Water Magician

Editor: Tseirp

In about an hour, they would reach the border between the Komakyuta Principality and the Suje Kingdom.

That’s when the problem arose.

“A ship is moving to block our path!”

Upon receiving this report, Kabui Somal, Princess Iliaja, Ryo, and Abel went to the bow of the ship to look at the horizon ahead.

The distance was still considerable.

“Can you identify the ship with a telescope?”

“They’re not flying any national flags. But judging by the ship’s shape, it seems to be a Go-War ship from the continent. I can see five of them.”

“A Go-War ship?”

He had never heard of such a type of ship before.

“It’s a ship from the continent, capable of navigating even the open sea. Honestly, it’s not that fast, but it has long-range attacks.”

“Huh?”

Ryo was bewildered by Kabui Somal’s unexpected explanation.

Long-range attacks?

“They line up magicians on the ship who then conduct magic bombardments.”

“Oh, I see!”

Apparently, Ryo had imagined an Earth-like naval battle with cannons, but that wasn’t the case.

“If each ship has twenty magicians, that’s a hundred magicians across five ships… Can we break through with this ship’s speed…?”

Hearing Kabui Somal’s muttering, Ryo turned to him, his movements almost creaking like a machine.

“Won’t that… damage the Rain Shooter…?”

“Yeah, it won’t be unscathed. Some damage is inevitable…”

“No! I won’t allow it!”

“Uh…?”

Kabui Somal was taken aback by Ryo’s sudden shift from his previously relaxed demeanor.

“I’ll protect the Rain Shooter! The best view of the ship… is from the second deck, right?”

“Y-yes. From the upper deck, you can see both the ship and the surroundings more clearly.”

The Rain Shooter had an area that could be called a second deck.

While it was a bit exposed, it offered a great view.

“Just to confirm, is it okay if we sink those ships?”

“No problem. Since they’re not flying any national flags, they’re considered pirates. Sinking them wouldn’t hold us legally responsible in this archipelago.”

“Understood.”

As Ryo said this, he exited the cabin, patting the wall of the Rain Shooter.

“Don’t worry, I’ll protect you.”

He said it softly but firmly.

Kabui Somal turned to Abel, who was standing beside him, and asked.

“Sir Abel, what do you think?”

“If Ryo says he’ll do it, he’ll do it. You can trust him.”

“Even against a hundred magic bombardments?”

“I don’t know what the magic bombardments of the Eastern Countries are like, but…”

He paused for a moment, then continued.

“Whether it’s a hundred, a thousand, or ten thousand, if Ryo says he’ll do it, he will. That’s just who he is.”

“”

Ryo generated a multilayered ice wall around the Rain Shooter, a wall so tough that even unexpected physical or magic impacts wouldn’t break through.

The Rain Shooter advanced, cloaked in the hardest of ice.

The five enemy ships had already stopped moving ahead and were lined up in a row.

They were probably preparing to launch a simultaneous attack on the Rain Shooter.

“An alone would probably suffice, but let’s be thorough. !”

The was one of Ryo’s favorite spells.

It placed mines made of water vapor in the air that would freeze and neutralize any incoming magic.

Even powerful spells would vanish in a burst of mutual annihilation particles upon contact.

However, this spell didn’t move.

Since it only used the water vapor in the air, it stayed in place.

But that wouldn’t work this time.

The Rain Shooter was moving.

So, Ryo decided to make the vapor mines move along with the ship.

Normally, he would specify the coordinates for the water vapor in the air, but this time he set the mines to activate at a certain distance from the Rain Shooter.

This way, the mines would move with the ship, protecting it.

“Doing it with magic is easy.”

Ryo murmured.

He meant that this was much easier than achieving the same effect through alchemy.

With magic, you only had to imagine it.

But that wasn’t the case with alchemy.

Alchemy required ‘formulas and magic circles to manifest magical phenomena’.

Whether those formulas were inscribed on a magic stone or an object like Ryo’s Murasame scabbard… it was still alchemy as far as Ryo was concerned.

Compared to magic, alchemy was more challenging because it required creating many formulas and quantifying them accurately.

Ryo had experienced this painfully when he created the second ship of the Rondo-class, the Neil Anderson, through alchemy.

Compared to that, magic was truly convenient and easy…

“I’ll protect the Rain Shooter! Come on, bring it on!”

Ryo shouted.

Though the enemy likely didn’t hear his shout, five Go-War ships ahead simultaneously unleashed their magic on the Rain Shooter.

Hundreds of magic bombardments.

All fire-attributed.

Among the four elemental attributes, excluding light and darkness, fire is said to have the highest offensive power.

This understanding likely held true in both the central and eastern countries.

It was because they intended to sink the ship with magic bombardments that they had gathered magicians capable of using fire-attribute offensive magic.

However…

Hundreds of beams of annihilation light flashed, causing all the magic to vanish.

Even from the Rain Shooter, it was clear that the crew aboard the Go-War ships were in a state of panic.

“There won’t be a second time! !”

As Ryo chanted, sixteen magic circles appeared behind him.

“!”

In an instant, Ryo and the magic circles launched ice spears in a fan-shaped formation.

A barrage of ice spears.

The number of spears exceeded ten thousand.

Each one was unusually thick this time.

About the size of an adult man’s torso.

It was hard to call them ‘icicles’ given their massive size.

The thick ice spears rained down like a torrential sideways storm.

They tore through the sails, snapped the masts, punctured the sides of the ships… and even created gaping holes below the waterline.

The ice spears, precisely calculated, avoided hitting any people but completely destroyed the ships’ functionality.

As a result, all five ships began to sink.

The Rain Shooter, the queen of the seas, sailed gracefully past them.

Some magicians, clinging to the sinking ships, attempted to cast spells, but… all of them were easily deflected by the invisible ice walls.

Ryo deliberately refrained from attacking the people.

He could have sniped them, just like in some naval battles on Earth, but…

“The true glory of naval warfare lies in bombardments.”

He muttered.

It seemed Ryo had a particular fascination with naval battles…

As the five Go-War ships sank one by one, the Rain Shooter sailed away from the battlefield unscathed.

Ryo returned to the cabin.

“Ryo, good job.”

“Just as I promised, I protected the Rain Shooter!”

“Indeed, well done.”

“Oh, it was nothing.”

Ryo said, blushing at Abel’s straightforward praise.

Next to Abel, Princess Iliaja bowed her head and said,

“Thank you, Ryo-san.”

“No, no, I only did what was necessary.”

Having witnessed Ryo’s magic in the recent naval battle, Princess Iliaja accepted this outcome as only natural.

Though she had been a bit surprised when the overwhelming number of ice spears assaulted the enemy ships, she had expected nothing less.

However, it was Kabui Somal and the crew who were most astonished.

Of course, Kabui Somal had received reports from Admiral Rockday through his deputy Narun.

He had heard that the water-attribute magician, Ryo, before him was not to be underestimated.

He knew about the 200-meter ice bridge that Ryo had created…

But even so, the reality far exceeded his expectations.

Yet Kabui Somal was the quickest to grasp the situation.

He bowed deeply.

“Sir Ryo, thank you for protecting the ship. We are deeply grateful.”

“Oh, no, please don’t worry about it. I just didn’t want the Rain Shooter to get damaged.”

Ryo replied, slightly flustered by the overly deep bow.

“I want the Rain Shooter to continue reigning as the queen of the seas in this archipelago. It needs a legend befitting a queen.”

Thanks to Ryo’s unique, somewhat mysterious logic, the Rain Shooter had just become the stuff of legends.

TLN: Please read my translations at tseirptranslations.com, I did not give permission to any site to host my translations. 

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