I do not own Hinowa ga Crush or any of its characters.
New Land
I watch as Tatsumi and Wave spar on the deck using wooden swords. Originally, the ship was supposed to have a full crew, but they told us that an eternal storm blocked the way and that they refused to sail through it. so instead, we had Najenda pull some strings to get the ship bought for us to take on our trip, as a last thank you for ending the Empire. So now, we're going to sail through the storm ourselves.
"Only a couple more hours before we reach the storm," Sheele says, wrapping her arms around me and cuddling into my side.
"We'll be fine," I say. "With all of us here, we have nothing to worry about."
"Well, not all of us are here," Leone says. "Lubbock and the boss aren't here."
"True," I nod. "But everyone else is. Even Kurome and Wave."
"True," Leone says, then glances to the side at Akame, who's standing at the front of the ship, staring off into the distance.
"Go," Sheele says. "She needs someone to keep her from worrying."
Leone smiles and nods, walking over to stand behind Akame, wrapping her arms around her. Akame smiles and turns her head, kissing Leone for a few seconds before leaning her head against Leone's. After a few more seconds, they both turn to Wave and Tatsumi as there's a yelp of pain. When I look, both are holding their injured foreheads, having apparently tied. Kurome and Mine, who have been arguing about whose boyfriend was the better fighter, both rush to check on their wounded boyfriend, Mine cradling her and Tatsumi's child in her left arm.
"Called it," I smirk at Sheele, who sighs and rolls her eyes.
"Fine," Sheele sighs. "You win. We can do anal tonight."
"I'm surprised you don't want to, having a lust demon inside of you," Chelsea said.
"Well if she had won, the deal was that I'd have to fuck her in every hole tonight, where as since I won, I get to fuck her in every hole tonight instead," I say, smirking as Chelsea rolls her eyes.
"Wow," Chelsea says sarcastically. "Really taking a big gamble there, aren't you?"
Sheele and I both shrug. Wave and Tatsumi begin a new sparring match, having finally managed to convince their girlfriends that they weren't permanently damaged, and we all settle in to watch, including the now much calmer Akame.
"You finished your augmentations yet?" I ask my demon after a few minutes.
"One more dose, and three days of being violently sick," the demon responds. "Same for the whores."
"That's not nice," I scold him.
The demon growls in annoyance and drives my fingers into my eyes. I hiss in pain and wait for them to heal before blinking several times to clear my vision and make the pain fade.
"You shouldn't antagonize him," Sheele says.
I shrug. "He's not going to actually kill me because he'd die too. And you're safe, too, so I don't mind."
"We're about to enter the storm," Akame warns just as Wave and Tatsumi slam their wooden swords into each other's sides at the same time.
We all quickly scramble to prepare ourselves to follow Wave's instructions, and a few minutes later, it's begun. To my surprise, sailing through a storm is surprisingly high-maintenance. Within a half hour, anyone without a demon inside of them is exhausted, but we all continue. At least, until we reach the eye of the storm and are circling a maelstrom. It's at that moment that a massive sea serpent Danger Beast at least two hundred feet long and ten fifteen feet wide bursts out of the water, hissing and spitting angrily.
"Well, hello there you beautiful creature," I grin. "Akame, you hungry?"
"Very," Akame nods, drawing the sword I'd forged her.
It's the result of me practicing to refresh my knowledge of forging weapons like my ring before reforging Lionel's buckle for Leone. It's not my best work, and it's not a Teigu by any means, but I was able to make it as durable as me and Tatsumi's swords, and the blood I took from my demon to give it a special ability, other than cutting something, gave the blade the ability to inflict wounds that never heal, at Akame's suggestion. Apparently, the ability is the same as the weapon that Akame had before wielding Murasame, which was destroyed while facing the previous owner of Murasame.
The massive serpent lets out a loud shrieking roar and lunges. I grin an leap off of the ship, sending flames out of my feet to launch myself up at it, slashing it across the face. It hisses and opens its mouth, a massive spray of a thick purple fluid spraying out of its mouth. The others all scatter off of the ship before the fluid hits it, smoking and hissing as it begins to burn and melt the ship.
"You mother fucker!" I snap. "We were using that!"
The snake lunges at me and I flip out of the way, slashing it across the eye as I pass. Then, it crashes down on top of Akame, dragging her under water. Tatsumi and Leone both shout in surprise and fear, diving, and I flip, launching myself down into the water after it, seeing Akame bounce off a mountain of corral sticking up from the sea floor as the serpent streaks toward Sheele. I ignore it, swimming rapidly down to Akame and grab her, swimming toward the surface again. Tatsumi and Leone, both of them being fully human, aren't able to swim deep enough to retrieve her, so they're both clinging to the serpent, Tatsumi with his sword driven into its back. Then, as it reaches Sheele, she flips under it and slashes along its underside with Extase's blades. It shrieks and flips once it's past her, Tatsumi and Leone both swimming back to the surface. Just as I break the surface myself and lift Akame out of the water, the serpent explodes out of the water above Leone and Tatsumi, only for Mine to fire a massive beam of energy from her Imperial Arms through its head, obliterating the serpent's brain, Wave floating beside her with her and Tatsumi's child screaming and crying in his arms.
