Author's Note: Alrighty then everyone! Another Chapter down! Come over again tomorrow and check out my new Mass Effect fic everyone!
Chapter 72: The Sealed Monsters of Q'Ten Lo
Tanya stood on the deck of the ship. Siltvelt was understandably reluctant to loan the heroes another ship after Kuro apparently broke the last one scattering bits of it on the bottom of the ocean. Reluctantly Maple had come up with a suggestion but said that she'd need to be around 120 to be able to use it. Sadeena's response was simply stating that it was understandable, had Tanya bring out one of the otter Kigurumi's her group had and took Maple somewhere in the ocean to level up. Thus Tanya was now riding on a ship, that was also Maple's shield.
"How exactly did you manage turn your shield into a war ship?" Tanya asked looking at Maple with blatant suspicion.
"It's one of the Noble Phantasms that Kuro made for me." Maple stated though she seemed rather reluctant about using it. "It's called the Prydwyn, it use to be King Arthur's shield."
Tanya remembered that one.
"Isn't that the one that caused you to go berserk back at Cal Mira?" Tanya asked brow creasing in annoyance.
"Hence my reluctance." Maple stated closing her eyes and breathing a sigh.
"Why can you make a warship when Kuro can't even use the weakest of her weapons?" Katarina asked looking at Maple in confusion.
"Maybe because it's not very useful?" Maple suggested and the others looked around at the ship, it was big enough that it was carrying all of their parties combined, and Maple can use it to go level out in the ocean which as she had just demonstrated is hugely efficient for levelling. "I mean think about it: it's a ship, when am I going to use it other than levelling out in the ocean?" Tanya stopped to think about it for a moment, on land it would just be a big wooden barrier, people had cracked through Maple's metal shields before, all they would really have to do against the Prydwyn is set it on fire. "My Mechsuit is available at 100, but it's a lot smaller too, my guns at 150, and the one that lets me make a castle is at 200." The others blinked stupidly at Maple for a few moments.
"Remind me to go over with Kuro what she's been feeding to our weapons." Tanya stated bluntly.
"I'd like to do that too." Maple breathed out a sigh as she watched the notifications fly by her face.
'The Prydwyn is more useful than the Lord Camelot.'
'The Prydwyn is significantly weaker than the Lord Camelot.'
'The Lord Camelot cannot be used, therefore it is useless.'
'The Lord Camelot doesn't want to hear that from the Prydwyn who sent The Hero on a rampage with The Shield of Gluttony.'
'The Shield of Compassion, is only useful for making the hero a bigger target.'
Maple closed out the notification options as she breathed a sigh.
"I feel more like a chat room moderator than a hero. And why is it only these two that speak up?" Maple just let out a sigh while the two shields argued with each other unseen.
"Your weapon talks to itself?" Katarina asked looking mildly concerned. They already knew that Kuro's sword talked, read sass, to her but neither of them apparently got into touch much with their own. "Well we should still be careful about that, if those people find us then we'll all be swimming over to Q'Ten Lo." None of them have forgotten the fact that damned pink hammer those bloody Shadows brought with them to the village instantly seals their weapons, in this situation not only would the boat disappear but even if their levels were in the triple digits they were still three puny little girls in a sea full of monsters being attacked by individuals who were in all likelihood quite use to the water on top of also having a high level.
"I wish we could take the air ship..." Katarina could only let out a sigh, but Rat strapped her laboratory to it a couple of days ago and declared that she was off to look for the next directional beast. In reality, that irresponsible person was simply free to perform her blasphemy's against nature unsupervised.
"We can't do anything about that. We just have to hope that irresponsible person will show up on time." Tanya sighed as the familiar pink aura surrounded the area. "On no we're under attack." Tanya turned around and faced the people who had just climbed aboard the ship, hammer in hand. "Is this all of you or are there more?"
"Don't mock me child." The whale man snapped as he got ready to swing his hammer around.
"Alright lets try this again." Tanya turned around to face Katarina. "Is this all of them?"
"The rest of the group is in the water but Skull's taking care of them." A few moments later the head of the skeleton dragon that Katarina had following behind them in the water poked his head out of the water the bloody remains of Q'Ten Lo's Sakamata in it's jaws as they dripped down onto the deck and formed Sakamata Shadows. "Well that was eventful. Katarina, Maple." Tanya stated as she already took the back seat.
