Salt and Blood [A Pirate LitRPG]

The names we give to the gods are not always the all encompassing truth of their existence. We can only give words to what we understand, but often the complexities of the divine elude our mortal understanding. How can we, whose lives are as ephemeral as a single wave to the deities of the pantheon, fathom what an endless existence might mean?

-Quoted from the last words of Crestreader Eshallian

A weathered fisherman sat upon a rock, staring out at the endless blue expanse that was laid before his eyes. It was a serene picture that had greeted him endless times before, but the seas were not always this peaceful.

In his hands, he held a fishing rod that seemed ready to fall apart at any moment, held together only by determination to outlast the ancient bastard who'd made it. There was a greater chance of it ascending to divinity itself than that ever coming to pass.

The God of Fish and Fishermen, they called him. That had been his title for the past few millennia. The pantheon rarely corrected mortals when they decided to change what a particular deity was called on a whim.

Their lives were so fleeting, after all. All things return to truth in the end. He couldn't remember his own mortal life. All he remembered was the rod in his hand and that he must never let his vigil end.

That was his truth. The watcher on the waves, cursed to guard the shifting oceans of the world.

He no longer fished in the truest sense of the word. He rather enjoyed the company of the myriad lifeforms that populated the depths and was loath to snuff out their ephemeral lives for personal enjoyment.

Mortals needed to eat, so he didn't judge them for their actions. He did not. They also risked their fragile lives each time they set out on the waves, whether the seas were a calm reflection of their current form or a raging storm that threatened to tear their ships apart and devour them whole.

A sudden prick roused him from his slumbering rest. He raised a gnarled and calloused finger to his eyes, frowning at the scarlet dot beading in its whorls and lines.

This was new to him and yet brought back memories long lost. Pain. Fear.

Love.

Hope.

It felt as if it had been moments ago, that conversation with his oldest friend. In the same way he was as unchanging as the depths, she was as twisting and changing as the tides.

She had spread her gifts far and wide, raising up armies and legions of mortals. Thousands had lived and died with her blessing and an anointed few with her blood.

He'd never seen the appeal. No longer needing to feel such base emotions was the greatest reward of ascending to divinity, so why did she cling to mortal notions like family?

It was an argument as old as the oceans themselves. A disagreement wedged between them since their earliest days of godhood. After all this time, she'd finally stopped fighting back and instead posed him a question.

"Instead of this incessant arguing, Sylack, perhaps you should simply try it yourself. Only once. If your beliefs are as true as you claim then they should not be shaken by a single unimportant life."

So, when two of his followers began to send him endless prayers, he jumped at the chance to prove his old friend wrong. He called the woman to the seas in the middle of the night and she entered the shallows, barely a speck in the vastness of his domain.

Life was a simple thing, but not to be freely given. The blood of a deity was a rare thing and without care it could cause disaster. Not that he cared what his actions did to the kingdoms and connections of mortals. This was an experiment.

He'd given the woman what she asked. A single touch of his divine energy and a drop of his blood, sent through the waves.

To him it had barely been a moment since he'd done that and yet in that blink of an eye, feelings and fears he'd believed lost to the waves had roared back in defiance. This child of his, that he believed would live and die without disturbing his vigil for a single moment, had changed his entire world.

As he looked at the rapidly growing bead of blood on his finger, Sylack sighed, though the corner of his mouth curled upwards into a hint of a smile. She had called for him once more.

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The first time, he had sent a faintly flickering servant—barely more than a mortal fish. It had done its task well and he'd rewarded it with a speck of power. This time, he would send a slightly bigger pet.

Looking through the wind and waves, he frowned at what he saw. There was turbulence at the edge of his domain, far from where it belonged.

Something had interfered with the natural order of the tide. Given arcane gifts where they weren't supposed to be given. No, not something.

Someone.

He wasn't sure which mischievous meddling trickster had seen fit to poison that which was his, but in his soul he knew that it was time. Time for him to remind these upstart young gods and goddesses that the watcher on the waves wasn't hiding from the danger they posed, but guarding them from something far more terrifying.

