Kancolle Alt

by MasterBaiter4.0

A new destroyer joins the Yokosuka Naval Base, befriending old and new allies alike to fight their sworn enemies, the mysterious Abyssals. Little do they know, the first act of the war is drawing to a close...

14. Chapter 14 - Titanomachy

The day was clear as today's weather was cloudless, the light blue sky indicative of warmer than average weather today.

On the harbor, there were several tall females surrounding the Admiral, who had her signature white Admiral blazer draped over her shoulders as her Admiral's cap was being twirled around her right index finger.

She had a folded umbrella in her left hand held like like a cane to shield herself against the afternoon sun as she talked to her ship girls.

Now, the Admiral herself wasn't exactly short as she was a respectable 1.79 meters tall.

But she was surrounded by the tallest ship girls in her base, and even Hiei, one of the relatively shorter battleships present, was already taller than her as she stood at 1.85 meters while Nagato and Mutsu stood at 2.03 meters, and Yamato was a whopping 2.35 meters tall.

But Admiral Mako wasn't exactly concerned with height, not when she was without question the most powerful person on the base.

She could order anyone to kneel before her if she ordered them to. (not that she'd do that to her girls) Right now, she was rather relaxed as she looked around her to take in the collective might of the battleships.

Kongou and Hiei were there, Haruna and Kirishima pursuing different career paths to help out the base in ways other than just fighting battles.

The two Kongou Sisters that were present were fired up for the practice session, fueled on even further by the powerful allies that surrounded them.

Yamato and Musashi were there, eager for what was essentially their introductory lesson to naval warfare and despite their calm demeanors, they were fidgeting about, eager to hit the ocean and fire off a few practice rounds in a sparring session.

Yamato was calmly looking down at Hiei, smiling serenely as she listened to whatever it was that Hiei was talking about, the superstructure of the Kongou-Class battleship having been constructed somewhat similar to the Yamato-Class, and that caused a bond to form between them.

Musashi was discussing something with Nagato and Mutsu, her high heel occasionally clacking in impatience as the Yamato-Class battleship tried not to draw any attention to her impatience.

Kongou was trying to out-boast the German battleship Bismarck, the German wearing a bottomless gray, black and red uniform along with a chest plate held up by an anchor between her collarbone and a metal collar around her neck.

Bismarck had black thigh-highs that led to steel high-heels that were the default footwear of most battleships, detached sleeves primarily black in color and doubled as brown-black gloves for her hands.

Her shoulders were bare, and her silky blonde hair flowed down her back as she stood proudly. Her cerulean blue eyes were prideful, yet respectful towards the battleship whom she was debating with.

She was shielded from the elements by her peaked cap, and her black underwear barely peeked out from underneath her uniform as she didn't wear pants or even a skirt.

Admiral Mako was standing in their midst, appreciating the moment.

The base often went through calamitous times, Admiral Mako quietly observing one of the turret pods that lined the base to shoot at Abyssals should they ever attempt a land assault, which they pulled off once on a national scale and cost the world dearly.

She wanted to protect her ship girls despite her impotence and inability to join them on the battlefield.

And as she had discussed often with Kiyoshimo, she wanted nothing more than to sail the seas with them and be out there on the field to participate in battles and give out orders.

But she sometimes felt as powerless as the king in a game of chess, being the most valuable piece that needed to be protected by her own girls, but not possessing the potential of the destroyers like pawns who could be promoted or the raw power of the battleships like the queens on the chessboard.

But she finally looked away from the turret pod, reminding herself of the responsibility that came with being an Admiral, being able to command and sortie the fleet en masse, not being held down by too much bureaucratic bullshit that she despised dealing with, and she had the potential to see the big picture.

She would send her ship girls on sorties that would best utilize their abilities while planning for the future, where extensive training with senior ship girls, fleet drills, practice matches and field experience would prepare them to fight this war indefinitely.

She had the clearance and power to obtain almost anything she needed and could account for everything on the battlefield to either influence, take advantage of or avoid completely.

From allies that would join them and improve their odds of winning to the weather conditions that were impartial to their suffering and influenced the battle whenever and however they wanted, like heavy rain and bad weather that would cause the ship girls to miss more often.

She hated depending on things that were beyond her control, like waiting for the Abyssals to make their move before she could make adjustments to her plans, often considering many plausible scenarios and preparing accordingly.

And even then, she wasn't able to even promise, much less guarantee that they would win every battle that they fought.

She raised her hand to get their attention, and the battleships all stopped their conversations to listen to her.

She began.

"Alright, so your objective today is to learn from each other.

There are several things that you all can either learn or train up on, and I want you all to try and spar with each other in order to learn something today and to keep yourselves combat-ready."

Admiral Mako could see the battleships nodding in response.

The battleships were outclassed only by the Abyssal Princesses, requiring the might of one or more fleets to take down and were abundant in types with new models being churned out every year ever since their debut in the latter half of the war.

Ammo shortage was a legitimate concern out on the battlefield, where the ship girls and Abyssals sometimes had to resort to fighting tooth and nail just to survive.

It wouldn't hurt to learn about some defensive close-quarters combat maneuvers to make sure that they'd survive in such situations.

Admiral Mako reassured them with a wave of her hand, making sure they got the point that this wasn't going to be the last lesson for them.

"This isn't going to be the last lesson for you all.

Instead, this is more like a introductory lesson for some of you, and a lesson for others to keep their skills sharp.

We're planning to have another training session for you girls a week later, since the upcoming Pacific Assault requires massive firepower from you all to soften up anything that gets in our way.

You all need the training required to fight them in close-quarters combat should our naval battles stretch into prolonged fistfights.

So Yamato and Musashi, you two don't need to worry about our resources, we got a stockpile to invest in your lessons, so learn as much as you can from everyone."

Yamato and Musashi both nodded in acknowledgement, before Admiral Mako waved and signaled for them to disperse and suit up for battle while she stood alone on the harbor, overlooking the ocean as she saw the fast Kongou battleships already strolling towards the harbor.

She couldn't fight like the ship girls could, but she was going to do everything that was possible to maximize their chances of winning.

From the introduction of submarines to mine-laying, a once-illegal practice that was now widely accepted as a way to deter the Abyssals from attacking certain locations, to being the most selfish Admiral in Japan, bullying bureaucrats and corporate heads with Yamato behind her to barter for extra resources and watched as they caved in from the innocent demands of the revered battleship.

She used their 'donations' to fuel the war effort, and was building up her base to become one of the largest and strongest armadas in the world.

And if the 'Reincarnation' theory was true, and that sunken ship girls were 'Abyssalized' to be turned them into Abyssals, then she was going to starve them of ship girls as best she could as she brought her ship girls up to be the best of the best and had relatively low losses despite their enormous fleet roster.

She valued every single member of her base and was going to pull out all the stops to win this war, although she wasn't going to fall into the trap into believing that all the ship girls were going to be alive at the end.

She knew that losses were inevitable.

But even then, she wasn't going to give them any more ship girls than they already did if she could help it.

And right now, she had done everything in her power to prepare to greet the Abyssals at their doorstep with a barrage of cannon fire and a hail of explosions.

She understood the risks of micromanagement, history proving that being too controlling of your troops and logistics would lead to the whole command structure breaking down.

That was why she delegated the issue of management of ship girl fleets and logistics to the Coordinators, as they, being ship girls, would understand what was needed to best help the ship girls under her command.

She wanted her ship girls to be independent should she ever die, and she wasn't under any sort of illusion that she was safe on land and was protected by her ship girls like a king was behind his soldiers and subjects.

The Abyssals have attempted land assaults in the past, the most successful one being in the United States of America in 2007, where they invaded from the Atlantic Ocean onto the Eastern front, pushing far inland due to the element of surprise and countless reserves as they occupied the eastern seaboard from New York to Florida.

The Americans had to resort to using everything short of a tactical nuclear strike to flatten the Eastern front and drive them back.

And even then, the Abyssals made off with almost all of the nukes on the eastern coast of the United States that were placed there in the past to launch at the Soviets as the ship girls entered and secured the nuclear bases that were thankfully spared from the aerial bombardment, and found that all of the warheads were stolen by the oceanic invaders as they retreated.

At that time, the United States Ship Girl Navy was nothing to sneeze at since being the industrial war machine that they were, they had already summoned powerful ship girls like Enterprise and Iowa several times and had hundreds of bases lining both coasts.

But even then, the Eastern bases were devastated, being overrun by the sheer amount of Abyssals that spawned from the depths that numbered in the tens of millions after a long lull in their movements.

And that wasn't even accounting for the sheer firepower they brought.

As the Abyssals assaulted the Eastern front with astounding speed to overwhelm the American bases in a manner reminiscent of the German Blitzkrieg by bombarding the coast with carriers, battleships and Princesses stationed off the coast to soften everything up for the admittedly ill-equipped ground troops, where ship girls and civilians alike were forced into an exodus as the Abyssals stepped ashore.

The ship girls were overwhelmed by the sheer manpower and firepower that the Abyssals brought, with wave after wave of Abyssals throwing themselves at the ship girls while being harassed by Abyssal bombers and Abyssal battleships taking pot shots at them.

They were unprepared for land-based combat, and were eventually forced to abandon their unwieldy ship girl weapons that couldn't be reloaded or maintained without the tools and resources in the bases that they left.

Their heavy sea-based weapons only served to slow them down on land, heading inland while evacuating the entire Eastern seaboard at the cost of their lives.

