Author's Note:
Can I ask you which is better? Zombies? Vampires? Pirates?
You know what's better than all three of those things? Zombie/Vampire Pirates!
Sorry it took so long to update. Like I said, I focused most of my writing time on my 'Demi-Human Students of Beacon' fanfic, and a bit on my 'Worst Enemies Make Even Worse Housemates' rewrite. While I was trying to come up with something to write for Chapter 36 of this fic, my mind kept stubbing its toe on the large, and very inconvenient, stone called "writer's block."
I started and tried to write Chapter 36 with a few other ideas. Such as; Time Crisis 3, Azur Lane, my RWBY MMORPG original idea, the Destiny Regicide chapter I started but haven't finished. I even began a Warhammer 40K chapter that will feature my own Space Marine Chapter. In the end, I decided to go and do this chapter.
After deciding to make this chapter to be the next one, I tried out this new system where I try to write at least a thousand words a day for my fanfics. Hopefully that will help with the speed that I write chapters, and the frequency in which I update my fanfictions. We'll just have to see.
To those who enjoyed the Three Kingdoms chapter and requested another chapter on it, particularly of the duel between Lu Bu and the Three Brothers. I'm sorry to say that I'm rather unsure about writing it. I mean, I really like the tv series, but in my opinion, the horseback duels are not one of the series' strong suits. I'm not against writing it, but have you seen those duel scenes?
Anyway, here you go.
Warhammer Total War 2: Curse of the Vampire Coast
The shadow of Keeper Alaric finished readying the next universe he had in mind for the audience. But, before the shadow went ahead and started up this next viewing of the Multiverse, he had a curious question to ask the audience.
Which of these do you like? Zombies? Vampires? Or pirates? Alric asked the audience, arousing a bit of suspicion in regards to what the walking shadow had in mind. The shadow had asked a question, though, so they audience decided to play along and answer him. Their responses as varied as the audience members were.
"Oooh, I like zombies!" Yang jumped up in her seat and punched a fist into the air. She had once tried to make Ruby walk a zombie movie with her a couple years ago, but their father caught her, and Yang ended up getting grounded for a week. "Are we going to see some kind of zombie apocalypse universe? It would be scary as hell, but it would be pretty cool to watch someone kick zombie ass!"
"One of my sisters made me watch the first season of 'The Running Dead' late at night. I had nightmares for weeks," Jaune added a bit shakily, obviously not as fortunate as Ruby.
"They're overused," Qrow bluntly stated his own opinion, one that was shared by a fair few other members of the audience. "Feels like every year a movie or game with zombies in them is released."
Those were a few of the opinions the audience had on zombies, now it was the turn for those who wanted their thoughts on vampires heard.
"I've seen a few things about Vampires, and they can be pretty frightening in our media. I can only imagine how terrifying they are in these other universes," Ozpin commented.
"That they certainly can be," Maria spoke up. The former Grimm Reaper remembering a movie she watched where a vampire was portrayed by a famous actor who passed away a few years ago. She couldn't recall his name, but she knew that the actor's first name was something along the lines of Christopher Eel or something like that.
"Ruff!" Zwei said(?), again, no one understood what exactly the little corgi had said. Apart from Alric, of course, who went ahead and nodded at the corgi's response and materialised a bowl of Zwei's favourite dog food in front of the little dog. A few in the audience, namely Ruby, Yang and Weiss looked on jealously at how Alric, and by extension Alaric, and Zwei had bonded over the course of their audience's time in the Repository.
Vampires done and out of the way, it was now time for the opinions of those who wanted to talk about pirates was to be heard.
"They are a despicable bunch. Something people tend to forget when watching their dramatic portrayals in movies and other such things," Winter disapprovingly commented. She wasn't wrong.
"Yaaar! Walk de plank, ye scallywags!" Nora jumped in while wearing a pirate hat, an eyepatch over one eye, and a waving around a fake hook, all of it courtesy of Alric.
