The Golden Gravekeeper - 122 Chapter 122

The Leviathan surged forward, its immense bulk causing huge waves of water to wash over the ships, rocking them and sending several hapless Marrina navymen overboard.

“Hey! Didn’t your parents teach you not to rock the boat?!” I yelled at Mizuno Umi, but she merely rolled her eyes and showed me the finger.

“You’ll all die! And get eaten by my Leviathan! Ha ha ha ha ha!”

“So we’ll all end up in the Belly of the Beast?”

“Stop it! It’s not funny! I’ll kill you!”

This had to be the fifth or sixth time she said that in a single hour, and she had already failed to kill me each time. I shook my head and sighed.

Meanwhile, the Marrina Marines and demon soldiers that I dispatched to capture the ships were already ready. As one, the entire fleet opened fire on the speeding Leviathan. The sheer amount of firepower from at least twenty battleships, thirty-six destroyers and thirty cruisers was enough to level three cities. Even The Emperor’s Glory opened up, with Mkoll and his men taking over the controls of the remaining weapons on the enemy’s former flagship.

Every weapon found its mark. Gauss rounds, railgun projectiles, missiles, plasma bolts, laser beams – all of them slammed into the Leviathan with ship-killing force. The behemoth was so enormous that it was impossible to miss. I mean, a three-hundred meter long beast that was bigger than even most skyscrapers in my previous world was streaking toward us like a mobile fortress wall. Even if we wanted to aim elsewhere, we would still accidentally hit it.

Explosions blossomed across the maw of the Leviathan, engulfing it in a raging inferno. Missiles struck and detonated, plasma seared huge patches of scales off the creature’s skin, and gauss projectiles buried themselves deep within its flesh. The Leviathan let out an earth-shattering roar, its voice so immense it shattered glass for miles around and caused my soldiers to fall over from the pseudo sonic assault.

Nothing happened. The Leviathan was scarred and brusied from the sheer volume of firepower, but it was neither mortally wounded nor crippled. If anything, it was accelerating across the sea. It would be upon the fleet in less than a minute.

“Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!”

Mizuno was guffawing with that annoying laugher of hers. Bending over, she clutched her stomach and wiped tears off her eyes.

“It’s useless! Nothing you can do will ever hurt my Leviathan! Destroy all of them! Annihilate the fleet! I would rather these ships get destroyed than fall into the hands of the enemy!”

The Leviathan bellowed, as if signaling that it was complying with Mizuno’s orders.

I merely sighed and shook my head, forgetting that Mizuno still couldn’t see me inside my Titan’s cockpit.

The clouds broke apart and the zombie ancient dragon descended, howling in fury and bloodlust. Dozens of magic circles appeared around him and he unleashed Draconic Meteor Barrage. Fiery meteors materialized in the skies and rained down upon the Leviathan in a devastating hail, vaporizing large volumes of seawater into steam and carving bloody craters into the Leviathan’s body. The enormous sea serpent thrashed about, screeching in agony. The waters around the behemoth turned red as blood poured out of its mortal wounds in torrents.

“What the hell?!”

Mizuno was literally jumping up and down in rage and disbelief. Jabbing a finger at Ryuu in disbelief, she turned on me.

“How is that possible!? What the hell is that thing?! How can a loser like you summon a dragon? This isn’t fair!”

Yet it was fair if she summoned a 300-meter long sea Leviathan. I really didn’t understand the logic of these bullies.

Gritting her teeth, Mizuno infused her Leviathan with magic. Rolling about in the waters and sending fresh waves rippling across the shore, the enormous Leviathan turned up and unleashed a single jet of highly pressurized water that streaked across the heavens like a spear. Ryuu dodged it, doing a cartwheel in the air, before he retaliated with a black beam of fire of his own. His attack scorched the Leviathan but other than marking its already scarred flesh, it didn’t leave…well, much of a mark.

“That thing’s pretty sturdy,” I muttered as I studied the Leviathan. Despite taking a bombardment from both my newly captured armada and Ryuu’s Draconic Meteor, it was still alive and kicking. Rearing up, it unleashed several more sprouts of highly pressurized water, forcing Ryuu to desperately evade in the air.

