Storm Strider

Marisol peered over the railings and down at the shadow of the titanic leviathan, her heart completely gripped with fear.

… So much for being fearless, she thought, forcing a nervous, trembling grin onto her face. What did you say it was? A rem… remah–

[It is a giant remipede.]

With what little moonlight fell over the rainy sea, she focused her eyes like never before and tried to pick out the leviathan’s physical traits: armoured from head to tail, chitin joined in giant segmented plates, a hundred pairs of legs jutting out its sides, and it was also around five hundred metres long. It could wrap around the warship five times and still have length to spare.

[Identification Complete]

[Scientific Name: Nectiopoda Remipedia]

[Common Name: Remipede]

[Brief Description: Oar-footed, worm-like, blind and carnivorous—remipedes are often confused as giant sea serpents by sailors and fishermen. Specifically designed by the Swarm Queen to counter the Worm God nearly three decades ago, remipedes excel at using their chemosensory antennae to detect smaller prey near the surface. Their fangs are venomous, their prehensile antennae are adapted to help them navigate in the dark, and they are capable of moulting up to a thousand metres in length. The older they are, the slower they move, but the longer they get]

Marisol saw the word ‘sea serpent’ on the status screen that popped up next to her head, and she felt she understood why people could confuse the two of them; stuck on a tiny ship, surrounded by eerily calm waters, the shadow of the giant remipede did resemble a serpent trying to gauge its prey before attacking.

Now, there were plenty of snakes in the desert town where she lived, but they were all relatively small and unnoteworthy—they were nothing like the giant remipede circling the ship.

[... Just to clarify before you get any funny ideas: this giant remipede is not something that can be beaten head-on at your level, or even by most trained Hasharana,] the Archive said quickly. [It may not be on the level of a Mutant or a Lesser Great Mutant, but in leviathan terms, it is quite the titanic bug. It will not be possible to slay it the same way you did the fairy shrimp. Its chitin is immensely thick from the outside, and unlike the fairy shrimp, its abdomen on the underside is armoured as well. You do not possess a weapon sharp enough to cleave through its chitin, and that is that.]

She gritted her teeth. Is it a zero percent chance of victory?

[It is a one hundred percent chance of defeat.]

… Okay, she thought, breathing into her hands, trying to calm the pounding heart in her chest. Alright. Got it. I ain’t keen on fighting something like that, either, so what’s the strategy here? What’s it even want with me, anyways?

[I believe it is patrolling this particular strait intercepting any and all ships trying to reach the Whirlpool City,] the Archive said. [Please look up. I believe I saw something quite interesting in the fog enshrouding the warship.]

She did as instructed and tore her eyes away from the shadow of the remipede, looking through the misty, rainy fog.

True to the Archive’s words, there were silhouettes of other ships and vessels floating on the calm sea—and all of them were wrecked already. She couldn’t believe she hadn’t noticed it before, but now that she was looking for them, there had to be two dozen shipwrecks flanking both sides of her own warship, forming a thousand-metre long line of floating wreckages along the perimeter of the fog. They must’ve met the same fate as her; giant barnacles appeared on the bottom of their hull and stopped them from advancing through the fog, and then the giant remipede appeared to finish them off one by one.

How long had this been going on for?

Even if that fairy shrimp hadn’t destroyed Captain Antonio’s fleet, would they have made it past this rainy fog with the patrolling remipede?

[Indeed, something is afoot with the great blue,] the Archive muttered. [Both the attack by the fairy shrimp and the appearance of this giant remipede are extremely abnormal situations. I do not believe you are being targeted explicitly, but… perhaps something is spurring these giant bugs to action. It may be headed in the same direction as you are, therefore–]

How much time do I have left?

[–eight minutes,] the Archive finished. [There are no rowboats on this warship. Disembark the warship and skate towards the wreckages. If you can hide and survive until dawn, the giant remipede may forget about you and return to the lower depths; then we can think about how you will proceed towards the Whirlpool City from there.]

Eight minutes. Biting her lips, she looked out at the closest wreckage and started fidgeting. The absolute nearest pallet of wood she could reach was a hundred metres away, and while she could easily skate there in under eight seconds at full speed, there was no telling how sensitive the giant remipede was to ripples and vibrations. It neared the surface just because she poked her head underwater for a brief moment; what was to say it wouldn’t immediately pounce on her the instant she jumped off the ship again?

[As I mentioned, the giant remipede’s chemosensory antennae are very keen. It will be able to detect you if you rush towards the wreckages even in this heavy rain,] the Archive said. [Just to play it safe, you should aim to get a thousand metres away from this warship without it noticing you leaving. That nearest pallet would not do as the destination. Aim for the furthest pallet, far and deep into the fog.]

And just how can I possibly skate without making any… vibrations…

…

Her thoughts trailed off as she remembered her mama’s technique book.

It’d already been more than a month since she last read the first chapter.

