I pointed to the entrance of the cabins. “Go get Shadara!”

I looked over my shoulder and watched the monster swimming behind us. The monster didn’t seem to have any intentions of stopping. A growing wave followed it.

“That can’t be good,“ I said with a deadpan expression. “What are our options?”

Captain Webster pulled the wheel hard right as the sails pulled harder against the masts. “I’m not about to turn this ship around and be letin’ that thing attack me ship. The last place I be wantin’ ye lasses to be fightin’ is here on the deck.”

“And how long will it take us to reach the next island?”

“Three tips of a flagon,” Webster replied.

I stared at him, not hiding my annoyance. “What?”

He rolled his eyes. “We’re already there.”

I turned and saw another island. But it was smaller compared to the others we’d visited so far.

As the ship sailed full speed towards the tiny island, I noticed its lush greenery, vibrant flowers, and towering palm trees. With its small size, the island held a tranquil aesthetic. That’s not going to last long.

I turned to see the serpent was catching up to us, as was the wave following the serpent. The wave began cresting upwards and growing taller than the tallest mast of our ship. What scared me more was that my brain already calculated that the wave was going to catch us before we reached the island.

The boat started tilting forward as the wave began swallowing it up. I looked around on the deck and let my brain calculate the best place for staying on the ship. I had a eighty-seven point one percent chance of success if I attached to the center mast, there wasn’t enough time to reach the cabins below deck. Without hesitating, I drove my stinger blades into the mast, making sure the blades were parallel with it.

My feet slid off as the ship started overturning and I dangled from the mast. I looked back and saw the island was rising up to meet us. After pulling myself closer to the mast and closing my face visor, I desperately held onto it as I braced for impact.

Everything jerked backwards as a deafening boom sounded when the boat crashed into the sand sideways. I lost my grip in the impact, but held on by my stinger arms staying embedded with the wood. All of the joints in them were dislocated as I dangled in the air when the sand hit me from below as water dropped from above.

The water wasn’t empty. Once the deluge ceased, I saw that a dozen of the smaller fish were clinging onto my body in various places by biting me. Their teeth couldn’t eat my jacket or skin so I wasn’t worried. On the ground were hundreds of the fish, flopping around suffocating on the soaked beach. Our captain, who lost his hat, lay sprawled completely untouched by the omnivorous fish. I didn’t see Killa or Shadara anywhere.

Maybe they’re still in the cabins. They should be safe.

No sooner than I had those thoughts, then the center of the ship exploded. The mast I had been holding on to was barely missed as the serpent fish burst through the ship. It was twice the size that I remember.

Of course it’s bigger. And why is that thing floating in the air? Magic, of course. There’s a high probability of the tidal wave being magic too. My brain calculated it to a sixty-four point five percent chance. Thanks brain.

The creature stayed suspended several feet in the air as it whipped its head back and forth before settling on me. It let out a loud hiss before it lunged at me. I pulled my stinger arms out of the mast and dropped to the ground. My joints all made popping sounds as they went back into place.

The creature sailed into the mast, shattering it as it missed me. How powerful is that thing? My mind brought up a sheet I didn’t expect to see.

Estimated stats:

Deviant Sea Monster

Level:

52 (Minimum)

Agility: 220 Arcane: ??? Power: 900 Quickness: 400 Resilience: ??? Toughness: 1100

That’s really bad. Eleven hundred toughness is going to be impossible to get through.

Incorrect. Your werewolf transformation spell adds one hundred and sixty percent—after your recent level up of Solidify—of your arcane stat to everything.

Name: Rina Lone Augments: Level: 51 Cellular Reconstruction Agility: 535 Cerebral Prediction Matrix Arcane: 340 Synthetic eyes: lvl. 2 Power: 170 HUD Quickness: 785 Mana battery (shadow) integration Resilience: 360 Synthetic skin (face) lvl. 1 Toughness: 360 Additional Stinger Arm X2 Unassigned Points: 0 Arm blade (right), Retractable Shards: 274,371 Synthetic tendons lvl. 2 Synthetic muscle lvl. 2 Shadow Powers: Synthetic bones lvl. 1 Manifestation lvl. 9 Epidermal plating lvl. 2 Shaping lvl. 6 Nanobot Blood Replacement Distance lvl. 3 Nanoweave Hair lvl. 1 Anchoring lvl. 1 Voice projector Infusion lvl. 5 Plated dragon teeth Solidify lvl. 2 Synthetic tongue Shadow Lycan Form Spell

That means your quickness is effectively one thousand three hundred and twenty-nine and your toughness is nine hundred and four. Your epidermal plating’s defense is rated one thousand eight hundred and eight while it is active. The attack power of your arm blades is three thousand five hundred and seventy-five if you use your tendons to increase your quickness by thirty-three percent. You can kill it quite easily.

