The Asshai's Bloodmage

 I get up excitedly from my chair and quickly leave the cabin, a shipwreck is something I've been eagerly awaiting. In addition to the mission, it's a chance to get extra cargo and other valuable items. Unless the shipwreck was criminal, in which case there won't be much to gain. Soon Omar and I meet Henry who is using a spyglass to observe from afar, we wait in silence for his opinion after the initial observation.

"It's a warship, although it's one of the smaller ones, it was dragged by the storm very close to the rocks. I have good news and bad news, the good news is that it wasn't pirates who caused the problem, which means it could still have its cargo on board, the bad news is that I don't see anyone on board, not even a survivor. Only half of the ship is underwater, but I don't see anyone on it and there's no sign of any attempt to signal a rescue."

I understand what Henry means, it could be a trap by some pirate group or it's likely that some race or sea creature came aboard and killed everyone. Omar uses his spyglass and then says:

"The ship is in perfect condition, without much seaweed or rotten wood, it is likely that it sank recently during the storms we faced."

I agree with the fact and Henry continues:

"This increases the certainty that some monster or sea race came aboard, mainly the fishmen. If it is them, they have already entered and taken most of the cargo and killed everyone on board. But if it is some violent mutant or mutants in the plural, the cargo may be intact, but it would be too risky to go. I will let my men decide for themselves who wants to explore it."

Omar and I agree, then we ring the warning bell calling all the crew and passengers. The Captain then stands in the center and announces:

"We found a small shipwreck. It can't have been many days since the shipwreck, but there are no signs of the crew inside the ship and no signs of any attempt to signal on their part. It could be a trap set by some group of pirates who arrived first and are waiting inside, or some sea race may have already killed the crew and are still nearby. It will be extremely dangerous for anyone who wants to try their luck on the ship, but I won't forbid anyone from trying. Anyone who wants to volunteer and try their luck, please come to the Captain's cabin within the next hour after getting ready."

After getting ready in my cabin, I removed a good portion of the items from my inventory to make more space and put on the full leather armor and metal arm guards. I checked my 2 crossbows and the 5 loaded pistols in my inventory thanks to my blacksmith who had made two more, and went to the Captain's cabin. When I got there, I saw 4 people besides me: Omar's former subordinate pirate, Sir Arthur's subordinate who uses daggers, one of the Ghiscari men with a shield and sword, and one of the passengers, a 30-year-old Valyrian man holding a sword that I suspect belongs to Jones' pirates.

When I saw everyone, I waved and tried to convince the passenger to give up and only go after the 4 of us checked if the place was safe, but he refused, saying that he would only look in the area that was above the water and not go too deep. I warned him to stay close to the others, not to walk alone, and at the first sign of danger to run away. I could bring him with me, but I plan to explore the underwater and more dangerous part; I can't risk his life, just as I can't force him not to go. We used a small lifeboat that another Ghiscari man and one of the crew decided to stay in nearby to get us out of there quickly in exchange for a share of the loot.

Soon the two of them row towards the wreck and I can see the warship that, despite being considered small, is still larger than our sailboats. The stern, along with half of the ship, has disappeared into the water. The remaining half that is above water includes the bow of the ship and the cabins, the crew area and the cargo area are submerged, and we don't know if it is still dry or not. The men decide to work together and climb up to enter the cabin area. I warn them that I will go to the deepest part to check the cargo, but I warn them to run away if they hear my gun and they all nod in understanding. After all, if I shoot, there is something dangerous on board.

After watching them climb up, I enter one of the cracks in the hull that leads directly to what I suspect is the mess hall and keep my old sword comfortable in my hand. Half of the mess hall is knee-deep in water at the current location, and the slope of the ship makes it difficult to walk as if I were always on a hill. As I climb the water at my feet disappears and I find the drier part of the mess hall, followed by the crew quarters and finally the infirmary. Inside the infirmary I see a lot of blood, but I consider it normal since someone could have gotten hurt. The problem is when I enter the crew quarters.

It is quite dry, but there are many stains of blood, torn clothes and I can see bones too. The feeling that I have entered a den of some wild animal gives me goosebumps, I exchange my sword for two pistols. After ensuring that the dormitory is really empty, I feel calmer and start to inspect the bones, I keep one of them that has claw marks to try to find out what creature was here. I take the opportunity to look at the men's personal belongings and find many bags of coins hidden between the beds and closets, as well as some silver and gold coins hidden in secret spaces between the beds. Omar had shown me these "hiding places" when I inspected Pirate Jones's sailboat. There wasn't much I found but if I added up all the coins it would be around 15-20 gold coins and there were some gems and jewelry like rings, bracelets, earrings and necklaces, but the majority were silver with a few being gold.

