I found myself floating in a sea of darkness, I could not see any stars or even feel the water around me. But I knew it was there because I could hear the sound of water gently lapping against a large piece of wood, I felt like I was sliding in and out of consciousness. The sky suddenly lit up with a kaleidoscope of colours and images as a man stood on the surface of the water. I noticed his feet were bare and only inches from my shoulder, as he was looking up at the sky.
"You know I always find you, my love."
I could see a small smile on his face as he continued to watch the sky.
"Do you remember us yet? I do. I remember when I first met you, I was a young woman, barely nineteen, laying on a beautiful beach on Aqua, the planet of the endless ocean. I was so in love with the ocean and then you crawled out of it so beautiful and charming.”
He turned his face seemingly looking down at me but as his face was shrouded in the darkness, I could not tell or see who he was.
“Our love burned so brightly, you told me so many things of the world and the universe. Then things slowly changed, we had children and my parents were overjoyed. However, I noticed that while my parents and our children aged, you and I did not. Over the years we had many more children. So many, five hundred children and I watched them all grow old and then die.”
His face shifted and I could almost see a sorrowful look on it.
“But my love for you was so bright, I was blinded to this and did not notice something was wrong with that until you left me behind. I wandered around Aqua, lost and lonely, watching our grandchildren grow old. Yet no matter how much time changed, I did not grow any older than I was when we met. You once told me that you had given me a blessing from the gods, but as I watched our grandchildren die of old age I came to realise you had cursed me. Then one day something changed, I felt it, a flash of your power returning to the world. I ran to it as fast as I could but when I found you, you were not the man I knew.”
His face turned from mine looking forward over the endless water before continuing.
“You were now a woman but you were diminished like only a sliver of your soul was there. You grew old, you had a family and then you died. I could not bear to approach you so I watched your first life without me from afar. It was not long after that I felt you again, you were back but that was not the only thing I could feel. I felt our children returning as well.”
He looked down at me as anger flashed across his face.
“You never came for me, I had to watch you live life after life, never seeming to remember the previous. Our children though, they remembered and they started seeking each other out. They also sought out me, they believed we were all blessed by a god to return eternally. My life began to burn brightly once more as I lived with our children through time, and for a while I was happy.”
His face changed to one of sorrow again.
“Then one day I felt your soul come back but this time it was not on Aqua, you were so far away. So I began to encourage the people of Aqua to build ships that could fly through the void of space.”
He grew angry as his voice became heated.
“I followed you to your new planet and saw you on the beach with another woman. Something inside me broke that day and in my rage, I ordered my fleet to invade that planet and we reduced it to a barren world of ash. But you would come back on a new planet and I began to hunt, time after time we battled. Over a thousand lives we fought, it became a dance, sometimes I would kill you, others you would kill me. It broke me again and again that you never remembered me or even seemed to recognise me. But I did notice that as the battles went on, that you started to become used to the struggles of life and death and would adapt to killing faster until it no longer phased you.”
He turned to look up at the sky again as he seemed to frown.
“Then something changed again and our children did not return to Aqua, they started being born on a planet called Earth, but the planet was so primitive and Aqua had expanded into the universe so far that there were now rules and laws of first contact to primitive worlds. In other words, I could not follow them there.”
He slowly turned away from me and began to walk across the water for a dozen feet before coming to a stop.
“Over the lives, your soul's light had begun to diminish further, I could no longer tell it apart from our children. I continued to seek you out and as time passed I began to appear to you in your dreams, I could once more talk to you again. Our children of course always came together in each life, and soon I was born on the same planet and now able to join them. But you never did, that was how I found you again. But when I arrived I found a woman on the beach surrounded by a large family that loved her and called her ohana. They treated her as the baby of the family and I could feel the love within the family, it shined so brightly that I could not bring myself to harm them. Her name was Monica Delrose and she loved the ocean so much that it reminded me of our first life together. She did not recognise me or even remember our lives but we were together and in love once more, That was enough.”
He smiled happily and I could see the joy on his face as he looked at me with a deep sense of love.
