hi. uh oh guys he’s discovering the attack size stat.
[Part 7] — — — — — — — — — — — — — — [Part 9]
Chapter 15
Fruits of Labour
Cain discards his charred and now very dusty jacket near Veyne’s corpse, leaving him with just his white tank top, stained red in some areas. He pants a bit and looks behind him at the collapsed tower. The cloud of dust dissipates as he lets out a large sigh.
“Gods above… That was insane, Cain…” Emilios says, approaching his friend.
“Sorry… I don’t know what came over me… Just… I barely even know who I am, and neither do they… But just the mere assumption that I’d be a survivor of Lumen… Is enough to get them to try to kill me. That… It really pissed me off.”
“I didn’t know you had it in ya, ahah… But hey, well done, my man!”
Emilios reaches for a fistbump. Cain smiles again, and tiredly bumps his fist.
“Gotta say, Bevel… This thing is doing wonders.” Cain says, retrieving his swordspear from the hole in Veyne’s chest.
“Glad to hear it… Well, let’s salvage what we can from the tower, alright? Get some supplies for us and the Province.
Cain and Emilios nod, and start looking through the rubble. Bevel takes all the weapons she can find, managing to grab Veyne’s own axe and the various weapons from the hunters and their supplies. Emilios and Cain both get some weapons, and stockpiles of cannonballs and chests that they could find.
The trio spend an hour salvaging and returning the supplies to Bevel’s sailboat until the tower is ransacked fully. They look at the collection with pride, a solid six large chests with gold trims for them to open. They split it evenly amongst themselves, despite Emilios’ efforts to give Cain one of his.
Bevel immediately opens both of hers, greedily looking at the contents within. She found a good sum of drachmae, gemstones, and a small collection of armor and weapons. She looks at the equipment, which is much better than the plain clothes and single knife she had. But instead of putting it on, she puts it aside.
“No… Smithing is an art, and my art… Is better than this.”
Emilios finds some drachmae and a couple potion reagents inside his, along with some weapons. The standouts to him were an amulet with a glowing blue gem, and a set of lightweight armor, perfect for fighting styles. A black robe with a white trim, with long black sleeves, protected by light metal spaulders and bracers. He throws the weapons to the side, for Bevel to collect. As he tosses out a greataxe, he notices a scroll written on brown parchment, with a blue seal. He smiles, saving it for later.
Cain opens his, smiling as he looks inside. He finds drachma and gemstones, and a couple weapons. He found a bronze chain necklace, with five peridot gemstones inside of it. The last thing of interest to him was an old, torn piece of paper. Unfurling it, it seemed to tell a story of a criminal giving up his life, and pointed to a particular island for treasure.
“Huh…! A treasure chart…!” Cain smiles, showing his friends.
“Luckyyy. Let’s go get it, shall we?” Bevel asks.
“Uh-uh. We gotta get back to Redwake as soon as we can. We got some pretty important documents for my father to take a look at. And we can’t afford to waste any time.”
“Yeah… I agree. We’ll have time after.” Cain says, stuffing it in his pocket.
Bevel sighs, but nods. They get their chests and newly found riches onto the sailboat. As they do, they begin to hear the sound of battle. A powerful tremor rocks the island, and they see massive slashes of red and white energy. Bevel gets quite perturbed by this, and immediately unfurls the sails.
“Wait..! Bevel, we have to help…! What IS that…?!”
“W-we don’t have time, and I don’t think we’d stand a chance against him in the state you’re in…!”
“But… Emil, back me up…!” Cain continues, looking at Emilios desperately.
“Sorry… But we have to cut our losses and head back. The Province needs this equipment and information.”
Cain looks back to the island in anger, seeing more red slashes fly from it. He notices a blue and white brig, with the emblem of the Grand Navy.
“Those folks from the town… The Grand Navy… They’re the good guys, they’ll handle it…”
With this in mind, he begrudgingly looks away. Bevel charts a path between the Stepstones and Whitesummit, beginning to slowly sail through The Southern Jaws. Cain reads his chart, looking at a spare map of the Crimson sea that the Veridian Hunters had. The first part seemed to be located on a small island known as Limestone Key.
Emilios assists Bevel a bit with navigation, then returns to his scroll. Taking off the wax seal and unfurling it, it described a technique known as “Breathtaker”. He reads the parchment over and over, planning his practice out.
Chapter 16
Repose
Soon, Bevel and the crew make their way to the port of Redwake, met with smiles and cheering from the people. Bevel and Cain blush a bit from the attention, while Emilios relishes in it. With help from the townsfolk and port guards, they unload the supplies meant for the people, keeping their own things separate.
Cain picks up one of the weapons they collected from the tower, but Bevel gives him the side eye.
“Hey… You aren’t considering using that, riiiight?” She asks.
“I am… Why? Jealous?”
“N-no… But I can certainly make something better than THAT.”
“I noticed you barely even looked at the armor in that chest… And you have ALL those weapons to the side… Do you intend to forge your own armor and weapons, too?” Emilios asks.
“Well of course. I know I can do better than this… Plus, you never know where it came from, right? If it’s been washed in the last hundred years… Yeugh.”
“Eh… Smells fine to me. I’ll be puttin’ this thing on as soon as we get back to training!”
“You do you… I could probably make that too…”
“You’re gonna work yourself to death if you try to do everything yourself, Bevel…” Cain responds, looking at her worriedly.
