Chapter 180: 170. The USA War (I)

“Hey, Onion, how are we?” Jay greeted while leading Beren into the darkest and dankest corner of the crew’s personal quarters. In that corner was the Onion [Mage].

Most of the crew had to share bunks that could stack up to five beds on top of each other. Bluish white magic lights floated above, shining down on the corridors formed by bunks and cabinets of the maze-like area. The space was sectioned for boys to have a corner for themselves, girls to have another corner, and people who didn’t care to have their own corner. Certain familiars could stay here with their humans. If not, there was another area for familiars to have as their own as long as they didn’t try to eat each other. Or worse.

Department leaders had to rove around occasionally and make sure people cleaned up. Once a week, they had an all-hands cleaning day to freshen up the space thoroughly.

Nothing short of divine powers could keep the Onion [Mage’s] magic from seeping into the corners of his bunk and the bunks of those who slept around him. Jay handled the issue himself when he’d overheard different leaders arguing about Onion. The [Mage] got his own little corner with a few empty bunks left available to anyone who wouldn’t mind the smell. Most people minded.

“Oh, hey, Commander!” Onion jolted up and struck his head against the bunk above him. He scrambled out of his bed, fussing with his blanket. Once on his feet, dressed in only his boxers, he held his hand like a claw over his heart and bowed in deference to Jay.

“At ease,” Jay said. “I brought you a bunkmate.”

“You’re joking,” Beren said, looking wide-eyed around him.

A green tentacle with black spots slithered through a crack between bunks behind Beren. The [Godling] of Duels shifted away slightly as the tentacle waved at him.

“Don’t mind, Marty,” Onion said. “He’s one of the friendliest familiars I know. He always likes to say hi to me and make sure I’m not lonely.”

Jay smiled smarmily. “See, Beren. You’ll have plenty of space here with Onion. And you got Marty as a neighbor.”

“Ah ha ha ha, of course.” Beren glowered down at Jay. “Excuse us, uh, Onion. I’m going to have a quick chat with your hilarious commander here.”

“Oh, okay! Well, when you’re ready, I got a welcoming gift I’ve made! It’s got some really great magical properties. I’m not much into crafting, but I dated a Cheese [Crafter] once! And–”

“Yes, nice, thank you.” Beren placed his hand on Jay’s back and ushered the drunk and grinning commander off to the side. “You can’t do this to me.”

“You won’t be far away from me. Just take a few turns here and there, follow the passageway, and you’ll find my quarters.”

“Then give me that. Or something similar. I’m the scion of the Multiverse Duelist Pantheon. The greatest pantheon of the Multiverse.”

Jay lost some of his drunken glee. “And where was your pantheon when YoAnna’s pantheon was put through a genocide?”

Beren clenched his jaw. His silence was answer enough. He would not speak of the past of YoAnna, an agreement made between the two [Godlings]. Jay didn’t want to know. Not from Beren. Jay wanted YoAnna to tell him. But it was annoying to have his nemesis strut around like he and his pantheon were the best around when it hadn’t been the case some time ago.

“Your elders and ancestors must’ve known the Protectorates quite well, I imagine,” Jay said with a deep eldritch voice. “Eons and eons can be long for us. But not for them. How easy was it for them to move on once they took the place of the Protectorates as the greatest Multiverse Pantheon?”

Beren seethed with anger, barely keeping his divinity bound. “Do not speak ill of my pantheon, worm. For you know not what you speak of. You have no grounds to criticize the powers who’ve seen stars come to life and die a plethora of times. You are nothing compared to my elders. To the Hell Circles, you are a mistake.”

It took everything inside of Jay to not draw his sword.

His hand was on the handle.

The temptation was powerful.

But drawing The Sword of Comedy here would weaken it. Jay could sense this in the flow of causality. The fourth dimension teetered with rapt anticipation to see if Jay would lose his cool and fall to temptation or keep control of himself and keep his eyes looking northward toward greater possibilities. But everything Jay could sense, Beren could sense even better.

