“I’m sorry for getting cocky. I’m not the storm. I am NOT the storm. Fuck. Get away from me, you shitheads.” Toby cursed as he fought against a school of piranhas near the water’s surface.
The day after the party was selected, Toby and Lukas were dragged away by Elaria to the training spot in the middle of the sea. While she was teaching Lukas how to use a Skill Scroll to cast Bubble Breathing Skill, Toby was tossed into the sea with fresh meat strapped onto his body.
“Do you think I showed you my technique yesterday just for show? Copy it and beat those small fries already.” Elaria shouted.
Easy for you to say, you’re babying Lukas while you throw me into the frying pan.
Toby grumbled, but he still did what he was instructed. He remembered the sensation when he was enveloped by Elaria’s Mana when she created that armor-like layer to stop the waves. The closest thing he could compare that to is imagining being inside a hazmat suit – a separate layer stopping the outside world from affecting him while also letting air in.
As he kept on slapping the piranhas and using broken blades to slash at them, more and more of them gathered because of the thick stench of blood.
This can’t go on. I’ll get overwhelmed sooner rather than later. There are too many of them.
Toby tried his hardest to create an armor from Mana but the only result he got was a womble, wiggly, tofu-like layer of Mana that popped the moment a piranha bit it. He tried again and again, but the result was the same.
Why isn’t it working? He thought. Fuck it. I’m going to increase [Mana] stat anyway. Seven points into [Mana].
[Mana increase: 13 -> 20]
[Distribution point: 10 -> 3]
The moment his [Mana] reached the second threshold, Toby felt a cool gush of spring wind rush through his mind and body as his understanding of Mana itself increased. Before, he thought Mana was something akin to sand that could be molded, but it wasn’t very stable and could collapse at any moment. But he didn’t think the same anymore. After his stat upgrade, he thought Mana was like clay – something he could touch, mold, and change according to his will as long as he had the correct technique.
When he slapped another piranha away, his flipper felt a bit numb. Yet, that simple sensation was the wake-up call he needed.
I’m just a newbie and I tried to do something a pro was doing? How foolish was I? Master the small stuff first, Toby. It’s a long journey ahead. Don’t rush. One step at a time.
Toby withdrew the Mana surrounding him and focused them on his flippers instead. He recalled the sensation when he wore gloves and shoes, then projected it onto his limbs. His Mana moved on his command and shaped into a solid protective layer, about half an inch thick, around his limbs. The layer still wavered slightly, but it didn’t look like it would collapse anytime soon. It was a strange feeling, as it wasn’t something the skin could feel, and yet, Toby could clearly sense the weight and warmth of the Mana around his limbs.
Another piranha lunged at Toby, he raised his front flipper and blocked it instead of dodging this time. When the fish bit down, its teeth couldn’t penetrate the Mana layer at all, let alone pop it like before.
Hahaha, you’re dead meat now, you little shits. Toby got excited and charged at the school of piranha.
Each swing of his flipper slapped a fish to death, each swing of his broken blades cut up a dozen more. But he realized the problem still hadn’t been solved. He was still trapped in an endless circle of killing, drawing in more fish, kill again. If he wanted to finish this like Elaria tasked him with, he needed a different approach.
System, any suggestions over here? But the System didn’t answer Toby this time.
Right, it's in sleep mode. I only have myself to rely on right now. Maybe I have something that can deal with this. My [Magic Hand] and my [B*tch Slap] are only adding more kills, they won’t solve the problem. That leaves [Floating Water Platform], [Float], and [Push]. There has to be a way.
As Toby fought and killed, he saw the blood from the piranhas flow out of their bodies before scattering in the sea.
That’s it. I need to make a fish tank. Toby thought before using [Floating Water Platform].
He didn’t gather normal sea water, he directed the Skill to target the seawater that had blood mixed in with them. The red, murky water started to churn and gathered toward the spot on top of Toby’s head above the sea’s surface. First, it was a staircase step made from red, then it expanded into a small platform, finally, it expanded once more into a six by three inches fish tank.
More and more seawater mixed with blood got gathered into the tank while Toby used [Float] to move the fish's bodies up and then dropped them into the tank. The water tank slowly turned from dark blue into more and more like a mysterious fish soup that no one would even dare to try as the stench of dead fish in the air came out of the floating fish tank.
Feeling he was at his limit from multitasking, Toby thought it would need to run away soon.
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“I’m coming, big bro Toby,” Lukas shouted before he jumped into the sea.
The boy flailed around a bit at first. He might had felt a bit disoriented with how there was no footing under the sea. But soon, Lukas stabilized himself and swum toward Toby.
“I’m here to help,” Lukas said.
Toby opened his mouth to ask something, but no sound came out, only water came in. He looked at Lukas and saw a transparent layer covering the boy from head to toe, the only thing that wasn’t covered was his greatsword.
“Master said this is the new and improved version of Bubble Breathing Skill. With this, the Skill is compressed into a thin layer around the body, so it will also act like a weak armor of sorts." Lukas explained when he saw the confusion in Toby’s eyes while they killed the piranha.
…I just learned the discount version of something that already exists. Great. Toby stared into the distance a bit. Well, maybe it wasn’t that bad.
He pointed at Lukas, then at the piranha before making a swinging action. Then he pointed at himself, followed by pointing at the creepy-looking soup tank above the surface.
“You will gather the fish’s remains while I deal with them. Is that what you trying to say, big bro Toby?” Lukas asked.
