I rolled my eyes and turned back toward our destination. I cast Water Lung on myself rather than taking fish form. I wanted to lure predators to me.
The shadow of the boat above me played tricks in the water around us, the motion making me think there was more to the area than there truly was. I couldn’t focus like that, so I made my way further from the ship, finding a school of fish to follow.
Their yellow, black, and green scales seemed to blend into the ocean around them as they surged around me curiously. I cast Nature’s Voice and noticed that there was no longer a timer to it.
Huh.
“Can you all help me find a predator?”
The fish seemed put out that I could speak to them at first, startled by the noise, but one of them answered, “Why would we do that? They eat us.”
“Sorry, I’m a Druid, see?” I motioned to myself, and they didn’t seem to care. Tough crowd. “I was hoping to find one or two to collect their forms.”
“Try swimming deeper, to the east,” another fish suggested as they swam forward to eye me carefully. I reached out and tapped it, scaring them all off, but acquiring the form.
I shifted, then swam with my new tiny body down into the darkness.
This is wrong! We shouldn’t be swimming alone, where is the school?! I rolled my eyes and ignored the fish’s instincts as I pressed on with Yve hot on my tail. Light was scarce here, but I could still see slightly thanks to the heightened aquatic vision. Any light was useful to a fish, and this was enough for me now, as well.
The ocean floor was still quite a ways off when the instincts suddenly quieted, like a sudden jolt of silence.
Something’s out there. I growled and swam in a slow circle, then saw it, a set of eyes. Peering out of a cold darkness, a silvery glint to them as the creature moved forward. It looked like an eel, but it was some kind of water snake. It had to be with how it moved. I couldn’t get a bead on the color or look of it as it stuck to the shadows.
I’d need to lure it out. Thinking on it, I swam downward again. Just toward the stalking serpent at an angle and waited.
A rush of primal fear seared through me as I twisted and shapeshifted just in time to catch the fangs that would have pierced my fish-like skull if I had hesitated a second longer, on my metal arm. The snake tried to recoil, but I shot my arm forward and called the shadows to my aid. They wrapped around the snake to hold it still while I looked it over.
Dark scales mottled green and black covered the thick hide with small dorsal fins on the sides and top of its back and then a small barb at the tail. It writhed and squirmed, but my control over my magic was flawless, and touching the cold scales allowed me to obtain the form I desired. Thinking on it, the thing could be useful, so I took my clawed hand and rammed it into the beast’s throat. Blood as black as pitch poured into the water around us.
“You struck as ruthlessly as my Queen said you might.” Yve watched from where she swam, her voice quivering for some reason.
I ignored her and watched the shadows around us, this couldn’t be it, could it?
After waiting for a couple minutes, I sighed heavily and began to haul my prize toward the surface. The hide seemed like it would make decent armor, and I wanted to give Muu something to help level his crafting. I was a little way from the kill site when I caught a glimpse of motion off to my right.
“Are you a whale?” I asked rhetorically as the massive creature swam close to us, within about thirty feet. Its gigantic bulk displacing the water slightly before passing out of visible range. “That was beautiful. I wonder if this is what it feels like to whale watch?”
“Move!” Yve snarled as she slammed her eel body into my side to shove me out of the way as the same whale swam directly toward me and my prize. The wide mouth opened, the film it had there being cast aside from the lips to reveal rows of sharp teeth as long as my leg pointed my way.
Fuck me!
I shifted into my belgar form, the weight drawing me into the depths and out of the way of the carnivorous whale’s trajectory. It nicked the serpent’s corpse, the razor teeth shredding the tail a bit and taking some with it. I shifted and rushed back up in time to run my fingers across the creature’s stomach, then used my shadows to collect my serpent corpse before legging it out of there.
The whale turned, and another one of the monstrous creatures soared from the depths toward us with a third coming. Three of the bastards and their levels varied only by one.
