The Apocalypse is a Side Quest: Book Three, page 44
“I’m almost done, just hold it a bit longer!”
As soon as Tamsin finished her sentence, Arika’s eyes flashed again, and she drooped forward. The Sea King’s eyes snapped over in Arika’s direction and toward Tamsin.
Beams of energy shot out from Tamsin’s side.
But it was too late.
The Sea King sprinted away from the beams before they could hit it. The beams merely crashed fruitlessly against the arena walls before dying down to nothingness.
Tamsin let out a few quick pants. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
Nathan ran forward and crashed right into the Sea King. The two went tumbling down in a mess of fists and elbows.
Now, Nathan wasn’t experienced with this type of combat—but neither was the Sea King—at least, if they were going according to the theory that the Sea King was some kind of imitation of Nathan. Which it probably was.
Nathan kneed his imitation in the thigh. The imitation shot back a sharp elbow to Nathan’s shoulder. Nathan winced. Someone would bruise later. He reared his head back and slammed his forehead into the creature’s nose. There was a strange squishing noise, and when he pulled back to see what damage he’d done, he could see that the nose had been compressed into a disfigured blob.
He was thrown off by the imitation and rolled away on the sand. Leviathan came back in and stabbed into the creature. Both daggers sank deep. There was a flicker of surprise on Leviathan’s face before he pulled out the daggers and jumped away.
Nathan frowned at Leviathan’s expression. “What is it?”
“It—” Leviathan scowled. “It’s hollow.”
“The monster?” Nathan said.
“Yes, the monster. The whole thing on the inside. It’s all just hollow.”
“Could there be a core?” Nathan said.
“I didn’t sense anything like that.” Leviathan’s grip tightened on his daggers. “I miss the good old days when things just died when you stabbed them. You’d just get them in the lungs, and they’d die. It was that easy. Now we’re fighting metal sheets and hollow wax figures—”
“You’re sure it’s wax?” Nathan said, perking up.
“Yes, why?”
“Leviathan,” Nathan emphasized his next few words, “wax melts.”
Leviathan’s mouth formed an oh in understanding. He turned back toward the imitation and held out both his hands. On both hands, balls of flame appeared above them.
The Sea King’s spine suddenly straightened, then froze.
“I do believe that we just found this thing’s weak point.” Leviathan grinned. “Say goodbye.”
The fireballs launched forward. For a moment, Nathan held out hope that it would be the end of things—
Unfortunately, the creature was a bit too smart for that.
The Sea King jumped out of the way. Not deterred, Leviathan launched fireball after fireball, trying to enclose the thing in a net of flame. Each time, however, the creature would find some absurd way to jump or duck out of the way. Leviathan’s frustration grew more and more visible until it reached the point where he was growling.
“Stay still!”
Nathan turned toward Arika. “I don’t suppose you have one more illusion in you?”
Arika was still on her knees. She shook her head, deep breaths heaving her chest. “No. That took everything I had.”
They needed a way to trap it.
A small grin lit up Nathan’s face when he thought of a potential way to freeze it.
What was the classic problem that happened to fishermen when they shared space?
Although it didn’t come up too often in the more arcade-type fishing games, the sims were realistic enough to include this particular element.
Nathan cast his fishing line with an almost leisurely grace. The hook spun through the air before it crashed into its target.
Namely, the line of the Sea King’s own fishing pole. With a jerk from Nathan, the two lines tangled together into an instant Gordian Knot.
One of the fireballs was rapidly heading for the Sea King.
An expression of shock appeared on its face. It had two options: Either let go of the fishing rod or tank a fireball.
It hissed and let go of the fishing rod, then sprinted forward.
Leviathan ran forward, another fireball appearing in his right hand. He outran the imitation and got in front of it, the ball of flame pointed directly at the Sea King’s face.
The Sea King dug its heels into the dirt and came to a sharp stop. It turned around and went in the other direction—
Only for Nathan to get in front of it.
The creature was now trapped between Leviathan and Nathan.
It tried to break off to the left. Nathan double-cast both the fishing rods that he now had, hooking the Sea King on the shoulder and on the thigh. The force of the creature running jolted him forward, but Nathan managed to stay still and hold on.
Leviathan approached it slowly, and the creature struggled to escape.
Leviathan didn’t have any fanfare, nor did he say anything. He simply raised the fireball overhead, then threw it forward like a baseball.
The fireball crashed into the creature, and it let out an infernal hiss. Steam came off the creature as its skin started to melt into fat, large wax droplets.
Leviathan summoned another fireball and slammed it into the creature. Before long, the Sea King was nothing more than a puddle of discolored wax.
[You have leveled up!]
[You have leveled up!]
Nathan crossed his arms. “Hey, Leviathan. We need to talk.”
Leviathan glanced over at him. “About what?”
“About the fact that your counter looks exactly like me.”
Chapter Sixty-Two
Nathan waited for Leviathan to respond. The man cracked an awkward smile.
“It’s a crazy coincidence, isn’t it?”
Out of the corner of his eye, Nathan could see that more than a few other people were awkwardly attempting to listen in.
