Life aboard the Wavebreaker was different. Not necessarily as uncomfortable as David had imagined, but definitely far removed from anything else he knew.

His room was small, yes, and the food was a far cry from the mess halls at the barracks, but it was warm and filling enough. It helped that David had splurged some of his untouched salary on buying a few spices that reminded him of home. Elderberry, powdered seamoss, and even a tiny pouch of torrentroot were enough to elevate any porridge or fish stew into a meal worth being served at a noble's hall.

The crew was surprisingly polite for such rough sailors. They all greeted him whenever he emerged from his room, they got out of his way first if they met in the ships' crowded corridors and even made sure not to speak too loud in his vicinity after the first mate had told them he needed silence to concentrate.

It helped that he was still a mage, capable of more than just divination—no matter that it was slowly evolving into an entire school of casting, separate from the utility spells he had first learned of it as.

Lighting a fire for the cook, mending and recharging a mana crystal that had gone out faster than the schedule allowed. These were all small things that the crew's water mage, Portia—who David had yet to meet—was too busy to handle, and that allowed him to establish himself as someone useful even beyond extremely esoteric magic.

He wasn't one of them yet, but David thought that part of his job was going better than expected. Now, if only the task he was brought to do was as easy.

After the first day of employing his usual tactics for scrying vast areas—and wasn't it crazy that he now had such fine control of his gift that he could direct when and where it would take his mind's eye—and quickly becoming exhausted as he tried to scout the watery abyss, David had to change tracks.

He sat hunched over the small desk in his cramped cabin, the gentle sway of the Wavebreaker lulling him into a strange rhythm. His hands absently drummed the edge of the desk as he stared at the scribbled-on map. The Serpent Sea was deep, more so than he'd realized before attempting to scry even just a fraction of it, and the idea of scouring its waters for threats felt increasingly impossible.

The first day had been a mess. He'd begun his task confidently, sending his consciousness outward, feeling the familiar tug of the mana currents, and flying through the route. He had tried to stretch his senses as far as possible, scanning the waters ahead of the Wavebreaker, looking for anything out of the ordinary. Even privacy wards couldn't hide from his gaze. How difficult could it be to find a few sea monsters hiding below the surface?

He had approached it like any other task, thinking it no more complicated than scrying a battlefield or scouting the warded pirate strongholds of the Scales. After he was done with the surface scan and was sure no ship was lying in wait for them to pass by, he went to dive in.

The deeper he tried to go, the more he realized that the Serpent Sea did not pose the same challenges as the surface. It was a lot harder. Unfathomably deep. The light dimmed far too quickly the further down his vision reached, until he was groping through darkness, trying to see through inky black depths that resisted his mana at every turn.

It wasn't just the dark, though. That alone could be combated with an increased expenditure. There was something else—something far more insidious. The mana in the deeper parts of the sea felt hostile. It resisted his control, pushing back against his scrying attempts like some unseen force didn't want him there. The feeling was initially subtle, and he spent a good hour wading through the murky water, but as he pushed further, it grew stronger until David's instincts told him he risked doing some serious damage to his third eye.

He had tried for hours that day, but the harder he pushed, the more his vision blurred and his energy drained. By the time the sun had begun to set, David was forced to abandon the effort, his body trembling with exhaustion.

He sighed, resting his head in his hands as the ship groaned and swayed beneath him. Even now, he buzzed with frustration at the memory of his failure. It wasn't that he was a stranger to it. During his apprenticeship with the Blazing Torch, might the Light be kind to his soul, he had to work tirelessly through the night to achieve what many of his peers could with little effort.

But divination magic was his thing. His, in a way no one else could claim about any other discipline. It hurt to admit that he wasn’t making any progress. It hurt even more to have to say it out loud to the crew, but he couldn’t let them go further without knowing that the path wasn’t secured.

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When David went to Captain Charry that evening to explain his difficulties, the man listened patiently, nodding as he outlined the problems. But when David finished, hoping for some understanding or suggestion, Charry simply clapped him on the back with a grin.

"Figure it out, Diviner. You're clever enough." With that, the Captain returned to his duties, leaving David standing there with the weight of the impossible task pressing down on his shoulders.

The morning after, David sat in his tiny cabin, staring blankly at the map before him. He had gone over his methods a hundred times, replaying every moment in his head, searching for a way to make it work. But no matter how he looked at it, scrying the Serpent Sea with the usual spells was a fool's errand.

