I wake up to the smell of some milk. “Is this for me?”

Sam is still cuddling me. “Good evening.” Her voice sounds as loving as ever. “Hilda got it for you while you were sleeping.” She helps me sit upright. “Want to eat something now? I heard we should be getting to land pretty soon.”

“Mhmm. Thanks Sam.” I give her a big hug which she swiftly returns with a kiss.

“I put the plate on the ground because I thought you were going to roll on top of it.” She leans over and gives the plate to me. Some of the food has already disappeared but there was still plenty of meat on it.

I put a couple of slices of meat in my mouth. “Awd do ywou know whewe the othews awe?”

“Ami, don’t talk with your mouth full.”

“Sowwy, I was hungwiew than I thoughwt.”

Sam laughs and wipes my cheek with a paper towel. “Hilda was going to play some chess with Taylor while your sis and Nikki apparently were playing some different games with the crew. Want to go and look when you’re done with your plate?”

“Yesh!”

And so it happened, after I finish eating the rest of the food and finish of a delicious glass of milk, Sam and I head over to the galley.

“Did you get some good rest, Ami?” Hilda immediately saw me when I entered the room.

“Mhmm.” I nod, “Thank you for the milk.”

“No problem.” She smiles.

“So, who’s winning?” Sam walks over to the board.

“This gal has won every single one of ‘em.” Taylor replies frustratedly. “I’ve never seen someone play this good.”

“Sorry for that, I play to win.”

“It’s alrigh’, would get angry if you went easy on me.” Taylor moves a piece on the board to which Hilda starts smirking.

“Checkmate.”

“Fuck!”

“Want to play another round?”

“Nah, should be headin’ to the bridge, should be arrivin’ soon.” Captain Taylor gets up from her chair and puts her tricorn hat on. “Thanks for the games.

“No problem.”

“But you gotta teach me some of them moves next time.”

Hilda nods. “I will.”

Taylor leaves the room, leaving me and Sam alone with Hilda in the galley.

“You pulled some pro-gamer moves didn’t you?” Sam asks her.

“Well, she’s not a bad player, but if you play chess as much as I do it’s really not that much of a challenge.”

“Are there games you don’t play, Hilda?” It’s my turn to ask a question.

“Mhmm.” She thinks for a second. “Riichi Mahjong, but that’s mostly because I can never find other people to play with me.”

“Oh, I do know my Pons from my Rons!” Sam replies with a sentence that makes absolutely no sense to me.

“I see, I see. A challenger has arrived at the table.” Hilda smiles. “Now we just need two more players and we can have a game.”

“My parents like to play as well!”

“Nice! I’d love to meet them then!”

I laugh at the enthusiasm these two are showing. “Yeah, Sam’s parents are great! It’s been a while since I’ve seen them, maybe next time you can come too!”

Sam nods. “I think they’d like that, especially since you’re like a mother figure for Ami as well.”

Hilda gives me a head pat. “Maybe a little.” She stretches and gets up from her seat. “Let’s go see what your sister and Nikki are doing.”

“Yes!”

We look around the ship and finally find where my sister and Nikki are by following the commotion in the lower crew quarters.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“Gods, that girl is strong.” One of the crew is swinging their arm around, trying to loosen their shoulder.

We peek through the crowd and see that both Élise is preparing to arm wrestle an incredibly buff looking sailor with Nikki standing next to the both of them.

“Alright. Three, two, one, go!” Nikki calls out as the match begins. At the start it doesn’t look like either of them is gaining the upper hand, however my sister’s face did look incredibly relaxed compared to her opponent until a smirk appeared on her lips.

“It’s my turn now.” In the matter of second Élise slams the arm of the sailor into the table, leaving him in complete awe. “Any other contenders?” She gloats, looking around the room but apparently no one else wanted to take part. “Ah, Ami! Are you feeling better?”

Our little group of three finally manages to get through the crowd. “Yeah… I just needed a rest after what happened.”

“I understand.” She motions me to come and sit on her lap, which I gladly do.

“So, what were you two doing?”

“Well,” Nikki starts. “First we were playing some dice games until one of the sailors challenged my girlfriend to some arm wrestling.”

“Then people started betting, and from one thing came another.” My sister nods at the pile of bronze and silver coins. “But we’ll just give it back when we disembark because we don’t need the money.”

“Did you beat everyone?” Sam asks.