Whatever survivors were left after the inland push barely held the line while only armed with ineffective human firearms until the Western front airdropped the other half of the American Ship Girl Navy with extremely expensive and hastily-crafted Anti-Abyssal weapons made from scratch.

And along with a few tanks to turn the tables, they turned the tide of the war with a few B2 Spirit Stealth Bombers performing bombing runs that thankfully didn't destroy too much of the infrastructure as the ship girls took back the Eastern coast.

They finally pushed the Abyssals back into the ocean, although the unspoken consensus was that it was more as if the Abyssals themselves decided to retreat like a receding wave, having already done extensive damage to America's naval bases and not wishing to hold onto territory that they knew they couldn't occupy for long.

The assault was infamously named the 'American Blitzkrieg' after the Nazi invasion into France, the invasion carried out with deadly efficiency and with blinding speed to take the ship girls by surprise, the enemies retreating just as quickly and taking their nukes with them.

After that fiasco, the world decided that Anti-Abyssal weapons be made readily available to be crafted at a heavy cost of resources, creating weapons that could be wielded whatever the situation.

Most of their naval maneuvers were carried out by their powerful boat slippers, hence why ship girl weapons were created to be heavy as they didn't need to run while carrying them.

Even for destroyers, their weapons would only slow them down as they brought their sea-based weapons onto land, the reduced speed a result of their ship girl armor, battle backpacks and weapons weighing them down.

The worst offenders of this were battleships who could essentially bring down entire buildings at the cost of moving at a pace of a snail.

Thus, an alternative was to use resources to create an Anti-Abyssal weapon that could naturally be used on land by creating a weapon based off of an existing human weapon design.

The most common kind were knives or swords that could be carried around easily by ship girls to be used in times of emergency, and when the option of using ship girl weapons were unavailable, for example, due to ammo shortage.

They were either crafted by the Fairies and human engineers or was a weapon that was crafted to accompany the construction of certain ship girls, Tenryuu, Tatsuta and Murakumo being a part of that group.

One thing that users were warned about was that an Anti-Abyssal weapon was perfectly capable of killing a ship girl just as they could kill an Abyssal, as both parties were created from the same steel and thus could be hurt just as easily.

Strangely enough, Admiral Mako thought, the Anti Abyssal weapons required a certain level of skill to be wielded effectively as they were based off of weapon designs not meant for conventional ship girl warfare, but was absolutely devastating in the hands of a veteran who knew what she was doing.

Admiral Mako sighed and looked towards the ocean, the wake of the last few battleships barely visible over the horizon.

She loved all of her ship girls, she really did.

And if dumping all her resources into creating the best weapons meant that they would all survive this war, she'd do so in a heartbeat and haggle every single corporate head out there to do the same to end this horrid war once and for all.

She never wanted to lose another ship girl in her life, for it felt as though she lost another daughter to this neverending conflict, and there was nothing she could do to stop it for good.

But like she said, she wasn't so naive to believe that there would be no casualties in war.

She simply didn't want them to be the girls that she had fallen in love with, and whom she treated like family in lieu of her real one.

---

Hiei was waiting for the Ise-Class battleships as she conversed with the taller Yamato-Class battleship, describing her sortieing experiences and the lessons she learnt from the ship girls of this base.

Being constructed earlier than the revered Yamato meant that she somehow felt a need to look out for the more inexperienced battleship.

And unlike her Onee-sama who was exuberant, dependable and experienced enough to hold her own in a battle, she saw Yamato as the kind to be strong in battle as she faced off against her enemies, yet somehow delicate as a flower when it came to collateral damage as the battle raged on around her, likely getting distracted by the injuries of her comrades.

So here she was, teaching Yamato that even though she was a battleship, she couldn't be distracted by her injured comrades.

It was alright for her to tank a shot for another ship girl if she knew she could withstand it, but she wasn't a repair ship, and it wasn't her job to worry about her comrades.

"And that's why, we must harden our hearts and accomplish our objective before we can worry about our injured comrades."

"B-But isn't that too heartless, not to spare a thought for them as they fall, Hiei-san?"

Hiei's face hardened, looking away as she remembered Junyou getting injured on the battlefield.

And yet, all she could do was keep pushing on, forcing herself to ignore her injured comrade lest another one of her fleet members got hurt.

"It's not about what we want to do, when it comes to anything that happens out on the battlefield.

It's a matter of doing what we were created to do.

And for us, our duty is to annihilate our enemies, no matter who they are."

She looked back up to Yamato, looking into her despondent face that revealed the conflict within.

Between her kind heart that simultaneously wanted to help everyone and her duty to be the most powerful battleship in existence without any prior experience, having previously being kept as a 'trump card' throughout the war and ultimately being sacrificed in a desperate and ultimately pointless battle.

Hiei smiled sadly at the battleship, truly touched by the battleship's kindness, and wondered why a Yamato Nadeshiko like her had to be burdened with such responsibility.

If she were someone like Musashi, she could understand, the dark-skinned 'ganguro' being a blood knight that wanted to participate in a battle, if only to protect her comrades in her own way.

But Yamato was the incarnation of a perfect wife, something that had no place on the battlefield, much less being essentially the most powerful ship girl in existence.

"Well,"

Hiei tried approaching it from another perspective to help her friend out.

"You can think of it this way.

If you wipe out all your enemies as quickly as possible, you all can go back to the base sooner and your fleet mates won't have suffered in vain, right?"

Yamato looked away, still conflicted about having to fight in a battle while being so heartless and suppressing her concern for her fleet mates, but she finally looked back towards Hiei, her eyes hardening as she accepted the grim reality of war, responding.

"I understand.

I can't do anything about my injured comrades other than towing them back to the port.

But I can do the one thing I do best and defeat my enemies with my overwhelming firepower to end my battles quickly."

Looking over the horizon wistfully, Yamato described her feelings about her desire to fight conflicting with her desire to help.

"You know, like my sister, I often dreamed of sortieing with my fellow ship girls.

So when I heard that the Admiral was organizing lessons for us and was planning to sortie us in the upcoming Pacific assault, I was so happy that I protect everyone on the battlefield.

But now that I'm here, I can't help but also think about the safety of my comrades, and how I can't hope to protect every one of them as it's not within my power to do so.

The best I can do is protect those around me with my armor whenever I can, and focus on destroying the enemy in front of me.

But it feels a little sad, doesn't it?

It feels almost pointless to be created to be bulletproof, and to be the 'ultimate' ship girl, if we can't protect everyone around us…"

Hiei shook her head, correcting Yamato's thinking by trying to change the way the situation was viewed.

"Just as the Ultimate Spear should not feel guilty for not being able to function like a basic shield, we should not feel guilty for not being able to protect everyone we way you wish for us to.

When you think about it, we're considerably slower, which means if everyone were forced to cluster around us for us to shield them like you intend to, it instead makes it even easier for the Abyssals to concentrate their cannon-fire, torpedoes and bombers to kill us all in one fell swoop.

Instead, like the Ultimate Spear, we should instead focus on an overwhelming offense and strive to destroy our enemies in one strike to ensure no one else gets hurt.

When you think about it, to erase the source of the threat is also a form of protection, no?"

Yamato looked back to Hiei, smiling radiantly now that her worries were assuaged, thanking the Kongou-Class battleship that never failed to brighten up her day and helped her feel better about herself.

"Thank you, Hiei, for lifting my spirits whenever I feel down."

She scratched her cheek sheepishly, wondering out loud.

"Although I feel that being the more powerful and older-looking battleship, I should be the more mature and caring ship girl here…"

Hiei waved her arms in faux-pissed off manner, puffing her cheeks out as she moved her clenched fists in a cyclic manner, softly hitting on the thick armor of Yamato's 46 cm Triple Cannons while exclaiming,

"I'm older than you, just so you know!

I participated in World War 1 and 2, so I'm your senior!"

Yamato giggled at Hiei's false outburst, and bowed meekly in apology.

But Yamato asked a question about their two remaining battleships, causing Hiei to stop her action.

"What are the Ise-Class battleships like, if they're sent out so often despite Admiral Mako possessing stronger battleships?"

Hiei reviewed her memory files, trying to discern the true nature of the Ise-Class battleships as they had never found a reason to interact with each other outside of shelling missions.

Their personalities, however…

"They both know that they can't compare to most of us when it comes to a straight up fight, so I heard that they fight using unconventional methods to throw the opponent off.

And even though we can all easily wipe everything out with our cannons, in this base, we are more concerned with teaching ship girls what to do when the conventional methods fail us in times of combat.

Hyuga's pretty ripped and lean as she prioritizes close-quarters combat while using her katana and cannons up close, contradicting our usual doctrine of staying further back to soften up the enemy with our overwhelming firepower and using our strength to defeat anyone foolish enough to fight us in close quarters.

And Ise is… just Ise."

Hiei's furrowed, trying to describe the name-ship of the Ise-Class battleship, and failing to find any words in the dictionary to describe her personality.

She shrugged as she saw the two Ise-Class battleships approaching them, letting Yamato know.

"Just don't expect them to fight in a manner that conforms to any specific fighting style."

The two Ise-Class battleships had short brown hair and brown eyes, wearing a miko uniform of sorts with the skirts colored in their signature brown color.

Underneath the uniform was some sort of black skin tight suit that peeked out from her elbow-length sleeves and their brown dresses, and they wore knee-high socks and sandals.

Their riggings had four 35.6 cm Twin Gun Mounts, and they both had a handheld triangular flight deck in one hand, with one hand resting on the katanas they carried on their left hip.