In fact, some were just blatantly standing a few feet away, eyes pointed at them unabashedly.
Nathan was, of course, referring to Mara.
He turned his attention back to Leviathan. “It’s a hell of a coincidence.”
“I guess you just happened to be my hard counter, or something like that,” Leviathan said.
Nathan’s eyes narrowed. “Why would I be your hard counter?”
“Our abilities, of course. You’re a specialist; it’s pretty clear. I’m a generalist. I can beat most people at just about anything, but in this one area… You’re better than just about anybody else. That makes you my counter.”
“I think there’s something that you’re not telling me.”
“I can’t change your opinion.”
Nathan remained quiet and tried to search Leviathan’s eyes.
After he caught what he was searching for, he nodded. “Sorry, Leviathan. Just being paranoid.”
Leviathan smiled. It sent a chill down Nathan’s spine.
“Of course,” Leviathan said. “It’s no problem.”
Nathan was about to walk off when he stopped. One more thing he had to confirm.
“By the way, Leviathan—” Nathan looked him directly in the eyes. “—have you ever heard of Thalassa?”
Leviathan froze. It was the smallest thing—almost unnoticeable. If Nathan hadn’t been looking for that exact reaction, he wouldn’t have spotted it.
“No, sorry,” Leviathan shrugged. “Not sure.”
After some more small talk, the two went their separate ways. Nathan with Mara, Chad, and Bree. Leviathan on his own.
Nathan came up to Chad’s side. “Did you see it?”
Chad scoffed. “How can I not?”
So that meant Nathan wasn’t going crazy.
“Care to let the rest of the group in?” Mara said.
“I’m pretty sure Leviathan is going to betray us,” Nathan said. “And I’m not sure what we’re supposed to do.”
Nathan marched through the portal and popped open his raid menu. He clicked the one labeled “Seaside Town.”
He felt a jolt and dropped down into the fortress. Mushroom people and werewolves jolted at his presence.
“Sir!” a werewolf jumped up into a salute. “You need us?”
“At ease,” Nathan said. “I’m here about a separate matter.”
“What would that be?”
Nathan needed to contact Thalassa, and soon. He didn’t care about her explanations or her excuses—what he needed was information. The conflict with Leviathan would be coming; Nathan would need to have every scrap of information he could get his hands on.
Nathan was Leviathan’s hard counter; that was true. But there was no doubt in his mind that Leviathan had plenty of tricks up his sleeve—not only that, but he was fairly certain that Leviathan had been planning for the coming fight a lot longer than Nathan had.
Probably since the first time that Leviathan met Nathan and got a small glimpse of his abilities.
Who knew what kind of trump cards Leviathan would have up his sleeve? Worst-case scenario, there might be some sort of anti-magic bullshit deus ex machina.
However, none of that was really relevant to the current situation. The reason Nathan had gone to the seaside town, one of the many towns that he had taken from the Harrowed Hand, was because of a certain other requirement needed for upgrading his fishing rod.
Yes, the fishing rod that the blacksmith had promised him. Nathan already had the twelve metal fins. What he needed now was the five kraken scales. Nathan imagined that normally obtaining such a thing would be borderline impossible. Luckily for Nathan, there was a kraken basically in his backyard.
“I need to speak to the kraken,” Nathan said.
The werewolf froze. “T—the kraken, sir?”
“Yes, he’s still here, right?”
The werewolf nodded slowly. “Yes, sir, of course, he hasn’t escaped. Indeed, he doesn’t seem to want to escape.”
“What do you mean?”
“The, uh, the kraken is very strange,” the werewolf said. “From what I understand, he has decided that his best chance of survival is attaching himself to you. Apparently he’s planning to go to your home planet and establish a colony…?”
“That’s great. Where is he?” Nathan paused. “Also, he?”
“He stops by for regular conversations, my lord. We learned that the kraken is a he. Also, he is very lonely and is looking for a mate. I had to inform the kraken that we did not have any female krakens in our local area.”
“He figured out how to talk?” Nathan shook his head. “Never mind that, can you get him or alert him?”
The werewolf hesitantly nodded. “Let me go see if I can get him to surface.”
The werewolf shouted something indistinguishable to one of the gate guards. The gate was pulled open, revealing the new docks that had been built on the edge of the island. The werewolf walked up to the edge and dipped his finger in the water, wiggling it back and forth.
Nathan tilted his head. This was perhaps one of the stranger methods of calling an ancient beast from the depths that he’d seen thus far.
The ground rumbled. The noise got louder and louder until there was an explosion of water, and a massive bulbous head appeared from just under the surface of the ocean. The kraken’s wide, weary gaze immediately locked in on Nathan Lee.
“Nathan Lee,” the kraken rumbled. “What brings you to my domain?”
“This isn’t your domain. This is my town, though someone else is administering it.” Nathan scratched his chin. “I don’t even know who’s in charge, actually. There’s too many moving parts now.”
The kraken laughed. “Fine, then. What brings you here?”
“I need five of your scales.”
