Battle Across The Omniverse

Jayr POV - Tortus, Tortus Ocean - 2013

We are inside Hajime's submarine, quietly moving toward the location of one of the seven Great Labyrinths, around 300 kilometers est from Erisen.

During the underwater voyage, I once again explains to everyone how to exactly reach the Sunken Ruins of Melusine, because as expected Hajime and his party were too annoyed by Miledi's antics to listen to her and so they were flushed out.

So I tell them that even if we reach the destination, we have to wait for the moon to come out and then use the proof of conquests of the Gruen Great Volcano to find the hidden Labyrinth.

And so, we only advance through the vast ocean in accordance with the direction and distance I told them.

And as expected, we didn't find anything when we reached our destination and searched the pointed location at the bottom of the sea during the daytime.

They did the search because Kouki thought that they'd be able to find some kind of trace because it was a bottom sea ruin, but they were too naive, the Liberators planned everything when they built the Seven Great Labyrinth, so it will be difficult to find an opening to exploit.

And indeed, the location is rather shallow compared to the other place with a circumference of 100 kilometers, clearly indicating that something is hidden here, but even I can't sense anything, for sure they made it so that it is impossible to access without the right key using a combination of all Age of Gods Magics.

Reluctantly, the party decide to stop the search and wait until night, when the full moon has come out, as I had told them.

After waiting for a few hours, the sunset finally comes, the sun is shining in red with half of itself hidden beyond the horizon, brightening the world for the last time today.

The sky and sea are dyed in orange while a straight road is produced by the reflection of the sun on the sea from over the horizon, 'It is a beautiful spectacle of nature no matter whichever world it is!'.

I'm enjoying this beautiful spectacle on the deck of the submarine while holding Eri's hand while she rests her head on my shoulder, then I hear Eri mutter, "This is one of the happiest moments in my life...", and she clings closer.

I caress Eri's head with my free hand, and at the same time, I start to look around and see Freid on one side of the deck as he uses a rod to fish, while on another side, Kouki and Ryutarou are sparring, and the one that sometimes even I forgot exist, Endou Kosuke is resting on a blanket, while Hajime is standing on the deck looking at the sunset.

Then Kaori comes out from the inboard, with her hair still damp, and asks Hajime who is wearing a thoughtful expression, "Did something happen?", at the same time, Yue, Shea, Tio, Shizuku, and Suzu also come out of the interior of the submarine with their hair still damp.

That was the reason why all the men are outside on the deck, everyone had taken the shower inside the submarine built by Hajime who took great pride in it.

Their flushed cheeks, the damp hair stuck on their cheeks, and their nape, made their figures truly captivating.

And with the water from the shower room was set to rain right from the ceiling, so it wasn't a problem for the six of them to shower all at once.

Hajime shakes his head, then he replies to Kaori, "I am just recalling a little about Japan. After all, the scene here isn't that much different from there", and Kaori takes a seat next to him, looks at the sunset, she nods and says, "… I see. Yeah, it really is. It is just like the evening sun I have seen in the sea before… somehow it makes me feel nostalgic. Though not even half a year had passed, eh...", and Hajime explains, "That's because every day here is too eventful".

Maybe because she feels the loneliness from the conversation between the two, Yue trots her still-flushing body towards Hajime and sits on his lap.

She entrusts her back to Hajime's chest even though she must be feeling hot, then, she began to watch Hajime right under his face.

Her eyes are obviously expressing she wants them to let her join their conversation. Yue was feeling lonely, and at the same time, she wanted to hear about her hometown, and at this time, Shea draws closer to him from the opposite side of Kaori with sparkling eyes, she was obviously signaling she wanted to be cared for too.

Looking at them, Eri asks, "Will we have something like that too? It doesn't look so bad...", and as I look at Hajime's party as they cuddle close to each other above the vast sea, I continue to caress Eri's head and reply, "I hope to be something even better, right now they are still fighting for his attention, while what I want is one big family that loves and support each other...", hearing that, Eri smiles brightly, then she utters an, "Un..." before she starts to kiss me, and in the background, I hear the clamor made by Suzu and the other girls, at the same time, I sense Tio sitting next to us.

