Chương 62: Chapter 61 - A Blast from the Past.

The inquisitor took another swig of alcohol "Yup, it's me".

"Listen, I'm just here for a chat, not war" he said. Alright, I'll give him 10 seconds before I blast his head off. Flux swirled throughout the bar, Nythera could feel rage bubbling up on the inside, whispering to her to make his death a spectacle. The moment the cannon formed, Hyper-flux bubbled up into the chamber, pushing out the half-formed regular shell. The entire bar stared at her. Nythera turned around once, "None of your business" and turned back to her drink.

"Please, try not to blow up my bar" he seemed hesitant to even speak to her, retreating to the opposite end of the counter. Ren's eyes kept flicking to the cannon pointing at his back, his relaxed demeanor completely gone. His hands struggled to bring the drink up to his mouth.

"Well, what have you been up to? Killed any little girls lately?" Nythera asked, turning away. The sound of spitting beer reached her ears a moment later.

"Nope… just tilling the fields."

"Farming? The lives of little girls?" Nythera spat back. You don't get to play innocent after what you did.

"Exterminate any dangerous families out there in the fields?". The sound of footsteps leaving the bar could be heard until all was silent, Marco had disappeared into the back of the bar as well.

"No… I can't, rest assured even if I wanted to, the power has left me" Ren said. Both took another swig of their beer.

"My skill is dead, it won't activate. Grasping Chains is the center of my class and it just won't move. I don't know why" Ren leaned back and chugged the last half of his beer all at once, the drink sloshing onto his tunic.

"Another" he slammed it down on the table. Marco scuttled out of the back, eyes flicking from Nythera to the cannon and back. Both sat silent until Marco had moved on, retreating into the back.

"What do you mean your skill won't activate? Maybe the gods are finally punishing you for all you did" Nythera hissed.

"I don't know, they should work… I'm confused. Where is my power? And what are you doing playing savior here? I know you're the witch…" Ren looked straight at her "but I can't bring myself to hate you anymore, maybe". He got up and slapped money down onto the counter. Her cannon twitched, pivoting with his every movement. With a flick of my wrist, I could blast him to pieces. I could have revenge. The start of it at least. HE KILLED WILLIAM. Her voice betrayed her.

"Get the Hel out of here, Ren. you're lucky I haven't decided to kill you yet, when I start my slaughter of inquisitors, you're the first in line" Nythera spat back at him. Ren didn't respond and walked out the doors.

"DO YOU FEEL THE GUILT YET?" Nythera shouted at his back. He'll be the first in the mass grave I start. Just you wait. If I had killed him, I would lose my only source of information on the enemy. I'll torture it out of him later. She grabbed her drink and chugged half of it on the spot. We don't rush revenge, we take our time. Patience. … Nythera awoke feeling restful, despite her run in with Ren, the rest of the day had been peaceful and quiet. The orange of dawn crept into her room. KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK. Nah.

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK Go AWAY! KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK Nope.

"Nythera! I found your captain" Rowen's voice bled through the walls. Shit… She ripped open the windows,"Rowen did you have to come knocking this early? The sun hasn't even risen yet" she hissed from above, careful not to wake any neighbors. The sun isn't even over the horizon yet!

"Well, I had three deputy mayors after me with a list of nearly a hundred captain candidates in the last four hours, so let's get this resolved now. They want us moving that ship by today" Rowen said, staring straight up at her from the door.

"Well who is it?" she hissed back. He smirked "come down and see. Hey don't talk, SHHHHH" Rowen shushed someone next to him. They were hiding in the doorframe so she couldn't make out any details. Fine, I guess he did his job, can't complain. But did he really have to come here at dawn? Nythera pushes the reinforced door open, hoping to swing it directly into Rowen's smug face. Rowen stood next to him, smiling with the biggest grin she had ever seen.

"Hello Milady, it is I, one Leo Wellspring at your service, or Captain Wellspring now I suppose-" Nythera grabbed Rowen's collar and pulled him into the house, pulling the door shut.

"Are you insane? Leo?" Nythera hissed.

"Woah, Look just think about it for a moment. Leo is going to guard his position with his life, he wants to prove himself, and he's worked with Lance for years as an errand boy" Rowen said, hands up in surrender. If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

"Yeah, so what? He won't give up the position in a day, doesn't make him a good captain" Nythera said, resisting the urge to smack Rowen on the head.

"So he knows where everything is, who to talk to, who needs an extra hand, what farms are understaffed. Leo knows everyone between Grandport and Halsbury, he can have people placed and ready to go before they even set foot on the island" Rowen spat out quickly, trying to avoid a beating. Ok maybe he did think this out more than I thought, but still… Leo?

"Look, the kid is stronger than you think, he did well in the war, killed several enemy soldiers and has advanced to strata one, he can take it" Rowen said with an expectant look in his eyes.

"Fine, fine, Leo is the captain, I'll teach him the controls. If this goes wrong, it's your head mounted on a pike" she hissed back and opened the door.

"I need the ship ready to go by tomorrow, both of them. Captain Leo, can you handle that?" She asked. A blinding spark of pride appeared in his eyes.

"Yes I can" he saluted and marched off. Yeah, Rowen's right, he would rather die than give up this position.

"Where are we going tomorrow?" he threw up an eyebrow in confusion.

"Come back tonight and we can look over the map we found in the shipyard. There is a wakepath going to a place called "Aelthyr" that had some interesting markers by it". She answered.

"Are you insane? Another wakepath? We only just got back to Vathrial" Rowen's eyes went wide.

