Free Web NovelChapter 102: Tentacles
In the midst of that chaotic situation, panic obviously spread fast across the deck of the "Traveling Mermaid", and Victor struggled to free the many sailors who were grabbed by the Devourer of Ships’ numerous tentacles. freewēbnoveℓ.com
The cries of the sailors mingled with the sounds of battle.
"Save Timmy!"
"Protect Anabel!"
"Damn monster, you’re not going to kill any of our people!"
Victor was protecting the crew members who were most vulnerable while others managed to escape in time. Victor’s eyes searched endlessly for any opportunity to attack, but apart from cutting tentacles, he didn’t seem to be directly damaging the Devourer of Ships.
The sea monster’s tentacles seemed to multiply, wrapping around the ship like iron chains, threatening to crush the vessel and throw everyone on board into the sea. It was like fighting the raging ocean itself, a battle lost before it had even begun.
Desperate, the captain went down to the deck and turned the handle that opened a trapdoor in the middle of the deck that led to the ship’s internal storeroom. His face was marred by shock, but his determination to keep all his crew alive was clear.
"Come on, men! It’s safer inside!" The captain shouted with his words cutting through the air.
Those sailors weren’t pirates, they had no swords to fight with and no skill, they were just workers who made deliveries and took shipments from merchants.
"Come on, Jonathan, you good-for-nothing! You can’t die yet!"
The sailors began to run together towards the door that had been opened.
However, the Devourer of Ships seemed to have eyes in its tentacles, because it noticed the men moving and tried to grab them to drag them to the bottom of the world.
Luckily, Victor was alert and advanced across the deck with his sword slicing through the air. A blow from him cut those two tentacles in half, and the tips of these limbs, which fell to the floor of the deck, continued to twitch by pure natural reflex as if they were still alive.
Despite Victor’s efforts to keep everyone safe, he was the only warrior to deal with so many tentacles that regenerated within seconds of him cutting them off, so two sailors were grabbed and the tentacles holding them retreated towards the sea.
"Nooo! Timmy! Jonathannn!" The captain shouted.
Quickly, Victor approached the edge of the deck and looked down to check where those two sailors had been taken.
When Victor looked down, it was the first time he noticed that the Devourer of Ships had raised the ship more than ten meters above the sea water. This could at any moment bring the ship down and see it crash into the water, and if it hadn’t done that yet there could only be two reasons: it was either very dumb, or very cruel.
Victor also saw the silhouette of the Devourer of Ships for the first time. This monster was hidden inside the sea, so it was only possible to see part of what it was, but it was visibly huge, with a head perhaps even bigger than the "Traveling Mermaid" ship and a single red eye that glowed with ferocity as it looked at Victor.
At that moment, Victor felt the entire ship creaking beneath his feet. It wouldn’t be long before the ship gave way or they all died if they carried on like this.
Then, in a moment of quick and determined decision, Victor saw his opportunity. He climbed onto the wooden deck support and with a daring leap launched himself off the ship, his figure plunging towards the rough sea below.
The wind began to howl in his ears as he fell, and Victor hoped that his spine wouldn’t hurt too much when his feet finally met the water hard. At the same time, his mind was plunged into a whirlwind of thoughts and emotions.
The salty smell of the sea flooded his nostrils as he approached the vast expanse of blue-green water below him.
Victor’s dive was rough. His body cut through the surface tension of the water with a muffled roar, sending concentric waves in all directions. It was then that he was completely submerged, enveloped in liquid darkness, and opened his eyes. Thus, Victor saw the monster’s true and frightening appearance for the first time.
The Devourer of Ships was a creature from nightmares, a rare, gigantic old Moon Squid with green skin and full of bulges from all its time at sea. Its tentacles stretched for many meters, each one more like a tree trunk than a limb of a living creature
Before he could fully process the situation, one of the creature’s tentacles quickly extended towards Victor, grabbing him tightly. Victor didn’t have time to use his sword, as his arms were clamped tightly around his body. The force of the tentacle was overwhelming, but Victor didn’t give up. He concentrated, his mind calming down amid the chaos around him. freewebnovel.cσ๓
’Take it easy... Your oxygen is a valuable resource here...’ Victor thought, warning himself.
Victor then used a special Den technique that he himself had dubbed Sound Release. Striving for it, Victor touched a part of the tentacle with the palm of his right hand and a wave of sound energy spread across the surface of the tentacle’s skin. It was as if the sound itself had become a weapon.
Immediately, the tentacle twitched violently and let go of Victor while the Devourer of Ships emitted a brief sound of pain as if it had been shocked.
In this way, Victor knew that the Devourer of Ships’ weakness was sound, most likely because it lived many meters from the bottom of the sea and wasn’t used to such noise. Possibly that was also the reason for staying underwater.
Free, Victor turned his body and dived even deeper, temporarily escaping the Devourer of Ships’s view, because his turn created many bubbles in the water that hid him for a while.
Victor’s lungs were no longer as healthy as when he was younger, so his wiser mind needed to find ways to suppress this handicap with a quick victory.