“That’s what you truly are, isn’t it?” Beren asked with a sneer. “A mistake. You aren’t supposed to exist. You aren’t destined. I can see it.” Beren hunkered down until his eyes were leveled with Jay’s. “It’s in that eye of yours. YoAnna’s blessing to grant you a thimble of divinity and hold back the fates from correcting the mistake.”

“I’m not a mistake,” Jay mumbled.

Beren straightened with a snort. “It’s the wrong use of her charity, really. How long until you turn on her? How long before you betray her so you can seize all the power for yourself like the monster you truly are?”

“I’ll never betray YoAnna,” Jay said.

Beren opened and closed his mouth. He was on the verge of uttering something that would give too much away. Something about YoAnna, Jay imagined. His hesitance gave Jay all the time he needed to back off and turn away.

“Have fun hanging out with Onion,” Jay said. “It won’t be for long, I suppose. We’ll be home soon enough.”

“How long is soon? The next hour?” Beren asked, brushing past their intense moment.

“Impatient, aren’t you?” Jay cocked his head to the side. “It depends on the USA military. I don’t like how that jet you’ve ridden on to get here lingers next to my ship.”

“Oh, well, I did tell them my purpose here is to kill you,” Beren said. “If not, they wouldn’t help me get here. Then I’ll have to get to you with my own effort, and that’s not proper for someone such as myself.”

“I thought you liked your new friends.”

“They weren’t really my friends.”

“They started getting pushy didn’t they?”

“Yes.”

Jay snorted. “Of course. Please tell me you didn’t give away the whole bag.”

“Only the basics of spellcraft. I swear! They learned incantations from their angel reps.”

Ah. Yes. Another problem the Protectorates had to face. The 777th Heavenly Realms Dungeon had representatives on Earth. The angels were angry with the Protectorates for gaining the secrets of Affinity Spirits. The angels were especially angry with Brit’s insistent hold on the Holy Affinity, refusing to bend to its will or let it go.

Brit was the source of both issues.

Obviously, all the blame fell on Jay.

“They’re really trying to turn me into a Multiverse Demon Lord, huh?” Jay asked mostly to himself.

“Ha! Such a thing hadn’t existed in eons! Do not kid yourself, luck-less,” Beren said, chuckling.

“See ya, Beren,” Jay said, before stopping. “Oh, Onion?”

“Yes, Pantheon Commander!” Onion peeked around the corner slowly, as if he hadn’t been listening in on juicy Protectorate drama.

“Get to your battle station,” Jay said, his voice wrinkling the air. A purple ripple passed through the crew’s personal quarters. “You and everyone. I believe our new guest here has brought us more problems. And what do we do with those problems?”

“KILL AND LOOT!” shouted Onion and everyone else around the ship. In the blink of an eye, the entire ship became an example of organized chaos. Protectorates rolled across the ground, crashed into each other, tripped on the tails and tentacles of dashing familiars, and jumped around on one foot while donning their special battle leggings or whatever. Helpful utility magic– telekinesis, strong grasping vines, indoor flight, and more– went on display as Jay’s magical crew prepared for a fight.

“What about me?” Beren shouted.

Jay smiled. “Enjoy our wonderful 5-star hospitality, it’ll be lovely to have you close once and for all.”

Beren’s expression flitted from disgust to rage and back.

Jay left the [Godling] behind as he got lost in the hustle. With the powers on his profile, it was easy to slip into the onrush of Protectorates moving to their stations and be a part of it. Bodies large and small, multi-limbed and single-limbed, brushed past Jay, jostling him around, sometimes crushing him into the wall. It was kind of fun. He still had a buzz going, too. Getting knocked around a bit helped him loosen the hold of Beren’s words on his mind.

“Hey, kid! Get your ass moving or I’ll make it move for you!” shouted a [Fighter-Type].

“Whoops! I guess I am slowing down the process,” Jay said, letting himself become more recognizable. “Sorry about that.”

“C-C-C-Commander, sir!”