"I once fought some pirates operating off the south-western Sanus coast. Let me tell you about it. It was-!" Port began to ramble on with another of his overly long and very self-glorifying stories that he had the unfortunate tendency to tell whenever he got the chance. The rest of the audience and Alric decided to ignore him, it was for the best really.
"So, are we going to watch something about pirates? Zombies? Vampires? Vampire zombie pirates?" Fox asked the Keeper's shadow.
Alric did not answer, but just went ahead and started up the TV.
The TV screen faded into a closeup of a hermit crab slowly but surely traversing a sandy beach. The camera then panned to the right, showing a few more hermit crabs, and then coming upon a leg wearing brown leather boots and white-and-red striped tight pants.
Now panning upwards, the camera looked over the leg and showed a bit more of the location all this was happening on. The place looked like a desert island, for it was mostly sand with several palm trees scattered here and there. Three metres away was a man wearing a heavy dark-red coat digging into the ground with a shovel, a small chest with an object that glittered blue under the sun was close by him.
What was also close by the man currently digging were two more bodies, all of them dressed in the same colours as the leg the camera just passed over. When the audience thought about it, they were also dressed and armoured similarly to Rudolph Kruber, Ruby's alternate in that viewing with those filthy Skaven.
"Does this take place in the same universe as the one with the Skaven? Those soldiers are dressed like my alternate self from that viewing," Ruby remarked upon seeing the corpses around the digging man.
No, but, it does take place in the same branch of universes. Alric replied, his response inspiring intrigue and some caution in the audience. The last stuff they had seen and of from this branch of universes was actually pretty crazy, and not really a place that they would ever consider living in or visiting. Yet the universe was interesting to learn of, so the audience sat up in their seats and intently focused on the TV screen.
Changing the conversation subject away from what universe this was taking place in, and to what was happening in the universe they were watching, Oscar spoke up.
"Is that a pirate digging up some lost treasure? Or is he going to bury some?"
"Actually, pirates rarely if ever hid their treasure." Oobleck butted in, using his extensive knowledge of history to correct and enlighten the farmhand in the audience. "They would normally, and quickly, sell or spend what loot they got their hands on due to their rather short life expectancy as a pirate."
"Oh, so, what is he doing? And who is that anyway?" The young teenage boy asked once Oobleck was done.
He is a pirate. Alric responded to Osca's question, but, rather infuriatingly, left it at that. It was really hard for the audience to put up with this kind of behaviour from both Keeper Alaric and his shadow. That they seemingly had no choice but to put up with it was even more annoying to them. Where was Alaric anyway, and when would he be back?
"You wouldn't believe us... The tales we could tell!" The man digging into the sand said to corpses around him.
The audience were quick to identify just who it the pirate digging into the sand was by listening to his voice. There was a bit of an accent to it, and sounded more conniving than person they recognised the pirate to be, but the audience knew the pirate was the bowler hat wearing criminal in the audience with them. Roman Torchwick.
"Oh, great. A viewing starring him," Blake mumbled to herself while also casting an disapproving glance towards Roman. The criminal possessing what looked like a pleased look on his face for finally getting a main role in a universe viewing.
"Hopefully he gets shot like in that universe where he turned out to be a blueberry pie," Sun said to Blake when he heard her mumbled words. He agreed with Blake's view of Roman, and though he normally wouldn't want someone to get shot, Roman may or may not deserve to be. Actually, correct that previous statement. Roman almost certainly deserved to get shot.
"Up yours, monkey boy! Hah, it's about time I got time I got my turn in the limelight." Roman remarked after hearing Sun's less than complementary words about him. Over by Neo, Roman's short henchwoman/girl, she frowned and rose up her sign which also had a frowny face drawn on it. "You'll get your turn Neo."
Neo was not at all appeased by Roman's words, but since she didn't seem capable of doing anything about it, the pint-sized criminal jut frowned and crossed her arms. She wanted a viewing with her as a main character in it as well. Preferably with her kicking someone's ass, like Yang's, in an epic fashion.