Toby nodded. Got it in one, great job, Lukas.
With their roles divided, Toby put his broken blades away and focused solely on gathering the blood and the corpses, while Lukas hacked away at the school of piranha.
At first, Lukas’s moves were slow and clumsy, as he seemed to be finding it difficult to adjust the amount of force he needed to use to be strong enough to cut the fish but not strong enough to throw him around like a spinning top. The boy swung again and again as he breathed in some kind of specific rhythm. After what felt like ten minutes, Lukas got into gear and didn’t spin himself in place anymore. Just like that, the two continued the endless onslaught.
Toby didn’t know how long it took, but when he realized it, the piranha’s number started to drop. They weren’t coming at them in an endless stream like before anymore. This might work. He thought.
“This is great training. I can’t believe you and master hid this from me and trained by yourself yesterday. Big bro Toby is a bully.” Despite saying so, Lukas was smiling like he was having the time of his life.
Suddenly, Toby caught the sense of something different. It wasn’t the numbing sense like that of the eel or the bloody stench of the piranhas. The smell was more like the smell of moisturized earth floating in the air whenever it was about to rain. Toby looked toward the source of that smell and saw something big charging at them. Something really big.
Toby panicked a little when he saw the creature. It was like nothing he ever saw before. The gigantic creature was bigger than a blue whale. Its four eerily yellow eyes, with two of them on its forehead, blinked vertically as it swam at the speed of a race car at them. The long, crocodile-like body with bony and scaly gray skin with a bit of dark green on it ripped through the sea as it created large, swirling currents whenever it went by. Its dragon-like head devoured every single piranha on its way toward them. If it missed one, it would turn around and attack again until it ate every single piranha in sight.
Toby subconsciously used [Insight] on the thing as it roared.
[Leviathan – Rank. ??? – Lv. ???]
[Alliance: Monster – Suggestion: Love to eat piranha]
“Wh-wh-what is that?” Lukas shook uncontrollably as he stared at the thing.
Toby was able to ask Lukas what was wrong when he felt the same thing Lukas was feeling. A distinctive primal fear reached out from the depths of his subconscious and grabbed at his throat. His body shook unwillingly as it was frozen in place. His eyes shook and his breath labored. It was like ten tons of rock were put on his chest when he was lying down.
Fear effect? Dammit. Toby thought as the Leviathan got closer and closer by the second.
His mind was clouded as it was being taken over by the fear. But one thought refused to disappear from his mind. It was the information he got from [Insight] – this thing loved to eat piranha.
Toby looked up, the icky floating soup tank was still there. That’s why this thing is charging at us. Toby shouted in his mind.
As quick as possible, he moved the soup tank away from them and pushed it toward the direction the Leviathan was coming from. The soup tank moved too slowly, so Toby used [Push] and [Magic Hand] to move the thing. Even a second faster could spell the difference between life and death.
The Leviathan sniffed as its nose twitched. It looked up at the soup tank and changed its direction. The Leviathan was no longer charging at Toby and Lukas but at the soup tank instead. Its long, eel-like tail generated even more force and propelled the right out of the water. The gigantic monster jumped out of the water like some kind of showtime dolphin as it chomped down the soup tank in one bite.
“Throwing your trouble at your master? You two sure have guts.” Elara said as she looked at the monster heading straight at her.
She moved her left leg backward as she lowered her body. Her right hand pulled back, her fist gripped tightly. Above her head, Mana gathered into the shape of a giant fist that was as big as a truck. Her white hair and jacket danced in the air as strong wind gushed out from her body.
The Leviathan's roar shook the air as Toby felt like his entire body was hit by an invisible shock wave. His ears were ringing while his blood felt like it was flowing backward. If that thing had aimed for them instead, he and Lukas would have been dead meat.
“You’re being too loud. Shut up.” Elara said before she punched.
The truck-size fist followed her movement and shot at the Leviathan’s face. The fist hit the monster in its left cheek, knocking out a single, cone-shaped, sharp tooth. The monster couldn’t retaliate before being knocked to the side and skipped on the water’s surface once. It was like Elaria was the stone skipper and the Leviathan was the stone before it sank in the sea.
The monster soon recovered and showed itself on the surface again. It let out another sky-shattering roar as it directed its gaze at Elaria.
But when it saw how the word “murder” was written on the elf’s face, the monster clammed its mouth shut mid-roar. It stared at the elf without moving. When Elaria saw that the monster wasn’t leaving, she had that evil smirk and said, “I haven’t eaten any Leviathan for a while.”
Once she said that the Leviathan’s pupils shrank to dots before it ran away with its tail behind its metaphorical legs.
Elaria let out a snort before she said, “You two. Get over here.”
Toby and Lukas, who only showed half of their heads and shell above the surface, flinched at her words.
“Hahaha, master Elaria is the best fighter there is. You even punch the shit out of that monster. It was super cool and awesome. Isn’t that right, Lukas?” Toby jabbed Lukas lightly.
“Ye-yes. Master is super cool.” The boy nodded his head continuously.
“Is that so?” Elaria smiled coldly at them.
Toby’s instinct was telling him this woman would not let the fact he threw trouble her way and had her solve it for them was a bad move, a very bad move.
With a single step, Elaria dashed behind them and stood on the water with Mana beneath her as footholds. She bent down and grabbed their heads.
“Since I’m so awesome, you two want to train harder to be as awesome as me, right?” She smirked evilly.
This is it, goodbye world. Toby shed a single tear.