Chapter 86 : Seaborn Martial Tournament (2)
Chapter 86. Seaborn Martial Tournament (2)
Yul was mingling in the Seaborn area in human form.
His immediate thought,
‘They’re all small fry.’
In terms of sheer physical ability, there wasn’t a single creature on the level of Gehenna or Yalmuka—none of the Great Powers of the Great Azure Ocean.
However, there was the peculiar variable known as skills, so that had to be taken into account.
There were countless types of skills, many of them unknown. Once that variable was confirmed, victory would be assured.
‘Hiding my abilities is going to be important.’
He had heard that the martial tournament used a tournament-style bracket. That meant he would inevitably have to fight at least once, and using skills would reveal his strength.
“Oh. Hey, you there—pretending to be a carbuncle.”
Huh?!
At Yul’s words, the Seaborn beside Yera Mul shuddered violently.
“What’s your name? Come to think of it, we never even introduced ourselves, did we?”
Yul crouched down in front of the carbuncle and beckoned with his hand.
“Come over here.”
The one pretending to be a carbuncle trembled as it approached Yul.
He looked a bit like a punk, but anyway, he wasn’t actually one. Yul was just intrigued by this creature’s body.
-I, um, excuse me, d-do you need something from me?
“Your magic signal is well controlled. Why were you hiding it all this time?”
-I, I’m not tasty. P-please don’t eat me.
“Relax. Why would I tear you apart and eat you? But why are you participating?”
-Because Yera is participating…….
Yul used divinity to glimpse part of the truth. Behind that form was some other kind of sea creature.
Its shape resembled a jellyfish. Beneath translucent crystal scales, a heart was visible, and several tentacles with a soft, jellyfish-like glow extended from it.
“You’re a species I’ve never seen before. Were you able to polymorph from the start?”
-Y-yes.
“Sounds like you’ve got a story. I won’t attack you, so go on—tell me.”
-W-well, um. M-my name is Pinky. Yera gave it to me. And our species was originally called Midora.
The Midora were, by nature, creatures that lived in the Deep Sea.
They were deep-sea beings with crystal scales and multiple tentacles. But there was a problem.
-I-in the Deep Sea, there are too many strong ones, so our species was always in danger.
“Yeah. I get what you mean.”
While roaming the Deep Sea as a jelly octopus, Yul had encountered both countless tiny creatures and overwhelmingly powerful beings.
It was a place where the power balance gap was extreme.
“Your species were prey?”
-That’s right. Ever since I was young, I almost got hunted so many times. S-so I fled to the surface, polymorphed, and wandered around.
But he hadn’t fully learned polymorph from his parents, so he couldn’t use it properly.
-A-at first, it was hard.
When he came up to the surface and tried to polymorph into something close to a human, he ended up as a horrifying mix—half true form, half human.
-I transformed into all sorts of things to survive, but pretending to be a carbuncle worked the best.
“I see.”
That was how he ended up meeting Yera Mul.
Piiiiiik.
At that moment, the sound of a whistle rang out in the distance, and as if it were a signal, the Seaborn began moving in that direction.
‘Why do these guys engage in Communion?’
For Yul, he needed to reach max Communion level to lift the seal, so that made sense—but why did the other Seaborns do it?
“Pinky, why do ordinary Seaborn engage in Communion?”
-I-isn’t it to raise their rank? During Communion, all abilities increase, experience gain goes up, and you can even learn new skills.
“And what do they want from that?”
-W-what do they want?! Obviously, to become stronger—what else could it be?
The one who cut in was a massive creature resembling a horseshoe crab. A red ruby was embedded in its forehead, its back shaped like a horseshoe crab’s shell, while its lower body resembled a crayfish.
-To become strong. Stronger and stronger, until one day I ascend as a Transcendent creature!
“Really? That’s it? No meaning of existence or anything like that?”
-That’s right. For that purpose alone, I’m responding to the arrogant demands of those human bastards. Meaning of existence? Instead of wasting time on that, I’ll smash more Seaborn and gain more experience!
Its appearance and words were like a manifestation of fighting spirit. An extremely belligerent one.
-Lostura! Gideon! Ahramad! I’ll crush all of you! Uooooooh!
And as if it were the first match, it immediately barged into the arena.
“What was that guy?”
-Oh, just one of those who only want to get stronger. I heard it’s a Seaborn in Communion with the child of some ducal house, but I can’t remember the name. Ah, I think it was called Rafatum.
“Hm.”
It seemed that the Seaborns of the Department of Communion were conscious of one another and treated each other as rivals.
Yul had thought the smaller ones might be less aggressive, but that wasn’t the case either.
-Kyaaaaak!
-Ptueeeeeh!
The small ones were locked in their own little standoffs among themselves.
“Truly a jar of small poisons.”
Yul had his match confirmed by Lucian, who had approached him. Shall he go and smoothly secure his first win?
* * *
Bubble… bubble.
The sea near Weimar Wigma Academy.
Gas bubbled up to the surface, and soon after, a colossal beast revealed itself.
An asymmetrical face. A creature with a twisted spinal frame.
-Multiple Seaborns detected. A perfect place to absorb their vitality. And that presence is…… still not detectable. Is it because there’s no terminal? Well, it doesn’t matter. I’ll make it come out soon enough.
Beneath it, a writhing mass of Sea Horrors emerged in great numbers.
* * *
The martial tournament was a full mobilization of all kinds of bizarre sea creatures.
Just watching the Seaborns alone was more than enough to satisfy the spectators.
