"Can you really… hold that back?" Neptunia asked quietly. "Because if not, we're really in trouble."
Maria looked out at the horizon again. The endless swarm of monstrous silhouettes some large enough to rival towers, others small but countless were tearing through the water toward them. Their roars and screeches echoed through the sea, shaking the currents themselves.
Her expression didn't change.
"I don't know," she said calmly. "But I can try."
Her voice wasn't trembling. There was no fear in it.. just certainty. Cold and unshaken.
"I can feel something inside me," she added softly, almost as if thinking aloud. "A vast amount of mana… very very vast. It's almost overflowing."
Neptunia blinked in surprise. "Mana? whats that?
