Ch#36
Five minutes earlier.
[We can obey. We can submit, Master.]
The response to Tiye's question of whether they could help her was concise and certain.
Tiye didn't agonize long.
"Then Tiye needs a ship right now."
[......Anything belonging to the abyss of the sea god. Anything at all.]
What happened next was, swear to god, the most thrilling and exciting thing Tiye had ever experienced in her life.
"Unit Leader......?"
"Necrolord! What the hell is all this?!"
Tiye gaped wide amid the crowd all calling out to her.
Something was slowly rising from the deep, black-rippling sea below.
At first just a shimmering in her palm-sized view, it soon burst fully out of the water amid white foam.
"The Necrolord is summoning a wrecked ship!"
It was an enormous ship, mast towering endlessly upward.
"I-it's the ship of the dead! Ghosts!"
As people said, smoky black spirits roamed ceaselessly over the deck.
[Master.]
[Master.]
[Master.]
Tiye swallowed hard at the voices circling her.
And gave her next order to her new friends—no, her subordinates.
"C-carry Tiye!"
The empty, crewless ship creaked as it lowered its gangway.
Black shapes swarmed around her, as if guiding the way.
Tiye hesitated as she followed the spirits, then glanced back.
The people gathered at the pier stared at her in shock.
Tiye said cautiously.
"Anyone wanna go?"
Of course, no answer came.
Tiye shrugged.
"Then Tiye'll go save 'em alone, whatever."
The spirits looked like smoky black shapes to ordinary eyes.
But not to Tiye.
To Tiye, she could see their hair and eye colors.
How they looked, where their faces bulged when they smiled, where wrinkles formed.
"They're good kids......"
The moment Tiye stepped onto the gangway like it was no big deal.
"Let me come too!"
Marianne rushed over from the crowd.
Standing before the gangway, Marianne trembled as she spoke.
"I-I want to board too. I have to save Raoul and Enzo, both of them......"
Tiye looked at the governor with wide eyes, then nodded.
"Yup!"
And stepped aside on the gangway to let the adult go first.
Marianne drew a deep breath and stepped into the wrecked ship swarming with the dead.
The moment the rumor began that Agabert's Unit Leader Necrolord could summon not just skeletons, but abyss spirits too.
* * *
The ship of spirits Tiye summoned.
The so-called Ghost Sail Ship shot straight to the Mana Stone in one go.
And slammed its hull right up beside the passenger ship Death Hound had bought.
"What the—!"
Kal, about to kill Basto with his men, dropped his sword at the shadow looming overhead.
An unbelievable sight unfolded before his eyes.
He stared blankly at the eerie hull asserting its presence right in front.
"Wh-what the hell is......"
Every time the tattered, shredded sails flapped in the wind, a ghostly wail echoed.
The three masts holding the sails tilted as if ready to snap any second.
Something whooshed past the cracked, hole-ridden railings, making Kal flinch and drop his weapon without thinking.
"Unit Leader! It's the ship with the Necrolord on board!"
Recar shouted as he approached.
Kal's face drained of color as he shot back.
"What're you talking about? How the hell did the Necrolord get here?!"
Before departure.
In case Agabert tried to siege the Mana Stone, he'd sabotaged every ship in the village a bit.
Some had holes punched in the lower hull, others had their ballast removed or damaged to unbalance them.
Basto had quickly saved the last unsabotaged one, but it didn't matter.
He could just ram a tiny boat like that with the one he'd bought.
'With only these two ships left, no reinforcements from land.'
But the ship before him dwarfed even the passenger ship he'd secured.
Incredibly decrepit and gloomy—how it even sailed was a mystery—yet somehow unmoved by the storm.
"Looks like we were too obvious! Sh-should've thought the Necrolord could summon spirits!"
Recar was in full panic.
His eyes shook unstably, his face blue.
His bracelet clinked repeatedly from trembling so hard.
"Recar!"
"W-we're all gonna die! We're all dead, dead......"
"Recar, you—!"
Kal stopped shaking Recar's shoulders. He'd spotted something odd in his subordinate's eyes.
Recar's pupils lacked focus.
And for some reason, his body was growing ice-cold.
"......Recar."
Just then, something dripped from Recar's hair.
Kal yanked his hands away in shock.
And stared incredulously at the moisture on his own hands.
Recar's body was soaked through before he knew it.
The water dripping from his hair was freezing cold.
Cold enough to pass for seawater from the deep abyss.
"No way......"
Kal spun around hurriedly.
Sure enough, the other subordinates fighting Basto lay scattered here and there.
Some curled on their sides, some flat on their backs staring at the sky, all mumbling the same thing over and over.
"We're dead, we're all gonna die......"
All like Recar—eyes unfocused, bodies drenched.
"Damn it all!"
Then a shout came from overhead.
Lifting his head with blue lips, he saw the Necrolord gripping the wrecked ship's railings.
Black spirits swarmed around her.
"Our Basto unc... ah, no, Basto's ironclad right-hand man!"
A hollow laugh escaped at the lisping pronunciation.
Before heading out to sea.
When he'd heard that speech at the pier, he'd just found it funny.
A bit irritating, vaguely unpleasant—that was it.
But,
"Around my Ghost Sail Ship flow the tides of the dead! Especially when touching the silent abyss......"
The Necrolord speaking turned sideways with a 'right?'
One spirit moved eerily, as if replying.
Nodding, the Necrolord looked down at Kal again.
"The cold deep sea's energy will instill fear in your souls! You won't budge and will meet the lords of the deep!"
Kal's face hardened.
His men weren't in their right minds.
Especially their bodies growing drenched without touching water—it was creepy as hell.
[Fear more—]
Just then, someone whispered in Kal's ear.
"Shit! What—!"
Terrified, he whipped around frantically.
[—Yes, like that.]
This time, a chill wind blew in his other ear.
"Aaaah! Get away!"
Kal shook his stiff body and head wildly.
Then plugged both ears and twisted desperately toward his comrades.
But the spot where they'd been moments ago was empty.
"......Re-Recar?"
Kal called his comrade, trembling.
At some point, cold water dripped from his own hair too.
And something had been crawling up from his feet for a while now.
"......S-save me."
Kal was too scared to even look down as he muttered.
Meanwhile, the surroundings grew eerily quiet.
The patter of rain, crash of waves, roars of monsters—all vanished into silence. How much time passed?
"S-save......"
[Karl Warben—!!!]
This time, an ear-shattering boom tore through the air.
Kal flinched violently, squeezing his bloodshot eyes shut then open. Something entered his hazy vision.
[Satisfied? Pleased?]
Someone gripped both his arms in a grotesque pose.
Bloody clothes, skin covered in wounds, hollow eyes and sunken cheeks.
[Driving my husband to his death, feeding us to the monsters too. How'd it feel being the only survivor, I'm asking.]
......It was Eve.
Basto's wife, now dead.
The woman Kal had abandoned in Ban-Anra Village to the monsters.
Eve's face thrust right up to Kal's nose.
Her blank lips slowly stretched sideways—then split wide.
[You repulsive thing.]
"Li-Lilia......"
[Looks like you're ready to pay for my husband and our Lilia too.]
