Inside, a dark blue oblong shape sat nestled in a bed of straw, its surface covered in tiny ridges that gave the distinct impression of scales.
“Gods below.” The quartermaster paled.
“What is it?” Eve inquired. “What’s wrong?”
He didn’t answer, instead turning to the nearest crew member. “Fetch the captain,” he barked, his voice hoarse with fear. “We’ve been betrayed.”
“We’ve been what now?” Wes asked.
Eve didn’t bother trying to pull an answer from the shaken man, instead turning her attention to the three-foot-long scaly object. In typical adventurer fashion, she Appraised it.
Leviathan Egg
Rarity: Epic
Eve cursed. That hadn’t been joy at the prospect of going home early she’d seen on the faces of the merchant sailors. It was relief at ridding themselves of a ticking time bomb.
“It’s a fucking egg,” she told the others. “And if it’s humming like this, that can only mean a few things.”
Preston’s eyes widened with a hint of eagerness. “Is… is it hatching?”
The quartermaster quietly gulped and shook his head, leaving Eve to do the explaining.
“Worse than that,” she said. “I think it’s calling its mother.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Leviathan
THE HOLD STILLED. The stuffy torch-smoke air hung unmoved by breath or speech as the egg regaled them with its dreadful hum. Even the deck below their feet halted its ceaseless pitch and roll as if in respect for the gravity of the situation. Eve suspected something worse. The ocean didn’t calm for just anyone.
It was neither comment nor curse nor thought of a plan that broke the oppressive silence, but a call of distress from above deck. From her position closest to the egg, Eve was among the last to mount the wooden stairs. She blinked in surprise as no blinding sun loomed above her, the ship overtaken with gloom. It wasn’t until she stepped outside and the first drops of rain struck her exposed head that Eve realized why.
The storm had come from nowhere. Gone was the cloudless sky that’d been there but minutes ago, replaced by a veil of gray and the falling deluge. Even stranger, the tempest came without wind. The rain fell straight down through calm air, while beyond the railing the sea stood flat, its glassy surface disrupted only by the ripples of rainfall. Eve shivered.
“So… um…” Wes muttered, “does anyone know anything about leviathans?”
He and Eve both turned to the obvious guess.
“What are you looking at me for?” Preston reddened. “I’m a Caretaker, not a Whaler.”
“There be different kinds,” the grizzly voice of the First Mate chimed in. “I know not which one this be.”
Eve shrugged. “Apparently one that controls the weather.”
Wes snorted. “Useful.”
A crash rang out in the distance, echoed by a chorus of desperate screams. Eve raced to the starboard rail just in time to watch an angry maw clamp down on the merchant vessel that had just betrayed them. The ship snapped in two.
Even through the curtain of pouring rain, Eve’s keen eyes watched in horror as survivors leapt from wreckage as the dark shape dragged it under. Within seconds, the merchant vessel was no more than a field of flotsam and stranded sailors clinging to it. Those were the lucky ones.
“Gods below,” Preston murmured. “We’re fucked.”
“I wouldn’t go that far,” Eve replied. “We’ve survived some crazy shit so far.”
“We should give it the egg,” Wes argued. “Maybe it’ll leave us alone.”
“Bad idea.” Eve pointed at the distant wreckage. “If the egg is calling to it, why do you think it destroyed that ship but not ours?”
“Why do monsters do anything?” the fire mage asked.
Preston, however, picked up on Eve’s reasoning. “Because it knows we have the egg, and it can’t risk destroying it.”
“Exactly.” She snapped her fingers. “That egg’s the only reason we’re still afloat.”
“So what is it planning?” Wes asked. “How does it get the egg without destroying our ship?”
“Hells if I know.” Eve shrugged. “But my plan is to stop it.”
As if to punctuate her statement, a shrill cry pierced the shock and fear in the sailor’s minds. “Squawk, to battle stations!” Captain Abraham circled above, still clutching his miniature cutlass in his left talons. All about them, the crew of Freedom’s Gale burst into action.