"Akame," I say, slapping her awake.
She coughs up water and looks around before trying to move, only to gasp in pain. I reach down and reset her broken right arm. However, as I prepare to heal her, she stops me.
"Wait until after we find land," Akame says, looking around. "There's some wood floating over there."
I nod and swim over to the wood, which is floating just beyond the range of the maelstrom, laying Akame on it and allow her to begin inspecting her own injuries. As she does, I begin to swim toward Wave, Kurome, and Mine, the others all swimming toward us. Once we're all gathered around the wood, with Mine and her child seated on top of it with Akame, Leone lifts herself up onto the wood to check on Akame.
"I'm alright," Akame said. "Broken arm, leg, and two ribs. I'll be fine."
Leone nodded and kissed Akame before dropping back into the water, all of us beginning to swim East again. As we continue, the storm begins to rage again, but I use my flames to scatter any large waves coming toward us, and Sheele and I use our combined demons' strength to drag the serpent's body behind us.
I drop the head of the snake on the shore and dust my hands off before walking over to Akame. "Want me to heal you now?"
Akame shook her head. "I'll be fine without it."
"Who are you all?" a voice asked from off to the side, everyone turning and staring at a young girl with blonde hair in a bun with a ponytail falling from under it wearing a white tank top with a strap around the back of her neck, and a pair of loose black pants.
"We're not from around here," I say. "I'm Jason, this is Sheele, Tatsumi, Mine, Leone, Kurome, and Wave. And this is Akame. Our ship was attacked by a Danger Beast and sank, and Akame was hurt. Do you have anywhere she can rest?"
"Danger Beast?" the girl asks.
"The giant monsters that eat humans?" Tatsumi offers.
"Oh, you mean Freaks!" the girl says.
"Focus," Leone says. "Akame needs a place to rest. We don't have any money, but we'd be grateful."
"Just a minute," the girl says, turning and running off.
I roll my eyes and turn to Akame. "I can heal you."
"It would be suspicious if you heal me now that we've told her I'm injured," Akame said.
"I could at least make it heal faster," I point out.
She considers for a moment before nodding. I hold my hand out, light shining from my palm for a moment before fading. A few seconds later, the girl from before returns with a friend, this one with short pink hair, a white cloth tied over the top of her hair, a black belly shirt with a spaghetti strap around her neck, then a white kimono-style top over it with a thick blue border, the kimono-style top also leaving her midriff exposed, tight black shorts, a white cloth belt wrapped around her waist, and black sandals.
"Is your friend alright?" the pink-haired girl asks.
"She'll be okay," I say. "She just needs to rest."
The girl nods. "We have a place she can rest. Come on. We'll show you."
I thank her and Leone picks Akame up gently, all of us following the two girls to a small building with a small living area and a few rooms. It won't fit all of us, especially since it's the girls' home, and it looks like they share it with a few more, but they give Akame a room to rest in, so the rest of us can find somewhere to make do, with the exception of Leone, who stays with Akame.
After a little bit of searching, we find out that we can't get a room anyway, since our money is no good in this country, and we have no choice but to find somewhere out of the way to camp. None of us particularly mind, however, so we find a place with a few trees and scatter around the area. Over the next few days, we check in on Akame and Leone, and during the third, Akame is able to move around again. The pink-haired girl, Hinowa, agrees to lead us on a tour of the island, and we all follow her and her blonde friend, Tobari.
During the tour, we learn the history of the country we've landed in. It's where we planned to get, but it's not called Jinwa anymore. Now, it's a group of separate nations actively at war. The one we're in is called Sokai. Additionally, we learn that Hinowa and Tobari are two of five who are studying martial arts, and from the sparring sessions we watched, Tobari likes using two swords and is very hard to predict for someone not experienced in combat, while Hinowa favors one sword and is a little behind Tobari.
Once the tour's over, Hinowa brings us back to the small shack for dinner, also introducing us to the dozens of stray dogs and cats she's taken in. She feeds us with fish she's caught, and we thank her, everyone trying to eat a respectfully low amount of food, except for Akame, who's naturally massive appetite is now compounded with the fact that her metabolism is raised to heal her faster. Hinowa explained that she planned to volunteer as a soldier in hopes of someday ending the war, as well as becoming someone great and fulfilling her mother's dream for her. So, after the meal, in order to help them and thank them for everything they'd done so far, Akame promised to train Hinowa. The training lasted several days, days that the others spent cutting the Danger Beast they'd brought with them into pieces for food and selling some of it for money. They used the money to buy new custom-tailored clothes, all of them just getting their own outfits remade, as well as renting rooms for everyone at an inn, paying by the day.
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