“I needed neither food nor breath, air nor companionship. All I needed were the waves beneath my hull and the sky within my mind”- Unknown
I blinked my eyes and stared up at the sun, the harsh light causing a ripping pain to pierce my head as I groaned and tried to sit up. I could hear the sounds of seagulls, and the soft murmur of soft waves hitting the beach. The last thing I remembered…I…
Another horrible pain shot through my head as I tried to recall what happened last…I was visiting my family up north…agh. The pain was too much. I stopped thinking about it and decided to sit up. Sit up. Sit up.
Nothing. My body wouldn’t respond. In fact, as I began to truly look around for the first time…where was my body? It felt like I was already sitting up, now that my point of vision had adjusted. I could actually look around but I had no body…and as I looked down for the first time, I realized I was sitting in a small rowboat tethered to a dock near the shore. Well…I wasn’t really sitting. My point of view was coming from just above the small boat but I had no discernable body or anything…strange.
As if by pure will, the boat untied itself and began to move towards the shore as I desired. My eyes scanned the shoreline but I saw no sign of human life, save for this dock and small rowboat.
I reached the shore and I grounded the small boat, and began to walk to shore. Or, I tried to. It seemed like I was stuck. Locked to this small boat, unable to move from it. Very strange. I repeatedly tried to remember what had happened last…visiting family…going to Uncle Anda’s barbeque…ugh the pain was too bad. I tried to moan aloud at least to diminish the pain somewhat but it didn’t seem like I could make any noise either.
Suddenly, waves of panic and nausea began washing over me and I bent over to vomit, but I couldn’t. Why was this happening? What the fuck is going on? I cursed whatever gods had placed me in this hell as I suddenly realized what I needed. I had been beached too long. Whatever this boat was, it was connected to me deeply. I could feel it in my very soul.
It took all of my willpower to get the boat off the beach back into the water, and once I was floating again the nausea and panic quickly subsided.
Okay, lesson learned. Don’t leave the water unless I absolutely have to. And uhh…where the fuck am I? We weren’t anywhere near a beach or ocean…and we were so far north…I muttered to myself as I realized the island that lay before me had lush jungles and we were nowhere near anything I had a frame of reference for.
Well, I decided sitting here staring at the island wouldn’t do me any good, so I began to head back to the dock to see if I could glean any information. As I approached, I wondered where the rope that had tied my rowboat to the dock had gone. It was nowhere to be seen, and I didn’t really remember what happened to it when I untied myself initially.
Again through only the slightest effort of willpower, a conjured rope appeared tied to my port (left) side and began to tie itself to the dock, as if on instinct. I studied the feeling for a little while, it was hard to tell how quickly time was passing due to the 4 suns that passed overhead in unison, my only indication that I was still on my own planet at least.
Palipsa, the sixth planet from the 4 Suns, the 98th populated Free-State in the Quadrona Star System, the planet I had lived my entire life. However, the Palipsa I knew was a far cry from what I was seeing now. It was a thriving megapolis, with incredibly vast technology and magics. But where was I then? I didn’t know Palipsa had any parts that were still uninhabited. As I stared at the sky and thought to myself about my next steps. I heard a strange blip in my head.
*Ding*
For the first time, I noticed a small blinking red circle in the corner of my vision, and as soon as I focused on it, a screen popped to life in front of my eyes.
Unnamed- Sentient Rowboat
Race: Rowboat
Grade: F
Skills:
Rope (1)
Identify (1) New!
Swim (S)
Okay, welp that basically confirmed it. I died and was reincarnated. Fucking figures dude I always hated isekai shit no wonder the gods put me here. Well, at least I had an S grade skill, that helps. And it looks like I got some kind of notification for Identify also?
As I focused on it, the skill slowly expanded as a description came forth.
Identify- The skill to learn more about a thing. It’s obvious, isn’t it?
Yeah, it was obvious. Simply doing the actions should be enough to level them up I guess. And it was also good information to have as I gazed at the sky once more, a small tag appeared in the sky:
[Palipsa- ??? -]
I now had confirmed I was leveling my Identify skill by simply using it, so I figured I should start using it constantly like, now. Before that though…the system said I was unnamed. I knew I had a name before, it was on the tip of my tongue, but the more I thought about it the worse the pain got. Well…if I couldn't remember my name, I’d have to give myself a new one. A name fitting a boat.