Preston leveled a dry look at Eve. “And by stop it, you mean…”
Eve simply grinned. “How much exp do you think a leviathan’s worth?”
She didn’t give the others a chance to reply as she dashed back down belowdeck and into her cabin. There, she scurried to don her armor, her hands deftly navigating the array of straps and buckles involved in gearing up. Scarce minutes later, she emerged with her daggers at her waist and her griffin-bone club in her hand.
Eve paused a moment as she stepped past the open door to Wes and Preston’s room, looking on in curiosity as two sailors furiously tried to point the cannon within down at the water. Neither found much success.
Shaking her head at the futility of firing a cannon underwater, Eve continued her dash back to the upper deck, finding it a case study in controlled chaos.
Sailors ran this way and that, bearing everything from crossbows to scimitars to an oversized slingshot. Each of them moved with purpose and a destination in mind, not that Eve could ever piece together what that was. Practiced as many of them seemed, Eve counted fear more than determination upon their faces.
The rain fell harder.
Eve didn’t need long to find Wes and Preston at the starboard rail, staring into the deep. A dark shape lurked, its silhouette just visible enough for Eve to Appraise.
Level ?? Stormtide Leviathan
Surprise mingled with welcome relief as she read the description. “It’s weaker than the griffin.”
“Lower-leveled,” Wes corrected. “Not necessarily weaker.”
Eve nodded. If the shifting darkness was any indicator, the beast was at least ten times the griffin’s size. Without knowing exactly how deep it was, Eve couldn’t accurately guess the length of its serpentine form.
Still circling even through the hammering downpour, Abraham squawked his order. “Fire!”
Arrows and bolts and rocks flew through the air, churning the water below as they fell. Most went wide or crashed ineffectually against the surface, save for the one weapon Eve thought might have a chance of harming the monster—a massive ballista. The six-foot spear it launched pierced the watery barrier to bury itself in the creature’s side, a glancing blow, but a blow nonetheless.
The leviathan retaliated with a swipe of its tail, deforming the crystalline serenity of the windless ocean into a twenty-foot wave that crashed against the vessel’s hull.
Freedom’s Gale pitched back, throwing a pair of unfortunate sailors overboard. Eve held her grip on the rail.
Abraham cackled. “What are the comprehensible terrors of man, squawk, compared with the interlinked terrors and wonders of God?”
The ballista fired once more.
It missed.
“It’s trying to capsize us!” Preston yelled over the deluge.
“Really? What tipped you off?” Eve snapped back.
Another wave sent the vessel reeling, cutting off the brief exchange. This time the sailors were ready for it.
Except for one. Pete, the First Mate, his hands occupied reloading the all-important ballista, found no rail to hold. The ship tossed him to the sea like forgotten refuse.
Abraham wailed, squawking deliriously as he descended to the deck, grasping the fallen spear in his beak to load the ballista. “Squawk! Ego non baptizo te in nomine deorum, sed in nomine infernorum!” He incanted a mad blessing upon the spear tip, flapping his wings to level the weapon at their abyssal foe.
The parrot squawked once more. “To the last I grapple w
ith thee; squawk! From hell's heart I stab at thee; for hate's sake I spit my last breath at thee.”
He fired.
The ocean itself shuddered as the spear struck true, embedding itself in what Eve could only hope was the creature’s neck. The beast thrashed but didn’t still. It wasn’t enough.
Eve glanced sideways at the insane parrot. “Well that’s enough of… whatever this is.” She shook her head, handing her club off to Wes. Its tip fell to the deck, too heavy for him to hold up. “Hold this,” she said, “I’m going in.”
Wes’s eyes widened. “You’re what?”
In lieu of an answer, Eve took a step back, taking a running start before vaulting over the rail and into the water below. It greeted her with open arms.
She floated there for a moment as the frigid ocean washed over her, swiveling her head around to find her bearings. The saltwater stung her eyes, but Eve paid it little heed. She’d hurt far worse. Their light shined forward in visible beams, twin spotlights that scanned the depths. It didn’t take long for them to find their quarry.
