Trader CYOA: Arn Year 1 Part 1

http://strawpoll.me/4130003
You had decided to head East towards Arn, the Coast city. During your travels you noticed the lack of dry land, as water was seemingly everywhere on the road to the capital city. Within the hour you had already gone over two bridges that crossed over strong raging rivers and soon reached third, this one going over a large lake. As your horses drew your carriage across the stone you heard splashing and looked around, peering over the side and clearly seeing waves on the surface. More splashes filled your ears as you got off the carriage and peered over the bridge, in the reflections of the water you saw short blue fish like creatures, could these be sahagins? You've heard stories about them but never seen them. They crawled from under the bridge, gurgling and pointing spears and tridents at you, and clearly eying your carriage. You needed to act fast and grab a weapon from the bags before they can steal everything.
You ran to the cart and looked through the bags as the Sahagins lunged at you, you pull out a metal staff with a pinkish gem on top, you turn and block the attacks and push the fishmen away. They gurgle and surround you as you clench the staff. "Take this!"
You swing at them and hit one clean in the face, it's head twists in pain before it looks back at you, annoyed. They leap at you again and you swat as many as you can away before they tackle you to the ground. "Damn it dad! Why did you put a worthless weapon in the bag?"
The rest of the fish started to take things from the bag, food, weapons, jewels.
"Stop!" You shouted as they leaped off the bag, you clench the staff harder and tossed some off, and ran to the one carrying jewels.
"I won't let you take away what I've worked for!" You swing again, this time there was a glow from the gem, and once it collided with the Sahagin's face there was a small explosion. The creatures stopped and stepped back as the Sahagin you hit screeched in pain, it's cheek on fire. You were shocked and looked at the staff which had a small flame hovering above the crystal.
"Oh. That explains it." You say inspecting the staff closer. The Sahagins began to scattered with your things, you chased after as many as you could, hitting them with the small flame you conjured, but some were able to get away with some of your things into the lake.
You didn't want to lose a single item, you were raised to be able to sell anything, even a single apple could mean life and death to you. Taking your shirt and shoes off, and tying the staff to your back, you leap into the water after the Sahagins.
They swam towards an underwater cave, their hideout no doubt, and you swam as hard as you could with the staff on you. The empty handed Sahagins turned to face you and fly at you with their weapons. You take out the staff and focus as hard as you could, thinking of a flame, the water around the staff began to boil up as they drew closer. As they drew close you surrounded yourself in steam from the water evaporating. The Sahagins stopped as your swam past them. "Idiots."
Entering the cave you climbed out and saw the Sahagins placing the items in a pile, gurgling to each other. "Hey."
They turned to see you as you walked up smacking your staff against your palm. "I believe those belong to me."
They drew their weapons as you formed a flame, larger than the one before and pointed the staff. "Okay. Be that way."
The cave had flashes of orange spark inside now and then, before one man came out with bags. You swam topside and got back onto the bridge. As you opened your bags to put everything back into order you found a green object sitting inside a bag. A Frog Girl to be precise, she looked up and saw you and waved sheepishly. "H-Hi."
"Well Hello to you. Any particular reason you're hiding in my bag of precious jewelry?"
"I wasn't stealing, I was just stowing away gero." She looked away as you lifted her up, she was fairly small and modest chested, but had an ass like no one's business.
"Pretty sure that's also a crime." You said carrying her to the front.
"I just wanted a ride to the city! Nothing else."
"Lucky for you that's where I'm heading."
"You're not mad?" You sat her down and climbed in and started the horses back up.
"Long as you didn't steal anything you're fine. You didn't steal anything did you?" She looked away and pressed her webbed index fingers together.
"Gimme your tongue." She opened up and you pulled her tongue out and pulled off a sapphire she had stuck to the bottom of it.
"You're a runaway aren't you? They're usually the kind that steals despite knowing it's wrong."
"You could tell huh? I ran away from my step dad cause he doesn't care about me at all, my mom is dead and I'm an only child."
"You still got your tail, how old are you?"
"15."
"That's young all right. So what do you plan on doing once you get town?"
"I dunno, I'm sure I can find work with the undersea exploration teams."
"Undersea Exploration?"
"You aren't from here I take it."
"Just got into the country."
"Well You'll find out." The trip became quiet as the sun began to set, at last you reached the city gates.
"Gero, guess this is where we split up. What's your name anyway?"
"Anonymous, but you can call me Anon."
"I'm Fran. You take care of yourself now." She leaped off the cart.
"Fran!" She turned around as you called out
"If you ever need a job come find me, I'm trying to become a merchant. A Big one." She stared at you and blinked her eyelids like a frog does.
"Okay." She hopped over to the gates and was let in, after they closed you rode up.
"Halt! State your business."
"I'm here to see whoever is in charge about setting up a shop." You hand over a slip of paper. The guard looks it over and nods to his companion, they ring a bell by the gate and open it.
"Please wait at the entrance once you are inside." You rode in and stopped once you entered Arn capital. It was certainly not what you were expecting. There were no real roads or streets, but a large network of wooden bridges over water. Men and women walked on them while mermaids, crab people and people riding large sea creatures swam by them. Buildings seemingly were no taller than 2 stories, and the people dressed lightly, some men without shirts and women with just tops and clothes around their waist with the occasional one with a jar on her head carrying water. It was less of a Capital and more of a large beach pier from the looks of it.
"Hello there!" You looked down to see a blue toned mermaid with a large octopus behind her.
"You are here to see the Chief correct? Please step into the carrier and we can be on our way. Do not worry about your things, we shall take care of them." You nodded and stepped down, patting the Horses and sat the wooden carrier and the Mermaid dashed off and the Octopus following her.
"This is not what I was expecting. For a Capital this isn't exactly."
"You must be new, trust me there's a lot more to this city than the surface!" As the Octopus stopped you saw an old man sitting on the bridge fishing, eyes and face covered in grey hair, but despite his age his physique was amazing.
"Chief, you have someone who wishes to speak with you, Chief? Oh dear, fallen asleep again. Forgive him, he'll wake up when he's got a bite. do you wish to see the city?"