A radar array was poking from the top of their riggings, and two rings around their thighs were holding some sort of metal plate that doubled as secondary turrets for extra protection.

The few things that distinguished them from one and another, is that Ise had her hair tied up in a ponytail and held together by a red ribbon, while Hyuga had her short hair down.

Hyuga had a serious expression on her face and strode forward diligently, while Ise was bubbly and was practically hopping forward, painfully enthusiastic about the training session.

Everyone greeted the two approaching battleships, Nagato starting off the session by opening up with a suggestion.

"Alright, let's start this session.

I think it's best if we split up to try and spar with each other and try to learn a few techniques from each other.

Does anyone have suggestions on whom they wish to spar with?"

Musashi was the one to raise her hand first, her open palm forming a fist in the air and leaving her right index finger out as she lowered her hand to point at Nagato, stating her desire.

"I challenge Nagato-san."

Hyuga looked to Yamato with an aside glance, receiving a few surprised looks due to her audacious challenge towards the gentle battleship.

"I shall do battle with Yamato-san."

Yamato's eyes widened in surprise, but she nodded in acceptance as she held her umbrella a little tighter upon shifting her gaze onto Hyuga's katana.

Ise giddily raised her hand as she ecstatically chirped.

"I'll fight Hiei, Kongou and Bismarck all at once!"

Everyone went dead silent at that, staring blankly at the name-ship of the Ise-Class battleship as she smiled radiantly, her eyes narrowing to form curves as she stood behind her claim and rested her left hand on the handle of her katana.

Kongou waved her clenched fists around as she exclaimed indignantly, Hiei and Bismarck also looking rather insulted at Ise's bold claim but allowed the name-ship of the Kongou-Class to be their unofficial spokesperson.

"Who do you think you are to think that you can fight the three of us at once, desu?!"

Ise tilted her head, completely unfazed by the glares that she received as she coolly responded.

"Well, why don't you follow me and find out, hmm?"

Ise boosted away, her muscular legs propelling her forward and allowing her to get a decent head start before an affronted Kongou followed in her tracks, Hiei and Bismarck looking to each other before they shrugged and followed suit.

The four of them zoomed across the ocean as fast as battleships could go, leaving a messy wake behind them as the five slow battleships were left in the middle of the ocean, Nagato awkwardly coughing into her right fist as she commanded.

"So, now that we've gotten that out of the way, everyone...

Battle stations."

The four participants steeled their expressions as Mutsu retreated to a safe distance, being there to use her heavy-duty steel cable to tow back any injured battleships, Musashi and Hyuga looking to each other and wordlessly coming to an agreement as they shuffled and stood closer to each other.

Musashi cracked her knuckles and Hyuga drew her katana, somewhat mirroring Nagato's clenching of her fists in anticipation and Yamato worriedly brandishing her steel umbrella in response to Hyuga drawing her Anti-Abyssal weapon.

Hyuga kept her eyes on Yamato as she distanced herself from Musashi and Nagato, slowly strolling as she chatted with Yamato in her emotionally flat voice.

"The days where we fought as warships are over.

We are now also girls who can walk on water, we must change the way we fight our battles.

It would be easy for us to fight like a conventional battleship as we always have, but eventually, we will encounter situations where the Abyssals will somehow survive our barrage of cannon fire.

They'll fight up close and personal, where our cannons won't be as effective due to their slow rotational speed and long reload times.

And in this case, we need to make sure that every strike counts."

Hyuga noted, now doing her part to educate the battleships on the benefits of fighting the way they did.

"We, the Ise-Class battleships, don't fight like most battleships since we know that doing this will only limit our effectiveness.

So, we instead fight as ship girls, something that forces us to think out of the box and use whatever's on hand to do whatever it takes to take as many enemies down as possible."

Hyuga then bolted forward, katana in hand as she crossed the distance quickly by running the whole way, but Yamato's folded umbrella was already moving to intercept the incoming blade.

A loud screech rang out as the two weapons impacted, Hyuga pulling her blade back and her eyes narrowing in suspicion, before shifting the position of her feet and her weight to strike again.

This time, Yamato swung her umbrella out, cleanly and easily deflecting Hyuga's blade as she stepped back, her concentration never wavering for a second.

Hyuga easily dodged the umbrella that was swung down hard by the slower battleship, and was able to put some distance between them to reassess the situation.

Yamato chafed a little upon seeing Hyuga being so willing to strike her opponent down in the midst of her own speech, pointing out.

"Don't you find it dishonorable to try and surprise your opponent with a sneak attack, Hyuga-san?"

Hyuga's eyes darkened a little upon that, lazily swinging her katana while expertly hiding the fact that she constantly shifted her weight from foot to foot to keep herself limber and ready to evade a potential attack as she snarked.

"Honor?

Pride?

These things have no place in a battlefield, where ship girls can die if they don't constantly adapt to an enemy that has seemingly infinite resources and reserves.

Let me tell you something, Yamato."

Hyuga firmly clasped her katana, pointing it at Yamato as she continued dryly.

"When you face a situation that's so heavily stacked against you with so much on the line, you may see that sometimes, things like honor and dignity are paltry things to forsake to win, and sometimes to even survive.

Do you understand me?"

The Yamato-Class battleship seemed rather taken aback at this statement, her doey eyes widening and blatantly expressing how deeply that statement had cut into her heart, not surprising considering her suicide mission against the Americans in World War 2, and suddenly realizing where Hyuga was coming from.

She shut her eyes for an instant, visibly trying to shut out the hurtful memories of abandonment before opening them to reveal steely eyes that exuded a shaky but unyielding will to win.

Yamato's rigging groaned and screeched as all her 15.5 Cm Triple Gun Turrets rotated, all of them aimed right at Hyuga as Yamato looked on, not wanting to immediately resort to her most powerful cannons for fear of outright killing Hyuga with them, even if she was using training rounds.

She was carrying the most the world's most powerful ship cannons on her rigging, and her shells could potentially kill anyone given close enough distance and sheer bad luck.

Hyuga let out a tsk, and being an aviation battleship, she had her boost gauge installed after her remodel to help improve her mobility as she emptied the boost gauge in one boat slipper to dive to the right.

Balloons of smoke erupted from the barrels of Yamato's smaller cannons with the accompanying chorus of explosions, flames licking out of the barrel and the barrage of projectiles replacing the position of Hyuga's torso where she previously stood, Hyuga correcting her stumble and aimed one of her cannons in Yamato's direction while her other cannons whirled to face in other directions.

Yamato flinched and strafed to throw off her aim, only to find that it was a feint as Hyuga pulled out an empty Type 0 Recon plane to hurl in Yamato's direction, using the boost gauge in her other boat slipper to propel herself towards the Yamato-Class battleship.

Yamato reflexively caught the Recon plane with her hand, but Hyuga had already shortened the distance between them, Yamato dropping the plane in her hand and using the secret weapon that she carried around 24/7.

Unfolding her umbrella's handle to pull out a gun handle and trigger, Yamato held up the barrel of the Anti-Abyssal Rifle hidden in her steel umbrella and fired without thinking, finally remembering the warning that her Admiral gave her, that her powerful Anti-Abyssal Rifle, as per its name, was only to be used on Abyssals, as it was also fully capable of killing a ship girl.

She watched with dread as the bullet flew toward towards Hyuga, hoping that despite her precise android aiming skills, she'd somehow miss the advancing battleship, who had built up too much momentum and couldn't stop to evade.

But she was both shocked and surprised as Hyuga dropped down to slide on her knees, using the flight deck that was on her left arm to deflect the bullet as she held it up to her face.

She angled it in such a way that the bullet wouldn't simply punch through the makeshift shield, but the bullet's trajectory would be thrown off by the shield's resistance, throwing up sparks as the bullet was deflected successfully by the more experienced battleship.

Two of Hyuga's four cannons were pointed backwards and downwards towards the ocean, the recoil of their combined firepower providing the push needed to propel Hyuga back up.

Yamato was now panicking, not having expected the aviation battleship to deflect the bullet, Hyuga charging forward and regaining the lost momentum from her initial charge to put her weight behind her steel flight deck like a battering ram, Yamato bracing for the imminent impact.

Yamato's left forearm collided with Hyuga's flight deck, causing a shock-wave to reverberate through the surrounding air and even disturbing the seawater around them by causing waves to form.

But Yamato was made painfully aware of a sudden pain in her stomach, looking down to see the glint of a katana as the steel buried itself into her uniform.

Yamato's heart froze as she tore herself away, the blade thankfully not piercing through her body.

Blood was flowing from the wound as she struggled to get away while Hyuga was swinging her stained katana around lazily, not intending to chase after her.

Yamato struggled to stay up, the Fairies trying to close up the wound as she gasped, sweating from the very real fear of being hurt.

Being a ship girl that hadn't seen too much combat, Yamato knew that she, like all ship girls, could be injured, killed and ultimately sunk.

But the wound on her stomach was something that she couldn't comprehend.

Despite Hyuga's katana being a Anti-Abyssal weapon that was likely created along with Hyuga herself and hence having the potential to cut through steel, she was Yamato.

How was Hyuga able to wield her katana so effectively to be able to pierce through the armor of the strongest battleship in the world?

The Ise-Class battleship looked as if she was able to read Yamato's mind, looking into her wincing eyes as she flatly pointed out.

"Don't look so surprised.

Just like how we can get extremely nasty, you'll be surprised what tricks the Abyssals have in store to take down us capital ships.