“We shined so brightly together once more and flew across the world helping clean up the oceans and rescue animals from oil spills. But we had lived so many lives that the immortality we once had was long gone and we now grew old, our bodies began to fail us and we were unable to help anymore. So we built a home on the beach and watched the water from the balcony until you slipped from this world and into the next life.”
His face filled with sorrow again as he turned to look back up at the sky.
“I do not know where you are now, your light is almost gone but I will find you, wait for me Ku’uipo, I am coming.”
He faded into the darkness that surrounded him as his face turned to look at me one last time with love, then he was gone and the sky faded back to black.
I felt my body slowly fall then thump into the ground as my eyes fluttered open and water sprayed from my mouth. A chime went off in my head and I heard a voice whisper.
“System installation complete.”
I looked around but no one was near me. All I could see outside the doors was the ocean and fish swimming around. The water had drained from the room and I was laying on the floor in the middle of an air bubble. I quickly sat up, looking around the room, seeing for the first time a desk and chair with a cot in the corner and a wooden drawer on the other side of the room. My face turned back to the ocean outside and as I watched it I thought about the dream I just had. My thoughts were quickly interrupted by a soft voice in my head.
“Welcome to the Kahleskar system, you have reached floor…. 150 and become a sapient creature. This has automatically triggered the installation of the correct system for the host.”
I dismissed the message and my thoughts returned to the dream and a smile spread across my face. I could not seem to wipe the smile off my face as I turned to look around the room again. I contemplated what I had seen and heard. This made me wonder about who this man was and why he was so important to me. Until out of nowhere the voice distracted me from my musings.
“Host who thinks too much has received a title! The host has received the title ‘Child of the Sea’; this title has been automatically applied to the host.”
I got to my feet and walked over to the desk running my finger over it slowly feeling the soaked wood. I felt the urge to ask.
“What does the title child of the sea mean?”
The system responded to my question immediately telling me.
“Child of the Sea:
A title granted to one person chosen by the sea to receive its blessing.”
I looked up from the desk as I frowned. As I was about to ask what blessing it was talking about as I had not received any, the voice spoke again.
"The spirit of Kahleskar oceans has given you her blessing. This blessing has given you one free ocean-related evolution, One expert rune crafting skill book, one mysterious skill book and one personal message."
The voice in my head suddenly changed and became a beautiful melody.
"Little one, I have seen a part of your soul and discovered your strong affiliation to the ocean and someplace called Hawaii and in my infinite wisdom I have decided to bless you with the name Kai."
A book dropped from the air, having appeared out of nowhere, and landed on the desk. I looked down at the book cover and read 'The way of an expert rune crafter'. I let out a soft chuckle. Flipping open the book, I began to read the first page, and was not surprised when it exploded into many small particles of light. As knowledge of how to draw and empower many runes passed through my mind, expanding my ability and library, I could see that to make an expert rune, I would have to draw the equivalent of 6 basic runes, all connected to each other. With a silly smile on my face as I looked out at the ocean taking note of the holes in the ship, the rust on the metal and barnacles growing all over the ship as fish swam in and out of it, I let out a laugh and screamed to it all.
"My name is Kai!"
I suddenly clapped my hands together in excitement and smiled happily as I looked out at the ship.
“I must get you to the surface and floating before I can bring you into a drydock for repairs. But first I must find out what is in your cargo hold to pay for those repairs and figure out how to get you to the surface!”
I turned slowly pacing back and forth in front of the doors as I bit my thumbnail trying to work out how to do that.
In the middle of my pacing, I heard that monotone whispering voice of the system.
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“Evolution has been denied. The host must be at least level 10 to accept the water evolution blessing. The evolution has been stored until the host is the appropriate level.”