"So while I wait, tell me a bit about yourself."
"Oh me? I'm just a simple Mermaid who works for the Chief. My name is Merline, and I've lived here my whole life!"
"You see quite upbeat."
"Of course, it's so nice living here, so much space to swim around, and you meet all kinds of interesting people in a major port like this city."
"So where the hell do you live?"
"Why down there silly." She pointed down, and you looked into the water now that it calmed down.
"Whoa!" You saw that there was an entire city built into the wall of the rocks below the coast, all types of fish people swimming around as they went in and out of caves.
"Amazing." You said sitting back up.
"It's simple but we all call it home, while majority of the humans walk up here we aquatic people generally live down there."
"Now I understand what you meant by on the surface." Just then there was a grumble, the two of you looked at the Chief woke up and without warning pulled the rod and from the depths came a giant swordfish.
"Oh that's beauty!" The man caught the fish that was twice his size before turning around.
"Merline? Did I sleep through a visitor?"
"No sir we just got here he wishes to speak with you."
"Hello Sir, I was interested in becoming a Merchant here, I have all the papers needed."
"Well let me see." You handed him the forms and he looked them over, stroking his beard.
"Yup, looks in order to me, I'll fill out all that silly paper work tomorrow. Merline! See this fella to his new place."
"YES SIR!" She pulled the Octopus and began the swim as you waved to the Chief. The carried stopped at a somewhat beat up place among other buildings down the road from the docks. Down from the main 'street' were Sea Horses carrying your things.
"Here you are! Please enjoy living here, I know you'll love it!"
"Hey thanks, uh are you doing anything?"
"Hm? Well of course! I'm the Chief's assistant."
"No I mean, nevermind." She waved goodbye and left you to your place.
After putting your things to the side for when you got up you decided to walk down to the docks to see about a side job or something along those lines. It was beginning to get dark as you walked about 50 feet to the docks. There you saw all kinds of workers, large men carrying large crates, men with harpoons and nets, even what looked like naval officers who were pushing canons onto ships. "Wow. This is what I'm talking about."
"Watch it!" You turned to see a man carrying tons of crates running towards, giving you just enough time to get out of the way. THIS was what you wanted to see, people working all over the place, the hustle and bustle to get things done. "Ahoy there lad! Mind tossing me that rope you're standing on?"
You turn your head to see a boat of fishermen, and look down to see a length of rope, you toss it to the man. "I can tell from your pale skin you're new here. Feeling lost?"
"Oh no, I'm just down that way and came to see about a job of some kind."
"Well plenty of that here. We got plenty of side work to do. You got people like us who fish for food, you got the dock workers who carry all the crates filled with Goddess knows what, then you got the Naval patrol that keeps the first two safe from Pirates, they accept volunteers. Last you got the Underwater Exploration team, you gotta see them first thing in the morn though."
"I see."
"What about it lad? We're going out for one last trip for the eve."
    “Actually I think I’ll see about that Naval Protection bit, I’m trying to be a merchant myself and I wouldn’t want some pirates wandering around.”
    “That’s a fine choice too lad, you’ll want to speak with the Captain down by the Guard Boat, can’t miss him with his big ol’ hat and pipe.” The Fishermen pushed the boat off the pier and began to swim off towards the sea, leaving you to walk towards a man clearly from some sort of Naval force, big white hat, blue button up jacket, scar over her left eye, and smoking a corn cob pipe. “Excuse me sir, are you the man I’m supposed to see about the Volunteer Naval protection?”
The man turns his head and looks at you, his eyes narrow as he looks you up and down and his removes his pipe. “Ay, and I suspect you want to come? You look like an Outsider, how can I trust ye?”
“I don’t have enough dirt and too many teeth to be a pirate?” You say, the man stops for a second before chuckling.
“Okay lad you’re right, but still. Can you fight?”
“I can hit things, with a stick, that I can kinda make fire from.” You pull out your staff and formed a small flame to which the Captain raised an eyebrow to.
“Well Beggars can’t be choosers I supposed, get aboard lad.” The Captain points you to the ship, a medium sized boat clearly designed for combat with each side hosting 5 portholes for Cannonballs. You walk aboard seeing a mix of Naval officers and commoners who probably were in it for the same reason as you. As you stepped on the Captain followed and raised the plank.
“READY THE SAILS AND RAISE ANCHOR LADS! WE’RE OFF TO PATROL! NO SLACKING ANY OF YOU! AND REMEMBER IF YOU SEE HIDE OF THE RECENT WINNER OF THE PRIZE HUNT TO LET US KNOW!” The Captain head into his quarters as you learned over to one of the crew.
“I’m new here, what ‘Prize Hunt’?”
The other men chuckle and laugh as you say this. “You ARE new if you haven’t heard. The Prize Hunt is the most noble tradition in all the Country and Islands around us. Every Year men and women hunt down something of great value, be it jewels, food that could feed an army, or the most wanted criminals. Then you head to the Shrine of the Dragon Goddess, where she grants the winner one wish after feasting, admiring the jewel or condemning the criminal to Hell.”
“A wish? Like any kind of wish?”
“Yes, but there’s some rules to them, and also you can forgo the wish and challenge the Dragon Goddess herself for a chance at wedding her should you win, but no one has done it.”
“That sounds interesting. So I assume since the last champion is missing he didn’t wish for anything.”
“That or he wished for his own Island, no one knows, it’s only been a week.” After the talk you wandered around the ship, keeping eyes on the dark sea and only seeing the moon’s reflection on the waters and the occasional fish leaping out of the water. As the cold sea breeze grew colder and colder you took one of the blankets the ship offered, though it smelled funny so you kept it to your lap only. You decided to focus on trying to make a larger flame with your staff, you were interested in how far you could take this whole magic sthick. As you were you thought you spotted something in a foggy part of the ocean. You walked over to the Crow’s nest and pulled a string to get attention of the spotter. “I think I see something in the fog over there!”
The spotter took out his telescope and peered down it. “I don’t see anythi...wait...WAIT!”
He rushed back into the nest and rings the bell. “BLACKTOOTH! IT’S BLACKTOOTH!”