Jay chuckled as he bounced off the passageway wall and moved above the heads of his Protectorates using Zero-G flight. He navigated his way to the top deck just in time to see Hailey preparing a ball of dark lightning in one hand, while inscribing runes into the air with a stencil in her other hand. She stopped to look at Jay for permission.

Jay raised his hand for a second.

“Do I have permission to engage with the USA, YoAnna?” Jay asked.

YoAnna’s impression reappeared. It had gone away earlier when Jay escorted Beren to where he’d bunk. Jay was glad she wasn’t a part of that spat between him and Beren. If she had been looking deeply, Beren might not have spoken so haughtily. And YoAnna had bigger things to focus on, anyway.

His wife’s impression was stressed. She had little time to think.

“Where is Beren?” a voice blared from the jet’s onboard speaker system. “Please return the [Godling] of Duels if your business is finished. If you do not return Beren of Wonor, we will treat this as a hostile act breaking the accords of our treaty.”

“We can’t let them have Beren again, YoAnna,” Jay said.

He could feel her nodding in agreement. Her impression wrapped around him, delivering -100 HP of damage while sharing a teensy tiny bit of her love and concern for him. She was less concerned for his life. She was more worried for his feelings. Jay had shared with her how twisted it felt to be the enemy of the USA. And how this was yet another fault of his.

He’d taken YoAnna’s spot in the hearing half a year ago to address the issues the world was facing because of the displaced blood of a [Godling]. The reporters were the worse people Jay had ever faced in the public affairs arena. He truly wasn’t prepared even after hours of drilling with Hailey and Emily. 

Jay had lost his patience.

He had spoken too truthfully. Too bluntly.

Jay had spoken to the world honestly.

Things had escalated out of control because of politics, public rage, and outright terrorism that USA authorities were letting slip by them. Push came to shove. Jay and the Champions took a hard stance. And there was too much public outrage about people meeting the Champions violently and never getting to go back home. Despite his feelings, Jay figured the only way to come out of this was to see it through to the end.

And defeat the USA.

“Do it,” Jay said. “Punch first.”

“Cry, Havoc! and let slip the dogs of war!” Hailey cawed with witch-like glee, breaking out the Shakespeare before unleashing her dreadful magic. “Superior Dark Lightning Lance!”

Hailey thrust her hand forward and let loose a bolt of black lightning. Its mere passing was like the roar of a dozen thunderclaps. It passed through the ship’s barriers, disrupting them quite a bit. Before it struck the tail of the fighter jet, the tip of the dark lightning shaped itself into a crow with its beak leading the way.

A little light blue barrier flicked on in defense of the aircraft and shattered instantly. There was no way a 2nd Circle defense could stand up to a 4th Circle attack, especially a 4th Circle designed to counter another’s magic.

The jet fighter blew open like someone taped an explosive to an aluminum can. The only thing that remained intact was the cockpit, which was catapulted away from the mere force of Hailey’s opening attack. Her mercy might’ve been a cruel one since the jettisoned pilot would have to endure the arctic water and weather.

“Drop the cloaking barriers!” Jay shouted with gravitas, his voice traveling through all three ships while giving his people a boost in Conviction. “Move at full speed! Evade first, fire second if they draw close! Prepare the barriers for anything we can’t dodge!”

“Will we get to fly with you, Commander?” Emily asked, both her physical wings and spirit wings extended. Hailey was the same. They took their positions on each side of him, as if they could predict the answer would be a yes.

“No,” Jay said, shocking them. “I want you both on defense. This isn’t a killfest. This is a gauntlet of endurance. I’ll go out on my own if necessary, but no more than that. For the sake of my wife’s wishes, we’ll do what we can to see if we can salvage a new treaty after this is over.”

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“Half measures, Jay, half measures,” Hailey cawed, pointing a talon at him. “We’ve struck first. We might as well fly with the momentum. By showing how strong we are, we can make the USA back off.”

“I don’t know, Hailey,” Emily said. “This might be what the USA wants to incite more passion into their people.”

