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Salt and Blood - Chapter 84
🕑 Added 2024-11-26 10:00:07 +0000 UTC<< Chapter 83 | Table of Contents | Chapter 85 >>
1.84 - Desperation Drowns All Hope
A true man knows when he can no longer run from his fate. Giving in doesn’t make you weak; a true hero makes the most of the cards he is dealt.
-Excerpt from ‘Silversea Saga’ by Norris Howell
Trent wasn’t sure what to make of his current situation. When the commodore had sprung his trap and sealed him in a coffin of fire, Trent had given up the idea of escape.
The man’s flames weren’t lethal to him, despite how it may have looked. Up until that point he’d only been fighting to allow his crew to escape. He’d realised that wasn’t a possibility a little too late.
So, while trapped in the swirling column of fire, Trent had been debating if it was worth exerting the energy to kill Commodore Saff once and for all. Even after the fuckery the annoying brat had put him through, he still didn’t want to kill him.
Not because of anything Saff had done—this Saff, anyway—but because he actually respected the brat’s old man. He was a damn fine shipwright.
Nonetheless, this had gone far enough. When the fire had been doused by a mysterious fountain he didn’t think to question it. They were at sea, after all.
What he hadn’t expected was for the world to suddenly go dark as the pair of them were swallowed whole by some kind of monolithic beast. Creatures this big weren't supposed to exist in the Sunblessed Sea—or at the very least, they didn’t approach the surface…
Saff’s terror had made it easy. Trent had jumped at the brat while he was screaming his head off, beating him senseless.
He hung limp in Trent’s hands, held up by the scruff of his neck. All that bluster just for it to end like this… Trent was almost disappointed.
But he couldn’t forgive Saff for what he’d done today. Harassing him across the seas was a game—he always enjoyed giving the kid a thrashing. However, dragging his crew into it was stepping over the line.
Trent placed a hand against the beast’s mouth, grimacing at the slimy sensation. From the deafening bellows he’d heard, he suspected it was a whale of some kind. Why it had decided to swallow them was a mystery.
He didn’t know why, but he had an inkling the girl was involved. She always seemed to be, ever since he picked her up on that blue island. Well, meeting her had broken him from his spell of mediocrity.
Trent wasn’t born to raid merchants in a backwater sea. Drawing his cutlass, he prepared to slice his way out of the whale’s maw when suddenly it roared, sucking him further in.
While tumbling, he managed to keep hold of Saff. They slammed into something wet and sticky, before a surge of water drowned them.
He spluttered, struggling to catch his breath as he felt the water being pushed upwards, carrying them along. Suddenly, a burst of force erupted below and he was blasted through the tunnels of flesh.
Light exploded, blinding him. Even through that he clung onto the little brat. The white faded and he found himself soaring in the air, hundreds of feet above the ocean surface.
A fountain of water was falling faster than him and he took a moment to let the beauty of the world sink in. In the distance, he could see the towering cliffs of Minenblum.
For all its faults, Minenblum was a magnificent country. The cliffs were obsidian, a stark contrast against the ocean. Fortified against the gods themselves, perched atop the abyssal cliffs was Aughold in all its dreadful glory.
Black stone towers reached for the sky like demonic claws rising from the underworld, smoke billowing from the shipyards and forges that never slept.
Trent chuckled inwardly at the irony. Prior to Prince Kaldex’s death, Aughold had been a hub of free trade between three different oceans—the Bluestone Sea, Aetherdew Ocean, and the Sunblessed Sea. One that welcomed pirates, navies, and merchants alike to a grand hubbub of gold, steel, and the arcane.
How far it had fallen. In their own right, they were still a local superpower. With the strength of their military they had no equal, save for Iskallior across the Sunblessed Sea—though their sights were flung further west than this little ocean.
Gone were the days of freedom, where all men and women who sailed the tides could intermingle without fear. He couldn’t only blame the navies, or the king… They’d played their part in Kaldex’s death after all.
Trent looked down at the still limp Commodore he held by the neck. The brat wasn’t particularly close to the former Prince, nor had he held an officer’s rank back then. His grudge with Trent had begun as a way of advancing his career when the royal family was still clamouring for his head.
It had worked against him in the end, as failure after failure instead drove him from the King’s graces. Only his father’s reputation and skill saved him from a full dismissal. He wasn’t blameless either, but he wouldn’t take much joy in killing the boy.
And yet he would kill him. There was no other choice. Trent waved his ARM, a translucent platform of light appearing beneath his feet.
Gently landing, he threw Saff onto his knees, binding his wrists in shackles of golden sunlight before slapping him until he spewed saltwater and moaned. “Wake up, Commodore Saff,” he sneered.
