CalCroissant
patreon
Undersea Reincarnation - 3.08: Up for it?
🕑 Added 2025-04-24 19:23:59 +0000 UTCAsh was having some trouble keeping up with everything happening around her, though no one could tell from looking at her. There was one skill she had picked up while surviving ever since she had been chased out of her home: it was to go with the flow. Just watch. Stay quiet and nod.
Thankfully, Maurice—the talking crab—made that really easy. He could talk enough for all three of them, so it was easy for Ash to listen and not panic. But now that he was scuttling away to talk to his friend, Ash took a slow, calming breath as she watched literal B-ranks go about their days, laughing and joking as if each and every one of them was not capable of sinking islands.
She could understand how a Privateer’s crew could have B-ranks, considering the daily dangers they had to face but still, even in the case of their crew, their numbers was limited. But this was a whole city, with dozens, if not hundreds, of B-ranks.
It was staggering.
In the meantime, Fabian went to get them something to drink. She knew he was as shocked as she was, though he was a bit more happy-go-lucky than her.
Each one of them could become a lord back home, she thought. Even her dad had only been a high C-rank—which was still difficult to wrap her mind around, considering she had already become a C-rank herself.
Focusing back on Maurice, she watched him talk with his friend—a kraken wearing a human visage—while both Velistraine and Zerathstra—the latter who might be a literal god, as far as Ash was concerned—talked animatedly before they were joined by an older woman with a cocktail in hand.
Yet another B-rank… what is happening in this place?
Thalis could rule the world, if they wanted. She doubted there was a military force anywhere capable of holding up against the might of this place if they ever wanted to expand. Sure, she had learned that A-ranks were a thing as well, but Thalis had two of them, while the richest and supposedly safest city of Stormhaven, the Emerald Isle, only had one.
Sure, there were more A-ranks around, supposedly, but they were spread out, and they were often doing their own thing.
Ash was wondering how many A-ranks were really around when her musing were interrupted by a green glow that surrounded the empty turtle shell. A moment later, her captain summoned a nimbus of crimson light that made Ash’s eyes water.
What are they doing now?
She watched quietly. Unmoving. She worried that if they remembered she was nearby, they’d chase her way, though to be honest, she couldn’t move even if she wanted to. She was flabbergasted by what she was seeing.
How is he doing that?
Without realizing she was doing it, Ash leaned back, away from whatever the kraken was casting. It didn’t look exactly dangerous or offensive—and of course, there were A-ranks standing right there so she didn’t believe she was at risk, but it still felt like there should be a few barriers between her and whatever that was.
She could almost feel the magic against her skin, and barely a few seconds later, the voice caught in her throat as she saw flecks of skin begin to float away from Henry. At first, only small bits from his face but with every second, the clear blue and yellow light in front of his chest was growing brighter—bright enough that the citizens of Thalis were stopping to stare—and by now, chunks of skin were flaking off the caster, dissolving from being near such potent magic.
It’s probably not his real body, she thought, then stealthily pushed her chair backa bit more, only to stop when she saw Maurice stumble.
Zerathstra’s head snapped toward the crab, and barely a breath later, Maurice’s many legs folded under him, as if robbed of their strength.
Ash bolted to her feet, ready to call for help, only for the captain to shake her head just as a pulse of tingly magic spread out of the spell collecting in front of Henry’s chest.
It was done. Whatever they had been working on.
Velistraine let go of the shroud of concepts she had conjured and moved so fast it looked like she had teleported, appearing right next to the ape as he examined the fainted crab. Thankfully, after a couple of seconds, their posture seemed to relax, right as Henry brought himself back up to his feet.
They didn’t have to fuss about the passed out crab for long, and Ash breathed out a sigh of relief as Maurice quickly got back to his energized mood and proceeded to tell them about all of what he’d seen.
