Author's Note: Okay so finished my reading for Shield Hero volume 20, fully approved, But now it is time to move one. Read, Review, Favourite and Enjoy!
Chapter 59: Cal Mira's Waves
Setsuna found herself in the section of the map just East of Penguin Island as she and her party members dived into the water. Setsuna grew into her full demon form while Keel cast the scuba magic from the resort on all of them. The Penguins had taken to feasting on the sea life but seeing a much bigger predator in the form of Setsuna they had opted to stay far, far away from her and were right to do, they hadn't wanted to be eaten themselves. The ocean was the right thing to do, Setsuna spotted the giant crabs wandering the bottom of the ocean, and soon the hunting had begun.
Rishia had taken to the Pekkle Kigurumi far easier than Tatsuya, giving yet more evidence of her bullied past by stating that no one would see her upset while she was wearing one. A blatant lie, albeit one Rishia didn't realise, Tatsuya soon learned. While he was sat on the back of Ryuteimaru who was treading water Rishia was desperately swimming around trying to evade shark monsters. Without success.
"Well time to save her." And so Tatsuya aimed his fancy new spear gun into the water while he spoke the skills. "Rapid Fire, Arrow Rain." And so everything behind Rishia died in a swarm of spears loosed into the water. That wasn't to say that the school of sharks was without survivors, the ones who were manoeuvring around to get Rishia from the front now high tailing it away from the destructive rain of spears. Tatsuya allowed them to get away, along with whatever meat he didn't save for his bow, in order to replenish their numbers. Rishia swam back up to the surface where Tatsuya, Rat, and the old lady were waiting for her on the back of the dragon turned platform.
"Can we go back to the resort now?" Rishia complained as Tatsuya pulled her onto the dragon's back.
"That was the first school. While Ryuteimaru takes us to the second the three of us are going to be training with the old lady." Tatsuya explained while Rat just sighed and got her whip ready to crack.
"Well... I guess water magic does have it's advantages." Naofumi and Tatsuya had had occasion to trade notes. Naofumi with his accessory business was able to teach Tatsuya the basics and explain which materials he needed to feed to his weapon to make up the difference in talent and training. Tatsuya had used Rishia to methodically dissect water magic, then created his prototype, not a weapon for this would never be used to bring direct harm to a creature, rather a accessory to boost Ikki's affinity for water magic. This... miracle was the end result of blending that with Ki and Ittou Shura: The ocean had been parted, the waters frozen solid leaving behind a mass of confused giant electric eels and other fish flopping around on the ground. "I suppose at this point we should just stop being surprised."
Ake and Ikki both ran out through the sea floor, hacking away at whatever creature they came to with skills and reaping the crop of XP that came about from the process. Only one enemy truly gave Ikki pause.
'Each wave spawns a unique 'boss' monster. It is the alpha of the pack and the strongest off them all. Defeat it to end the wave.'
The monster in question looked like a giant horse, his mane several lengths of sea weed, his hooves crab like pincers, while his back side was replaced by the long body of a electric eel, and he knew that because it was sparking lightning. Ikki imagined this thing must be quite a nuisance in the water.
"Hundred Swords." Now it was just bleeding like a stuffed pig, stabbing blades hitting it from a hundred different angles while it screamed in it's death throes. There were similar creatures to it around, some with the traits of a shark, others octopus, it's offspring no doubt, others like it might be around right now but Ikki was not concerned in the slightest. "Ake, we're retreating for now." Ikki stated bluntly while he prepared to go back to the ship they had lodged in a ice flow at the top of the chasm they had created.
"But what about the rest of these monsters?" Ake asked not knowing what was going on having not received the same notification about the sea horse before it was dead.
They never tested to see what would happen if they brought monsters from past waves into a new one, Setsuna's dogs were the only example he could think of, horribly mutated and bound to her with a seal: not exactly grounds for solid judgement.
"Thousand swords." Ikki thinly spread the blades all over the battlefield. If he was in the mood to fuck around today he would simply use the skill to pin them in their vital area's and then use Ittou Rasetsu to go through their heads but as it so happened, he wasn't. "Change Blade: Dynamite sword!" Each blade slammed into and skewered the monsters divided with a radius of about twenty feet in between each blade before they all detonated blowing the monsters to pieces. Unfortunately the explosions also collapsed the ice canyon and Ikki and Ake were at the bottom of that.
"Sorry I asked." Ikki grabbed his protege, who by now was rethinking his life choices, and hauled ass up to the collapsing ice stairs to where they parked the ship.
