The Dive: Birth of a Wordsmith

by Justin Miller

  In the end, I did end up needing to pay another two platinum coins to hire expert transmuters that specialized in carpentry. Normally a ship like this would take months of work to build with a crew of hundreds. But they managed in just five days because they accelerated their work with magic.

  Around town, we became quite popular for all the business we brought in, buying furniture from various stores, as well as some food and supplies, basic repair kits, or even just because of all of the people that had been hired to work on our ship. In the end, we got a bed, dresser, and mirror for every room--all nailed down, of course. There was also a nightstand for the captain’s quarters, and a large table with chairs for the galley.

  I’ll admit, I felt kind of bad for paying for all of this with coins that started out as being worth less than one percent their current value, but it also felt really nice to have something so big. I could even use this to sail around the continent instead of doing a cross country journey. The only reason I decided against that course of action was because there are certain events that would only happen if we take the route by land.

  Kev hadn’t been around for the last couple days, so it was no surprise the look on his face when he appeared near the port and saw the fully constructed Unity. Of course, Denise and I were waiting for him, not wanting to sail off on the maiden voyage alone. Okay, that’s a lie. We really wanted to sail off. But we decided to wait. After the harbormaster informed me that the ship was completed, a message appeared for me.

  You have been granted ownership of a seaworthy vessel

  The Unity has been completed!

  Class: Galleon

  Firepower: 36 cannons and 2 harpoon turrets on either side.

  Mobility: Four masts

  Crew capacity: 200 crew, 40 passengers

  Cargo capacity: 2200 tons

  Speed: 8 knots(10 mph)

  The Unity is a Magic Ship

  Enchantments

  Magical Steering: By will and mana of the captain, the ship can be steered without the need for additional crew. Mana cost: 5/second for steering, 50 mana to deploy or retract sails.

  Automated Artillery: Each of the Unity’s 76 weapons can be fired and reloaded with mana, so long as ammunition is available. 10 mana per shot.

  Emergency Barrier: The captain can erect a barrier around the Unity at will, and the strength of that barrier depends on the amount of mana used to maintain the barrier.

  Detection Field: The captain’s quarters possesses a detection crystal able to see everything within a 1km radius of the Unity, and can be set to warn the captain of approaching ships or creatures, or nearing land masses.

  Balancing: Thanks to the enchantments placed on the ship, it will never capsize due to a natural event.

  Ghost Crew: The captain is able to determine a course and plot it on a map in the captain’s quarters. The ship will then follow that course for as long as the captain’s mana allows. Mana requirements are the same as Magical Steering.

  Okay.. I recover 21 mana every second, so unless I get crazy with the cannons I should be good on mana. I could just imagine a normal mage trying to pilot this ship, collapsing from mana exhaustion halfway through the voyage.

  “Chr--uh, Jin… this… this ship is really your’s?”

  “Well, only captain can sail it with magic, so come aboard and let’s find out!” I grinned to him and quickly got on board, standing at the nose of the ship. I could almost feel the ship as an extension of my mana, and nodded. “Awesome.”

  “You are enjoying this way too much, you know.” Denise was standing next to me, grinning. Kev was just frantically running about the ship like it was some great treasure he had to explore.

  “Oh, I know. Preparing to depart!” I flexed my control, and the anchor was raised, ropes untying the ship from the port. Kev gasped when the ship seemed to move all on its own. “Steering us out, lowering the first sail.” I controlled both the sails and the steering, and gradually the ship moved away from the port. “And full speed ahead.”

  All four masts opened up, and the ship took off. It seemed my skill bonus didn’t give that big of a bonus, because we weren’t going much faster than ten miles an hour. Still, it was faster than walking. “I’ll head to the captain’s quarters to plot out our course. Try to keep him from falling overboard, will you?” I smiled to Denise, and she nodded, looking to Kev.

  “Kevlar, you really shouldn’t be standing so close to the edge…” I could hear her scolding him as I walked off to my cabin, smiling inwardly at this ship. Of course, ten mana per shot isn’t much, but if I get into a big fight, I’d have to fire at least thirty cannons all at once. That’s over three hundred mana. It’s possible that given a bad situation I could run out of mana, but I could trust myself and Denise to not let that happen.