Carnivorous Whale Level 63
Yve slithered through the water before me. “Get out of here, I will distract them!”
“What if you fall?” I labored to get myself out of there, but I worried about her.
“Then I fall for a worthy cause—go!” She turned and barreled past me toward our pursuers with a battle cry that made the hair on my neck stand.
Kayda! I shouted mentally as hard as I could after slamming open our link. I could feel her surging toward where we moved, but she wouldn’t make it in time.
I pressed the serpent toward the surface once more and turned around. “Move Yve!”
She turned and swam away, clearing my line of fire as quickly as she could.
Pouring mana from the core of my being the same way I had to enchant Arc Cutter, I called Hubris to me with a flex of will and cast Lightning Storm through it. The power flexed, and the spell doubled in size and intensity, the cylindrical shape of it concentrating as soon as it left me into a slightly smaller cone that slammed into the whale swimming straight at us.
Dark whale flesh blackened immediately, and the creature thrashed violently where it floated in the water, forward motion suspended as it fought the pain. I had managed to hit it for a quarter of its health in one blow, but the mana cost to alter the spell and amplify it had been enormous. About triple the 250 MP cost, and some of it had escaped into the water around me, making my fur stand on end.
The other whales were coming, so I grabbed Yve with some more shadows, my mana reserves trickling slowly away. I pressed us toward the open air in bursts and saw motion above us.
The serpent broke the water first; Kayda grasping it precariously in her claws. I have it!
My shadows fled from the catch and used some of them to send slicing attacks at the closing whales. The attacks did minimal damage, a couple percent here and there, but they kept coming.
Once I broke the water, I threw Yve into the sky and shifted into my green dragon form. Using my powerful wings, I lifted myself into the air and gathered the location of the ship off in the distance by about a mile or so.
Water broke beneath me; one of the whales surged up, clearing the waves by almost twenty feet to try and take a chunk out of me. My wings worked to move me aside, and the creature fell back onto its friends.
We can lift that creature and take it to our lair. The dragon’s instincts grumbled. We would eat well, and it would give us strength.
I raised a ridged eyebrow as I wondered. “Think we could lift it?”
Try.
Good enough for me, I grinned and muttered, “Pie” Before diving at the one still trying to get its bearings below me. The crashing weight of its friend had stunned it for a moment, the blackened flesh on the nose giving me a thrill, that was the one we wanted!
I raced around and swooped down, digging the claws of my feet and hands into the creature and heaving. It barely budged at first, but I worked my wings harder and harder until it lifted, and we moved forward.
You are weak for a dragon. The instincts spat.
I rolled my eyes and noticed that my load lightened slightly. I turned my head to find Yve carrying the tail as a giant eagle, her powerful wings flapping as much as mine were, while Kayda struggled with her cargo.
The whale struggled mightily, bucking one of my hands free, and almost making me drop it before the instinct in my head took the reins.
My head reared back as my chest filled with fresh, sea-salt filled air and exhumed a venomous gas straight into the blowhol
e of the creature. It struggled more, but I watched in morbid delight as its health bar sank, a small skull popping into existence beneath it to show the poisoned status.
Our poison is potent, though the difference in your levels will only account for a small amount of damage from you.
“It takes mana to do that shit, though!” I had recovered a decent bit while flying, but that attack had eaten through 507 MP!
If you would prefer to drop it, then by all means. The dragon growled through my head. I rolled my eyes and continued on as my muscles strained.
Zeke, we think we can see you, what’re you doing? Bokaj asked in alarm.
I told Bea to find him and tap his leg with her tail to get his attention.
You using her to talk? She nodded at him, and he continued. Is that thing alive?
She nodded her head once more and smacked her lips excitedly.
Why the hell are you bringing it here, then? Jaken howled through our earrings.
Bea growled and slashed with her clawed hands, and the others seemed to get it.
We’ll be ready to light it up once you’re in range. Be careful.