Time passed swiftly as we enjoyed the peaceful atmosphere, and the sun has completely gone down to the other side of the horizon, and the full moon has finally begun to shine in its place.

Thinking it is about time, I take out the pendant which is the proof of having conquered Gruen Great Volcano from my Soulbound Territory.

The design of the pendant is of a woman hanging a lantern and there is a hole in the lantern, making it hollow.

I start to hold the pendant towards the moon, in such a way that the moon can be seen from the hole of the lantern design, then wait for a while, but there is no immediate change, Hajime, thinking that this method doesn't work, sigh and begin to try another method with his own proof.

But right at that time, a change appears in the pendant, the lantern part is absorbing the moonlight and light begins to accumulate inside of it, and after a few minutes, the hollow part is filled with the light, before long, the lantern finish accumulating the light and the pendant is now clad in light.

At the same time, a light shot straight from the lantern, pointing to a certain location on the sea's surface, seeing this spectacle, Hajime, who is nearby says,"… What an exquisite production. Truly different from Miledi's", and Kouki adds, "It is... It really is fantasy-like, even I'm rather impressed by it".

This "Guided by the moonlight", is such a romance-like thing that makes not only Hajime, but also Yue and the rest raise voices of admiration, but since we don't really know for how long this phenomenon will continue, I urge Hajime to drive the submarine and follow the pendant's lantern's leading light.

The sea at night is dark, or maybe it would be better to say that everything is black, and even though the surface of the water is still bright because of the moonlight, we are lead into the waters, and thus everything instantly turns dark, with the light released by the submarine and the pendant as the only thing cutting through the darkness of the sea.

The light easily bypasses the glass of the submarine made from a type of sturdy and transparent ore, allowing me to continue leading the way from the inside of the submarine, and right now the light is pointing at the bottom of the sea.

The pointed location is the rock wall zone of the bottom of the sea, numerous distorted rock walls are joined to form a mountain range, It is a place we had searched during the daytime but it resulted in nothing, but when the submarine approaches the rock pointed by the pendant's light, a light tremor can be felt all throughout the submarine along with a strong rumbling sound.

The sound and tremor are caused by the rock wall that begins to move, and soon, one of the rock's part is split in two, opening to the right and left like a door, and seeing that Ryutarou says, "That dark road that leads inside is as though it is inviting one to the netherworld...", but I quickly reassure him, "Don't worry, I know for experience that this isn't how the entrance to those kinds of places looks like... This looks more like some kind of evil organization lair...", and Hajime smiles and adds, "Yeah, that is for sure...If I'm not wrong you went to hell, right?", to which I simply nod without saying anything else.

Then, Hajime drives the submarine and we finally enter the crack, at the same time, I notice that the pendant's lantern still has around half of its accumulated light, but it has stopped releasing the light, and now only the submarine's light is shining inside the dark sea now.

All of a sudden, Tio asks, "Umm~, this one had thought this since hearing about the bottom sea ruin, but wouldn't it be impossible for ordinary people to enter this labyrinth without this "submarine" thing?", to which Suzu replies, "… It's impossible unless one is using a strong barrier", but Eri adds, "It will also be impossible if they can't control the air, light, and water current at the same time, eh", then Shizuku realizes "But, it is necessary to conquer Gruen Great Volcano to come here, so I think people who are capable of conquering the Great Labyrinth are able to enter", and Kaouki nods and says "Maybe we are supposed to use Spatial magic".

Entering deeper on the underwater road, our party start to consider other ways to conquer this Labyrinth without a submarine, they are impressed by the fantastic entrance, but indeed, once they thought about it normally, unless there are several top-class magic users, it is impossible to enter the Labyrinth, a troublesome point similar to the other Great Labyrinth.