***

Rose raised her hands towards the surface of the sea, gathering the few specks of arcane energy in her core at the tips of her fingers. It wasn't enough, but perhaps it could make the difference between life and death.

Her body froze as she prepared herself. She plunged her fingers into the bullet wound, grasping for the invasive slug that was carving her flesh apart with knives of arcane power.

Skill up!
Arcane Resistance 14 > 15

Fingers slipped on flesh slick with blood. They tapped a hard surface, feeling for the cursed bullet. It was bone.

She struggled, but despite fishing about inside her shoulder for a few seconds she couldn't get hold of the bullet. Every passing moment, more sharp arcane energy sliced deeper into her chest and towards her spine.

Skill up!
Arcane Resistance 15 > 16
Endurance 14 > 15

Rose sank deeper into the depths, her blood trailing a globular trail towards the rapidly escaping surface. Why can't I find the damn bullet!? she cursed to herself.

It hurt.

People weren't supposed to shove their fingers inside their own flesh and dig around like they were searching for gold. Yet with every second more blades of arcane energy burst from the bullet hole and carved deeper into her body.

She felt her consciousness slowly slipping from her grasp. If she had fallen to one of the commodores, she could've accepted it as her weakness, but this?

A stray bullet ending her story before it could even begin…

Pathetic.

She refused.

Drawing a dagger from her belt and clamping her jacket between her teeth, Rose pulled out her fingers. A mist of scarlet sprayed into the blue-black waters in an artistic splatter.

If she couldn't dig it out, then she would carve it off. Rose could live with an injury, but death was unacceptable. Sharp exhale.

Inhale.

She sliced down.

Her screams were muffled by her makeshift gag, the sounds that slipped through lost in the endless depths. A strip of flesh floated in the water above as she continued sinking.

However, her suffering hadn't been for naught. She realised why finding the bullet had been impossible even with her practically tearing her own shoulder apart.

There was no bullet.

Whoever the marksman was, he was skilled. The most skilled sniper she'd ever encountered—including the enemies she'd faced alongside Trent and crew.

He had shot her with a bullet of pure arcane energy. It had carved into her flesh and clamped down, slowly unravelling and slicing apart muscle and sinew with every pulse of magic.

To most, an arcane bullet would be a devastating threat that they would struggle to remove. But for Rose, now that she knew what she was dealing with, it wouldn't be too difficult to purge.

At least, she hoped so.

Her arcane energy manipulation was at a decent level. Her vision was fading. The pressure ramped up, her temples throbbing the deeper she sank.

Blood loss made it worse, her consciousness flickering like a candle in the wind. She carefully gathered a stream of energy from her core and swirled it round and round, pushing it towards her shoulder.

When it reached her chest, she gave it a push, letting it burst out of her shoulder. She screamed, this time the echoes reverberating through the ocean around her.

Skill up!
Arcane Resistance 16 > 17

A skill has evolved!
Field Medicine 1 > Arcane Field Medicine 3

Her shoulder had been blown open. Chunks of flesh, scraps of skin, and shards of bone decorated the surroundings. Small fish sniffed at the viscera, hoping for an easy meal.

Rose didn't feel scared of the creatures that hunted her. Her blessing didn't protect her from predators, but most ocean creatures would perhaps leave her alone until she was dead and a free meal.

With her most pressing issue fixed, Rose turned her gaze to the ocean's surface. It would be a struggle, but she had to return. Her life, her crew's lives, and the safety of her nation depended on it.

One stroke, then two. Every shift of her arm was agony.

She had to give up on using her wounded shoulder. The pain was impossible to push through and the extra pull was barely worth it.

Twenty strokes later, she felt as if she'd barely climbed an inch. The pull of the depths was stronger than whatever feeble effort she could offer.

When hope had begun to slip through her trembling fingers, she felt the ocean rumble and heard a bassy groan in her ears that sent a shiver down her spine.