While Neo was silently complaining about her lack of appearances in these viewings, the rest of the audience had noticed that something about this version of Torchwick seemed off. Yes he had a bit of an accent, but that was not new, nor was it the thing that alerted the audience that something was up with this Roman. There was a quality to him, one that the audience could not understand where it came from, that made the audience feel as if he less than human, but also more at the same time. The fact that the camera was actively avoiding showing Roman's face was another hint that there might be something else about this version of the criminal.
In response to this, the audience kept their guard up in the very likely event that something crazy might happen.
The screen cut to another location, this time it looked like a rainforest at the dead of night. A stone pyramid structure of Aztec-like design, with a strange blue glow coming from within, towered over the forest canopy.
Another cut showed Torchwick striding through the abandoned corridors of the pyramid, yet the camera still only showed his back. A couple seconds later, Roman exited the corridor and entered a wide hall with a tall ceiling.
Over at the far end of the hall, at an altar atop some stairs, was a strange yet beautiful artifact. It was a large sky-blue crystal set in a gilded cube that was surrounded by a gilded ring. Interestingly, this artifact was not resting on the altar, but was levitating above it a few centimetres above it.
"Well hello beautiful. What price can you fetch for?" Roman said to himself whilst eyeing the very precious, and probably priceless, artefact. He wasn't the only one eyeing the artefact with desirous intent.
Emerald, longtime and natural thief that she was, was currently imagining how much the artefact would be worth if sold in the black market.
Profe-I mean... DOCTOR Oobleck's mind was blazing through all kinds of questions and ideas in regards to the culture, and history, of the people who created the artefact and built the pyramid that housed it. Being in the Repository had exposed him to all kinds of civilisations and cultures, and the DOCTOR felt slightly dejected that he could not get a better opportunity to learn more about them.
"I'm guessing that this is in the past? You know, like a flashback." Neptune commented, receiving an affirmative nod from Alric.
"Though... Truth be told," Roman said as he stopped digging and planted his shovel into thd sand. He then looked to a corpse slumped against a palm tree, and whose dead eyes were looking at Roman. "It started very poorly."
Back to the scene in the pyramid temple, as Roman neared the stairs, the eyes of two guardian statues depicting a pair of lizard-like creatures that stood along the path towards the altar lit up, and the entire pyramid began to violently shake. Bright blue magical energies engulfed the guardian statues, and from their stone mouths, bolts of magical lightning began to relentlessly lash out and strike Roman over and over again. It looked, and certainly was, painful as hell.
Roman fell on his knees and let out a tormented scream as the defensive magic set long ago on the pyramid did its work on him. The man tried to fight back against the magic that assailed him, but the protective spells set on these ancient halls were made to fight off creatures even more powerful than him, so Roman's struggle was one of futility and only made things more painful for himself. Meanwhile, Roman's prize, the golden artifact upon the altar broke apart into two halves and flew past him. The blue crystal set in the cube going to one part of the world, while the ring that had surrounded it to another.
Leaving the man that had sought to claim the artifact to the mercies of the temple's magic, before the screen cut to black.
"Well, that was... rough." Coco remarked, breaking the short silence that had fallen over the room as they watched the Torchwick onscreen be subject to an undeniably painful experience. But, knowing the kind of man Roman was, a thief being the least of those things, the guy was probably intending to plunder the temple for personal gain. So, he kind of deserved what he went through, but still, what they saw was pretty terrible.
"Yeah, 'rough'. Rough is a very apt way of describing just happened to the other me." Roman sarcastically said in response to Coco's remark. Excruciatingly painful would be a much better way to describe what had happened to pirate Roman, seriously, Roman actually squirmed in his seat a bit while he watched the other him get bombarded by magic lightning.
"And yet he was able to survive that?" Cinder said, adding her own thoughts to the mix. She was right, and it was remarkable that Roman had apparently withstood the magical defenses of the temple, but the audience did doubt the idea that he came out of that experience unaffected in anyway.
Taking into consideration that fact they had not even seen a glimpse of Roman's face since the viewing started, the pirate version of the criminal most certainly by this experience in the pyramid in some way. Had his face been severely scarred or deformed in some way? Maybe, but all they could do was keep watching and waiting.