Dark blue scales lined its two-hundred-foot length, each two times larger than Eve’s head. Five trios of spiked fins deftly maneuvered the great serpent through the dark water, each wriggling independently to propel it in any direction. Eve didn’t bother with them. Her gaze fixed instead on the leviathan’s neck and the shaft of wood that jutted from it.
Pivoting to point her body towards it, Eve Jetted forward.
The force of the water bombarded her head and shoulders as it tried to resist her motion, stealing away her precious momentum even as she neared her writhing target. She Jetted again.
The Defiant shot like a torpedo towards the monstrosity’s head. Eve shuddered as she noticed the trail of wafting blood drifting from a fallen sailor still impaled on the beast’s fang. She didn’t halt. Adrenaline forced fear or revulsion to the background as her heart raced and Mana raged within her. Not even the chill of the icy depths could pierce her focus.
Eve stopped herself with a third Jet, righting herself and grasping the embedded spear in a single motion. She yanked it free. The leviathan scarcely seemed to notice.
Her Mana pool dripped away as it accommodated for her lack of oxygen. Eve leveled the spear for a gap in the creature’s scales, dumped a few hundred Mana into Mana Rush and swung.
The blow failed.
Just as much as her motion propelled the weapon forward, so too did it launch her back. Without any footing to support the attack, all Eve managed was to swim away slightly faster. Shit, she cursed mentally, unable to do so audibly while underwater.
In the distance, the beast thrashed its tail once more, and a series of splashes rang out as yet more sailors fell overboard.
Eve’s mind raced. Ideas ranging from testing out Mana Burst underwater to using several Jets in a row to turn into a living torpedo competed for attention. Both sounded more likely to hurt her than the leviathan. Her Mana dropped yet lower. Her lungs began to ache. She was running out of time.
Eve cursed to herself once more, swimming back into position above the beast’s head as she scrambled for a plan. It wasn’t until her third scan through her skill list that one presented itself.
With all the speed of a Courier and the Strength of Mana Rush, Eve bent down and tore her boots from her feet. She could only hope the upgrade from Surefooted to Defiant Body hadn’t rid her of the old bonus.
She planted both bare feet against the smooth scales of the beast’s neck and sent her focus inward. With a thought, Eve directed her rapidly diminishing Mana to the exposed skin.
The ability took hold.
Locked into position as Mana fastened her feet to the leviathan’s neck, Eve spared no moment’s hesitation before thrusting the spear once more.
This time the beast felt it.
The weapon sank deeper and deeper past the creature’s scales, wreaking havoc on the soft flesh within.
The leviathan writhed beneath her, twisting desperately in anguish and fury, but Eve’s foothold was unshakeable. She drove the weapon further.
It wasn’t until all six feet of the ballista-bolt had sunk into the massive beast that it finally ceased its thrashing. But a moment later, the notification chimed.
You have defeated Level 98 Stormtide Leviathan: +730000 exp!
Level Up!
Eve dismissed the other notifications. She could read them later. Right now, she had other concerns. Releasing her grip on her Mana, Eve freed her feet from the leviathan’s neck and canceled Mana Rush.
She Jetted to the surface, launching a dozen feet into the air before falling back to land hard on the water’s surface. She winced.
Gratefully gulping down every breath of air she could, Eve treaded water as she patiently waited her turn to climb the rope ladder up to the deck. Nearly two dozen sailors had fallen overboard to the leviathan’s thrashing, but miraculously most had survived unscathed. The beast hadn’t been there to eat puny humans. Such disdain for the smaller beings had been its downfall.
When at last The Defiant pushed herself over the rail, she met the chorus of blue-lit eyes, dropped jaws, and fearful looks with a tired grin. Without skipping a beat, she turned to address the Quartermaster.
“You—um—you wouldn’t happen to have a spare pair of boots, would you? I seem to have lost mine.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
To the Victor
ABILITY UPGRADED!
Passive Ability - Haste
Applies to swim speed!
Eve dismissed the notification with a thought, muttering to herself, “If only I could swim.”