The Captain rushed out and everyone started to move towards the side where you were, and looked out to the fog as the bow of a ship came through and began firing from the front. “ALL MEN, BATTLE STATIONS! IT’S BLACKTOOTH THE PIRATE! HE’S NOT ONE TO BE MESSED WITH! BRING THE EXTRA CANNONS TO THE TOP OF THE DECK AND READY THE CANNONS BELOW DECK!”
“Roger!” Everyone saluted, and you did too after seeing it and followed the men below deck. The portholes opened up as some men manned the canons, the beefier ones lifted the cannons up and carried them while others grabbed the cannonballs and followed them topside, you grabbed one and followed them up as the boat shook from a cannon shot. Once you hit top side you were blindsided by a pirate boarding the ship you drop the Cannonball and draw your staff and slam the top against his chest before blowing him away, the ship shakes again. You and some other men tumble over from the shake and land on the other side of the boat as more pirates begin to board. “CAPTAINS ORDERS, KILL EVERYONE ONE OF THESE LANDLUBBERS!”
The pirate then had a section of his torso have a large portion cut out as the captain was wielding a scimitar, the pirate fell down into the waters below.
“WHAT ARE YOU DOING LADS! Don’t let up! We need to sink that ship!” He parries a strike from another boarding pirate as you get up and pick back up the Cannonball you were carrying and load it into the cannon. As you turned you saw some wet pirates running down below deck. You caught a glimpse of grappling hooks on the side opposite their ship and realized their plan. You quickly ran down below deck where the cannoneers were fighting off the pirates as cannonballs hit the boat and blew back the cannoneers. The enemy ship began to move away as you saw the cannons were lined perfectly straight. “Are those cannons loaded!?”
“Y-Yes, but we can’t light them on time.” You run to the side and line your staff up and start a fire.
“Come on baby.” You pull the staff back and thrust forward.
“Fireball!” You shoot a quick stream of fire in a straight line, setting all the fuses off at the same time, the cannons launched at the same time, just as the enemy ship was about to get away two of the shots hit the end of the boat, tearing the rudder off.
“HA HA! I’ll take Five in a Million over a One in a Million shot any day!” As you celebrated a pirate came from behind and was poised to cut your head off when a member of the crew stabbed him through the chest.
“Any of you who can still fight we need you topside, we’re going to try and board the enemy ship!” You and a few others ran back topside where the battle continued.
“Alright lads get ready to board!” Some of the naval officers swung onto the enemy ship as you began to pepper them with Cannonballs, as you all cheered you noticed the Captain’s expression turn more and more grim.
“Something ain’t right. Where the hell is Blacktooth? I don’t see or smell the bastard.”
“Captain!” The man station in the crow’s nest called and he and you looked up.
“THERE’S LIGHTS COMING FROM TOWN!”
“What!?” The captain took out his own telescope and peered in the direction of town and lowered the glass quicker.
“EVERYONE WE’VE BEEN HAD! THE SHIP WAS A DISTRACTION! BOARDING PARTY GET BACK HERE ON THE DOUBLE!”
‘Leave us Captain! We’ll make sure that Bastard doesn’t have a ship to come back to!” The boarding party vanished amongst the chaos of the fight. The Captain took his hat and put it over his chest before putting it back.
“ALL HANDS DOUBLE TIME IT BACK TO ARN! HELMSMAN 180 THIS CRAFT! FAN THE SAILS IF YOU HAVE TO LADS WE WON’T LET THAT DIRTY RAT HARM OUR TOWN!”  The boat turned around and set sail back to port. The entire remaining crew walked up to the bow and watched as the city grew larger, as did the lights illuminating the way, almost leading you back. Upon landing you see dozens of pirates standing around carrying torches and standing by tied up citizens, one with actual clothes on, and with a pitch black toothy grin stepped forward and bowed while removing his black feathered cap.
“AHOY THERE CAP’N!” Under the boot of the Pirate leader was a beaten up bloody heap of the fisherman who offered you to join him, you couldn’t tell if he was alive or dead.
“Seems you fell for my little scheme, and now I’ve got quite the upper hand.”
“Blacktooth you bastard, sacrificing your men and you ship! Have ye no honor!?”
“Oh Cap’n, please. Everyone knows honor doesn’t pay, and I am going to miss my ship, but I can buy a new one after I take all the money these people have, and that pile you give to these ‘volunteers’ of yours and that dinky boat can give a few shillings once we scrap it.”
“You think I’ll just hand over my ship!?”
“Oh You Will Captain, otherwise I kill all these innocents, You don’t that to tell the wife and kids do you? Oh and I’ll take you as a bonus, I was to watch you walk the plank meself.” The Pirate gave a wheezing chuckle as he held up the fisherman and held a blade to his throat.
There was only the sounds of waves as the Captain stood there, biting his lip. You wondered if there was anything to do as you squinted, swearing you saw something. A fin was cutting through the waterways of the town at high speeds. Blacktooth stopped and turned around, seeing nothing as the Fin was now behind him. A large splash and a giant woman with huge fangs was heading towards the pirate, in a quick moment he slashed at her mouth and with a single bite she shattered the sword into pieces before diving back into the water. Then without warning the Pirates all began losing limbs and chunks of their bodies, the waters beneath the pier turned red before only the captain was left standing. The woman pulled herself up and crashed her large fin onto the boardwalk. “Captain Blacktooth, you are wanted for multiple crimes of murder, theft, arson, and destruction of Public, Private and Government Property.”
“Ah Captain Shala! I figured ye ugly mug would show up sooner or later, I was hoping to finish my business with the good Captain quicker, but I guess I need to me a watch.”
“Save it, I’m taking you in slime, or what’s left of you.” The Woman, clearly a shark showed her fangs as the Pirate took out a wooden whistle.
“I’m afraid you’re not taking me in, not I’ve still got some friends in Low places.” He blew the whistle and from his shadow rose a skeletal knight.
“Yes Boss?” The Knight bowed slightly in a deep voice.
“Get me and me ill gotten gains out of here.” From the knight’s shadow a dark line lifted a bag of loot the pirates gathered, and pulled it to the pair.
