The Karmadont Chess Set (The Way of the Shaman: Book #5) LitRPG series

by Vasily Mahanenko

  How can a Shaman be a Shaman if he’s ruled by his mind and not his feelings? Lean left. After all—they had locked my summoning powers—not my ability to sense this world. Lean forward. No one could ever divert me from the Way of the Shaman, except myself. Lean back and jump, forcing the foal to calm down. Kornik tried to get this through to me, as did Prontho, but due to all the problems that had fallen to me lately, I had forgotten who I was in this world. Lean right, dodge a tentacle and lean left immediately, dodging a second tentacle. I am a Shaman! Lean right. And no one could convince me otherwise, whatever powers I lost. Lean forward.

  Not a single thought remained in my head. The feeling of complete relaxation was so surprising and alluring that I was making various turns and banks without paying any attention to the ‘Taming’ bar which was slowly but steadily filling with green progress. But even that didn’t matter right now. I didn’t even feel—I saw what the foal was about to do and had the time not only to prepare myself, but to steady myself as well.

  The squidolphin has been tamed. Rest time: 30 seconds.

  The ‘Taming’ status bar stopped at 50%. The system began the countdown, allowing me time to rest, or perhaps loading new, still unused, combinations of moves—when my attention was drawn to the barrel of fish, which hadn’t budged an inch this entire time. Placing both hands on the ship’s body, I shut my eyes and following Anastaria’s example mentally offered the ship a snack. She had to regain her strength after all…

  Like a giant hammer, a tentacle slammed next to the barrel and carefully, like a child’s hand, embraced it and lifted it from the deck. I heard a munching sound, mixed with the sound of splintering lumber, and the ‘Taming’ bar filled up by another 10%. The ship had liked my snack…

  “Fleita, bring me another barrel!” I managed to yell into the amulet as the time for rest ended and the next dance began. The dance of feeling and premonition…

  “How hungry she is!” said Fleita with surprise when the third barrel of fish vanished down the squidolphin’s gullet. The second wave of taming was no less intense than the last and if I hadn’t continued to work at the level of premonition, it would not have ended well. The speed with which the ship went from one maneuver to the next had increased several-fold, forcing me to dash back and forth along the foal’s body. When the ‘Taming’ bar was at eighty percent the ship got tired again and I managed to feed her another barrel of fish. There was no third wave, as if the squidolphin had eaten her fill and was waiting for another portion, her tentacles rummaging around the place where the other barrels had been placed.

  “That’s true,” I agreed, and a whole litany of messages began to scroll past my eyes:

  Achievement earned: ‘Sea Devil.’ You have become the owner of a unique vessel. Speed of movement on water increased by 20%.

  Ship acquired: Minor squidolphin.

  You have acquired a personal ship. Please speak to the registrar to receive your captaincy license.

  You have acquired a nameless vessel. Please name her.

  Skill increase:

  +4 to Spirituality. Total: 89.

  Your reputation with all encountered sea-based factions has increased by 5000.

  New title available: ‘Tamer of the Seas’. Movement while in a squidolphin increased by 10%.

  “Mindblowing,” Fleita muttered, stepping onto the ship’s deck. “Never in my life would I imagine that someone could sail in such a monster!”

  I didn’t reply and looked at the girl carefully. She was wandering around the deck, wondering at the chairs and the tentacles that moved like oars, carrying us along the shore, and doing so quite rapidly. I was looking at an ordinary girl of whom there were very many in Barliona, and yet I suddenly realized that our brief acquaintance had come to its end. I had nothing more to teach this Shaman. She had proven today to everyone, including myself, that she was ready to complete her trial. And the hell with the fact that we had scheduled it for several months from now…

  “Kornik…” I whispered into the air. For some reason, I had no doubts that the goblin would hear me. “She is ready…”

  “Are you sure?” my teacher’s voice sounded to the right of me. To my surprise, there was no trace of mockery in his voice.

  “Yes, absolutely. I don’t doubt it for a second. She is ready.”

  “In that case…Fleita!” yelled Kornik. “Come over here!”

  “Kornik?” Fleita asked, surprised. “What are you doing here? Have you come to check out Mahan’s ship as well?”

