While Mirage is dealing with Nine and MoB, Schmidt and Bell are dealing with a massive fiend who is capable of devouring entire villages. Leviathan is a powerful fellow but also incredibly tricky to deal. Schmidt’s armor allows him to tank most hits thrown at him. But the stronger his armor, the more rigid it is. That rigidity makes him more sluggish. Even if Bell is here to aid him in his mobility issues, she can only compensate for so much before putting herself at risk.
“Watch out!” she says for the 50th time.
Leviathan emerges from just a few drops of rain barreling past them. Schmidt is starting to grow tired of this endless battle of attrition wherein they aren’t allowed to deliver fatal blows. They have to wait for Mirage’s victory against Nine and MoB. Then, they’ll have to await Shen’s awakening. This irritating kilometer-long snake is testing Schmidt’s patience. His carefully crafted talons that could tear through almost anything are itching to disembowel this beast.
“I’ll leave the rest to you. I’ve expended most of my magic, but I can keep Nine and MoB away from battle,” Mirage relays by telepathy.
Since Nine and MoB are gone, Schmidt has one out of two conditons to pummel Leviathan fulfilled. He could proceed and kill it now, but taking that risk means growing weak enough to be charmed by Sandman.
“Bell! Mirage has beaten Nine and MoB! Report back to Nikolay!”
Bell takes off, heading to Nikolay up above. Meanwhile, Schmidt opts for his trusty hammer and shield. Leviathan emerges from below, threatening to swallow him. Teeth line the entirety of its endlessly long throat. This kilometer-long water-born lizard threatens to shred Schmidt, yet he skillfully strikes at one of the teeth with his shield, pushing it away. It falls to the rainy grasslands below, once again vanishing within the drops of water.
Schmidt, upon landing, realizes that his shield has slightly bent out of shape but he’s certain that a slight crack had formed in its tooth. Irritated, he considers wasting his magic on another shield.
Meanwhile, Nikolay is flying around above the clouds of acidic rain dipping beneath them every thirty seconds, checking on the battles partaking below. His eyes are mostly set on the demon controlling the clouds and their rainfall. To a civilian, every drop of rain would tear away at their flesh, melting them into a bloody puddle. To a Dream Catcher they’re raindrops halting or slowing their healing capabilities along with breaking their concentration. What concerns Nikolay is that it isn’t letting up. Such a massive cloud covers a massive area with relentless rainfall that seemingly will not stop. It’s not an area hazard caused by the domain itself yet FoP seemingly has no concerns for its bottomless basin of magic.
“Niko!” yells Bell just as he comes to a halt. “Mirage defeated MoB and Nine! She took them away!”
“Yeah. Their presences are gone… Take care of Schmidt for now. Just dodge. Don’t fight. Go.”
His eyes are fixated on Shen’s location. Nikolay can feel some sort of darkness brewing around Shen and Calpyso. It seems to be due to the influence of Sandman and Calypso’s ability to lure demons. Neither feels like enough of a threat to fixate on them, yet he can’t help but feel like something’s off.
Suddenly, something speeds past him into the clouds below as the clouds begin to fall. Their crash flood the domain, sweeping anyone crushed beneath them away. Calypso pinched Shen’s nose shut while praying that no water got in through his mouth. A punch directed at the deluge breaks the water’s tension, preventing Shen from getting crushed. Schmidt blasted himself past the layer of water with a mighty blow from his hammer. If not for Schmidt, Bell would have been swept away and likely would have drowned.
As Nikolay turns to face Floodgates of Purity, he’s splashed by water. Though he’s coalescing massive amounts of blood to have functional wings, they fall apart as he begins to fall. Without warning, Leviathan emerges, nearly swallowing Nikolay. However, Schmidt strikes it hard enough to force its unsightly snout shut. Nikolay jumps off of Leviathan, dodging beams of water with new wings.
“Was it Mirage?! Were they waiting for her to leave?” Nikolay wonders. “Lower our guards, tire us out, trap us with Sandman…”
No amount of dodging can stop the inevitable. Beams of water keep firing away at him from above and below. Before long, he’s sent to the flooded lands below, holding his breath. The beam he’s caught up in pushes him further and further down, drowning the poor scout. Only Schmidt’s raw power can break him out of the sea prison as Bell invokes flight on him. Calypso, Shen’s body, Nikolay, Schmidt, and Bell are now gathered at one spot.
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“We should leave!” commands Nikolay, even if that means leaving Shen to rot in an eternal nightmare. The least he can do is make sure he survives.
“No! I can’t let it kill so many people!” Bell yells.
If they were to abandon their mission here, this Fusion would not only recover but also become whole. On its flight path lies a small village that would likely have dozens of casualties along with flooded homes if they don’t defeat it here.