A crashing splash below us reached my ears, and Kayda’s screeching anger spiked as a crash of lightning split the air beneath the whale and me. I could almost hear the angry calling of another one of the whales below us before a secondary splash sent a fount of water up toward me, splattering my wings.
It took all we had to get the whale over to the ship and close enough for my friends to do some damage. Hopefully.
The violent retort of a cannon preceded a force that nearly tore the whale from my grip. The damage amplified by the fact that it wasn’t a cannonball that had hit, but a batch of thin balls that shattered against the hide and loosed shrapnel that seemed to burrow into the fat and bled the creature well.
I whipped my head back and let my chest expand before spewing more poison into the monstrous whale’s blowhole and snarled as it expelled some of it back into the air.
“Hold your breath, Yve!” The Fae creature growled and must have consented to the order because I didn’t hear any more coughing than that of the whale trying to clear its lungs.
Another volley of cannon fire came and rocked our prey from my grip, dropping it into the water. Arrows sprang from it, my friends joining the fray, with Vrawn leading the charge on the water with Arc Cutter at the ready. She slashed the creature on the way into the water, and when I was certain I wouldn’t hit her, I dropped from the sky in a deep dive after it. With the water disturbed, I took no damage from the impact, shifted into my fox form, then into my own newly-gained whale form to lift it out of the water and into range.
It thrashed wildly and slapped me with a surprisingly sharp fin, slicing into the large fatty section of my forehead. I slammed into it as hard as I could to keep it from fleeing the area, and as far as I could tell, we had escaped the rest of the pod, as well. It was at less than half health when it began to wail and moan in a cadence that underwater made me feel as though I was going to get sick.
What the hell is that noise? Balmur cried. It’s driving the sailors mad. They’re fighting each other!
All of you get over here so I can cast Water Walk on you! Bokaj called to the others. After a few silent seconds, Go! Kill the damned thing. I’ll get these guys.
I couldn’t see much of what was happening, but the fight with the whale turned into a massive struggle. I bit at it, my vision slightly impaired as my eyes were on the sides of my head. I could sort of tell where it was just by the sheer mass of it, but it was going poorly.
Use your sense of smell, child. A gentle voice urged me through my mind. Our sense of smell is sharpest.
I took a deep inhalation of water, the salt burning slightly, and a sense of panic filled me. Breath, there is a sac of fluid in the nostrils that filters the salt and hydrates our body. We do not actually breathe this way, so you will need to rise for air soon.
I fought on and could tell that the creature was injured by the amount of blood scent in the water. I pressed it back up with my huge head and pushed out of the water and took a deep breath.
Bite it! The voice wailed, long and low, sudden motion on the left side of my head sending a rush of adrenaline through my veins.
I lunged forward and bit the fin before me, the sharp object bloodying my mouth a bit, taking 7% of my HP, the salt stinging mercilessly.
I could hear my friends fighting with it, their weapons and attacks striking it mercilessly. A burst of lightning struck it and me as well, sapping 15% more of my life away.
Luckily it did a lot more damage to the creature. Between all of us working on it, we managed to kill it before it killed anyone. I let go of the fin in my mouth and shifted into my normal form to wade out of the water onto the massive corpse.
Chests heaving, the others looked at me with Muu leading the charge. “The fuck did you bring that thing here for? Are you nuts?”
“We need the experience, and as far as I know of, this thing was twenty plus levels higher than us.” I poked the hide. “Look at what we’re capable of! We can do this.”
“But did you have to put all of us at risk for it?” Jaken reprimanded me gently. His consternation was evident on his face, and I blushed a bit.
“I didn’t know this thing was capable of that.” I looked at the others as they stood and glowered at me. Everyone except for Vrawn. “What’s on your mind?”
“I leveled up.” She smiled at me and then the others. “Did you all not gain experience from this fight?”
They glanced at each other, frowning, Balmur nodding. “Well yeah, I got a little over five hundred experience from it. Think we share with the crew as well since they fired at it with the cannon?”
