Chapter 147: Foot Planted into Face
“And you said land battle wasn’t your strong suit.”
“I said it wasn’t my strong suit, not that it wasn’t good at it at all.”
First, Eufemia transformed into the dead ritualist, copying his form and aura before he had died. She didn’t’ want the pirate captain to notice their subterfuge and the death of the ritualist while Sen was dealing with matters above deck.
Nahir stared at her, transfixed.
“That’s uncanny. If I hadn’t just slain that pirate with you, I would have attacked you again.”
Eufemia struck a pose distinctly uncharacteristic for the pirate ritualist.
“Please don’t do that, it is paining my mind.”
Cutting the jokes, she crouched down in the water, examining the waterproof ritual circle. Although the caster was dead, the water within the room would remain for a while yet, before it dissipated back into magic.
“Destroying it won’t trigger it?” Nara asked.
Nahir startled in shock.
“I didn’t notice you approach. You are not even a scout.”
“I function as one for the team. I’ve gotten pretty good at it.”
“As understated as unfurled sails.”
Unfurled sails were not understated, Nara thought.
She narrowed her eyes, trying to pick apart the saying. “You mean it’s a…severe understatement?”
“Should you really be analyzing the linguistic intricacies of the local colloquialisms right now?” Eufemia said flatly. “Do I have to do everything around here?”
“Nope. Sorry.”
“Aliyah, can we just destroy this ritual?”
“Yes. Destruction should not trigger any affects, unless another ritual is set with that as its own trigger. Can you sense any active rituals in the area?”
“There’s all the normal ship stuff, I think. It’s too advanced for me.”
“I’m asking Eufemia.”
Well, geez. She was supposed to have some expertise in rituals, but she supposed Eufemia was more experienced with emplaced and trap arrays.
Eufemia gazed around the room, “I’m not up to your level Aliyah, but I don’t see anything that could pose an issue other than my own rune traps.”
“I think we’ll be alright then—Sen?”
“Do it,” Sen said. “Whatever it sets off will not be worse than what was meant to go off.”
“Loud and clear.”
Nara suddenly looked up, frowning.
“What is it?” Eufemia asked her.
“He’s attacked a hostage. They’re dying.” Nara could feel the desperation and the fear from their aura, more so that the rest of the terrified hostages.
“It’s not your fault.”
“I know. Doesn’t stop me from feeling bad.”
So Nara said, but even this didn’t fluctuate her aura.
“…What sort of training has Laius been giving you? More than what he’s been teaching us?”
“…Laius said powerful auras can be dangerous to normal people, especially with emotional fluctuations. He knows I wanted to go back to visit family, and they’re all normal rank. Laius he… is an unrelenting teacher.”
“Oh.”
“He said he wasn’t done with me yet.”
“My condolences.”
“He also said I needed to refresh my parkour skills, and I haven’t readapted them to bronze rank as much as I should have. He and Amara have been having fun redesigning the parkour course for my expanded abilities.”
“Those rocks are going to hurt.”
“If they don’t take my arm clean off. He’s…enthusiastic when Redell is around. Ever since I’ve reached iron rank it seems he’s decided that he has been coddling me previously. Amara said it was a great way to internalize the advantages of my body.”
“…What advantages?”
“Not having any important internal organs .”
“Are you…alright?” Eufemia didn’t quite know how to voice her concern. She was also familiar with the brutal training techniques of essences users. She had lived a ‘relatively’ normal life and hadn’t grown up with the teachings of adventurers like Sen and Encio had.
“I think essences have done something funny with my brain. Since it all seems hunky-dory to me. It’s like this internal voice telling me, ‘Your friends are doing it for your own good so its fine’. Which is true, but I’m not sure how I feel about that thought.”
“You don’t have a brain.”
“If I did, would they go easier on me? Maybe I could learn to regrow one?”
“Essences don’t change your thoughts,” Nahir said.
“That’s what you pulled from that conversation?” Eufemia said. “Not the more concerning consensual abuse-not-abuse in the name of training?”
He shrugged. How else would you grow stronger? Better suffer a bruise (or involuntary amputation) now than death later. “Why would it change your thoughts, it’s just magic,” he restated.
Nahir wasn’t wrong, but he also wasn’t entirely right. Nara didn’t know the details; Redell had only mentioned bits and pieces, and Oswald Willard had hinted at something as well.
But it wasn’t the time to contemplate the effects of essences on the soul.
“Sen. The ritualist is dead, and the ritual is destroyed, what now?”