“Says the idiot who took down the main target by himself. You were fine, I’ll be fine.”
“Hah! She makes a point, Cain!”
“I guess she does…”
The crew chuckle as they grab the information. They head over to the Captain’s Hall, but are stopped by the guards.
“If you’re looking for the Basileus, he isn’t in his hall right now. He’s doing some sparring with Viceroy Anthimos.” The guard on the left explains.
“Really?! Where are they?!” Emilios asks excitedly.
“Atop the Pelion Rift.”
“Hell yeah! C’mon, I’ll show you guys a lift! Let’s go!”
Emilios runs inside and takes the two through a door, leading to a lift. They ride the wooden lift up, then a second one to get to the top of the spire that made up Gaius’ substitute for a castle. They look out toward the west, but they can only make out small silhouettes of the two men and their attacks. Nevertheless, Emilios and Cain watch intently.
On the Pelion Rift, Anthimos backs up from spires of earth shooting up from the ground. He jumps up, using a spire to launch himself toward his captain, thrusting his jitte forward. Gaius ducks the attack in the air, summoning earth below him to allow for a powerful kick with both legs. Anthimos thinks quickly, and uses a burst of magic to get out of the range, summoning multiple walls of wood.
Gaius summons a boulder the size of a small boat, and lobs it over the walls in an attempt to hit Anthimos. Using all his strength, Anthimos pierces through the boulder and destroys it, then launches three projectiles of compressed air at Gaius. Gaius parries the projectiles perfectly with an arm of stone, and stops an oncoming slash from Anthimos’ sword with his fingers.
“Dammit, man… You’re tough…! Your control over the Earth Curse is getting better, I can tell!” Anthimos stops, sighing as he puts his blade away.
“Correct me if I’m mistaken, but I was stronger than you even before Gaia chose me. Hmph… You put up a decent fight, however. We’ll stop here.”
“Yeah yeah yeah…”
Gaius retracts the small spires, and looks at his arm, feeling the strength within. A white glow surrounds his left arm. “Hm… Yes, this plan of ours should go well.”
“I bet. Oh, hey! Captain, they’re back!”
Gaius looks over at the distant spire and smiles, sensing the familiar presence. He creates a path of earth, and runs over with Anthimos.
“Hey, father! All done!” Gaius gives Emilios a hug with one arm, a soft smile among the stern man’s face.
“Good, good… I can see you’ve brought back supplies for the village as well. Very well done, you three.”
“Heyyy, Cain! Damn, you look messed up! You alright, kid?” Anthimos asks.
“I’m fine… I just fought Veyne on my own…”
“You took him down on your own?! What the hell, you two?!”
“Don’t worry, Uncle… I figured he could handle it. He got pissed after hearing Veyne talk about those Nexus creeps hunting down the survivors of Lumen… I wanted to let a warrior fight his battle, y’know?”
“I uh… I was a bit paralyzed by the whole change, to be honest…” Bevel admits.
“…Hunting down survivors of Lumen, you say? Let’s take this down to the hall. Bevel, the papers.”
“Oh, here, sir.”
Bevel hands Gaius the papers, and the five of them take the lift back down to the Captain’s Hall. He lays out the papers on his war table.
“Have some food at the Red Finn, you three. I’ll have Anthimos get your rewards.” Gaius says, waving the crew off.
They nod, and go off to eat. Gaius spreads the papers and books out, beginning to mull it all over with Anthimos.
“The scouting reports seem mostly insignificant… No, wait… A sighting of a ship, bearing the colors and flags of The Hoarfrost Confederation…?”
“Hah! Is ol’ Nora shirking her duties again?”
“It’s a Ship of the Line. That’s not a Jarl’s ship… Hm. Could it be a Frostborne Prophet? Perhaps even a Saint of the Rime…”
“It could be entirely unimportant… But it’s something to take note of. That could be big for us, Captain!”
“Mm… Then there’s his personal logs… It seems he, too, was a member of Nexus… But he was just an Agent. It mentions a letter… Sent from a fellow agent in the Syndicate..?”
“An Assassin, huh? I think I killed that guy… So even he was part of Nexus… They have their claws deep in these seas, Captain…”
“Indeed they do… And I thought that war tempered them… Moreover, this confirms the suspicions that I’ve harbored… Nexus really did take Lumen down. And now they’re poaching the survivors…”
“That’s probably why the Triumvirate haven’t made appearances recently. Those freaks creep me out. That would explain things, though… According to this… Captain, do you think it’s true?”
“His energy is certainly unique. It almost reminds me of Emilios’, but more… Chaotic. I don’t think I sense an inheritance within him, but it’s plausible that he simply couldn’t access it yet…”
“I haven’t either… But I agree that his energy is… Peculiar. I don’t know what it is, exactly… What I can say, though, is that he has great potential inside of him. If taking out Veyne on his own already is any measurement.”
“He seems like a capable man. I doubt he’ll be very content staying here, or even being a warrior for our kingdom… Though if this is true, I worry about his safety. Train him well, Anthimos.”
“I will, Captain.”
Anthimos salutes his lord, and walks out of the Captain’s hall, down the stairs. Gaius looks one last time at the papers.
“Cain Lochester…”
bye. pray for arvid he aint ready for the aoe conj 