act18d3

R-Rocks! They're falling from the roof—

Uh, Inquisitor, did you block that for us?

You...

The elderly woman grips tightly onto the Inquisitor's sleeve.

Grandma Petra is looking at you, Inquisitor. She's thanking you.

Hold on tighter, then...

You're bleeding.

Tsk... It was that bash I took just now. It kinda hurts, too.

You helped me when the Sea Terror attacked me, too. We'll call ourselves even.

Why am I even doing this to begin with...? It's not like any of you are ever scared of anything. You don't even run away when your lives are in danger. Does that even count as being alive?

Her song... is still stuck in my head.

Inquisitor, the singer isn't here. Is that going to be a problem?

Problem...? Hmph, I guess what you think is a problem isn't that kind of problem.

You know what she's like... If she does actually have a problem, I'm sure the answer to your question wouldn't be too shabby.

If you want to know how that will turn out, you'll just have to wait. Perhaps she will... actually give you a decent answer.

We're almost there to the chapel!

It isn't stopping!

The tentacles reach upwards, crushing all the falling rocks into dust. The gravels collide into the surrounding walls and cause them to fissure.

Specter's saw is rumbling, and the moment the tentacles draw near her, a smirk appears on her face.

I wonder how long it has been since I had to take on a prey like you? This is becoming delightful.

Specter swings her saw in one horizontal stroke, striking it on the wall. A huge hole appears in the granite rockface.

She uses the momentum to flip herself up. At the same time, the saw traces a grayish path beneath her that intersects a tentacle.

A sharp slicing sound rings through the air, slicing the tentacle in two.

With her hair fluttering in the air, the 'nun' grabs what had been a part of the stairs and pushes before continuing her dash toward the chapel.

She gazes at the cross section of the tentacle. A few tiny spores are bulging out of that translucent white area.

Do you hear that? Its cells are screaming just like us.

It has emotions. It used to be an Ægir... No. No more, and it could hardly be called one before.

Suddenly, the tip of its severed tentacle releases the spores, and several sharp-edged streams of liquid gush out toward the hunters.

Skadi flips her sword and presses the blade against her body as a shield.

The three liquid streams hit the blade, pushing Skadi back by several meters. The liquid splashes onto the rockface nearby, boring a few small holes before evaporating.

The pressure's even higher than the waterjet on my workbench.

It's looking at us.

Think of something. Is this thing going to keep growing without end?

All of a sudden, the eyes on the head of the 'bishop' let out a strange beam.

Energy beam?!

That moment, Gladiia's lance slashes the sight organs of the 'bishop.'

A hard membrane layer immediately covers the monster's eyes. The lance's tip leaves a long trail of scar on the membrane.

She then leaps upward as the monster howls in vexation below.

The hunters are almost there to the bottom of the building; the chapel's floor has already crumbled away during their fierce battle. There are only a few seconds left until they make it to the top.

However, Gladiia slows down.

Swordfish?

We're almost done. Going by its size and weight, this should do the trick.

Get ready.

The monster's body lets out a strange sound. The noise of the mountain collapsing and its strange howl are mingled together as they reverberate throughout the chapel.

Yet its hunt has come to an abrupt end.

How could this be...

The monster is confident.

Its power comes from the sea. Their assault is unstoppable. All they have to do is reach out to their consciousness, and the answer will reveal itself.

Its tentacles can almost reach the nun's leg. It will pull her down onto the ground, drag her back, and tear her apart—

Yet it cannot reach her.

It realizes its tentacles cannot extend any further. That difference of four centimeters between it and its prey feels as wide as the deep trenches of the sea.

As her saw revolves in the air, the nun quickly twists herself around, like seagrass in a turbulent current. She tilts her weapon downwards, ready to counter! It mustn't give her this opportunity... It mustn't give them any chances at all!

The bishop is starting to fret. That is, if his blood temperature allows for that.

It needs to evolve. It must evolve further! Its inner shell should still be able to expand further and break free from its flesh!

It should be able to fill its signum with blood before ejecting it in all directions like spikes... Its neural system should be able to release electric currents, and the tips of its tentacles should be able to harden and be used as weapons!

Its body should not be rooted to the bottom of the sea! It should be able to move. Yes, it should move, and it should then be able to slither and swim among the rubble, leap upward, pull their bodies into its coils and crush them!

Evolve! It must evolve... and evolve!

But, suddenly, it 'remembers' the Seaborn, and it realizes, that Seaborn was unconcerned about its life.

The tribe will continue, their future is prolonged. Their descendants will evolve... Their descendants. Its descendants. Descendants.

Not itself.

The bishop's ability to reason is frozen dead in its already dissolved skull.

Evolution is something that concerns the entire group for generations to come. It has nothing to do with itself individually.

It will die.

Its only plausible outcome is to die here in despair.

No, do the Seaborn despair? Are its hopes being shattered only because it had been an Ægir?

It starts to struggle desperately with its external tentacles while its inner ones reach out to its consciousness.

It no longer understands anything. It cannot begin to understand. Just what was it that pushed it to surpass what had been its kinsmen, spurred its growth, and led it to its downfall?

This is as far as it can grow. The Sea Terrors are making their way here by following its pheromones, but they won't be here in time. They are not fast enough... It won't reach those rich nutrients in time.

The Seaborn are not God...

They are a different kind of organism, and so is it. This is as far as it gets. Its body will feed the sea.

Having finally come to this realization, the bishop screams in terror, but its lungs have already been transformed into a kind of filtration organ. All it can do is hopelessly let its cysts continue their beating.

An intense stream of gas gushes out of its mouth. It desperately curls its all-too-long body. The gas that streams out lets out a sharp shriek as it passes through the beast's layers of teeth, sending the entire chapel trembling.

But the monster is unable to escape.

It is prey.

And the hunters have already found their prey.

Now!

This is payback for everything you've done to me...! You could say I've really gone easy on you!

Don't let it get away.

We've made a pretty big ruckus already...

We'll let you off the hook for the other Hunters, bishop.

But this one strike is for my family and my friends, of both the sea and lands, all of whom you murdered.

Die, bastard.

Like flowers blossoming in the sea, the hunters slam downwards straightaway with the stone cold weapons in their hands.

The bishop makes an attempt to retreat back to its cave. Prey animals tend to think their nests are the safest of all locations. This response was etched into their bodies tens of thousands of years ago.

As the enormous creature pulls away, the path begins to collapse as it twists and turns. The mountain crumbles away like cake, large chunks of rock falling down like crumbs.

The bishop flees. It is fast, so fast that it has exceeded the limitations of living organisms. Its body possesses all the qualities that predators and survivalists could only dream of.

As long as it makes it back to its nest and seals off the path, its enemies will have no way to follow it, and it will swallow them as they sleep.

All it needs to do is make it back to its nest.

But it is all too late.

In their swift fall downwards, the hunters look just like—

—Shooting stars.

A sight that those who live in the deep seas rarely have the opportunity to witness.

With his desires and plans clouding his head, the bishop has, of course, never looked up at the night sky to enjoy that spectacle.

But they are different.

When the Abyssal Hunters had to fight for their lives and escape from the melancholy and sacrifice, they swam upwards, and when they finally reached the surface, they could only solemnly gaze upon the star-filled night sky... The Hunters have all etched the destinies of these short-lived stars into their hearts.

Despite everything, the darkness can still be broken.

Now die.

The three shooting stars illuminate the deep passageway.

The bishop is horrified. It has no lungs and no vocal tracts. This thundering sound is as close as it gets to a scream for its current body.