Storm Strider

“... Why?”

She accidentally said that aloud instead of keeping it as a thought in the back of her head, but her question was genuine; she couldn’t hide the disgust from her face as the Archive tapped the water once again, beckoning her to drop to her knees and take a bite out of the fairy shrimp.

[Eating the bugs you slay is the only way you can gather points,] it said, completely nonplussed. [Accounting for your still-very-human biology, fifteen points is the most you will be able to obtain from eating only the easily digestible parts of the fairy shrimp, that being the first three pairs of thoracopods, the compound eyes, the left cercopod, the latter section of the upturned abdomen, the nauplius eyes–]

“The points,” she interrupted, nearly falling over backwards as she tried to stomp the little water strider. “What do these ‘points’ even do? I don’t know anything about the bug-slayers’ systems, so–”

[We have around fourteen minutes remaining. Allow me to make this brief. This is your status screen, which denotes all of your physiological attributes:]

[// STATUS]

[Name: Marisol Vellamira]

[Class: Water Strider]

[BloodVolume: 4.9/5.1 (96%), Strain: 109/499 (21%)]

[Unallocated Points: 0]

[Strength: 1, Speed: 1, Dexterity: 3, Toughness: 1, Perceptivity: 1, Strain Limit: 499]

[// MUTATION TREE]

[T1 Core Mutation | Striding Glaives]

{T1 Branch Mutation | ???}

[T2 Core Mutations | Ripple Sensors | Hydrofuge Spines] 50P

{T2 Branch Mutations | ??? | ???}

[// UNIQUE SWARMSTEEL LIST ]

[From top to bottom, we have your name, insect class, your current blood volume, and the measurement of your strain limit. You can think of strain limit as ‘stamina’. Everything you do will increase your strain slightly, including when you use your class-specific insect abilities. The closer your strain is to one hundred percent, the closer you are to death,] the Archive said plainly. [After that, you have your six basic attributes. One ‘level’ in strength, speed, dexterity, toughness, and perceptivity means you are equivalent to an average human in all those attributes. If you have five levels in strength, you are basically as strong as five average humans. Understood?]

She was no stranger to her mama’s rapid-fire dance technique lectures, but this wasn’t so much a lecture as it was information injected straight into her head; she felt she knew all of it even before Archive opened its nonexistent mouth to speak.

[If you want to raise your strength from level one to two, it will cost you one point. If you want to raise it from two to three, it will cost you four points. To increase any of your attribute levels by one, it will cost a number of points equal to that attribute's current level squared, and this applies for the first five attributes,] the Archive continued. [For the sixth attribute level that is strain limit, however, the cost is consistently one point per level. This is because strain limit is the representation of your stamina, and stamina is the easiest modification I can make to your body. Therefore, to increase your strain limit from four hundred and ninety-nine to five hundred, it would only cost you one point, and from five hundred to six hundred, it would only cost you a hundred points. Understood?]

That said, it was a tad annoying hearing it talk so fast. Captain Antonio hadn’t been lying when he’d said it was going to be noisy.

[Finally, for the mutation tree at the bottom… there are ten tiers of class-specific mutations you can unlock, and you must complete each tier before moving onto the next. Your tier one core mutation, ‘Striding Glaives’, was unlocked the moment you chose your class, so if you have fifty points, you can unlock either one of the tier two core mutations,] the Archive finished. [There is no point explaining branch mutations at this stage. There is no point explaining Swarmsteel at this stage. There is no point explaining the intricacies of how the levelling system functions at this stage. Now that you know everything you need to know, please—start eating the bug.]

…

She felt she understood the gist of it, but plenty of concepts still flew far over her head.

Might as well eat while I… ask?

The little water strider tapped where there was fairy shrimp meat to be chewed on, so, tentatively, she knelt and felt around the water with her bare hands—recoiling with instinctual disgust as fleshy meat squelched in her palms. Dammit, I already got this far. She shook her head and forced herself to dig in with her nails, ripping out a whole strip of soggy, pinkish-bluish flesh.

Her nostrils crinkled as she tried to place a smell, but it was just salty. And briny. The Archive nagged her to plug her nose and chew—it’d be difficult for her to digest the flesh otherwise—so she did exactly as she was instructed.