“I know that. I’ve worked against that. And trust me, it’s not worth bending backwards for. It doesn’t matter anymore. Violence and fear is the way now.”

“Or complete and utter death,” Emily said with a subdued tone.

“We’ll discuss this later.” Jay turned his attention to half a dozen magic missiles with invisible enchantments. He caught them before they landed on his lead ship and slung them aside. They automatically exploded but caused no harm to his ships and crew. He was less concerned by the regular fighter jet payload even if it had magic on them. There were other things of the old world that were more concerning– things that had a touch of small magic that could rip past Multiverse magic.

“Hailey,” Jay called. “Get back to the lead ship. Prepare countermeasures for nukes.”

“Fine.” Hailey summoned a broom and surfed ahead.

“Emily, stay on the command ship.” Jay raised his voice. “Casey, Dennis. It’s time to work on your archery. Get out the big bows.”

“On YoAnna’s wicked scar, thank you for not sidelining us,” Casey said, grabbing Dennis by the arm. The guy was down in the dumps after losing to Beren. He was also the least interested in fighting the USA. He’d never gotten that opportunity to throw a football around with the president.

“Sorry, Dennis,” Jay muttered as he snatched and slung missiles flying in from many miles away.

Every time a missile flew in, the jets blipped on Jay’s radar. The jet fighters had to move slowly to avoid Jay’s perceptive senses, so their invisibility was useless on Jay. Just about everyone knew of the cloaking magic the Yoroachians had used effectively against the Protectorates. It was an open secret thanks to the Benefactors. But it came with weaknesses. The USA military had staged themselves far ahead and waited in anticipation of this moment. There was really no need to hide it.

They wanted an excuse to fight the Protectorates and put the blame on Jay for the fight. It could be the start of their outright military offensive or another political stunt risking the lives of their military for favors from YoAnna and Kleo.

It didn’t matter now, Jay supposed.

They were firing missiles at his ships.

“How are they able to track us?” Emily asked.

“That fighter jet that was flying right next to us must’ve scanned us and fed his friends enough info to track us,” Jay said. “It’s bugging me how fast they’re able to adapt to this stuff. And they have the angels teaching them incantations.”

“Jay, how do we win this?” Emily asked.

“Without losing our souls?”

“Yes.”

“Let me figure something out,” Jay said.

Casey and Dennis appeared on the top deck with giant bows and the arrows to match. When it came down to having Mana for the activation of Skills or to feed their Talents, [Fighters] tended to choose Perception over Intellect. Casey moved to the port side while Dennis took the starboard side. They set the Long Distance Heavy Bows (Superior) down on the deck where a spike on the end helped steady the weapon.

Some of the crew scrambled out from below deck with barrels of heavy magic arrows to set down next to Casey and Dennis. Meanwhile, other Protectorates took positions behind the cannons or snatched up magic rifles from the armory. The rifles could be used by anyone if they had enough Mana. The same could be said for the cannons, but the cannons needed more Mana than the rifles to operate.

“Monitor the rear ship for me, Emily,” Jay said. “They might try something sneaky.”

“How can they sneak past you?” Emily asked.

“Traps,” Jay said.

Right on cue, something concealed exploded next to the lead ship. It burned the hall a little and rocked the crew on it but left minimal damage.

“There it is,” Jay said with a sardonic chuckle.

“I get it. If they can’t pierce our defense with missiles. They’re going to set hidden bombs in the air. But how?”

“Balloons,” Jay said. “I noticed it right when it exploded. It might not take long until they can literally leave levitating smart magic bombs. Like mid-air mines.”

“They are adapting. How scary.”

In Jay’s opinion, this wasn’t the scary stuff. He was pretty sure they were holding back their full roster of magic science advancement. Jay supposed it would make for an interesting test run for them. It was also interesting to see how Hailey adapted to the challenges.

