Chapter 291: Book 5-7.1: Chase

For a moment, Yuriko thought that the gigantic Chaos Dweller would be done in by the Plasma Carronade. It was within the firing angle of the left side of the ship after all. And the thing moved sluggishly, though each step of its thick, chitinous legs ate up nearly a dozen paces.

Whoosh!

Boom!

The left side Carronade fired a scintillating bolt of superheated plasma, which reached the monster in the blink of an eye and splashed its payload onto its carapace. The water around it instantly burst into steam and fog, which rolled over towards the beach and the Horizon.

Her Enhanced Sight was useless against it, but when she activated Chaos Sight instead, the thickness of the ambient Chaos, both in the air and the water, made it just as difficult to make things out.

The steam cloud smashed into the Horizon, parting against the Protective Sphere. It hissed when it touched the shimmering sphere, and caused some cracks to form. Yuriko struggled to see, but now, all of the smaller dwellers were hidden from view.

“Hey! What happened!” Layla’s voice drifted over from the opposite side of the ship. “Where’d all the fog come from?”

“Huge dweller!” Aidan yelled back. “Get back in the ship!”

“No! We’re almost done. A couple of minutes. Come down here and give us a light. I can’t spare the Animus to do it.”

“Eh! But there’s still the dweller!” Aidan whined.

“Shush and obey me!” Layla screeched.

“Oh, alright,” he muttered.

“You shouldn’t have said anything,” Riley murmured.

“Can I bring Riley along?” Aidan yelled back.

“Yes!” Layla answered

“Aidan!” Riley squealed.

“Heh heh.”

“I’m fighting!” Riley yelled.

“Fine.”

But Riley gulped at Layla’s tone.

Yuriko barely registered the byplay while she struggled to see past the fog. With Chaos Sight, blurred outlines started to form when she looked long enough. The small fishrats swerved away from the Horizon, though some of them bounced against the sphere. More cracks formed on it.

Yuriko and the other sailors tried to eliminate the creatures before they could come near, but the steam cloud blocked everything.

Thud! Whoosh! Thud!

Worse, from the sound and the large outline with her Chaos Sight, the big one was still alive.

“Come!” Jonir yelled, drawing his broken greatsword from his back. The blade was only a couple handspans long from the crossguard, which was actually wider than the length of the blade. His weapon started to glow with Animus, and in front of Yuriko’s incredulous eyes, a pale blue blade formed into existence from the jagged blade. Jonir yelled a wordless cry, then leapt over the railings, even using them as a platform to propel himself towards the behemoth.

Riley muttered an oath, then leapt over the railing too. Zoey, on the other hand, simply continued to shoot Animus arrows out into the fog, though this time her eyes glowed yellowish orange, just like a candle flame.

She drew her bow, an arrow formed from the ambient Chaos, then she released. It took a couple of seconds for the entire process to happen, nearly four times slower than using a Plasma Caster, but clearly there were advantages to her using that weapon instead.

The steam lightened after a minute or so, enough for Yuriko to get a clearer view. She had to fight the urge to follow her cousin and the other marine over the rails, opting to wait until the situation was clearer, and she wasn’t disappointed.

Jonir’s weapon had carved large furrows into the beast’s carapace, which leaked yellow-black fluids. The huge crab-lobster swung its oversized claw at the man, who ducked under and scored another gash.

Riley, on the other hand, was continuously blasting at a single spot, right under its mandibles. Already the constant attacks made more of an impression than the Plasma Carronade. As far as she could tell, the only thing it did was redden the carapace a bit.

As it were, the creature barely seemed to pay attention to the two marines’ attacks. It swatted at them every once in a while, but it continued its forward momentum. In fact, its beady eyes, ten of them, were fixed on the Horizon, and its small feeding claws were twitching. It didn’t bother to catch the fishrats at its feet.

“It’s after the ship.” One of the sailors muttered a curse.

Yuriko glanced at him, but he didn’t look that nervous. She shrugged and decided to give in to her urge to fight. She handed the Plasma Caster over to her neighbour. The man looked between the weapon and her face, clearly puzzled.

She glanced at the skies. There was a bit of the Radiant Sun reflected on the Veil and she could feel her reserves grow by a trickle every minute. Only some Waypoints reflected the Radiant Sun and Luminous Moon, Yuriko knew from barely remembered lessons. Or, well, lessons she barely paid attention to.

Still, there was enough Radiant energy that she felt that she didn’t need to hoard what she had now.

Yeah! Go kill it!

Of course, Damien would drain her reserves if she didn’t do anything with it. With a sigh, she formed a sunblade slowly, taking care to form the structures as perfectly as she could. Half of the time, her Animus followed the Radiant energy’s lead which meant she barely knew what she was doing. Though, she suddenly realised, maybe the pattern came from Fri’Avgi. Her reserves were stored around the artefact’s form in her Anima after all.

The giant lobster-crab thing was only fifty paces away by the time her sunblade had formed. She took a running leap off the ship, forming Anima webbing between her arms and legs to glide over the thing.

It finally took notice of Riley and Jonir. The Coalition native managed more gashes on the reddened carapace. A few blows landed on the unharmed areas, and then only created sparks and a whitish mark instead of rending the carapace. So the Carronade had an effect.

In the blink of an eye, she was a couple of paces above the monster. She twisted her body, pulled back the gliders and struck at an exposed eyestalk. The edge of her sunblade struck, then skidded off.