"Reflect Shield: Destiny Stone Hammer Shield!" Suddenly the entire ship changed from being made out of wood and was now made out of pink stone. "Reflect Spear: Destiny Stone Wing Spear!" Katarina in the mean time stacked together both the Destiny Stone Spear and the Spirit Turtle Svardstav.
"Impossible! The Destiny Weapon!" The Whale was slowly backing up as he bumped into something behind him which grabbed him, looking up the person he least wanted to see was staring down at him with a crescent shaped smile as she grabbed him from behind.
"Mr. Shadow, a word of advice, if people are openly discussing their weaknesses while stating that they hope no one around them is listening then you should assume they are lying." Tanya wrested the stone hammer out of the prisoner's hands and shoved it into Sadeena's harpoon which allowed it to take the form of a pink stone harpoon.
"What do we do with him?" Sadeena asked indicating her prisoner.
"Can any of them talk?" Tanya asked indicating the men that had appeared on deck who silently standing there and staring.
"Doesn't look like it." Katarina stated by way of reply.
"Take him below deck and figure out what he knows." Tanya stated bluntly. The reason for the new ability, the 'reflect weapon' was the skills unlocked from the Spirit Turtle Weapons made for them by Katarina's black smith friend. Another reason to thoroughly wreck Q'Ten Lo's current government.
'Sitera Destiny Stone Sword Proficiency Maxed. Equip Bonus: Sitera Skill Alteration. Weapon Pacification Field. Weapon Pacification Exclusion.'
"Well now isn't that interesting." Kuro stated while she was sitting on top of the pile of dead bodies she and her party had stacked together. "So basically, what you're saying is, we didn't turn it on?" The sword went into the menu for skills and brought up the one related to the Sitera destiny Stone Weapon they had unlocked quite some time ago.
'That would seem to be the case.'
"Oi useless sword..." Kuro was zapped for the insult. "...Aren't you the one who's suppose to be managing my skills and bonuses for me?" The pair, the Legendary Hero and her sword, unlocked this particular weapon back when Kyurie was being held captive by Takt, which was to say nearly a month ago, which led to the highly relevant question... "Why is this only turning on now?"
'Sitera Skill Alteration: While Weapon Pacification field is active all skills are altered and enhanced.'
"So what you're saying is that this annoying skill will keep my weapon from getting sealed by these losers, but in exchange it will tamper with my skills?" Kuro let out a sigh. "100 Swords." 100 translucent green blades appeared beside Kuro. Kuro frowned as she pulled down two of the blades and observed the chain connecting them together, she even attempted to pull them apart but they wouldn't budge. "Well there goes my signature move." Kuro stated letting out a sigh. All her ammunition for Rail Gun was now all bunched up together. "Change Blade: Soul Eater Blade." Kuro had the blades take the form of the familiar Soul Eater, there was not too much of a difference in appearance, when you ignore the unsightly chain breeding inconvenience for her. That said. "Malfunctioning skills are still better than no skills at all." Kuro stated bluntly.
'Agree to disagree. The Hero has access to divine magics Creation, Metamorphosis, Gravity, Time and Space. The lethality of the magics is clear to see.'
"That is not the point." Kuro snapped as she decided she was getting off topic. She switched her weapon over to the Thunder Sword and readied a stance. "Thunder Slash!" Kuro swung the blade down releasing a bolt of lightning, which then changed forms to a wolf made of lightning before it pounced on the target Kuro set up for it and destroyed it. "That's good to know." Kuro whipped out the plasma sword next and loosed another swing. "Solar Flare!" The weapon produced a beam of energy, that energy turned into a dragon and continued to obliterate Kuro's targets, splitting up and carving multiple bright red smoking hot trenches through the ground like some kind of multi-headed monstrosity. "Okay, this is starting to look like it might be fun." Kuro stated smirking knowingly at the weapon in her hand.
'The more skills the Hero fires off the more attention from the Q'Ten Lo government that the Hero will attract.'
