Chương 80: Chapter 79 - Cost of War.

She looked up to see the beast dead, Rowen having cut it in half, the storm flux still ran through the air. He spoke to her, but she could not hear him over the screaming. She gasped for air.

"Nythera, we need to get you out of here, NOW" Rowen propped her up, ensuring she didn't tumble backwards over the railing.

"No, we are not done with this, we are not done until that fucking thing is dead!" She yelled back. He flinched. His eyes flicked down for just a second. What? The arm? That won't stop me.

"NO, I can still fight, we must kill that thing! Look at what it has done to my ship, to my crew. They are ALL DEAD!" Nythera cried. He spoke softly, as if walking on ice "How much Health do you have left?" The question shocked her out of her reverie. Health: 934/1, 545"Over nine hundred, but it's depleting rapidly" she frowned, "but don't worry I feel weirdly fine, we have a war to win" Nythera reassured him. She tried to wipe the drying tears off her cheek, just to remember, one arm was but a stump now.

The stump was already growing a tender layer of new skin, the bleeding had stopped. But it was not regrowing the missing bone from the elbow down.

"Look we need to get you- AAAAAAGH" Rowen stumbled backwards, arms flailing to get at the spawn that had landed on his back. Nythera reached for her dagger. The stump fell short. Did it have to be my right arm? She looked down at it, puzzling over it. The deck was completely covered in green ichor and corpses. Nythera collapsed, back against the central console. Ohhhhh was it poisoned? Nah its probably fine, I just need to close my eyes for a bit.

She leaned down till her body carried her to the ground, lying against the deck. Eyes shutting slowly, she felt cold. In the distance, over the back of the ship, she could see another silver shell arcing towards the Obros-ka, sunlight glinting off it. Beautiful. Wait. Wait, they are still shooting at it? We aren't done yet? WHERE THE HEL AM I GOING? Nythera pushed her stump against the deck. Boxy broke open in her cloak and a swarm of rings rasped out like a river, flooding over her form.

Ring after ring filled her remaining hand, she tried to pry them off, but the stump was not cooperating. Bands of rings linked together wrapped around her wrist, ankles and one big band tightened around her neck. They moved in unison "fight or die" Xyrk spoke. Power flooded her body, jolting her awake. Her body moved on its own, legs pushing her to her feet. Her good arm rapidly heated up, flux flooding it. Her arm turned backwards, pointed behind her. A shell fired out a second later.

She craned her neck just in time to catch a group of spawn blasted off the side.

"Kill or be killed" they rasped in harmony. Her arm raced across the console, adjusting the jet force, collapsing the fins, and changing their course. The ship had long since raced past the maw back to the open seas. Fine, you get my good arm, but I still got my head. Nythera brought forth the Aether Cannon, filling it with as much hyper-flux as she could. I'll leave the ship and spawn to my… newly liberated arm.

It swung out and pulverized a spawn with a single punch while loading another round, a split second later it unleashed a shell into the air, detonating on one of the giant spawn. The ship rotated, returning for another firing barrage. Xyrk piloted them close to the great waterfalls of ichor, surprisingly deft with the controls. She was nearly thrown off her feat, Rowen barreled into the railings as they turned. Her feet were rooted to the ground, held in place by the bands of rings around her ankles.

It's growing on me, but only a little.

"FIRE" She bellowed, despite the aching in her arm, all of her focus was on the shell. It arced forth and flew straight into a great crater of a wound. Shell dug through flesh and the detonation ripped open massive arteries. The right flank of the maw began to collapse under its own weight. Her left arm unleashed a barrage of projectiles, one after another in several different directions. Well at least its not getting hot, seems this fucker can use my skills better than I can.

Another shot began loading into the cannon, the last of her hyper flux. She smirked down at a Rowen, who simply stood watching in awe, no spawn managed to land on the deck now that her arm had been turned into an automatic murder cannon.

"By the gods, dualcasting" he muttered as another shell thundered off. The ship barreled forth, unhindered by spawn, the great tooth had sunk deep into the flesh of the lower jaw. How is this thing not dead yet? Speaking of that, I haven't seen a shell from the other ships in awhile, I guess they ran out or died trying, lets hope for the former. The Obros-ka loomed over them. Is it…. No way. FUCK GOGOGO Synchronized Thunder could not activate fast enough, yanking the ship away from the monster.

Stolen story; please report. It fell. The waterfalls of ichor raced forward across the water as the leviathan tumbled from its perch on the wakepath. Nythera had the cannon pivoted and fired shell after shell into the falling monster as they sprinted from its corpse. The shadows thickened as it fell with increasing speed, a great gale force of escaping air pushing along their ship.

Fortunately, even with the meager battery left, the jet force was still way too fast, they broke out into open sunlight well in advance of its bellyflop into the open ocean. The wave it generated would head straight for the south side of Mistvale and any other nearby islands. Pathetic, that wave is only about as big as a single wave from God's Wrath, nothing these islands haven't handled a billion times before. Even in death you don't matter. Nythera's neck craned back, eyes searching.

