So yea... I'm late again sheesh ;-; my bad really I won't even mind if you're angry since yea it's twice in a row now...
my... thesis, or at least, thankfully, it was one part of it, got rejected and I have to start again from scratch it really took me pretty down to the bottom... I'm trying my best not to let it intervene with this series but eventually my thesis took my first priority and I could only continue writing this on my "work-made-into-leisure" time. Miraculously I could still somehow finishes this before my actual thesis was done.. so I was like ok, I'll just finish this one chapter and apologies yet again to my reader before continuing with my thesis... that said, that part of my thesis is now 25% complete and since I've read most of the books my lecturer told me to for the rest of the part I do kind of have a positive thinking that the rest should be a smooth writing though again, I'd like not to make an impossible promise as I did previously... so I do hope you'd understand but I'll have to postpone this two series for a while. At least until that part of my thesis was accepted so that my parents could stop nagging me about my thesis process and hopefully by that time I could concentrate to at least finishing the side story (which is supposed to end in about 2 or 3 more chapter) while continuing this one (which.. still is far from ending I'd say...)
so yea that was a long Gibberish huh, that said, hope you can still enjoy the story ;-;
"Ok then, shall we continue?" I ask, Makigumo nods as an answer and so, I continue the story...
The cruiser opened fire beginning the attack while the destroyers fans out to surround me. Luckily enough its attack was far from hitting me.
"Admiral, ignite me." I say.
"Ignite?" Makigumo asked.
"Ah, yes, you didn't know about it…" I just realized that this Makigumo have just got assigned…
"You'll know what it was while hearing the rest of the story." Shiranui says.
"O-ok then…"
The admiral didn't respond to my request at first, but then a radio came in, "Negative Inazuma, I'm not going to do that again, you know it right."
"But commander, we… don't have.." another shell comes at me nearly grazed my aft, "ghk…"
"Inazuma! Tsk…. Ok, hang on a second, I'll ready the ignition process." Finally, the admiral agreed to ignite me. At that time nothing could be recognized from where I stand, but I'm pretty sure admiral would be activating his Ground Effect Vehicle (GEV).
Anyway, the abyssal destroyers start firing their cannons as they get into their main cannon's range on me. Several of their shells managed to graze me left and right, but none did any noticeable damage.
Quickly, I dodged the other shell that the cruiser spews as it get closer onto me. As I start to get closer toward the cruiser, several destroyers welcomed me with their 8 inch shells which I easily dodged. I managed to get close toward the cruiser, but the other destroyers herd me away from it with their guns blazing.
I sail myself in a zigzag to avoid salvos from the destroyers as I return some of it. Neither side managed to do noticeable damage, but if anything, the abyssal managed to deplete my fuel faster. The sun has yet risen from its slumber while the fog is getting thicker to the point it completely covers me. To make things worse, the abyssals are giving no time for me to rest.
After several hours of hit and runs, I managed to moderately damages one Ha class out of the other two destroyers. The Ha class quickly retreat itself to the rear of their formation. Another destroyer came and took the retreating Ha class' position. I was about to shoot it when I realize that my ammo is nearing to being depleted. So I evaded his attack as I keep my distance from it. But then another problem pops up, my fuel is getting empty and I'll have to continue with my cruising speed. But of course, it's not enough to keep me away from the destroyer... Clank! One of its shell ricochet at my smokestack before smashing the sea. I'd consider myself lucky enough since we're pretty close by the time the abyssal destroyer shoot its cannon. Seeing that admiral is still nowhere to be found, I decided to shoot the destroyer with what left on my cannon's magazines. clank! My shell grazed the abyssal destroyer's teeth but it didn't do much. The abyssal destroyer shoot its 8 inch toward me blasting my engine room and send me flying for a second.
I can't really feel my back, but it's really hot back there. Right when the abyssal was about to load another round, another shell came from my left, clank! I know what shell this one is. It stuck on my hull before it sprinkles waters on me. The water feels like the ones you'd find inside the repair bucket. At the same time, the shell injected several fairies onto my hull which replenish all of my weaponry ammunition both of which occur only on several seconds. So, once the abyssal destroyer managed to load its cannon and shot it, I have already gone from where it was aiming at. Managing to outrun the other destroyers, I charged toward the unsuspecting cruiser while readying my 12.7 cm.