The zombie ancient dragon whirled around and released a few torrents of black beams, which tore through the armored hide of the Leviathan. More of the behemoth’s blood leaked into the ocean, but it wasn’t even fazed.

Ryuu dove downward and cast a second Draconic Meteor spell, raining hell on the Leviathan. The ocean turned into boiling steam as the meteors slammed into the Leviathan with apocalyptic fury, causing it to screech as it was driven back. The Leviathan spun about in the boiling water, its bulk sending scalding tidal waves crashing against the battleships and rocking them. Growling, the gargantuan sea serpent swam after the seemingly fleeing Ryuu. More torrents of highly pressurized water blasted out of its pores, piercing Ryuu’s wing.

However, Ryuu had achieved his objective. By soaring in the opposite direction, he had led the Leviathan away from our recently captured fleet and toward much vaster waters. The behemoth churned about in the ocean, trying to chase down the wounded ancient dragon, who was getting lower with each flap of his wings. Fortunately, thanks to his zombie regenerative powers, the injury was closing up and he was gaining height once again.

“Tanaka…this alpha predator of yours…do you really think he stands a chance?”

Mizuno was sneering at me. I shrugged inside my cockpit.

“The arrogance of men is thinking nature is in their control and not the other way around.” I nodded sagely as I did my best impersonation of Ken Watanabe. “Let them fight.”

“What nonsense are you babbling?!” Mizuno shouted. Hey, you were the one who started it with the alpha predator line.

The Leviathan fired several bursts of water at Ryuu again, gouging several holes in the ancient dragon’s wings and causing him to drop into the ocean like a rock. As Ryuu struggled in the sea, the Leviathan closed in on him, opening its wide maw to swallow him whole. Not that it was capable of swallowing a dragon of that size.

But I was aware that Ryuu might really get killed if this went on. He was my trump card, the most powerful familiar I had on hand. There was no way I could let him die – the moment Ryuu was defeated, it meant that I had no cards left to play. Well, there was still the nuclear option, but nuking the Leviathan when it was this close to us would be suicide. Furthermore, I didn’t want to expose my men to radiation and other deadly effects.

Not to mention I would be damaging the environment. Whose bright idea was it to give me the ability to summon a freaking nuke?!

“Ha ha ha ha ha!”

Mizuno was laughing that annoying laughter of hers again, crowing triumphantly as she watched her Leviathan close in on my hapless ancient dragon.

“Even your dragon is no match for my Leviathan! Die! Just die!”

“There really is something wrong with you.”

I shook my head and then glanced up at Ryuu, who was trying to get away from the approaching Leviathan. Looked like I had no choice.

“Thousand Astral Graves.”

A thousand and eight watery graves rose out of the ocean like tiny islands, seawater running off them and spilling back into the sea. Like a floating graveyard, the gigantic tombstones towered over even Ryuu, each of them resembling a monolith or some sort of monument in the middle of nowhere – ancient structures that belonged to a long-dead civilization.

“…what the hell is that?!”

Mizuno was gaping at me. I wanted to gloat, but remembered that I would just fall into the same level as her irritating attitude of thinking she had already won before the match was over, so I said nothing and remained humble.

Having seen how much of a fool Mizuno made herself out to be, I had no intention of making myself look stupid.

Ryuu transformed and evolved under the 12 different buffs of the Thousand Astral Graves, his already immense bulk growing to enormous proportions to rival even Leviathan’s size. His wings and body healed, and his tail stretched out, lancing across the water. A black halo glimmered sinisterly around his behemoth body, and the sea began to churn and bubble as it was corrupted by the black energies. With a bellow, Ryuu spread his wings and took off into the skies, his brilliant form momentarily blotting out the moonlight and suffusing the surroundings with a terrifying aura.

The ancient dragon had evolved into a dragon god.

Ryuujin (yeah, might as well change his name now that he was a dragon god) raised a single arm and pointed a claw at the Leviathan.