  When I got to the cabin, I walked over to a large map on the wall. The map itself was magical, and updated with its owner’s knowledge of the area. Currently, it held a rough map of the Shattered Realm. Thanks to some research beforehand, I knew that the nearest island with a Fighters’ Hall was Thurgil.

  Since I had enough magic to sail day and night continuously, we could make the trip in three days. Only reason it will take that long is because we had to navigate around a few other islands in the way. Carefully, I began plotting out the course, linking the map to the ship while tracing a finger through the route.

  While I was here, I also activated the detection crystal, and a window appeared in front of me.

  Unity Detection Crystal now active. Please designate conditions for alarm.

  In the end, I set it to activate the alarm if another ship approached within the range of the detection, or if any monsters capable of inflicting damage on the ship approached within half that range. Five full football fields is quite the buffer zone, and I only need to be warned if they actually come that close without turning away. As for ships, the range of a cannon could surpass even that warning range of a kilometer, though the aim would not be as good.

  Next on my to-do list, I decided to check in with my allies from far away. Thanks to the skills I gained with my Infernal Magic, I could use communication magic to speak with a demon anywhere, regardless of range or dimension. “Message, Lilith.”

  “Huh? Who is this?” The demon queen answered warily as the spell reached her.

  “Ah, it’s me. Jin.”

  Instantly, her tone changed to a happier one. “Ah! Hey, I was wondering if you’d call. So.. updates! Tell me everything.”

  “Hey, are you just trying to live vicariously through me?” I smirked a bit to my question.

  “Maybe~. The real question is, would you mind if I was?”

  “Not really. Just wanted to get that cleared up first. So, I met up with my friend, and we ended up heading for the seas. Just got a new magical ship, and planned to sail around for a little while to see what I can find.”

  “Ooh, sounds like you’re going to have some fun. But, why don’t you just use the Gates to travel? Surely, it would save you some time.”

  “It would, but there are reasons why it is better to travel under my own power. For instance, if I had just been teleporting from place to place, I never would have encountered the demons, would I?”

  I heard Lilith let out a brief giggle. “Fine, fine, fair enough.”

  “I do have one question, though.”

  “Oh? Feel free to ask.”

  “Seeing as a lot of my travels will be over land, I’d rather not leave my ship unattended. Is there some kind of magic item that can be used to store it or something when I need to?”

  “Well, you could convert it into a token with the right spell. But, it’d probably be easier for you to just use a Gate to keep it in Hell, and then retrieve it when you’re ready to set off again.”

  “I thought the Gates only connected t
o your throne room? I’d rather not drive a galleon and half the seas right through your front door, you know.”

  “Oh, that? You can have it connect to different gates, really. But, when you summon a Gate in the water, it will by default connect to a Gate that is in water. Basically you’d be bringing it into our port.”

  “I… didn’t even realize you had a port. Does Hell have its own navy?”

  “Of course we do! One of my generals leads the Army of Cocytus, composed of ships and sea monsters alike.”

  “Huh.. and you don’t mind me stashing my ship there?”

  “Why would I? We haven’t waged a sea war in centuries, so the place is not very lively.”

  “Alright. Oh, I had another question, now that the subject has come up. It’s about the Open Pit spell.”

  “Sure, what can I tell you?”

  “According to my information, I can summon demons through the spell to attack, correct?” When she indicated I had it right I continued. “Am I able to summon specific demons, or does it just pull something out randomly?”

  “Well, you can’t summon any of my Knights. More as, you specify a type of demon to call, and it will appear. Take this example, you could place the pit in the sea and call a Kraken. If it was big enough, maybe even a Leviathan Demon. Of course, the bigger the demon you summon, the less you can call. You could summon a thousand imps just as easily as a single Kraken.”

  “I see.. So basically, giving me these spells lets you give your army more exercise now and then than it has had in years, right?”

  I could hear her laughing for a little while before she agreed. “Yeah, I guess so! You’re our only military contact in the human world, and nobody else has really wanted to piss us off lately.”

  “Well, I’ll be sure to give your people plenty of exercise eventually. For now, I’m still hiding my ability. I want to wait until I’m at least sure of how strong I am compared to the others. If they find out I am the only foreigner to pass the human mage exam, they may come to challenge me.”

  “That’s true. On that note, though, a rumor came in recently. It turns out, there has been another human foreigner that passed the test, out in the country Eastal. There have also been a few elf mages step forward, but their criteria for graduation seems to be different from the humans.”