The screen brightened against, this time showing a trio of sails ships surrounded by fog and creeping towards the island Roman was on.
"I was one... But now we are many." Roman said to himself as he continued with his digging. One of the ships fired a broadside of cannonfire at the island Roman was on. The cannonballs flying over Roman's head, one almost taking his head off, and exploded somewhere offscreen. Roman cackled when he heard the cannonballs exploded and began to pick up the pace with his diggging. "We all agree on one thing!"
There was something about Torchwick that drew concern from the audience. Not the 'I'm-concerned-for-this-person' kind of concerned, but the 'I-feel-concerned-because-of-this-person' type of concerned. Trust me, they're two different kinds of concerned. His personality seemed to have shifted, from a calm and somewhat normal one to a slightly mad one. Somewhat normal because he had been talking to a corpses, which I'm certain is not a normal thing to do.
"To sail the coast!" Roman continued.
Another scene change occured, this time to an aerial view of a fortress-like settlement in the dead of night. It was situated at a coast or near the mouth of a great river. One side facing the waters while the other was towards the rainforest that dominated the land.
"Hunt down those Lizard trinkets." The camera focused on a small chest filled with an assortment of golden baubles and artifacts created from goodness knows how many years ago. The one that stood out from all the other contents in the chest was the blue crystal half of the artifact Roman had tried to take from the pyramid. "And we will find them. Muhahahahaha!"
"Okay, that laugh was just creepy." Fox stated, everyone else in the audience agreeing with the teen. The more the audience heard this other version of Roman speak, the more they felt that there was indeed something up with him. He already was a scummy pirate, but was he a mad pirate as well? That would be a supremely bad combination if that were real.
"What was that about him being 'many'?" Neo inquired, curious as to what pirate Roman meant by that. The Keeper's shadow refused to answer, and only crossed his arms.
Great, more questions with answers that they would have to wait for.
In the streets of the Empire settlement, the night guards were doing their rounds. Most were in pairs, while a few patrolled on their own. One such poor unfortunate soul who had the misfortune of patrolling the dark streets of the settlement on his own, was walking down a street with a halberd in one hand and a torch in the other. His mind split between focusing on staying alert for anything, and longing for the warm bed and cold ale he'd get once his watch was over.
It was then that the soldier heard some behind him. Turning round, the man, and the audience, laid eyes on a creature from a horror film. It was a shambling half-corpse, literally, for the creature lacked the lower half of the human body it used to be. Using its long arms as a substitute for its lost legs. Its dead skin was grey and cold, needle-like teeth filled the gapping maw that was its mouth.
Terrified, and absolutely browning those white-and-red pants of his, thd guard started to back away from the creature. Yet, his fears only grew when the fire of his torch revealed even more horrors. Approaching him were a small gang of shuffling zombies. These zombies had the looked of drowned sailors or pirates if their wet rotting flesh and attire was anything to go by. And they were advancing right towards the guard.
Turning to run, the guard was only able to take a two steps when he froze where he stood as he came face-to-face with something else that had been stalking the night. It was Roman, his features still hidden, this time by the night's shadows. In his right hand he carried a cutlass that he used like a cane, and in his left was a flintlock pistol that he rose up so the guard was looking down the pistol's barrel before firing.
"What in God's green earth was that-that... monster?!" Jeanne cried when she saw the walking half-corpse with a gaping mouth, completely aghast at the knowledge that such a monster actually existed in the Multiverse. She was not alone, and those who shared such thoughts felt a chill up their spine as they imagined running into that monster in the dead of night like the guard had.
"Were those... zombie pirates?" Kali asked about the gang of shambling undead that she saw onscreen.
"I believe so," Ghira responded to his wife's question. The two remembered what Alric had said before the start of this viewing, and when the two faunus saw the attire that the zombies wore, they were quick to make the assumption. They were not alone, and others in the audience agreed with them. So this was why Alric had brought up zombies and pirates earlier.
But what about vampires?
"Is Torchwick a zombie pirate as well?" Glynda asked Alric.