“You won’t get away!” The shark woman grabbed water in her webbed hands and tossed it, with a loud crack as if she fired a small cannon, the knight threw his cape over himself and the pirate, blocking the water and making the two vanish.
“DAMN IT! FUCK!” The Shark woman punched a hole in the pier as the crew of the ship sighed, feeling that everyone failed.
“Lads, stand at attention for yer pay.” The Captain was clearly sullen, feeling as if he made a wrong choice, you were fixated on the Shark woman, her light blue skin and pale white muscular belly, her messy white hair and her large but toned breasts, you snapped out as everyone lined up.
The Captain began distributing pay to the volunteers, leaving the officers out as they had their own pay, and slowly reached you, and handed you two sacks. “I heard one of the boys from below deck say you got the bow of Blacktooth’s ship. I commend ye lad, had that scurvy ridden rat not tricked us we might have had him. A commendable job, if you ever want to be a part of the Navy proper come let me know.”
As he was ready to leave you stopped the Captain. “Uh Captain I was wondering, can you tell me about that shark woman from before?”
“Lad, if I know what you’re thinking, STOP. That woman is a loose cannon, who bites first, ask questions never. She’s a bit too much to be tamed by a young guppy like you.” After that you were dismissed and got off the boat, everyone was still freaked out by what happened. The Fisherman was being tended to, the town’s guard questioning people and all the fish people stayed under the surface. You walked home, feeling this was enough for one day. You opened the door and sat down, counting 100 gold coins for your work. Part of you wishes you could have done something to stop all this, but the other part was too tired to think on it anymore. Putting the money away you walked into your bedroom and laid down on a stiff bed made up bamboo and leaves. It wasn’t much, but it was a start you thought as you drifted off.
    Morning drew strong as the sun poked in through the ceiling forcing you awake. You stretched out, feeling a bit sore from action yesterday. You head into the kitchen and have a light breakfast of fruit and eggs before starting off you day.
You open up shop for the first time in your life and sit behind the counter to wait. As you wait you see the people pass by, some window shoppers but no one seemingly interested. You wait for an hour for anything when you hear a loud banging from under the floor. You walk over with a confused look to see a hook on the floor, you pull it and a long stretch of boarding comes off to reveal a waterway, and out pops a familiar shark woman. "You! Are you the newcomer that showed up in town yesterday!?"
"Yeah?" The Shark woman looked you over with a mean look to her and sniffed you out.
"I find it quite odd. That Captain Blacktooth just HAPPENS to sneak past one of our oldest and trusted officers in the country on the same day you show up."
"Are you accusing me? The Captain himself can vouch for me, I hardly did anything to affect his judgement"
"The Captain is busy drinking himself into a stupor for what happened last night, and I'm merely fulfilling my duty as Captain of the Guards to eliminate any possibilities." The Shark woman turned around with a huff.
"I don't know if you had anything to do with it or not, but I don't take chances, especially after last night."
"I'm just a simple merchant trying to make some cash."
"That's exactly the kind of person Blacktooth would recruit if ya ask me." You were just going in circles with this woman, you thought about changing the subject.
Despite the Captain's warnings, and possibly overall better judgement you decided to try and sweet talk the shark girl. "Listen, even if I was a member of those filthy pirates, seeing a pretty face like yours would turn me instantly back to the righteous path."
"Are you...hitting on me?" She had a toothy grimace on her face
"Which answer will rebound me to not get anything bitten off." Pushing herself forward onto your counter with her tail she cupped your cheeks with her webbed hands.
"Listen here and listen good. I don't date guys unless they're absolutely positively sure they can handle me. I bite, and bite hard. So I'm going to give you one point for trying and one warning. Don't hit on me again unless you're ready for the roughest god damn shit in your life." You nod slowly as she puts you back down.
"By the way what's your name?"
"Anonymous, but you can call me Anon."
"Well Anon I'll keep my eye on you...and I assume you'll keep yours on me." She said noticing you looking her over. She leaped back into the water under your floor and went away.
"That was hot."
After the scene you finally are met with a few fishermen who are interested in some spears, selling 3 of them for 300 gold. Soon it became afternoon and you found yourself still sitting around waiting.
You decided to close up shop for now with a 'Gone Out' Sign and head over to the library to learn something about Arn or maybe to understand your new found knack for magic. Of course you realized you had no idea where it was so you needed to ask for directions. You spend a good hour walking around before finding it, feeling stupid because it's one of the larger buildings in town, a good three stories tall and probably half a street long. You slowly open the door and look around. The library was almost packed with all sorts of books, maps and models of ships. "Hello?"
You walk to the front desk and ring a bell, after 10 seconds you attempt to ring it again but feel something wet and squishy. "Ow!"
You look to see an orange tentacle on the bell and an Octopus woman behind the desk.
"Whoa sorry!"
"It's fine, how can I help you Mr....?"
"Anonymous, but just call me Anon. You are?"
"Octavia, I'm the head Librarian here." The Octopus woman was orange in her lower body's tone, dressed in somewhat proper clothes, her hair was orange with long singular masses of strands around her head and she wore circular glasses, her breasts were very ample and bounced with each motion, and obviously no ass to be found, and the most important note was 'gloves' on each tentacle but none on her human hands.
"Never expected an Octopus to be into books."
"How Rude! I'll have you know Octopi have quite large brains, even Octogirls like me have 34.766% more brain mass than an average human."
"Sorry about that so anyway I was wondering if I could check some books out."
"Oh of course! I'm always happy to help someone who wants to read books! Pray tell what kind of books are you interested in?"
"Well I recently learned I can do magic so some books on magic would be very useful."
"MAGIC! That's so amazing! Oh I wish I could do magic. I assume since you recently learned you'll need some rudimentary reading. Follow me."
"Oh also perhaps some books on Regions, maybe I could learn Holy magic."
"Hmm I think we have a book on basic Holy magics at least." Octavia leads you around, picking book after book out, and holding them with her tentacles as she moves along looking, she eventually sits you down with about 14 books.
"Please skim through and find 4 books, we have a 4 book policy on take outs." She goes back to her work as you look through.