The sea was too big. The depths were too dark. His spells—at least how he used them—weren't enough.

It makes sense since they are designed to work on the surface. Interference is baked in, but they can't withstand too much. Most of the space left in the matrix after the scrying bits is taken by safety features meant to keep the mind's eye from straying too far or separating from the body. Anything I take out to make more space for precision and penetrating power would just make me vulnerable to whatever is putting up a resistance.

"And I have no idea if it's a property of the sea or some kind of monster I have never heard of."

David leaned back in his chair, closed his eyes, and took a deep breath. There was only one possible solution, and it started with acknowledging that he wasn't like any of his colleagues.

He had to own it: he wasn't just a mage trained in divination magic. He was a Seer. That was why the Grand Marshal had spared him during the siege of Lamprey Port and why he'd been drafted into the Revolution's magical division in the first place. He wasn't like the others, those who had learned to imitate his gift through hard study and trial. His talent went deeper.

But it's dangerous. I haven't had any crazy dreams since I got a modicum of control over my gift, but I remember what it was like to see my death every time I closed my eyes. I didn't want to go back to that for a reason.

David hadn't used his true gift in a long time, not since they had asked him to help establish the Divination Division. The Revolution's mages, despite their hard work and incredible skill, had only been able to harness a fraction of what he could do, enough to create a limited, safer version of his magic. It had helped the Revolution immensely, of course, but it was nothing like the real thing. Nothing like what he could see.

Not just the present.

The future.

The very thought made his stomach twist. The last time he fully used his foresight, the visions nearly drove him mad. The constant sight of his own body being crushed, stabbed, disintegrated… No matter what he had done to change the future, he had been incapable of preventing his own death.

What use was foresight that only showed immutable futures? None. It was only a burden.

David had survived only because the Grand Marshal's power was beyond the heavens and the earth. A being so infinitely mighty that even the strings of fate couldn't bind him. But he was well aware that he wouldn't be so lucky again.

Sighing, David ran a hand through his hair. He didn't have a choice, did he? There was no other way. If he couldn't see the threats below the water in the present, then maybe he could glimpse them before they ever arrived.

With a resigned breath, David reached into his satchel and pulled out a small booklet. It was weathered and well-used despite being written not even six months ago, the edges of its pages frayed from frequent reference from countless hands. The title, "A Comprehensive Study of Foresight," was embossed in faded gold on the cover. Archmage Jean Franklin, the mind behind the study, had overseen the divination project almost from the beginning, and it was thanks to her that the Revolution had been able to formalize what little they could of David's gift.

After the new school was developed and copies were made for the students and researchers, Lady Jean gave the original to David. It was a magnificent gift. Should he dare sell it, he could retire and not work a day until the end of his life. But the mere thought of doing that made his skin crawl. It was too private.

And yet, despite being unable to get rid of it, David had never opened it since the end of the experimental phase.

Grinding his teeth, he flipped through the pages, scanning the carefully written notes and diagrams. He had read this book before as it was being written, but this time, it felt different. This time, it was more than a theoretical exercise. He had seen it as an explanation of his gift and treated it as such. Had been content to never think about it again after its secrets were revealed, just enough to grant him control. No more nightmares, save for those he gave himself naturally.

Now, he needed to delve deeper. David had to study the nuances of true foresight to grasp at the edges of the visions that had once come so naturally to him and turn them into a well-honed weapon in his arsenal.

The book's contents were meticulously detailed, filled with Franklin's insights on controlling the flow of future visions. The basics were simple enough: a calm mind, focus, and, most importantly, the ability to filter out the noise of a thousand possible futures to grasp the one most relevant to the moment.

That obstacle stopped the researchers from crafting a spell that could replicate David's ability. Surprisingly, Lady Jean had quickly cracked the code to peer into the future—something to do with removing one's spirit from the flow of time by following the Light—but no one, not even she, had been able to control what they would see. One more ambitious researcher who had ignored her warnings had even gone mad.

David was quite sure his gift would handle that for himself.

With the map of the Wavebreaker's route spread out before him and the booklet in hand, he took a deep breath. He wasn't sure if this would work. But he had no other choice.

Closing his eyes, David let his breathing slow, his awareness sinking deeper into the flow of mana around him. He could feel the pulse of the sea, the life thrumming through the water, the distant, murky depths calling to him.

Ignoring all of that, he activated the experimental spell's matrix and sought his connection to the Light.

This time, he would see.