A duel between a colossal shrimp clad in iron armor and a flying fish firing sunlight from its forehead like a laser. If a man could resist that, he wasn’t a man.
Naturally, fights like this had money riding on them behind the scenes, so Wigma Academy went ahead and legalized betting on the duels.
Instead, they cracked down hard on illegal gambling.
No idea whose brainchild it was, but it was a damn brilliant idea.
“Since it’s a newly established legal betting system, there are loopholes.”
Yul put all twenty ducats he had on himself.
Normally, competitors weren’t allowed to bet, but there was no explicit rule prohibiting it.
“I’m winning. No question.”
Just then, Lucian came running up to Yul in a panic.
“Yul! Your match is about to start!”
When Yul hurried up onto the arena, a massive mantis shrimp appeared on the opposite side, accompanied by a man who looked like someone from Earth’s Middle East.
Maybe because it was such a huge crustacean, it was grotesque beyond words.
[Now then, match fourteen! The terrifying supersonic puncher, Rokait! And his Sinker, Abudabi of the Department of Communion!]
[And…… on the other side, the Sinker Lucian, and…… uh…….]
At that moment, voices rang out from the spectators.
“Hey! Bring out a Seaborn!”
“Mom, Mom, this is a Seaborn martial tournament, so why is a human up there?”
“We came to watch Seaborn duels!”
The announcer shouted through a voice amplification spell.
[The man on the right is Yul, a Seaborn. He is merely using a Polymorph skill to take on human form. Um, according to his request, he says he will not revert to his original form unless he encounters an opponent strong enough to force him to. Rumor has it that his true body is immensely powerful and enormous. Some even claim he is the first Unique rank Seaborn.]
At those words, the man on the opposite side shouted.
“He won’t return to his original form? I’ll smash him to pieces right now, so start the match already!”
[Ah, understood. Since both sides seem to be in agreement, we will now begin the Seaborn duel!]
The moment the start signal sounded, the mantis shrimp charged forward like a mad beast. Dozens of legs churned as it launched into a frenzied sprint.
And the instant it reached Yul—
Yul raised his hand.
Goooooo! Kuguuuuuung!
The charging mantis shrimp was slammed straight into the ground.
The skill was Telekinesis.
Normally, Telekinesis would be invisible, but this time it was different.
The water covering the entire arena floor was crushed and distorted under overwhelming pressure.
-M-my goodness. What is this tremendous Telekinesis?
Yul stopped pressing down and lifted it as is, then flung it aside.
Thud! Thud! Thud! Thud!
As if swinging it by the tail, he used Telekinesis to smash it alternately left and right.
“B-break free, Rokait! Golden Shell Shedding!”
“Oh?”
Yul saw the mantis shrimp slip out of his telekinetic grip.
What he was holding now was nothing but an empty shell.
‘How did it shed its shell?’
Normally, crustaceans that had just molted would be soft and weakened, but this mantis shrimp seemed even stronger as it rampaged.
“Explosive Punch!”
-Oooooooh!
When the mantis shrimp drove its claws into the ground, the arena floor exploded, stones flipping up into the air.
‘Is this a skill too?’
A technique that imbued the fists themselves with tremendous explosive force, yet inflicted no damage on the user—it had to be a skill.
Then, through the gaps in the debris, the mantis shrimp charged in again.
“It’s over!”
Yul clenched his hand around the rising debris. Grabbing the shattered arena floor, the muddy water, and the mantis shrimp all at once, Yul immobilized everything with overwhelming force.
Then, as he slowly clenched his fist, the space held by Telekinesis began to compress.
Squirm, thrash.
Yul watched the struggling opponent with an indifferent expression.
Seeing that, the opposing Sinker panicked. Realizing that no Seaborn could endure this, his earlier confidence vanished, leaving only terror.
“I, I surrender! I surrender!!!”
[Ah! Abudabi declares surrender! Without revealing his true body, he completely overwhelmed his opponent using only skills! That was astounding Telekinesis!]
It was an absolute victory. From start to finish, he simply pinned down a flailing opponent with Telekinesis.
Yul immediately released it. The compressed arena debris and the mantis shrimp fell back to the ground.
“Healers! Call the healers!”
Recovery mages rushed in to regenerate the fallen mantis shrimp’s injuries.
“Whoa! A Seaborn named Yul? The opponent didn’t even stand a chance!”
“Mom! Mom! I want a Seaborn that can transform into that person, too!”
“What? He beat a Heroic rank Seaborn named Gideon at the start of the semester? You should’ve told us that earlier!”
“Damn it! I lost everything! My money!”
One by one, exactly the reactions Yul wanted followed.
‘At this rate, I’ll smoothly take first place.’
He did want to cross paths with that so-called strongest Seaborn, Lostura.
‘If it’s Heroic rank, I’ll probably need to reveal my true body.’
When he turned around, Lucian was staring at him with sparkling eyes.
“S-so… we’re really getting a thousand ducats soon, right?”
“That’s right. They’re all just small fry.”
“Should we buy meat once we get the prize money?”
“Not a bad idea.”
Yul snapped his head around. He had sensed a strange presence.
“Something is coming from the sea. Lucian, be careful.”
“Huh?”
The tournament was still in the round of sixty-four. Yet something was intruding from outside.
Far away, beyond the surging edge of the sea, a mass of dark seaweed rolled in.
No—more precisely, they were amorphous creatures known as Sea Horrors.
“Emergency! Emergency!”
A mage who had detected the enemy’s approach shouted.