“Of course. I’m a pretty high level tank, strength is like the only thing I’m good at.” Lise laughs. “I mean, I can heal myself a bit but nothing compared to what Ami can do and I can only use it for myself.”

“I honestly doubt most of these sailors could wear her armour for any prolonged period of time and she just wears it almost constantly.” Hilda stacks a couple of the coins into a little tower while she’s talking.

“Ah, there you are.” Taylor’s lieutenant walks over to us. “Taylor asked if you wanted to come up on deck to see the new continent for yourself. She said, and I quote: ‘It looks quite amazin’ at sunset.’' The lieutenant mimics her voice and accent almost perfectly which makes a couple of us laugh.

“Alright, we’ll come with you then.” My sister stands up, picking me up as well while she does so.

“Waaaah! Lise!”

“Awh, don’t you like it if I pick you up? But I enjoy picking up my little sister.”

“I-it’s not that, j-just warn me next time.” I pout.

“I won’t promise a thing.” She puts me down and pats my head.

Our group heads upstairs and is greeted immediately by Taylor who’s standing at the wheel above us.

“Ready for the most beautiful sight after a couple of days at sea?”

“Hell yeah!” My sister leads the way to the aftcastle and once the rest of us get there our mouths drop wide open. The setting sun has turned slightly red and beautifully contours the land that’s visible in the distance.

“Those are some amazing mountain ranges.” Hilda whistles.

“Indeed.” Taylor hands her the spyglass. “The people who inhabit those lands have tunneled through a part of them too so they have easier access to the inland.”

“Tunnels through those massive things?”

“Amazin’ isn’t it? If they theocracy of Osvik saw those they’d probably call it an act of the Gods or what not. But the Dwarger who live there are just that ingenious.”

“Dwarger, so, dwarfs?” Sam asks Hilda who just shrugs in return.

“I think so? This continent is new for me as well.”

“They even built these huge machines that work on steam, it’s pretty bloody impressive.”

“Yep, dwarfs.” Sam talks to herself.

“Damn, the person who created this world definitely was a fantasy fan…”

“Did you say anythin’?” Taylor turns to Hilda.

“Uh, not really. But if they are so advanced, why didn’t they explore our continent?”

“I don’t think it’s because they can’t.” Taylor explains. “I think it’s because they don’t want to. Y’see, what struck me as curious last time we got into harbour was that practically all their ships are not really seaworthy. Coastal fishing vessels at best.”

“Oh, that’s interesting.”

Taylor nods. “Anyway, we will be laying anchor in about… hmm… twenty minutes. Feel free to pack your things, or stay on deck, it doesn’t really matter.”

“Not going to leave anytime soon?”

“We are probably going to hang around the area for a week or two. Just killed a high ranking cleric so we might lay low here for a while. Waitin’ for things to cool down.” Taylor glances over at me. “Oh… right… sorry.”

“It’s fine…”

“And while we are at it we can get some lucrative trade deals here. Since they don’t really have any fast ships to trade with other settlements it’s a good windfall for our pockets.”

“Truely a mind for business, hey?” Élise laughs.

“Got to keep me crew fed somehow, don’t I?” Taylor winks.

After our little talk we all decide it might be better for us to grab our gear together so we don’t have to make Taylor wait too long. By the time we are ready the ship is already docked. The houses that were too small from a distance to discern were now very clear. Their architecture is unlike anything we’d ever seen. Obviously we’ve seen houses made out of stone, but these were just something else completely. The stones the walls were made off were massive and were richly decorated with what appeared to be runes, although slightly different from those I’d seen in the few history books I’d read. And while I expected the Dwarger not to be completely the same as my expectations, I was still surprised to see that most of them still were around the same size as me.

“So, how much do we owe you, Taylor?” Hilda takes out her coin pouch.

“Eh, don’t worry about it.”

“Really? Even though we got you into danger?”

“Danger is part of my job description.” She winks. “Nah, see it as me repaying the debt for helping my sister.”

“Alright, well, thanks for the hospitality.”

“No problem.”

Before we walk off the ship Taylor stops us one last time.

“If you ever need some help from your friendly neighbourhood pirate. Just shoot up a blue signal. Alright?”

“A blue signal, how?” Sam tilts her head.

“You have one of the most powerful fire mages around, you’ll figure somethin’ out. Anyway, take care!”

“You too!”

Auguste also came to wave us goodbye as we entered the strange new city. Our first order of business, finding a place to sleep.

I shouldn’t have taken a nap earlier, I’m not even tireeeeed!