A Beginner's Magic book, obvious choice there. Then a book on basic holy magic, again needed. You then picked up a 102 book on general magic and a listing of all Religions in the country and their ideologies in the event you wanted to learn more in depth Holy Magic. You take the four books over to the counter as Octavia pulls out a clipboard with a sheet. "Sign here."
You wrote your name down and Octavia took the clipboard and wrote down the book names and number, as you did so you noticed across the room was a board with multiple pirate bounties. "These are all due back by the end of the month. Hope you enjoy yourself and learn some magic! Is there anything else I can help you with?"
"Yes there is one last thing. Tell me about yourself." The Octopus girl's cheeks turned red and she grew flustered.
"A-A-About me!? W-Well there isn't much to say, I'm just a nerdy girl who likes to read books that's all!" She turned away as you leaned in.
"What kind of books?" She turned her eyes towards you.
"Usually books about adventures or romances."
"Ah A dreamer then." She looked at you with a stunned expression, you clearly hit the mark and she turned beet red. Without warning you grabbed her human hand.
"Tell me Octavia, would you do me the honor of a date?" Just then a squirt noise was heard, and Octavia turned pale before turning around.
"DATE!? I-I-I...!" She shook around before taking some deep breaths.
"Do you mean it?"
"Yes."
"O-Okay, how does tomorrow evening sound?"
"Wonderful." Octavia turned silent, you knew she couldn't say more so you left. The moment you stepped out you leaped in the air and pumped your fist, you had a date with a big breasted octopus woman. You sauntered back to your place and walked in. Putting the books in your bedroom you realized it was still only dusk.
It would be best to take a look at those books now and start learning some magic. Opening the beginner's guide you were taken aback by how much the introduction alone told you. 'In the world of magics there are four base arts. The Arcane Arts of the Five Elements Fire, Water, Wind, Lightning and Earth. From Those comes control over Magma, Ice, Weather, Energy and Metal. Beyond even that lies control of the Ethereal. Holy Magic which starts with healing the sick and renewing lost strength and giving more strength to one's being. Following that comes smiting down wicked and evil creatures, following that is the creation of life and beyond that is to wrestle the souls of the dead from the grasp of Death itself and to understand Creation on a higher level. Space/Time magic which is broken into control over Gravity starting with force magic or movements of objects between distances. Eventually the conundrums of the universe are unraveled allowing one to control gravity, dimensions and even time itself, no known master has been found of these arts. Lastly is the Forbidden Dark Arts, none of which are covered. Animation of the Dead, summoning devils and demons, corruption of minds and bodies, death and decay. Eventually all leads to Destruction Magic, and with that the end of entire nations.'
Ethereal? Creation? Space/Time? End of entire Nations? What have you gotten yourself into you wonder. You look through the book's index to find some basics on Arcane and skim through the Beginner's guide to Holy magic, learning bit by bit about the elements and basic healing magic. Dusk turns to Night as you eat fruits while reading to keep some energy as you find yourself fascinated with Magic, but it was getting late.
    You find yourself enthralled with the books' content, and read more and more into the night. As the moon rises to the top of the sky you begin to feel the weight of your exhaustion hinder your reading. You come up with the bright idea to try and use Light Rejuvenation whispering the incantation you point your staff to yourself and feel a warm glow and a bit less tired to keep reading even more. For an extra hour you take in and practice magic before your body just says 'no' and you pass out.
The morning comes strong once again as you groggily wake up and rub your eyes, seeing you fell asleep onto your books, you open up a pocket watch and see the time was 10 in the morning, too late to see the Underwater Exploration team you gather. You stretch yourself awake and take a shower and get dressed thinking you still had the day ahead before your date with Octavia, you needed something to do until then.
You decided to open up shop until it was time for your date. You turned the sign to Open and sat down still feeling a bit tired. A few old ladies came in looking for ingredients for dinner, looking around as some Navy men came in asking for some weapons, one was even kind enough to pay for one of the lady's shopping of 50 silver along with their purchase of some weapons coming out to 1,100 gold. The other ladies each made their shopping taking 3 gold worth of meat, fruit, vegetables and drinks. As the day went on you found the hustle and bustle had slowed down, you leaned back to shut your eyes for just a second when you heard to store bell ring. "Afternoon, how can I help you..."
You leaned your head down to see it was the Captain from your first night here. "Ahoy Laddie. Mind if I have a chat?"
"Depends, do you have anything you want to buy to go with it?"
"Got some booze?"
"Cheap stuff is 10 silver, good stuff 25 and the REAL good stuff is 50." He places a gold coin down.
"Two of the real good stuff." You take the coin and hand him two bottles of strong rum figuring a sea captain like him would appreciate it. As he took it, he gripped the top of the bottle and somehow with just squeezing it popped the cork and downed some.
"I'll cut to the chase laddie. Remember when I said you should consider joining the Navy?"
"Yeah?"
"Well, I'm BEGGING you this time. I was doing some thinkin last night as I drank myself stupid. Our town doesn't have much in terms of safety, I'm old, Sharla is good but reckless, by the by I warned you not to hit on her."
"Yeah sorry about that."
"I have a son but he'd rather look for treasure than help protect the city. Look laddie I know you have this shop here, but willing volunteers are shrinking every month. We need someone new lad, and if you can use magic like the crew said then you'd be a great asset to the Navy."
The Captain began tearing up.
"I beggin ya lad, I got a family I want safe."
"This is a pretty big commitment you're asking me sir. I've just started this shop up, and I've just started learning more magic. I understand where you're coming from, I want a family myself and I want to keep them safe. But I need to take some time to think it over." The Captain sighed and turned around.
"Well if you find your answer come to the town hall, and ask for Captain Argus." The Captain walked out with his bottles, with a bit of a stagger from the booze.
You sat back and looked up at the ceiling thinking about his words carefully and about your shop. You knew how to be a merchant, you knew every con trick and how to avoid or counter them, you knew nothing of Naval laws and battles. The ringing of the bell signaling another customer snapped you out as you made a 500 gold sale on a fulls set of armor.
