Sumatra's Greatest Fan-Chapter 91: Rain Of Stones

"Keep it up! Steady!" Inin shouted, "If your defenses let up for even a moment, tank it using your body."

While the maintenance crew were scuttling across the hull on a platform of cloud that hung on its sides, Torq maintained pace by erecting a barrier of mist to defend against stones being pelted at them.

The stones weren’t dangerous, lacking power and weight behind them to be dangerous enough. However, there were too many of them, almost packing the space like sardines.

These stones were the size of a nail, irregularly round. When polished to the limit, they will appear no different to marbles. They were just available in the region, like how rain and mud exist in other terrain.

Deep at the river bed, bubbles slip out of the cracks nonstop, carrying within them a stone or two they come across during their path to the surface.

The mouth of the Kappeet Channel was covered by these stones to the extent they occupied more space than the water in the region. And as these bubbles move up with force, they will carry the stones and launch them to the sky.

Some of these stones get launched as high as four hundred metres, making them pretty dangerous for the average living being. And as the sky is literally filled with them, the stones behave no different to rain.

As the stones collide into each other, they create a series of minor chemical reactions at the microscopic scale. At the macroscopic scale, they produce a certain dust from all these collisions that boost plant growth along the banks of the Kappeet Channel.

Hordes upon hordes of Iron Grade Pranic Beast races live in these regions, with a good chunk of them possessing Primary Natures related to hurling these stones at others.

From time to time, such Pranic Beasts targeted the Battleships from the shores. Of course, most of their attacks failed to even reach a Battleship, much less scratch it.

But they were indeed a problem to the maintenance crew, as the Battleships moved through the stone-filled water at high speeds, a series of vibrations travelled through the hull and at rare occasions, reached resonance frequency.

In such cases, hairline cracks appeared in the hull. Even though the highly compressed Gentle Coral forming the hull had healing properties, the presence of a hairline crack caused the travelling soundwaves to congregate at the spots and further aggravate the damage.

The maintenance crew existed to quickly patch up such cracks so that the healing effects of the Gentle Coral could kick in on time and ensure the hull’s integrity was maintained at full power.

But that wasn’t all. The powder released from the collision of these stones with each other could latch onto the hull and give it a new coating. 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝙬𝙚𝓫𝒏𝓸𝓿𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝙤𝓶

This coating helped the Battleships withstand the Dralh Sea’s waters better and hence, the maintenance crew were also tasked with helping as thick of this coating latch onto the hull as possible.

While the crew went around performing this task, two of them, Inin and Torq, were in charge of protecting them from the hail of stones.

"Cover a wider area!" Inin shouted, "And keep drinking as many vials of medicine as you can while doing so."

"Ensure you don’t run out of Prana and most of all," He barked, "The crew mustn’t be harmed or distracted by the stones. Move with enough finesse they don’t have to worry about keeping an eye out and could focus all their attention on their work."

"I am...doing it!" Torq grunted and gave a swirl to his barrier of mist. The swirl diverged the stones away from the cloud platform. His Prana consumption was pretty insane. However, the medicines he was given were equally insane.

’A gulp, and it flushes down to my stomach. There’s a warm feeling, and in a few seconds, I can feel Prana trickling into my Spirit Container.’ He was in shock while desperately holding on to dear life while Inin camped in his ear canal and barked orders nonstop.

Inin had created a thin tube of mist to carry his voice and deposit it directly into Torq’s ear canal, making his barks pretty annoying. However, Torq didn’t complain, for Inin’s orders were pretty competent.

It allowed him to rapidly familiarise himself with his abilities. And best of all, ’How are these medicines so efficient? If given the choice, no one would consume an Elixir.’

An Elixir raises the total Prana capacity upon consumption. In situations the cultivator had already reached maximum Prana capacity, the Elixir would only serve to replenish their expended Prana for the set amount it was created for.

However, in both cases, upon consumption, the cultivator’s spirit Container sustains strain and won’t be able to grow any further for a set duration, which ranged from a few days to years depending on the improvement granted by the Elixir.

Medicines, however, didn’t come with such side effects. Of course, they were incapable of elevating a cultivator’s Prana capacity. They only served to replenish Prana.

’In the book, very few forces have a decent batch of medicines. But here, it’s insane.’ Torq gasped, ’A single, tiny vial can replenish almost a hundred units of Prana, and within a minute. I can consume at least a dozen vials in one sitting.’

After a few hours, once he feels hungry, implying his stomach had become empty, he could consume another dozen vials worth of medicine, ’Even though the Cooter Clan probably packed their best batch of medicines, the fact that they could create such great ones is a testament to their expertise.’

And the medicines he was consuming were meant for the maintenance crew, who didn’t have large Prana reserves and only used abilities that drained little Prana. ’The medicines used by the battle teams must be significantly superior in terms of performance.’

Constantly exerting himself gave him a headache. Torq promptly uncorked another vial of medicine and downed its contents. A couple minutes later, his headache had subsided greatly.

’There are medicines for every situation!’ He grew excited, ’I want to research them more!’

’I wonder why the furball never delved into their details before?’ Why he thought as such, something prickled his skin. His expression morphed as he ducked to the floor, watching something rapidly fly overhead and crash into the hull.

"Huh?" He noticed a gaping hole had appeared in his mist barrier, followed by a metre deep crater in the hull.

"Shit! Get inside!" Inin shouted. And right as Torq reacted, something slammed into him and blasted him into the hull, "BOIBOI!"