My mood dropped instantly and I felt like sulking as I turned my head to look away from the beautiful ocean scene, as I was turning I noticed a mirror hanging on the wall above a wooden drawer. Slowly walking over to look into the mirror at my face, I noted the green skin, ginger hair and deep blue eyes with golden flecks, I could not help smiling at myself. Then I noticed the scratches and cuts across my face where splinters from the railing had cut me. I looked down, seeing my shirt all cut up. It was stained with blood and now looked like rags barely concealing anything. Further down my leather pants had fared a lot better, they had dozens of scuff marks on them but other than that they were not damaged. I looked back into the mirror and a rune came to the forefront of my mind showing me how I could temporarily give myself the water breathing skill by drawing the rune over my mouth and nose. I held off drawing the rune as I would first need a plan. I thought about how to get the ship to the surface, I would need to strengthen the hull so it didn't break apart on accent. I let out a sigh as I tried to think through all the runes I knew to see what would be best suited for the task when I noticed a book sitting on the corner of the desk. I slowly turned to look at the spine of the book that read 'a mysterious skill book' I frowned when I saw the cover of the book had different words on it, those read 'part of the ship, one of the crew.'
“The hell does that mean?” I asked as I moved over to the book and flipped open the cover.
I was surprised to see the front page did not have random words intended to initiate the learning of the skill process but instead had a short explanation.
‘Congratulations you have been awarded this one of a kind skill book there are no others like it and this one grants you two skills, the first is part of the ship, this skill allows you to bind a ship to yourself making it a part of your body able to move it as if you were moving your fingers. This skill also allows you to sail the ship without a crew. The entire ship will move and adjust itself to your will, allowing you to sail the ship above or below the surface and fill its sails with the air or ocean currents. The second part of this skill is one of the crew, this allows you to offer a soul contract to any man or woman inches from death. If they accept, the contract will bind their soul to the ship for one hundred years and they will have to serve as crew aboard the ship until they fulfil the contract and are granted a chance at reincarnation. However, should they ever try to rebel or betray their captain the contract will instantly kill them and store their soul for your use.’ That was all the writing said and as soon as I finished reading it the book exploded into many small particles of light. I blinked a few times as I felt the knowledge of how to bind a ship and offer a contract settled into my brain. I turned and strode over to the doors confidently. I could not see the helm on the deck, glancing up I thought 'must be on the quarter deck' in my mind before mentally shrugging and thrusting my hand out in front of me and gripping the helm as my eyes looked to the sails. For a few seconds, nothing happened and doubt was starting to worm its way in.
Would you like to bind the ship known as Nightwind to yourself?
Joy shot through my body as I squealed in excitement.
"Yes, I would like to!"
I instantly felt the deck under my feet shudder then the ropes started tightening alarmingly fast pulling the sails taught. Then the ship moved. I felt the hull grating against the sand as if my body was being dragged across it. The feeling was distant and easily ignored if I had wanted to. The ship was moving, and with a silly grin on my face, I felt my hand instinctively pull back on the imaginary helm only for the ship to respond and begin ascending. I giggled excitedly as I did a little stomping dance with my feet before looking out at the ocean. I was sailing the ship, I could also see a lot of fish and other sea creatures abandoning the ship as it sailed away from the ocean floor. Soon I knew there was nothing alive on board, other than myself. I focused on the feeling of the ship moving through the water, it was the most fantastic feeling that made me even feel a little giddy. However, the ship was ascending too quickly. I could see the surface rushing down to meet me. I pushed forwards a bit to slow the ascent but it was too late and all too quickly the mast was breaking the surface of the water, the rest of the ship followed it up. The speed of the ship raising from the depths caused it to lurch out of the sea like a submarine jumping before it crashed back into the water. I felt more than heard a few boards coming loose and falling away. The ship floated safely on the surface and the water was rushing off the deck and down the sides as the wind in the air took hold of the sails and the ship lurched forward quickly picking up speed. It was heading in the direction the Sparrow Runner was going when I had been knocked overboard. So I ignored it and let it sail on. I noticed I had a sort of feeling in my head like I knew which direction on a compass the ship was sailing in. I thought that was pretty cool but my curiosity was getting the better of me.