Racing back into the captain’s cabin where there was a roof overhead and candlelight to illuminate the pages, she got down on all fours and slammed her mama’s book on the floor. One pull on the latch, the lock on the second chapter clicked open—her eyes devoured the diagrams spanning fifteen whole pages before she even read her mama’s handwritten letter on the first and last pages.

This technique… it’s–

“To el borde Vellamira, Marisol, my only little rascal.”

“If you’re reading this on the tenth page of the diagrams, it means you just skipped my letter on the first page because your eyes are too excited. You wanted to get right into the technique without bothering to hear what I have to say, hm?”

“You little rascal.”

“I knew you would skip the first page, so I’m writing my letter here instead, knowing your eyes will catch on my words if they’re interrupting the flow of the diagrams.”

… Tch.

You really got me, huh?

Water dripping from her hair and onto the pages, she chuckled softly and decided to slow down a little bit. She still had a few minutes left before she had to book it, so she read her mama’s letter carefully—poring over each and every last word with all her heart—before reaching the second letter on the final page, where the lock on the third chapter started ticking down a one month timer again.

Next time, she’d remember to at least pull the latch and unlock the chapter first even if she wasn’t going to read it. She wouldn’t have to wait another month after chapter three to read chapter four then.

[... One minute, Marisol,] the Archive warned, and she bounced onto her glaives, slipping her book behind her waist. [A fair word of warning: your mother’s technique appears to be untested. There is no guarantee that it will work on the sea. You must be prepared to make a break for safety should it fail–]

Mama’s techniques are never wrong, Archive.

If Sand-Dancers can fly, do you think we can’t crawl?

The warship started groaning, rocking left and right as the waves churned beneath it. Now, there were plenty of things Marisol wanted to take with her—most of the children’s gifts and garlands, for one—but there was no time to sprint down to the lower decks for them, not even to take a live crab with her. She had her ghost crab scarf over her neck, her mama’s sand-dancing cloak and technique book over her back, and a chatty worm in her ear; it was just like the time when she’d set off from the fairy shrimp to skate through a storm.

She was afraid, but she wasn’t frozen.

With thirty seconds left to spare, she sped out of the cabin, carved across the deck to reach the front of the ship, and leaped off the bowsprit with the tip of her glaives pressed together. She landed on the sea with barely a raindrop’s worth of ripples, her arms spread out to maintain perfect balance—she didn’t dare turn around as she heard the giant remipede split her warship in half, splashing a massive wave outwards as the whole vessel was dragged underwater, pulled into the depths.

Alright.

Good landing.

But now…

Exhaling coolly, she looked to the left and spotted floating debris a thousand metres off into the fog. Anything she could wait out the night on would serve well enough.

She took one slow step forward—tentatively raising a glaive and placing it back down on the inner edge—and she ‘slid’ by pushing off her back glaive, keeping her body extremely low to the surface as she slid a single metre towards her destination.

There was no ripple created by the movement.

“... If you’re reading this chapter, you must already be two months deep onto the great blue.”

“I don’t know if you’ve reached the Whirlpool City yet, but by now, I’m sure you’ve seen your fair share of the leviathans that roam the sea we call the ‘Deepwater Legion Front’—and while I may have imparted on you the War Jump meant to demolish all walls that stand in a Sand-Dancer’s way, the truth is, there are some walls that are simply very, very difficult to overcome.”

“The leviathans of the Deepwater Legion Front can be such walls.”

“So, if you ever find yourself facing a wall you cannot kick your way through with brute force alone, mama is here to teach you yet another old Sand-Dancer’s technique—because after learning how to destroy others with the 'War Jump', you must learn how to protect yourself with the 'Silent Step'."

"This is but the natural progression of a Sand-Dancer."

The giant remipede’s shadow slithered beneath her, evidently unsatisfied with its catch—all wood, all metal, little juicy flesh to go by. Maybe it’d mistaken her warship and all the other ships around her as living prey.

Whatever the case, she had only one objective: get as far away from the wreckage of her warship as possible and tough out the night.

“This technique begins by standing on your tiptoes, feet pressed together. You take one step forward, press the inner edge of the forward feet against the sand, and then push off the sand with your back foot as you slide with your forward foot. Perform every motion on the inner edge of your feet with your body hunched over, palms hovering right above the ground—almost as though you are walking on all fours, moving by dragging the ground past you instead of you moving along the ground.”

“The head is always the heaviest part of a Sand-Dancer’s body, and it is like an iron ball attached to a string that is your torso. When you dance and turn normally, it is as though you are swinging that iron ball, and you must keep that swinging momentum constantly fast lest you lose your balance and fall.”

“However, perform the ‘Silent Step’ correctly, and that iron ball is constantly swinging low, slow, and close to the ground. You will not make a sound. You will not disturb the desert gods. As long as you maintain focus, you will be all but invisible to any giant bugs that burrow beneath the sand."

"The old Sand-Dancers trudged across the desert like this, and while it is a mostly useless technique in new sand-dancing routines, it is a technique that measures your rhythm."

"How well can you control how fast you skate, and how long can you do it for?"