I almost couldn’t believe what Orange was telling me. Am I really that powerful now? Why am I even bothering with a gun anymore?

Poking her head out from the center of the ruined ship, Killa surveyed the destruction. She’s alright. And if she’s looking around, that must mean Shadara’s safe too.

I wasn’t the only one to notice her. The magically, flying serpent looked down.

I pointed to the creature. “Look out!”

Killa looked up as the thing charged towards her. “Catch!”

She threw Shadara out of the ship. I ran over to catch her. As I ran, I used my stinger arms to slice off the fish still nibbling at me. It earned me seventeen thousand shards but no points.

The creature rammed into the place Killa was. The slime woman stretched out into a ring around it and clung to its body as it passed through her.

I checked to make sure Shadara was okay. Her breathing was shallow and there was blood on the back of her head along with several gashes. There was a eighty-eight percent chance she’d survive her wounds.

Until she recovered, I needed to take her to a safe place. The tree line looked the safest place.

“Hang on, I’ll be right back!” I shouted to Killa as I took off.

“What do you think I’m doing?” Killa’s voice warbled as the creature tried to buck her off.

After I placed Shadara next to a tree and covered her with a few large palm leaves, I turned around. The monster was swimming through the air with Killa clinging to it as her body swayed with the movements.

I looked at my arm with the arm blade. It might be crazy, but I need to help her. We can do this without my werewolf form. We are stronger than that.

My feet dug into the ground and ran after them. With my overwhelming quickness, I was able to catch up with them. I grabbed onto the tail and drove my arm blade in deep. The monster screeched.

Using my arm blades, I cut along its body as I scaled the monster. Every time it jerked, my blades kept me attached, and I continued climbing. I finally reached Killa at its gills. I dug my stinger blades into it, trying to keep from falling off. The monster was thrashing wildly as it tried to shake off the slime woman and me.

I looked at Killa and asked, “Are you ready for this?”

“Ready for what?“ she responded without forming her head.

“You’re going to kill this thing,” I said with a smirk as my mind ran through several plans. She needs the levels more than me. “What’s the best way for you to do that?”

Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

“Are you nuts?” Killa shrieked. “Maybe if you could give me an opening to its brain, I’d be able to consume it. But I can barely hold on. How do you plan to stop this thing?”

I grinned as the best plan formed. “You let me handle that. I’ve got a plan. First though, I’ll need you to let go.”

“I trust you,” Killa whispered.

She slid off the monster as she stretched out to fall straight to the ground. I looked at the beast’s neck as I drove my stinger blades into its gills and climbed up to its head. I used the blades on my boots to keep me from falling off when the monster tried to buck me off.

When I reached its head, I stabbed my blades into its skull and hung on while it continued to try to shake me off. The serpent continued to buck wildly as it swam through the air.

I know the perfect bait for you. Using my shadow magic, I created a small orb in front of its face. It froze as it watched the potential morsel of food. It sat at the edge of my control, so I pushed it downward as hard as I could.

Shadow Power Distance level up.

The creature followed it as it flew after it. But, it was too late. I released it and it vanished as I braced for impact. The creature smashed its face into the beach before skidding along the ground. It flipped over its own body and landed on its back. I lost my hold and flew into the ground kicking up my own wave of wet sand.

I pulled myself up to my feet as it started recovering. I looked around and saw Killa had fallen in front of the tree line where I hid Shadara. She sprinted towards us.

It’s time to keep you down.

Before it could recover, I infused my muscles enhancing speed before I the hardest punch I could at the creature’s face. It reeled back as my fist dented its skull. It was enough to stun the monster for a moment. My stinger arms reached for an eye and pried it out. With a quick snip of the optic nerve, it fell to the ground with a wet squelch.

“Now!” I shouted.

Killa leaped up on top of its head and slid into its skull through the empty eye socket. The monster writhed and roared as Killa ate it from the inside. In less than a minute, the creature stopped moving.

“Killa?” I shouted, “are you okay?”