  “Ah? So I’m not the only one anymore.”

  “Nope! Still, you were the first. And the one from Eastal was a more public face. Apparently, once he announced he passed the final test, he was swarmed by foreigners to demand they tell him how he did it, or to join their group. After that, he went into hiding as well to avoid them. The elf mages don’t seem to be causing as big of a scene, though.”

  “Hmm.. the human mage, can you give me his name?”

  “I don’t know it right now, but I can find it out. You want to get in touch with him, I take it?”

  “Yeah. If I contact him with magic, he should realize that I’m the other one like him and be more willing to talk.”

  “Alright, I’ll get a couple of my spies right on it. Heheh, it’s been years since I had work for them!”

  “Thanks. If you can have them find out his general location, that should help me to contact him as well.”

  “I’ll make sure they know. You sure you don’t want us to just invite him here and let you meet face to face?”

  “Sorry, but that probably wouldn’t work. Remember, demons in my world are seen just as badly as demons here are. He probably wouldn’t trust you without some proof.”

  “..I understand. Anything else?”

  “Yeah, one more thing. Here in a few days, once my friend is off the ship, I was thinking about summoning you and my friend from the elves so that you could meet. No fighting, just a nice chat. Sound okay with you?”

  “Sure! Just remember, I can only hear you in the darkness. I might be paying special attention, but if you aren’t somewhere dark enough I won’t be able to answer your call.”

  “Alright, I’ll have the meeting at night. I recently got a new spell that I want to consult both of you on.”

  “Ooh, the suspense! Well, I’ll be waiting. By that time I should have the information you want, too.”

  “Good. If you don’t mind, once I get acquainted with him, I might have him visit Hell to earn your blessing. No idea if the power he gets would be the same, but if he is a mage he has one of the Deific Dictum.”

  “Alright, but it probably won’t be my blessing directly he gets. That was a special occasion. But he can get the blessing of one of my court if he helps us enough.”

  “I understand.” And with that, we said our farewells. Once the spell ended, I received a new popup that I hadn’t gotten before, but was rather excited about.

  You have fully mastered the Message spell! You may now bring out it’s full potential. Whenever you perform the chant with the spell, you may now choose to perform an Announcement, or contact someone regardless of distance, or even dimensional boundaries.

  Announce- This variation of the Message spell can be used to speak with multiple people at the same time. You may specify either a group of people, or an area. If speaking with an area, two way communication is impossible. However, speaking with a specific group allows all of them to share in the spell.

  This… dimensional boundaries… wait… I was stunned for a moment as the possible implication of this hit me. I was going to tour the ship, but that could wait until later. I immediately ran out to the deck of the ship and found Kevin, goofing off behind the ship’s wheel. “Kev!”

  He must have thought I was angry or something. “I didn’t do anything, I swear!”

  “No, not that. I don’t care. Come here!”

  He was curious, but this was an urgent matter that I had to test. Eventually, he did manage to come down to the deck. I saw Denise at the nose of the ship glancing to me curiously as well. “Okay.. what is it?”

  “I need you to log off.”

  “What?”

  “Log off. After ten minutes, come back. Trust me on this.”

  “I won’t spawn in the middle of the sea or anything?”

  “I’ll stop the ship if that makes you feel better, alright?” At my words, the sails retracted, and the ship’s anchor dropped.

  “Okay… I’ve got no idea what this is about, but sure.” A few moments of navigating the system windows later, Kevin vanished in front of me. Denise looked a bit worried, and came over next to me.

  “Is everything okay..?”

  “Huh? Yeah. I just need to test something..” I took a deep breath and pulled up my spell list. I hadn’t needed the chant for this for a while. “Wings of light, signs of beginning, may my voice reach the farthest corner. Message, Kevlar.” It was… also the first time I had used his game name. But, nothing happened. I grimaced, and repeated the spell again. This time, I called him Kevin. Immediately, I heard a sound I wasn’t sure I’d ever be hearing again.

  I heard a phone ringing. And ringing… and ringing… Finally, there was an answer. “Hello? Who is this? Do you have any idea what time it is?”

  “No, Kevin, I do not.”

  “....Chris? Holy shit… how are you calling me? Did you get out of the game?”

  “No, my communication spell reached the level to cross dimensions. And, since where we are from is treated as another dimension..”