Chapter 25 - Escape

  “Can’t this poor excuse of a shipwreck rise any faster?” Varg shouted over the sputtering backfires and unsteady gears of the goblin engines struggling below deck.

  “Would you prefer to walk to the next world, human?” Brukk replied from the ship’s helm.

  Zurni rushed past Robert as he helped Alice and Oswin tie off their three mounts to the railing of the curved staircase. Above them, Brukk gripped the great wooden wheel that piloted the vessel.

  “I say we throw the buffoon over to lessen our weight!” Zurni screeched as he rushed to the aft staircase leading below deck.

  “Just help us with the mounts,” Robert said, cutting off Varg before he had a chance to escalate.

  Robert struggled to tie off Carrot, who was unusually agitated. His gray, trusted donkey reared onto its hind legs before Robert could secure him beside Killer as the ship continued to rise through the light, misty air of the Frozen Forest.

  “Make ready!” Brukk roared as the ship’s deck rose to a point just below the forest canopy.

  As they crested, Robert scanned the horizon of the endless forest around them when he once again noticed the churning gears coming from some unknown source. They had always been there, he thought, but they had been masked by the struggling engines of their own airship.

  “Look out, Brukk!” Alice cried behind him.

  Robert spun toward the starboard side of the ship. To his shock, a massive vessel twice the size of theirs, with three triangular red sails, was barreling straight at them. Whether the orc ship had intended to crash directly into their side in an attempt to split them in two, or if they had simply not spotted them yet, Robert was not sure, but Brukk sprang to action.

  “Hold!” Brukk roared as he spun the wheel rapidly to his left.

  Their ship pivoted hard, rotating until its bow lined up opposite the approaching vessel. With a loud clank, Brukk pulled one of the metal levers beside him, and the ship drifted slightly to the left, placing them just out of the direct path of the approaching warship. Robert could now see enemy orcs on the other ship, looking over its deck down toward them with confused expressions on their hardened faces.

  With the enemy ship still flying toward them, Robert realized they had not drifted far enough away from its heading. The bigger ship sideswiped theirs with a massive crash, and Robert flew forward as the hulls ground together. Wood shattered in all directions while their starboard side broke apart against the much larger vessel as it continued on its forward course.

  “Hold on!” Robert shouted as he grasped one of Carrot’s stirrups. He used it as an anchor to haul himself up as the deck shook violently from the grinding impact and the deafening sounds of scraping wood and metal. With a sudden jolt, their ship began to climb upward again, this time far more violently as the engines below began to roar with unrestrained power. Brukk tore their ship free from the enemy vessel in a swirling maneuver as Robert held onto Carrot’s saddle, steadying himself in the spin.

  “Archer! Their sails. Use your fire!” Brukk roared toward Alice as he spun the wheel hard to the left.

  Alice drew her bow and arrow as she bolted past. Robert followed her in a sprint to the ship’s railing, coming to a sudden stop as he peered over the edge of the deck while she took aim. To Robert’s shock, large sections of the ship’s side were gone. All the repairs they had made since crashing into the mountainside had been torn away, leaving gaping holes in the hull where smoke billowed outward from the strained engines hidden beneath them. How are we still flying? Robert thought in horror as he took in the damage.

  A sudden hot fire burst bright right beside him, pulling his attention back to Alice. Her steel arrow now burned with enchanted red flame as she lined up her shot at the turning enemy warship below them.

  “What are you waiting for, Alice? Shoot the cursed thing!” Varg shouted as he ran up beside them.

  They all watched as the flaming arrow sprang forward from Alice’s bow. It arced downward through the air and struck the enemy ship’s largest sail dead center. The thick red canvas burst into flame as the ship’s crew scrambled across the deck.

  Robert narrowed his eyes as a massive figure in yellow plate armor stared up at them with deep hatred burning in his red eyed gaze. Warlord Grukthar, I assume, Robert thought briefly, when suddenly dozens of black arrows shot upward toward them from a block of archers who had formed a line at the front of the enemy ship.

