One week remained until the great sea serpent arrived. Turan and his companions spent that time practicing magic and discussing how to coordinate their attacks against the enormous monster.

The merfolk royals, including Rowina and Armani, joined in to discuss what roles they should take.

“If you need to stay above water because you can't breathe down there, why don't I carry you? That scrap of wood you came here on is bound to shatter as soon as the fighting really starts.”

The speaker was a merfolk royal who could turn into a sea turtle whose shell alone measured a full seven meters long. But their admiration for a body even larger than that of the more powerful Rowina was short-lived.

“Can't you go any faster?”

“This is my limit! I'd have to shrink to go faster!”

Turan sighed softly at the sea turtle shouting as it trudged along, seemingly weighed down by its own bulk. Fortunately, it swam somewhat faster, and even after shrinking, it was large enough for all three of them to stand on. It would at least make a useful place to rest, though riding it to travel quickly seemed out of the question.

The other merfolk royals demonstrated transformations into a variety of sea creatures, from long, slender cutlassfish to squid, marlin, orcas, and jellyfish...

Naturally, turning into enormous animals was not all they could do. Like Rowina, each possessed one or two special abilities: piercing anything with a sharp bill, emitting electricity from tentacles, or releasing sound waves with a bellow.

One good turn deserved another. With the merfolk taking such an active part, Turan's party revealed a few techniques of their own.

They demonstrated everything from Turan's specialty, stone-slinging, to Maysa's lightning spells and Solif's Light of Judgment. When golden whips lashed the waves, vaporizing the water into clouds of steam, the merfolk exclaimed in wonder.

“Oooh...!”

“I thought demons' powers were limited to controlling water and freezing it. They're more varied than I expected.”

Apparently having little experience with human wizards outside House Karmine, the merfolk royals found the party's techniques utterly fascinating. Finally, when Turan demonstrated an explosive spell using the Spirit of Fire, one of the royals remarked,

“That's similar to Mother's technique. If only she were here.”

“Your mother?”

“Yes. She stayed at the palace to protect the little ones who are too young and weak to help. This one's only here because we didn't have time to take him back.”

The young princess caught Armani, who had been swimming alongside them and pestering his older siblings, and stretched his cheeks as she spoke. If the merfolk queen was a formidable fighter, even if not as strong as her husband, she would have been a great help. But it seemed they had left themselves some insurance against their kingdom's total destruction.

For Turan's party, that was both disappointing and fortunate. Stronger merfolk would make the hunt easier, but would also be more likely to seize control of the situation.

“You said the merfolk king turns into a whale, right?”

“That's right. He truly is magnificent. He'll probably be leading the charge in battle, too.”

The merfolk king was currently away from the island, having taken on the task of luring the great sea serpent here himself. Apparently, he would provoke it little by little from a distance to change its course.

They had not explained the details to Turan's party, but as people who had served the great sea serpents since ancient times, they clearly knew a great deal about them. Perhaps it was an ability of the trident he carried.

After learning something of one another's abilities and working out how to fight together, they split up to begin separate training for combat at sea.

In the process, Turan devised several spells, including one that formed a tube connecting to the surface for emergency breaths underwater, and another that manipulated the surrounding water to move his body, much as he propelled their boat.

“Ugh...”

“Try to do better. This is the most important technique for you.”

“Easy for you to say! Do you think I'm a genius like you two?”

Turan had created the spells, but Solif practiced them hardest of all, since his poor grasp of wind magic left him unable to fly. Watching him flounder as he tried to propel himself with water, Turan spoke quietly.

“Vije will be paired with you, but you need to prepare for fighting underwater too, in case she's badly hurt and can't fight anymore.”

He avoided mentioning that she might die, afraid it would invite bad luck, but all of them knew this battle could claim lives.

That was the very nature of fighting. The odds varied with strength, but at its core, it meant staking their lives against an opponent's. And this time, they could not even fully gauge their enemy's strength until they faced it.

Perched on Turan's head, Vije tilted her head, then stretched out a foot to write on the water.

[Could we die?]

“It's all right. You only need to carry Solif and support us from the air. I won't let you do anything dangerous.”

[Turan mustn't die either. Or mate, or servant.]

“Who are you calling a servant?”

When Solif bristled beside them, Vije flicked her wings, sending a gust that splashed him with water. Spitting out seawater, he asked Turan,

“So you two will fly on your own while you fight?”

