"Wait...do we even need to go into those waters?" Jinju Ren asked, despite enjoying the show of her man going shirtless so readily.

"If we want to deal with the giant sea monster, yes," Zhen Liu answered while stretching.

"No, I mean..."

Trailing off, Jinju Ren drew her [Dragon Taking Saber] and gestured towards a familiar yellow jewel that was embedded in the hilt and then towards the ring necklace that was Hurricroak's accessory form.

It took Zhen Liu a few moments after that to realize what his fiancee was suggesting.

"Oh...yeah, that could work."

...No reason reminder: mineralized water is more conductive than fresh water...

<Any changes in the water or nah?>

<Nah. That giant murder shrimp is still swimming around. >

<Dammit.>

The people of Soot Snail Town weren't having a good week.

Normally, at this time of year, the townspeople would be greeting the arrival of a fresh crop of tourists and members of the Ember Slug Trading Company, who had an exclusivity deal with the town's exports.

Instead, this week began with bloodshed.

A lot of bloodshed.

For reasons none of the townsfolk were aware of, the Erupting Dawn Empire and the Sacred Flame Therocracy had decided that their quaint little home was going to be one of the myriad of battlefields that would host one of their dumb skirmishes.

On the positive side, the people of Soot Snail were given precisely twenty-four hours to evacuate the village before either side of the war decided to start slinging fireballs at each other. The townspeople decided to use this small modicum of time to take whatever ships were available and hide out by the local reefs.

They didn't evacuate further inland, due to fear of local aether beasts being attracted by all of the fighting, and they figured that the local ocean would help to absorb any stray attacks that were sent their way and not cascade into a wildfire.

Thankfully, they were correct in this assessment.

From the safety of their lashed-together flotilla, the people of Soot Snail could watch as the Sacred Flame Theocracy And Erupting Dawn Empire tore not only into each other but also the town that they had called home for several generations.

Watching the scene unfold before them was incredibly bitter to watch. However, they were also just incredibly happy to have been able to avoid being caught up in the collateral in the first place.

At least, that was the case up until the actual cost of the battle began to rear its ugly, shrimp-like head.

Many aether warriors ended up spilling a lot of blood into the surrounding ocean, causing the water and the sands to take on a deep red hue.

That much blood in the water had a tendency to attract predators, and there just so happened to be one passing by as all of this blood was being spilt: a Violent Dragon Prawn.

A sixth-tiered dragon-blooded aether beast with a nasty look and an even nastier attitude, the Violent Dragon Prawn was a carnivorous beast that didn't care what it ate as long as its chosen meal had died a violent death.

Whether that violence was committed by itself or third parties didn't matter in the slightest.

When it initially arrived in these waters, the battle between the Erupting Dawn Empire and Sacred Flame Theocracy had more or less ended in a stalemate, with both sides suffering heavy losses. As such, there was plenty of carrion for the Violent Dragon Prawn to feast upon...for about two days.

Afterwards, it had begun to set its sights on the flotilla of townsfolk, who were thankfully protected from the Violent Dragon Prawn due to the reef they were floating over. Unfortunately, this also meant that they were trapped with no safe way to return to shore.

Some of the braver and more powerful among them had tried to return to shore and get help in dealing with the Violent Dragon Prawn; unfortunately, many of these same brave fools ended up returning horribly injured or found themselves buried at sea.

At this point, the people of the flotilla were just waiting for the Violent Dragon Prawn to get bored and finally leave…or for the lot of them to die of starvation, hopelessness, and recklessness.

Because many of the flotilla were starting to entertain the idea of sailing back regardless of the predatory presence.

This increased interest in the idea of a reckless retreat is actually what prompted the flotilla to start assigning people to keep watch over the Violence Dragon Prawn. 𝚏𝕣𝕖𝚎𝚠𝚎𝚋𝚗𝐨𝐯𝕖𝕝.𝕔𝐨𝕞

Which is why, despite the danger, a pair of young men were standing on the top of a reef rock and watching over the Violence Dragon Prawn, just for the most minuscule chance of being able to push through and escape.

^So are you in the reckless rush group or the wait and see group?^

^Neither. We're all just going to die either way so bother choosing our method of—wait a minute… what the fuck is that?^

As the two sentries continued to talk and watch, a pair of figures suddenly flew in from the coastline and began to hover over the area that the Violence Dragon Prawn had declared as its hunting ground.

^Who the heck are those guys?^

^Don't know. But they feel powerful…^

Looming over the Violence Prawn Dragon, a strange neon-blue frog-like woman and a dark-skinned dragon-blooded woman armed with a sword were looking down on the beast with clear disdain in their eyes. At least, that's what the sentries thought these two women looked like as he couldn't really see their expressions from their current position.

^What are they doing up there?^

…Up in the air…

[Miss Jinju, I'm going to be honest, I find it weird as hell that I'm doing a double-team attack with the giga-bitch who burned my arms and almost caused irreparable damage to the Maestro,] Hurricroak admitted to Jinju Ren.

"I get what you mean, but this is the most effective way when it comes to dealing with the overgrown appetizer swimming around down there," Jinju Ren retorted. "Besides, if it makes you feel better, Shocktra finds this equally weird."

[So you do name them!] Hurricroak exclaimed before turning her attention back to the kaijin on the shore. [I was right!]

Once Hurricroak got that moment of gloating out of her system, she turned her attention back towards the Violence Dragon Prawn swimming beneath her feet like a shark on the prowl.

In a couple of moments, this shrimp was about to become soup.

[Alright, let's do this thing.]

As soon as those words left her mouth, Hurricroak began to circulate [Chaos] around her webbed fingers and produce sparks of purple electricity that danced between the aforementioned digits. While the power flowed between her hands, the shadows of giant beasts made of that same purple lightning began to form around her, contrasting nicely with her neon blue skin.

"Well, now we have to show off," Jinju Ren commented as she saw the display being put on by Zhen Liu's kaijin.

Drawing her dragon-taming saber, Jinju Ren began to channel her aether and dragon force into the yellow gem holding the tamed Giant Thunder Dragon Otter and began to pull forth its might.

Yellow dragon-lightning began to manifest around her as the aforementioned Dragon Otter's shadow took form over her saber.

…Now back to the water…

^HOLY SHIT^

^BY THE PHOENIX KING'S TEARS!^

Looking up, the sentries of the flotilla were awestruck as the two floating warrior women started generating enough thunder and lightning to rival a hurricane.

The strongest among the flotilla members was an old Aether Master who had seen better days.

When the Erupting Dawn Empire and the Sacred Flame Theocracy clashed, the people of the flotilla could feel the telltale clash between Aether Lords.

The girls above them were probably Aether Grandmasters at most, but for reasons neither of the sentries could fully comprehend, they had a feeling that they were even stronger than those skirmishers from before.

And right now, they were about to unleash hell upon a sixth-tiered aether beast prawn.

Of course, the beast was going to take this attack while swimming around.

"KREEEEE!"

Once it had sufficiently understood that its domain was being encroached upon, that there were those above it that were trying to attack it, the Violent Dragon Prawn made sure to respond in kind.

Crimson light filled with bloodlust began to pool in the Violent Dragon Prawn's mouth before being released in a terrible beam attack that threatened to tear the two women from the skies and down into its hungry maw.

Unfortunately, this puny shrimp's effort was utterly pointless.

Before the violent beam of bloodred light sit could even possibly graze the feet of Hurricroak and Jinju Ren, their combined lighting attack came down like the judgement of an angry storm god and tore through the beam before slamming into the Violent Dragon Prawn directly.

A roar of pain and anger echoed over the waves, but the sound leaned more towards the former than the latter.