A slime woman formed out of the corpse’s head and looked down at me. “I’m okay. I‘m just enjoying a well earned meal.” She slipped back inside of it.

I could help but chuckle. I sighed as I looked around. “What happened to the captain?”

I turned and saw Captain Webster sitting in the tree line by where I left Shadara. His tongue extended and wrapped around the unconscious panther woman. Everything slowed down as I cast my werewolf form spell while dashing towards the demon frog.

“Let her go!”

I transformed into a shadowy werewolf in an instant. I rushed towards the demon frog. He grinned as he started folding Shadara in half backwards.

“If you want the lass to live, ye’d be wise to stop.” Even with the lisp, I could understand the creature.

I skidded to a stop and stared at the frog, trying to think of what to do. If I attacked, he could kill Shadara.

“Why are you doing this?” I growled.

The frog grinned. “Ye made that monster. Then that monster wrecked me ship. Ye owe me a new ship. Until I get me new ship, I’ve got a hostage.“

I looked at Shadara’s face. She was completely out of it.

“I’ll rip you apart!”

The demon frog chuckled as he waved my sister out in front. “Ye can’t kill me. Not without killin’ the lass too. Unless ye got some fancy magic that can cut through me tongue without killin’ her first, yer stuck. Ye be quick on the draw, but ye not that fast.“

My mana was draining quickly and I ran through all the simulations of how I could save Shadara. There were less than three hundred options, and none of them ended with Shadara alive.

“Why don’t ye git to buildin’.“ Captain Webster took several steps towards his ruined ship always keeping Shadara between us. “And don’t even think about escapin’ this floor without me, or if this pirate be killed, ye never find yer way out.“

I let out another growl as I released my werewolf form. I wasn’t doing anything with it up and it costs too much mana to just hold.

“Good lass.”

Killa climbed out of the fish head and burrowed into the sand. From Webster’s angle, I knew he didn’t see her. I wanted to smile, but I knew that would ruin the plan. Until Killa could get into position, I needed to keep his attention on me.

I started collecting the wooden boards of the ship.

“That’s it. Keep at it. I want me ship fixed by the time the sun comes up,” Webster said as he watched me work.

I tried to ignore him. He was the most annoying person I’d ever met. The worst part was he was right. We needed him to take us to the next floor. That made every word he said all the more aggravating.

He kept laughing as I worked. He didn’t even bother to help me. Not that I expected it from him. After a couple of minutes of me working, I kept a subtle eye on Killa’s progress. She was almost underneath Webster and Shadara.

I glanced at the demon frog and saw he was still looking at me. I was going to have to do something drastic to get him to distract him.

“You’re pathetic,” I growled as I hurled a hunk of wood at him.

He turned his head to look at the plank flying towards his face. As he turned, he also lowered his head. The plank obviously missed him, but it did get him to focus on it.

The frog turned back to me and said, “What did ye think that would...”

His sentence was cut short when the sand beneath him shot up like a geyser. Killa launched herself at Webster and wrapped herself around his face and tongue. Half of his tongue was severed by a bladed tentacle. Shadara dropped to the ground as Webster rolled backwards. He struggled to get Killa off of him.

I wasted no time and sprinted towards them. With an uppercut, I launched the demon frog into the air and away from Shadara. Killa also took the hit to leap off him as well, reforming next to me and creating a barrier of purple tentacles around Shadara.

Webster landed on his feet a dozen feet away. “Ye lasses are goin’ to pay fer that!”

“Not likely.” I activated my werewolf transformation and lunged for the frog.

He tried to hop away, but I caught him with my claws before he could get too far. I grabbed onto him with my stinger arms as my claws tore into his sides. He struggled against my grasp. I slammed my fist into his face with all of my enhanced strength. His face caved in as he flew backwards several feet.

As he lay on the ground, I ran over and jumped on top of him. I grabbed him by the bottom jaw, my claws ripping holes through it. We needed him alive, but he needed to pay for threatening Shadara and using her as a hostage.

Webster wheezed as he breathed, and half opened one eye as I contemplated what to do with him. He struggled against my grasp, but he couldn’t move.

“Kill me,” he rasped. “Ye’d become another prisoner of the Nexus like meself.”

I grinned. “I’m not going to kill you. But you’re going to tell us how we can find a ship or I’ll make you suffer more than you can imagine.”