I walked over to the wooden dresser and began to open each draw looking inside. I only found old mouldy clothing and one metal object about palm size with some sort of coat of arms on it. I quickly turned away from the drawer deciding it had nothing in it of worth or interest and I considered throwing the entire thing overboard. As I was walking past the desk towards the cot because I had noticed a chest under it, I saw the desk had seven draws, three in each square leg and one in the middle under the table between the square legs. I moved to open them. The one in the middle was locked but the six draws were not and I found a lot of stuff in them. One held a lot of paper that was waterlogged and fell apart at my touch then there were writing tools and bottles of sealed ink, those might be salvageable, a spyglass and a lot of other things, it was all water damaged. Some of it had rust, others had stuff growing on it just like everything else in the room. I let out a sigh and headed over to the chest under the cot. I reached under and pulled the chest out only for a wet click to go off causing me to flinch away from it but nothing else happened. I peered around the chest at the floorboard it had just been sitting on. In the middle of the board was a little metal hole that now had green sludge in and around it.
“I guess I should have been expecting a trap. Most likely meant to be a powder-based gas. Damn, saved from being poisoned by it sitting at the bottom of the ocean for god knows how long.”
I paused as I considered this before looking at the chest with a bit of reluctance towards opening it.
I decided to stand behind the chest and lift the lid from there. Someone up there must really love me today because the lid had not lifted more than an inch or two when something flew out of it and smacked into the side of the desk. I looked at it to see four darts in a row sticking out of the side of the desk and there was a green liquid running out of the holes. I gulped involuntarily as I stared at them, my hands lifted the lid a few more inches only for a click to go off then darts peppered the entire room in front of the chest.
“Someone really did not want anyone that opened this to survive it.” I mumbled as I looked down at the chest.
I looked down into the chest to see a contraption anchored to the lid of the chest. It had one last row of four darts waiting to be fired and from the angle of the lid, I was guessing it was meant to be fired behind the chest. I froze, fear raced up and down my spine as my eyes widened and I stared at the darts. Holding the lid up I slowly moved around the chest to the front before letting the chest lid fall and the click went off as the four darts flew out hitting the wall behind the chest. My breathing came in quick gulps as I thought about just how dead I could have been. I looked into the chest to see a medium-sized chest sitting next to a small chest.
“Fuck me” I moaned as I thought about how these two could be trapped too.
I slowly placed my hand on the small chest and braced myself before leaping towards the door pulling the small chest with me. Nothing happened until I hit the floor jostling the small chest then I heard a click from inside the small chest. I froze again when I saw two darts had come through the lid half sticking out of it now as green liquid coated their tips. They had missed my finger by less than an inch and I was beginning to hyperventilate, all these traps were not good for my poor heart. I slowly opened the small chest to see a small silver key sitting inside of it, it looked about the right size for the desk’s lock. Taking the key I headed back to the large chest and sat down in front of it. I slowly reached in and gently tapped the lid of the medium-sized chest and whispered to it.
“I really want to know what's inside of you, but I know you are going to be just as mean as the last two.”
My eyes were drawn to a small indent on the left side of the chest. Frowning, I slowly reached down and pressed my finger gently against it. What happened next nearly caused me to shit myself. There was a click then the lid of the chest flew open and a loud bang as the top of the lid hit the back of the chest. I flinched hard and grabbed my chest before falling back onto the floor, now staring at the ceiling as I hyperventilated.
“This shit really is not good for my heart!”
After getting my breathing back under control and working up the nerve, I slowly sat up and looked into the chest. Peering in, I could see two small pouches on the left and three metal orbs on the right. I reached in and picked up the pouches, noticing that one was empty as I did so. Because of this, I attached it to my pants while praying I wouldn't lose this one. Turning my attention to the one that was not empty. I flipped open the lid flap of the pouch only to stop and stare. Inside the pouch was black mist floating about, and on the lid of the pouch were numbers and words.
Merchants coin pouch.
3 platinum, 30 gold, 523 silver and 734 bronze.
“I am sure that no one is on board, sir. It appears to be a ghost ship, by maritime law, we can claim it as salvage and tow it back to a drydock.” someone said from out on the deck of the ship.