A black cloud of shadowy crows whirled into the frigid air above the lead ship. They split apart into hundreds of individual crows that dashed forward in a wide wave. After a few seconds, an aerial mine exploded. Then another after that, taking a few crows with it. But there were more magical crows to replace the lost ones as the creations of Hailey’s magic and spirit scanned the air in front of the ships and popped the mines for their mistress.

“It’s hard to beat Hailey when she has [Magical Magnificence],” Emily said.

True that. Hailey’s Talent for preferring Perception and Intellect instead of one Attribute gave her leeway in creating tricks or sniffing them out. Individually, the Attributes received a weaker soft buff compared to other Champions who chose on Attribute. But Hailey’s chosen pair gave her an overt advantage of high-level synergy between the two magic stats. Jay could only imagine how powerful Hailey would get once she raised her Perception and Intellect to 300 AP for [Magical Magnificence II].

Other people outside of the Champions could acquire Talents that did the similar things, but the Champions’ had the benefit of being the chosen ones of YoAnna and got the best profile powers. Even their Soldiers and Agents didn’t get the high quality of powers the Champions could acquire unless they were an exception of sorts– like Jay’s mom. She was still a Soldier of Challenge even while evading both Jay and YoAnna’s search for her. Jhara was one of those exceptions.

“How come your Perception can spot the concealed bombs?” Emily asked Jay. “It’s one of the highest of Attributes among all the Champions.”

“That’s the rub. I have way farther range to sense with than anyone else. But that doesn’t intensify my senses against well-concealed magic. And last I checked, good old technology could sense way farther than my limit at 50 miles. So I think they’re playing to my fundamental weaknesses as a Gravity [Freak] and taking advantage of science more than us.”

And he couldn’t truly count them as assassins while riding war vehicles and responding to the Protectorates first strike.

“That’s troubling, Jay,” Emily said. “Why do the weaknesses seem bigger?”

“Because we’re bigger, Emily. We’re the biggest around. But we’re still new at this.”

“Hm, we are young. Yet, we are the most burdened.”

Emily nodded slowly to herself before taking a gander around the ship and everyone doing their part or waiting behind the cannons and rifles until a target entered their range. Their subordinates were thrilled, afraid, and a mix of both in the face of the USA military. The ships rocked and swayed as they moved close to sonic speeds, swerving through the blizzard as the weather battered at the diffusers.

All around them, the magic of the Champions countered the powers of a giant: a purple globe of gravity, magical explosions that made the air shake, and more outburst of war farther ahead where black crows sought concealed traps. Jay stood calmly with Emily by his side as he continued to thwart a constant onslaught of magic missiles. After a hundred had entered his range, none had broken through to lay damage upon the ships. Hailey kept sending magic crows forward to scan for aerial mines and blow them up harmlessly. Hopefully, she had enough Mana to keep that up for as long as the USA continued to hound them.

“What’s going to be the next trick?” Emily asked.

“They take a more aggressive risk,” Jay answered. “Battleships in the water. About forty miles out. They’re going to attack from below now.” Jay sent a wormhole message to the ship captains to increase evasive maneuvers. “It’s as I thought. They have Great Quality armaments on board. Just enough to chip away at the hulls. I can’t imagine how many materials they wasted to make those naval gun rounds.”

“I imagine they can’t arm all of their vehicles with that,” Emily said.

“No. But if they’re motivated enough, they’ll arm enough to threaten us.”

“You’ve been listening to Frank a lot.” Emily gave Jay a reassessing glance. “If I didn’t know you before Frank, I would swear you two are brothers.”

Jay smiled. “He’s become a little more chill lately. I guess despite the world turning against us, he could find the bright side.”

“Oh? What did he find?”

“He’s not the commander.”

Emily screeched with bat-like laughter.

Jay gave her a self-deprecating smile. He still had enough of a buzz in him to joke despite the growing threats. He lost his smile when a dozen fighter jets appeared far within his radar. The jets dropped their concealment to swerve around Hailey’s sweeping magic crows. They skated across the air using flight maneuvers that were only achievable via magic. And with each of their noses pointed at the top decks of Jay’s ships, they got a split second window to unleash a barrage of bullets, rockets, and missiles.