"To hell with that idea!" The criminal was quick to deny, not wishing to be a mindless corpse driven by a craving for living flesh, and without any sense of luxury or appreciation of a good cigar. Speaking of cigars, Roman took one out and lit it with a match.
Well yes, but no. Alric vaguely answered. He has control over them, but he himself is not a zombie. You'll see what I mean in a moment.
So Roman was a necromancer as well as a pirate? And what did he mean by that first part? Did Alric mean that the Roman onscreen was also an undead creature? The audience would not have long to wait for their questions to be answered.
"One piece at a time!" Roman continued to speak. Returning to the desert island, Roman had thrown his shovel aside and was now desperately digging with his gloved hands. Tossing sand into the air in his pursuit of whatever he sought.
After a few seconds, Roman abruptly stopped his digging and reached down to retrieve something from the sand.
"We will put ourselves back together!" Roman yelled as he rose up to his full height, and triumphantly held up the other half of the artifact he'd tried to plunder from the temple so many years ago.
The camera moved to face Roman, and slowly panned started to pan upwards as Roman took both halves of the artifact and began to process of restoring the artifact to its original state. As the camera moved upwards, the audience were finally allowed a full view of just what this Roman looked like. Or maybe I should say, what he really was.
This universe's Roman had rough, deathly white skin that bore its fair share of scars here and there. An eyepatch covered his right eye, while his good left one had blood-red pupils and the white of his eyes were actually pitch black. His hair, once orange back in another lifetime millennia ago, was now white with age and fell past his shoulders. Behind him, while Roman was busying returning both halves of the artifact together, a pitched battle between an army of soldiers from the Empire of Man and a horde of undead was raging on.
The pieces of the artifact in Roman's hands began to crackle with magic and a pale-blue aura started to surround them. It took a bit of effort, for both halves of the artifact seemed to try and resist being reunited with each other, but Roman was finally able to put the artifact back together. A small shockwave burst forth from the artifact the moment Roman completed his task.
"Fortune favours the infamous." Roman said to himself, a smirk on his lips as he looked up from his prize and right at the camera. As he opened his mouth to speak and smirk, it was revealed his canines were sharp fangs.
For a majority of the audience, they now understood why Alric mentioned vampires before the start of this viewing. Roman was certainly more than a scourge of the seas. He was definitely more, but less, than a human. This version of Roman Torchwick was in actuality a bloody vampire!
Say hello to Arch-Grand Commodore of the Vampire Coast, Roman Harkon. Or the Pirate King if you want a shorter title, Alric told the audience.
"W-What?" Emerald said, not in shock or horror, but in amused disbelief of the first title Alric had used to introduce Roman Harkon. If that was an actual rank given to him, she thought whoever came up with it in the first place was ridiculous. If not, and in the occasion that Roman came up with it himself, the thief believed that he came up with it to compensate for something.
"A vampire pirate. Well, I don't think I've heard of that before." Maria muttered, thumbing her chin as she tried to recall if she had. She couldn't, so she guessed that this was indeed the first time she ever encountered the idea of vampire pirates.
Yes, Roman Harkon is a vampire. In fact, one of the first vampires to have ever plagued this world, Alric continued to explain the identity of Roman's alternate in this universe. While searching for treasure in the jungles of a land called 'Lustria', his mind was split into dozens of personalities when trying to breach into a Lizardman temple. Each personality fighting each other for dominance, but they all agree that returning to their pre-shattered state would be very beneficial.
"So the Roman in this world is a blood sucking parasite who also operates as a pirate? Huh, not far off from what this one's like," Ironwood remarked disdainfully.
"Screw off, tin-head!" Roman yelled in response to the Altesian General's words.
"Looks like quite the fighting going on behind him," Cinder said. She was not interested in it, but she was imagining the powers that the vampires in this word wielded. Alric had mentioned that Roman had control over zombies, so was necromancy a natural ability of vampires, or that Roman had learnt over the years. As if he had heard her thoughts, which he no doubt did, Alric answered Cinder's unspoken questions.