I quickly dropped the pouch back into the chest and closed it before closing the bigger chest and sliding it back under the cot before standing up and looking at the doors. I noticed the rune was still on the wall above the doors. I turned to look at the one on the wall next to me and had an idea. I placed my finger against the rune and began to push my mana into it until all the runes glowed blue, then activated. I knew the shield was on the doorway and the air bubble was back. I looked at the door as I slowly came to realise only the door frame was protected by a strengthened shield rune and the walls on either side were now the weak points of the room. I quickly sneaked over to the closest one and began to draw out the strengthened shield rune on the wall. Then I drew one on the roof to make sure they could not get at me from above. Having finished reinforcing those two points, I crouched down and snuck around behind the desk. As I passed I glanced at the keyhole in the drawer and decided now was not a good time to let my curiosity get the better of me. I continued and worked my way around to the wall on the left side of the door and began to draw the rune on it when I glanced out the doors and locked eyes with a man leaning against the railing of the ship that had come alongside my ship.
“Lieutenant! There's a slave in the captain's quarters!” he shouted.
Luckily I managed to finish the rune just before a woman walked into the shield on the doors and bounced off it falling to the floor. Frowning, I walked in front of the doorway and stood there, looking down at the woman in leather armour with a sword by her side. She glared up at me angrily before grabbing her sword and standing back up.
“Slave, bring this barrier down at once and let me in!” she demanded.
I blinked as I wondered why everyone was calling me a slave. The woman took my blinking as a response and spoke before I could formulate an actual response.
“You are a slave, you will do what I tell you right this instance!” she screeched as she stomped her foot.
“Why does everyone keep calling me a slave?” I asked curiously before adding.
“I do not wear or have a collar, brand or anything like that.”
She looked at me with a look of disdain before replying.
“You are a hobgoblin.”
She then turned to the five people standing behind her, who were wearing leather armour as well.
“Get at the room from below, the floor doesn't have a barrier rune on it.”
The five of them nodded before turning and running across the deck to the stairs down. She turned back to look at me and smiled menacingly.
“Turn off the barrier now and you might live to see tomorrow, but if they manage to get through that floor before you disable the barrier, then I am so gonna kill you!”
I could almost feel the five sets of feet running across the deck below me, each step like a nail being pounded into a coffin only to be made worse when I heard the first axe hitting the wood below me. I looked at the woman in front of me.
"They have axes?" I asked as I heard four more joining the first.
"Of course, we are pirates," she replied as she laughed at me.
I turned and slowly walked around the sounds as I looked at the spots they came from, a look of worry crossed my face.
I heard her laugh again before turning my head to look at her.
"You look worried little hobgoblin, ready to lower the barrier?" She asked me with a sweet voice.
I let out a soft growl as I stomped my foot down on the floor and yelled at them.
“Stop cutting holes in me ship!”
I then turned and walked over to the shield stopping next to it as I smiled at the woman.
“What's your name?” I asked her.
She glared at me before replying “I am Lieutenant Alison Mcgregor, not that it matters to a slave that will soon be dead.”
I grinned as I nodded my head before thrusting my right hand out grasping my imaginary helm tight. It was a little surprising when an ethereal helm flickered into existence for a few seconds before fading away.
“Agreed, so I shall tell you my name, it is Kai! Now Lieutenant Alison Mcgregor that means our next stop is brown pants town!” I told her as I pushed the helm forwards watching the bow of the ship behind her follow the helm and slide into the ocean spraying the deck that soon followed it with water. Alison screamed and took a few steps towards her ship before we were swallowed by the ocean and heading down to the floor. As I levelled out the ship near the ocean floor I felt the bottom of the ship scrape the ocean floor and a few more boards come off. Grimacing, I saw Alison still floating a few feet from me, a look of fear and panic on her face. I let go of the helm as I smiled at Alison, the sound of axes hitting wood had stopped too.
“Welcome to brown pants town, there is only one way to survive,” I told her as I held out my left hand like I was holding out a scroll to her. “What will you do?”