*****
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“Oh, wow! Look at that, you all took too long, and my knife…slipped. Let’s choose the easy way for the next one, hm?”
The woman fell to the ground, gasping for air she could no longer breathe, her throat slit. A subordinate pirate dragged another hostage to the pirate captain, a young child, stifling sobs and shaking.
“’ere, captain.”
He raked his blade across the child’s throat too, killing her as well.
“Whoops. I don’t like brats much. Hand me another.”
This time, it was a teenaged boy. His hair was slick with sweat and saltwater, and his face streaked with salty dried tears.
Sen could feel the anger radiating off of John. John’s next words were very even, but his seething rage was barely contained.
“Let me heal her. I can still save her life.”
Brains could survive ten minutes without oxygen, and any negative side effects of the prolonged deprivation could be cleansed and healed. John could still heal the throat and restore blood loss before the woman died.
“No take backs, sir adventurer!” The pirate crooned, waving his knife around. “Respect the sanctity of life! Or do I mean the sanctity of dying? For your benefit, I shall repeat myself! Suppress yourselves with the collars I so generously provide and welcome us aboard the ship. We will take the goods, and everybody gets to live.”
He looked at the struggling, gasping woman and the already dead child.
“Except for her, of course. But my lessons come at a price. I do not think it has been too costly a lesson yet. Aren’t I generous, teaching you for so cheap?”
“What do we do, Sen?” John asked, voice low, itching to take to physically shutting the pirate up.
They could ignore the pirate, charge in. The distance was still large, and it would take some time to cross ships. Nara and the others were still below deck, so they could execute a pincer. Not all the hostages would survive, but they could save a few.
Or, detonate the Rune Traps aboard the pirate ship. If Eufemia has placed them judiciously, it may cause the ship to collapse and sink. The chaos may distract the pirate, or he would realize he could no longer escape and resort to extreme measures.
He could try negotiations. See what the captain is willing to give up of their cargo. Depending on the situation, if the loss is acceptable, actually handing over the agreed upon amount, or instead grasping a chance during the exchange to slay the pirate captain.
For now, Sen would buy time.
“Are negotiations amenable to you, Captain? Our captain here may be willing to forego some cargo for a…peaceful resolution. As you say, no one further gets hurt.”
“What say your offer, sir adventurer?” His tone was that of mock respect.
By his own calculations and Captain Kezo’s suggestion, thirty percent would still result in a profit. Above that would be a loss, but something they were willing to forego to escape the situation.
“We can offer twenty five percent. We portal the goods with a single adventurer from our side. They will be outnumbered; you can rest assured the goods will be dispensed without violence or issue.”
Aliyah could do so, but he wasn’t comfortable sending her over with her ability set. Nara would be the mule in question, but the pirate didn’t have to know where she was yet.
“Lives must not be worth very much to you, adventurer?” The pirate dropped the teenager to the floor and unsheathed his sword at his waist.
“Stop! We can offer thirty percent of the cargo. With the size of your vessel, this is the limit of what you can carry.”
“You presume my limit, adventurer?”
The pirate swung his sword down, but it was intercepted by a slender black blade. It seemed far too slight to have stopped his attack, especially from his advantage of downwards momentum.
“What?”
Nara’s next swing was incredibly fast. A sharp trust upwards, enhanced with resonating-force damage, the bonus from Astral Return, her Speed bonuses from Cosmic Path, her increased reaction speed from Avatar of the Boundary, as well as the new effect of Dream’s Wake.
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Ability: [Dream’s Wake]
Essence: Balance
Awakening Stone: Moon
Special ability (boon)
Cost: None
Cooldown: None
Effect (Iron): Negate all damage and non-damage effects from actively intercepted or parried attacks. Not all damage and non-damage effects from very powerful attacks will be negated. Intercepted or parried attacks will not trigger retributive effects.
Effect (Bronze): Gain an instance of [Waking Moment] upon intercepting or parrying an attack, even if not all damage or non-damage effects are negated. Instances of [Waking Moment] have a threshold determined by current rank. After reaching the threshold, gain instances of [Endless Dream] instead.
* [Waking Moment] (boon, magic, stacking): The [Speed] and [Power] attributes are temporarily increased by a small amount. Additional instances have a cumulative effect, up to a maximum threshold.
* [Endless Dream] (boon, mana-over-time, magic, stacking): Periodically recover a small amount of mana. Slight reduction in mana cost for abilities. Additional instances have a cumulative effect.