Afternoon was becoming night and you closed up to get ready for your date, dressing up in your best shirt and jacket. Suddenly a horrible realization hit you as you got to the door "I NEVER ASKED WHERE TO MEET UP! SHIT!"
You heard a knocking and opened it.
"Sorry we're clo..." It was Octavia, dressed in a black dress and wearing white gloves on her hands and tentacles.
"H-Hi, I never asked where to meet so I looked up where you lived." You were stunned at how beautiful she looked.
"You look amazing."
"U-Uh thanks! S-So where do you want to go?"
"How about a nice dinner date?"
"That sounds lovely, I know a place that serves the best mix of traditional and seafood."
"Lead the way then." You checked your coat pockets for the money and walked off, holding her hand as the town of you walked through town. Heading towards the area of the main gate she shows a fairly large restaurant with a fair mix of well dressed townsfolk and the upper class. "Here we are. I hope they have room."
The two of you walked in and hear the soothing sounds of a violin being played as you are greeted at the front by a well dressed man.
"Table for one human and one monster person?"
"Yes please." You responded.
"Very well, this way please." The man lead you to a circular booth and seated you two together.
She grabbed the menus with her tentacles and handed you each one. You looked down through the menu, seeing foods you'd scantly heard of and some you flat out never heard of, finally a waiter showed up and bowed to you two. "May I take your orders?"
"Yes I'll take the Spaghetti with a side of the fresh oyster meat."
"And the Madam?"
"Yes what is this Sue-shi?"
"Ah that, a delicacy of our newest chef, all the way from an island nation in the east. It is and assortment of Raw fish wrapped in rice and edible sea kelp." Octavia's eyes glistened.
"A Foreign food you say? I wish to try this."
"Very well." The waiter left with the menus as the two of you were left alone.
You looked into each other's eyes as you grabbed her human hand, rubbing it softly. Just then there was a commotion, a drunken patron.
"Sir, please calm down."
"CALM DOWN! YOU TELLING ME THIS WINE COSTS 5 GOLD!? I'VE HAD SALT WATER THAT TASTES BETTER!"
You stand up as Octavia looks to you. "Anon?"
You walked over to the scene as the drunk man pushes the worker. "Excuse me sir? You're causing a ruckus, and ruining the meals of the good people here."
"SHADDAP! I WORK 9-7 EVERY DAY TRYING TO MAKE ENDS MEET, I CATCH ME A BIG ONE, HAVE SOME MONEY TO HAVE A DECENT MEAL AND THESE CON ARTISTS GIVE ME OVERPRICED GRAPE JUICE!?"
"Sir Please, it is our finest wine."
"THOUGH I TOLD YOU TO KEEP YOUR MOUTH SHUT!" The man went to punch the worker as you pulled your staff out from a handle custom tailored into your jacket by you dad and pointed it at the man's chair.
"Wind Blast." A swirl of wind appeared under the chair and swept him onto it.
"Da fuck?"
With a twirl of your wrist the chair began to spin with the man on it 10 times before you landed it. You then used it to push a trash bin under the man as he puked.
"Sorry for the disturbance ladies and gentlemen, please return to your business." You say as you sit back down, some of the people cheering and wondering if that was a show.
"Sorry about that." You said to Octavia who was beaming.
"Anon! That was amazing! You really can do magic!" You smirked and held her hands again.
"Not as magic as your beauty." She blushed as you leaned in.
She saw it and let you come in to kiss her, you heard a squirt and felt her face scrunch but she didn't break it, she brought you in closer. "I-I'm sorry. I'm such a child, inking over nothing."
"Shhh. It's okay." Soon you two were handed your meals.
You found the oyster meat nice, soft and moist and the spaghetti wasn't too strong on the sauce and the noodles were nice and soft making it easy to eat, and Octavia found herself enjoying the Sushi, eating it at a fairly quick pace.
"My that was quite good, even this 'wah-sabi.' they give you with it." You cleaned a bit of said wasabi with a napkin and payed for your meal, a total of 7 gold for the food and the 'finest wine' you wanted to try.
You two walked along the boards of the streets feeling the cold sea air on your faces as Octavia moved her hair back. "I love the sea breeze, don't you?"
"Wouldn't know, only my third day here."
"Oh! That's right you just moved in, I am so forgetful."
"It's fine. I like it though, being here."
"I like you being here too." Octavia blushed and covered her mouth and another squirt noise went off. This time you could see it through the black dress.
"Damn! I-I'm so sorry! I swear I try to overcome this!" You smile and take her hands.
"It's fine, it's endearing."
"It's childish! Even adolescents learn to not ink themselves." You bring her closer her eyes fixated on yours.
"Then you're a child at heart."
"You certainly make me feel as such." She pressed her bosom against you and using her tentacles guided your hand onto them, then into her dress as you both kissed under the moonlight before you both broke it and looked into each others eyes.
"Octavia do you have any Dreams?"
"Dreams?"
"Yeah, dreams! Ambitions, Goals." You walk up to a lamp post and swing around it and stand on the base.
"I have a dream to become a big shot merchant, making tens of thousand gold a day, and to live in a big house, with a big family. Beautiful wives and cute little kids running around and playing with each other. A big happy family that I can use all the money I earned to live happy and fulfilled lives."
"That's quite ambitious. But multiple wives? Aren't you worried one would feel...neglected." You hop off and walk up to Octavia.
"As long as she loved me I'd love her more than anything and never let her feel that way. So tell me Octavia, what's your dream?"
She blushed before she looked you in the eye. "I want to see the world." She moved towards the water and placed her tentacles in the water.
"All my life I've only seen the outside world through books, I hardly ever leave the town and when I do it's never far. I hear there are islands with snow all over, tropical rainforests with trees as tall as hills! Sandy deserts with wonders of stone, and even things we've yet to see. I want to see that myself, not just in a book, but with my own two eyes."
She looked down and kicked her tentacles around. "But I could never do that, I'm a frail librarian, I have no way to get a ship."
"A ship huh?" You sat down next to her.
"What if you were dating someone in the Navy?"
"Hmm?" Octavia looked to you confused
"Someone thinks I have potential to be something in the navy. I told him I'd think about it, but if a pretty lady wants a boat, I'd be willing to take a few orders now and then."