Barely anyone saw what had happened. The next thing I knew, hundreds of black beams materialized and tore through the Leviathan, ripping the screaming behemoth apart. The Leviathan thrashed about, but Ryuujin didn’t stop bombarding the dying behemoth until it was nothing but a floating corpse on the ocean, its body peforated and filled with holes.

But incredibly, the Leviathan was still somehow alive. It weakly flopped about, rolling about in the boiling sea, and slowly crawled across the violent waves toward Ryuu. The ancient dragon god allowed the behemoth to gradually approach him, and then he grabbed up the flailing Leviathan with both claws and raised it toward his jaws.

With a single movement, he nearly ripped the Leviathan’s gaping maw apart and released a single black torrent of fire down the sea serpent’s throat. The Leviathan’s head was torn away from the rest of its body, which was incinerated by the black, godly fires and reduced into nothing but smoldering ash that was swept away by the sea.

“How…how is that possible?!”

Mizuno inadvertently backed away when she saw the unexpected (for her) outcome. Stumbling back, she dropped to her butt and stared dumbly at the venerable ancient dragon god. Ryuujin slowly turned toward him, his dark eyes blazing under the shadows of the Thousand Astral Graves that surrounded him.

That was enough. Using Ryuujin against Mizuno would be overkill. Never mind overkill, I might accidentally erase my own fleet and men if I had him attack Mizuno. That was how powerful he was right now.

So I had him disappear for a bit, along with the watery gravestones that marked the boiling ocean like silent, deathly islands.

“Sir…that was…”

“I don’t have enough energy to maintain such a high-level summon and buff spell for so long,” I replied tersely. Mkoll hesitated, but shook his head.

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“No, I mean…what the hell was that spell and dragon? I heard you could summon such things, but this is the first time I’ve actually seen them…”

“I hope you enjoyed the show!”

“Um…no, that’s not what I mean.”

I wasn’t sure what he meant, unless he meant to sound impressed or something. Not that I cared. I had more important things to worry about. Instead, I turned toward the stunned Mizuno, who was blabbering in disbelief.

Time to finish this battle once and for all.

“It’s your turn now.”

As usual, I had no intention of gloating or wasting time making my opponents suffer like all villains and antagonists did and thus allowing them the time or opportunity to retaliate or escape, so I immediately dashed forward to obliterate Mizuno with my broadsword.

Mizuno glanced at me, her eyes finally sparking in fury. Rising to her feet, she raised her fist and screamed.

“Release the Kraken!”

There was no answer.

“I didn’t know you have a kraken,” I muttered as I swung Matsukaze’s broadsword. Mizuno, to her credit, reacted pretty quickly and summoned a water naginata to parry the strike. However, a human hero such as herself couldn’t withstand the sheer force of a blow from a bloody Titan, and Matsukaze’s attack sent her flying across the ship.

“Ugh!”

Reducing another wall to rubble, Mizuno slumped down, but she refused to give in. gritting her teeth, she pulled herself up and leaned on her water naginata.

“I don’t mean Kraken! I mean the Blooded Soldiers!”

“What the hell are those?!”

My question was answered almost immediately as heavily mutated soldiers leaped from the remains of the smoldering naval harbor and landed on The Emperor’s Glory. Each of them was a hulking beast, with tusks growing from their lower jaws, and their muscles bulging out in disproportionate portions that indicated a ridiculous amount of strength. Their eyes were blank, devoid of intelligence, and they were slavering – obviously they had been mentally neutered into mindless berserkers who could only obey their commanders. Even though their human origins were visually obvious, they had mutated into something that was more beast than men. Aside from leather armor and metallic breastplates that hung over their oversized frames, they were armed with all sort of weird weapons like lightning claws (without the lightning) and mauls.

But another question came to mind.

“Where did they come from?”

“Ha ha ha ha! These are soldiers who have comsumed vast amounts of artificial mermaid blood and evolved into the ultimate warriors! It doesn’t matter even if you’re a hero! They possess more than enough power to kill you!”

“Uh…”

I couldn’t help but feel a bead of perspiration drip down my face.

“If they’re so powerful, why didn’t you use them from the very beginning? Why wait until all your soldiers are killed, why bother summoning your Leviathan first, and why wait until the very end before using these guys?”

