Kaboom!!
The first clash with the enemy started when the mass-produced ship begin to fire their volleys to the enemy, with North Carolina in turn engaging in gunfire with a Siren battleship. By being cautious while dodging and counter-attacking, she swiftly advanced towards the group of Sirens, then adjusted her loadout to AP guns and effortlessly decimated the Siren fleets.
On the other side, Volga's rigging destroyed a Siren destroyer and launched her Hellcat towards the cruisers. She also assisted Memphis in handling the air attacks while guarding the flagship. The rigging emitted a powerful beam, destroying the approaching suicide boats.
While the fleets were fending off a fierce Siren attack, Memphis suggested approaching the White Tower by utilizing mass-produced ships to break through their formation. While advancing towards the tower and destroying it quickly before any risks arise seemed like a good idea, there is also the risk of a surprise attack from the Siren.
The tower stopped rising when it reached its peak, making a loud, echoing boom that was deafening. Fortunately, the shipgirls were unscathed by the sound and proceeded to exchange fire. However, the same cannot be said for Greynar, who remained inside the command vessel. Volga was worried for her lover's condition, and slowly withdrew while supporting the air assault.
Her comms line suddenly connected to Greynar's channel, "Don't worry about me, just keep fighting." He said.
She halted her movement, "Commander... Okay, if you said so." Dodging the incoming salvo and counter-attacked by crashing her rigging to enemy's battleship.
The battle raged on as the tower gleamed radiantly, indicating another imminent event if they failed to act promptly. Saratoga and Memphis proceeded towards the forefront and eliminated the enemy fleets while Volga backed them up and conducted air strikes while North Carolina fired her turret at the Siren's carrier, preventing the planes to take off.
"Memphis, Saratoga, can you hear my voice?" Their comms connected to the command vessel in the backline of the formation.
"Commander?"
"We can hear your voice, loud and clear."
The comms sighed in relief, "Listen, i don't have any time to explain but i will make it brief." He explained. "There is a weakpoint in the middle of the tower, i can see it from here with my binoculars. Try to look above you."
The girls turned their direction above, there is a small crack outside of the tower. Big enough for a child to fit in there, it wasn't hard to spot but you need to get closer to see it with naked eye. The appearance of the crack was definitely suspicious, but they guessed it was caused by the Royal Navy's previous engagement with the tower. Memphis and Saratoga looked at each other and nodded in unison.
"We have located it, and I will attempt to have my aircraft drop a bomb at that location," Saratoga mentioned.
"I will also assist Saratoga using my anti-air gun if there is any Siren's aircraft." Memphis readying her gun.
"Good, let me know when you need help, i will be on stand-by trying to establish communication with outside of the mirror sea."
※ ※ ※
The communication broke off as Greynar sighed into an empty space, "You know something I don't, don't you?" He glanced at the person next to him, similar in appearance but with a slight difference in skin colour.
It was just an illusion he had created with the power of S.A.V.I.O.R. The person in question silently opened his eyes, "I have spoken with ᓭᑑ⚍ᔑ∷ᒷ regarding about your circumstance, and it seems that person is right, we need more time before we can proceed with our next plan."
The illusionary figure rose and approached Greynar, it gazed at his entire figure with the glowing red eyes, the figure left a small sigh. "I regret coming out from my slumber, your body simply rejected my existence as a whole. Even S.A.V.I.O.R also has locked me out of my own place."
Greynar felt guilty and left a small laugh, "I apologize for that, i just hate the idea someone could possess my body easily. That's why i used S.A.V.I.O.R. to separate myself to make you leave my body."
The figure stepped back with a bitter expression, it took a sit and crossed its leg. Making a small gesture while reminicsing of something.
"You know, this situation is similar to what Shinano dreamed about." The figure mused.
"Shinano? You met her? I thought she-" His word got cut off.
"No, not in person of course. I did not meet her directly, only observed her dream," Stated the figure, making a soft humming noise.
"If you are observing the dream, then you must have seen countless of possibility that she saw."
The illusion nodded, "All possibility lead to the awakening of Leviathans. We still have time before their rising, we can use them to travel into another timeline and gather our strength."
Greynar leaned back to the wall, he crossed his arms over his chest. He looked over the windows, the shipgirls are fighting for their life, Saratoga making a small jump to her plane and launched her dive bomber directly to the cracked surface. Greynar then turned his head to the side, looking above the sky, he gritted his teeth. He let out a huge sigh while crossed his hand on the chest.
"For the last time, i won't use a time hop before we are certain of those possibility that you told me before." Greynar said turning his head to the illusion.
The figure looked over him in disbelief, but soon after that the illusion smiled. "So you won't change your mind. A fine desicion for a rookie Commander, not that you are officially one in the first place," Light slowly gathering, turning the illusion into dust. "And good timing, i will pray for your safety."
"You're leaving so soon?" Greynar looked at him in the eyes.
"Well, my time in this world isn't much anyway, i might be aswell take my eternal rest, i can safely entrust the humanity's future to you again." The figure slightly chuckled. "I'm sure you will lead them to the future you wanted, farewell i will be looking forward to it." The figure disappeared an instant.
Greynar closed his eyes. "I will keep that in mind, Commander."