“I see. That can be done.” The kraken’s tentacles reached around toward its underside. It then struck Nathan that he had never thought to ask what exactly a scale would look like. Given that the exterior of the kraken seemed to be nothing but blubbery, rubbery skin, Nathan quickly decided that he did not want to know.
The kraken stopped, its eyes going distant. “Are you sure that that’s what you want?”
“The recipe called for five kraken scales.”
“What are they for?”
“A fishing rod. A blacksmith is going to create some kind of… ultra fishing rod? I don’t really understand the details. Either way, it should be significantly better than what I currently have.”
“I see, my scales should provide the toughness and durability needed to contain the immense amount of energy that it’s going to have.” The kraken’s eyes locked onto Nathan. “But there are better alternatives.”
Nathan blinked. “I’m gonna have to go on some absurdly long fetch quest—”
“No, simply stand there.”
A tentacle reached down to the underside of the kraken. The tentacle tugged, and the kraken winced.
“What are you doing?” Nathan said.
“Just wait,” the kraken’s voice seemed muffled. What was it doing?
There was another tug. A red pigment stained the water.
Rather than ask again what the kraken was doing, Nathan remained silent.
He smelled something…
Blood?
The kraken gave one final tug, and the water shook from the force of the pull.
A tentacle moved upward, its end wrapped around a half-cylinder white object.
The tentacle dropped it onto the shore. Nathan inspected it.
[Kraken’s Tooth] - C++ grade
Technically not a tooth, but more of a beak thing? Either way, it’s the absolute hardest material you can get your hands on. Infused with a massive amount of water energy and hundreds of times stronger than diamond, this is all but unbreakable except at the deepest circles.
Nathan recognized it. Back when he launched the kraken into the sky, he’d gotten a peek at its underside—where there was a beak similar to that of a bird.
Had he just—?
“You ripped out your own tooth?” Nathan asked.
“Consider it an investment in the future.”
Blood continued to seep through the water like dye through clothing.
Nathan wasn’t quite sure how to respond to this. Obviously, the kraken was not doing this out of the goodness of his own heart—he clearly expected Nathan to get to the bottom. Nonetheless, the show of faith filled Nathan with gratitude.
“When we get to the bottom, I’ll make sure that you find a place where you can live out the rest of your days in peace.” He paused. “Although I’m going to have to warn you in advance that I will probably not be able to find a female kraken.”
The kraken scoffed. “Typical. I go to all that effort, and this is the thanks I get.”
Nathan rolled his eyes and picked up the tooth. He stuffed it into his inventory, turned around, and walked away.
Now it was time to go see a certain blacksmith.
Nathan didn’t bother contacting any of his friends for help infiltrating the elven town. Instead, he simply slipped on the prosthetics that he’d been given by Anand and found a makeup artist in his city willing to help him out.
The makeup artist had been very surprised to see Nathan. By the same token, Nathan was very surprised to see that his city had taken off to the point where there were now, apparently, makeup artists.
What was next, amusement parks? High-rise offices?
Actually, that last one wasn’t even that far outside the range of possibility…
Nonetheless, he entered the town without too much of an issue. Security had actually grown laxer, he noticed. When he asked around, he found out that Emi had redirected the guards to train further, citing a lack of need for such defense. Apparently, Fliel had objected, but he was too busy patching up all the holes in his reputation that had been created by his handling—or his lack thereof—of the Grigor situation.
Nathan could’ve found it incredibly funny… And that’s exactly what he thought it was. Incredibly funny.
He was still worried that Fliel would have some kind of ace up his sleeve, however.
Nathan could never be too cautious.
He ended up asking for further information, finding out the location of the blacksmith. It turned out that the man was relatively well known. He had a reputation for being a little bit eccentric and arbitrary. He’d refused an unknown noble who’d wanted a ceremonial weapon on the basis that the weapon would never be used. It was an enormous sum of cash as well. See, he was so committed to his craft that he couldn’t abide the idea of one of his masterpieces simply sitting on a shelf somewhere.
Nathan couldn’t quite understand this mentality—if it were him, he would’ve taken the cash, no question.
But then again, he wasn’t a blacksmith. He was a fisherman.
Kind of.
Nathan briefly thought through the dozens of different roles that he’d fulfilled since he came to the apocalypse and decided that calling himself a fisherman was a bit of an understatement.
He arrived at the door of the blacksmith’s home and knocked on it.
“Coming, coming!”
The door swung open, revealing the bearded face of the elven blacksmith.
“Who are you supposed to be?” the blacksmith asked.
Nathan reached up to take off his prosthetics when he froze. Probably wasn’t a good idea to take off his disguise in the middle of the city street.
“Can I come in first?” Nathan asked.
“You’re a total stranger, why would I let you into my house?” the blacksmith said.
“Because this is also your place of business?”
The blacksmith rolled his eyes. “You should’ve taken the front door, then. This is my personal door.”
“Okay, where was the front door?”
The blacksmith stuck a thumb out over toward his right and laughed. It was the exact same height and width as the door to the right.
Nathan did a long stare. After a few seconds of trying to convince himself that he was dreaming, he walked over to that other door and knocked on it. The blacksmith walked over, passing behind the closed door, then swung it open.