Honestly, it wasn’t that bad. If she just closed her eyes and pretended it wasn’t raining, thundering, and she was sitting on a firm chair on solid ground, the raw shrimp meat tasted almost rich. Deep and pure with…. Salt. Lots of it.

No, it was pretty bad.

… You’re saying mama spent decades honing her strength and toughness, but I can literally be twice as strong and tough as her if I just put two points into those ‘attributes’? she thought, forcing herself to gnaw through and swallow bite-sized chunks of meat one at a time, her stomach crying and flipping in protest. How does that even… work? I get you’re some advanced weapon the smartest people on the continent developed, but–

[Insect flesh is more protein-dense, folic acid-dense, and vitamin-dense than any other food in the world,] the Archive said. [It is such a potent source of nutrients that, if a normal human were to consume insect flesh, they would begin mutating traits of said insect and gradually lose their humanity. However, Swarmsteel Systems such as I are capable of controlling that intake of biomass and converting it into ‘points’, which you can then use to selectively increase your attributes or evolve controlled mutations. There is no ‘magic’ involved in the process.]

She scoffed in between bites, retching a little as she finally finished her first strip of meat. Sure sounds like magic to me. I mean, the people who developed you must’ve been–

[Out-of-this-world genius, yes. They even designed us ‘Archives’ to be able to converse with our users like this.] Then it skated over to a different part of the shrimp’s abdomen, waving her over with a little leg. [Now eat this part over here. You have twelve minutes remaining.]

She crawled over, careful not to scoot right off the shrimp lest she fell into the sea. I get it, I get it. I’ll eat whatever you want me to eat. If only it ain’t so salty, huh?

The Archive looked at her like she was dumb. [It is a saltwater crustacean.]

And where I come from, we cut our fish open and leave it to dry for at least two days so the saltiness is less overbearing, she thought, clenching her throat as she ripped her second strip of shrimp flesh. At least, I’d hoped my first bite of a crustacean would be… you know? Cooked? Will I really be safe eating raw flesh like this?

[No.]

What?

[Apologies. I meant yes,] it said hurriedly, and she briefly got the impression it was mocking her; she was the one who’d told it to lie a little if she’d be more confident as a result. [But… perhaps you could start a little fire. Not only would eating cooked insect flesh yield more points, it would also be easier on your stomach.]

And how am I going to start a fire in the middle of this?

She gestured wildly around at the sinking wrecks, at the violent, churning, frothy waves, and the Archive countered by pointing at something she’d been completely oblivious to: the three masts she’d used to impale the fairy shrimp with, still sticking up like wooden pillars.

Though the masts were all drenched and cold in the rain, just the thought of not having to eat shrimp meat raw was enough to get her standing.

How the hell do I start a fire, though?

Now, she didn’t have a match or two sharp flints to spark together, but… she had something better. She kicked the closest mast with the entire length of her glaive as hard as she could, dragging the blade along the metal bands and then deep into the wood. She made a small chip. The sparks from the metal bands ignited the splinters, and then the splinters turned into a small flame.

Nice!

Eyes aglow, she immediately pounced around the fire and kept it protected from the rain with her body, wrapping her strip of flesh around the chip so it’d cook on the inside—that’d have to be good enough.

[You can cook multiple strips of flesh at once to minimise cooking time,] the Archive urged, skating over to the other parts of the shrimp. [Rip flesh from here, here, here and here. This is all you can realistically eat and digest within fifteen minutes for fifteen points. Do not throw away the inedible chitin, either. Put as much of it inside your cloak as you can.]

She was reluctant to move away from the fire, but eventually convinced herself to peel away from it so she could work on the other parts of the shrimp. Flesh from the abdomen, from the tail; then she moved onto the first pair of legs and was left utterly confused.

I don’t know how to carve a shrimp.

[I do. Grab the leg at the base and twist– just like that. Good job. Now squeeze out the flesh and–]

I know how to carve a shrimp.

She repeated the process two, three, five more times, and then did the same for the giant tusk-like antennae. It was a bit difficult plucking them out of the shrimp’s head, but with a bit of effort and a little water skater nagging in her ear, she eventually had all her flesh stuck around the fire and her chitin parts sitting around the base of the stake.

Looking at the chitin parts now, she thought there was no way she could fit even half of it inside her cloak. They were sharp parts. What if they cut her mama’s cloak to shreds, or, even worse—what if they cut mama’s book to shreds, which was still tied to a cord at the back of her waist?