  “You think I’ve never seen a squidolphin before? Back in the day, it was the only way to travel. We have other business at the moment. Get your things—the next trial awaits you.”

  “But it’s still five months away!” the girl exclaimed with astonishment.

  “Your teacher says that you are ready—so you’re ready. It’s not up to you. Let’s go. The Supreme Fire Spirit is expecting you.”

  “But…am I really ready, Mahan?”

  I nodded to her silently and smiled. My teaching had ended—it was time for Fleita to become an Elemental Shaman. It was looking like a new Shaman had appeared in Barliona—one who would give me as well as Antsinthepantsa and Kalatea a run for our money. Fleita was singular and she had to continue to grow. It was too bad that it wasn’t going to be with me—the girl had to follow a Way of her own.

  “It’s too bad,” muttered Kornik before vanishing, “that you couldn’t wait another couple weeks. I would have won my bet with Prontho…I guess I’ll have to buy him a case of the best vintage at the Golden Horseshoe…That damn orc. I bet you two are in cahoots! Coincidences like this don’t just happen on their own!”

  Fleita cast me a farewell glance and vanished, leaving me alone with my new ship. A notification popped up telling me that my student would do her trial in a week after some extra training with Kornik, and I sighed bitterly—I would miss the annoying little brat.

  Not wishing to overthink things, I named my living ship Nautilus (I hope Jules Verne doesn’t sue me) at which point an ordinary ship interface appeared before my eye—though, after studying it for several minutes, I understood that perhaps it wasn’t so ordinary after all—there was no mention of masts, but there was an extra tab dedicated to the ordinance. Ordinary pirate ships were armed with several nose harpoons and some boarding hooks. There weren’t any cannons in Barliona, which was a good thing. Why would a ship need extra weapons anyway when you could just fill it with a squad of Mages who would do much better than a dozen cannons. And yet my Nautilus did have plenty of non-standard equipment.

  First of all, the tentacles acted not only as oars but also as both cables for boarding and ordinary melee weapons that could break the hull of an enemy vessel under water. Having the option of submerging to a depth of ten meters, Nautilus was a very dangerous threat. Sonar was unheard of in Barliona after all. All I’d have to do was approach an enemy ship from beneath, hit her hull with all twenty tentacles and, poof, the enemy ship was sunk. Time to deal with the next one. Now I understand how the squidolphin destroyed the ships of pirates and merchants—she approached them from below, grabbed onto them and then dove deeper, pulling her prey down with her. In this manner, I could safely reckon that my squidolphin and the one that we had to hunt were different creatures. I wonder—is it possible to tame the large one as well?

  Second of all, my ship had another weapon at her disposal—a mouth filled with teeth, which would enable me to ram enemy ships with ease—with all the attendant consequences. The squidolphin really wouldn’t be bothered by ramming her nose into a hull, so if I really wanted to have fun with my foe, I could play chicken with them to see who’d squawk first.

  Third, the squidolphin could emit a black liquid called ‘toxic ink.’ This did damage to all organic matter but had a downside as well—it did damage to the squidolphin as well. With that said, the effective radius of the ‘toxic ink’ was quite small—only a couple meters. All I had to do was exit the cloud of ink and its n
egative effect would cease, while another five minutes later, the ‘toxic ink’ would dissolve in the water. A pretty double-edged weapon this, but since I have it, I’ll have to try it sometime.

  Getting familiar with the controls took up so much time that I didn’t even notice the sun rise in the sky. However, I did manage to learn two more aspects of Nautilus. The first was that the beacons that Fleita and I had lit, had absolutely no effect on her. The ship could crawl out onto land and then crawl back into the seas. Another surprising capability with uncertain applications.

  Before returning to Narlak, I decided to stop by Gumtrees and tell Rastman that I had caught the monster. I’m sure that a new squidolphin will show up in some amount of time and will begin to terrorize the village all over again. But for now that wouldn’t happen. And yet I did not for a second anticipate the astonished reaction of the Gumtrees resident…

  “A MONSTER!!! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!!!” Rastman’s wild yell shattered the morning calm of the village, forcing me to smile. And why not? Bypassing all of the defensive barriers, the monster sailed right up to the pier. Pure terror, nothing less!