The cruiser has already got the wrecked destroyer by the time I managed to get it inside my main cannon's range. It's about to get out of the scene when its engine room was set ablaze by my 12.7 cm. It screeches in pain as fire scorches its body.
The destroyers behind me start to fire its cannons. Bwash! Rain of shells poured around me as water splashes all over me, I managed to slip through all of it with only being wetter. I managed to get close enough toward the cruiser without taking any damages. Quickly I snatched the chain that holds my anchor and rotating it like a cowgirl I was. The rotation starts pretty slow but it got faster as it starts to ring a deadly swosh every time it made a circle. The cruiser slowly rotating its body to let its cannon points me, but before it happened, I had already threw my anchor, releasing the momentum weapon toward the cruiser's stomach. It stuck pretty deep into it. The cruiser screams in pain as it try to shove the anchor out of its stomach. I shoot my cannons whose shells managed to splinter the cruiser's main cannon. The cruiser shot its secondary cannons to rain me with "small" shells, but none of which actually made any noticeable damage. Using the stuck anchor, I made a circle around the cruiser. I managed to land two direct hits onto the cruiser's back before it could align me with its canon's sight. Blast! As the sound of the cruiser's cannon glare, I've already start closing further into the cruiser while loading another shell onto my cannon's chamber. Clack! Bwash! The sound of the shell on my cannon, which signs that it's ready to shoot, is in harmony with the rain of shell that the cruiser gave me. Blast! My cannon roars as its shells flew through the cruiser's "head" which pops out greenish gasses all over the place. I pluck out my anchor from the cruiser before I get into the damaged destroyer which sat right beside the cruiser.
Seeing their flagship sunk, the other destroyers start to flock me like a bug to a light. All three destroyers shoot its cannon simultaneously at me, one of which ricochets near my engine room, luckily with little to no effect. I replied their salvo with mine which hit the Ha class destroyer and immediately set it ablaze before slowly sink into the ocean. The other two destroyers continued their march toward me. Seeing that, I dashed myself toward them while readying my torpedoes. Bwash! More saltwater flew away as the abyssal destroyer's shells penetrate the ocean. I managed to slip past through the barrage unharmed and we soon reach our torpedoes' effective range. We exchanged torpedoes as another salvo of shells was fired by several abyssal destroyers. I bank right and left to avoid both of the abyssals' torpedoes and shells as I came closer toward them. Pwoofs! I released the rest of my torpedoes toward one of the Ro class destroyer that came onto me. It took most of the torpedo before splitting into two and then got eaten by the sea.
The last Ro class destroyer shoot its cannon onto me, its shell nearly hits me but sunk into the ocean instead. Seeing its attack failed, it tried to escape so I send him home with a whack on its head with my fist. After flinching and "lands" its face on the ocean's surface, it quickly ran into the horizon.
"Whoa!" Makigumo can't hold her excitement any longer, "So, basically, ignition works like a strength buff medicine for us ship girl or some sort?"
"Ahahaha!" Nagatsuki laughed, "You can say so."
"Then, why is it being banned?" Makigumo asked.
"The side effect is the problem." Shiranui answered, "Though it does restores us to our optimum performance and is considered one of the best method of prolonging a shipgirl's combat capability, especially after the usage of Compass Fairy Protection, it's later found that the ignition process negates any Compass Fairy Protection, so a shipgirl could sink in one hit from full health and each nodes could collapse right after their fuel drained out."
"In other words, most of the time it is a suicide mission once the ignition shell used." I adds.
"I see… ah, then how could you survive it?"
The only way to prevent the inevitable sinking of shipgirl whom was ignited, was to get her off the sea before her fuel depleted. The admiral managed to save me. That is after making assure that no enemy came after the damaged destroyer of course. He shot me with fulton recovery shell which took me to the air before his GEV took me. The same method was used to take the damaged destroyer. Several fairies quickly tend the destroyer and tried to separate the abyssal body from the fisherman's… that is to no avail…
"Awh… that's pretty much a downer for an ending…" Makigumo say.
"But thanks to that," Nagatsuki say, "we knew that these abyssals could also took humans as captive."
"We also learns a lot from that hostage." Shiranui add, "In fact, there are researches on ways to actually extract hostages from its abyssal body."