This honestly sounded to me like a random plot twist that some incompetent author threw in to prolong the battle pointlessly. It made absolutely no sense whatsoever. As much as Mizuno was insane, I didn’t know she was this much of an idiot.

“What’s the point of holding them back until now?!”

“Don’t ask stupid questions!”

Were my questions stupid or was she the one with the idiotic line of reasoning?

“Kill him!”

As if to cover up her embarrassment for forgetting all about her secret weapon until the very end, Mizuno hastily ordered her experimental mutants forward.

It was a one-sided massacre.

I merely trampled on the berserk mutants and flattened them into bloody pulps, or cleaved them in half with my broadsword. As durable and powerful as they were, even they couldn’t survive being sliced into pieces by a gigantic katana or stomped to death by a several-tons Titan.

“What…what?!”

“I see.” I was nodding in understanding after wiping the floor with the last of her Blooded Soldiers. “They’re experimental and just mere prototypes…not even perfected or conditioned properly for actual combat. No wonder you didn’t want to use them until absolutely necessary.”

Judging from how Mizuno was speechless, I was probably right. Or she was probably too dumbfounded by the sheer defeat of her Blooded Soldiers to be able to properly form a sentence or two. It didn’t matter.

I wasn’t interested in her reasoning or the truth. With all the obstacles eliminated, I could finally get my revenge. Not wanting to bother with another plot twist in the form of another bunch of Blooded Soldiers or a second Leviathan, I accelerated my Titan forward and swung down my katana. Despite parrying the blow with her watery naginata, Mizuno was crushed onto the ground. With another swing, I obliterated her weapon and then punched her to the ground.

Then I stomped on her with Matsukaze’s Titanic Feet, dishing out at least 12 Strength 8 AP -2 attacks that did D3 damage each. With the sheer volume of attacks, I managed to slay the enemy Warlord, reducing her to a bloody stain on the deck.

For added security, I sliced her with Matsukaze’s katana, dishing out a flat 6 damage just to ensure she was dead.

By the time I was done, there was nothing left of Mizuno but a pool of blood and squashed, tattered flesh. It was going to be a pain to wash all of that off the deck, but it was completely worth it. As an added measure, I used my vampire abilities to drain the blood away from the deck to ensure she could never be resurrected.

“Sir! Are you all right?!”

Looking through the visual display, I saw that Mkoll and his men were approaching. Additionally, I was receiving vox-hails from the rest of my soldiers and commanders.

“Confirm kill,” I informed them through the vox. “The Omega-level threat has been eliminated. The so-called hero is dead.”

There was a rousing cheer from all over the vox. Resisting the urge to smile, I flipped the channels and contacted Lieutenant Charlie Bass.

“Lieutenant Bass, what’s your situation?”

“We’re safe, thanks to you, sir.” Bass quickly filled me in on what happened. Apparently all the naval soldiers were recalled back to the base to retake the ships, only to be shelled to obliteration by our captured fleet. Right now, the small squad of Marines were helping the laborers out. They had been malnourished, abused and ill-treated and were in need of medical help.

Upon hearing that, I quickly contacted the corpsmen of the other companies and assigned them to look after the laborers. Just in time, Aoyama Aoi contacted me to let me know the counter-curse was done, so I asked him to come and help out with the medical treatment.

With all that done, I jumped out of my Titan and surveyed the fleet. Mkoll stalked up to me and saluted.

“All ships captured, sir.”

“Great job, everyone.” I took a deep breath and finally allowed myself a small smile. “Rotate everyone in shifts and get them to rest. This is just the beginning.”

Mkoll shook his head. “Go get some rest, sir. You’re the one who did most of the work.” He glanced at the pool of blood that used to be Mizuno Umi. “I still can hardly believe how you trounced a hero like that.”

“It was quite difficult,” I admitted, remembering how Mizuno’s Leviathan gave me and Ryuu so much trouble. Fortunately, all that was done now and I could finally take a break. Grinning, I raised my fist toward the night sky. “And that’s another one crossed off my revenge list.”

Number of former classmates killed: 7. Number of bullies left to kill: 6.

Their days were numbered.