While continuing the discussion, with caution, our party watches the bottom of the sea through the front crystal, but all of the sudden, the side of the submarine suddenly receive an impact and immediately, the submarine was thrown towards a certain direction, the submarine is turning around and around, but under my advice, Hajime already has a countermeasure for such occasion, he uses the gravity stone installed at the bottom of the submarine to increase the weight and stabilize it.

While the others are trying to regain their bearings, I observe the outside through the front crystal, the Green Light stone's light is circulating around the dark cave, letting me see the surroundings, 'From what I can see, we seem to have been swept by the current into a huge round cave... but maybe that is where we are meant to go...', and so we continue to advance following the current, and after a while, the "Farsight stone" installed in the stern catches innumerable objects shining in reddish black, which makes Hajime mutters, "They seem to be approaching us… Well, they are most likely monsters clad in reddish black magic power, huh", and Yue, who is sitting by his side, is already gathering magic power in her hand, and says in gangster-like tone, "… Shall we?".

But Hajime stops her, and with a smile, he replies, "No, let's use weapon here. I also want to confirm their effectiveness", and starts operating the gimmick on the back of the submarine.

Then, numerous pet-bottle-sized torpedoes that had dyed Ancadi's Oasis in red, are launched, Hajime thoroughly painted them so they looked like mischievously smiling sharks, but because they are inside the swift current, the torpedoes' propulsion can only move them to a small degree, and it results with them scattering like sea mines.

The submarine continues to advance ahead, and before long, the numerous monsters clad in reddish black magic power with the appearance of flying fish enter the cluster of torpedoes.

And a set of grand explosions appears in succession from behind the submarine and a large amount of bubbles wraps the group of flying fish-lookalike, afterwards, the bodies of flying fish-lookalike are torn apart by the impact and the flesh and blood are scattered from inside the appearing bubbles, looking like seaweed thrown into a swift current.

Seeing the result of his attack Hajime smiles evilly and says, "Yup, it has more power than before. The improvement is a success.", then Shea pointing somewhere outside exclaims, "Uwaah~, Hajime-san. Just now, there was something with eyes of a fish being swept outside", but Tio calms her, "Shea, those art actually dead fishes", and Kouki comments a little upset, "Once again it makes me think that the artifacts Hajime-kun made are a foul play...", while we are calmly chatting, our party advance as we easily repel the flying fish-lookalike attack that happens quite frequently.

We continue to advance without knowing how long it would take to reach the destination, when all of the sudden, I begin to have a sense of incompatibility with the current unchanging scenery.

And when we arrive at a place where the surrounding walls had been randomly destroyed, this sense gets stronger so I start to carefully look around, I also notice that I'm not the only one that feels that something is off, then I notice the torn heads of flying fish-lookalike that are placed between the rock walls with their hollow eyes looking at the sea, and I realize what is going on, and so does Eri as she asks to seek confirmation, "… Hmm, isn't this the place we passed before?", to which I nod and reply, "… Seems so. We are going in a circle, this".

Realizing that, we now don't advance according to the laid road, and carefully search the surrounding for any clues, and as a result, "Ah, Hajime-kun. There's one there too!" screams an excited Suzu while she points at some place where some engraving can be seen, seeing that Hajime nods and says, "With this, it is the fifth place…".

We discovered several places inside the cave that were carved with fifty centimeters long crest of Melusine, the carved crest of Melusine is a pentagram with lines connected to every five points and the center is carved with a crescent moon-like design, it seems similar to the other five places in this circular cave.

For a thorough examination, we approach the crest we first discovered, and because we are exposed to the swift currents, Hajime takes care in controlling the submarine, at the same time, I move closer and say, "Well, there are five places with a pentagram, so if the remaining light inside the pendant is used…", and take out the pendant and hold it before the front crystal, and the next instant, the pendant reacts and light is released straight from the lantern.

Following that, the light touches the crest and the crest shines, at the same time, Kaori says, "It will be disastrous for people who come here using magic… if they didn't notice this immediately, their magic power would be depleted", and Shizuku adds "Just as Kaori said, this RPG-like method would be too cruel for people who somehow survived only by maintaining their magic...", but Eri snorts and says, "All the Great Labyrinths grants immense power to those that conquer them, it is natural for them to have the hardest challenge possible...".