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The resonating-force damage cut into the pirate captain’s throat, cutting off any spell before it began; a weakness she and John did not have. After puncturing his throat, she pulled her sword trough, ripping through the muscles and delicate flesh of the neck, while avoiding the spine at the back that would have stopped her sword.
The pirate captain clutched at his throat, gasping as blood poured from his throat like a faucet with no closure. The other pirates sprang into action to converge on Nara who was towards the railing of the ship.
Nara picked up the teenager, still alive and wide-eyed.
“What are you doing—!”
She tossed him over the side of the ship. Her team members would sort him out.
“The ocean rages, the tide surges.”
Nahir had the same spell as the ritualist, one of his few spells as a human. A torrent of water surged forth, smashing into the pirates that had converged on Nara. She blinked away, and the water either slammed them into the railing or pushed them over the edge.
The water wasn’t disadvantageous to the pirates—many of them had aquatic animal essences and water abilities, but it separated them from the hostages above deck. The pirates had separated the hostages out of line of sight to prevent teleportation abilities from being used on them. This benefitted the infiltrating trio, as Nahir could cast his spell without sweeping them away. What was left above, the three could deal with.
Caspian swooped down from the sky, picked up Aliyah gingerly with a claw and lifting her into the air. With line of sight secured, she conjured a portal from the deck of the two ships.
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Ability: [Rune Gate]
Essence: Adept
Awakening Stone: Holding
Special Ability / Conjuration
Cost: None
Cooldown: None
Rank: Bronze 1
Effect (Iron): Allows the user to store items in a dimensional pocket.
Effect (Bronze): Allows the users to create a portal that is able to transport 20 Iron rank individuals, 2 bronze rank individuals, or equivalent amount of mass. Items in dimensional storage do not count towards this limit.
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Eufemia freed the hostages with her dagger, ushering them through the portal as Nahir and Nara fought off the pirates left above deck. John burst through the portal, running to the dying woman as fast as he could, casting his largest healing spell after a few quick Life Bolts to buy time. The child was dead. John didn’t have the capabilities to revive the dead yet, and could only bite back his dread and frustration, and focus on the ones he could save.
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Ability: [Grand Renewal]
Essence: Renewal
Awakening Stone: Life
Spell (healing, ritual)
Cost: Extreme mana
Cooldown: 1 hour
Effect (Iron): Conduct a powerful healing ritual that cleanses all afflictions. This ability takes the place of the ritual’s material components.
Effect (Bronze): The ritual circle is magically drawn, allowing the ritual to be more quickly enacted and in less ideal conditions.
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As he did, Nara, Nahir, and Eufemia received shield support. He may have been in the middle of drawing a ritual, but the qualities of spatial awareness and multitasking were qualities healers inadvertently trained for.
Nahir’s combative roar signaled the start of chaos.
Nahir slayed any pirates he came across, trident spearing through bodies. The thin layer of water on the deck of the ship was enough to trigger his movement ability, launching him like every step was off of a springboard. The iron rankers were torn through, dead in one strike from superior strength and speed from his passive abilities. With the piercing strength of his trident special attacks, the untrained had no chance to pose resistance.
Nara prioritized defending John, primarily by causing more chaos together with Chrome and Thanatos. She slipped through the pirates that attacked her, the simultaneous attacks triggering Dream’s Wake repeatedly as she guided attacks with spatial manipulation to just brush against her staff like gentle butterflies brushing against delicate flowers. They swung to miss as if their own attacks were telegraphed. Layers of light, space, and presence manipulation shrouded Nara like a phantom of a ghost ship. Chrome was the opposite, a shooting star of gleaming gold. He couldn’t match up to an essence user single handedly, instead balancing offense and defense. His flying swords weaved through the air to make unpredictable attacks from hard to block directions, while he followed up with his own dual swords.
Nara’s staff gleamed with an ethereal blue-black flame that set enemies on fire with Umbral Burn with a smash. She rarely needed to teleport, only to intervene if a pirate foolishly attempted to attack John. She showed less generosity to those that attacked him, and the pirates unconsciously gave John a wide berth, on top of the raging bear that was tearing through the pirates above deck and outright flinging the unlucky—or lucky—back into the sea.
A familiar face peered over the railing. His throat held a new scar, pierced through at the center then dragged across to the right.
“Oh no you don’t!” Nara shouted at the pirate captain.
She flung her bodyweight towards him, simultaneously spinning her sword to cut the two hands that clutched at the railing. It wasn’t enough to sever bone, he was a bronze ranker, but in combination with a foot planted into his face, his grip loosened, and he was sent tumbling back off of the ship.