  Failing to react in time, screams erupted around Robert as the arrows tore into his party. Black shafts whistled past as he finally moved, ducking low behind the deck’s railing as Oswin dove beside him, dodging the flying missiles as they zipped by.

  To Robert’s dismay, Alice had collapsed next to him with an arrow protruding through her shoulder, while Varg remained standing, shouting obscenities towards the Warlord’s ship despite several arrows jutting outward from his breastplate.

  “Hold on, Alice,” he shouted as he gripped her by the arm as she slumped forward.

  Robert raised his staff into the air, ready to cast a Party Heal, when the floor beneath him erupted in a sudden flash of fire. Shock overtook him as he felt his feet lift from the deck and his vision faded to black.

  [System: G.. u.. .. . Rob… . .A.c… . .]

  The green script flickered rapidly across Robert’s blackened vision as he opened his eyes and began to gasp for air, realizing the last of it had been blasted from his lungs.

  Where am I? he thought in a state of pure confusion.

  Above him, the sky was blanketed in thick green tinted clouds, and to his left was a familiar sight.

  Carrot, he thought as his trusted donkey stared at him with what Robert thought were unusually concerned eyes.

  “Get up,” he heard a muffled voice say faintly, as if it were coming from underwater.

  Was the donkey talking to him? he thought briefly before the gruff voice came again.

  This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

  “Get up, human,” the voice said, louder and clearer than before.

  Brukk? he thought.

  Robert slowly tilted his head upward and saw the big orc peering down at him over the steel levers used to control the ship, realizing he had somehow been launched all the way from the ship’s railing toward the curved staircase leading up to the ship’s wheel. How on earth did I get here? he thought.

  Remembering the explosion and his friends who also stood in its path, Robert painfully lifted his head, giving him a partial view of the smoky deck below. To his horror, a large portion of its port side was missing, blown away by something that had erupted below deck.

  Alice. Oswin. Varg, he thought as his staggered mind began to race. Where are they?

  He tried to sit up quickly, but the moment he moved a sharp pain shot through his gut.

  “Arg!” he cried in pain.

  He gripped his stomach just below the left side of his breastplate and found a jagged piece of shattered wood jutting upward. He grasped it with hands that appeared to Robert to have had their skin almost completely burned away. Too in shock to be disturbed by the gruesome sight, he yanked upward on the large splinter. A spray of blood erupted as the wood tore loose, and Robert cried out in pain again.

  [System: A…c…. .. ….]

  Robert ignored the undecipherable script flickering across his blurred vision.

  “Where… where is my staff?” he managed to whisper, barely audible across the cacophony of noises being produced by the dying airship.

  Robert searched around himself in a panic as the ship lurched back and forth, struggling to remain airborne. Unable to find it, he rolled onto his stomach, still clutching his wound with one burned hand. He pivoted until he faced downward on the curved staircase and began dragging himself toward the partially destroyed deck below.

  After what felt to Robert like an eternity, his burned hand reached the last stair. With his fleeting strength, he yanked himself forward, dragging his face across the wood as the trail of blood behind him dripped down the staircase. With his head tilted, lying on the wooden deck, he inspected the destruction, searching for his friends, whom he feared might already be lost.

  No, he thought as he caught sight of Varg and Alice lying near the ship’s mast, arrows protruding from their motionless bodies. Dark soot, or worse, burns covered their exposed skin.

  Just beside them, Oswin stood staggering across the deck, gripping his dirtied orange hair as if trying to rip it out.

  [System: R… .….s. .. …d… L.. .. . . ….]

  [System: …]

  [System: Class Ascension selected…]

  What… Robert thought. What’s happening? I haven’t selected anything. Through the haze of agony, another thought surfaced. Am I losing hold of myself?

  [System: Lifewarden selected. Initializing…]

  [System: +100 Constitution applied…]

  [System: Strength Lock activated…]

  [System: Dexterity Lock activated…]

  Robert felt a sudden rush of energy spark within him. He clenched his fists and ground his teeth, tasting blood from his tongue as the shock tore through him.