"Please! Don't do something like that on my account." She placed her hands on yours before pulling back in shock.
"I wouldn't want you to get hurt over someone as insignificant as me."
"You shouldn't say that about yourself. You said yourself you have a dream to see the world, than that's how big you are. You're as big as your dreams!"
Octavia put her hand against her mouth and began to tear up. "N-No one has ever said anything like that before to me." You take her hands and kiss her on the lips once again.
"Well I just did." Another squirt sound.
"Ohhhh!" You chuckled as you helped her pull her tentacles out of the now black water.
"I think our date has reached it's conclusion." Octavia looks at you through the top of her glasses.
"I'm sorry, I just never..." You place your fingers on her lips.
"Stop being sorry for who you are. Now how about we clean you up." She looks down to see her ink is pouring down.
"How close is your place?"
"Too far. Your place is closer." You nod and lead her back to your place, shutting the door, locking it and taking her to the bath.
"Sure you'll be fine?"
"Yes, but, do you mind washing my dress for me while I wash myself off?" You walked in and saw her half naked, her large panties over her octopus half and her bouncing breasts, Octavia forgot how undressed she was and blushed with her dress extended out with her tentacle.
You took the dress from her and walked out without a word. You started to hand wash the dress and you heard the shower start. You cast a Water spell to drain the water out of the dress to dry it off and tossed it into the water under your shop. You heard the shower turn off and waited 5 minutes before a tentacle came from between the cracks, you handed Octavia the dress and waited for her to come out. She looked just as good as when you first saw her this evening. "That was..awkward."
"Don't sweat it."
"Thanks for the evening Anon, it was...quite frankly the best night of my life."
"Well looks like I need to top that."
"Oh! Don't do anything reckless." She said as you laughed and kissed her once again, she waved and turned for the door, stopped in the doorway and looking back to you.
"You really are magic anon, because you make me feel like I'm flying." She walked out the door and into the night.
You smiled and stretched as you counted up all the money you had and cleaned you good clothes before heading to bed.
The next morning came strong as ever, this time you were up at the crack of dawn, early enough to cook some bacon and eggs before 7. You felt more alive than ever after that date with Octavia, the day was yours to have.
You were up early enough, it was time to look into the Underwater Exploration team, perhaps maybe meet up with Fran if she did join up with them. You walked out and headed to the docks where you saw a large fishing boat sitting next to a weird half submerged ship made of metal, with dozens of people getting supplies onto the ship. You walk up to them. "Ahoy there, are you the Underwater Exploration team?"
The group looked towards you and a tanned young man with a green gem around his neck jumped down from the mast of the boat before you.
"Indeed we are! I'm Captain Argyle, leader of the Underwater Exploration team! Are you looking for adventure! Treasure? Or to see the beauty that lies beneath the surface of the seas?"
"I'm preferable to all of thee above."
"Ha ha! I like that kinda attitude! We're about to sale off, so hop aboard the ship or the Submarine."
"Subwhat?"
"Submarine! Latest invention from the big brains at the Naval headquarters, it's a ship made entirely out of metal that can go underwater! It's amazing!" Argyle was walking back onto the fishing boat before you remembered something.
"Hey have you seen a Frog girl lately?"
"Hmm? Nope, HEY! ANYONE OF YOU GUYS SEE A FROG GIRL?"
"Nope." One guy went off
A red mermaid popped up. "I haven't!"
A guy with two eyes closed shook his head. "Nope, ain't seen no green gals around here."
"Sorry bud, but if you want to join us hurry up, the Fishing boat is for keeping the Sub safe and pulling things up, the Sub is where all the fun undersea stuff happens."
"I'll see what this Submarine thing is all about." You said climbing inside.
"OKAY! EVERYONE LET'S SET SAIL!" The top of the sub closed and the ship and went under water as a large bulky man turns a crank and the ship moved forward shaking and creaking.
"Sorry about the noise, she's just a prototype!"
"It's fine, I just hope we have an escape plan in case it breaks."
"She's outside." The crew member pointed out the window to the red mermaid who waved at you, and you waved back.
"Merlina keeps us safe if anything is wrong and since Mermaids understand fish she can warn us if something is coming."
Merlina? The name sounds familiar, or perhaps familiar to something else. "So what's the plan today."
"Big score, we found some Dragon bones yesterday, now we're going to see if we can pull it out and study it. The best part is it's a Winged Dragon, those are especially rare in this part of the world."
"Anything else?"
"Nothing much, the dragon had a chest under it's ribs, we're probably going to get that and divvy up the gold as usual. Oh right, new guy. We usually divvy up any treasure we find, unless it's something small or someone really put a lot of effort to get it."
"Sounds interesting, you guys do this every day?"
"Yup, crack of dawn to the late evening. Sometimes it's boring but when we've seen our fair share of exciting stuff too!"
"Yeah, like the time the Captain took down that Sea Serpent, or the time Merlina swam circles around a Kraken to save three crew members."
As the trip went on you found yourself peering out the window and admiring the view, both the underwater and the mermaid.
"We're here, heading up!"
"Hmm? We're going up?" You asked as the ship rose."
"Yeah, we need to get our suits on and get out there so we can hook it to the fishing boat." As the sub went topside you and the others got into suits with weird helmets and a rubber hose attached to the back.
"What's this?"
"A hose for the air you're going to be breathing, we have these tanks that hold air inside them and that we turn the dials on to release air. It's how we breath underwater since we're not all fish."
You all climb out of the sub with the rest as they check their gear and help you check yours. After everything checks out you all leap into the water and feel yourself lower onto the surface. It was there you saw the skeleton. A massive formation of dragon bones, belonging to what must have been a 30 foot long winged beast. Under it's ribs you see for certain a chest. Perhaps it died looking for it? Or it was his and ate it to prevent something from stealing it. Either way you all walked towards it, looking over the moss covering it's bones and seeing a shadow of a boat appear over you all. Hooks lowered down as you all began to latch them to different pieces of the dragon. You were curious about the chest though and slowly made your way. Just then you felt something, the ground under your feet shake. You step backwards until you see the cause, the shaking of the bones of the supposed to be dead monster.