Going back to the cafeteria in the dry part, I pick up some barrels of clean water and beer that I found. I keep my eyes on the surrounding area and think about whether I should shoot to warn the men about a possible creature, but since I didn't see anything I would only be disturbing them and also announcing our presence in case there is something here. I then go back the way I came in and look at the water, I can see the stairs that go to the cargo area I will have to dive a little if I want to look at the hold. After waiting a while, still hesitating, I finally decide to take the plunge. I take out an artificial light powered by the magic stones I bought in Valyria and continue, breath held, swimming with just one arm. I go down the stairs and head towards the cargo where I know it will be dry, after swimming for around 50 seconds I finally manage to find the dry area of ​​the cargo hold and breathing as quietly as possible I only take half my head out of the water with it. with the alchemical light and eye around everything.

I see several closed boxes whose contents I don't yet know, and many bags of what I assume are grains. I slowly come out of the water looking at the darkened and damp "basement", I am still completely alert and with a wave of my hand the boxes and bags begin to enter my inventory. I can check later what they are, then I start to relax when I don't see or hear anything and continue collecting the boxes, until as I collect a huge box I suddenly look behind it and take a deep breath in terror. An all scaled creature in humanoid form is lying behind her. She has gills on the sides of her neck, a human face, serrated teeth that can be seen even with her mouth closed, her humanoid hand has 5 fingers with thin skin between them and her feet are similar, but I don't have time to count how many fingers he has.

The creature seems to start to wake up as the light hits its face after the box blocking it is no longer there, I make my sword appear in my hand and attack with everything I have to pierce its head before it gets up.

"Shhhh"

The sword makes a clean puncture and the creature makes no sound as it dies. I remove the sword and store the creature in my inventory and begin to slowly tiptoe back toward the water, as I continue to observe my surroundings with even more caution and fear, but all my care not to make any noise is in they go.

In the direction of the cabins above me a huge noise is heard followed by several screams and roars on the upper floors, at the same time I hear several wooden creaks on the cargo floor where I am. I turn the light to look in the direction of the noise, while still slowly backing away only to see several creatures just like the one I killed rising from their sleep after being woken up by the noises of the men on the upper floors, they look at me and the disturbing light. their eyes and they all let out a chilling scream.

"GRAAAK!"

FUCK!

I leave the light behind and this time I run very quickly towards the water, as I arrive at the place I lose speed as the water slowly rises up my shins, while I take slow steps, I look back and see several of the creatures already reaching me. I put away my sword and draw both pistols, shooting at them, then switching a second time from empty to loaded pistols and shooting again. When I'm finally about to dive and I've already fired 4 shots at the monsters, I throw a ceramic jar full of oil and throw a fireball at it, making it explode, spilling burning oil over the water, then I dive, trying to go back the way I I already memorized it.

This time I only spend 20 seconds swimming with both hands and when I finally return to the flooded cafeteria area I am surprised by another creature as soon as I get out of the water. I only have time to grab my sword as she jumps at me, the sword goes through her body but she's still alive trying to bite me, I push her to the side and throw a fireball, the water puts out some of the fire, but I managed to stay get rid of her, before I pay attention to a second creature that was also in the cafeteria and runs towards me.

I'm still lying in the shallow puddle of water and I only have time to pull out my last pistol and shoot, but the bullet only hits its left arm. The creature then jumps on top of me, while I'm on my back on the ground. Its right hand strikes and rips my left shoulder up to very close to my forearm, rendering it useless. When it raises its right arm for the second time, and its arm comes down towards my neck, I use my remaining right arm to hold its arm before it hits my neck, changing the direction and making it scratch the wood next to my face, keeping its hand still immobilized. This infuriates it and it tries to bite me, but with my right arm in front it only bites the metal protector on my forearm and it starts to creak while I'm also losing strength, I won't be able to hold on much longer.

I start to think about how to get out of that terrible situation and a dagger appears in my wounded left arm, but I feel it numb and I can't lift it to stab the creature. Without more pistols and with the beasts being too big, it becomes impossible to use them. The two fireballs of the day have also already been used.

Think, think... Quickly... In that brief moment of terror I remember the primordial flame rune in my heart. It was said that it could be used to create an innate fire-type spell. I didn't know how to use it, but whenever I concentrated on my heart I began to feel a heat spreading throughout my body. I hoped I could reach Asshai to gain more knowledge and create the best possible spell. But now in a life or death situation, I had no choice and let the power of the flame spread inside my body before starting to concentrate it in my lungs and then I let it all out through my mouth like a breath of air. The flames spewed from my mouth came out like a roar and hit my arm that the creature was biting and then its face. It tried to resist and continue biting, but before my air stopped leaving my lungs, it screamed and fell to the side with half of its face melted. I then grabbed the dagger that was in my left hand and pierced its heart.

I stood up dizzy, seeing some system messages that I ignored at the time. I swept the two bodies into the inventory, along with my pistol and sword that were still burned and inside the second monster. I jumped through the gap in the broken boat and swam towards the lifeboat. I knew there were more creatures and the fire caused by the oil would not stop them for long. In the boat, I saw the men trying to get in while pulling a safe that was floating with the help of several barrels so it wouldn't sink into the sea. The men saw me swimming and only noticed that I was injured after climbing into the small boat with them.