I always remembered boats had weird naming conventions, but I couldn’t remember what they were. I figured that my name should be something poetic and grand, to spit in the faces of the gods. Like….Arghest- The Eternal Omnihull or something oblique like that…
*Ding*
You have been named “Arghest- The Eternal Omnihull”
Well…not exactly what I wanted, but it fit. I liked the name Arghest, it came from a bedtime story my dad used to read about a sailor who traveled the stars and went around solving all kinds of wacky mysteries. He had always been my favorite when I was a kid. And the Omnihull, a classic comic from my pre-reincarnation days. Feeling good about myself and having been energized by simply having a name, I began to sail about 20 yards away from the shore, following it around. As I did, I continued Identifying everything in sight, noting the seemingly free use of the ability I had.
At the same time, I began trying to apply a bit more fine control to my ropes as well, slowly getting used to the feeling of almost being the ropes. In fact, now that I knew I had been reincarnated as a boat, the whole feeling was very strange. I could change my point of view to any place within a radius of the boat, and had no issues chilling underwater either. I had no desire to experiment with the land sickness either, that had been fucking awful.
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
After trailing a little while, it seemed like I passed a threshold of some kind.
*Ding*
Minimum Experience required- Skill Choice Obtained
Oh hell yeah, skills are rad. Honestly much better than an overall level system in my opinion, and it had been reflected in my work before this whole boat ordeal as well. I had been a systems developer for a small games studio for only a couple years, that much I could remember. Honestly though, I didn’t really like being in this situation at all, who would? There was no choice now but to go along with this but…it all seemed a bit cliche to me.
Reinforced Hull- Passive- Your hull durability increases, removing any signs of age and increasing your size.
Broaden Sails- Passive- Your speed greatly increases and your affinity with wind is enhanced.
Crows Nest- Passive- Your frame of view can now raise much higher, and you can zoom in on distant objects as well. Land ho!
Alright…there wasn’t much to go on, honestly. I had a solid clue what each would provide, but had no idea what would be best to pick right now. Out the gate, I was leaning towards Crows Nest. I already had another perception based power and my hunch was that it would provide some better visibility, maybe let me see my surroundings from farther up than I had been able to before.
Reinforced hulls were the boring defensive option, and I couldn’t help but wonder if I was being offered this trait due to my name. Regardless, I hadn’t seen anything hostile in the area and the waters seemed clear of any rocks or coral, at least for now.
Broaden sails also was really tempting. I assumed it would help me use wind magic maybe? And quicker speed would be nice…but ugh, these were all just guesses. My first ever skill selection needed to be good, so I continued pondering for a bit as I continued slowly down the shoreline.
Eventually, I decided to go with my initial instinct and select Crows Nest. It might not do exactly what I thought, but hopefully it would be a better all around choice than the others. I mentally opened my menu and selected the skill.
Crows Nest- Passive
Your frame of view can now raise much higher, and you can zoom in on distant objects as well. Land ho!
I excitedly tried to raise my field of view, and it was incredibly disorienting at first but I quickly adapted, sitting what felt like 40 feet over the small rowboat beneath me…or…40 feet over myself? I still wasn’t exactly sure what being a boat entailed I mean I still felt human enough, just with no physical body…I could feel my grip on the human sensation slipping though as I got more and more comfortable in my new form.
Unfortunately, 40 feet barely made a difference in terms of what I could see right now, gazing out at the vast ocean nothing had changed beyond an identifier for it:
[Palipsal Ocean Reserve - ???]
Not incredibly useful but I’d take all the levels in identify I could grind out for now. The island, on the other hand, I could glean a bit more info from. I could see farther up the mountains and after messing with the new zoom function on my field of view, I could see small pillars of smoke coming from deep on the mountain. Inhabited…I wasn’t sure if that was a good sign for now or not.
I had wondered what would happen if a person tried to sail me themselves, if I could even communicate, if they’d recognize me as a sentient boat…but I just didn’t have enough information to even hypothesize.
Honestly it was just now starting to set in exactly how fucked this situation was. The suns were nearing the Fal formation which meant it was nearing midnight…I’d been here probably 10 hour or so now. I was beginning to doubt this was a dream. So I began to come to terms with things.
I wouldn’t see my family again. My pets. My job. Everything I knew and once was…just gone. In the blink of an eye. I still couldn’t remember anything past Uncle Anda’s barbecue. Thankfully though, there were many things I could still remember.
My sisters smiling face as I arrived at the event that night. My cousins fake fighting by the pool as they were shoved in one after the other. The immense feeling of pride as my uncle announced why he had even thrown a barbecue in the first place, he was having twins.
I remembered it all so clearly, and yet as my eyes continued to scan the horizon, it felt foreign and wrong to me at the same time. These were the memories of a human. The sensation of walking on land, of hugging my family, of enjoying grilled meats. It just seemed so wrong now.
Land made me feel so ill and vile, I hadn’t seen another living creature since I got here, and I was pretty sure boats didn’t need to eat at all. Well…maybe some boats technically ate coal? Or different power sources? But I doubted they’d be as satisfying as a good barbecue.
