire! Show it that we're anxious to strike!" Nohopu orders.

"I can hold it in place for a moment with our magic! Prepare a synchronized strike!" I yell at the birds.

"Prepare a synchronized strike! On Ryder's orders!" Hihiriwa relays.

The Leviathan slaps the Floater on its side, but the ship turns its heading towards the fin at the last moment and absorbs most of the shock so that it doesn't get thrown away. It immediately faces forward again and slams against the Leviathan's face.

They wage a contest of strength as they push against each other, but the Floater is losing as it gets pushed back

"Celestial Horns in position!" Ririmu relays.

"READY!" Yunia yells.

"NOW!" I scream.

"ATTACK!" Hihiriwa relays.

"FIRE!" Nohopu and Oritiki scream at the same time.

The Leviathan freezes, and a large [Beam] stabs at its face, then smaller ones from all directions pierce into the rest of it. Before it can even create the mirror, [Discharge] is unleashed upon all of its body, giving us another second to wound it more deeply.

"UROOOOOOO~!" It roars in rage and slaps the Floater away. Half of the monster's face is severely burned, now just a black char, and one of its eyes is completely gone. Seven black char lines are spread along its body, penetrating deep past its transparent skin. Other wounds, caused by the Trinity Cannons and the girls, make it bleed glowing, white blood.

It suddenly turns upwards and starts to hastily swim away, trying to escape.

"NOO! WE CAN KILL I~T! Nohopu screams and stands up.

"No, we can't! It's too tiring for my wife!" I exclaim and see Yunia being supported by Hana due to her exhaustion.

Kurii grabs Nohopu's arm, and he flinches, then he grits his teeth and sits back down.

"The blue Leviathan is a priority! Don't chase after the albino, we have time to kill it later!" Hihiriwa angrily yells.

"Yes, Marshall!" Nohopu angrily responds.

"Follow the trail, NOW!" Hihiriwa orders, and nobody has anything to add.

We fly in the direction the sniffer had mentioned, but our battle scattered a lot of mana, so it takes them a few minutes to pick up the wounded Leviathan's mana trail again. An hour later, we pass by an islet and see a huge droplet of glowing blue blood on it, confirming that we're on the right track.

Soon after, a massive outline appears and slowly reveals itself from within the mist. The Floater slows down until it stops completely, and we all gaze at the sight in amazement. A massive gray stone gate stands before us. The patterns of small glowing lights all over it tells us that it's still active, and the trail of blue blood staining it is evidence that the wounded Leviathan has crossed through it.

"Hihiriwa, we've found an abandoned fortress..." Nohopu solemnly relays.

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