When Kanna mentioned someone else was the champion, Uncle ACE became unhappy, his face flushed red as he mumbled things like "LOGOS cheated..." "I wasn't in good form that day," "The chair I chose was poor quality, the bottom was too rough to slide..." This made everyone burst into laughter: the vehicle, inside and out, was filled with cheerful air.
When the convoy rested, Reinhardt specifically came over. Although he found Provence's account of the experience in the Calamity quite fantastical, as a fellow Calamity Messenger, he believed she wouldn't lie to him. After all, the protagonist of that experience was right there; even if she exaggerated wildly, a simple test would expose her.
Kanna wasn't offended by Reinhardt's arrival, not seeing his actions as a sign of distrust.
Because, indeed, based on her appearance, she didn't look at all like a "great hero" capable of saving an entire fully armed convoy.
For this reason, she didn't mind showing off a bit.
After Uncle ACE agreed, the group watched Kanna casually throw a Thunderbolt Wedge to her left and another to her right. The next second, Kanna appeared at the left Thunderbolt Wedge and threw another Thunderbolt Wedge towards the right position. Just as the two Thunderbolt Wedges were about to touch, Kanna suddenly swapped places with the Thunderbolt Wedge she had just thrown, appearing on the right.
The Thunderbolt Wedge that appeared on the left passed through the convoy and flew to the right again (on the way, to avoid hitting the one that had been moved to the middle after the previous swap, she thoughtfully recalled it) and collided with the new Thunderbolt Wedge Kanna held in her hand.
In an instant, a huge lightning storm descended from the sky, shaking the entire convoy. The villagers and children, unaware of what was happening, were so frightened that they all hid inside the vehicles, not daring to come out.
Reinhardt and Ayers, as Cautus, felt it even more "profoundly." With their keen hearing, they almost thought they had gone deaf at that moment. It took a while for both of them to recover from the shock brought by the lightning storm.
At this moment, they no longer had their previous nonchalance when looking at the little dragon person squatting by the campfire, drooling over the roasted whole lamb.
After all, if it was an adorable little Wyvern girl just a moment ago, now it was a little Wyvern girl holding an Originium bomb.
They seemed to hear a voice in their ears, a young girl's voice, "Originium bombs for sale, fresh Originium bombs..."
The two exchanged glances, as if seeing the same scene in each other's eyes, and couldn't help but shiver, then obediently retreated to the back.
As for Kanna, although Uncle ACE outwardly criticized her, saying her commotion was too loud and likely to attract the attention of interested parties, he was secretly quite happy.
With that one lightning strike, he believed that even if someone in the convoy had other intentions, they would have to dutifully suppress them. As for the surroundings, let alone being deserted, even if someone saw the scene, they would absolutely not dare to approach.
Kanna was also very happy at this moment because her eyes had returned to normal... Although her previous vertical pupils looked very cool, they also caused a hint of fear, which didn't quite fit Kanna's preference for slacking off.
As for the mission, it was also shown to be successfully completed, and the skill acquired was a super-modified version of Kanna's ultimate ability from League of Legends, the Thunderbolt Wedge — Arcane Art: Super Myriad Thunder Heavenly Prison.
Super Myriad Thunder Heavenly Prison — Kanna summons a Thunderbolt Wedge storm, lasting up to ten minutes, which can be interrupted at any time. Every second, a Thunderbolt Wedge is summoned next to all enemies within a hundred meters, dealing thunderstorm damage to all nearby enemies. If the distance between two Thunderbolt Wedges is less than ten meters, they resonate, triggering a larger thunderstorm (multiple Thunderbolt Wedges can stack resonance effects). Kanna can choose any Thunderbolt Wedge for position replacement, and she herself is not affected by the thunderstorm and is considered a Thunderbolt Wedge. There is no limit to the number of Thunderbolt Wedges summoned during the skill's duration, and they disappear after the effect ends.
After seeing this skill, Kanna only sighed that it came too late. If she had this skill before, the team wouldn't have been so disheveled. With Kanna's speed, she could have completely cleared all creatures within five miles outside the village within ten minutes, and wouldn't have been so embarrassed later.
However, even though it came late, Kanna felt that it was at least a decent area-of-effect skill, and its effect looked quite strong, belonging to the type where the more enemies there were, the more damage it dealt, so she didn't dwell on it.