Until the end, he would play his part.
“Bastard Blackheart! Unhand me this instant and accept your fate,” he spat, struggling against his shackles.
The futile struggles only made his wrists bleed onto the golden light. Trent began to unbutton his shirt, glaring at the boy as he did.
“You know what, Branmore,” he spat, lacing the man’s name with unrestrained venom. “I honestly couldn’t care less. Even if King Malthax himself was to descend upon us, he would be powerless to save your sorry soul.”
He tore his shirt off with a dramatic flourish, letting the wind rip it from his grasp. Saff clutched his mouth, cheeks bulging before he couldn’t hold it any longer.
Bile spewed through the gaps in his fingers, but fell through the light as though it couldn’t bear to touch the foul excrement. Trent’s eyes burned with cold judgement.
“You can’t even stand to look upon your work,” he said, face relaxing. “How do you think it feels to live every day like this? Missing half of your body while the rest fights off a virulent necrotic rot?”
Commodore Saff threw up once more, not daring to look up at Trent’s rotting chest and blackened, beating heart. He was nothing but a snivelling coward. A spoiled brat given station and an inflated ego.
Trent sighed. There was no satisfaction in this. He was only attempting to placate his rage.
Nothing could ever do that.
Not even curing the rot.
He went to draw his cutlass, pulling the blade an inch out, before dropping it back in its sheath.
Too personal.
Trent pulled out his pistol.
Bang.
You have slain [Branmore Saff]!
Accumulated merit:
2 Occupations Completed
11 Titles Acquired
4 Soulbound Items
2★ Earned
Flowing Core
Trent dismissed the meagre summary of the man’s life with an indifferent flick of his finger. As if he needed a reminder. Sunken Sun, he’d been present for most of it…
He felt the power flowing into his core. It was barely a trickle compared to the vast, empty gulf within. His strength had remained stagnant, the bulk of his energy forced to stem the encroaching corruption.
Just then he heard the sound of shattering glass. He lurched, thinking his platform had come under fire, but the golden light shimmered bright beneath his feet. Then he spotted it.
Fuck.
A small sliver of crystal forged from the off-cut of a tidestone had shattered. It had hung around the commodore’s neck, hidden under his uniform until now. Trent immediately recognised it as a lifestone.
Which could only mean one thing.
Whoever held the other copy of the lifestone now knew that Branmore Saff was dead. Trent figured there were only three people who might hold the other stone.
His father, Elmer Saff, head shipwright of Saff & Company, the man who built half of Minenblum’s Royal Navy by hand—his father built the rest before he was born.
His mother, Arabella Saff, daughter of Admiral-Duke Allanor II, the Under-Sealord of Minenblum.
Or his brother, Vice Admiral Chester Saff, the man known as the Shadow King of Minenblum, said to pull the strings of the Royal Navy and wield power equal to King Malthax himself.
The ideal outcome would be for Lady Saff to be in possession of the other stone. She would be distraught and likely raise hell. Gods only knew how much her father spoiled her… Duke Allanor’s fury would make Branmore Saff seem like a mewling kitten.
However, that would take more time than they needed to make a clean getaway. Trent didn’t care if he had to slaughter the Under-Sealord of Minenblum. He’d be cured by then.
And if he wasn’t, life wasn't worth living further. He could go out in a blaze of glory, sacrificing himself to let the others escape. Nasar will keep them safe, he chuckled to himself. The man was a tough bastard.
Next on the list was Elmer Saff. Trent had a great deal of respect for the shipwright. Given Branmore’s recent actions the grizzled veteran may even consider death a fitting punishment. However, he also had a soft spot for his wife—what good husband didn’t?
He’d be obligated to return to the seas. Trent wouldn’t mind seeing the devastation he left in his wake. It would be a grand tapestry of death; a magnificent backdrop to his final moments.
The worst of the three to be holding onto the lifestone was the commodore’s brother, the Shadow King. Worse only because the man never left his damn ship. A true fanatic of the tide.
He’d set sail the moment the lifestone broke and would catch them with ease, given they currently lacked a ship. All of a sudden Trent heard a keening whistle, followed by another.
And another. Then three more. Then ten. Then a hundred.
He looked up to the sky and saw it carved into ribbons by a thousand streaks of abyssal smoke and bloodsoaked flames.
Trent gazed at the magnificent beauty of their impending death. His worst nightmare hadn’t even come close to reality.
He let out a deep sigh of frustration.
“I really wanted to find that cure…” he lamented, tucking the pistol into his belt and reaching towards his blackened heart.
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