342. The Deep Sea Matriarch (3)
342. The Deep Sea Matriarch (3)
- 1 -
The execution of the 'Deep Sea's Great Mother' was a success.
Once all the remaining krakens were either dead or had fled, the sea settled into an eerie calm, as if nothing had ever happened.
The fleet, now reduced from five ships to three, was equally silent, as if infected by that stillness.
However, that quiet only applied above deck.
Below, it was swarming with frantic activity.
"All kraken carcasses this way! We need to preserve them!"
"Move it, move it!"
A damp, fishy stench stung the nostrils.
The lowest cargo hold of the Black Lily was filled with the smell of monster blood, flesh, and human sweat.
On one side, noisy commotion erupted as they processed the kraken carcasses. On the other, captured fanatics were being dragged away, their screams and curses mingling into a din.
The space, magically expanded by Libertas to accommodate two kraken carcasses, was quite literally a scene of chaos.
"「Still Springs」."
"「Glass Bead that Holds Time」."
"「Frost Flower that Never Melts」."
Everyone capable of using magic, whether monster or human, was bustling about, extracting and preserving high-value body parts from the carcasses.
However, there was one carcass they couldn't bring themselves to touch.
A giant body far more valuable than any other corpse here, yet one that radiated such an ominous aura even in death that no one could even approach it.
It was Gertrude's corpse.
"Hoo."
In the end, the one who stepped forward before that black, twisted flesh was the Mermaid Lord herself, Salvia Wepar.
After suppressing the corpse's curse with all her magical power, she reached her hand between its six eyes.
Past the unpleasant sensation, she found something like a hard sphere. She fixed it in her hand with magic and carefully pulled it out.
Jjigeok...
A sphere, almost the size of a person, holding a faint, bizarre light, was separated from the flesh.
It was the second heart of an ancient monster, radiating a mana so potent it made the skin tingle just by looking at it.
In the Western Continent, it was also called a 'Cintamani'.
It was a Mana Core.
- 2 -
Above deck, the cold night sea breeze brushed past her hair.
"I still feel like my blood's boiling..."
Shue leaned against the railing and let out a refreshing sigh.
It felt as if the adrenaline that had stormed through her veins like a tempest was only now subsiding into a calm lake.
In contrast, a shadow was cast upon the face of Saya, who stood beside her.
A gloom seeped from her drooping shoulders and her gaze, fixed on the distant horizon.
Sensing this, Shue asked curiously,
"What are you worrying about...?"
Saya answered quietly, her eyes still fixed on the sea.
"I feel as though I was not of much help. In my prime, I would have been able to play a greater role."
Shue shook her head and stated firmly,
"That's a misconception."
While Libertas had clearly played the decisive role in this fight, it was not a situation she could have resolved alone.
Besides...
"Honestly, even if Master hadn't come, we probably could have managed the situation somehow with our cooperation..."
Of course, they would have suffered far greater sacrifices, and perhaps one of them would have died or been wounded nearly to death.
But if the number of krakens had been smaller, such a thing wouldn't have happened in the first place.
And even if the Great Mother had appeared and coordinated an attack in that situation, they could have overcome it somehow.
But assumptions were meaningless.
Only what had already happened, and what was happening now, held any value.
Besides...
"Master landed that final spell through the opening you created, didn't she...? The wound I made just regenerated right away."
"Hm."
Saya cleared her throat and averted her eyes.
She knew it too. She knew Shue was not wrong.
Her own power had indeed been insufficient in this battle.
Without Libertas's mana, even holding on until the end would have been difficult.
It was just that her intense desire to be of greater help to her lord made her feel that much more regret and frustration.
"..."
The conversation paused for a moment. The two naturally shifted their gazes to the other side of the deck, where Libertas stood alone, staring out at the distant sea.
Her black dress melted into the darkness of the night sea, and her purple eyes, shining like jewels, held an indescribable weight, like a deep abyss or the secrets held by an ancient star.
She seemed lost in thought, as if carrying all the weight of the world on her shoulders.
Sarak.
Then, her eyes met theirs, and she smiled.
So naturally, as if she hadn't been listening to their conversation at all.
But they knew.
They knew that while worrying about her own concerns, Libertas was also listening to them and thinking about how to comfort Saya.
And they also knew that Libertas knew they had realized she was pretending not to hear their conversation.
They had that kind of relationship.
- 3 -
I was quietly listening to the two of them talk.
Seeing them go up to the deck together when everything was so hectic below, I couldn't help but be concerned.
Both of them had fought a tough battle today.
But the worry was needless.
After confirming that Saya's mental state had returned to normal from just a few words from Shue, I came back down to the lowest level.
"Here it is."
"Thank you."
As I took Gertrude's core from Wepar, an ominous aftertaste flowed through my hand along with a vast power.
That sensation pulled the worry that had gripped me on the deck back up to the surface.
The last words the 'Great Mother' had left right before her death.
[We... no longer hide...]
Before meeting her end, Gertrude's final words resurfaced vividly.
As if I was hearing them right by my ear.
[The slumbering ones... are awakening... They... will rule over you...]
Gertrude's last utterance, spat out even as her breath stopped, even had a hint of laughter in it.
[I will... wait... laughing... in hell...]
It was not simply the curse of a loser.
It was a statement implying the existence of 'something' I did not know about.
'What could it be.'