"And while the higher ups wouldn't trusts me on this," I further add, "I believe that they're also starts to learn to understand feel as though they were human."
"Hmnn... That's why you helped that destroyer on our first sailing training?"
"That's one of the reason, but you saw it yourself right? He actually thanks us for helping and it could've shot me but it didn't..."
"Wow... So this abyssals are more complex than we knew they were..."
"Not with that abyssal though I guess..." Nagatsuki pointed her index finger toward a closing in abyssal ships, "two Tsu class torpedo cruisers at three o clock."
"All units engage!" as I said that out loud, I called my weaponry out, followed by Makigumo and Nagatsuki. Shiranui had already equipped hers already so she jumped off the boat first and quickly head toward the two torpedo cruisers
"Boss, I believe Shiranui could try and flank the one on our right while I'll cover her..." Nagatsuki says, "You could take care of the other one, right?"
"Yea, I have my own plan for this one. Makigumo stay close to the tanker, see if there are any hostile submarine around" I say, we then quickly split up, Shiranui silently slip to the cruiser's right flank while Nagatsuki covering her by shooting her cannons one after another at the cruiser on my right. Meanwhile, I am closing in toward the cruiser ahead of me while firing my main canon. The cruiser tried to shoot me, but none of its shells even managed to scratch me. I quickly return the salvo and managed to scratches the cruiser. I then proceed to get into torpedo range within a minute. Right when we're close enough, we exchanges torpedoes. Neither of us accept any of the torpedoes though. Quickly, I sail myself closer to the cruiser and aim my canon to its head. Blast! With a single, almost point blank, shot, the cruiser releases green smoke from the hole on its head as it begins to sink. I could see Shiranui had already launched all of her torpedoes off from its tubes. Two of them were shot by the cruiser's machine guns while another two of them severing the cruiser by ripping it apart in half. Followed with greenish smoke puffing up from the crack, the cruiser slowly swallowed by the deep blue sea.
"Hwaaaa you girls are great seniors!" Makigumo's voice could be heard over the radio.
"Hehen that was nothing really. " Nagatsuki claimed.
"Now-now let's not get ahead of ourselves. " I tried to warn her but Nagatsuki just continued her proud laugh. I can see Shiranui is shaking her head left and right from afar.
After making ourselves assured that no other wave of enemy's inbound, we climbed our way back aboard the deck where Makigumo, who climbed up first, waits with her excited face.
"Hwaaaa... " Makigumo repeats herself.
"Now-now, I believe you'll get to our level quite soon if you practiced hard enough! " Nagatsuki claim as she patted Makigumo's head.
"I'll agree with her on that." Shiranui nodded as she put her hands on her hip.
Those words from the two destroyers managed to brought Makigumo's confidence back. With that, our journey continues for several more minutes before a land could be seen on the horizon.
"Land ahead! " said one of the ship's crew.
We managed to docksafely. The ship's crewmen guides them to the port's office with a lot of smiles and gratitudes. Makigumo is smiling widely toward the crewmen and so does Nagatsuki. I can only spot a slightly stretched smile on Shiranui's face as she waves toward the crewmen.
"Well, we'll be waiting here this afternoon." said one of crewmen before he raised his salute, we replied shortly before we headed toward the harbor's exit.
"Whoaa... Did seniors look at the sailors' faces? They seem so happy when we managed to escort them safely. "
"Well, the fact that we keep them alive…" Shiranui made a pause on her statement, "and the fact that we're girls compared to ordinary machinery could be the reason of their exaggerated happiness." she continued.
"A-aahah… B-but I'm glad to know that our actions could actually saves lives. I start to feel lucky for being born as a ship girl." Makigumo said.
"Ohoh, we tend to do that when we're not busy trying to clean the sea off of some Seeds." Nagatsuki says before she patted Makigumo's shoulder, "but of course you still have a long way to go before you could actually do something like that." she said.
"Anghh... Then... I wanted to train more to become a lot stronger like seniors!" Makigumo says.
"Well, that's The spirit!" Nagatsuki shouts.
"But I'm afraid you're going to need one training, hard enough to make you regret being a Shipgirl." suddenly a voice of a mature lady could be heard from our back... And indeed she was the trainer who could make anyone or perhaps anything regret being born as a Shipgirl.