"Oh puh-lease!" Kuro stated in a mocking tone of voice as she pulled out the Chimera Dragon head sword. "I'm already immune to their fancy anti-hero ace in the hole. What exactly is the worst that they can do to me now?" Suddenly a massive ear piercing roar echoed throughout the town, as if some kind of monster had just arrived. "One of these days, not just me but everyone, will learn not to say things like that." Kuro turned around to face the creature that was emerging from the hill that had been near the village. Massive and hairy, two massive horns evoking the image of a cow were mounted on a head with eight blood red eyes and backed by eight massive legs each the size of a light house, most bizarrely of all was the length of shimenawa, or rice rope, that was tied around the thing's neck like it was some kind of guardian beast. Kuro blinked stupidly twice as she looked directly at the creature before pinching down on her cheek and pulling, confirming the presence of pain. "This is so surreal. Why is there a Juro Gumo wandering around the country side?" Kuro asked looking at the creature off in the distance in question.
'If The Legendary Sword might suggest? There is something tied around the monster's neck, perhaps a collar, which implies that an enemy released the monster intentionally.'
"Well let's go find out whoever they are." Kuro and Atla ran across the air using Atla's aero-kinesis to form platforms to the area above the gigantic spider like platform. "Hundred Swords!" 100 see through jade coloured blades. "Change Blade: Ten Thousand Tonnes of Air."
The blades changed into great swords and were fired at the giant spider cow, hitting with the force of a meteor and then ripping apart it's flesh when the blades switched over to repelling everything around them. The monster's rather impressive bulk was sent flying, legs torn from it's torso which now had several holes ripped through it, it's head and it's rear. "And yet no XP." Kuro noted as she prepared another round of attacks. The wounds on the spider smoked and closed, the legs turned into mist and re-entered the wounds from which they had been severed, mind you it was still on it's back so Kuro still had some time to deal with it. "Solar Flare!" The Plasma sword released it's multi-headed fire attack once again sending the spider abomination flying in the explosion full of injuries.
"I don't think this is working." Atla stated watching as the creature continued to regenerate.
"Then I'll keep killing it until it does work." Kuro replied bluntly, having found a wonderful target for her to try skills out on.
"Still it's strange. The way that it keeps regenerating like that it's almost like we're looking at a reincarnated." Atla and Kuro subsequently stared at each other with Atla's words.
"Hundred Blades. Change Blade: Soul Eater Blade!" Thus a hundred fish bone blades were prepared and fired, stabbing all over the monster's body causing it to shriek in pain before Kuro tore the blades back out, no reincarnated soul in sight. "Well so much for that theory." Kuro stated letting out a sigh. But it's wounds were taking longer to heal now.
"It's life force has weakened." Atla noted causing Kuro to reach an epiphany.
"So it's not a matter of being a reincarnated, this fellow's vitality is just too god damn high is that what you're saying?" Kuro prepared another hundred blades. "Change Blade: Soul Eater Sword. Reflect Blade: Spirit Turtle Svardstav." This time the swords changed into long spear like weapons, the fish bone like blades now being wrapped in a layer of jade coloured turtle shell. "It's a shame that I've run out of Noble Phantasm blades."
'The Hero can modify non-sword weapons into weapons which can be copied by the legendary sword.'
"Huu. I know." Kuro sighed as she sent the blades flying.
As should be the case with the material of a god refined by a professional, the Svardstav was just full of features. Aside from the ability to allow one of her blades to use two blade transformations at once she also gained a skill called magic snatched that absorbed magical energy from things that she had cut. From there step two was tracing a Noble phantasm that she could remake into a sword easy, so to start with she whipped out the Prydwyn. The Prydwyn in it's legend had two forms, a shield and a boat, however a third was possible with a bit of fudging, a surfboard, don't ask how she knows that. Having created something that vaguely resembles a giant over-size blade Kuro then proceeded to add a handle to it and continuously altered the board shrinking it down and sharpening it's edges until...
'Weapon Copy Activated: Prydwyn II Unlocked. Equip Bonus 100 000 Swords. Ship Transformation...' Kuro dismissed the unimportant details for now, instead she focused on reworking the Spear of Leonidas's Thermopylae Enomotia into a short sword. 'Weapon Copy Activated: Thermopylae Enomotia Gladius: Equip Bonus 1 000 000 Swords...' Kuro would continue but the collapse of the monster that she had just been using as a energy source indicated that she was done now.
"Well that was uneventful." And she noticed that she still didn't get any XP. "What's wrong with this thing anyway?"