After finishing an entire roasted lamb by herself, ACE sat in the car and began to inquire about the monster during the Calamity. After all, he had only seen a few roadside corpses while driving, which looked like some kind of giant fish. Only Kanna, who was outside, knew the specific situation best.
"That strange fish? It wasn't really a strange fish! It looked like a loach from the rice paddies, just much, much bigger. The biggest one's head was about the size of this car we're sitting in, and it was six or seven cars long. But that loach was really ugly; it had those... those oripathy particles all over its body, and a few were especially huge. I don't know how it swam so fast carrying such big rocks."
As Kanna gestured wildly, the image of the monster gradually became clearer in everyone's minds.
ACE and Reinhardt, who had moved closer, took out their notebooks to record Kanna's words, because from her descriptions, they saw a brand new species capable of adapting to the Calamity.
Although it sounded like this creature had mutated severely during the Calamity and was heavily contaminated, it also indicated that the Calamity could very likely stimulate some wild species to mutate in unpredictable directions.
This direction had been studied by scholars before, but the samples were extremely rare.
After all, Calamities are often accompanied by a sharp increase in oripathy particle concentration. In such situations, everyone's first reaction is to hide, trying to keep the Calamity out with sturdy walls and sealed rooms. No one has the energy to explore what the land truly looks like beneath a Calamity.
Incidents like Kanna encountering high-density mutated creatures in a Calamity have actually been discovered through traces on the ground after Calamities, but most of these traces were destroyed beyond recognition by the Calamity, and the creatures in those traces disappeared after the Calamity dissipated. Therefore, this has always been a major challenge in Calamity research.
Now, through Kanna's narration, they seemed to catch a glimpse of the unknown ecological environment within the Calamity.
"Based on Kanna's account, I have reason to believe that if we had arrived an hour later, this village would have been completely destroyed by those mutated 'loaches.' And everyone inside would have become food for those 'loaches.'"
Even with just one person's words, the astute Calamity Messenger could still analyze a lot of information from them.
Chapter 75: Chapter 70: It's Absolutely Necessary to Get a Badass Weapon
The next day, the convoy successfully returned to Rhodes Island's main vessel.
Opening the car door, Kanna saw Amiya and Rosmontis standing on the steps not far away. When they saw Kanna, both happily waved.
"Wow! Are you waiting for Kanna?" Kanna pushed off with her little legs, and with a single leap, she arrived in front of them.
"Yes! When ACE sent back the mission debriefing, he praised you at great length! Provence also said in the debriefing that she would apply for a high-difficulty Contingency Contract medal for you, which made everyone so happy."
Yesterday, ACE's debriefing had already been sent back to Rhodes Island. This was not only to convey the message of mission completion but also to make contact and know the time and location for boarding the ship later.
In the debriefing, he praised Kanna profusely. Based on Kanna's description, ACE put himself in her shoes and realized that without Kanna's ability to see through heavy rain, if it had been him, upon discovering the strange fish, he would have only been able to lead his subordinates and villagers to retreat into the village, waiting for the Calamity to pass and the strange fish to leave.
But in that scenario, both the team members and the villagers would face enormous risks to their lives and severe oripathy infection. With the team's strength, they would likely survive the disaster, but deaths would certainly be unavoidable.
Everything Kanna did significantly minimized the danger of this operation. Although she was exposed to great danger while operating in the Calamity, it was surprising that after leaving the Calamity zone, the accompanying Medical Operator performed an emergency check on Kanna, and the results showed no traces of oripathy infection in Kanna's skin exudates or saliva. However, Kanna had stayed in the Calamity without any protection for a long time, which worried ACE.
Regarding his concerns, Kal'tsit sent a private message, telling him and the Medical Operator not to spread news of Kanna's physical condition. Although ACE had doubts, he respected the directive.
"Don't rush off to play yet. Kanna, your actions this time were very dangerous, ACE has already told us. So, you must go to the Medical Department for a comprehensive check-up first. You can only leave after the examination is complete."
Before Kanna could be happy for a few minutes, Kal'tsit's voice came from behind her.
Hearing Kal'tsit's words, Amiya and Rosmontis both showed expressions of helplessness. Kanna could only droop her tail and follow Kal'tsit into the corridor.
After the examination, Kal'tsit and Warfarin held Kanna's medical report, their faces showing an 'as expected' expression.