"We saw the explosions from up here are you guys okay? What happened?" Catherine looked between the two and recoiled when she saw the serious look on Ikki's face.
"We need to find the others."
A giant stuffed penguin with a shark shaped shield was riding a orca woman as they were being chased by a shark with tentacles in place of fins. Naofumi double checked what he saw earlier just for the sake of confirmation.
'Each wave spawns a unique 'boss' monster. It is the alpha of the pack and the strongest off them all. Defeat it to end the wave.'
"Get ready to deal with the bastard. We ain't letting it leave here alive." Naofumi had picked where they would make the bastard's grave, a large amount of open water on all sides where he suck the remains inside of his shield, now to see if their gambit would work.
"Slow down some Sadeena, we need the bastard to bite at us." The giant stuffed penguin explained as he got ready for a skill.
"That seems kind of counter productive." The Whale woman stated as the shark thing was on their tails.
"Counter Attacks don't work unless we can get it to attack us first." The pair of them slowed down considerably as the shark with tentacles finally caught up with them. "Shield Prison!" The shark thing looked pretty confused when it snapped it's jaws down on a hard ball of shields instead of a tasty penguin and whale combo platter. "Change Shield: Demon Lord Shield!" Spurts of red were produced from the shark's body as barbed spikes were suddenly rammed through it's mouth. The creature naturally tried to let go but barbed spikes tend to be pretty good at holding things in place.
"Zweite Lightning Strike!" Especially when they're spontaneously electrified!
"FINISH THE BASTARD OFF!" Two more stuffed penguins, a Karma Penguin, a Filolial and a lizard man came in stabbing, hollowed spears piercing the sides of the shark thing and soon it had bled to death. The others bore witness to the horrific process of the shark being turned inside out as it was absorbed into Naofumi's shield guts first before he indicated for the group to surface.
"At least I'm out of that costume." Raphtalia pulled off the penguin costume revealing the bikini she had bought back in Cal Mira, she had been hoping to derive a compliment from Naofumi beyond not having to worry about if the costume leaks but it seems that they have bigger things to worry about as Naofumi gave her their marching orders as soon as they were back on the ship.
"Fire the flare for a meeting, we've got problems we need to deal with." Even though Naofumi said that he already saw one flare in the air already, it's bladed shape indicating who was responsible. "So Ikki figured it out too then?"
It wasn't long until Setsuna and Tatsuya were on the ship, Ikki ironically was the last to arrive in spite of having lit the signal.
"We had some turbulence, evidently the ice we used to isolate the area made for some pretty good obstacles." Ikki stated as he made his sword spit out the head of the boss monster he fought, a Hippocampus or so his sword had told him. "Anyone else find a boss monster?"
"My shield called mine a Lusca." Naofumi stated as he brought up the shark shaped shield. "You two?"
"No." Setsuna stated bluntly.
"No." Tatsuya however was already analysing the situation. "If we use Melromarc as the baseline, we should currently be on our third 'set' of waves. Which would logically mean that we should be dealing with something on the same level as that ghost ship I fought against."
Made sense, so what were they going to do about it, for that matter should they? Can they? The fact that this was happening at all carried some unpleasant implications: like for instance was the ocean divided into area's with their own Dragon Hourglasses? Or was it just because Cal Mira was a island? Is there something dealing with it already like Fitoria and Nero were? No not likely, the two bosses were evidence enough that Cal Mira was going un-attended, unless of course they like everything else just came here from somewhere else attracted by Food and XP.
"Is he okay?" Sadeena watched Tatsuya mutter to himself drawing conclusions and dismissing them like they were no one's business, he looked a little bit mad.
"No that's normal for him." Naofumi stated as he decided to snap the meeting back to normal. "Before we decide if we should do something we should first ask ourselves can we do something. Sadeena, you've been exploring the ocean floor around here for the past few days: anything that looks like a Dragon hour glass inside?"
"Well, there's a building on the bottom of the ocean floor: does that count?" Sadeena led the group to where she found the building in question, it was too deep for the diving magic, cue four giant stuffed penguins swimming down to the building and finding inside a sealed up air bubble, stale air was better then no air.
"Never speak of this. Ever." Setsuna's threat lost all tension with her head sticking out of the penguin costume. "First Fire." Setsuna set her spear on fire and waved it around as she went looking for what she came here for. "Oh dammit." The hourglass found them before they found it, light beaming down from above and hitting their weapons as a new notification appeared in the corner of their vision.
'Cal Mira Days4 Hours9 Minutes38'
"We have less than five days to prepare for the wave we're about to portal to." Tatsuya summarised for everyone without costumes with built in lungs once they were back on the ship. "If any of you have ideas I'm open to hearing about them."