I wasn’t human anymore. It finally truly sunk in. I was free of the limitations of the human form, freed of the obligations that life left me with. At the same time I was now a prisoner, stuck as this boat for potentially forever. I decided I needed to begin making a plan, otherwise I would sit and be sad for who knows how long.
I needed to figure out exactly where I was. The [Palipsal ocean Reserve- ???] tag should’ve helped but…it was a giant ocean. It covered nearly 80% of Palipsa. I wasn’t sure what the reserve part meant but everyone knew of the Palipsal Ocean, and it was enormous. Partially uncharted. And extremely hostile. Well not the ocean itself but the things that resided within it. In fact, the majority of cross-ocean travel had been done with airships on Palipsa for thousands of years at this point, and although everybody knew what a boat was I doubted anybody I had ever met had ever even seen one in person, let alone ride one, especially in the Palipsal Ocean.
Okay so step 1, where the fuck am I. Step 2, keep leveling. I mean, it seemed obvious. My only connection to another being, even if it was some unknown System, I felt a strong urge to pursue it. I felt good about my choice with [Crows Nest], the visibility was really nice and the zoom function could come in really handy, I was sure. But it didn’t really help me in any concrete ways right now. I took another look at myself, truly studying my new body for the first time.
I was a small rowboat, big enough for maybe 2 people, with some shoddy oars. I was clearly an old boat, long decayed with age, and yet I had no leaks, no rotting wood, only aged pieces that seemed like they had potentially been damaged at some point in the past. I also now had a crows nest, made of substantially nicer wood, jutting up 40 feet above the boat. It looked very awkward, however it felt right. It was me. And then there were my ropes.
It seemed a bit strange, having prehensile ropes attached to my side, but it made a lot of sense at the same time. Over the last day I had gotten pretty good at manipulating them, but I didn’t really have any good way to judge. I hadn’t seen any birds, any fish (although to be fair I hadn’t spent much time underwater at all), or anything remotely useful to use my sweet new rope powers on. But I knew that simply using the skill would provide levels, so I kept on playing with the ropes anyways.
One neat thing I did figure out was I could actually spawn the ropes from anywhere in my radius, same as my point of view. They simply popped out of nothing at the slightest nudge from my willpower, as mindless to control as my old body had been. I tried not to think too hard about how it was happening, ultimately I was just grateful to have something to focus on to keep from freaking out internally.
As I continued along the shore, humming to myself, 3 horrible things happened all at once. A shiver ran down my stern, and I turned my gaze towards the sky as everything I knew came into question. 2 of the Suns were quickly turning a putrid green color, and a sickly feeling overcame me, probably just mental given the situation. They were also…moving. Not like the Suns normally danced across the sky in their typical rhythm, no they were moving at speeds visible to me from this far away, and it looked like they were about to collide.
The second thing that happened was both greatly comforting and also horrifying at the same time, I heard a very loud, very human scream coming from the beach about 40 yards away. I quickly zoomed in on them to find a small family huddled around a dim campfire on the beach, and my rudder sunk as I realized they were looking at the third thing.
I had wondered where the fish were. I had looked underwater for nearly an hour and hadn’t seen a single sign of life. Oh, how I wished to go back to the moment before I knew what truly swam beneath the waters. Oh, how I wished I had taken [Reinforced Hull]. Curse my hubris..I mean fucking a Crows Nest? Really? Fuck I should have chosen something else.
Too late now…I muttered to myself as the creature turned from the family and stared at me for the first time.
The first thing I noticed about the squid-creature were its beady red eyes, peering straight into my soul. The second thing I noticed were its giant, slimy, crab like claws that were eagerly clicking away as he slowly turned fully around to face me. The third and final thing I noticed was a small blinking notification in the corner of my vision as I silently used [Identify].
Identified Creature: Returner Squid
In many places within the Oceanic Damns the dead congregate and rise again, creating twisted and demented versions of their original host species. Returner Squids are exceptionally common and can be very potent in numbers.
New Quest!
Survive a fight with a Returner Squid.
Reward: ???
Location Updated- Palipsal Ocean Reserves- Oceanic Damns
Fantastic. My first fight was going to be against this ugly bastard. I liked my odds, weirdly enough. I felt like it could be easy to just tie him up and beat him with an oar as long as his grubby little claws stayed far away from my ropes.
Not only that though, I had finally figured out where I was. The Oceanic Damns…one of the most cursed places on this whole planet. Sighing deeply I briefly turned my gaze back to the sky and saw a fourth thing, well, really it was the first thing (the situation had developed a bit) and my non-eyes widened at my realization that the 2 Suns had already collided, and there was a very clear shockwave of superheated violet and green heading straight towards us….