  Convulsing from the pain on the deck floor, he looked down at his clenched hands. Trying to release them, he began to scream through his teeth as he finally caught full sight of the devastating state of his charred flesh. Several places along his forearms and hands had burned down to the bone. But as he lay there on the deck of their ruined ship, staring at his ruined hands, Robert’s horror slowly gave way to a strange calm. His hands slowly opened, his clenched jaw loosened, and suddenly the pain was gone as he watched in amazement while missing patches of skin began to stitch themselves back together, covering the exposed bone beneath with remarkable speed.

  How… Robert thought as the charred flesh that reached up to his forearms began to flake away like stripping ash from a burnt log, revealing not further wounds beneath, but freshly healed skin.

  [System: Ascension ability, Lifebinding, unlocked…]

  As the green script faded, a new image appeared across his vision of a man with bright light illuminating from his center. It settled just above the rest of his five skill slots, waiting for Robert to activate the new spell.

  Taking one last look at his decimated party scattered across the deck, he hesitated no further and activated the Ascension ability.

  A powerful surge of energy flowed through Robert again, similar to the feeling he just felt while Ascending but this time with far more control.

  “Come on, you bastard,” Robert roared impatiently. “Do something.”

  As if in response, a coil of light began to form around his newly healed right arm. Remembering the spell’s description, he extended his hand toward Alice, and the light shot forward in a rapid, swirling motion before rising into the air above her and plunging downward, piercing her heart.

  Immediately Robert sensed Alice’s lifeforce once the Lifebinding took hold. Pain erupted all over him as the feeling of fire flashed across his body. Burn marks suddenly flared across his skin, followed by deep wounds splitting open along his arms. But to Robert’s amazement, as quickly as the wounds appeared, they began mending on their own.

  My Constitution, he realized. The hundred point bonus had given him supernatural regeneration.

  With the Lifebinding still in place, he pushed himself onto one knee with his free hand. Across the deck he could see Alice’s grievous wounds beginning to close as she gasped awake, the arrow still protruding from her shoulder.

  “Alice, pull the arrow from your shoulder so that my heal can finish!” Robert cried as he pointed his other arm toward Varg, materializing a second Lifebinding. It shot forward like the first as the light pierced straight into the warrior’s core.

  But this time something was wrong.

  The pain was too great. Robert nearly collapsed back onto the deck as he felt several wounds tear open across his chest.

  The arrows, he thought. He’s been injured too many times.

  Robert coughed deeply as blood spewed onto the deck in front of him.

  “Robert!” Alice called out as she slowly tried to rise. “What’s wrong with you?” she added weakly, horror spreading across her face as she watched him vomit red.

  Feeling the blood beginning to fill his lungs, Robert panicked. He recoiled his left hand violently, trying to sever the binding, but to his dismay the motion instead flung Varg across the deck, sending him crashing into the starboard railing.

  Cursed hell, Robert thought, trying not to pass out.

  He closed his eyes and concentrated, trying to will the spell to end when suddenly he felt the life force of Alice and Varg sever from his own, as if their pain was no longer his to bear.

  Robert opened his eyes and saw the light around his arms fading, recoiling back into nothingness.

  I need my bloody staff, he thought as he waited for the wounds he had absorbed to begin healing.

  “Robert,” he heard Oswin say as he slowly rose to his feet.

  “Oswin?” Robert replied, scanning the partially destroyed deck as the sounds of Brukk shouting commands at his remaining goblin crew muffled his voice.

  He took a few unsteady steps forward until he spotted the enchanter behind the ship’s mast, still gripping his orange hair, facing away from him.

  “Robert,” he heard him say again in a shaking whisper. “I think I may have made a mistake.”

  The enchanter turned toward him, and Robert’s eyes grew wide.

  Parts of the man’s pained face flickered in and out of existence, replaced by a blinding pink radiant light that began illuminating the deck in rapid flashes.

  Robert inspected his friend in dismay.

  Oswin… what have you done?

  [Oswin Westwick (Starfire, Level 27)]