Wooong…
A vibration shook the atmosphere. Rather than the air actually vibrating, it was more of an auditory hallucination. All those fighting on the sea heard it. It sounded as if a very large being was twisting its body and groaning in discomfort.
The soldiers who had been wielding swords and spears at each other all stopped for a moment, and they turned to look at the front part of each ship, where magic was activating. And for a moment, nothing happened.
Yaboon exclaimed, “Ha! Of course! You failed!”
While confronting Yaboon, Vasen Lak Orazen slowly widened his distance from the front of the ship, where the Sea Serpent was.
Yaboon then looked at Vasen and said, “You don’t seem to know much about magic, do you? Magic easily fails. It fails even if the magic circle is drawn a little differently, or if the spell is recited with a stutter. So there’s no way it would succeed on this battlefield…”
Krawawawawa…!
Vasen covered his ears at the loud shriek. However, the sound wasn’t hitting his ears, but coming from within him. Vasen leaned against the railing to prevent himself from falling. Meanwhile, many soldiers fell off the deck screaming in pain.
Fortunately, Vasen wasn’t the only one caught off guard. Yaboon also hurriedly stepped back, and Mazdari, who was exercising the magic, stumbled and didn’t look so good. However, the monster that was supposed to be knocked out by the magic seemed fine. The silver lining was that it remained stuck between the ships and was looking around warily.
Vasen looked at Mazdari like he was pathetic.
“What have you done, Garuda? This way, not only are the enemies unable to fight, neither can we.”
Mazdaro awkwardly smiled.
“Just wait. I haven’t even gotten started yet.”
Bang!
On the opposite side of where Vasen was, an explosion occurred in front of the magic circle drawn on The Humiliation of Pirates. And a pillar of black shadow rose.
‘No, it’s not a shadow.’
It was an arm. It was hard to tell what species the arm belonged to. It was big enough to grab three or four people, and at the very end was a hand. The hand was tapping and groping around the front part of the ship like it was looking for something.
“What…is that? It looks like the hand of a giant.”
Mazdari then replied, “You have keen eyes. That’s summoning magic.”
“Summoning magic?”
“Magic circles are used as signals of change, but they’re also used as doors between worlds. I opened a door for a creature from another world, which was known as Talajin in ancient times.” 𝘳𝑎.𝒸ℴ
The Talajin’s hand roughly rummaged around the front of the ship and soon caught a Deep One.
“Let go!”
The Deep One’s resistance was short-lived. With a crunch, the Deep One’s whole body was completely crushed by the Talajin’s hand. The hand then threw the dead Deep One onto the deck and began to grope for the next target.
Soon after, a second and third Talajin’s hand appeared on the front-most parts of other ships.
The soldiers’ screams continued.
Vasen looked at the hands and said, “It seems like they are looking for something… What are they looking for?”
Mazdari laughed.
“They’re looking for me.”
“You?”
“This magic spell is called Talajin’s Hand. It makes the Talajins angry. Imagine, Vasen.”
Vasen looked at Mazdari’s eyes, which were glowing with his magic circle.
“You’re taking a nap on a sunny hill on an autumn day. The sun is warm, and when it seems to be getting hot, a light breeze blows and cools the hotness down. But then an ant crawls past your ear, the rustling noises waking you up. You find it most distasteful. Why did the small ant have to pass by your ear on this wide hill?”
Mazdari pointed at the fourth magic circle he drew on the Deep Ones’ ship.
“So you find an anthill that was right next to you and put your finger in.”
From the magic circle, a fourth Talajin’s hand rose up. Immediately, it broke the end of the mast, grabbing and crushing the watchkeeper who was shooting arrows at it. Blood and organs poured out of the Deep One’s mouth.
Vasen replied, “Then…isn’t it dangerous?”
“All magic is dangerous.”
“…Hm.”
“However, there are measures put in place. Magic sets rules. Rule one, those Talajin’s hands only recognize Deep Ones as people.”
Vasen could confirm that when he looked at the top of the ship. A number of unfortunate souls did get knocked off balance, but everyone the Talajin’s hands were grabbing or crushing out of rage were Deep Ones.
