Chapter 298: Island in the Sky (1/2)
”Ugh, I've forgotten how boring sailing can be. Why aren't we there yet?” Sera complained as she collapsed on the deck of the ship. They'd been out to sea for the better part of a week, and weren't even halfway there yet.
”You know, I did have a faster means of travel available.” Mike commented from where he was sitting, not bothering to look up from his work. He was in the middle of carving a piece of driftwood into the shape of a small turtle.
”Don't remind me!” The Oracle shot back while childishly kicking her arms and legs up into the air in a fit of emotion. ”Besides, I'd rather suffer through weeks of boredom than get on one of your flying deathtraps.”
”Come on, it's not that bad. Right, Tal?”
The elf gave him an unreadable look before returning to the book she'd scavenged from the cabin's study. ”No comment.”
The three of them were occupying a space on the ship's foredeck, out of the way of most of the sailors that went about the business of keeping the vessel moving. It had rained for most of the journey, forcing the party to spend nearly all of their time inside their cabins, when not in the demi-realm, and the resulting dreariness had been dampening their morale. Thankfully, that weather pattern had come to an end, and they were able to get out and enjoy a bit of sunlight on deck.
”Look, I know flying is a bit scar-” He started before Sera cut him off.
”Flying is not the problem! It's how fast you end up going at that make the process terrifying.”
”Well, if we want to get where we are going before the summon dissipates, we need to move quickly.” He shot back, a little irritated. While he didn't mind taking his time on traveling, especially considering the number of things he needed to work on, he was getting tired of hearing her complain about it. ”If the boredom really bothers you, I can have us in the Riverlands in a matter of hours.”
Sera frowned for a second, as if considering the idea, before shaking her head. ”No thanks. I'd rather suffer boredom than risk death just to save a few days of travel time.”
”Fine! Then stop whining about it!”
”But it's taking so long!”
Relying on his enhanced Willpower to resist the urge to strangle the infuriating girl, Mike took a couple of deep breaths before resolving to ignore her. Once he felt reasonably calm, he went back to his carving.
”What doing?” Tal asked in the common tongue, perhaps as a means of distracting both parties from the argument they were fixing to get into.
”I'm trying to make a wooden sculpture of a turtle to serve as the base for my Transmutation practice.”
”That's supposed to be a turtle?” Sera asked while rolling over to give it a better looked, ”I thought you were making a horse with an unusually large saddle on its back.”
”That's its shell!”
”What are those fiddly bits hanging of the sides? Hair?”
”Legs!”
She snickered. ”Well, it's good to know that you aren't perfect at everything.”
”Look, I haven't gotten a carving skill yet, so I'm basically an amateur. Give me a few days of practice, and I'll be making works of art. Just you wait.” Mike grumbled in defense of his creation. It was a little amateurish, to be honest, but he didn't think it looked too bad…. probably.
Once again playing the roll of the peacemaker, Tal asked. ”Why turtle?”
Taking another deep breath to calm down, he explained. ”According to my reference books, Transmutation is more dependent on imagination than other forms of crafting skills. Because you are essentially infusing the normal runes into the object directly without writing them out, it becomes necessary to have a strong image of what you are attempting to create. They recommend that beginners start with items which strongly relate to the intended effect, to better facilitate the imaginative process.”
”So, you are making it a turtle because you want to enchant it with defense?” Sera asked, sounding mildly intrigued. ”Do you associate turtles with protection or something?”
”Well, of course. They carry around a natural suit of armor. Why? What do you two associate them with.”
”Slowness.” Came Tal's quick reply.
”Helplessness, since most of them can't do anything when they're on their backs.” Sera added with a mischievous grin, obviously messing with him now.
”Whatever! It's my creation, so I'm going to do it how I want it.”
He must have spoken a little too loudly, since the water to the left of their position burst into a spray of droplets that quickly left them soaked. A large serpentine head looked down on them with something that might have been concern or maybe hunger. It was hard to tell.
”It's alright.” Mike reassured the Sea Serpent. ”Nothing's going on, we were just having a bit of an argument.”
The creature stared at them for a few more seconds, before once again dipping back beneath the water.
Sera watched the creature go, before asking, ”Didn't you say that thing was supposed to be temporary? Why is it still following the ship?”
”How should I know? I'm pretty sure I only used a basic summoning spell to bring it into existence, but for some reason it seems to have fully manifested as a living creature. Every other time I used that particular method, they only lasted for a half hour at most.”
The serpent was something of a mystery to him. As far as he could tell, it had become a real being, much like Red, but without the intense mana requirements that the dragon had needed to maintain himself. The only possibility that made any sense, was that at some point it must have gotten hold of a mana source powerful enough to sustain itself. If he could figure out what that might be, it would go a long way towards improving his dragon creation methods, which were still in the developmental stages.
Of course, Sea Serpents were unusual among draconic beings for only having slightly more intelligence than most animals, making questioning the one accompanying the Huntsman fairly difficult. So far, Mike hadn't had any luck in solving the mystery.
”Not sure why you are complaining.” Morris broke in as he walked up to join them. ”I think it's been eating the monsters that would have otherwise been harassing us.”