Chapter 2

We Need Mana Potions

The next few minutes were deafeningly silent. Adventurers crowded above deck to see why we had stopped. Someone pointed at the depths of the sea port side.

“What’s that over there?”

The sea was a dark shadow. I couldn’t see anything. What I thought was simply the darkness of the sea ended up being the silhouette of something colossal. The shadow moved and my blood chilled. People gasped. I felt an elbow nudge my arm and turned to see Jack arrive by my side.

“What’s going on?” He said.

“Something huge is in the water. O’Kallan stopped the ship and he seems worried.”

“Keep this between you and me,” Jack said. He waited for me to nod, confirming the deal. Satisfied, he removed a small box from his inventory. Upon it was a blue carved relief of waves. I was slightly taken aback when he opened it to reveal an array of several dead fish, a dead eel, and several dead water insects. I raised an eyebrow at him, and we shared eye contact for a brief moment. Then he pulled out the eel and tossed the corpse overboard. We watched it fall below the ship, then through the air, until splashing into the water far below.

Jack returned the box to his inventory and raised his hands as though he were going to flow his mana out into its circular bar form. There was no blue mana bar. Instead, the ring was small and almost completely invisible. The air was warped like heat waves on a hot summer day were the mana bar would have been.

“You’re a rogue?” I said, recognizing that rogue’s were typically the only class to acquire a stealth mana bar. Jack was not your typical class specific adventurer, it turned out.

“No, not a rogue,” he said.

He closed his eyes and concentrated. Dark green light bled like wisps of smoke from where his eyelids met, wetting his eyelashes with droplets of light. He crushed his fists and the same dark green light rose like wisps of smoke from between his fingers.

I wanted to ask what he was doing, but I knew better than to interrupt someone in the middle of a spell. Since Jack asked for discretion, I wouldn’t ask him until some other time in private.

Jack stood still for nearly half an hour. His hands would make slight movements every once in a while. The shadow in the distance still moved about. It was indefinable. Then it stopped. A deafening sound—a click—flashed through our whale form and ship. The sound was so loud that it was painful. I felt hot, as though on the brink of a fever. Another click sounded, this time louder, and everyone except O’Kallan fell over in pain.

Jack cursed and then said, “lost my eel,” before getting up and offering me a hand up as well. I heard the sounds of healing all around me. I heard potions tinkling with sloshing liquid. I heard the chiming spells of divine light and a myriad of other healing spells.

Healers were gathered below O’Kallan’s floating body, using artifacts and spells to replenish his diminishing mana. Most were crew members. There were some adventurers that had stepped in to help as well.

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“Whatever’s out there is much bigger than it seems from here,” Jack said.

“It seems massive from here.”

“Even so. Much bigger.”

“Judging by the look on O’Kallan’s face, he knows exactly what it is.”

Jack turned to regard O’Kallan for a moment. The mage was sweating profusely, still suspended in mid air, keeping his spell strong. The captain approached him and they spoke quietly.

“Captain doesn’t seem too worried,” Jack said.

“He’s probably seen things like this before.”

Before we could continue, the captain motioned for everyone to come forward quietly. When we crowded around him, he begged us to keep our voices down, and magic use to a minimum until we were out of trouble.

“We’re facing a King Cyladon,” the captain said. “Our only chance of survival is if it lets us pass. our fate is completely out of our hands.” The crowd whispered nervously. “Right now, that monster is assessing us. We’re going to wait until it’s done.”

“You expect us to just sit by and do nothing?” Someone said with a bit of volume and anger in ther voice.

“I don’t ‘expect’ anything from anyone. That’s not how this works. You’re under my command and you will obey my orders. If you are a risk to everyone aboard, If you can’t control yourself, then my crew will be forced to imprison you for the duration of our voyage. Your reputation will be permanently tarnished.”

Several crew members stiffened and crossed their arms. The man who’d spoken up went below deck, muttering under his breath.

“How long will we be waiting?” Someone else asked.

“That’s not up to us,” the captain said. “It depends on the king Cyladon. As long as we’re quiet and patient, we won’t incite it. The worst thing we can do is use any magic while in its presence.”

Jack cursed under his breath. He grimaced and cast his eyes down at his feet. I was suddenly much more worried with what he’d done. I resolved that I had to ask him about it and soon.

O’Kallan took a deep breath. “It’s coming closer,” he said.

Half the crowd stifled a gasp. We turned as one to see the colossal shadow shift and come nearer. The closer it came, the more I realized I had underestimated its size. It slowly came right for us.

“We’re going to roll,” O’Kallan said. “Brace yourselves.”

As the King Cyladon drew near, an underwater wave buffeted our whale form. The ship rolled to one side, then swayed in that direction. We were being pushed sideways to sea.

The next thing I knew, all light from the surface of the sea was blocked out. The only light we had was from O’Kalla’s wavering blue mana bar. The King Cyladon coiled its body around us. There was so much of its long body that after an hour of winding into a ball, we were pitched in complete darkness.

“Everyone stay calm and still,” the captain whispered.

The King Cyladon began to rotate in place, until one of its eyes came level with our port side. Its eye was larger than the city of Klayvale. With all our levels combined, we were puny against the monster. When it blinked, it took a full minute for the top eyelid to close against the bottom. When its eyelid lifted again, it sent a wave toward us and we rolled several times in the next hour.

When the ship rolled, Jack and I crouched and held onto anything for traction and stability.

“Get a ladder,” the captain told his crew. “Adventurers. I need mana potions.”

O’Kallan’s mana bar was depleting faster now. A ladder was placed beneath him, and a team brought up mana potions for O’Kallan to drink.

An ancienne tried to cast an Elder Azure Mana Totem, but several crew members quickly interrupted them.

“Again, do not use magic. O’Kallan is the only one who can use magic right now. Potions are fine. If O’Kallan is out of mana, we’ll die at sea.”