[They are part of your reward for slaying the shrimp,] the Archive chided. [Twelve shrimp phyllopodia—twelve ‘legs’—and four shrimp antennae. They can be used to construct Swarmsteel, which are wearable equipment that provide bonuses to your attribute levels when they meld with your skin.]

She knelt around the tiny fire, shivering and biting her lips as she felt water creeping up to her hips, now. The fairy shrimp was sinking fast.

You’re going to have to explain what ‘meld’ means–

[Say you construct a shrimp helmet out of the parts you just obtained. If you wear the helmet and it comes in contact with your skin, it will begin to stick onto your skin. That is ‘melding’, and the higher quality the Swarmsteel—which depends on the quality of the parts, the quality of the construct, and how well you can meld with it—the more attribute levels you can gain from equipping it,] the Archive explained. [You already know who the Great Makers are. I notice you reference them a fair amount as an expression of exaggeration in your speech and thoughts–]

–hey, don’t pry into my memories like that–

[–so the people who understood how to work with insect parts to turn them into powerful weapons and equipment are called ‘Makers’,] it finished, the little water skater hopping onto one of her burning strips of flesh. [Now eat. Five minutes remaining. Since the flesh is now semi-cooked, you should be gaining twenty points instead of fifteen points.]

She sighed and grumbled to herself as she peeled off the first strip of flesh, not at all excited to gobble it down. It tasted a bit better, but that was such a low benchmark to pass that she couldn’t help but feel disappointed nevertheless. All things considered, the semi-cooked flesh was still disgusting to swallow down.

And… I don’t assume I can make any Swarmsteel with these random parts just sitting around? she thought, feeding herself with one hand and slipping the smallest shrimp parts inside her cloak with the other; thank the Great Makers there were little tassel loops inside her mama’s cloak that she could hang the parts off of. They’re going to weigh me down, right? Are they really worth keeping around even though I probably won’t be using them anytime soon?

[Just hoard it. I am sure it will come in handy eventually.]

She shrugged. If you say so. But if I sink, that’s on you.

[That would be on you for picking the water strider class–]

Is there anywhere for me to skate to? Another ship or something of the sort?

She looked up as she kept eating and stuffing parts into her cloak, carefully scanning the stormy horizon so the Archive could get a good look as well. If the attribute of ‘perceptivity’ meant what she thought it meant, she wasn’t particularly perceptive; she couldn’t spot any islands or ships in the distance, but maybe the Archive could.

[... According to the navigation data that Antonio Saranno last updated three months ago when he sailed by this strait, there is one landmass somewhere between three to four kilometres of where we are,] the Archive said, pointing one of its legs straight ahead. She squinted, seeing nothing but storm clouds, thunder, and death. [If you can manage to skate through the storm, you should be able to see the tail of the island, but if you cannot, you will die. There is still the option for you to attempt skating back to the shoreline. What will it be, Marisol?]

…

It was a useless question.

As if it didn’t already know her resolve to push forward.

… I have twenty ‘points’ now, right?

[Unallocated Points: 0 → 20]

And how do I raise my attributes?

[Simply command me to do so. I suggest, with twenty points, you put–]

Raise my speed to level four, my toughness to two, and… how many points would I have left?

[Five points.]

Put the rest into perceptivity and strength and strain limit, she thought, wiping her lips as she stood up wobbly; she couldn’t fit the giant shrimp antennae in her cloak, and frankly, she didn’t care for them too much. A Sand-Dancer must be graceful, and I can’t do that if my attributes aren’t properly balanced, right? A few levels in every attribute should be… helpful.

[Strength: 1 → 2]

[Speed: 1 → 4]

[Toughness: 1 → 2]

[Perceptivity: 1 → 2]

[Strain Limit: 499 → 502]

[Unallocated Points: 20 → 0]

[... The attribute levels will help, but at the end of the day, this storm is a nasty one to skate through on glaives,] the Archive said, reappearing atop her shoulder as she skipped over to the head of the shrimp, sucking in a sharp breath. [If you shall make it out of this alive, it will be your tenacity that pushes you through; nothing more, nothing less.]

[Good luck, Marisol.]

[Objective #2: Skate out of the storm and head towards the unidentified landmass]

[Time Limit: Undefined]

[Reward: Survival]

[Failure: Death]