If the Abyssals did what I did in battle, you'd be suffering from more than a stab wound, seeing as they are our mortal enemies and truly have no qualms in doing what it takes to sink you and deal a mortal blow to our morale."

Hyuga lowered her katana and relaxed her stance as she allowed Yamato's Fairies to patch her up.

Yamato still looked wary but exhaled as she took the chance to wipe her sweat while listening to Hyuga's lecture.

"Honestly, I was glad that I voted to spar with you before Ise did.

You may think that I'm 'dishonorable' or whatever, but I truly feel bad for Kongou, Hiei and Bismarck for fighting against my sister ship."

Yamato breathed in, thankful that Hyuga wasn't pressing her attack anymore as she exclaimed.

"Aren't you the least bit worried about your sister, Hyuga-san?

She's going up against three battleships at once..."

Hyuga shook her head at that, jutting her chin towards Yamato as she pointed out the battleship's wounds.

"Worry about yourself, for in a real battle, I would have struck you even if you were down.

Ise can handle herself, although it's her mental health I'm worried about.

She's..."

---

A minute earlier…

"Alright, girls! We're now far enough from the main group, now let's party!"

Ise cheered, allowing the battleship trio to surround her as they slowed down.

The fast battleship duo weren't exactly tired to the point of exhaustion, but they were indeed sweating, although Bismarck had suffered the most from the small marathon.

She was carrying more armor than the two Kongou sisters, and she had to resort to physical running in order to keep up, the sweating exacerbated by the chest-plate that she wore, her primarily dark and thick uniform that was all designed for a colder climate and not suited for summer weather as it passively absorbed the ambient heat.

She was starting to sweat buckets, and her chest was heaving as she paused to catch her breath as she tried to look as dignified as a disheveled ship girl could when breathing heavily and wiping away beads of sweat.

But Ise never broke a sweat as she inhaled, loudly and cheerily announcing.

"Alright, boys and girls!

We're here today to celebrate the advent of our resident hero ship girl!

And you know who she is and her ship class, so say it with me now!"

Ise then physically formed out the alphabet as she exclaimed maniacally.

"B!

B!

V!

I!

S!

E!

Aviation Battleship Ise, on the scene!"

All of the battleships were frozen upon witnessing her mania, and could only watch with morbid curiosity as Ise took out a bandanna to tie around her forehead, Ise losing her mania completely upon tightening the bandanna behind her head as her expression hardened.

She drew her katana, only to shove it in her mouth and place her two hands on the cannons opposite to form an 'X' right in front of her with her flight deck still on her left forearm, as the Fairies, knowing the Ise-Class battleship fighting style all too well, scrambled to leave the cannons.

As they left, Ise 'unsheathed' the cannons to physically wield the dual cannons while the remaining bottom two cannons slowly whirred, pointing downwards so as not to interfere with Ise's movements.

Ise now announced seriously, her voice muffled by the handle of the katana between her teeth, but her words could still be understood by the three battleships before her.

"I introduce you to my preferred fighting style, the 'Three-Sword Style'!"

Everyone simply stared at her incredulously, before mentally agreeing,

'No matter what, we ABSOLUTELY cannot let this idiot of a battleship win!'

But while they were lost amidst their thoughts, no one noticed the subtle brown aura of strength flowing out of Ise's back, barely hinting at the dormant powers that were stirring inside the eccentric veteran…

---

" …She has seen better days."

Yamato could only sweat-drop at the crude hint regarding the mental state of the name-ship of the Ise-Class battleships.

But Hyuga was quick to recover, her indifferent demeanor returning as she spoke up in her sister's defense.

"But do not underestimate her.

Anyone who does is in for a world of pain.

I strive to find a harmony in all the weapons I carry, believing that all our weapons can be used no matter what the situation, and that no weapon can be truly rendered ineffective by circumstance.

It's all about what you can think up of to improvise with what weapons you have, and I strive to utilize all of them as best I can, whenever I can.

Ise, however, breaks the meta by completely disregarding everything and doing whatever she wants as she fights."

But she heard Hyuga continue, a tone of sobriety in her serious, deadpan voice.

"I can't dispute the fact that we are weak battleships.

But the age of warships is over."

Hyuga's eyes clouded over as she drove her next point home and met Yamato's gaze.

"This is the age of the ship girl.

Pride.

Honor.

Convention.

When the situation deteriorates, don't be afraid to cast off these shackles to expand all your effort into protecting your comrades."

The Ise-Class battleship then shook her head sadly, seeing Yamato's sullen expression, adding solemnly.

"Either way, I'm in no way under the illusion that I can beat you alone.

The gap in power between us is too great, though I fully understand that it's not your fault.

But as a result of this gap, I don't think we can understand each other no matter how much we try."

Hyuga glanced at the Yamato-Class battleship as she calmly explained the vast gap that existed in between them in terms of talent and stats.

"Amongst the three paths to strength are talent, potential and experience.

Those who are built to be naturally strong likely wouldn't understand the struggles of those who had to develop their strengths through experience or had to train tirelessly to unlock the power hidden within them, but it is not anybody's fault for being created the way they are.

You may be able to fight like a conventional battleship even under adverse conditions and still win, and that is something that I can never understand as I am not, and will never be as powerful as you.

So with that said, let's get back to the fight."

Hyuga raised her katana, but Yamato raised her hand in a ninety degree angle to get Hyuga's attention, requesting.

"Just as you've said your piece, I'd like to say something, too."

Hyuga considered it for a short while before nodding and lowering her katana, while Yamato gathered her thoughts as she inhaled and began.

"I respectfully disagree with your statement that I cannot understand you at all.

Even when I am called the 'strongest battleship', I can't sortie at all due to my high consumption rate.

Even the Admiral, who wants to give everyone a chance to sortie, had to stockpile resources just to give me and my sister a chance to even come out here to practice."

Yamato's face darkened as it seemed as though she were subconsciously dredging up bad memories as she continued, eyes lowered and focusing on the spot of ocean between them as she continued.

"You have no idea how it feels, when everyone keeps praising you as the 'ultimate battleship' and you can't even step out on the ocean to protect your comrades.

What's the point of being called the 'ultimate weapon' if no one is even willing to send you out into combat?"

Yamato looked down, now looking very exposed as she shared her secrets and inner thoughts with the Ise-Class battleship, but she seemed determined to clear this misconception that Hyuga had about her, reluctantly continuing.

"And even when I'm sent out, it's more for support shelling missions where it's basically 'stand at designated spot, shoot my cannons, and go home.'

Even my service career in my last life was short and my death was laughably pathetic.

So much for the 'ultimate weapon'.

I want to protect everyone, but even as you called me talented, I am nothing without experience!

I want to learn how to fight to the best of my abilities, and I don't care if I have to throw away my pride to learn from you, Hyuuga-san!

So please!"

Yamato held out her Anti-Abyssal umbrella to point towards a slightly surprised Hyuga, steeling her gaze and visibly hardening her resolve to try her best to win at all costs, to protect not just her fleet-mates but all the ship girls of Yokosuka as she requested.

"Don't hold back."

Hyuga blinked, suddenly hearing another earth-shattering punch sounding off beside her as Nagato and Musashi were engaged in a no-holds-barred fisticuffs match, Nagato maintaining the upper hand through skill and experience when going up against a stronger Musashi.

Both of them were trying to one up one another by trying to catch the other in the sights of their large-caliber cannons whilst fighting, knowing that a battleship's shell was going to hurt at this range even if training ammo was used.

The thing was that the both of them knew that they were both in their element, the two battleships grinning ecstatically as the ocean beneath them quaked with every blow connecting, displacing small craters where they stood.

No choice then.

She would have to bring her A-game if she was to even hope to beat the legendary Yamato despite the stronger battleship's inexperience.

Hyuga sighed as she put her unoccupied, flight-deck carrying hand on the barrel of one of the cannons to her right with the Fairies already evacuating the cannon turret itself and retreating into Hyuga's rigging.

She waited for the cannon to safely disconnect before uncoupling the cannon, now wielding the katana in her right hand, the flight-deck/shield and the cannon-sword on the left.

And a brown, intimidating aura of strength began flowing out of Hyuga, her expression hardening and her muscles tensing up as she warned the battleship before her.

"Maintain your hold on your weapon.

Don't drop your guard for a second.

Keep your eyes on me at all times.

Because if you don't..."

Hyuga's light-brown aura flared up, her air of intense concentration refined through years of sorties and training sessions as she saw Yamato starting to sweat, Hyuga finishing her morbid warning.

"...You'll be dead before you know it."

---

Kongou dodged another swipe from Ise's cannon-sword that was swung diagonally up to the left and prepared her cannons to empty their shells into Ise.

But a sharp pain in her gut sent her reeling, throwing off her aim as Ise pushed her leg into Kongou's lower torso while emptying her boost gauge to make Kongou miss, and to simultaneously push herself away to dodge Kongou's messed-up shots fluidly and retreat from the struggling Kongou, who was clutching her stomach in pain and staggering.

But Hiei came in hard, swinging her fists at Ise.

The two battleships tussled as Ise swung her cannon-swords around while Hiei blocked them with her bare hands and threw some hits of her own to keep Ise on edge as Ise blocked with her flight deck, Ise's cannons that were on her rigging already in position.

Ise then put her foot down, bending her knees and holding her two cannon-swords tightly as she shouted.

"Twin Steel Dragon's Ascent!"

And used her boost gauge as well as her powerful leg muscles to propel herself upwards, swinging her cannon-swords in an upwards slicing motion as the two cannons blurred from the sheer speed of the move.