“Yes. Carrying all three of us through a storm would be too much for Vije.”

Maysa answered in his place as she smoothly controlled the water to move her body nearby. Though she learned a little more slowly than Turan, her accomplishments in this kind of magical intuition were nothing short of genius.

Solif stroked the short silver beard growing on his chin and spoke worriedly.

“But is it really wise to use everything without hiding anything? I'm worried word might spread.”

“Well, the merfolk seem to have less contact with the surface than I expected... And this is only a guess, but I think this kingdom will soon cut ties with House Karmine too. After that, they won't have much contact with the other great houses.”

It was the natural conclusion when he combined the king's evident distaste for Karmine's god, the Lawyer, with his ambition to revive the ancient royals' powers through the great sea serpent's corpse. There was nothing surprising about people wanting to throw off subjugation once they had the strength to stand on their own.

At that, Solif slapped the water with his palm and cried out.

“Oh, that reminds me! What are you going to do about that?”

“About what?”

“The great sea serpent's corpse. You're not really going to hand the whole thing over, are you?”

“And if I don't?”

“We're all laughing and getting along because those royals have self-control. Even now, there are probably people being eaten by merfolk somewhere along the coast. I honestly don't know if it's right to give them that much power.”

“As long as they keep their promise, I intend to keep mine. That's what a promise means.”

A few of the noble-class merfolk still occasionally looked at Turan's party with hunger, but at least the royals showed no sign of it. In that case, Turan would consider them intelligent beings he could reason with—people—and treat them accordingly. If he wanted them to keep their promises, it was only right that he keep his own. That was the Golden Rule.

Listening beside them, Maysa cleared her throat softly and spoke.

“I agree. Besides, if what Turan says is right, wouldn't the merfolk growing stronger put a crack in the gods' control? I think that would actually benefit us.”

Outvoted two to one, Solif gave a cry of resignation and flopped onto his back on the water. His practice had evidently paid off: the way he firmed the water beneath him into a bed was impressive.

“I give up. I'm sure you'll figure it out.”

“There's no need to worry so much. Once we've hunted the great sea serpent, we should be able to stop them from using their new power to oppress humans.”

According to the merfolk king, it was incomparably weaker than in its prime. Even so, killing a creature capable of causing natural phenomena on this scale would surely grant them tremendous power. Perhaps all of them might surpass the realm of top-ranking nobles and approach the strength of the great houses' heads.

“Besides, gaining the ability to turn into great sea serpents won't make them an overwhelming threat. Only one of them will survive to become king, after all.”

At the mention of the merfolk custom they had recently learned about, Solif and Maysa immediately looked toward the royals playing together some distance away. Just then, one young royal was pouring sand over Rowina's head, only to yelp as she struck back.

“Right... Speaking of which, I find them so strange whenever I look at them.”

“How so?”

“They'll kill each other when it's time for the succession, won't they? How can they get along so well?”

“If it were me, I wouldn't dare stand beside them.”

Maysa added her agreement as she lay sprawled on the water. Turan watched the merfolk for a moment before offering what sounded like an excuse on their behalf.

“Well, that's... I suppose their moral concepts are different from ours.”

In truth, he did not understand it either. How could siblings who would one day have to kill one another be so affectionate?

If he had been one of the merfolk royals, he would have tried to eliminate his siblings by any means necessary. Conversely, if he judged that he could never be the final victor, he would have fled the kingdom altogether. Yet despite the clear differences in their strength and talent, they treated one another as brothers and sisters and got along.

When he said as much, the other two stared at him.

“What?”

“Nothing. It just never occurred to me to kill them all first.”

“I think this sometimes, but there's something a little strange about your sensibilities.”

“Is there?”

“Yes. There really is.”

Maysa and Solif nodded in unison.

* * *

After training, tired of fish, Turan's party caught an animal and made a meal of it with various spices and grain flour brought from Miguel Island. Once he had eaten his fill, Turan turned to Maysa, who had managed only a single bite and was licking her lips wistfully.

“Let's go top up your meal.”

“All right.”

Maysa nodded, stealing a glance at Solif. They had been together quite a while now and had done this many times, but she still seemed reluctant to let him see her being fed this way, much as someone might dislike drawing attention to a trip to the toilet.

“Bring back some water, will you?”

Aware of this, Solif deliberately treated it as nothing out of the ordinary, though that sometimes only made the atmosphere more awkward.

