Chapter 44 - Emperor Unagi

Titus let go of Ambrosia's ankle, his expression unchanging. He couldn't stop her from initiating this duel, and instead chose to simply sit back and watch it unfold, regardless of what happened.

"Hm, well I suppose if you're so confident in your improvement these last 5 months, I don't see any reason why we couldn't duel. But I'll warn you now, I've also improved some."

"Hehe, well then, let's start it up! Here, Titus, I'll show you how real heroes fight..."

Hero and Ambrosia took their sides on the field, opposite of each other. The crowd hadn't diminished yet, there were still around 60 spectators lingering around, anticipating this second duel.

Because Ambrosia was obviously much more skilled than Titus, Hero would waste no time gathering information, and instead opt to focus on this duel to the best of his ability. Despite what Ambrosia might have said, their duels were usually much closer than one would assume...

"You there, Esper Witch, was it? Are you sure you have what it takes to meddle with this guy!? You saw what he did to someone as brawny as me!" said Titus, gingerly coming to his feet, still rocked by the aftermath of his duel.

Ambrosia glanced at him, taking note of where Hero struck him. He seemed to mainly go for the torso. This would be important for Ambrosia to realize, so she could figure out ways to protect herself from Hero's punches.

"Yeah, but trust me, I've done this countless times before. I think things will go differently this time."

"Well then, initiate the duel I guess...but be careful..."

Hero, despite his seemingly infinite potential, was in fact slightly injured from Titus's strikes. This would put him and Ambrosia on more equal grounds, even if not by much. Ambrosia thought to target where he had already been hit, in order to magnify the power of her blows.

She would opt to take control of things around her, using them as weapons as her physical strength was somewhat lackluster. After strategizing for some time, Ambrosia finally initiated the duel.

"I, Ambrosia Heroux, enlisted in the Hero Camp, challenge you to a duel!"

"I, Hero, enlisted in the Hero Camp, humbly acc--huh?"

Before he could finalize the initiation, Hero was cut off by frightening screaming, coming from the western gate. Everybody focused their attention on this sudden interruption. What was the problem?

"EEL MONSTER! ON THE BEACHES!" yelled a man, running his way through the West Gate. He was followed by a smaller group of beachgoers, still in bathing suits. Some had minor injuries on their bodies.

"What? Did you say an Eel? How large?" asked Hero, disregarding the duel entirely. If an eel monster suddenly showed up, that meant their duel would have to wait.

"Pretty damn big, and it has smaller fish monsters swimming with it! I'd say the Eel is nearly an Emperor sized sea creature!"

"Emperor...that's the second largest size classification of a sea monster. Hey, Ambrosia, I think we should take care of this, can the duel wait a few more minutes?"

Sea Monsters were classified into 6 size groups, as most of them couldn't be accurately measured from under the water. In order from smallest to largest, they are: Mini, Minor, Moderate, Major, Emperor, and Lord.

"Ugh, fine, but after we kill this eel thingy, I'm starting the duel, no matter what conditions we're in, okay?" said Ambrosia, clearly annoyed at the sudden change of plans. She had been anticipating this duel for months.

"Alright, that's fine by me, just follow, and hurry!"

Hero and Ambrosia took off. Hero's method of travel was simple enough, he just ran! Ambrosia however opted to use her ball of light. She could transform in and out of it at will, making it a great form of transportation.

"Yukio, do you think we should follow them? Maybe you could train on a smaller fish monster."

Mayumi, standing next to me, looked somewhat excited. Despite the beach being in danger, this was a good opportunity for me to sharpen my skills with the sword, as well as work on taking control of monsters.

"...yeah, let's go, I have some training to do..."

"Mm!"

We left the crowd of people, making our way into the Western Gate. As we walked through the shopping district, groups of people were running the other way, escaping the monsters that threatened the shoreline.

Inversely, there were also heroes from the camp making their way to where we were going. Omega seemed to be mainly occupied by level 4 and 5 heroes, with the occasional level 6. I hadn't seen any other level 7's except for Ambrosia and Hero.

Mayumi and I both had our swords with us, but we weren't wearing any armor. We were both just wearing summer outfits. I had my palm tree T-Shirt on, and Mayumi, a purple and white T-Shirt. We were unprepared to defend ourselves, but it's what we had at the moment.

"The Eastern Gate should take us straight to the beach, I'm just going to follow the heroes, as I've never been here before."

"Well, me neither, so I'll follow you!"

As we ran through the camp, we hurried by copious amounts of panicking individuals, as well as numerous buildings and shops. Kneeling atop one of those shops, unseen by us, was Cynthia, once again stalking us... we had no idea she was there...

"Ahh, a monster attack, right now of all times too. This is perfect! I'll be able to study just how you fight, Yuuukioo Sazuuke!"