  “Rastman, calm down! It’s me, Mahan! The squidolphin is mine from now on!”

  “Mahan?” The alderman, perhaps by habit, was once again on his back trying to retreat in a crawl against a building’s wall. “The Dragon?”

  “The same one,” I replied with a grin, docking to the pier and hopping down from my vessel. “From now on, this monster is my ship!”

  “Nice ship, what can you say,” a deep voice sounded behind my back. I whirled around and like the village locals, stared agape at the two-meter-tall Water Spirit that had taken a seat on the edge of the squidolphin and dangled his tail into the water—the Level 500 tail of the local Guardian… “But you’ll have to pay the toll. It’s not proper without paying the toll, you know.”

  “Toll?” I echoed surprised. “For what? As soon as I get back to Malabar, I’ll pay it…”

  “Not the one for your ship,” the Water Spirit waved his arm. “I’m talking about a different toll—the road toll. Or the water one, if you prefer. You owe me five thousand gold for using the ocean, considering the power of your ship and her number of tails. You got lucky too that your registration isn’t in the capital—otherwise your toll would be a lot more. Anyway—I can’t spend a lot of time out in the air, so why don’t you go ahead and pay. It’ll be easier for everyone that way…”

  Road tolls! What a bunch of jerks, those devs. They try to make money from everything, even such trifles! And this is money players have to pay!

  “Sorry to pile on, Mahan,” Rastman said, coming to his senses. “But you owe me six hundred gold for three barrels of fish. If you had sailed off right away, I wouldn’t’ve said a word, but since you came back…By the way, do you need any more fish? We could get you some in a jiffy!”

  All I could do was grin, hand the alderman a wallet with the money and order another four barrels of fish. I had discovered a surprising detail about my ship—I had to feed her. Otherwise, she would fall asleep. The ship needed a standard barrel of fish once a week—and there was even space to store five such barrels in a special hold. So once a month I would buy five barrels and then I could avoid worrying about such trifles for the rest of the month. With all that said, it’s important to note that the squidolphin’s main hold was in her belly. I could store food, loot and items in there—that part of the stomach was like an ordinary storehouse. A pretty convenient fish, this squidolphin. I wonder why they aren’t more common?

  “Dan, where are you?” Anastaria’s telepathic question popped up around two in the afternoon. Judging by the map, there was no way I’d make it back to Cadis by three. In five hours, I had covered 150 km—the squidolphin did about 30 km/h with her bonus to speed. She was only a Level 1 vessel after all, so I couldn’t complain.

  “I’m out at sea, breaking in my ship,” I replied flatly, not wishing to explain everything that had happened now. I’d rather it be a surprise…

  “You bought a ship? Why? I thought we’d already decided everything?” Anastaria’s irritation was so evident that I could even feel it in reality.

  “It just happened this way, Stacey…”

  “Daniel, oh Daniel…What an overgrown bungler you are! All right—come back. When should I expect you?”

  “In about two hours. I won’t make it back earlier than that…”

  “Hold up! What do you mean two hours? Where are you right now?”

  “Out at sea. My Energy’s running out. Call me on my amulet…”

  “All right, out with it—what’d you do?” Stacey asked a moment later. “I know you didn’t spend ten million on a ship. You don’t even have that much!”

  “I don’t,” I agreed. “I didn’t buy a ship. I acquired one.”

  “Want to tell me about it?” came the question. “He acquired a ship…It was delivered to him.”

  Even though my gloomy thoughts about Anastaria were still fresh in my mind, I didn’t want to pick a fight with her right then. I just didn’t have enough information and all my assumptions could be shattered in a matter of minutes. I also didn’t want to bring up my feelings about our relationship, so I summoned her to my location. I guess I’d deal with the problem as things developed.