After they finished the feeding in the woods a short distance away, Turan watched Maysa put the magic tools she had removed back on and voiced a thought that had recently occurred to him.

“After this hunt, we might need Solif's help too.”

“With what?”

“This. If you get stronger, I might have trouble knocking you unconscious by myself.”

It had not mattered when she was emaciated and frail, but as Maysa grew healthier, knocking her out was becoming increasingly difficult for Turan.

Of course, with equal mana, Turan's superior physique would give him greater muscular strength. The problem was that Maysa's mana ranked among the very highest of top-ranking nobles, whereas his was near the bottom of that range.

Moreover, unless they reached their limits when absorbing the great sea serpent's mana after the hunt, Maysa was more likely to gain greater strength. When absorbing mana from a far more powerful being, those who were already stronger could do so more efficiently.

“Look at the state of things already. By then, we might need one person to hold your legs while the other knocks you out.”

The ground where Maysa had instinctively thrashed a little earlier was quite literally churned up.

Maysa gave a low, troubled hum.

“I'm not really comfortable with that...”

“No?”

“No. Not really. If it comes to that, I'd rather go hungry for a while. Or find another way.”

The other way was the possibility they had recently hit upon: building her self-worth by helping people.

Had the great sea serpent hunt not suddenly intervened, they had planned to roam the North Sea rescuing merchant ships in distress and doing similar good deeds. Now, though, the storm had made that difficult, with few ships venturing out, merchant or pirate alike.

“Then when the time comes, we'll try that approach first.”

“All right.”

And so the two of them made plans for after the hunt. In another sense, it was a vow that neither of them would die during it.

* * *

As day after day passed in alternating training and rest, the island's weather grew steadily harsher. The winds strengthened, rain lashed down, and sometimes thunderstorms rolled in.

The island's animals began roaming in crowds, sensing the strange weather. Before long, even the fish in the sea showed signs of distress, splashing up to the surface.

The relatively friendly atmosphere stiffened with it. They were beginning to truly feel the approaching battle—and the possibility that some of them might really die.

When the fateful day finally arrived, a storm of terrifying violence engulfed the island.

“We can barely hear each other like this!”

“Use hand signals from now on unless it's urgent!”

Of course, Turan and Maysa could carry their voices with wind magic, while Solif could form letters with illusion magic. But with every scrap of mana needed for the battle, they could not afford to overuse such spells, so they had devised and learned a few simple hand signals.

[Can you see?]

[Yes.]

[What about now?]

[Not very well from there. Did you signal “up”?]

While they were testing the distance at which they could make out the signals, they spotted Rowina approaching, irritated by the muddy ground. Once close enough, she practically shouted.

“My father will be here soon! The eastern shore, as planned!”

“Understood!”

After passing the message to the other two, Turan stroked Vije, perched at his side, to reassure her and set off. The merfolk royals had already gathered when they arrived.

“Final... here...”

“About... min...”

The fierce storm made it impossible to catch anything they said properly. The king's eldest son, Makun, who could turn into an octopus, came closer and spoke in a low voice.

“About five minutes left.”

“Understood.”

“The plan hasn't changed, I take it?”

“We'll need to change one thing.”

“What?”

“I'm afraid the barriers won't be any use.”

The day before, Turan had poured most of his stored Barrier-user bloodline mana into setting up barriers along the eastern shore. He had hoped they might offer even a little help in battle, but now he could see that they had all dispersed, apparently swept away by the storm.

An ordinary storm could never have done that. It seemed the great sea serpent's fusion with the storm spirit had imbued this one with magical power. Hearing this, the king's eldest son clicked his tongue.

“Then there's nothing to be done. I never intended to rely on such things anyway. Anything else?”

“No. And it looks like it'll be sooner than five minutes. They're coming right now.”

“What? So they are... Everyone, prepare for battle!”

At Makun's cry, the merfolk royals began transforming one after another. All but Rowina and the few others capable of fighting on land entered the sea, while the sea turtle took Turan's party onto its back.

From there, Turan steadied himself with deep breaths as he watched the torrent of power approaching in the distance.

“It's coming...”

He sensed a presence he took to be the merfolk king, stronger than when he had last seen him, and an enormous being following behind.

An immense serpent, its insides endlessly swirling as though it were made of wind. The great sea serpent was coming.