“If it scares you that much, leave with Selen! Three Dream Catchers can hold out long enough till Mirage finds at least a few rookies willing to support us,” Schmidt claims.
“So you’re saying that I’m not a proper fighter, huh?!”
“No,” Schmidt counters. “Do what you believe to be best for the two of you. I’m extending that offer to Bell and Calypso, too. I don’t know what you have in mind for the future, but considering Smoker is giving you the option to take any Devil Seed with you as long as we succeed, it likely involves a future full of demons. If you can’t handle these few you should give up. I’m not upset with you. I just want you to know that.”
Nikolay was awfully antagonistic, but Schmidt managed to ease the tension beneath them. Calypso and Bell seem to be prepared for the worst yet are willing to continue fighting. Shen is still fighting Sandman bravely suppressing his fear to help lead Nikolay towards his eternal dreams of research.
“I’ll stay… I’m sorry for lashing out. I’ll take care of the delude!” Nikolay says, determined.
They scatter as Leviathan emerges once again, even more aggressive than before. Instead of disappearing beneath the drops of water or the newborn sea, it’s chasing down Schmidt. Meanwhile Calypso is just trying to keep away from the water as he struggles to adapt to this entirely new temporary ability of flight.
“It feels weird, but I can manage,” thinks Nikolay. Flight without limit or physical anchors feel weird, yet aren’t all that different from Nikolay’s current version.
He finally spots the figure that had just sped past him. A copy of his made entirely of water is approaching him at his top speed. It seems as if Moment of Birth’s ability is already somewhat engraved into this Fusion. Nikolay bites off the fingers on his right hand and begins rapid firing into the copy. Somehow, he can keep track of FoP’s attempts at drowning him. Using his own wings, he increases his flying speed, dodging any shots fired at him by his waterborne copy. Several shots had made it into the copy’s body, but they had no effect.
Since FoP’s current strategy isn’t working, it’s creating even more copies chasing after Nikolay attempting to shoot him down. The amount of hazards he has to be aware of almost double with each copy. Its endless pools of magic aren’t letting up.
Meanwhile, Schmidt is carrying Bell as she’s growing more and more exhausted. Though she promises to uphold her ability even if she were to fall asleep now, he can’t let this kid push herself even more. He’s concerned for her well-being and not just for the outcome of this battle.
Leviathan holds still for a moment as flames form and coalesce in its throat, forming a fireball. As soon as the fireball has reached sufficient size and a beautiful blinding white glow, It fires a beam of flames Bell can barely keep away from. Only for an instant has her speed increased tenfold to avoid this deathly attack. The sea begins to evaporate as the heat echoes through the entire domain. Though it isn’t anywhere near enough to set fire to objects or people, the heat is significantly noticeable, forcing temperatures near Schmidt to rise by 30°C.
“Are you okay, Bell?”
“Exhausted…” She’s barely keeping her eyes open.
Nikolay can only watch in horror as he is struck by several pellets of water. His wings once again explode into a mixture of water and blood as he begins to slow down. If not for the faint traces of blood he had left behind on FoP, he wouldn’t be able to deduce where the beams of water would originate from with its hand movements.
“I can’t get anywhere near it! Damn pest!”
He’s struck again as he attempts to fly towards FoP. Occasionally, he overloads his copies with blood pellets that they burst and fall apart, but the amount of blood needed is ridiculous. Whether or not that is worth abusing is another question.
“I told them that I’d deal with FoP! I can’t force Shen into taking down one demon and then not defeat any myself! I’m such an idiot!”
As his final gamble, he scratches himself till he bleeds all over his body before biting them off along with his toes. He begins to spew blood from every wound, risking the loss of his life. Nikolay isn’t aware of his limits because he’s never had to test them. If they do end up being far beneath FoP’s bottomless well of magic, his death is guaranteed. However, if they’re even or his resources are greater than FoP’s, he can win through sheer volume.
A ball of blood begins to engulf him as several beams of water attempt to wash him away. Even Leviathan is beginning to turn its attention to Nikolay as it charges its next blast of intense flames. Just before it can fire, Schmidt forcefully shuts its mouth with one powerful strike. The fireball explodes within it as it retreats into the sea to recover from the damage taken.
Nikolay continues to grow his reach as he finally begins to corrupt the sea. This bloody nightmare of a countermeasure is diluting the power FoP holds as the water levels rise higher and higher. Finally, now that he’s at his limit with several kilometers of sea spanning over a little above 31.4k km². With his final attack, he engulfs FoP in blood, draining the world of most of its water. Crushed, it’s finally defeated. Just before he can pass out from exhaustion, he absorbs most of the blood with acidic water mixed in and plummets to the land below.
Calypso follows Nikolay deciding that it’s best to keep watch over them on the land below. Yet, all of a sudden pink light emerges from Shen just after he is laid down next to Nikolay.