Hiei barely dodged the dual cannon-swords, clearly seeing the rivets and seams on the surface of the cannon as the cannon narrowly missed taking Hiei's face off.

But Ise wasn't done yet.

Swinging the cannon-swords around her head, she brought down one cannon-sword as it was swung down at Hiei's head, the Ise-Class battleship shouting.

"Lone Steel Dragon's Descent!"

Hiei was barely able to catch the side of the 35.6 Cm Twin Gun Cannon as it was stopped with her two hands just centimeters from her face, the downward impact causing Hiei to bend her legs reflexively and sink a little into the ocean while roughly displacing large waves around her and causing an immense shock wave around them.

Her hands were trembling from having to catch Ise's cannon-sword that was swung down like a baseball bat, Hiei sweating and panting as Ise's boat slippers finally hit the ocean floor,

'I thought she'd be tired from having to swing those heavy cannons around all the time.

But not only is she less tired than I am, but she can still swing these heavy-ass cannons around like chopsticks!

Just how strong is she physically?'

But as she prepared to fire all her cannons at Ise like her sister planned to while still holding Ise's cannon-sword, she saw a blur swing up and approach her from below.

Her preoccupied hands were unable to block the incoming boosted boat slipper that connected with her chin, causing her to fall backwards as she released the cannon-sword, Ise backing away as she commented.

"Whew, thought I had to resort to using my cannons to get her to let go…"

But an explosion behind her rigging threw her forward, Ise crying out as she kicked up water upon hitting the floor, plumes of smoke wafting out from the back of her rigging.

Bismarck's smoking cannons betrayed her presence as she cautiously approached the fallen Ise-Class battleship, keeping a distance while her cannon reloaded.

The Bismarck-Class battleship knew that it was 'dishonorable' to shoot someone else in the back, but she knew from experience that holding on too tightly to such ideals in the face of danger was akin to signing your own death warrant.

And besides, this ship girl was far too unpredictable to be fought with the conventional tactics that most battleships often relied on.

This time, she saw a way to take down the seemingly unstoppable ship girl and had taken the shot, the practice round doing its job while doing minimal damage.

She was slowly approaching the downed battleship while trying to scoot around to try and cover the recovering Hiei as she pointed her smoking cannons at a groaning Ise.

But she heard the prone battleship trying to mutter something, which she finally made out as,

" … good job…"

Before one of Ise's cannons whirred slightly to point right at Bismarck, the German battleship's eyes widening before taking a step back and raising her arms instinctively.

But she was too late in trying to perform any evasive maneuvers as Ise fired off two shells, one into the left breast of her chest-plate and the second into her abdomen and striking the flesh underneath, causing her to fall back on her rigging.

She was barely paying attention to Ise, who had pushed herself up with her fists and was a few steps behind in trying to respond to Ise who was standing over her and was waving her cannon-sword around, obviously going easy on the three less-experienced battleships as she lightly mocked.

" … But not good enough."

Ise then seemed to notice something before boosting to evade the barrage of cannon-fire from the two Kongou Sisters, who approached the fallen Bismarck to help her up as Hiei addressed them both.

"We can't seem to beat her when we go in one at a time, so I propose that we all work together to take Ise down, Onee-sama!"

Kongou nodded, already trying to change her mindset to go against a better and more experienced opponent while Bismarck was trying to catch her breath as the last move had hurt her physically.

And Ise could be heard in front of them, nodding as she swung her cannon-swords around to warm up while she still had her katana in her mouth.

"That's right!

Your cannons aren't guaranteed to hit all your enemies all the time, and your enemies sometimes try to close the distance in order to reduce the effectiveness of your cannons due to the slow turn rate and long reload times of our cannons.

But this isn't a one-ship-girl show, and we aren't alone on the battlefield!

There are enemies stronger than us out there, amongst them being the Princesses.

And to fight them, you battleships had better learn to get your team spirit on!"

Hiei roared and charged in, Kongou and Bismarck right behind her as Ise readied herself for the triple threat.

Hiei and Kongou used several martial arts moves to block and attack Ise while Ise used her boost gauge sparingly to maintain her distance whilst swinging her cannon-swords around menacingly.

But when she successfully pulled away from the duo, she was assaulted by a barrage of cannon fire from Bismarck who kept up the pressure in long-range combat.

But Ise, being a veteran and a seasoned ship girl, wasn't fazed in the slightest as she struck out unpredictably with her knees and shoulders in a manner somewhat reminiscent of muay thai to keep the Kongou Sisters on their toes as well as keeping her swings of her cannon-swords to a minimum to prevent herself from revealing a moment of weakness and using her flight deck primarily as a shield, all while using the cannons on her rigging to shoot back at Bismarck, who seemed to be the designated long-range support.

She put her cannon-swords back onto her rigging and discarded her bandanna once she had some space to breathe, now resorting to the 'one-sword style' as she took the sword from her mouth with her right hand to swing at Kongou, Kongou swiftly dodging by ducking.

But she was almost unprepared for Ise's rising right knee, catching Ise's knee at the last possible second before she felt a sharp cracking pain on the back of her head as her head was forced down into Ise's knee by Ise's descending left shoulder.

Hiei moved in to help her sister, but had to strafe to dodge a round fired from one of the cannons on Ise's rigging, Bismarck tsking at the moving target that made sure to keep herself mobile the entire time, trying to get a clear shot at Ise without hitting Kongou.

Ise then took the chance to use the disoriented Kongou, who was dazed from the facial impact with Ise's knee and had a bleeding nose, awkwardly spinning the confused battleship and positioning herself behind Kongou while holding Kongou's chin up with her left hand that had her flight deck shielding her left forearm, and her right hand held her katana very close to Kongou's exposed neck.

Hiei's face darkened almost instantaneously, seething,

" … Ise…"

Bismarck grimaced, trying to find a spot where she could snipe Ise in order to break her hold.

This proved to be difficult as Ise was positioned behind Kongou and her rigging, the aviation battleship having a flight deck to protect her grabbing arm.

There was almost no way to shoot at Ise without hurting Kongou, Bismarck understanding that Hiei wouldn't appreciate it if she ever shot at her sister, no matter how justified the situation.

Ise was moving erratically while using the reflective property of the katana's blade to reflect the sunlight at the duo to throw off their aim, proving to be quite the veteran as she used everything she had to bring everyone down.

But Ise could feel Kongou feebly trying to disarm Ise's grip around her chin, understanding that she was starting to regain her bearings in order to escape her hold.

Ise sighed, raising her boat slipper while moving the katana away from Kongou's neck and releasing her hold as she kicked Kongou in the bum with a shot of her boost gauge to throw off Kongou's sense of balance, the fast battleship stumbling forward towards Hiei as the younger Kongou Sister's face softened.

And Ise dived to the left as Bismarck fired all her cannons, one round impacting the roof of Ise's cannon and causing sparks to fly as Ise used her flight deck to block another two rounds at the expense of dents being formed in the flight deck, her cannons whirring.

But as Bismarck rushed towards Ise with headstrong determination, she suddenly found the distance between them increasing as Ise used the entirety of her boost gauge to push herself away from the Bismarck-Class battleship as she pointed all her cannons at Bismarck, chiding.

"Rushing at me when all your cannons are reloading, and mine are all loaded?

Foolishness.

Cataclysmic Howl of the Eight Great Cannons!"

And fired all her cannons, Bismarck's eyes were open with horrified shock as all eight cannon barrels fired off like a bunch of photograph flash bulbs blinding her as she ran straight into her doom.

---

Hyuga swung her cannon-sword around while her katana was poised to intercept any ship girl foolish enough to get closer to her.

Yamato caught her cannon-sword with her hand, standing in front of her and facing her directly as she readied her umbrella to swing down at Hyuga.

But Hyuga was quick to respond by quickly lifting her boat slipper to place on Yamato's unsuspecting face, falling backwards and dragging a surprised Yamato down with her until Hyuga's rigging hit the ocean floor.

She emptied her boost right into Yamato's face, Yamato reeling back from the Inverted Stomp Face-breaker as her head ricocheted off of Hyuga's boat slipper and let go of her cannon-sword.

But Hyuga wasn't out of the woods yet, as Nagato joined their fight while her thunderous footsteps threw up water beneath her feet, Hyuga rotating her legs and hips to flip herself up.

She steadied herself, sheathed her cannon-sword and swung her katana at the approaching Nagato.

The thing that surprised Hyuga was that instead of hitting 'soft' flesh underneath her black elbow gloves, she instead heard an unyielding and sharp 'CLANG!', instantly recovering from her look of surprise by retreating and blocking with her flight deck as Nagato threw a punch, impacting the makeshift shield with a dull impact that was only achieved by two metal objects impacting each other.

Hyuga commented as she put some distance between them,

"Wearing metal plates inside your gloves, hmm?

Not bad."

To which Nagato said nothing and simply pointed at her, cannons now at the ready and fired in Hyuga's direction.

Hyuuga could only react reflexively and empty the boost gauge in her right leg to dive to the left as Nagato's cannons fired, resounding throughout the ocean with a mighty roar.

But Hyuga found that Nagato didn't fire all her cannons in one go, instead firing two of them while waiting for Hyuga to steady herself as she came out of the dive, Nagato grinning in response to Hyuga's grimace as her last two cannons sounded off majestically, forcing Hyuga to empty the boost gauge in her left leg to evade the incoming bullet.

What Hyuuga didn't expect was the Yamato-Class battleship standing a distance behind Nagato and out of sight due to Nagato blocking Hyuuga's view, and what Hyuuga saw made her heart stop.