'Warning: Skills 100 000 Swords and 1 000 000 Swords exceeds the Hero's capacity.'
So she'll just unlock some SP raising skills later. For now she needed answer's to her question, and in search of that answer, among others, Kuro went back to the village and brought over Raluva, read kidnapped Raluva and dangled him over the monster, to tell them what he knew.
"What the... how did... why has it been blessed!?" Raluva asked once his immense shock had worn off.
"You know what's going on here?" Kuro asked indicating the monster.
"Nothing that makes sense!" Raluva replied while dangling by his collar by Kuro, the fact that he didn't seem to really have his own state on his mind was probably a good indication about the severity of what going on here.
"Let's talk about it and see just how much sense it really makes." Kuro stated smirking sadistically.
"That is a monster that has been sealed away in this area over fifty years ago, and that length of rope around it's neck is a blessing of the Heavenly Emperor which will constantly absorb magical energy from the surrounding environment to raise it's stats. Why is it here!?" Raluva seemed to be legitimately surprised by what he was seeing, unfortunately it might be that his screaming was having a unintended side effect as the monster was waking back up.
"Whelp time to make weapons to copy again." Kuro had a lot of spear heads to go through after all. Maple and company docked on the shore leading into Q'Ten Lo, once everyone was off the ship Maple disengaged the skill and turned the ship back into her armour.
"Everyone knows their jobs?" Tanya asked looking over the group.
"We'll go and find the black smith!" Katarina stated fist in the air. "We're secure the port town and the tree in case we have to leave again fast." Maple explained while she was helping Raphtalia with her clothes.
"We'll focus on tracking down Kuro and see if she made contact with whatever resistance forces are in Q'Ten Lo." Tanya stated and as if on cue the giant cow headed spider emerged off in the distance behind her causing the ground to shake once more. "As you can tell I've taken the easiest job for myself." Tanya's tone of voice implied she didn't think that at all.
"Are you going to need help?" Maple asked looking genuinely concerned.
"It's fine: I'm sure the Tungsten Balista will be enough by itself and if not: I have skills." The look on Tanya's face implied that she would be thoroughly venting her stress today. Maple made a mental note to use creation to reinforce the walls of the village.
"Why are you just letting it... sit there?" Raluva looked like he was questioning in the situation at hand.
"So that I can blatantly abuse it." Kuro stated her attention clearly somewhere else.
Increasing the number of swords that she can whip out through her weapon is one thing but managing those blades was another. Even blades like the Hrunting that thirst after blood and thus are naturally drawn to targets having something with a little more... piznash would be good as well. Then Kuro's Mana generator had a meteor dropped on it punching a hole through the creature.
"Ah. Tanya's gotten annoyed then hasn't she." Apparently one wasn't enough, so instead Tanya pair the tungstun balista with the skills Rapid Fire X and Arrow Rain X resulting in damn near a thousand of the things beating the poor bastard into a fine paste. "Whelp. If he gets back up from that then we have a serious problem." Mind you, Kuro already had a serious problem, as she now had to go to Tanya and explain what was going on. That and the giant spider cow was getting back up anyway. "Okay so clearly this isn't your real body." Kuro stated looking down at the creature in question. "Ki has started flowing in from somewhere else. I'll see if I can track it down." Atla explained indicating another direction. "See you later then."
On that note the two split up, Kuro going back to the town to speak with Tanya and the others while Atla went looking for the source of the regenerating spider cow.
"Truthfully. I expected more damage." Tanya stated sitting on the wall outside of the village.
"Well, we stopped it pretty early on, so it wasn't able to do much other than take hits and produce mana for me to trace and modify Noble Phantasms." Tanya looked at Kuro suspiciously. "I ran out of swords." Despite them being the most plentiful type of Noble Phantasm. "My level is finally high enough that I can start unlocking them now." The fact that modifying a Noble Phantasm makes it dramatically weaker was one of the contributing factors to her unlocking the discounted weapons from earlier was proof of that. It makes her regret that she didn't try and tweak them earlier.
"I meant from you." Tanya stated almost in a growl. "Given your track record in Siltvelt and Cal Mira I'm half surprised that you didn't drown the countryside already."
"To be fair I was goofing off a bit, kicking hornet's nests and seeing what comes out." Kuro quietly decided not to mention the base that she erased from existence. "Speaking of which you do know that arachnid is still alive right?" Kuro asked indicating the nearby chunks of regenerating spider flesh.