Killa formed a head next to mine. “You don’t have to do that. It would be my pleasure to torture him. I know a few techniques that are quite effective. I can keep him alive and in a state of pure, unrelenting pain for as long as he lives. Since no one in the Nexus dies of old age, he’ll be like this for as long as we are stuck here together.“

The venom dripping from Killa’s voice mixed with the singsong honey tune terrified me. I looked at the slime woman. Her face was the picture of pure rage and hate. I let go of Webster and moved away from him, letting my werewolf form go. Killa shot forward and covered him in her body.

The demon frog screamed as the slime woman wrapped her tendrils around him. She tightened them around his body as more and more coiled around him. His skin peeled apart as she dug underneath and into his muscles.

I didn’t want to watch, but I didn’t feel right stopping her. Not when he had threatened Shadara. Not after what he did to us. He deserves this.

Shadara let out a moan as she started waking up. Killa must have noticed too, because she stopped. She still didn’t let the captain go though.

“Are you okay?” I asked Shadara as I rushed over to help her up.

She nodded. “What happened? The last thing I remember was the ship tilting, then nothing. Is everything okay?”

“Everything’s fine now,” I said, helping her over to a tree. “You’ve got a concussion. You must’ve hit your head pretty hard.”

The beastwoman rubbed the back of her head. She flinched and brought her hand back around and saw the blood on it. “That explains a few things.”

“Ye’ll never leave this island!” Webster’s voice was raspy and strained. “Ye’ll be trapped here fer as long as yer bodies last! And the Nexus will destroy ye long before then!”

I glared at him. “We’re not trapped here. We’ve got you. Now, you’re going to take us to the next floor or I’m going to let Killa continue what she was doing. And it’s going to be much worse than that. I’ll make sure of it.”

“Oh, I’ve only just begun,” Killa cooed in his ear.

I’m almost curious where she got such a sadistic side to her. Then again, I was just about to cut him up into little pieces.

Webster quivered. “There’s nothin’ I can do—not without a ship.“

“How many ways can I break a person?” Killa’s voice echoed inside her body as she spoke to Webster. “I can’t wait to find out. I can break you in more ways than you can imagine. You’re going to stay here until you tell us how to make a ship.”

The demon frog chuckled. “Ye’d have to have materials. Look around ye, this be an island for the lost, lasses. There’s nothin’ here but trees and the wreckage of me ship. Even ye aren’t that dense.“

Shadara crossed her arms. “You controlled that ship entirely with magic. Why can’t you make one with magic?”

When the frog didn’t respond, Killa pushed further into his body. He let out a squeal. “Fine. This pirate can. But it needs to be in the basic shape of a ship already.”

Shadara sighed. “It looks like we’re making a raft.”

I turned to the giant dead fish serpent. “Are there any limitations? Does it have to be made of wood?”

“It’d have to float, lass,” Webster said with a confused look. “Ye’d not be thinkin’ to build a boat from stone, are ye?”

I shook my head. “Nope. I’ve got something a little different in mind.”

I headed over to the large corpse as the other three watched me. Using my arm blades, I cut away at the meat of the serpent, eating some of it as I went. It would be a crude approximation of a boat, but it would work.

At least, I hope it works.

After finishing, I glanced at the other two women. Shadara was leaning against the broken ship. She was still a little weak from being knocked out earlier. Killa kept Webster in her hold.

With an opening from the head down its underbelly all the way to its tail, it looked like a canoe. I pointed to it. “Alright, will this work?”

Webster averted his gaze, but when Killa did something, he cried out in pain again and slowly nodded. “Aye.”

“No funny business or it’s a world of hurt made specifically for you,” Killa whispered to him.

Webster croaked and the flesh of the giant fish started to sink into the ground. After it had disappeared completely, the bones began to thicken and fuse. There was no sail, but it was wide enough that even Webster could fit inside with no problem.

Shadara walked up and handed me two long pieces of wood. “For oars. Since there’s no sail, we need to move somehow.”

I nodded and used my stinger arms to carve up two oars. The wood was harder to cut than I had anticipated. No wonder it knocked Shadara out when she hit it. Her toughness is pretty high.

We climbed into the boat, Shadara and I lifted Webster into it as his body was too damaged for him to move on his own anymore. That, and Killa wouldn’t let him go. With Killa’s magic, we pushed out into the water and her tentacles rowed the oars.

The sunrise turned the sky into a mesmerizing mix of orange and purple as it pushed away the night. We can do this.