It sounded odd to Ash, and she quickly realized that there were a lot of pieces she wasn’t aware of, on top of the fragmented nature of the vision. But a few elements stood out to her and unsurprisingly, the most scholarly individual of the lot had taken notes.
The older looking woman had her notebook out, her cocktail completely forgotten, and began reading from her notes. “I’ll start with what we’re still unsure of. First, we don’t know whose memory Maurice has seen, whether it’s the shell he’s wearing or if transferred from the second one, but that's not as crucial to figure out. What we do need to investigate is the second element. Specifically, the scale of the territory this turtle had infiltrated. And the only hints we have are this idea of a ‘cosmic current’, as well as the territory itself being watched. By what is also unclear. Was it a leviathan? Was it the System itself? Was it something beyond the System? We don’t know. But… this is important to figure out. These might be some of the only hints we’ve gotten in a while about what is happening around our world.”
Henry watched as the crab dipped a kraken roe in red-colored jam before he devoured it, and Ash thought the kraken seemed a bit troubled compared to earlier. She didn’t think it was a side effect of the magic, though. It looked more to her that he’d been really shaken by what had happened to Maurice.
Across from the crab, Velistraine reached over and popped one of the roes in her mouth. “Are you sure you haven’t seen anything else?”
“Nope!”
Zerathstra had his hands clasped. He didn’t even look at the food. “And you’re sure you’ve perceived the idea of ‘cosmic current’?”
“Yes! That one was a bit weird to understand at first, because she kept thinking of it as if it was a water current, but it was also water that was difficult to swim in? And it took her far. Like, really far, and she often didn’t know where she was going to end up when she followed it. Well… she sort of knew, but not really? Usually she’d be looking for something in particular, and she had an ability that kind of told her where to go…”
Maurice trailed off for a bit, thinking, but Henry seemed to know exactly what his friend was talking about. “The Pathfinding skill. We got it from the shell.”
“Right! Yes! Find the Path and Blink. But this time though, she wasn’t listening to that skill. She was following a cry for help, so she didn’t realize she got into a bad spot. I don’t know why she didn’t go out the same way she came through, but maybe that has to do with her being noticed?”
“Maybe there were protections from leaving, but not from entering? Some dungeons are like that,” Velistraine said.
Arisia nodded. “That would explain why another turtle was calling for help. It couldn’t leave by itself. It was trapped.”
Henry lifted his cope and stared down at it. “And if that confirms that the turtles travel worlds… then they might also carry souls around. That’d be how I got here. Plus, I remember when I first met the System how it had said that the power it collected was supposed to go somewhere, but that one came to collect in a while. I’m just thinking out loud here, but that sounds like it might be another hint. Maybe this world is stranded? Or abandoned, by whatever had brought the System here? And now, these turtles are coming in here and they’re unable to leave?”
Ash felt that maybe she wasn’t supposed to hear all of this.
Arisia put down her notebook and picked up her glass, swirling the ice with a wooden straw for a moment. “We have many theories without much to confirm them. Aside from finding the living turtle and getting answers out of it. But I think there is a high probability that there is some sort of… barrier preventing beings from leaving this world. Which could tie in our problem, Zer.”
At that, there was a flare of aura that made Ash’s skin break into goosebumps. It wasn’t targeted at her and it wasn’t aggressive in any way, but just the weight of it nearly froze her lungs in her chest.
The ape quietly nodded, eyes intense as they swiveled to Henry. “That makes our next move obvious.”
There was a silent pause, and before she realized, the word left Ash’s mouth.
“Finding the third turtle.”
All faces turned to her, and she felt heat creep up her neck, but Velistraine gave her a grin and a nod. “Yup,” the captain said, then turned to Henry. “So. You need to be able to recast all of that by yourself. Then track it. Because it doesn’t look like it has any intention of being found. Feel up for it?”
Comments
Touch
Edit but that -one- came to collect in a while None
Thomas V.
Poor Ash is in so incredibly far over her head lol
