Chapter 73: The Balance Point of the Universe
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[Third Person Point of View]
It's just been a few hours since Aqua vanished to do whatever he wanted to do. Mem-Cho knew there shouldn't be anything to worry about, but she couldn't help it.
Aqua was strong, but how strong exactly? She hadn't seen him fight with her own two eyes yet. So she felt a little worried about this whole endeavor. What if he ended up in big trouble? That mage yesterday seemed strong, and Quku didn't trust him – what if Aqua had to go against him? Will he be all right?
Mem-Cho was smoking and staring into the sea from the balcony of her room as she pondered all this. It was then that the wind exploded from the sea, and energy blasted outward. A portal appeared out of nowhere in the distance, and tentacles wiggled out of it. They were so large that Mem could see from here, but the figure of two people near the portal was but a dot to her eyes.
Despite that, she could tell who the dot was.
Her eyes twitched as the cigarette fell from her hand and she groaned, "What did he get himself into this time?"
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[First Person Point of View]
Perhaps the Kraken did it intentionally, sensing the danger from the sea beasts, or perhaps it was a natural occurrence due to the dimensional imbalance—in either case, we were spat out of the Middle Shore and back into the Far Shore. In Hawaii, Earth.
The bad thing was that the portal came to this realm with us. The Kraken's twelve tentacles were stretching the portal from the other side, and now I could see one of its red eyes glaring at us.
"I hate that Cthulhu's breed, all of them," I let out a groan as I recalled an old enemy from my 7th life. That world was filled with aliens of all kinds, but I hated these squids more than the others.
This one was strong, but not enough that I won't be able to deal with it. But it will take a bit of time and effort. Which wasn't very nice since I was in a human-populated area where many ships were around us.
Cameras were recording the scene. That wasn't a bad thing, I did say it was a plan of mine to reveal the magical side of this world. But not like this. Because even though the ships were fleeing, they were slow. The portal will expand before they can flee and they'll end up dead. No, the entirety of Hawaii will perish if that thing comes out. I can stop it, but our right will only quicken the erasure of the island.
So, I have to end this in the fastest possible way that is currently possible for me.
"Shirah- wait, your name is Shirahoshi right?" I quickly asked the mermaid on the back of my Mirage Frame, who broke out of her daze of staring at the stupid squid with fear-filled eyes.
"Ah- ah, yes. How did you know?" She looked at me, as I looked back at her from inside the head of my Tiger Mirage.
"I'm dropping you to the sea. You swim away from here. My job was to rescue you, and I have fulfilled that already. But now I have to take care of the squid. Do you understand?"
"Y-yes, I-" she sniffled. "I understand!"
"Good," I lowered my position from the sky and near the sea. The Kraken sensed what I was about to do, that I was about to let go of the fish that was filled with too much magical energy for her age, and threw two of its tentacles toward me.
My Tiger Claws flashed across the sky, like twinkling stars, they cut through the tentacles like tofu. It was harder than last time, the squid was gaining its full power back the more it expanded the portal. But the tentacles were still cut and splattered across the sea.
They began to regenerate right away, but it was enough for me to let Shirahoshi go. I dropped her on the water. There shouldn't be any fish here that'll be dangerous to her, given her size, and on top of that, that crazy power of hers.
I felt her stare at me from under the water, prompting me to frown at her. Did she think I couldn't see her? She flinched seeing me frown and quickly scattered away from this area.
Alright. Now it's time to end the squid.
I called something from my Soul Space, it was a Soul Weapon. The Death Sword that I got from that weird box that I used to kill a few members of the Phenex Family. If it could negate their regeneration properties, it should work against this thing too.
Perhaps not entirely stop the regeneration, given it was a relative of Cthulhu, but it should slow down the regeneration for me to take it out. Fucking squids.
The squid had begun to rampage when I cut off its tentacles again. A few of its tentacles stopped trying to pull the portal and began to hit anything nearby instead. And the only thing nearby other than the sea was cruise ships. Humans screamed and I changed the use of my Icon.
It's odd to hold a sword with tiger paws. But I don't want to use the Crown Icon again, that's to rejuvenate the Emperor again. So I switched the use of [Tiger Icon] from the outer shell it provided into a more internal change. It's similar to the thing I did to change my lungs yesterday to take a dip in the ocean but across my entire body.
The [Mirage Frame] tightened around me, the shape of a tiger turned humanoid, and it merged with my skin.
The [Metamorphosis Transformation] was a technique that allowed me to call forth the abilities of my past lives Icons into myself rather than into an aura Armor. My body grew taller, my shoulders broader, and my blonde hair turned white. My sclera turned black and my pupils silver, as tiger stripes spread across my body. A tail came out of my tailbone, and two ears sprouted from my head.
