Editing HEAVY OBJECT:Volume11 Chapter 3 (section)

===Part 9===

The fireworks swept away the darkness of the sky and sea.

A deluge of light covered it all.

An incredible number of explosions overlapped with each other and filled the space, but that was not enough on its own. The copper and other metals used to color the flames acted as chaff and once more prevented the Destruction Fes from using the electromagnetic guide for its acoustic weapon. Depending on the range, that weapon could tear a fleet to pieces or stop an Object in its tracks, but it was dead once more.

“This is our chance, Quenser!” shouted Heivia on the boat.

“But it isn’t a guarantee.”

Despite the opportunity, Quenser did not lose sight of the situation. He continued coldly analyzing the information that worked against them.

“This only took out the acoustic weapon, so it still has its legendary speed. The Princess can’t win unless we take out those special boosters on those three legs.”

“………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………How many more climaxes is this gonna have?”

“We need to observe, Heivia. This closed the gap a little, so the Princess can last a while longer.”

The problem was not the air cushion propulsion device below the spherical main body. It was the insect leg units with the boosters attached to the side. By firing those all at once, it could pull off those lightning-like back and forth movements that a manned Object could never reproduce.

And those boosters were not emitting flames like a rocket.

“We mentioned it before, but it’s shooting a liquid out. Seawater would be the likely suspect, right? It would be pumping it up and firing it out. If that’s how it gets its propulsion, can’t we just dive down and block up the pump opening?”

“I doubt it’s that simple,” muttered Quenser. “Heivia, the Destruction Fes uses an air cushion propulsion device.”

“What does that matter!? Aren’t the boosters the problem!?”

“The air cushion suggests it’s meant for use on water and on land. Then what does it spray out for its speed on land?”

“Oh.”

“Did you think they can’t use it on land? Not a chance. Azureyfear said she would exterminate the Vanderbilt family and that she would start with your girlfriend. Even if she joins with the hawks of your family later, they’ll want an amphibious Object that can operate in all environments to hunt down all those nobles scattered around the world. A purely naval Object doesn’t mesh with their design philosophy.”

“Then what? When it’s on land, does it stick a tube into the ground to dig up some underground water!?”

“…”

The student thought for a moment.

“Heivia, with the radios down, we can’t rely on our handheld devices’ maps. I need to investigate this based on memory, so help me out.”

“What could you possibly do now!?”

“I want to follow the route the Destruction Fes has taken in this battle.”

The two idiots used the rubber boat’s large motor to travel through the nighttime sea with no real landmarks. The dark sea would have thrown off their sense of direction, but the reflected colorful light of the fireworks messed with their senses in a different way.

Still, they somehow managed to find a remaining band of bubbles.

They stopped the boat and Quenser scooped up some seawater in his water bottle.

“What are you doing? It’s not like we have an examination kit!”

“Eyesight will be enough.”

Quenser showed Heivia the bottle as it reflected the fireworks.

“See those black specks?”

“What the hell are they?”

“Iron sand, most likely. The Destruction Fes’s boosters were never meant to spray water. They gain thrust by firing dirt like a railgun or coilgun. And of course, they use the iron and iron sand in the dirt as a ‘framework’.”

“Wait. You mean…?”

“Seawater conducts electricity, but that wouldn’t be strong enough.”

“Yeah, you don’t really hear about people making magnets out of seawater.”

“So just like mixing in diamond dust to increase the strength of an industrial water cutter, they’ve mixed in some iron sand to give themselves that ‘framework’. That way they can fire the water out with even more power.”

Heivia looked to the distant sea.

Even now, the battle between the Baby Magnum and Destruction Fes continued. A stray shot could fly toward the cruise ship and other ships at any time.

The sight was enough to squeeze at his heart, but he also noticed something else.

“Damn that fraud. I was taken in by the impressive appearance… I was taken in by Azureyfear’s fighting style.”

“Yes. It may look like it’s freely moving across the battlefield with unbeatable speed, but it’s really only fighting while moving back and forth across an extremely limited area. It’s retrieving and reusing the iron sand its boosters have scattered around. Of course it is. If it doesn’t have a filter to absorb the rare metals dissolved in the seawater, it can only use its limited stock during a naval battle. It isn’t replenishing its iron sand out of thin air.”

“B-but waiting for it to run out would be too reckless. The Princess is only barely getting by…no, she’s being worn down bit by bit. If she lets her guard down for just a moment, she’ll be hit straight through the center. We can’t hope for a long-term battle against something so fast.”