Yamato usually had three main cannons, two at her shoulders and pointed forward, one right behind her and flipped back.

Yamato's rigging was now transformed to point all three 46 Cm Triple Gun Cannons and all four of her 15.5 Triple Gun Mounts at Hyuga, causing Hyuga to wonder if this was where she was going to meet her maker before being revived at the docks.

But this wasn't the first predicament that she found herself in.

She did the unthinkable and put her weight on her left feet, pushing off of it to charge at Yamato.

This went against every survival instinct that screamed at her to simply dive to the floor, as her boost gauges were both empty.

If she dived, at least she could survive somewhat with a damaged rigging and two battleships to face off against, although the fact that she was in a tag-team with Musashi did help even the playing field.

But if her next move succeeded, she could fight on as per usual.

Now somewhat closer, she noticed that Nagato was tackled by Musashi whom Hyuga had teamed up with, both of them pausing their battle to gawk at her fearless move to charge into certain doom.

She could see that Yamato also looked rather shocked, but was still focused on arming all her cannons, a streak of blood streaking down a superficial gash running vertically down the side of her face, and even had some burn marks surrounding the wound.

Yamato had the cannon behind her fold out in front of her to act as a makeshift chest cannon and the transformed part of the rigging serving as a pseudo-tank with forward sloped armor, Yamato holding the third cannon with the help of two folded-out handles.

Her umbrella was being stored behind her in some sort of holder that allowed for the quick draw of the umbrella as the handle was pointed up towards the sky.

But the thing that got Hyuga's attention were her exposed legs.

A rigging, no matter how powerful, couldn't protect every part of a battleships's body, and Hyuga focused with all her might to run towards Yamato while banking on the fact that Yamato would hesitate to fire at a ship girl at point blank range.

True enough, she could almost see the sweat on Yamato's brow with her enhanced eyes, the battleship's head exposed as she looked down at the approaching Hyuga in trepidation, finally stepping back as Hyuga ran towards her.

She could hear Yamato announcing,

" … all systems, ready…"

And knew that she had seconds left before her impending doom as she flipped her body backwards so that her feet would face forward, Yamato surprised by the sudden development but pointing her rigging a little downward, the rigging transformation further hindering her ability to move as it surrounded her like a tank as she slowly shuffled back.

Hyuga used her momentum and her hips to propel her forward as she quickly pulled off a variation of the French savate move, the chasse bas.

She raised her right leg and held it close to her, bent and ready to strike, with Yamato announcing,

"… All cannons… "

And she shoved her right heel into Yamato's left knee with the intent of throwing off her balance, emptying whatever boost she had recovered in her right boat slipper into the battleship's knee as she put all of her weight on her right foot to propel herself backward.

She put a clockwise spin in to dive to the right, while Yamato's leg crumpled under the surprise force of Hyuga's weight on her kneecap as the whole 'tank' rigging tilted slightly to the side and upwards, Yamato's commanding voice fading as she failed to comprehend what just happened.

" …FIRREEeee?"

As the world exploded in a plume of smoke and fire.

---

Everyone watching was spellbound by the aftermath of the previous event, Nagato and Musashi speechless at the fearless charge made by Hyuga and the last-second maneuver to throw off Yamato's aim before the cannon-fire engulfed her.

Even the normally cheery Mutsu was silent, her eyes transfixed by the plume of smoke that shrouded the two battleships, the waves thrown about by the cannon-fire shaking the ocean surface beneath everyone's feet and made them struggle to maintain their balance.

No one missed the fact that the rounds fired from all of Yamato's cannons flew upwards, meaning that Hyuga's last-ditch attempt served its purpose well as the entire salvo of naval artillery shot into the sky, eventually splashing off into the distance or disappearing over the horizon to self-destruct in the air after flying a certain distance.

The smoke eventually cleared to find Hyuga getting up shakily, scrambling away while she supported her body with her trembling hand on the ocean, still trembling from the death-defying stunt she had just succeeded in pulling off.

As for Yamato…

She was on the ocean surface, the third cannon already folded back into position as she clutched at her knee and whimpering in pain.

Musashi rushed over to her injured sister, waving the smoke away to find Yamato softly crying as her relatively large body trembled, the knee in question bending at an unnatural angle as a red line cut into the flesh and bruised the flesh around the wound.

Along with slight burns plaguing the area around the wound as a result of boosting right into a ship girl's flesh, no matter how tough it was, the skeletal structure of a ship girl was inherently weak at the joints.

And it seemed that Hyuga's strike hit the mark as Yamato tried to muffle her sobs, holding up her pride no longer on her mind as she felt true pain for the first time.

The Fairies around her were sitting on canoes as they paddled around her knee while others stood atop Yamato's thigh, all of them chirping worriedly as they pointed at and diagnosed the broken knee, the almost invisible nano-machines that were installed in a ship girl upon creation already being directed by the engineering Fairies towards the most injured areas.

Musashi held her sister's elbow, her eyes threatening to water as she tried to calm her sister down with her words, whispering.

" … It's going to be alright, Yamato.

I promise … "

While Nagato spared a glance behind her to look at Hyuuga, who was trying to dry her clothes and shake off the water gathered on her blade, having dunked herself into the ocean to evade Yamato's barrage and was glancing back at Nagato as the Nagato-Class battleship slowly turned to face Hyuga, simply commenting.

"That was not nice."

Musashi looked up and glared daggers at Hyuga, but a comforting hand on Musashi's elbow distracted her, looking back to see Yamato struggling to tell her something, gasping as she started sweating profusely.

"Don't...

Just... don't."

And Musashi looked right into Yamato's crying eyes that were pleading with her not to hold a grudge against a fellow comrade, Musashi finally closing her own eyes, exhaling slowly and nodding in acceptance while Mutsu approached them with a heavy-duty cable to tow Yamato away.

She sluggishly stood back up to turn back to Hyuga, cracking her knuckles menacingly as she glowered, announcing.

"I shall withdraw from this sparring session, since Yamato is unable to fight anymore."

But Hyuga simply shrugged her off, pulling out her cannon again to serve as a second sword, readying herself as she looked towards Nagato with an unparalleled focus of her own as her deadpan face belied the deadly killing intent within, Nagato returning the hardened gaze in kind.

"Well now, Nagato-san.

It looks as if it's just us two left."

"No, Hyuga-san.

It'll be just me.

You're going down."

---

Kongou and Hiei were able to stop the bleeding that escaped the Bismarck's left arm, Bismarck reflexively using her arms to block herself and sustaining significant damage, the German battleship's rigging totaled and no longer functional.

Her uniform was in tatters, stained by the blood seeping out from her wounds and burns, and it was by the Ise-Class battleship's grace that she hadn't simply keeled over and died from the entire barrage of cannon fire hitting her at point blank range.

Practice rounds weren't meant to kill, but that didn't mean they weren't dangerous at extremely close range.

Ise had made sure not to hit any vital spots despite pulling off her move at close quarters without much thought, the Kongou Sisters very relieved that this was simply a training session where mistakes like those were tolerated here, otherwise Bismarck might have found herself dying or even sinking should those cannons empty their shells in the right places.

Meanwhile, Ise was politely standing off to the side, waiting for the trio to settle their business before continuing.

She was slowly leaning from side to side like a blade of grass swaying in the wind, gleefully observing the Kongou Sisters hurriedly apply first aid to the injured Bismarck as the German battleship laid silently on the ocean.

Hiei finally stood up once she made sure that Bismarck wasn't going to die anytime soon as she ripped her bloody sleeves off, the clothing only serving to hinder them in combat.

She didn't say anything, but she simply focused her attention on the distracted battleship in front of her while Kongou stood up behind her, also discarding her miko sleeves.

Finally, Hiei and Kongou both armed their cannons to point at Ise, the aviation battleship simply raising her arms up to welcome the incoming shells as she smiled coyly, almost mocking the two fast battleships as the cannons of the two Kongou Sisters roared, Ise disappearing in an explosion that engulfed her as all the cannon shells hit the aviation battleship.

They both kept their distance in case the unpredictable battleship defied their expectations again, the air around Ise still smoking as she intently weathered all the shells headed her way.

But there was definitely movement from within, meaning that Ise was clearly up to something.

The pillar of smoke was suddenly displaced as Ise roared with the fury of a vengeful wraith as she appeared, her forehead bleeding and her miko uniform stained with splotches of blood as she rushed out with katana and cannon-sword in hand while closing the distance with her powerful legs and sparing use of her boost gauge.

Hiei and Kongou both froze in place, unsure of how to respond to this sudden change in Ise's demeanor.

But the momentary pause was calculated, Ise's bloodthirsty expression hardening as she flipped her body back to raise her right boat slipper up, savagely kicking Hiei in the gut and emptying her boost gauge to cause further damage to the fast battleship, sending her flying back.

Kongou was to Hiei's left, and was already reacting to Ise's aggression, running up to her back to engage in hand-to-hand combat as her cannons were still reloading.

But Ise had already anticipated this, and as Ise's bottom left cannon was no longer functional, she instead positioned her functional cannons while simultaneously spinning on the spot, now holding her katana in a reverse grip as she spun around and hurled her katana at Kongou, forcing her to use her rigging to shield herself and causing a sharp screech to accompany the sparks that were thrown up by the katana hitting the tough cannon armor and lodging itself in there.

But this too, was entirely calculated as Ise positioned herself and used the two functional cannons on her rigging to shoot at Kongou, hitting the fast battleship's shoulder and rigging all at once, Kongou shrieking from the thankfully inert and (mostly) harmless rounds impacting her exposed skin and causing the round to explode harmlessly.