The slumbering ones.
Was that a reference to other Lord-class monsters of the past?
Or did it refer to something above even that?
It seemed certain that, like the Lord-class monsters whose locations Eligos or Agares provided, powerful beings hidden somewhere in this world were awakening.
Conversely, the claim that they would rule over us probably meant they would become beings of Dungeon Lord level or higher.
Then how many of them were there, and when and how would they reveal themselves?
And how should I respond to them?
That was the core of my concern. But...
'I can't come up with an answer yet.'
All I knew was that they were beings of tremendous power.
I had hurriedly tried to read Gertrude's memories, but all I read from her soul was that she had destroyed her own memories and soul right before dying.
Realizing that I was a Dungeon Lord, she had wiped out even the means by which I could obtain a final clue.
I couldn't find a single clue about those beings that she might have remembered.
If that was the case, I had no choice but to do what I could do right now.
- Uuuu...
I looked up at Gertrude's core.
The core of a being worthy of the title 'Grand Lord', surpassing an ordinary Lord-class.
But I couldn't use this as it was. A high-rank body already had difficulty digesting a Lord-class core, so what if it was something beyond that?
To feed this to my closest subordinates now, a degree of 'processing' was required.
I lifted the core and held it in my hand.
A core large enough that a person could stretch out their limbs across it.
The size was quite awkward to say I was 'holding it in my hand'...
But as soon as I applied force to my grip, the situation quickly changed.
Hwaak!
The sharp edges of magical power, blooming like a flower, turned into blades and burrowed into the core.
Jjeojeojeok — !
A core, being an aggregate of magical power, has no shell.
But the core before my eyes was cracking on the surface, splitting to both sides.
- Kuhaaa — !!
I heard her scream from when she was still alive.
As a result of the 'separation,' the core's size was greatly reduced, becoming about the size of my head. The other half was the same.
One was a Lord-class core. The other was an accumulation of power usable as an elite-grade core.
Though dividing it into two decreased the absolute quantity, unusable power was split into two usable pieces, so it was ultimately a gain.
I held the separated cores in both hands, looked at them alternately, and then cast my gaze towards Wepar.
"Let's go to Gertrude."
"Yes."
The Great Mother's monstrous body had shrunk somewhat compared to when she was alive, affected by the extracted core.
Without the magical power to sustain its size, it was gradually withering.
'If I refine this flesh into a core, I could use it for other purposes, but...'
Right now, it was time to give a special reward to the woman who had abandoned so much to pledge her loyalty to me and join my ranks.
Ttokgak.
I walked toward the carcass of the 'Great Mother' and took the weaker of the two cores in my hand.
Then, I exerted the essential power dwelling in my own flesh.
The power of necromancy inherited from my father, the Gluttony Duke.
"「Summon: Eldritch」."
- Kiyahhh — !!!
With a scream far sharper than before, the core and the flesh began to resonate.
The flesh, already withering, dried up further.
To a level where, in human terms, one would say 'skin stuck onto bones.'
It was a process of all unnecessary flesh being converted back into magical power.
Between the dried bones and flesh, 'mana' now filled the gaps and swelled.
Beonjjeok!
And a moment later, light returned to the six eyes.
Not the red light from when she was alive, but light reflecting the color of her soul.
Hers was a deep blue.
"It suits you well."
"...! Could it be, my lord..."
"Yes. It's an elite-class monster I am bestowing upon you."
Although it was pitifully lacking compared to when she was alive, she had been a Lord-class monster in life.
If nurtured like this, she might one day regain a fraction of her former level.
And it was quite uncommon for a high-rank Dungeon Lord to have a Lord-class monster as a subordinate.
Just as it was equally uncommon for a superior Dungeon Lord to personally use their power to craft and bestow a monster upon a vassal.
"...Thank you."
Wepar bowed her head, her voice trembling slightly with emotion.
Without a word, I stroked her head and turned to leave.
The next thing I had to focus on was the more intact dungeon core.
- 4 -
Looking at the 'Lord-class core' in my hand, I fell into deeper thought.
'How to use this core.'
There were largely two options.
First, using the core immediately to strengthen one of my five closest subordinates in advance.
In this case, the subject would most likely be either Shue or Saya, who had distinguished themselves in this battle.
It would allow for an instant boost in combat power, but it might leave the other retainers feeling disappointed.
Second, collecting all four remaining cores and conducting a ritual to elevate all five retainers to the Lord-class simultaneously.
If successful, this would be the most ideal method.
It would give equal opportunities to all five retainers, and there was the potential for their powers to rise in harmony.
But collecting all five cores was a task without a promised end, and above all, a ritual gathering five beings with Lord-class potential in one place would carry unimaginable dangers.
External attacks could not be ruled out, nor could unforeseen accidents during the ritual process.
Now that I had heard Gertrude's warning, I couldn't afford to stall for time and take on such risks.
In the end, there was only one conclusion.
"Shue, Saya. Come here for a moment."
""Yes.""
I called the two over and fell into slightly deeper thought.
'Who will obtain greater power first?'
Both had performed sufficiently in this battle. Neither was lacking.
It was hard to say one's loyalty was stronger than the other's either. Their loyalties were simply different in direction.
But the choice had to be one.
Nevertheless, it didn't take long to reach a decision.
"You go first."
It didn't take that long to reach a decision.