The others just shrugged and seemed to deflate a bit. “I get that my bringing it here was risky, but if we have to fight something big, we need to go into the fight stronger. The reason I grabbed that snake was more instinctive than anything, really, but I wanted to see if we could use anything from it. I’m not sure about this whale, though. Muu, is the hide salvageable?”
He set to work looking it over and began to cut into it with his blade, frowning as he separated the flesh from the muscle and fat below. “There’s some kind of poison in here, I think. Everything is ruined.”
I snarled at the dragon instincts mentally before ducking my head. “My bad, man. Sorry.”
“I get it.” He punched my shoulder lightly. “We can still look the serpent over. Let’s go back to the ship.”
I checked on Yve, who looked to be fine and took flight to get back to the ship before the others.
Spots of blood covered the deck here and there, some of the sailors coming to on their own where they lay in piles together with weapons drawn.
I cast Mass Regrowth on as many of them as I could and healed the others as well. Jaken and Bokaj had already started to heal them, their wounds swiftly knitting shut. I joined after that and aided where I could.
“I hope there was a decent reason for that episode of stupidity.” Captain Holly crossed her arms over her chest as she regarded me coldly.
“Yes there was, Captain.” I panicked inwardly and hoped she would believe me. “I brought it here to help us and your men prepare for what is to come. I know it wasn’t much, but every little bit does help, and we want your people to survive this if they can. That means we need to prepare.”
She eyed me steadily for a few heartbeats, limping toward me finally and leaning close to whisper, “You will do nothing of the sort again without prior authorization from me, am I clear?”
She leaned back, and I made to answer, and she hushed me with a finger to my lips. “Because if you do, I will throw all of you to the sea and be rid of this business. Money be damned. You may speak now.”
I just nodded, keeping my nearly-mutinous mouth shut for once.
She left me to see to her men, and I breathed a little easier, turning my mind to my brothers. You all okay?
&
nbsp; Other than smelling like sloppy tuna and gout-ridden slippers? Muu grumbled. Fine. We’re on our way back up to the ship. Vrawn too.
Calm as hell, Vrawn clambered over the side of the deck with her chest heaving. Yeah. Perfect image of calm.
“That was fun,” she panted with a slight grin gracing her features and a flush on her cheeks.
“I’m glad it was.” I smiled back before surveying our surroundings some more. The sailors seemed to be coming back to their own again and their eyes fell on me. So I had a decision to make.
Whatever you have to do to keep us from getting shanked—do it. Bokaj snarled, his animosity surprising me.
“Agreed,” Balmur’s voice surprised me. “That was a little dumb of you, man.”
Crestfallen, I stepped away from him and addressed the crew, “Ladies and Gentlemen of the Pussy Willow! I apologize for my actions, I merely wanted to ensure that we would be prepared for the fight to come.”
Looks of disbelief and discontent colored the faces of the men and women watching.
“You the one what made the ship magic?” The older crew member Taejon wandered over to me. “Made that there sword that the young lady be usin’?”
“Yes sir.” I frowned at him, but he nodded his head excitedly.
“You make my blade do magic, I’ll call us even.” He winked at me and handed me his saber. It was finely kept with a simple basket hilt to protect the user’s hand from attack.
“How you magic it’ll be up to you.” He waved and turned to walk away, then stopped and turned to the others watching intently. “Y’all got somat better to do? He magicked the ship, he can magic our gear.”
Oh, I’m gonna make sure his is great, I assured myself.
“Give me time, and I’ll ensure that all of you have magical weapons.” The crew clambered forward, but the captain surged forward and snatched me back.
“There will be no enchantments placed on your weapons all at once!” She bellowed, her own blade clearing her scabbard at her hip. “Joesa will call the roll, and you will come to have your desired weapon enchanted. One and that is it. If our friend here has more time, we will think on some more options, until then—get back to work you mangy curs!”
Into the Storm Page 24