Chapter 154: New Area

Chapter 154: New Area

DISCLAIMER: This story is NOT MINE IN ANY WAY. That honor has gone to the beautiful bastard Ryuugi. This has been pulled from his Spacebattles publishment at threads/rwby-the-gamer-the-games-we-play-disk-five.341621/. Anyway on with the show...err read.

New Area

It didn't take us long to reach the so-called Sea of Monsters, the massive body of water circled by the continent. Its name was a bit deceptiveafter all, everything was full of monsters on Remnantbut it was noteworthy because of its historical significance. As a general rule, the ancient nations of Remnant didn't make exploration a priority, beyond what was necessary. After all, the answer to the question 'what's out there?' was pretty much always 'a lot of horrifying monsters that want to kill us,' and the predation of the Grimm limited the potential rewards of such endeavors. Mistral's largest museum actually had an entire exhibit filled with the maps of ancient societies, depicting what they thought the world looked like, and it was actually pretty neat to see how people filled in the blanks. Generally they just went with the often sadly accurate 'Here Be Dragons' but other timeswell, a lot of Remnant's piecemeal history came from those maps. Even if you didn't share a language, you could still look at the pretty pictures, after all.

The Sea of Monsters, however, was one of the few exceptions that. While, yes, the maps of it were filled with illustrations of monsters, they stood out because they weren't just randomly placed warnings about the obviousthe Sea of Monsters was the first place that had been scouted and mapped such that the common locations of the various species of Grimm were accounted for. While the creatures of Grimm, being the dominant form of life on Remnant, were able to go wherever the fuck they wanted and would sometimes go far out of their way to ruin people's days, having the most common locals of the various beasts did a lot to make things safer, most of the time.

If records were to be believed, it had all started because of Mistral's old style of conquest. In their efforts to achieve dominance over the continent, they sought to obtain naval superiority, as all of their known enemies had also bordered the sea. Given the costs associated with going anywhere on Remnant, some emperor or other decided that, 'hey, if things were going to try to murder us either way, we might as well take a short-cut.' What was believed to be one of the first accurate maps of Mistralor the parts of it bordering the sea, anywaycame from those days, and some of the paths they'd mapped out were still used now, if rarely. There wasn't much point, now that just about everyone you could visit that way was deadand now that we had airships, of course.

Still, for something that had been a source of horror stories for thousands of years, the Sea of Monsters was remarkably pretty.

"I heard there was a herd of Leviathan in here," Adam mused as we stood on the beach. It was a nice place, I noted absently. I'd never been to a beach of recreational purposes, but my Mom and Dad had. Only the rich and powerful did that much, simply because of the odds of Grimm ruining the occasion. Vale had a few areas set up for that, but it was still rare and the fact that people worried about going made it that much more dangerous. "Do you think it's true? Andactually, is it a herd? Or a school or something? I don't know what you call a bunch of Leviathans."

"I actually don't know," I answered slowly.

"For which question?"

"Both, actually," I said, pursing my lips. "Leviathans are pretty big, but that doesn't necessarily mean anything with the Grimm. There could be a few in there somewhere, though. As for what they're called in groups, I have no idea. Leviathans are kind of weird looking."

Adam considered that for a moment before kicking the sand and watching it spray. I wondered if he'd ever been to a beach before. If so, it probably hadn't been to play.

"I've never actually seen one," He admitted after a moment.

"I doubt many people have," I replied. "Those sea monsters we killed last time? I bet most people have never even seen them before. You'd only meet them if you were on the water, after all, and most people don't sail much these days. But my Mom and Dad killedwell, tried to kill every monster in the book. Turns out the book's a bit bigger than they thought, but"

I shrugged.

"They killed a Leviathan, though," I continued. "A little one crawled up on the shores of Vale awhile back and they were part of the group sent to deal with it before it got to the rivers."

"Crawled up?" Adam repeated, frowning down at the beach with renewed severity. "Leviathans can walk on land?"

"They're amphibious," I confirmed, tilting my head as I wondered how to best describe them. "They'reodd. Sea monsters, but they're one of the Grimm that steal from various animals. There are some shark bits, some snake bits, some whale and crocodile, and some other stuff. Plus the general Grimm weirdness."

Adam snorted.

"I hate the sea," He said. "If there's not shit crawling out of it trying to kill you, then you're crossing it yourself and everything's going to shit."

I hummed once, figuring he was remembering Menagerie. Probably not fondly, not that I could blame him.

After a moment, though, he sighed.

"So how are we getting across?" He asked. "I mean, I assume you can just fly over run across or whatever, but I can't."

"You can run on water," I disagreed. "It's not even that hard."

"Across a river or something, no," He allowed. "But across a sea? That's a bit different."

I rolled my eyes, but I was smiling.

"Fine, you big baby," I said. "I'll just carry you over"

"How?" Adam interrupted, making me look at him oddly.

"Um," I began before pausing, honestly unsure of what to say. "Easily? I mean, all jokes aside, I'm pretty strong. I could run across with you on my back, no problem."