  “Well I’ll be god-damn-ed,” slowly, stretching each syllable and savoring it as if it was a sip of the most expensive wine from the Golden Horseshoe, said Anastaria after she appeared on Nautilus and got a chance to look around. “I mean, goddamn…Okay, Dan, tell me what happened…”

  “…Only 30 km/h despite the bonuses,” I came to the end of my tale, explaining the reason I was going to be late. We only had sixty clicks to Cadis, so Nautilus still had two hours’ worth of hard work with her tentacles ahead of her.

  “So does this mean that we’ll be hunting the same type of ship?” Stacey asked the question that, as usual, held the most promise to herself.

  “Yes, only she won’t be a little one like this one. Something tells me that we’re going to go up against this one’s mother, maybe even grandmother. And she’ll be capable of pulling a ship down to the bottom and breaking it to pieces.”

  “A squidolphin…I read so much about her today and it turns out that it was all wrong. Nowhere did it say that she was a ship and that you could capture her. Did you look through our papers?”

  “The ones you drew up when you made the bet? No,” I said gloomily, since Stacey had broached a very unpleasant topic for me. I really didn’t feel like talking about that.

  “You know, we’ll have to warn my uncle that we’ll be several hours late!” Anastaria changed the subject abruptly. “Let him meet the pirates on his own and…Dan, did you get a chance to test Nautilus?”

  “Sorry…What do you mean by test? We’re already sailing at full tentacles, if you could call it that—she can’t go faster.”

  “I don’t mean that. Look,” Stacey pointed at the horizon. Looking in the indicated direction, I noticed the outline of a vessel headed in our direction. “Are we pirates or what? Shall we try it?”

  “You want to attack a ship without even knowing its Level? Stacey, at our Level they’ll destroy us and not even break a sweat!”

  “Dan…If something goes wrong we’ll just dive as deep as we can and lose them. Don’t you want to see what Nautilus can do?”

  “If that ship is carrying players, I’ll be sent back to the mine in an instant,” I made a last attempt to avoid the adventure Stacey was proposing, even though she had struck the most painful chord for me—I desperately wanted to find out what the squidolphin could do before facing her ancestor.

  “It’s not a problem—you can just make me captain for the time being. If that’s a pirate ship, then there can’t be any complaints. If it’s a merchantman, then we get loot and as a Siren I can raise it from the bottom of the sea, assuming the depth here is less than one kilometer. If it’s someone else, like a cargo ship from a different continent…Too ba
d for them. It’s what they get for sailing in our waters. Shall we attack, captain?”

  “Full tentacle ahead, junior captain,” I agreed, granting Anastaria access to the ship controls. “Look—this is how we dive and this is how you attack with the tentacles and this is the ramming procedure…”

  “Got it,” Stacey nodded, all but rubbing her hands at the prospect of battle. The girl was so enthused that I couldn’t help but get into it too. Really—what could one ship do to us if we attack it from under water?

  “They’re headed in our direction,” Stacey concluded when the distance between us and our prey began to decrease. Not wishing to cause panic in the enemy, the girl submerged our ship into the water, leaving only the top of the deck on the surface and allowing the waves to wash over us. If it weren’t for the protective dome, I’d be neck deep in water right now. Additionally, in order to maintain stealth, Stacey did something with the tentacles and forced them to work not like enormous propellers, but as the legs of a dog treading water. I couldn’t believe it…I’d never imagine that you could make adjustments like that.

  “We’re diving,” said Stacey and Nautilus submerged beneath the waves for the first time since I’d acquired her. While I had been testing the ship, I hadn’t gotten around to trying this—and to be honest, I’d been a little scared to go under. What if something went wrong? “Do you see them?”

  If from the surface the sea seemed dark and terrifying, then from underneath it was transparent and captivating. All kinds of fish were swimming around our ship—from tiny herring to giant rays. The beauty of it all was so enticing that for a second I forgot why we were even down there. Who can think of war amid such beauty?

  “Target straight ahead!” said Anastaria, seemingly unconcerned with our surroundings. The girl’s eyes were focused on the ship sailing ahead of us. Judging by its properties, we were dealing with a Level 12 cargo ship from the city Verdax in the Shadow Empire. Consequently, there definitely wouldn’t be any players aboard, “Depth three meters. They can’t see us. We’ll get closer…Three seconds until contact. Two. One! Contact!”