A large majority of Vampires in this world are natural necromancers. Though, there are those from certain bloodlines whose power in that school of dark arts is lesser than their midnight kindred. The undead you see behind Roman, and those you will see, are under his or his vampire subordinates' command.
Cutting to the battle going on behind Roman, the audience looked on as various kinds of undead horrors slashed, stabbed, hacked, tore, beat, shot and chomped on the mortal men of the Empire. One of the first things that the audience saw was a unit of Empire swordsmen get assailed by small band of particularly terrifying creatures.
Two reanimated corpses of fat-bellied Ogres lumbered into the swordsmen and began smashing them aside with their massive arms and considerable girth. These monsters were horrifying to look upon, not just because of the decaying flesh of their bodies, but because their bodies had fused with bits of debris from sunken ships, a massive crab-like claw replaced the right arm of one, and the same hulk had a gaping mouth where its chest had been. Joining in these abominations of all things good, natural and living was one of those ghoulish half-bodies.
Above the carnage, flocks of bats as large as men swarmed over the battlefield. To the audience's surprise, carried in the talons of many of these bats were zombie pirates carrying all sorts of weapons. These included cutlasses and pistols, bombs, and even handguns/rifles.
"Man, those things are freaky!" Jaune said in regard to the hulking undead corpses that had once been ogres. His and the rest of the audience's disgust for the undead monsters only grew when they realised that a large tongue was protruding from the chest-mouth of one of the undead ogres. Just what kind of force was capable of mutating the dead in such a way was not something the audience really wanted to know.
"They're actually sickening to lay eyes upon." Salem mumbled, a frown on her face.
"Are those bats carrying zombies?" Pyrrha questioned, legitimately confused by the side before her. Of all the things she could think of ever seeing, that was not one of them.
Cutting away to another scene, the audience were greeted with the sight of a gunline formed by a large mob of zombie pirates using more black powder weapons against the Empire soldiers. Handguns, scaled-down versions of the cannons on ships, mortars, and actual carronades taken from sunken ships.
Standing amongst and giving orders to these zombie deckhands to fire was a vampire dressed like a pirate captain. An amusingly short vampire I must add.
Now, if that short vampire pirate captain had been just that, an amusingly short vampire captain, the audience would have just let it be and carried on watching. But they were not, and the audience were quick to identify just who the short captain was. For though she was a centuries old vampire, the captain bore a strong resemblance to none other than Neo Politan.
"Um, is that vampire supposed to be... her?" Yatsuhashi questioned, referring to the Neo in the audience.
Over by Neo, she was glad that she got a moment of screentime. Sure she wanted a bigger role in all this, but Roman's short partner-in-crime settled with what she got right now. At least she had showed up in one of these universes again. It felt like forever since she had been featured, or even mentioned, in one of these viewings. She still wanted have more than a couple seconds of screen time, but she could wait for as long as necessary for a universe where she took centre stage.
"Wait, what the hell is that?!" Coco cried in alarm, bringing attention back to the screen. Looking at the screen, the eyes of the collective members of the audience widened and their jaws hit the floor when they saw what Coco had brought to everyone's attention.
Behind the gun line of zombie pirates, and joining in the booming chorus of black powder weapons was probably the largest artillery cannon the audience had ever seen. The cannon's barrel was approximately over thirty metres (98 feet) in length by the author's guess.
This titan of a cannon rose up and fired. The massive cannonball tore through the air, and completely decimated a unit of Empire Knights garbed in the finest plate armour as they rode their barded warhorses in a desperate charge at the enemy guns. Many of these knights and their horses were sent flying by the explosion caused by the gigantic cannon's one shot, or were blown to pieces if they were in ground-zero of the massive cannon's shot.
"Oh my gosh, that's a big gun!" Velvet exclaimed in surprise the instant her laid eyes on the titanic instrument of death by cannonball. The rabbit faunus expressing the shared thoughts running through the minds of the audience once they looked upon the giant cannon, and the destruction it could wreak on the battlefield.