"Piggyback?" He asked incredulously. "That's not happening."

"Ah," I said as I understood. "You mean how will I carry you. Got it. UhI think whatever's fine. Over the shoulder, bridal style, I don't care."

"Well, I do," Adam stated firmly. "And I think you'd get stabbed if you tried to carry me bridal style. And I think you'd get stabbed in the back if you just threw me over your shoulder."

"If I get stabbed, I get stabbed," I answered amusedly, smiling at him. Still, I pondered the issue for a moment before shrugging. "There's really no dignified way to get carried around, Adam."

Sighing, I did what I tended to do whenever depressing things like reality started catching up on me and focused on something else. Luckily, my senses were good enough that it was easy to find things to amuse myself with.

Turning abruptly, I began to run in a wide circle atop the water. By my reckoning, which was more or less perfect, we were about two-thirds of the way across the seafar enough for the mightier Grimm to show their faces and yet still deep enough that they didn't need to until it was too late.

"Hey, Adam," I said, making my voice carry as a matter of course. "I found those Leviathans you were talking about. Want to see one up close?"

Adam looked down for his airborne position, raising an eyebrow even as he considered it. He was the adaptable sort and had gotten used to the strange manner of transportation quicklyhe even seemed to enjoy it a bit, which was good. I was using Levant to direct the air around him to make the journey a relatively comfortable one. He really must have had a lot of bad memories of crossing the water to go along with this, though. Or maybe bad memories of someone holding onto him while he crossed the water. Either way, there were friendship rules in place and they demanded that the situation be avoided if at all possible.

"Define 'up close,'" He asked. "You have different definitions of proximity than most people. I don't want to be eaten by one, if that's what you're asking."

"No eating," I assured. "I'm just in a bad mood and want to take it out on something. And maybe get some skill booksthat always make me feel better."

"You're simultaneously very high-maintenance and easy to please," Adam noted.

"It's not like I eat," I replied, slightly affronted. "Or sleep. Or drink. Or required much of anything, really. My vices can be forgiven. And hey, I just thought maybe you had a bad mood, too. If you don't want to"

"I could kill something right now," He admitted. "I'm all for misplaced aggression, when it's directed at things that deserve it anyway. It's a multipurpose exercise."

"And you get to see a Leviathan," I said.

"And I get to see a Leviathan," He agreed.

I stopped running and began to float above the water's surface instead. A shift of Levant's power was all it took to keep the cord taunt and Adam in the air, so I pondered the creature below us for a moment.

"You want to be the hook or the bait?" I asked after some consideration.

"Oh, I get to pick this time?" Adam wondered, seeming more amused then anything.

"Why not?" I answered, giving him a shrug. "We're a team, after all."

Adam flashed his teeth at that.

"Bait," He said.

"Oh?"

"How many people can say they've seen a Leviathan up close?" Adam asked.

"Hmph," I snorted, but didn't hide my grin. "Fair enough."

"Just remember to do your part," He said.

"Mm," I confirmed. A moment later, Adam began to fall like a stone, the wind literally taken out of his sails. Even so, he slipped through the surface of the water with nary a splash, passing through it like it was no more than a doorway even as streams of water rose up around him, forming a bubble of air around him. Together, Levant and Xihai pushed him as far down as the cord would allow, until he was bobbing likewell, like a fishing lure.

And then he began to glow. I felt him draw upon my power through the Caritas connection I'd established, flowing through him and into the sword at his waist. I saw the Grimm notice him, a tide of the creatures beginning to swim towards Adam.

But before they did, Adam unleashed him gathered power, directing the strike straight down.

A wall of water rose high above me, raining down on me as a side effect of Adam's attack even as it carved a fissure across the deep. Light warped around it, turning the sea and sky red and black, but the effect faded as soon as it came.

And the water began to roil and writhe for a different reason entirely, something dark abruptly stirring. Water began to twist into a whirlpool at once, but I knew what was really happening.

Immediately, I took flight and drew Adam from the waves and into the open air. The shape beneath the surface moved again and a forest of white spike erupted from the sea.

The Leviathan snapped its jaws closed and thirty feet above the water, we found ourselves face to face with the beast. Its head wasn't quite long enough to look like a crocodiles, nor blunt enough to seem like a shark, but the teeth within its maw had been reminiscent of both. Its body was massive and serpentine between the limbs of various creaturesa pair of crocodile legs here, a row of tentacles there, and then some pincers and claws and other such thingsand it was massive. I could see down to the bottom of the sea where its hindmost legs dug into the silt, and its head still rose above the surface of the water. Rows of luminous red eyes lines its body, gazing in every direction even as the clusters upon its face looked at us.

For some reason, I expected a creature like that to growl or snarl or roar, but the sound it made instead was like that of a teapot pot times a thousand, and accompanying the sound, steam began to rise from the sea.

The Abyss of the Sea

LV 107

Leviathan

"Wow," Adam said, voice dry enough to soak up all the surrounding water and then some. "You are one ugly motherfucker."