“Rule two, they see that monster as me.”
One of the hands groping around the front of the ship reached through the railing. The Sea Serpent was greatly wary of the hand.
“What are you doing!? Bite the hand!”
Vasen turned to see the source of the voice and found Yaboon having run far away, to a safe distance where the hand wouldn’t reach him.
Just as the Talajin’s hand was about to touch the Sea Serpent, the Sea Serpent turned and bit its wrist.
“Yes! That’s it!”
However, Yaboon’s satisfaction only lasted a moment. As soon as the first wrist got bit, the other hands zeroed in on the Sea Serpent. One of them grabbed the Sea Serpent’s head, making it shriek.
Kuuoooo!
While the Talajin’s hand was large, it was barely big enough to grab onto the Sea Serpent’s head. Even so, that seemed to have no bearing on the damage it could inflict with its power.
The Talajin’s hand ripped off the flesh of the Sea Serpent’s head.
Kuuoo…!
Scales, flesh, and blood splattered everywhere like rain.
The other hands joined, and they forced the Sea Serpent’s mouth open. Amid the Sea Serpent’s shriek of pain, there was the sound of its jaw bone breaking, followed by the tear of its ligaments.
The Sea Serpent’s torn-off jaw was then thrown toward the Deep Ones.
Kooo…
Then the fourth hand began to dig into the Sea Serpent’s throat and grab it. And at the same time, the other hands ripped off the Sea Serpent’s flesh while it was still alive.
Watching from behind a shelter, Vasen said, “Magic is indeed dangerous.”
“Yes. That’s why magic circles shouldn’t be drawn too big.”
“Why?”
Mazdari tapped on his shoulder.
“Then more than the arm and shoulder will come out. Things will get out of hand in that case.”
“Hm… Things will get out of hand, huh.”
Vasen was curious about what the Talajins looked like beyond the magic circle, but thought that something was better left unknown.
Vasen then turned to look at the stern of the ship, where Yaboon was.
“It’s better to capture him while we’re on board.”
“Right. We can’t go back now. I need to supervise those hands at the moment. I don’t think they’ll be entertained by this for too long.”
“I’ll be back soon.”
Vasen glanced at the Sea Serpent that was already being torn into blood clots before running forward. With the Sea Serpent being otherwise occupied, the odds were tilting in favor of Black Scale and the allied navies.
The pirate ships had approached despite the shots coming from Black Scale’s ships, but with the Sea Serpent under assault, their courage dwindled. Meanwhile, the allied navies had dealt with the Deep Ones on board and were now trailing behind Black Scale’s ships.
“Damn it…!”
The knights Yaboon had borrowed from King Gyo hadn’t been able to demonstrate their full power, and the Sea Serpent he was given as proof of him becoming the greatest priest of Deep Light got defeated by magic.
As the situation deteriorated, Yaboon wondered from what point had things gone wrong.
‘Are our strategy and tactics lacking? Is it because of the new weapons they brought? …No. It’s all because I got pushed out into the open sea.’
Yaboon sensed his fate as the weaker party. And the warrior who would end Yaboon’s fate appeared before him.
“Pirate Yaboon. I will punish you according to the will of the King of Black Scale, Kyle Lak Orazen.”
Yaboon shook his head and raised an ax.
“Don’t be ridiculous. Even if I die, it’s according to Deep Light’s will. Your nobody of a king has nothing to do with this.”
“Deep Light?”
“Don’t you dare utter the name of our God in vain!”
Yaboon then charged at Vasen. Vasen wondered what he should do, but Yaboon’s sharp and fierce attacks were not to be dismissed.
‘It’s no coincidence that he’s the head of a pirate group. He’s a warrior who has fought countless battles. He’s stronger than me, and more experienced than I am. He’s a strong enemy.’
Vasen asked himself whether it was a mistake for him to come to kill Yaboon alone.
‘…No. This is our only chance to deal with the head of this pirate group. If I hadn’t seized the opportunity, he would have run far away to the southern continent, and that could end up giving him countless chances to attack the Southern Archipelago. Even though it’s dangerous, it was necessary to jump into this situation.’