Obviously, all but two people in the audience were happy that Roman Torchwick of all people, an alternate version of him anyway, had such a weapon at his disposal.
"Ren-" Nora started to say to her best friend who she certainly did not possess hidden romantic feelings for.
"No, Nora. Just no," said boy immediately stopped Nora from proceeding any further with saying whatever she was in her in mind right now. He knew what she was thinking. He knew she was planning. And what Nora was thinking of doing if she ever got a hold of the giant cannon on screen was a BIG no-no.
"Party-pooper," Nora let out in a disgruntled whisper. She only planned to shoot a few people out of the cannon if she was ever able to lay hands on it, or something similar. The idea was part of an experiment she wanted to try out. Yes, an experiment.
Elsewhere in the audience, Ruby had fainted, and was currently being revived by her father, her team, and dog. The red-hooded Huntress-in-Training having collapsed to due overexcitement.
That is Queen Bess, a modified and scaled down version of a cannon used by a unique ship of the Empire of Man's navy. Roman was able to salvage/steal one of these cannons, and after a few tweaks, there she is. Hearing Alric's explanation as to what the giant cannon was left the audience baffled, or fascinated depending on where you stand. That Queen Bess was a smaller version of a much larger cannon astounded them.
Just what did the Empire of Man plan on using such massive weapons for? Blowing up a mountain?
Another cut showed several Empire confronting a gargantuan undead crab monster from the deepest depths of the sea. How large are we talking about? It was around nine metres (30 feet) across and about half that in height.
This monstrously-sized bit of seafood used one of its oversized claws to knock a man high into the air, and used the same claw to catch him before he could crash into the sandy ground. Death by splattering on the ground would have been a preferable fate to the soldier, for to his and the audience's horror, the monster opened its mouth and popped him inside its mouth. Eating the man alive.
A few brave/foolish souls were enraged by the sight of the giant undead crustacean devouring their brother-in-arms alive, and desperately charged at the beast. Hoping their spears, swords, halberds, and greatswords could penetrate the beast's hard as steel carapace. Taking notice of the Empire soldiers charging at it, the beast brought its mighty claws down and crushed them.
The audience had to admit that they were watching a serious house of horrors right now. First there were zombie pirates and half-corpses. Next there were mutated zombie ogres. After that there were giant bats carrying zombie pirates, then zombie pirates using freaking cannons. Now a giant undead crab capable of swallowing men whole.
"Yikes, really sucked to be those guys." Mercury stated, earning a few murmured words of agreement from the others. Plenty were thankful that they were not watching alternate versions of themselves be the receivers of many of the deaths onscreen. Now that would really suck!
"I feel sorry for the guy that was swallowed whole. That one of the worse ways to die in my opinion," Neptune added. Like Mercury, he too received a good number of affirmative responses from others in the audience. There were many terrible ways to die, plenty a lot worse then being swallowed alive, but being digested while you're still alive was one of the worst that the audience were willing to imagine right now.
"Y'know, you'd think they would be running away instead of charging straight at those things. I mean, look at these monsters!" The green-haired thief, Emerald, also said. Raising a fair point about what they were watching.
"They're most likely still fighting because they have no choice!" Maria spoke up, drawing attention to herself. "Either they've lost any means to escape, fighting to the death would be preferable to doing the opposite, or something big is happening. Something so big, that surrender or retreat is not an even an option to them. Trust me, I've seen plenty of such things happen back in my day."
Cutting to another part of the battlefield, the audience beheld two more products of the vampire pirates' necromantic endeavours into the unholy.
Towering above all else on the battlefield, their height rivalled only by Queen Bess, were two giant humanoid constructs made from an amalgamation of timbers and iron from sunken galleons, and the dead flesh of scores if not hundreds of men.
One of these unholy colossi was burning men to death with a giant flamethrower that stood in place of a right hand. While second, with a right arm bearing four carronades strapped together, loaded its weapons and unleashed its terrible fury some Empire soldiers.
