Chapter 12-334: Irish Seafood (1/2)

The morkoth wasn’t trying to stop the trawler; it was obviously herding them into the invading force of Deep Ones. A kraken could reach right over the bow and clean the trawler up in seconds, it wouldn’t even be a fight.

Happily, Bone Marrow moved very quickly indeed.

The Mick preferred to drive with the top down on his Caddister Convertible, because he could. Lights off, Devilsight being such a dear thing, he came racing up on the trawler, a Sound Bubble of variable size centered on the engine conveniently masking the full-throated roar as he arrived.

Watersight and Devilsight combined to make it look like we were riding over a great bubble of clear air, every fish and weed, bubble of foam and spray of waves visible with transparent clarity.

So was the tentacled abomination that was the morkoth.

Amaretta shot out of her seat, thirty feet in the air in a second, her blood-around-bone Sword Piit glowing crimson... with cerulean blue flames from the Skull mounted on its pommel added on to the vivic fire also spiraling around it.

Go ‘Merika!, I promptly thought, and they both grinned despite themselves.

She could see the thing below, its main eye turning to focus on the sudden blaze of light out of nowhere, and then she came crashing down through the water, plunging right into its dark mass with all the fury and power of a Blooded Ocean Dragon Warrior.

The water exploded with burning dark ichor, and the morkoth convulsed and tried to get away. That wasn’t happening, as Amaretta stayed right with it, fluid fires lighting up the seas as she proceeded to hack into the thing with inhuman strength and plenty of chi backing up every motion, ignoring its flailing tentacles, hypnotic effects, and snapping beak as she tore it apart... and not incidentally blew some intense blood magic into it, just to speed things along.

Dark ichor blossomed into the transparency of the dark seas, and the thing began to curl up on itself.

I saw the Aura of its life flutter out, and vivus ignite over it as the body began to burn. The delighted Blooded promptly hacked off the bulbous head with its waxy skull, and kicked up for the surface.

The Mick had turned on the lights now, and the crew of the trawler was gaping at them, which was hardly surprising when you meet a fancy car on top of the water several leagues out to sea in the middle of a storm.

Amaretta came arcing up out of the water, Sword in one hand burning red, white, and blue, and massive skull dripping white vivus as the unnatural meat on it was consumed in the other.

Hey, Aberrant Baneskulls don’t fall off trees. Take ‘em where you can get ‘em.

She landed on the hood of Bone Marrow weightlessly, making no indent, and wordlessly walked over to the door and stepped down into her seat while the crew stared.

“Captain, there’s a right charming group o’ fair Delilahs Offering kicking up a singing welcome for ye about three leagues ahead, with a wee pair of squids from down where me mother doesn’t talk about farting along as pimps. Ye may be wantin’ to pull inta fair Tralee and avoidin’ becomin’ Sunday mornin’ brunch to somewhats Mother was a shrimp and Father was a toad.” He tipped his white stovepipe nicely to the captain, waited until he received a hesitant hand raised in acknowledgement, and the trawler slowly changed course to the southeast.

The Blennerville docks would take them, and they could sit out the excitement coming.

Word was already out and going out around the Estuary, of course. There were members of my Allegiance in the area, mostly local clergy and their most sincere followers, there to provide information and communication links more than anything, but also quietly laboring away with Infusing or Investing if the gold was supplied to them to help. Other than that, the Divine Casters largely contributed holy water to the cause of slowly wearing down the several minor Shroudzones in the country.

Ireland had a fairly long and bloody history, mostly related to its relationship with England across the Irish Sea, which had conquered and subjugated it repeatedly over the centuries, and been merciless in doing so. Its greater population and trading with the continent gave England a consistent edge over the Irish, and the constant clan rivalries and internecine warfare of the Irish didn’t help matters, either.

Both Belfast and Dublin had suddenly manifested Shroudzones on the Day of the Fall. The remnants of massacred, starved, and plagued victims had risen from ancient cemeteries and mass graves and taken both cities. In addition, Ulster, Droghedra, and Galway had their own smaller Shroudzones, which had stayed small when the people managed to run away in time to avoid being slaughtered by the spirits of the dead.

All the Shroudzones had increased slowly in size as wandering undead or the foolishly slain were recruited into them. Droghedra and Dublin’s Deadzones were actually overlapping, and the undead regularly shambled out to beat each other to pulp all night, only to vanish with the Curse of the Sun and reappear back home the following evening, no worse for wear and ready to do it again.

The addition of vivus to this paradigm had been slow, but now there was regular sniping going on, mounting as more and more people gained Vivic Weapons, the dangerous incorporeals were thinned out, and the undead were wandering less.

Of course, the irregular assaults of Deep Ones on the British Islands hadn’t changed, and Ireland took the brunt of them, forming the shield against the Atlantic as it did.

Now there was a major assault coming, and a prodigal son of the Emerald Island was also returning home after three-quarters of a century. Who knew what that would portend?

---------

The Sound Bubble had stopped the morkoth’s death cries from reaching the rest of the invading force, the trawler was moving away under slow power, and Bone Marrow was moving forward slowly as the invaders moved into the Shannon Estuary at about 20 kph, a very good swimming pace for humanoid builds.