With that question and answer, Vasen also knew he was ahead of Yaboon.
Vasen crossed blades with Yaboon and made a big move. And as he did so, Yaboon didn’t miss the chance to trip Vasen. Vasen then quickly rolled back, but he dropped his sword and became empty handed.
“Is this all that you can do after making such a fuss!?”
However, Yaboon couldn’t charge at Vasen right away. Lizardmen were rushing toward Vasen from the back while killing Deep Ones.
‘Damn it, my next swing would be enough to kill him, but then I would have to face the other Lizardmen too.’
He could do that, of course, but the battle was growing unfavorable to him. He couldn’t tell for how long the battle would tie him down to the ship.
‘I can’t do that.’
He thought the best option was to move to another ship right away and plan for the future.
Vasen saw Yaboon running away from the back.
‘Yaboon, you’re strong, but…’
And then he took out the dagger he had inside his inner pocket. This was the advantage that Vasen thought he had over Yaboon. Yaboon had no secondary weapons.
‘You’re a coward.’
Vasen threw his dagger. It flew through the air and stabbed the back of Yaboon’s thigh.
Yaboon screamed in pain and turned around.
“…You punk! How cowardly…!”
“Then you shouldn’t have shown me your back.”
Vasen picked up his long sword and charged at Yaboon.
Yaboon’s neck flew into the air.
***
As Vasen raised the spear piercing through Yaboon’s head, the other pirate ships began to flee.
Black Scale’s military ships escorted The Humiliation of Pirates and the other ships, while the other allied navies began to quickly chase after the pirates.
“Did we win?”
It couldn’t yet be called a perfect victory. The fight against pirates on deck was still ongoing.
In particular, the Deep Ones had been pressing their backs to the railings before diving into the sea for fear of getting pierced by the spears. And of course, Vasen knew that the Lizardmen soldiers wouldn’t allow the Deep Ones to get away.
“…What happened to the magic?”
Vasen left the spear with Yaboon’s head on it to another soldier and returned to the front of the ship, killing Deep Ones on the way. There, he saw something strange. The dead Sea Serpent was nowhere to be found. Its organs had been taken out of the corpse and arranged in a row on the deck.
‘Do these hands also have intelligence?’
It was inevitable that he would think so. At first, Vasen had thought that the hands were only ripping apart the Sea Serpent with pure strength, but it seemed that the hands had arranged the various pieces of flesh, internal organs, and organs according to some rules so that they wouldn’t overlap.
The strange arrangement implied organized madness.
“…Garuda?”
Vasen carefully called out to Mazdari, but Mazdari was nowhere to be seen.
“That’s strange.”
As if their work wasn’t done yet, the hands bent down and started writing something.
‘These things with intelligence…are writing something down?’
Vasen made his way through the soldiers and pirates, carefully approaching the front of the ship.
“Mazdari, where are you?”
Before going around searching for Mazdari, Vasen looked down at what the Talajin’s hands were drawing and was left shocked.
“…!”
The hands dripping with the blood and bodily fluids of the Sea Serpent were drawing something at the front of the ship. It was a circle composed of unknown writing, and above all, it was giving off a dim light. It was a magic circle.
Then one of the Talajin’s hands raised its index finger and pressed into the center of the magic circle.
‘…Is it too late?’
Vasen ran towards the hand and was about to cut off the finger when someone grabbed his arm.
“You don’t need to do that.”
It was Hwee Ravina Muel.
“I discovered it first.”
“But they were trying to use magic and…”
“It’s okay. Look.”
Vasen looked at the magic circle as Ravina told him to do. Nothing happened.
Woooo…
The Talajins let out a disappointed cry and then hit the magic circle as if they were upset. The bow of the ship broke along with the magic circle.
Vasen then asked, “Did they fail?”
“Yes,” replied Ravina. “Magic makes rules. And those rules are very specific. Just as that pirate said, it requires very sophisticated techniques and an attention to details. Even the smallest mistake will prevent the magic from activating and make it collapse.”
Ravina tapped on her antlers.
“And I can cause such a slight mistake.”
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