Afterward, three more crests in our location were poured with light from the lantern, and the party arrive before the last crest, the light collected inside the lantern decreased when it was released to light up the crest, and the remaining light is enough for only one more usage.

I hold up the pendant and pour the last crest with the light, finally, a way to advance from this circular cave opens, and with a rumbling sound, the wall of the cave splits in two.

Not much happens as we advance into the interior, but the water is descending below, then, all of the sudden, the submarine is wrapped in a weightless feeling as it is falling down, and all I can hear are the surprised scream of everyone, but even so the first thing I do is hold on Eri to make sure that she will be safe while enduring the floating feeling between my groin.

Then, the submarine hit the hard ground with a roaring sound, the severe impact is transmitted into the interior, and those whose body isn't strong enough, Kaori, Suzu, Kosuke, Shizuku, Kouki, and Ryutaro raise a groan, while they are strong even for this world standard their bodies are still human, meanwhile, Eri used my body as a cushion, so she is fine, soon, we all start getting up and I hear Hajime asks, "Kh… Kaori, are you okay?", to which she replies, "Uhh, I-I'm okay. More importantly, here is?", and she frows as she looks outside through the front crystal, and unlike a while ago, the outside is not sea water but a cavity, and because there is no sign of monsters, we go outside.

Outside the submarine is a huge hemispherical space, when I look above, I notice that there is a large hole where I can see water swaying to and fro, but not even a drop falls from it, looking at that hole I say, "That should be where we came from...", then Hajime says, "Looks like here is the real thing. Rather than a bottom sea ruin, it is a cave though", and Ryutarou adds "… It's good that there isn't water everywhere", then Haime returns the submarine into the Treasure Box, and I urge the others to advance into the passage that could be seen inside the cave, but before the party could move, I and Hajime call out at the same time, "Suzu! Barrier!", "Yue!".

The next moment, I immediately notice the difference in trust and battle experience between Yue and Suzu, on one side, Yue trusts Hajime blindly and is easily able to understand him, so she quickly acts and without hesitation she mutter "Nn", and creates a barrier around us, and the next moment, laser-like water current attacks us like meteors from above, very similar to the spell Rupture that I'm so fond of, so that If one gets hit by it, a hole would be easily created in their body, however, Yue's barrier is extremely strong even if it was cast in a hurry, as a proof, it easily able to block the incoming attack from above.

Meanwhile, on the other side, Suzu looks at me with a confused expression for a few moments, then when Yue acts, she realizes what I'm telling her and starts to make her move, "E-eh? Ah! Undying holy light, be my shield forevermore, Sacred Shields!", and forms multiple Holy Shields at once all around us and reinforces Yue's barrier even more.

I also notice that only Shea, Tio, Eri, and Freid had already guessed that our shout was a warning of an attack and because of this are undisturbed by it, however, Kaori and the others didn't react the same way as them, "Kyaa!?", "Whoa!?", What the hell!?", "Careful!!", "Help!", the too sudden and intense attacks made them instinctively raise a scream and jolt up nervously, Kaori even immediately clung to Hajime who is beside her, but soon she realize what she has done and let go while saying, "I-I am sorry", to which he calmly replies with, "No, don't mind it", then Kaori appears to be in deep thought worrying over something, and Hajime who notices this asks, "Are you alright?", Kaori immediately tries to deceive him by making a forced smile and replies, "Eh? Ah, nothing. There's nothing wrong", Hajime doesn't buy it and slightly narrows his eye towards her action, but then he says, "… I see".

At the same time, Tio fires her spiraling magic flames to burn the ceiling, and with that, the culprit of the attack falls on the ground in a tatter, it is a barnacle-like monster, and a lot of them are sticking to the ceiling, shooting "Rupture" from the hole above, a physiological disgust-inviting spectacle.

Maybe because it is still an underwater creature, it is weak to flames and is immediately burnt by Tio's flame magic, Spiral Flame.