One of Kongou's cannons, set to training mode, was hit by Ise's cannon fire and the barrels drooped, likely indicating that it was out of action.

Ise then heard the wrathful scream of Hiei, a wordless roar announcing her presence and fury as she pulled her fist back to throw a punch, but Ise used the boost in her other boat slipper to easily evade the incoming fast battleship.

Ise had four main cannons, one of them had its status marked as 'damaged' and no longer functional.

The two working cannons she had were already emptied while firing at Kongou, and one of them was used as a cannon-sword while her katana was gone after having being used as a projectile to throw at Kongou.

Ise pulled back her left arm, the machinery that held the flight deck to her left forearm unclicking as Hiei changed course to charge at her again.

Ise suddenly swung her left arm out horizontally and flung her uncoupled flight deck at Hiei as though she were throwing a Frisbee, Hiei just barely catching the incoming projectile due to the unexpected nature of the attack, hearing Ise chide.

"Losing control of yourself just because your sister is hurt?

HOW DEPLORABLE!

MJOLNIR IMPACT!"

She failed to stop the incoming cannon-sword, held perpendicular to the ocean floor and hitting Hiei like a gigantic pseudo-frying pan as Ise held the cannon-sword with both hands on the same barrel and swung like a Major League hitter.

The cannon-sword hit Hiei in the upper torso and face like a bag of bricks, causing a shock wave at the moment of impact.

This was partly due to Hiei literally running into the mighty swing of the cannon and doing part of Ise's job, instantly knocking her out as her body, rigging and all, flew back from the impact.

She hit the ocean surface skidding and threw up large waves as a result, lying limp on the ocean surface as she hemorrhaged blood and her bruised skin darkening as she became motionless save for the twitching of her fingers.

Ise bent down to retrieve her flight deck, placing it back on the machinery on her left forearm as small clicks and whirred secured the flight deck to her arm.

She was a veteran who knew the importance of situational awareness, keeping Kongou in mind as she looked around and saw the name-ship of the Kongou-Class battleships pointing her cannons at Ise, with an expression that was bordering somewhere between pain and desperation.

Her miko uniform was partially in tatters from where the practice rounds hit her hardest along with a few splotches of skin that suffered first degree burns from the rounds hitting her bare skin and causing a mini-explosion of contained flames.

Her three working cannons were pointed at Ise, Ise's katana stuck in the side of one of them as Ise responded by throwing her cannon-sword that was unoccupied by Fairies at Kongou at the last second to block some of the cannon rounds, Kongou's cannons shattering the air with a deafening blast.

The cannon-sword did what Ise intended, blocking some of the incoming cannon rounds as the 35.6 Cm Twin Gun Cannon exploded in a burst of flames and metal shards as Ise circled the explosion, Kongou fumbling a she reached for the katana stuck to her cannon as Ise boosted forth.

Kongou finally gave up on that idea and simply held up her arms up to block Ise's advance as the aviation battleship's boost gauge and powerful legs pushed her forward at an unbelievable speed in order to close the distance quickly.

Ise threw a high speed punch which Kongou caught with her left palm, causing a minor shock wave to form from the impact as the same was repeated for the other arm, Kongou wincing from having to exert her burnt arm to such an extent as they both struggled to overpower the other through sheer strength.

But Ise still had a few more tricks left to play, raising her left leg as she intended to stomp on Kongou's feet, but Kongou anticipated this as she moved her feet away and started to look down.

And Ise suddenly pulled Kongou in, holding her hands tightly as she headbutted Kongou with the crown of her head, hitting Kongou again on the face for the second time, the first being Ise's knee hitting Kongou's face earlier.

As Kongou stumbled from the move, releasing her hold on Ise's hands as she bent over to clutch at her broken and bleeding nose that bore the brunt of the impact while stumbling back, Ise held the handle of her katana and pulled it out with a heave, throwing up some shards of metal and sparks upon pulling the katana out.

Taking her time to sheathe the katana back in her scabbard, she looked back to the trembling Kongou and skipped over to her merrily, in full control of the situation.

Standing diagonally to Kongou's right while facing Kongou's left, she firmly put one feet in between Kongou's legs and slapped a palm on the back of Kongou's head.

She made a sweeping gesture with her feet to cause Kongou to lose her footing while simultaneously pushing Kongou's face down towards the ocean surface to perform a savage face plant, causing waves to form from the force of the impact and effectively knocking out the fast battleship with her combat skills.

Kongou didn't move anymore, although Ise could see that she was still gasping for air, trying not to gulp in seawater as she lay motionless on the floor.

Ise radioed in for the retrieval team to try to retrieve the fallen 35.6 Cm Twin Gun Cannon that she threw at Kongou, not wanting to waste the base's equipment and incur a loss simply because of practice, exclaiming excitedly.

"I win!"

---

Hyuga noted a signal in the air, announcing,

"The Kongou and Bismarck-Class battleships have been defeated by Ise.

I suppose I should finish up my end of the business here as well."

Looking back at the bleeding Nagato before her, the Nagato-Class battleship commenting.

"That goes for the two of us, Hyuga.

I won't be settling for anything less than a win when going against you."

Nagato grimaced as she took the time to take stock of her situation and the wounds she had sustained, courtesy of the Ise-Class battleship.

Small cuts and slashes permeated her fair skin as she held her left forearm, the blood from all the small cuts on the covered skin flowing down to create a steady stream of blood dripping off of her fingers onto the ocean.

Nagato could feel the nano-machines in her own body trying to repair her injuries, the nano-machines installed in a ship girl's body to help a ship girl heal her injuries at a significantly slower pace than the specialized nano-machines in the docks, acting as a natural form of regeneration.

It wasn't something everyone knew about as it did its job quietly behind the scenes, but any ship girl could learn about them via textbooks or lessons.

One of the barrels of Nagato's cannon was cleanly cut off, the cannon barrels now misaligned and unusable, and she had a deep gash running down her thigh along with many smaller cuts on her body.

Various parts of her rigging had been pierced by Hyuga's katana, small slits in the armor where the katana punched right through the steel of her rigging.

But Hyuga wasn't doing too well either.

Fighting one of the strongest battleships in Japan had taken its toll, with one cannon being crushed by Nagato's overpowered punches which served to keep Hyuga on the defensive, being forced to use the cannon to block the Nagato-Class battleship's punch out of desperation.

Hyuga was panting heavily with several bruises on her skin, a few red splotches on her miko uniform, and two of her cannons were already taken out of action by the esteemed battleship.

The Fairies that were manning the now-defunct cannons had evacuated the rigging, standing on its various balconies to get some fresh air.

Some of them were covered in soot and coughed, while others carried little tools to try and patch up the cannon interior.

Hyuga cracked her neck, a trail of blood running down her forehead as she swung both her katana and her cannon-sword around, preparing herself for the final round as she maintained her focus, ready to intercept anything.

Hyuga placed her cannon-sword back on her rigging, only relying on her katana for the final burst.

She placed her left palm behind the handle of her raised katana that was pointed at the battleship, announcing,

"2nd Symphony: Chorus of a Thousand Birds."

Before she used her left boost gauge and her leg to accelerate forward, her last working cannon firing at Nagato as Hyuga approached Nagato at breakneck speed that didn't allow her cannons to get a good aim at her, Nagato raising her armored gloves to protect herself as she shrugged off the shells.

Hyuga used her katana to stab at Nagato's forearms in rapid succession, the Nagato-Class battleship feeling the katana scratch the armor in her gloves with a screech before Hyuga pulled back the blade to stab again, several of the strikes cutting into her glove and flesh in small cuts that wouldn't have bothered her individually.

But when a battleship was cutting you up in rapid succession with a series of consecutive strikes, it was hard to simply shrug off the injuries on her shredded and bleeding arms.

Hyuga then felt another presence sneak up behind her, and she used all of the strength in her legs to push herself to the side as a Japanese straight sword was brought down with extreme force, barely registering as a blur in Hyuga's eyes.

The resulting strike that Hyuga barely evaded took off the damaged barrels of one of her damaged cannons and the corner of the cannon itself, cutting through the armor like a hot knife through butter.

The cut made by the name-ship of the Yamato-Class battleship managed to compress the air along the way, causing the ocean beneath the sword to be split from the sheer power of the wielder, throwing up huge volumes of water and causing waves to form on the disturbed surface of the ocean.

Hyuga pivoted around and retreated to regard Yamato, who was hunched over as she limped feebly, breathing irregularly as she held her sword and her skin glistened with sweat.

Hyuga noticed that the umbrella stored on the back of Yamato's rigging was transformed, hypothesizing that the umbrella unfolded to allow Yamato to draw a sword by the handle and had an Anti-Abyssal rifle ad umbrella installed on its sheath, commenting.

"An umbrella which serves as a rifle for a long range assault, and unfolds to reveal a sword for close-range combat.

Truly nothing but the best for the Yamato-Class."

But Yamato wasn't listening to any of that, focusing on destroying the opponent before her as a crude white-red aura flowed out of the battleship's skin, Yamato pulling back her arm for another strike, her arm swinging forward at a surprisingly swift speed for someone her size.

The next strike was a horizontal slash, Yamato putting her weight on her uninjured leg before swinging out without a word, the aviation battleship ducking to avoid getting cut and noticing that another section of the ocean was split by the sheer strength behind the swing of the sword.