"We'll need the navy. I'm not fond of the idea of awkwardly lumbering around the battlefield in a penguin suit the whole time are you guys?" Naofumi stated bluntly.
"Which is a problem cause whatever this activation thing is about it's blocking our portal skills." Ikki noted as he tried to portal back to Melromarc just to prove his point.
"With my flight C.A.D. I can get outside of the area of effect in ten minutes and portal back to Melromarc to recruit the Queen's army." Tatsuya stated making both his opinion and plan clear.
Melromarc currently had the strongest army in the world, such ridiculously high stats would be a asset anywhere let alone tearing into the wave.
"Even in the unlikely event that the navy is able to come with you I'm not fond of the idea of a bunch of land lubbers going up against a enemy tailor made for the ocean in their native environment." Setsuna stated while she made her own proposal. "Siltvelt, I go dog, swim out to the ocean, and pop over there to snatch up a couple hundred, fish, amphibian and dolphin people and get our collective arses dragged back here when the wave comes."
"Do both. In the mean time there's already a army here, rapidly climbing into the seventies in the form of a army of adventurers." Naofumi stated as he cracked his neck. "Ikki can go do that with the count."
"I can't argue that, but what are you going to be doing?" Ikki asked suspicious at the way that Naofumi had passed the buck to him. "I'm going to be grabbing the other army on these islands." Naofumi donned his Device armour as he turned his attention to Penguin, Dog, Squirrel and Rabbit islands. "On a side note: Setsuna, I'm going to have to borrow the dogs for a bit, and Tatsuya I'm going to need the Squirrel costume."
"Fue!?" The person who owned said costume seemed to take offence to this.
Tatsuya flew off for Melromarc and Setsuna swam for Siltvelt, Ikki gave assurances that he would have the count understand the seriousness of the situation if he had to drag him to the hourglass under the water. The numbers of Rabbits had been replenished since Yesterday, Naofumi refused to believe that either Ikki or Setsuna would leave this many of them lying around, to do less would be a dereliction of duty. Filo was busy elsewhere, so was Raphtalia for that matter, everyone else were told to stay the hells away because this demanded diplomacy not a army. Naofumi was on foot right now alone as he went through the rabbit island, course that changed the moment he ran into a suitably sized rabbit monster.
"Time to proceed then." Naofumi sent the party invitation to the giant rabbit, and it seemed to make a face like Naofumi had three heads. "Come on I don't even have the dog shield out right now." Naofumi sat down and the rabbit took that as a invitation to attack him, and shattered it's teeth in the process. "Well I can't have that. Zweite Heal." The effects of the healing magic fixed the rabbit's teeth causing it make a even more confused face than before as Naofumi repeated the invitation. "What's it gonna be?" With a Timidity that reflected it's rabbit status, the creature accepted the invitation and got down on all fours, presenting his back for Naofumi to mount and he climbed on smoothly. "Take me to your leader." Naofumi found the head rabbit, there was first an olive branch a invitation like the first rabbit that was swiftly rejected. Naofumi summoned air strike shield, switched it over to the demon Lord's shield, and slammed the thing down pinning the rabbit in place. This time he accepted the party invite. "Come on you carrot munchers, I have a lot of work I need to do if I'm going to get you punks ready for the wave that's coming."
How did Naofumi convince her to do this? How? Raphtalia was running through the jungle using wind magic that she was unfamiliar with fighting a rabid squirrel for the right to be the alpha of a deranged pack of acorn collectors! Raphtalia's one saving grace was the Squirrel growth Corrections that Naofumi had earned from the material that Tatsuya had given him and was currently using that to launch some hit and run tactics using basic wind magic to take flight with flaps of squirrel skin. Her enemies superior use of wind magic floundered under her superior stats and after a few swings from her blade Raphtalia somehow ended up the alpha of a pack of Squirrels, the way that they looked at her made her keenly aware that she was female and the majority of them male.
"The Squirrels like me? Why!?" While Raphtalia complained to the heavens the advantages Naofumi arranged for his allies had shown through.
Filo's pair of Karma dog claws had allowed her to crush the head of the Karma Penguin Alpha her loss of Filolial growth Corrections and their replacement with Pekkle Growth Corrections be damned, her reward was the loyalty of the Pekkle tribe who at her invitation accepted her as their new Alpha, and they received the benefits of Pekkle Growth Corrections too.
"Okay everyone! Let's all go into the ocean and fish!"
