Morale All High Up

Ciemnosc looked at the air above, in front of the ships' formation and seemingly becoming more and more visible to the naked eye as more minutes went by, this time with still water and silence and nobody making a noise. Even those who gritted their teeth, perhaps feeling harassed by this murderous unnatural force, endured it and kept quiet to the point of trembling; but that was the help that Ciemnosc required to finally locate this thing!

‘I see you now.’ Without fear or anxiousness, Ciemnosc looked directly at the thing. More specifically, he was staring into what made him believe was this thing’s face, and it was quite the extensive up-and-down limit. But Ciemnosc ended up focusing his eyes on the thing’s eyes.

The thing seemed to hear Ciemnosc’s thought or read through those darkest pair of eyes set on itself, so it looked back at whoever was directly challenging its majestuous self. When the thing looked back at him, however, Ciemnosc felt its presence. And despite having grown so much to almost face any Obsidiafying realm cultivator or Creature now, he felt a kind of pressure which could never be explained. At least not now or with his current knowledge.

“!...” There was a commotion as the sailors felt like they were no longer required to simply crouch with their knees down in a fetal position, their heads were raised, and their faces turned towards their Chief’s medium ship. However, everyone followed the direction that the Chief in Command was looking, only to realize a silhouette of horrifying proportions but of a semi-humanoid shape was showing its body!

“... Hisaaahk~...” The thing seemed to whisper again, taunting Ciemnosc and everyone else who was looking at itself. On the other hand, Ciemnosc, as if he could understand something from the thing, uncaringly Claws Out and took a step towards the edge of the bow facing the water. With an ill-humored face, Ciemnosc slowly spilled out his words, “You are not taking anyone else, not from my people.”

The blackest, life-devouring like tainted claw-like nails were no longer as small as one’s eyelashes. They had undoubtedly grown to the size of a pinky fingernail now, showing clearly at the tips of Ciemnosc’s fingers, and they were somewhat too straight yet had a curvature towards the middle.

The thing wasn’t so ‘touched’ while Ciemnosc’s tone was grim. His right hand showed those tiny claws which were naturally seen by his troops as well. But they said nothing, still staring at the sky to see the horrible face and small body of that thing slowly appearing before them. The ‘thing’ -, in contrast, seemed to have changed even if not affected when Ciemnosc took his Claws Out.

The thing’s body finally materialized in front of everybody, and did so in the most bizarre, nerve breaking, and creepy ways. Turning into a solidified body from apparently being made out of gas. The thing’s head was as long as a tall adult person and as wide as a child’s height. It didn’t show the genuine size of its mouth, but, judging by the ‘normal’ proportions to its face, it was to be a ginormous set of teeth and tongue that nobody wanted to be in - no matter what.

Its eyes were almost of a sickly white color, but it would’ve been fine if such was the case. Instead, those eyes had a small circle each, blue and somewhat ‘separated’ by some sort of miniature strands of sludge.

Then, as if understanding what everyone was thinking, the thing opened its mouth, which was much larger than its own body, and showed everyone its contents.

From viscera to bones, lungs, hearts, skin, and even feces, all kinds of organs were shown in the thing’s mouth as it smiled while opening up broader and longer. Only when half its face was taken over by the aperture of its mouth that it stopped, but by then, its mouth was fully covered by all of those things. Some of those organs were chewed on as if a mother bird had wanted to take care of its chicklings.

The thing was even showing it proudly, its eyes seemingly twinking, but without any light nor life in them as Ciemnosc kept looking at it… and took another step forward with his left foot.

“... … …” Then, some kind of silence engulfed the entire place, but the misty fog was starting to disappear. Meanwhile, as Ciemnosc and the thing locked eyes, the latter began to feel some sort of apprehension at the daylight of the morning, the sailors who were as if thundered within their heads and bodies, looked all around towards the water in search of their comrades’ bodies.

They just couldn’t find any bodies’ remains that were mixing their blood with the Little Lake, not even a small piece of a bone or hair. All of it was now… gone. On the other hand, the thing hovering in the air didn’t even have the body of a child, while its head was enough to eat several mangled corpses all at the same time. Puking resumed, but this time without deathliness added to it. Though the first ones to puke were surely afraid of dying because of it and ended up rupturing one or some ribs from within from the fear.

Swweeesh- wheeesh~~...

Suddenly, the thing’s body disappeared at a rapid but not-so-quick speed. While it was still disappearing, it took one last look at Ciemnosc and somehow… gave Ciemnosc strange sensations. It also closed its mouth slowly as if too distracted to even notice it was going away.

“...” The sailors who were puking raised their heads with ease but worried still to look back up, while those who were able to hold it in or were stronger mentally kept on looking up above. And on the faces of the latter, grins and involuntary chuckles could be seen. Meanwhile, the former had their faces changing to the same type as those from the latter, but with much more prowess after having survived ‘just puking’ -.