But Yamato was visibly weakening as she was starting to sweat more and more, wincing as she placed her weight on her broken leg as she hobbled shakily towards the aviation battleship.

Hyuga looked over to see an ashen Musashi and dead-serious Mutsu at attention with heavy-duty cable hooks in hand, allowing Yamato to fight on despite her condition as Nagato tried to hold the limping battleship back out of genuine concern.

Hyuga saw Yamato shaking off the Nagato-Class's arm as she dodged another swing from Yamato's sword, the battleship now no longer thinking straight as she simply wanted to cut Hyuga down, and was not using her cannons to shoot at Hyuga when she clearly had the chance.

Hyuga shifted her weight in order to prepare to evade another potential strike, asking.

"Stand down.

I don't know how you convinced your sister ship allow you back into the battle, but you are no longer in any condition to fight."

But Yamato shook her head feebly, bringing up her sword again to strike Hyuga down as the Ise-Class battleship parried this strike, feeling that she could now match the weakening battleship's strength.

Yamato gasped tiredly as she was sweating buckets, the pain of her knee barely held at bay by the makeshift repair job achieved by the combined effort of Mutsu and Yamato's Fairies, and Yamato visibly suppressing her pain as she replied.

"No...

I fight on...because I choose to!

No one will hold me back.

Not the Japanese government or the Japanese Navy, who used me as a hotel when they felt like it, and discarded me like a used tissue paper when I proved to be a burden."

Hyuga could see the battleship was starting to talk herself into a fervor, her dormant fighting spirit awakening at the most inopportune of times since fighting on in such a injured state would only serve to exacerbate her injuries.

"No, I wish to fight to protect them, not as authority figures of Japan, but as part of the people of Japan.

I swore when I came back, that I would never stop improving, and never stop learning in order to achieve what others would deem to be a lofty goal.

And the Admiral was my idol and the backbone of my strength, always encouraging me to do my best, no matter what I did!

I'll do right by Admiral Mako by reciprocating her kindness with my strength, and to be the best battleship that the world has ever known!"

Hyuga considered Yamato's words for a moment, watching the 'greatest battleship' persist tirelessly to achieve victory regardless of her physical condition, Yamato raising her trembling arm for one last strike.

But it was this last point that drove Hyuga to retort by holding up and putting her weight behind her flight deck, which was already a wreck and barely able to block another hit, Yamato's katana skidding and throwing up showers of sparks upon impact.

Yamato's sword smashing into the flight deck caused the makeshift shield to crack ominously, but Hyuga's makeshift shield served its final purpose as Yamato's sword was deflected to the side, Yamato's strength working against her as she failed to stop the momentum of her own sword as she spotted Hyuga raising her right leg and boat slipper.

Hyuga's intimidating aura was flowing menacingly out of her before it focused onto the sharp edge of her boat slipper, the intense concentration frightening Yamato and freezing her in place as she helplessly watched Hyuga's boat slipper slam into Yamato's gut to end this match, thankfully not using her boost gauge to increase the lethality of her move.

Blood immediately flew out of Yamato's mouth, Yamato struggling to use her sword to shield herself and using her free hand to apply pressure to the bruise as she stumbled away from the menacing aviation battleship.

Hyuga spoke as she slowly walked towards the stumbling battleship, the aviation battleship noting that the spectating Nagato was standing within striking distance to discourage her from attacking a downed Yamato as they both watched Musashi move in quickly tend to an injured Yamato, who was clutching at the reddening streak on her uniform that was staining her skirt with blood.

"You strive to improve yourself for the sake of others, and that is a very noble goal that suits someone like you.

But you don't seem to understand just how valuable your own life is.

Being the incarnation of Japan itself and carrying the weight and pride of the country of your shoulders, you are without a doubt the most valuable ship girl that Japan possesses.

If you fall, the ship girls of Yokosuka will slowly fall into despair, as the 'ultimate ship girl' and by extension, the incarnation of Japan itself has fallen in the line of duty."

Yamato's eyes widened as she slowly started to realize the weight of her own existence upon stepping onto the battlefield for the first time and realizing just what was at stake should she ever fall in battle.

She looked away ashamedly as Hyuga continued upon seeing the understanding look in Yamato's eyes.

"You aren't just any rank-and-file ship girl that wouldn't hurt the base too much if you sank.

You are the Yamato, a ship girl whom the Admiral has dedicated time and tons of resources to construct.

If you sank, not only would you single-handedly break the spirit of the Japanese Navy, but you would also waste Admiral Mako's unrelenting efforts to obtain you and break her maiden heart, being one of her ship girl lovers.

And besides, what is the point of throwing your life away so pointlessly by fighting and dying?"

It was here that Hyuga tried to talk some sense into Yamato to get her to drop her pride-ridden ways of approaching combat.

"We, as capital ships who are the pillars of strength to everyone else, must strive to fight and live so that we may fight another day,

And if that means retreating wisely instead of advancing foolishly, I'd take the former over the latter any day.

Your attempt to try and defeat me is commendable, but serves no purpose except to throw you back into the frying pan.

So as much as you would love to fight to your dying breath in service of our country and people, you simply must not sink in battle."

Hyuga shook her head, her breath shaky as she was feeling rather fatigued from the prolonged battle, acknowledging Yamato's efforts to do right by everyone in the base and the country as a whole.

"Well, I suppose different people have different ways of doing things, and your indefatigable efforts to strive for victory is commendable."

Hyuga's intimidating brown aura dissipated as she relaxed her stance, her expression softening as she exhaled tiredly, a tremble in her arms and legs as she moved.

She sheathed her sword as she slowly sailed towards Yamato, who was now on one knee and trembling from the shock as sweat ran down her pale skin and dripped from her chin, having sheathed her straight sword.

Musashi was trying to find a way to sling her sister's arm over her shoulder despite their clunky riggings prohibiting this course of action as Yamato clutched her blood-stained uniform, Hyuga commenting.

"I suppose that in a war as bleak as this, it's refreshing to see someone as compassionate and as driven as you strive for a goal that would seem impossible to anyone else.

You need all the help you can get to achieve that goal, and I suppose it's only fair that I lend you my strength and expertise as your senior.

Your growth will exceed everyone's expectations as your strength is arguably unmatched by anyone else in the world except your sister."

Hyuga was now feeling her arms and legs giving out, having exerted her legs too much whenever her boost gauge wasn't available to accelerate and her arms in trying to swing her weapons around.

Despite being relatively muscular for a ship girl, the amount of force she had to produce to move her battleship rigging and steel body took a heavy toll on her leg muscles.

And she didn't pay too much attention to it in the heat of battle, but she underestimated the amount of energy she had to use to either cut into the skin of a battleship or to defend herself from the blows of the physically gifted battleships.

The armor of a battleship was created to be exceptionally tough, causing her to steadily deplete her stamina and strength throughout the entirety of the match as she did her best to pierce their armor to hurt them without the intent to kill, further weakening her throughout the match.

"No matter how experienced I am, the fact remains that you are a talented ship girl.

And no matter how hard I try to compensate with skill and experience, the cold hard fact remains that you possess superior armor, firepower and strength in spades to withstand my attacks.

My hands are trembling, my katana is chipped, and my rigging is destroyed.

I don't suppose we can consider this a draw now, hmm?"

Before collapsing in front of everyone, Yamato trying to reach out to help the aviation battleship up only to fall forward as she slipped, her rigging making movement for the injured battleship nigh-impossible without Musashi's help.

Nagato leaped in to lend Hyuga a hand, Nagato helping Hyuga up as Musashi gently lifted her sister, Musashi trying her best not to disturb Yamato's knee wound by shifting her sister's weight onto her.

And upon seeing Ise heading towards them while towing three unconscious battleships, the group of battleships began sailing home while supporting each other, the overhead sun reaching the height of its journey as it began its downwards descent back into obscurity after witnessing a clash of titans.

---

Back at the docks, Ise was overlooking the rest of the battleships that were getting out of the docks.

Admiral Mako had already prepared several quick-repair buckets filled with nano-machines that were designed to be more powerful than the specialized nano-machines in the docks, repairing their injuries and bruises in a matter of hours as well as resources that consisted of fuel and shaved steel that was required to repair a ship girl's damaged body.

And if the natural nano-machines in a ship girl could heal their injuries in a month, the nano-machines in the docks could repair their wounds in a week at most, the quick repair buckets healing them in hours no matter what their injuries.

Ise met Hyuga outside the docks, the rest of the battleships requiring a few minutes more to ensure that they made a complete recovery as Ise cheerily greeted her sister ship.

"So, Ise-nee!

How're the others doing?"

Hyuga shrugged her shoulders, still feeling a little sore after battling with a physically stronger opponent, although she did feel better since this was a good sparring session to keep her skills sharp and teach Yamato a lesson about modern warfare.

Ise, being her sister, understood this little gesture to be akin to a nod as she idly commented, ship girls that were entering the docks for recreational purposes giving the eccentric battleship a wide berth.

"Yes, y'see.

The fact that you can fight Nagato-san and Yamato-san to a draw and I can defeat three battleships on my own means that the age of aviation battleships is upon us!"

Hyuga gave her sister a small but genuine smile as she agreed wholeheartedly, proud of them both for being able to go up against the best battleships in Japan and actually stood a chance of beating them.

"Yes, it truly is."

"Not if we can help it."

Kirishima and Haruna popped up behind the two of them, Kirishima's glasses reflecting light at an angle and hid her eyes entirely while Haruna's fringe cast a shadow over her closed eyes as she wore a saccharine smile on her face.