The Heartstone Journey

Book 2 | Ch. 9 - Hypocrite

The next few minutes were filled with screams of terror, cannon fire, explosions and the raging sea as Cloudy dashed on reaching the deck where Hunter was battling the giant squid. His eyes widened when he saw Hunter being flung away by the tentacles too much for even him to handle.

"No!"

He yelled as he sprinted up the steps to reach Hunter. He grabbed him and threw him over his shoulder just as another limb came at him. The arm smashed into the railing sending splinters everywhere and breaking through the wood. Cloudy fell backward and landed on a pile of cargo boxes as Hunter was thrown away from and landed on top of the crates.

"Hunter, are you okay?!"

He yelled with concern. Hunter looked at him with blood coming from the top of his head and nodded before getting back up. The squid's eyes turned red with rage at its failure to destroy them. It started thrashing its arms in every direction trying to crush them. Splashing the ocean, hitting the front of the ship and almost destroying the sails. It made one final attempt at Hunter slamming him down hard onto the ground as he was crushed underneath the weight. It tried to move closer but was prevented to move any further by Zack's men firing desperate shots at the squid.

"AUGH!"

It gave out a roar of anger that shook the whole boat.

"What the fuck!"

Zack yelled as he was knocked away by the roar. The others followed suit and almost fell overboard but held strong only leaving two standing.

"We're gonna die!"

One of the crew members cried out as he fled to the middle floor.

"NO!"

Cloudy shouted.

They were too distracted to notice that the squid wrapped a portion of its tentacles around the ship preventing any kind of escape leaving only confrontation. Echoes of cannon fire roared as desperate soldiers who still had the will to live fought on with cries of intimidation but failed to even make the beast flinch within its own turf of the ocean sea. Cloudy looked around confused understanding that the boat was somehow still afloat even with all the damage it had taken pushing him to question how they haven't went under yet. It wasn't until a thought from before rushed into his head to solve his question which was the fact that Hunter was already using his aura to protect the ship from the waters and explains how they were still up and running.

"He must be smoothening the surface of the ship to keep it up! Anymore though and we are going to be swimming with the sharks!"

Cloudy shouted coming to that conclusion.

Hunter got back up in a small daze before shaking off the pain as his head began to throb rapidly. Cloudy screamed from afar he would repel the rest of the limbs and wanted him to fight off against the buster knowing that was the only solution to ending this battle.

"Trust me! I will protect everyone!"

"*Urk*.. I trust you Cloudy."

Hunter replied holding apart of his head that was injured.

Everyone that was there witnessed Hunter practically fly into the air destroying the floorboard beneath him as he lunged at the squid going at an extremely high velocity. The ship was thrown back as the water carried them away with the squid's lock on the ship torn apart by nothing but a pair of two battle-scarred hands in an instant. Cloudy saw the buster's limbs loosening and stabbed them to completely remove them from the ship allowing movement again. A mission was now given; Defend the ship until Hunter can defeat the buster. A limb was thrown at the ship leaving Cloudy to sprint in the direction it was aiming for to intercept. Making it just in time he pierced the tentacle deeply making it flinch backward. Collecting energy around him he smoothened the point of his weapon and swiped at the incoming tentacle from the side. With what little time he was given he judged that there was two limbs in plain sight, possibly one more hidden in case of a wild card and changed his strategy to adjust to the ongoing battle. Each time he deflected or redirected the limbs away he could feel his arms trembling and his breathing rugged. He was tiring out and knew that Hunter had to end the battle soon or he wouldn't be able to go on. With a newfound determination his eyes sparkled with conviction as he let out a smile unknowing to himself that he did that. He raised his spear high above him pumping himself up, his body was on fire, arms trembling and even then he smiled thinking how good of an opportunity this was for him. Taking a stance he planted himself and took an aggressive, defensive position ready to thrust him spear at whatever gets within his range.