“It’s over. Can talk now.” Tired, the voice of Ciemnosc sounded in the ears of his troops, who no longer kept themselves to the floor and stood up, some helping other sailors nearby up. And after saying such, Ciemnosc turned around and stored his thin Mortal sword, his head a bit low, his body naturally more languidly walking back to the front of the helm.

The medium ship’s captain; as he saw Ciemnosc return and walk with a relaxed face, heaved a sigh of relief and faced the sky with his face. Seeing such - there started to be some words being exchanged on each ship, the surviving sailors, which were much more than half were now unequivocally feeling more than glad and safe thanks to Ciemnosc’s efforts, even if it didn’t seem as if he had done much.

“Is it really over? At last?” - “Holy… what was that? It was… something…” - “That was… phew.”

‘...’ Some talked into the communications device, but those who weren’t captains didn’t have the same qualifications to speak towards anyone as they or the Chief in Command could. On the other hand, Ciemnosc made his way back to the front of the helm and turned around to face the front. The medium ship’s bow. ‘It wasn’t spooky like before, hm. And during daylight, in the open, above such a mighty pure energy-based body of water… good thing that it left.’

Ciemnosc raised his chin a little, his darkest eyes reflecting nothing as even the most natural of lights in existence was devoured by his darkest pools. He then let his chin fall down again, placed his hands in front of his body together, and spoke to the communications device.

“One of the ships at the rear… go back after whatever rests are on the water are picked back up. Then bring back another few hundred sailors. Go maximum speed when returning to the formation,” Ciemnosc said up to there, making a slight pause. He then said after making a few steps to the front, still in front of the helm where the upper floor was, which only medium ships had. “We will continue to advance at medium speed. We might have lost some of the brothers and sisters of the base… But even now, not even ghosts can stop our campaign to put down our enemy.”

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“Heard, Chief.” - “You heard him. Get to your positions after watching over the water!” - “Get moving, get moving. Those eastern savages won’t be attending an empty date!” - “Come on already, get to swimming and recuperate those parts! Over there, and there!”

The calmness of Ciemnosc’s words and of the Little Lake quickly had the sailors of these dozens of ships return to a stable state of mind. Although there was not a single high-spirited sailor at the moment, and even captains dragged on their word. When they looked to the medium ship and saw their Chief in Command calmly gazing ahead and waiting for the waters to be cleared of any remains, they continued to do their job silently.

Finally, when the water was all clean, and even the immediate surroundings were cleared up by some counting from a few sailors, the ships on the rear quickly decided for whom to go back to the base and bury these remaining parts… which were too few.

The fastest and most agile of them was selected, which was actuality captain Lons who had placed himself and his crew in dire danger before for the sake of the mission’s overall greater success. The ship departed at max speed and was to return with hundreds more sailors with the same traveling speed.

Though the losses weren’t near half the current dozens of small ships’ crews, it was still a rather authentic loss for the base’s students. The return of that ship and bringing hundreds of sailors to replace the felled ones was enough to keep the small ships at top capacity. The trip back to the ships’ formation was to be slightly lengthy and very speedy, so the sailors would have a good warm-up before they even caught up to the formation, let alone before the battle began.

On the other hand, the other troops on land who had been driving their armored cars resumed their driving after a bit of a pause. They also noticed the misty fog covering the middle of the shallowest waters of the Little Lake. But that was when it was behind them and already too late, several tens of kilometers away. The armored cars resumed their driving, but at a slower pace, waiting for the ships to catch up to them.

And within the ranks of the armored cars to the left and the right, Missa was on the west and Gallah on the east. When they saw the prominent traces of being ‘attacked’ somehow, in some way, the armored cars’ troopers ‘walked’ along the afflicted troops ‘walking’ on the water. Together, with the sun challenging time as always and trying to stan on the west, its light descended upon them as they slowly witnessed it get right above their heads.

… It didn’t take long for the dozens of small ships and that one medium ship, along with the armored cars, to arrive relatively close to the enemy’s territorial waters.

By the time the ships’ formation was nearing, the small ship commanded by captain Lons had already long returned, sailing slightly more than 50 minutes with the other ships before getting up to this point. And after being briefed, the armored cars on the west and east slowed down even more, letting the ships and Ciemnosc take the lead. Meanwhile, Missa and Gallah were to wait for opportunities.

“... Tell Gallah and Missa that they are to move now, everything according to how they see fit.” Ciemnosc looked around at his people. The sailors of the nearest ships were the most silent but also with the coldest and bravest faces. They, however, were showing respect and decisiveness at the same time. Those farther away were cold as well, but they had varying emotions as the ones to charge at the enemy first. Excitement, nervousness, determination; or fear, anxiety, and uncertainty. Anything could be named.

Ciemnosc looked at the captain of the medium ship before finishing his words from earlier, “And do tell them that they must not forget what I spoke to them.”

Finally, receiving the Chief in Command’s complete message, the captain nodded and talked to his collar. Meanwhile, Ciemnosc returned to face the faraway line formation of enemy ships. They only had small enemy ships.