The sight of these walking behemoths really shook the audience up. Not only because of their bizarre appearance, but also there was a sense of repulsive wrongness that permeated around the giant constructs. That these artificial giants should not be, and that they were an even greater insult to the ways and laws of nature than all the other things that they had since in Roman's undead army. And there had been a lot of things in it that were offensive to both eyes and nature.
"What... in... the... absolute hell are those?!" Were the words that many in the audience uttered the moment they saw the two constructs lumbering onscreen and lay waste to the soldiers of the Empire.
"Those things look like... ships with legs," Weiss muttered in alarm. One of the colossi actually had the prow section of a once mighty galleon incorporated to its chest, so it could be understood why she just said that.
"And here comes to explanation we honestly didn't want." Raven sighed. The bandit chief predicting that once the group asked those questions, Alric would jump at the chance to give them an answer that would creep them out to no end. Not a second later, and Raven's prediction was proven true, as Alaric's shadow sat up straight on his seat and explained what the 'ships with legs' were.
They are Necrofex Colossi. I am not permitted to go into detail as to how they are constructed, but understand that these Colossi are created by necromancers from the ruins of sunk ships and dead flesh of living beings, preferably humanoids. They have a will of their own, and can turn against their masters if an opportunity to do so arises and if they desire.
After hearing what Alric had to say, most of the audience were now unsure what was more terrifying. That there was a universe where these abominable constructs existed. Or that there were minds sick enough to even imagine creating such monsters, and worse, those willing to actually bring such abominations to life. Such thoughts made several audience members shudder at the thought of similar, or even worse, horrors that might have been created throughout the Multiverse by equally depraved minds.
Seriously, there were really a lot of things out in the Multiverse that put the Grimm to shame.
Roman looked on at the battle going on. The Arch-Grand Commodore of the Vampire Coast was pleased with how his minions were handily dispatching the mortal interlopers. Then a shadow fell over the beach, and when Roman, and the camera, turned to gaze on what was the source, awe filled the hearts of all who looked upon it.
Rising from the waters not far off from the islands, the back of some titan sea creature had broken from the waters. The beast's body was covered in blue and green scales that one might see on a serpent. And on its back were a set of spines connected to each other by thick dark-red membranes.
The vampire's pleased look became ecstatic, and he started to chuckle to himself. That chuckle then turned into a bout of near maniacal laughter. He had reclaimed the prize he had lost when he ventured deep into Lustria, and was now another step closer towards his goal of becoming one person again, but the greatest prize in all the seas of the world had just swum right up to him.
And with that, the screen turned to black.
The viewing was done, to the relief of a few members of the audience, because they had seen glimpses of even more undead monstosities that they did not want a closer look at. For example, a couple members of the audience could have sworn that they saw a zombie dragon or something along those lines. Whatever it had been, they did not want a closer look at it.
Speaking of monsters, the titan sea beast that had partially risen from the waves caught the attention of everyone in the audience. Knowing that, Alric quickly explained to them just what it was they saw at the end.
That was Amanar, probably the mightiest of the Merwyrms. Merwyrms are a distant relative of the winged Dragons that live within the ocean depths instead of flying in the sky. They have quite the appetite, and are known to attack coastal settlements in their search for food.
"So why was I happy to see you? Giant sea-lizard looked several times bigger than any ship," Roman was quick to point out his alternate self's enthusiasm upon seeing the Merwyrm. A thought then crossed his mind when he recalled the assortmenf of reanimated monsters that made up his army and crews. "Wait a second... Does the other me plan to kill it and turn it into an undead thing like all those other stuff?"
Indeed, Alric replied. And if he does, Roman Harkon could become the ruler of all the world's seas. With the greatest Merwyrm at his command, entire enemy fleets can be destroyed by a swipe of its tale, and all the booty and corpses those fleets leave behind will become his.
Leaving the audience with the thought of a vampire pirate version of Roman Torchwick possibly ruling that world's oceans thanks to a giant zombie sea beast, and becoming the ultimate pirate because of it. Alric took out the remote and started to prepare the next universe that Alaric desired to show them.
There you go, hoped you enjoyed this chapter.
I'll see you all when I next see you.