Maybe the upgrade would help her tread water faster, a concept that absolutely made sense and would definitely prove useful at some point in the future. Eve chuckled. She’d had little use for the skill to navigate the creeks of Nowherested, and Jetting through the water had worked well enough to kill a leviathan.
The thought led her in two directions. First, her mind flicked to the daydream of Jetting through the air as she had in the water. It sounded dangerous. Too much or too little Mana at the wrong time would make for quite the unpleasant landing, and the seconds-long cooldown would be plenty of time for her to fall to her death before ever getting a chance to correct her mistake.
Still, the idea of flight, however brief her Mana pool dictated, was a tenacious one. Maybe she’d pursue it if she could truly master the use of Jet or unlock an upgrade to reduce its cooldown. Eve shook her head. Fuck maybe; she’d definitely pursue it given the opportunity.
That settled, Eve’s musings turned back to the encounter with the leviathan. After its demise the rain had dried up, returning the sky to that frigidly clear state so associated with late autumn. Freedom’s Gale, however, had yet to move on from the site of the battle.
Anchor dropped for the time being, sailors took shifts swimming through the cold water to scavenge what they could from the behemoth carcass.
Eve, having earned the right to sit back and relax while the others toiled for her role in actually killing the damn thing, watched from the starboard rail. Behind her, Pete—who’d lost his peg leg after being thrown overboard but had otherwise survived unharmed—argued with the quartermaster over what to do with the egg.
The bespectacled bookkeeper argued it would fetch a handsome sum upon their arrival in Pyrindel, while the First Mate insisted it was too dangerous to keep ahold of. Eve was inclined to agree with the latter. Even after the death of its mother, the thing was still humming. Hells, she’d happily toss it overboard just to rid herself of the constant low-pitched noise that so picked at her patience.
Then again, the concept of it attracting another leviathan was tempting. The first one had been quite the windfall of exp. As long as it waited for her Mana to regenerate before… Eve shook the thought from her head. Sailors had died. Profitable though it might’ve been, it was best to keep the monster-slaying away from civilians.
Speaking of profits, Eve once again read the absolu
te heap of exp she’d received for her latest kill. Seven hundred and thirty thousand. It was obscene. Of course, at her level and class rarity, it hadn’t been worth much more than one level, but it was still an awful lot of progress for a single kill. Hells, even with the reduced reward from their minuscule contribution to the fight, there wasn’t a single man or woman aboard Freedom’s Gale that hadn’t leveled up at least once.
For fuck’s sake, the stormtide leviathan had been worth nearly ten times as much exp as the bloody griffin, despite being only a fraction of its level. A bit of quick math—made quicker thanks to the ten Intelligence she’d just received—put the base exp for a stormtide leviathan at a clean five thousand.
Eve swallowed.
If her limited understanding of experience math was accurate, if the beast had been one level higher, she would’ve earned ten thousand more exp. “So that’s the trick, then,” she muttered to herself. “It isn’t about grinding high-level enemies, but finding ones with a high base exp.” She wondered how many leviathans, wyrms, or yerrowids the Man of the Mists had slain to reach his insane level, whatever it was.
“So I spoke with the captain,” Wes’s voice pulled her from her reverie. “He’s agreed to give us two thirds of the scales and provide a cart to help us transport them once we get to Pyrindel.”
“Two thirds?” Eve raised an eyebrow. “I killed it; shouldn’t I get all the scales?”
Wes shrugged. “I don’t see you down there harvesting them, and without the Captain’s wagon we couldn’t carry that much anyway. Sailors died today, Eve. Abraham just wants enough of the spoils to take care of their families.”
“They’re pirates. What did they expect? Couldn’t he pay off the families with their cut of the stolen cargo?”
“They’re not really pirates,” Wes corrected. “And I don’t think insurance scammers really expect to wind up dead.” He sighed. “They need the money more than we do, and hells, for all we know leviathan scales aren’t worth a penny.”
This Class is Bonkers! (This Trilogy is Broken (A Comedy Litrpg Adventure) Book 2) Page 16