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Yuriko gasped. Somehow, she thought the sunblade would have sheared through the monster’s armour. Through the corner of her eye, she saw a blur heading straight towards her back. She barely managed to activate the second dance, which prompted her to tuck into a ball while dropping the sunblade.

Whoosh!

The wind of its passage knocked her down and she tumbled over the creature's back. She rolled to her feet, her Anima adapting to give her sandals purchase on the unexpectedly smooth carapace. A quick mental command made the sunblade fly back into her hand. Flipping it into a reverse grip, she stabbed it down into the carapace, fused with the third dance that made the weapon’s edge turn menacingly jagged.

This time, it pierced through the armour plates.and the scent of sizzling flesh filled her nose. Disgustingly, it made her tummy rumble and her mouth started to water.

The creature bucked and shifted, but no more than that. A moment later, she realised why. The length of her sunblade compared to the creature’s girth meant that the wound was equivalent to getting poked by a hot splinter or needle.

“Ignore me, will you?” she muttered angrily, then grinned fiercely.

She released her hold of the blade, reared back, then slammed her foot down on it, driving the sunblade deeper into its flesh. Past the hard carapace, the weapon’s scalding heat melted straight through what passed for the creature’s muscles and straight into it’s vital organs. Or at least, that’s what she hoped, and by the shuddering and pained chittering, she hoped it succeeded.

“Watch out!” Riley yelled and Yuriko barely caught a glimpse of a humongous claw, twisted unnaturally to reach above, strike her side, knocked her off its back and sent her plunging into the surf. Her Anima absorbed most of the blow, but the force of it still knocked the wind out of her.

So she plunged into the water. Cold!

She couldn’t help but gasp, and that meant it was water, not air, that entered her lungs. She thrashed reflexively, and perhaps that was what saved her, since the crablobster’s foot plunged down right where her head had been a moment ago.

The leg had a multitude of fine, sharp hair and she grabbed a fistful. When it walked forward the next moment, it dragged her out of the water.

“Ack!” she coughed, barely holding the need to vomit from making her into a helpless wreck. She felt the sunblade, still deep within the creature’s body. Red steam jetted out of the hole she made at the top, and the creature continued to thrash and writhe.

A hand grabbed the back of her hakama and dragged her away from the danger zone, then she was tossed unceremoniously onto the sand.

“Blergh!” Now she threw up.

Minutes later, the fight was over.

“You alright, lass?” Jonir asked as he ground his Animus formed greatsword into the sand.

Yuriko nodded and got off her knees, wiping her lips with her sleeve.

“I-I’m fine. Thank you.” She held out a hand and called her blade back. It burst out of the creature’s carapace, though through an area that was already damaged and landed in her hand. Jonir’s eyes widened in surprise.

“That’s an amazing Animus construct,” he said evenly.

“I…yes, but your greatsword looks just as incredible.” They hadn’t really interacted much, but up close, Yuriko could actually stare the man in the eyes without looking up. He was heavyset, with corded muscles on his bare upper arms. He also had salt and pepper hair, though his face was unlined. His neck and chin was covered in day-old stubble.

“Oh, you mean Whitereaver.” He chuckled, “This is my partner of decades.” He patted his sword’s pommel which had a green gem, inset. The gem gleamed with light within.

“An artefact?” Yuriko blurted out.

“What, no, of course not.” The man chuckled. “I’m from Sarkoras, a plane within the Coalition of Independent Planes. My people control our Animus through weapons such as these.”

“Inefficient and barbaric, you mean,” Riley snorted as he came up next to the two of them. “Lose your weapon and you lose half of your battle potential.”

“Ah, young Riley, but with it, our power doubles.” Jonir chuckled. “It’s an old argument. I’m more than willing to answer any of your questions.” He said to Yuriko after giving her another appraising look. “But let us not do it here.” He nodded towards the carcass.

The giant Chaos dweller’s head area had been cleft in twain. Yellow black ichor dripped down into the surf where the fishrats swarms and lapped it up. The scent of sizzling meat was stronger, and there was a large chunk from where her sunblade had come from that was burnt to charcoal.

The plasma bolt barrage had stopped after the smaller dwellers stopped attacking.

“Marines!” Svitlanna called from on deck. “Go harvest the Chaos shard! And you lot!” She called towards a few sailors. “Go grab some of that carapace. It looks tough and valuable.”

Feeling slightly better, Yuriko followed the other two back into the surf. Glowing Animus circles materialized under Riley’s feet, allowing him to walk on the water, though the waves made his balance a bit more uncertain.

Jonir just chuckled and did the same. They probably used the same device Layla gave her in the swamplands.

Five sailors dropped down onto the sand, carrying crowbars and rope. Unlike the marines, they waded into the surf. The monster had come close enough that the waves were only chest high. As for the fishrats, with the behemoth dead, they didn’t stick around when fired upon.

Jonir extracted a shard the size of his forearm from the creature, somehow finding it in a central cavity. Maybe he used Chaos Sight?

The sailors picked at the broken carapace and lugged them back to the ship. There were more than enough of them lying around. She didn’t think they’d try to pry it off the creature’s body. The whole thing won’t fit in the hold!

“Could be worth a hundred gold marks,” Riley muttered when Jonir tossed him the shard. “It’s certainly heavy enough.”

“Can I help?” Yuriko asked.

“Don’t bother, leave it to them.” Riley scoffed. “Go clean yourself up.”

“Ah, yeah.”

She hurried back to the ship, used the side of the hull as a springboard and didn’t bother to use the ladder. She went down to her room, then the lavatory to clean up. When she came back out, it was pandemonium.

“The pirates are back!”

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