Then Jay crushed each jet and their pilots with all of his power regardless of the Mana cost. He stopped them just in time from causing more death and destruction to the top of his ships. Most of the missiles exploded against the barriers. Some rockets had less magic to them and struck down with alchemical explosives. All the bullets passed through since the barriers were designed to stop magical attacks. The top deck lacked the Superior Quality defense of the hull, too. With a quick scan, Jay counted up the injured and killed.

“We’ve lost four Rank 2s, all new recruits,” Emily said sadly.

“I didn’t respond fast enough,” Jay muttered, eyeing the chewed up floorboards that some big bullets passed through. Only a few feet away from him, too. They had timed the attack right when Jay responded to another missile barrage. At the same time, he was paying attention to the naval cannons firing from below. The air thumped with passing rounds and anti-air flak blasting near the ships. His Chance Status was way down, too, leveraging on his weakness.

It was time to change things up before the battle worsened. Jay passed an order to the ship captains with his wormhole whisper. With a sharp tilt downward, the ships descended at once.

“Are we sinking their battleship?” Emily asked.

“You already know the answer to that.”

Emily smiled. “Should I take another shot at this one?”

“Please do. Their highest defense is the equivalent of a Rank 3.”

Emily began prepping. She summoned her Scythe of Grand Reaping. She enhanced herself with spellcraft tailored for her. Out came the Nullifier of Life Mk 2, the bore already loaded. As the ships continued to descend and race toward the battleship, Emily sauntered over to the port side and stopped next to her sister. 

Once the ships got within a few miles of the battleship, Casey started sniping attack helicopters out of the air with her bow, her Perception enhanced by spellcraft. Emily waited patiently before she turned to her scythe and opened her mouth.

She sucked in the spirit energy from her captive souls. Some got released in the process. But the newly freed souls left with only a little spirit energy after they paid the price for bail. Emily finished juicing herself up on spirit energy, licked her noir-colored lips, and began chanting.

Jay gave the orders for the lead ship to play chicken with the battleship and for the other ships to follow close behind. Then at the last second, the lead ship swerved away from the battleship. The command ship stayed on the tail of the lead as Company Graven Divinity moved as one, skimming over the arctic water, sweeping past explosions of bombs going off all around them, staying ahead of a bullet storm from fighter jets and helicopters, and giving their Death [Medium] her window of opportunity to truly wound the enemy.

“One Shot That Brings Death.”

Emily fired her hand cannon and punched a man-sized hole through the battleship’s bottom. The ball shot dug into the middle of the ship and burst into metal-shredding shrapnel. Each piece had the misty black and red aura of Emily. Wherever the shrapnel passed, the frigid touch of death checked the Conviction of the battleships’ crew. Some sailors would end up dying immediately, but the real objective of Emily’s attack was to kill the ship conceptually as if it was a living thing. 

That led to each piece of shrapnel ripping out of the ship and joining back together into one ball above the bridge. The ball flared dark and red death energy in the shape of bat wings. After heralding the power of Emily’s hold over death, the ball propelled down through the bridge, below deck, and out the bottom of the ship to truly kill it. By the time the battleship was exiting Jay’s spatial-g far behind Company Graven Divinity, it had taken in a lot of icy water. In no time, the Arctic Circle would serve as its grave.

“Nice shot,” Casey said.

“I don’t think I can use that a third time,” Emily admitted.

“You don’t have to,” Jay said. “They’re backing off.”

The Arctic Battle ended with a victory for the Protectorates. Jay’s buzz was gone by this point. He wasn’t sure if he should be happy with the victory. This was not a war that could be won with a single battle. And it did little for his levels. It offered more stress than danger to him and his Champions, and lives were lost on this day.

At the very least, they were returning home. YoAnna was there, and she was waiting for her husband. He could feel her yearning for him a lot more than usual.

Jay received -300 HP of damage.