"Tsk! What a terrifying little one. She was active in the wilderness during a Calamity for nearly half an hour without any protection, and yet she has no infection at all. I have to ask, Kal'tsit, are you really sure you can manage her?"
Warfarin spread her hands, seeing Kal'tsit's indifferent look.
Well, if you, the leader, aren't afraid, why should I, a subordinate, worry?
Besides, isn't there still the invincible MON3TR? When the sky falls, the tall ones will hold it up. What does it matter to an innocent Blood Demon doctor like her?
After the check-up, Kanna walked out of the Medical Department and saw Rosmontis sitting quietly outside. When she saw Kanna, her eyes lit up, and then she stood up.
"Sniff, sniff! Rosmontis, you smell so nice." As she approached, Kanna caught a faint, delicate scent. She had noticed it before, but she was too excited when she saw them, and then Kal'tsit immediately called her away, so she hadn't had a chance to ask.
"Really?" Rosmontis was very happy, her eyes narrowing into crescent moons.
"It's Senior Lena. These past few days, she and Miss Melantha have made many new sachets and aromatherapy diffusers in the Greenhouse. Doctor Kal'tsit said that this batch of aromatherapy and sachets is very effective for the mental comfort of oripathy patients, and I also received one." As she spoke, Rosmontis raised her hand, showing Kanna the small sachet hanging on her wrist.
Kanna nodded after seeing it; then she wouldn't need it. Although she also quite wanted such a small item, she didn't know the difficulty of production and the demand. If it was very scarce, giving it to someone who didn't need it would be worse than giving it to a patient in urgent need. Perhaps having stayed on Rhodes Island for a long time, Kanna would also consider these things more when it came to matters related to illness.
She led Rosmontis towards the lower levels of Rhodes Island, her destination naturally being Vulcan's workshop in the Engineering Department.
During this outing, Kanna also realized she lacked a handy weapon. Although with her strength, a weapon would only be the icing on the cake, killing an opponent with a weapon and with her fists were two completely different things.
Especially that big loach this time, in order to successfully kill it, Kanna endured the nausea and placed both hands on its head for an electric therapy session for quite a while. The smell of burnt flesh mixed with earth and the unique fishy odor was beyond disgusting.
If she had a suitable weapon, Kanna was confident she could easily cut the opponent in two.
Upon arriving at Vulcan's workshop, Kanna mentioned wanting to forge a weapon, and Vulcan was quite interested.
Then Kanna began to explain her ideas.
The weapon choice was a greatsword and a shield with very sharp edges on both sides.
And the shield could split in half, then the greatsword would be slotted in the middle of the shield, transforming the sword-and-shield into an extended great axe.
As Kanna spoke, she stepped onto a stool, gesticulating wildly (her feet couldn't reach anything higher).
"I call this set of weapon transformations 'Super Discharge.' When in doubt, just freaking discharge it! Any problem that can be solved with Super Discharge isn't a problem at all. Next time I encounter a big guy like that, I'll just axe them down one by one, maybe even stack some Bloodrage..."
Vulcan, who was beside her, went from initial enthusiasm to looking like an old person on the subway with a phone, fully displaying her complex and chaotic emotions.
Kanna didn't care about this at all, and Cerberus, who was beside her, even clapped her tail after hearing Kanna's description, because what Kanna said sounded super cool, making even the not-so-bright weapon master, Cerberus, excited.
Leaving aside whether splitting the shield in the middle would affect the shield's inherent defensive power and quality.
The strength of a sword-type weapon itself simply cannot be used as an axe handle, because the grip of a normal axe is the entire axe shaft from top to bottom, while for a sword, even a two-handed sword, the part that can be gripped by hand is only a small section. This means the power of such an axe would be concentrated at the outermost part, which would be a huge and fatal flaw for the user.
After being criticized by Vulcan, Kanna temporarily abandoned her shield-axe plan. Given her height and combat style, Vulcan advised her not to choose too large a weapon.
Because an overly large weapon would be too heavy and slow, which would not suit her attack style of using Thunderbolt Wedge's sudden repositioning for surprise attacks.
-------------------------------
I've already uploaded 30 - 40 chapters of this story on Patreon!
If you enjoy it, come check out the latest chapters in advance.
Here's the link:
[patreon.com/Greyhounds]
Thank you so much for your support!!