The head of the Karma dog Alpha joined a pile of three that was on the ground, the third Karma dog that meant to claim right that the pair of three headed Inu-gami dogs had earned as the new alpha's of this pack. This time they accepted the invitation to join their party.
If Rat wasn't seeing it for herself she wouldn't believe it, under the will of the Shield hero four species of monsters with a consistent and documented history of blatant violence against each other had gathered together on one island and weren't fighting each other.
"The rumours about you truly don't do you justice Shield Hero." Rat stated hand running through sweat soaked hair. "What are we doing? Am I to level them down for you?"
"Growth Corrections require high levels to be effective, and we don't have enough XP to go around for them to do it fives or six times. So we're just going to have to settle for taking them through the ocean and grinding, group by group, while you and our parties look after the rest." Naofumi stated as he got his spare Pekkle Kigurumi ready to go fishing again.
"Aha. And what are we going to do about food in the mean time? Growing monsters need full bellies." Casually, Naofumi tossed out the seeds of the Bio-Plants that Rat has been observing ever since she came to these islands and in moments they grew into blood smelling plants.
"It took me a few tries to make something that carnivores would enjoy: They have to first draw their appetite with smell, then I had to get the texture right so that they wouldn't immediately spit them back out." But it was successful as dog and penguin started to eat the fruit, though Naofumi made the penguins stop.
"Oi not you! We're going into the ocean!" Might as well start with the easy group after all.
"You mentioned that it took you a few tries. Can I see what else you got?" Rat asked looking at Naofumi like she had accidentally stumbled across a gold mine.
Naofumi for the most part just cocked a suspicious brow as he took more seeds out of his shield and explained to her what precisely each variant of mutant plant he accidentally created did, followed up with a additional explanation that she could unlock a weapon to help her modify them by feeding one of the seeds to her weapon. By the time he came back with the first group of Alpha level Karma penguins Naofumi saw what suspiciously looked like a house was built on the island, well not built exactly.
"Is that one of the pitcher plants I gave you to work on?" Naofumi asked while Rat moved to intervene.
"Well yes but I've been able to make few modifications, still a unfinished product though." As Rat explained that...
"GGGYYYAAAHHH! IT'S INSIDE ME!" Rowdy's shriek's of terror echoed out from inside of the 'house plant' causing Naofumi to level a glare at Rat.
"Still a prototype." Rat stated for emphasis.
"Next!" Naofumi took the second group with him back into the water, when he came back he saw that Rat had progressed with the House Plants, they were no longer trying to eat the people inside, which it should be noted now includes Rat after she had created a laboratory plant.
"The Whip wasn't working fast or good enough for me." Rat explained as she sat in front of what suspiciously looked like a computer but was made out of vegetation. The Computer wasn't all there was either, hanging off the side of the wall was a line of clear cocoon bulbs filled with fluid and some kind of fetal creature inside each one, another plant had been made to resemble a complex chemistry set. There were other hybrid's of contraptions and mutant plants throughout the laboratory, grafted onto the main plant that made up the building through the scion process.
"You do realise that we aren't actually staying here right?" Naofumi asked looking at Rat suspiciously.
"I've already added a function that after I've killed the plants using a specific herbicide they will revert into a seed that I can then use to transplant a identical specimen." Rat explained as if this was the most normal thing in the world. Rat might not come from another world but it was becoming clear that she was just as much of a monster as any of them were.
"Do you intend to use any of this to fight the waves?" Naofumi asked cocking a suspicious brow.
"I like this world, it has all of my stuff on it, so yes I intend to take measures to save it. Besides the waves spit out all the most interesting monsters. Those contain some of the materials I was given by the bow hero." Rat stated as she indicated the cocoon like bulbs to the side. "I've used slave ink to form a party with them and those dogs from the Spear Hero, once they've reached a certain point in their maturity I will begin the next phase of the creation of a anti-wave monster."
"And what exactly is that?" Naofumi stated his blatant suspicion made clear.
"A secret, perhaps it'll be ready by the next time you come back?" As was becoming increasingly, readily apparently clear by now: Rat was not wrong in her assessment of her little project.
Review Section:
RonaldM40196867: Not sure why that is but sure I'll go with it. Well the man has invented a trinket that can turn a ocean into a canyon, does that count?
drmcgraw186: Thank you for saying so. Don't forget about the part where he couldn't get any intel out of Naofumi about the Sword and Bow before he managed to stun him into a stupor with his stupidly high alcohol tolerance. Yeah, shield Hero does have a bit of a problem considering most of Naofumi's love interests are half his age. Thanks for the tip about volume 20.
superpierce: Didn't think of that.