This used to be my humanoid form in my 6th life, and now I have it in this life. It was quite draining, but it was very strong and fast.
I'd have rather not showed off my abilities in front of cameras, and luckily due to the Kraken's rampage, nobody on the ships had the free time to record this. So I streaked across the sky and toward the tentacles.
My blade ran across the tentacles that were furiously rampaging and cut them into halves. The tentacles fell into the ocean, but they didn't regenerate. Not right away anyway, I could feel it could begin to grow back not long after.
As if enraged further by my action, by not being able to regenerate, the Kraken let out a ghastly howl.
"Growwwll!"
The entire sky darkened and the portal let out a wave of magic that washed around all of Hawaii. I felt thousands of people lose their consciousness, and worst of all, the portal let out a sound like the breaking of glass against glass, just as the Kraken fully stepped out into this world.
Ah, shit.
I wanted to end it before it could come out. And the portal didn't close, which meant if I was too late in defeating this, other otherworldly monsters might come through it.
Goddamnit.
As if summoned by the term "God", the sky roared. A reptilian figure flew through the dark clouds. Lightning danced against its skin, and a song spread across the sky.
A hexagonal shape shone brilliantly in the sky. The clouds hastily scattered to reveal the golden carving of a dragon's face on it, floating over the real head of a feathered and winged snake. A Dragon.
Quetzalcoatl floated while her tail rolled behind her, her large wings spread to cast a shadow over the entire world, while the Dragon Icon streaked with power above her head. The Icon sang, and I didn't mean that metaphorically, it really sang the song [Stronger] by Kanye West.
I see.
As always, my sheer presence brought the concept of Icons into that particular world. The universe opened up to newer powers to balance with my existence. I am such a variable, such a powerful entity, that the universe itself evolves to allow Icons into their world. From the looks of it, this was not the first time Quetzalcoatl saw her Icon — for a person of her stature, she might have gained that the day I was born in this world as Doctor Garou.
The [Tiger Icon] in the sky matched the [Dragon Icon] with ease, and if not for my current strength, I could have easily overpowered it.
'...How dare a puny lizard take the same spot as me in the sky?'
I quickly calmed myself, that wasn't what was important right now. The important thing was that — the Kraken was glaring at her instead of me.
Its tentacles had regenerated already. But I didn't worry anymore. As I watched the massive feathered dragon open its maw, letting out a cry of power as a glint of light began to form there, I knew I didn't have to do anything else here.
My work was done.
"[Feather Dragon's Breath]!"
A brilliant beam of power that could take out even me, rushed toward the Kraken. The country-ending beam dove into the face of the squid, growing bigger to cover up its entire body as it caused the air to explode due to the heat while the squid was vaporized.
The Dragon's Breath lasted half a minute and when it ended, there was no trace of the Kraken left. Even the portal had been destroyed. I couldn't sense the tentacles that I cut a minute ago, even though they were in the sea. They too had been 'erased' even though they didn't get hit by the beam. The beam was a conceptual erasing ability.
"Phew, damn." I lowered my blade and eased my shoulder. I let go of my Tiger Icon in the sky too. That was impressive, for this low-level world.
I expected the dragon to turn back into a human and drop beside me, but it didn't. She kept hovering over the sky, her golden eyes staring at me with odd contempt.
What's going on?
"You,"
Her massive mouth moved as she spoke. Her teeth bared as she growled at me.
"You were the little rat from two nights ago, in the sea? And you killed the Jaguar brat? And you also stole the Box of Xolotl? Of course you did, where else would you get that weapon from?"
Ah.
Shit.
That Treasure Box did look like it came right out of some mythology. Based on her words, it belonged to the brother of Quetzalcoatl – the Dog God of Death, Xolotl.
Fuck fuck fuck-
"Return it to me," Quetzalcoatl clasped her jaws and let out a huff from her nose. "This is pissing me off, but I'll overlook it since I like you – and you just finished an assignment for me. Return the sword, and I'll forget this ever happened."
'At least she's understanding,' I heaved a sigh. But not in relief, but in defeat. Fuck me.
"About that," I rubbed the back of my head with an awkward smile. "I had no choice but to connect the weapon with my soul." The situation back then called for it, I had to sacrifice the Treasure Box as a supplement for Soul Fire. "So it's a part of me now… Sorry, I can't return it."
The Dragon God of Venus stared at me. The anger that she had been holding back went free and she widened her jaws. "Fine. I shall claim it from your soul, then."
"Hey, I thought we were cool-"
[Feather Dragon's Breath]
The brilliant beam of conceptual destruction that just took out the Kraken, that erased the squid from the face of reality, rushed toward me at full force.
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