After defeating those barnacle-lookalikes, we walk into the passage, and we find ourselves at a lower height than the previous room, making the seawater reach our thighs, and quickly Hajime picks up Yue and raises her on his shoulder since with her height she would be soaked faster than everyone else with her 1,4 meters of height, well, I do the same for Eri since she isn't that much taller than Yue, and Suzu who has the same height as Eri is riding on Ryutarou's shoulder, as he himself offered.

After we advance through these seawaters with a splashing sound for a while, Hajime starts complaining, "Ah~, it's hard to walk…", and Yue, who is sitting on his shoulder, asks, "… Should I get off?", but Hajime return a gaze that says that there's no problem while he ignores Kaori's and Shea's envying gaze, then, he put his hand on Yue's thigh so she would not fall, firmly fixing her in place, Yue also wraps her hand around Hajime's neck, meanwhile, I notice that Ryutarou is silently enduring the discomfort, but I also notice a heavy blush on his and Suzu's face, then I feel Eri moves her head closer to mine, then she whispers, "It seems that spring has finally come for my friend...", I nod and whisper back, "Yeah, while he is a muscle head, he is a good and loyal person".

Meanwhile, Kaori and Shea are sending a more and more envying gaze, but they are then forced to focus on another problem, an attack from monsters.

The appearing monsters look like shurikens, they move in a straight line towards their target while rotating at high-speed, but sometimes they also curve on the fly.

Hajime smoothly pulls out his gun and without hesitation, he fires, at the same time, I pull out my Tactical Arms in its Gatling Form and do the same, and together we shoot down everything in the air, then I hear Shea yell in surprise, "What!? The same kind of artifact that Hajime uses!?", even Yue and the other seem surprised by it, but the most surprised of all of them is Hajime, that as he looks at my weapon, his eye widen and he exclaims in wonder unable to contain himself, "That is a replica of the Tactical Arms II of the MBF-P03R Gundam Astray Blue Frame 2nd Revise! How cool!", and I feel a sudden uncontrollable urge to do something, I look at Hajime in the eyes, then close mine and say, "Ah, I see you're a Man of Culture as well...".

Then something strange happens, a solemn silence falls on our surroundings, and even the monster stop their attacks, as if afraid of interrupting a sacred moment, at the same time, I hear the familiar voice of Culture as he declares, "Congratulation! Hidden Effect of the Blessing of Culture Archived! If the Champion meets another Man or Woman of Culture, and they recognize each other as such, then the Universe of the fellow Man/Woman of Culture will fall under the protection and jurisdiction of the Champion... What does this mean? Simple first a Seed of Culture representing this Universe will be created in the Champion Soulbound Territory so that even if this Universe is destroyed or even erased, it will be possible to restore it, moreover, once this your S.T. grows big enough you can also transfer this Universe to it so that it will be safe from the attacks from the other Champion, and speaking of other Champion once they invade this Universe if their blessing is weaker than yours, you will know of their presence and they will be severely weakened and oppressed, in fact, you can even reject their entry in it if you so desire...".

Hearing that I can't help but think, 'This is nice... Basically, this universe can now become some kind of trap where I can farm potentially weaker Champions...', then Culture continues, "... And of course that isn't the only advantage there are many others, but the next most important is that now that this Universe is under your jurisdiction, you can easily access it using the Seed of Culture in your S.T. without using the Unigate or your ability to teleport, quite a useful cost-free method of travel... Once again, good job Jayr! Remember, Culture is what connects every sentient being, there can be different types of cultures, and some can even clash with some others, but in the end, the most beautiful thing is that Culture is something that can be made, can be learned, can adapt, and evolve, it can even be lost, but in the end, I hope that one day there will be one big all-encompassing Culture able to happily and peacefully bring together everyone! Continue your journey and have fun, Ciao!".

This time different from the others, Culture left behind a quite deep finale to his message instead of the usual silly ones, a message whose meaning I can slightly grasp but I also feel that some parts of it are still eluding me but I know that this is important, so I will remember his words and keep them close to my heart so that one day I can finally fully understand them.