"Impossible, I dropped thousands of WMD class skill combo's on top of that thing!?" Tanya stated severely alarmed by what she was seeing, and then the corpse bits dissolved, fading away to nothing.
"Seems like Atla found where it's real body was." Kuro commented lightly as she walked into town. "So where's Maple and Katarina held up?" When Atla arrived back at the hideout Kuro had appropriated she brought two things with her: the giant dessicated leg of a spider, and a bow that looked like it was made out of exoskeleton and webbing, with a large magical core in the centre.
'Weapon Copy Activated: Juro Guro Bow Unlocked. Equip Bonus: Summon Juro Guro...' That however wasn't nearly as disconcerting as what appeared afterwards.
'Bow of Wrath/Pride V Unlocked'
Tanya immediately dropped the weapon and backed away from it. "The hell is wrong with this thing!?" Tanya snapped glaring at the weapon in question. "It just advanced my cursed series!" Which was a big fat giant nope on the debate of whether or not she wanted to use this thing, like ever.
"I wonder if there's a method of reducing the power of the cursed series." Maple asked crossing her arms. "At the very least there should be a way of removing the reinforcements in place for my Shield of Gluttony."
"I'm more interested in finding someone who can fix this thing so that it can be used without drawing out a cursed abomination." Tanya stated as she made a mental note to have someone in their party come up with a way of taking this thing and putting it some place that she doesn't have to think about what it did to her legendary weapon.
"Hey Guys!" The door was slammed open as Katarina walked in, waving her spear around. "Look at who I found!" Tanya wasn't sure what she was expecting when Katarina first made mention of this black smith friend of hers, a paedophile making googly eyes at little girls was not it.
"Good evening ladies I am..." Tanya held up her hand indicating for the paedophile to stop before he did something to incriminate himself.
"You're a black smith correct?" Tanya asked brow cocked suspiciously.
"Finest in the lands." The man replied proudly.
Tanya indicated for the bow that was behind held in the air by a spider's thread to be brought over.
"It cursed my bow. Fix it." Tanya commanded bluntly. "That would be difficult, even for me." The old man replied as he picked up the bow in his hands. "I can bless it so that it can be used once, and only once."
"So long as I can replace the cursed version inside of my bow I don't care how many times in a row I can fire it." Even if it could only be fired once, Tanya would simply swap it back out for the version of it that could be fired again. "In the mean time, where did this abominable thing come from?"
"Looks like it was made using bits of that monster you two were fighting earlier earlier, it was killed a couple hundred years ago. It would've been part of a fairly common seal to create a focus..."
"Hold up." Tanya stated hand in the air as if the Black smith had just said something that warranted further elaboration.
"'A fairly Common Seal.' There are more of these things lying around somewhere?" Tanya asked looking quite concerned.
"This particular monster? No. But monsters of the like are sealed in quite a few places across the country and chances are in quite a few places on the mainland too." The Blacksmith explained prompting a horrified realisation to cross Tanya's face.
"So the people who blessed that thing and sent it after us have how many others like it that they can send after us?" Tanya asked as the same look of realisation crossed the faces of her fellow legendary heroes.
"Dozens." The Black smith let out a sigh as he made the same observation.
Author's Note:
Captain Imaginat: If you haven't learned what country Sadeena is from by now then go back and read the story again!
RonaldM40196867: Seeing the extremes we've gone through to avoid redundancies among the hero weapons? No. I watch them when available, they're not what I come to the story for though. No I haven't thought of isekaing a Mermaid or getting isekaied to a mermaid.
Galeon82: The power ups are going to keep coming. You haven't seen nothing yet about how terrifying Raph-Chan really can be.
Ratherfu: She's more of a Maple pine, sweet.
Dakota Bruder: Spirit wouldn't be too different from the Soul Eater attacking the soul. As for Evolution, Kuro makes a weapon with a similar ability in like... another twenty or so chapters. That person would be irreversibly screwed for the rest of their very short life. Monster from So What I'm a Spider? basically a giant hoard of monkey's that roam the great underground labyrinth, if you kill one the rest fly into a suicidal rage that makes them keep attacking the guy who originally killed the first monkey until either that person is dead or the entire hoard has been wiped out.