It's not that hard for Greynar to guess who is that person. He saw a certain vision while he was possessed, it was the memory of the unknown Commander. He was a trapped spirit within S.A.V.I.O.R to maintain the balance the connection of timelines. Before he was a spirit, the commander failed to save his own timeline. When he discovered there is a hidden trump card for humanity, it was all too late for him. Leviathans has invaded their timeline and the Siren left them behind. In a sense, he was a tragic main character that has suffered the worst possible outcome, the bad end, and trapped himself within S.A.V.I.O.R to balance the power and waiting for the opportunity to rise again.
'But, something feels odd, it almost as if i know him personally and saw it with my own ey-' He suddenly screamed. "KEUGHhhh.... AHHHhhhh.... FUCK!" Greynar grabbed his head with both of his hand.
He was struck by a headache as soon as he tried to recall something. The pain was so severe that he scratched the floor's surface until his hand bled. It was his first experience of such an acute headache. The intensity almost made him faint, but for the sake of winning the battle, he resisted the throbbing pain.
The headache calmed down after a while, he rested for a while to take a breath. Leaning on the chair, he opened his comms again to check the shipgirl's condition.
"Saratoga, give me your status."
Saratoga noticed her comms ringing, she picked it up. "Commander? We have widened the crack in the surface, but the Siren started to act different, we need our other fleet to maximize the damag-."
An explosion was heard near her location, Saratoga retreated to the backline while dodging the incoming salvo from enemy battleship. She noticed that humanoid Siren has started to appearing.
"Sara? Are you okay? Did yo-" The connection was cut off.
"Commander! Commander! Respond to me!" Saratoga tried to turn her comms back on, but it refuse to reconnect. "Darn it, this device need more fixing." Saratoga cursed.
A humanoid ship suddenly appeared in front of her, almost in an instant. She couldn't react at their movement so she took a stance to defend herself from the impact. She closed her eyes, but the expected attack didn't come. The small carrier girl opened her eyes slowly just to see something big has blocked her.
"Sorry we're late, we had to find another way to get inside the mirror sea." Washington used her rigging to defend the attack while smiling looking back at her.
"Washington! You're not pretty late by the way." Saratoga said with a mixture of relief and happiness.
"So what's the plan? Our comms has been jammed outside of the mirror sea so we are not really relying on those thing." Washington delfected the laser and shoot her rigging to the humanoid Siren.
Saratoga pointed to the huge crack she attacked before. "There, we need you and your sister to destroy it from inside using all of your salvo."
Washington looked at what she pointed and smirked, "That crack? It's easy-peasy, i'll go meet my sister and destroy it together, see ya!"
Washington departed from Saratoga and sped towards the humanoid Sirens alone, making use of her powerful rigging and turret to take down Siren fleets on her way to North Carolina. She arrived and assisted her sister using her salvo, exploding several Siren and standing between her sister and the humanoid Siren carrier.
She nodded to North Carolina, who was kneeling beside her. Glancing over at Washington, she smiled. Despite not exchanging a single word, they knew each other well and launched a counter-attack against the Siren while focusing on the massive crack on the tower. Washington was the first one to go on a rampage killing against the Siren.
"Heads up Siren! I'm here to make some killing!" Washington shouted while laughing maniacally.
With reinforcement arrived, the tide of the war was swiftly turned in their favour by the immense firepower of the fleets. Saratoga commanded every fleets to assist Washington and North Carolina into dealing with the humanoid Siren. Her priority is to make sure they are at safe place to use their rigging at full power, blowing up the cracked space on the surface of the tower. With no Greynar around to assist them, she need to take the flag to be second-in-command for battle.
Eventually, an opportunity arrived when Cleveland and Memphis who escorted the two battleships sister blocked the Sirens from every direction, giving them a space to properly aim their rigging to the hole. North Carolina and Washington fired off their salvos to the tower, exploding the surface into several pieces. The crack started to spread more around the tower. They give off the final blast to the cracked tower, splitting it into half. Most of the Sirens around it got crushed by the upper parts of the tower, sinking them without giving them a chance to explode.
"...Is it over?" Memphis asked.
Her comms ringed, Greynar with a desperate voice shouted. "EVERYBODY MOVE AWAY FROM THE TOWER QUICK!!"
The exposed core of the tower was a small, cube-shaped mass of floating energy, which suddenly turned jet black and emitted dark energy with a slight horror-like roar. The core effectively absorbed the dark sky cloud, causing the sea to quickly turn blood red. The fleets successfully escaped the tower's grasp, but the mass-produced Siren ship didn't make it.
Everyone turned to observe the tower accumulating a large amount of energy for a self-destruction protocol. Greynar instructed the fleets to withdraw swiftly, with the command ship accelerating at full throttle. Washington directed them towards a faint light near a small island. She explained that she had discovered a small gateway leading directly into the Mirror Sea while looking for a way to get inside.
Greynar trusted Washington and led the fleets into the light. Upon exiting the mirror sea, the red water reverted to its typical dark blue hue. Greynar glanced back to observe the tower transforming into a black mass before exploding. The resulting shockwave and dark energy struck them, shaking the entire sea with immense force.
Saratoga rose slowly as the mirror sea vanished in an instant. She glanced back and noticed a sudden blip where the tower had stood and saw a lone figure smiling at them before disappearing.
"Who... Is that?" Saratoga muttered.