Cynthia was watching from above as hundreds of citizens ran towards the Western Gate, away from the trouble. She was looking down on them, giggling to herself.

"Hehe, they're making my job too easy. With more people focusing on the danger threatening them, there will be fewer eyes focusing on me!"

Cynthia stood up and stretched. She was tall, just about Yukio's height. As the leading patriarch, it was her job to oversee the actions of the other patriarchs, acting as the overseer of The Zodiac. She was dangerous, but appeared so normal.

"Mm, I think I should get going before I lose sight of them. Hang on, you two!"

Cynthia then took a running start and proceeded to jump from rooftop to rooftop, climbing buildings as she needed to. She was incredibly athletic, making zero mistakes in her movements.

As she approached the final building, she landed on it, kneeling down once more to stalk the pair. She was wearing a sun hat to help disguise herself, though her school uniform seemed to stand out among the others in the camp.

"Ohh shit, that's a big eel, where have you been hiding for so long, lovely?" she said, gazing at the Eel monster as it burst from out of the ocean like a whale, landing back in the water shortly after.

Cynthia was sitting down on the roof of what appeared to be a surf shop. It had palm leaves decorating the roof, giving her a good hiding spot. She set a small bag down next to her, filled with her supplies.

"Well, I think I'll just post up here for now. I have a good view of the eel, as well as those two down there," said Cynthia, pulling out a pair of binoculars. She was fully prepared to gather as much information as she needed.

"Let's see now... Yukio, Yukio, ah yes, there he is. The handsome boy with scarlet hair like mine. He appears to be next to a blonde girl with glasses. Is she a hero as well? They both have swords..."

"Regardless, I can't wait to see your ability in action, Capricorn... let's hop to it then, shall we?" said Cynthia, looking through the binoculars.

Back on the beach, Mayumi and I were nearly out of breath. We ran through the entire camp from West to East, just to make it here. When we arrived, there were already heroes on small boats making their way out to deal with the smaller fish monsters.

We spotted Ambrosia and Hero standing near the edge of the water. We decided to approach them to ask about the threat levels of these beings.

"Yo! Hero! What's the situation?" I asked.

"Ah, Yukio, you followed us? Perfect! Now we can start your training! You see that big fish monster beached over there? Go defeat it!"

I turned around and took notice of a beached fish monster in the distance, unoccupied by any heroes.

"But what are the threat levels? How dangerous are these things?" I asked, turning back around.

"Oh, they're not too bad. The fish monsters are probably level 2 threats, but this Eel is something else... it's probably a level 5 or 6. It's known as an Emperor Unagi, and they're native to the oceans around Kemono Island."

"I'll deal with the Eel, just go slay those fish before they start making their way towards the Camp!" yelled Hero.

I turned to where he was pointing, and noticed another giant fish, resembling a trout of some sort. It was beached, unable to move, yet it was larger than me! It was probably 6 or 7 feet tall when vertical, however, it was on its side. What confused me though, was how there would be any way of these monsters making their way to the Camp. They were fish, what were they going to do, walk?

....but then, it happened. I noticed one of the fish monsters in the distance begin to turn on its side, and then stand up... THEY HAD LEGS...

"What the hell!? Why do they have legs!?"

"Yeah, that's why you need to defeat them quickly! They run super fast and eat basically anything they come across, that's how they grow! Now hurry!" said Hero, punching me in the shoulder.

I drew my sword and looked at Mayumi, who drew hers as well. Together, she and I were going to defeat those fish monsters before they could run to the city. It would be the first official monster that I would kill, and I was exhilarated.

"Mayumi, can you take on the standing one? You can do this much better than I can."

"Absolutely! Go deal with that other one before it gets up as well!"

We went our separate ways, running across the sand as best we could. It was difficult running on sand, as it shifted constantly below our feet. I glanced back at Hero, who boarded one of the smaller boats, as it made its way towards the Emperor Unagi.

"Damn, good luck out there, Hero!" I said, turning back around, continuing my path towards the fish monster on the shore. Mayumi reached the standing monster before it could move, and sliced one of its legs off!

"Yes! Go Mayumi!" I shouted, running past her. She looked up at me and smiled, before returning her focus on the giant trout monster. It had green skin, sharp teeth, and black eyes, but it was menacing nonetheless.

From the top of the surf shop, Cynthia was tracking our movement, learning what she could about our fighting styles.

"Going straight for the legs, very smart, I would have done the same. But Yukio hasn't reached his monster quite yet. He's fairly slow on his feet, but then again, they're running on sand..."

"Let's see if you take control of this fish or not, Yukio. It would be totally lame if you didn't!" she said, smiling to herself. She seemed to be holding no malice towards any of us, and instead, rooting for our success...