“I know that and that’s not what I’m going for.” Quenser tapped his temple with his index finger. “We don’t have to wait around for it to run out. If we take that stock away from it, it’ll stop in no time.”

“But how?”

“We already have the answer. We’re going over there next, Heivia. Get the boat moving.”

Before asking for details, the delinquent noble did as he was told.

The rubber boat almost seemed to hop along the nighttime sea filled with dancing colorful lights.

They were nowhere near an island or continent. They were surrounded by ocean in every direction, so the only things they could be approaching were the Objects, the aircraft carriers and cruisers where Frolaytia’s group waited, and…

“We’ve finally gotten them directly involved,” said Heivia as he operated the large motor that doubled as the rudder. “Welcome to the Celestial Flowers fireworks festival, I guess! Since we’re here, maybe I should go pay that lonely kitten a visit!!”

“If you’re going to ask a girl on a date, pay attention to your hair and clothes. Show up in that sweaty uniform and she’ll slap you.”

“Ha ha. You don’t know the first thing about nobles, Quenser. She’ll play rock, not paper.”

“Hey, if you’re going to get all lovey-dovey about your girlfriend, can you at least pay me? It sounds like more work than being a fortune teller under an overpass, but I’m willing to listen if it pays!!”

There were five hundred ships, but they came in all shapes and sizes. The biggest were the Rose & Lily and about ten other cruise ships that rivalled an aircraft carrier in size. The smallest were more like wooden river-crossing boats with plastic roofs. Some had such simple designs that taking them out to sea would clearly be suicide, but the cruise ships likely supplied water, food, fuel, and other materials like they were air refueling tankers.

The hundreds of ships were packed in over only a few kilometers, so it looked like a boat bazaar filling a river. It grew difficult to continue on even with the rubber boat. Quenser and Heivia climbed from the boat to a ship and jumped from ship to ship from there.

“That’s weird. I don’t see anyone. They’re all launching their fireworks without anyone onboard.”

“That’s convenient. They’re probably all gathered on the cruise ships. A panic here would cause the ships to start running into each other and they’re all packed full of fireworks. Who knows how far the damage would spread.”

The world-class fireworks craftsmen had likely known what would happen to radio signals when they launched their products, so they were mostly being launched by timers or wired connections.

“More importantly, where are we supposed to go!? Tell me already!!”

“To that!”

Quenser pointed into the distance where a giant structure seemed to lean over several ships.

“The wreckage of the acoustic weapon’s peacock feather the Princess tore off! It’s a giant speaker, so it has to have giant magnets inside. And a ton of them!!”

The Destruction Fes mixed large quantities of iron sand in with the seawater to fire it out like a railgun or coilgun.

Quenser wanted a large number of magnets.

Therefore…

“This is everything we need. Now we just need to set it up.”

“Wait a second!! Watch out!!”

As soon as Heivia cried out, a blinding light swept across the ships.

It was the Destruction Fes’s low-stability plasma main cannon. A fair distance from the two idiots, it slipped between a few of the cruise ships, yet dozens of the smaller ships vanished in the light. Some had simply been vaporized and others had been set alight by the intense heat, igniting the fireworks.

A chain reaction of large explosions followed.

Flowers of unnaturally colored flames meant for entertainment blossomed here and there. For the ones the size of a small fishing boat, the explosive force of the fireworks must have overpowered the ship’s weight because they were launched into the night sky like rockets. As their silhouettes fell apart in midair, a few of them approached Quenser and Heivia.

“Shit! Jump in!!”

Quenser reflexively crouched down, but Heivia grabbed his collar and threw him into the dark sea. As soon as they both plunged into the thick water, a muffled explosion and a blinding light erupted overhead. The fireworks in the falling boat and in the one they had been standing on must have ignited.

The explosions continued with no sign of ending, so the flames may have spread to the neighboring boats.

Quenser tried to rise to the surface in search of air, but Heivia held him down and forced him along. They only surfaced after diving below another ship and reaching a spot that seemed to be shielded from that ground zero.

“Bwah!! Cough, cough!! Cough, Cough! Ohaheh!!!!”

“I have no idea what you’re trying to say, but I’m not accepting any complaints. This spot won’t be safe forever either and we have no idea which ship will blow up next. If you have something to do, then hurry up and do it!!”

“Cough! Cough, cough!! Ugh… But if the Destruction Fes’s stray shots are finally ending up here…”

“Yeah, the Princess isn’t perfect. She’s gradually being pushed back this way. If she wasn’t protecting that final line, that probably would’ve been a direct hit on the cruise ships!”