As for what Ciemnosc had in store for his 2 teammates, it was simple really. It had to do about their role in this mini-operation, for they had to move o their own without depending on Ciemnosc’s orders and advice. They just had to follow their own instinct and minds. They were to decide when, where, and how to attack the enemy. Be it the enemy’s stronghold, ports, temporary base on the east, or just long-distance bombardment from the west at the stronghold; and so on.

“Start the comms interruption,” Ciemnosc commanded. The medium ship’s captain didn’t say anything but responded with the movements of his arms, giving a few directions to a few people around him seated around and behind the panels.

Immediately, changes were occurring to the large and wide sails of the medium ship. Unlike the small ships, a medium sized one only had 3 sails, one on top of the other, for each mast. They were just a few but encompassed much more space than the small ships’ sails could. The medium ship’s sails began to emit a flat, sky blue color in energy other than the light green and it wasn’t the wind that was being seemingly absorbed and expelled from the front and rear of the ship’s sails - respectively.

Instead, the flat, sky blue colored energy seemed to form a small snake-like antenna that was trembling yet dancing at the same time in a straight line into the sky. The ships’ formation was coming closer and closer to the enemy’s line formations of ships. The string of flat, sky blue energy with the thickness of probably just an adult’s arm suddenly thinned out massively, sending sounds of electricity all around and beginning to be visible by those enemy ships still a couple hundred kilometers away.

“Fire it,” Ciemnosc commanded, once again, and the captain nodded this time before also shouting quite loudly. “Activate the array!”

Pshiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiift~!

In an instant, as the enemy was just t the realization that something was about to occur, they were just about to receive some notifications from their Identification Tokens when they went… just off.

“... What’s going on?!” From the enemy side, the bosses of each ship began asking each other out loud, while the few who were smarter noticed that they weren’t going to solely fight in the water. They tried to send some messages back to the stronghold and to prepare, but no communications worked. All they could do was send someone on a smaller boat back to the stronghold, but already being more than 100 kilometers away from the 2nd port, it was about to take a while.

From one of the small ships which was, in reality, all they had. A person, in particular, was watching with crossed arms as she could smell a cruel and ruthless battle about to erupt, and the enemy already had the bigger and stronger hand… from the get-go.

Lere was a brand new rising star of the Eagerburning Flames Sect. She was not only a ‘young’ Spirit Gathering realm 10th stage cultivator, at around her 60’s, she was also a good commander that many ex-Ciemnosc’s troops said to be almost as good as he is. Hence, after quite a few months of observation, this fine young, promising woman was selected to act as the ‘general’ since the last agreement was signed.

A brunette with long cocoon brown wild hair. But incredibly, had rare golden eyes. Though she was a bit of a shortie, about 1.60 meters tall, making her body and appearance quite visible for Ciemnosc even as he just did a simple lap of his eyes through the enemy ranks. Yet, even the tallest of enemy cultivators crouched and bent their backs ever so complacently to notify her as their communications were wholly interrupted.

As she looked with her golden eyes narrowing, they seemed darker the more she looked at the base’s ships coming closer and closer, barely able to identify them but not being able to notice that there was a much larger, broader, and taller ship amidst the others. Only that its ship’s sails were slightly bigger and weren’t as separate from one another as the other ships, and that it had about fewer, illuminated with a different color. But the latter was barely even discernible at the very least.

… Right at this moment, when the ships on both sides were coming closer and closer, Ciemnosc and Lere seemed calmer and at ease than ever. They both looked at the other side without any emotion, not even calmness. It was as if they were merely about to watch a crocodile eat a bunch of ducklings. Or rats being eaten by some chicken that managed to peck it with their beaks to death.

Fwuush- po po po po po- pvwuoooom~~!

Up in the sky, as the sailors looked upwards from the top corners of their eyes till facing the enemy at the front, the enemy ships’ crews also looked up, but more extensively as their eyes became as large and wide as possible in surprise and understanding.

The sky was suddenly lit with a flat, sky blue color that looked like a kind of ‘drawing’ where electric snakes reached about from the base’s ships to their own ships from the enemy’s point of view. On the other hand, after training so hard and vastly for the last few weeks, despite this being the first time they see it with their own eyes, the sailors from the base were beyond ecstatic as they witnessed the overlordiness of their side compared to their enemy.

“Now, start with maximum speed,” Ciemnosc said in a very low volume, but the captain some few meters behind him beyond the 10th meter mark nodded and took a large breath of air. Then, as he began lighting up half the ship’s sails of the medium ship, its trajectory was changing slightly; the other small ships all noticed it too and began to light up their own. At the same time, the captain shouted in command, the small ships’ captains answering at his command.

“Charge!” - “Chaarge! Chaaaaaaaarge!” - “CHARGE!” Though the terminology wasn’t adequate, the captains and sailors both knew well that they still insisted on calling out loudly to each other without hiding it from their crew.

Ciemnosc, on the other hand, blinked charmingly once without even trying. The left corner of his lips almost showed a grin. At the same time, however, his body was leaned backwards and forwards continuously like a mama duck, along with its small ducklings… began charging at the enemy’s line formation of ships!

…