Where is it, where is it, come on. Precision-Sight was already straining towards the limit, combined with Flux-sight she searched for something hidden within the mists. A huge grin broke out on her face. YES, I can see the wakepath, clear as well, clear as fog I suppose. It's really there!

"Keeping you awake costs too much energy, go to sleep" The rings around her neck rasped. Her eyelids gained the weight of boulders and a great throbbing pain lanced through her body from the stump. What the fu- She hit the deck. … Bright light shone through her barely opened eyelids. [System Notifications!] [System Notifications!] [System Notifications!] [System Notifications!] Well at least it learned to shut up when I am fighting. Let's see if it stays that way. Who put this soft thing under my head?

It's making for an adequate pillow. Nythera tried to get up, but so much as twitching her right arm caused pain to lance through her entire body. It was gone, from the elbow down and covered in blood soaked bandages. I wonder if I can use this for magic acts in the bar? BEHOLD MY BLOODY STUMP. I'm not sure it has the right ring to it… maybe I can something attached to the end? A beer glass I can never drop sounds pretty nice. Nythera held up her one good hand, examining it against the sky.

The six rings glittered with the light. At least I still have all of my rings, all six of them. Wait, six? XYRK! I have two new rings, that fucker attached two more of his shit to me. Nythera tried to yank them off and found out of all her rings, the greater leech ring and all three of Xyrk's rings would not come off. [System Notifications!] x 24 FINE, She flicked open the notifications. Level Acquired! x 36 Class Level Threshold Reached: 1 Upgrade Token Acquired 1 Augment Token Acquired What the Hel?

36 despite the leech ring, I probably would have ascended my strata if it weren't for it. Welp, free stats are free stats, can't complain. Multiple skills have leveled up!

Aether Cannon (lvl 22 > 30) (3/4 tokens) (CAPPED) Synchronized Thunder (lvl 12 > 19) (2/4 tokens) Giant-Slayer (lvl 10 > 16) (1/2 tokens) Artillery-Command (lvl 12 > 18) (0/2 tokens) Precision-Sight (lvl 8 > 11) (1/2 tokens) Flux-Condenser (lvl 7 > 10) (1/2 tokens) Heat Resistance (lvl 15 > 17) (0/2 tokens) I wonder if Artillery-Command influenced the ships cannons? It should have, which means it got levels from both my own cannon and the ship cannons, and still barely level. Damn annoying to level.

Precision-sight and Flux-Condenser are also so slowwwwwwwwww, why do my favorite skills have to level so fucking slow? Title Achieved: Dualcaster-master Dualcast without any skill for it. Subskill gained - Dualcasting: You may cast two skills at once, splitting your focus between them. This skill utilizes both Intelligence and Wisdom stats, if stats are insufficient, the mind might break. Flux costs increase by 50% for each skill. For every level, reduce cost increase by 0. 5% and increase cast speed by 0. 5%.

By the fucking gods, I can dual cast now? 50% cost be damned, I've got the flux for it. I've got loads of Wisdom and… some Intelligence, I'm sure I'll be fine, I'll just throw some free stats in it later. Nythera began to maniacally giggle. What if I use an evolution token on it and go for Triplecasting! Triple! Wait, I don't have any other attack skills… Nevermind. A shadow came looming over her.

"Good morning, Milady, how was your rest?"

"Morning? Just how long did I sleep, Rowen? Move your fat head, you're blocking my view of the sky" Nythera whined back. Rowen shifted to the side "About thirty minutes, you woke far faster than I anticipated. We are on the way back to Grandport now, the other ships pulled ahead when our battery finally ran out, I had to lower the jet force" Rowen moved to tap away at the console again "Yup, just 4% left""Turn this ship around, now, or I'll do it myself. We are going back for what we came for."

Nythera tried to push herself up. The stump pressed against the ground, leaving her stunned by pain. Fucking blasted arm, its not even useless, its less than useless. She glared at it menacingly.

"Milady, you might be in shock, you just lost an arm. I'll take you straight to Stormbridge for medical treatment" Rowen tapped vigorously at the controls.

"No, we aren't going back yet. Why the fuck did you think we killed this thing? I need answers, does this path also go back to Vathrial… or somewhere else?" Nythera pulled hard on Synchronized Thunder causing half the jets to turn off, sending them into a slow spin.

"Fine! Fine! Just a look and then right back? We lost our entire crew, the sailors, the archers, they are all fucking dead" Rowen yelled back in frustration. Nythera could not meet his eyes.

"Ok, that works, just a look, then we go back to honor the dead" She relented. I'll need to get something for all of their families and set up a proper burial, someplace nice.

"The whole crew, Nythera. Leri, one of the sailors, had children. Those archers you barely spoke to, I believe some of them also had children. All of them are fucking dead!" Rowen smashed his fist into the console.

"Why are you even here, Rowen? Why are you helping me? Why are you always around? Leave the dead to me, I'm the one who got them killed." Nythera screamed back.

"I am here because if I weren't Myrraval would have been set ablaze by now. I am here because you take me places I could never find on my own. I am here to protect you from yourself" he scowled.

"Rowen, what the fuck do you mean by set Myrraval ablaze?" Nythera used her good arm to pull herself up.

"Shit"