"Anyways, you have business to go handle somewhere else, I am going to spend today doing nothing. I've earned that much, see you tonight, only after the sun has gone down, bye" Nythera pushed him out of the door "Wait but are you-" she yanked the door shut on him. Finally. With the captain debacle resolved I can just. Do. nothing. … Three naps and five cups of tea later, Nythera bolted to the door as soon as she heard the knock.

"Finally, let's get started" she said, letting him into the house.

"What are you two up to? Nothing I should be worried about hopefully." Shelly commented from the kitchen. She gasped "No, you wouldn't, Nythera you're way too young for children!" she exclaimed with fake shock. Oh not this shit, I gotta kill this, now!

"Shelly if you make that joke again, I will blow up your room" Nythera smiled innocently. Shelly's grin flipped into a frown.

"No children, got it."

"Oh, Shelly if you could see a map of the entire seas and all the islands would you?" Nythera stopped to ask her?

"Absolutey not" she took a sip of tea "the only reason I can hope for ley-insights is because I am filling in the edges of the map myself. If I knew where everything was, it would at least halve my level gains as well".

"Got it" Nythera led Rowen to her room, ensuring Shelly could not get a peek at the map. Nythera clicked on Boxy with a quick prayer to Kronan. Please do not go through the roof. The giant map appeared horizontally before them, going from one end of the room the next. Ok we can work with this. Rowen and Nythera stood on opposite ends of the map and weighed down one side with a chair on a table. They unrolled the map bit by bit, shuffling more and more of it off to the side as they made way for the wake path.

Both the northern and southern wakepaths revealed themselves dead in the center of the map. Nythera crawled under the bottom of the map hanging between the desk and the bed and shuffled up against the wall.

"Ok the opposite wakepath is for Thornfall, which has a bunch of warnings for dangerous fluxspawn." She pointed at the small path through the mist before them "This one says "Aelthyr" and it has the markers for "developed" and "rich" and "safe" so I think it would be wise to check it out.

"What about the one on the eastern side?" Rowen asked, pointing at the curled up edge of the map.

"As I recall that one was unknown and dangerous, we should start with the safe and developed ones don't you think?"

"You just want to go see new shit, don't you?" Rowen groaned.

"And you don't?"

"Fine, point taken, are we departing tomorrow?" She nodded "best to get out of the council's way, now that the migrant route is set up, all we really need to do is find more opportunities for Myrraval." Rowen departed swiftly "I'll make the preparations, we'll leave after Leo's ship departs tomorrow." Nythera crammed the giant map back into Boxy bit by bit. I really need to get a smaller version of this. Or maybe one with more than naval facilities? There have to be more maps!

Nythera drifted off with dreams of a new world. … The smell of salt was a fact of life she had long since gotten used to. The milling of dock workers, a common occurrence everywhere. Lizigeons croaked from post perches, some sailors even dared to cook the things, but the common report was that the bugs had more meat. But Captain Leo, now that was a new development.

"Ok now this button is how you raise and lower the ship, be very very careful because if you set it too low it will sink the ship, turn it off if you're going on the sea" Nythera explained for the third time, ensuring he knew exactly where the explanation was on her parchment notes. Leo nodded, his large straw hat telegraphing every twitch of his head.

"Understood miss Queen" he saluted "I will consult the notes before every movement, and I will absolutely not tell anyone about-" Nythera shushed him with a glare "You are not to even speak of it, nod if you understand". Leo nodded with vigour, Nythera had to dodge the brim of his hat as it came down. Leo's control pass had been stitched into his clothing by Rowen, so the chance of him losing it was remote.

I am still extremely worried about this, if he loses the pass, they will be stranded, and I don't have any more of them. After another two hours of explaining ship controls and quizzing Leo aggressively on what to click she finally jumped off onto the dock. This'll have to do, if they die, they die. Leo waved from the helm, his ridiculous temple robes fluttering in the wind while he held on the oversized straw hat with one hand. The ship was navigated carefully out of the dock by the deckhands.

She waved as they took off for the open sea.

"GOOD LUCK LAD" An old man with a crooked cane shouted from the end of the dock. Is that Edgar?

"Alright back to work, I want the sails prepared to be mounted today" Lawrence shouted from one of the warehouses. Nythera's ship was loaded and ready to go within the hour. Just her, Rowen, and a single sailor. Halt was preoccupied with his new students, his only comment had been "Aelthyr? You'll be fine on your own" and waved her off. She set course straight for Mistvale's western side, they would skirt around the edge of the island and then bolt for the wakepath.

Within the hour, Mistvale was already passing off their portside. I am going to need to work on developing Mistvale more in the future, we are going to need way more pines to make our fleets. Welp, first I need Waketown built up and then I am going try making a settlement right at the Quartz dungeon, if I can get more strata one and two delvers, we will have the manpower to tame the interior.

Vast open seas opened around them as they cleared the island, only the distant islands half-obscured in sea mist lay visible. That and the ever-present white walls of their small world. While she knew they were within a giant circular sea, the curvature was so small that the wall appeared straight. One day, all of these seas will be mine, I will tame every island and bring the resources of this land, these seas, to bear against Tianshiang. She scanned the horizon with Flux-sight as they drew closer to the wall.

Against this much mist and wall, it's going to be a pain in the ass to find the entrance. There's no island close enough to base my position on.

"Nythera, what in the blazes is that?" Rowen called out from the prow, pointing towards the mist. What could it possibly be? He doesn't have Flux-sight so he shouldn't be able- Oh