It's empty eye sockets glowed red as the head raised itself. The Dragon had come alive and began attacking grabbing on of the crew and opening it's maw. Before the fangs crushed the man the mermaid had already rescued him, pulling him above water.
"Everyone stay clear of the beast! I'll save you!"
The dragon roared and started towards you.

    You stared down the dragon as you unzipped your diving suit in order to pull out your staff. You saw Merlina swimming towards you and raised your hand and shook your head. You pointed to the others as your staff glowed blue and you slammed it onto the ground. “Bubble Barrier!”
The water around you moved away from your body, slowly creating a circle around you, thick layers of water formed a barrier between you and the dragon who tried crushing you but the bubble held it’s boney hand back as you pondered the situation. “Let’s think, I can’t cast fire Magic underwater, and lightning magic would only harm me as well. I don’t know how hard the ground under me is so i doubt I could harm the dragon with that. That leaves me with Water Magic, Wind Magic and holy magic.”
The dragon slowly began to flatten the bubble as you continued to think. “The book on Holy magic states that healing magic has the reverse effect on Undead and Demonic creatures. Meaning that my first course of action would be…”
The bubble burst as you smacked the ground with your staff and 2 pillars of rock rose up and caught the dragon’s hand between it’s claws and you swam up to the right wrist of the giant arm. “To break this dragon apart piece by piece!”
You placed your hand on the wrist and cast Light Heal, steam rose from the creature’s ligaments as it howled. It raised it’s claw up as you cast another Bubble Barrier, cringing from the stress of casting two spells at once for the first time. You kept holding on before you saw the Dragon was aiming for your air hose. You canceled your barrier and cast Wind Blast to blow yourself away as it swiped, you saw the creature lose balance for a second showing you did hurt it somewhat. You were confused now, why did the Dragon attack your air hose, how did it know that attacking it would hurt you? There was no time to think because suddenly another crew attacked the beast’s hind leg with a harpoon, stabbing it repeatedly to no avail other than gaining the beast’s attention. Merlina was topside and just turned around, even she couldn’t make it as the Dragon turned to swipe the man. “Light Empower! Bubble Barrier!”
You protect the man as the slash cut the bubble and him, light bits of blood dripped into the sea as the man stabbed again, this time piercing the bone of the left claw palm. Merlina grabbed the man and pulled him away as you placed your hand on the right ankle of the dragon’s foot and cast Light Heal once again, and again the beast roared in pain, this time it’s retaliation was quicker, a slam from it’s tail to knock you off your feet. You floated helplessly as it turned and opened it’s maw. You formed another barrier around yourself to slow the crushing jaw enveloping you. You were trapped, the bubble had mere second before it would pop and you needed to think fast, you then realized a way to beat the creature, however it would be dangerous. You cast Light Empower on yourself just to ready yourself for this plan, then you cast Wind Blast and filled the bubble with so much air it felt like you were in a storm, your staff  glowed red as you looked up at the beast’s closing jaw. “Fireball.”
The bubble erupted into a huge blast of flame blowing you away and the jaw apart, dislocating the beast’s jaw and cracking it’s skull, teeth slowly rose to the surface as black smoke covered the Dragon’s face. The damage wasn’t just to the beast however, you were slightly burned, your muscles were in pain from casting that many spells at once and your face was cut up from the glass of your mask breaking, you toss it off and put a bubble around your head to breath. Merlina was floating above having seen the scene in awe. “That was amazing! You beat that Dragon!”
“GET AWAY! IT’S NOT BEATEN YET!” You shouted motioning her away frantically but she couldn’t hear you as the bubble blocked your voice.
The creature’s claw swung towards her and she was like a deer caught by a hunter. You cast Light Empower on yourself to handle the stress you were about to put your body under. You blasted towards her with Wind Blast and put bubbles around both of you as your got in the way just in time, taking the full brunt of the attack and being smashed into the ground, and Merlina merely received some cuts from the edge of the claws. You looked as the beast turned back towards you and limped towards you. ‘For something without muscles, you sure hit hard.’ you thought as you clenched your staff and put a bubble around your head again. “That being said however, I’ve already won.”
The Bone Dragon walked forward as your feet touched the sandy ground and you looked up. “Earth Spike!”
Three pillars of earth shot up through the hole in the Dragon’s left palm and curved to make a hook trapping the dragon’s palm to the ground.
“Water Control!” You created a tube of between you the the dragon by moving the water in a circle around the empty space, then formed a large bubble, large enough to fit the dragon’s skull in before shrinking it and placing your glowing staff against it.
“Wind Blast!” You filled the bubble with so much air a tornado formed before it became part of the shrinking bubble which ended at the size of a pool ball, you placed the bubble at the end of the tunnel and struck it with your staff and turned it to point the crystal down the path and fired a fireball out towards the bubble as the Dragon roared.
“Fire requires oxygen to burn, now, if you were to have a ball of compressed air and added some fire to it…”
The bubble went into the Dragon’s mouth as the fireball burst the bubble.
“You get a Firebomb.”
The Dragon’s skull exploded into pieces and the shockwave knocked your back as you smirked.
“Spell Combination #1, Firebomb!”
You felt yourself passing out, and the bubble around your head faded, you could fell water entering your lips as your eyes slowly closed. Suddenly warm flesh pressed against your lips and sucked the water out, you opened your eyes back up to see the red mermaid giving your mouth to mouth as she carried you towards the fishing boat.
You were content with this situation, until you saw something horrible. The Bone Dragon, now headless reaching it’s claws out for the two of you. Just then Captain Argyle leaped into the water carrying a sword, he swam past your two and with three blindingly quick swings the entire beast was cut apart. He grabbed the two of your and leaped back onto the boat.
“Hey, coulda done that sooner.”
“Sorry, I was interested in the magic show.” He laughed as Merlina groaned, holding her cut up sides as they were still bleeding.
“Merlina!”
“Hold on! I can heal…” You got up onto your knees before you lost consciousness completely.
You woke up in an unfamiliar room looking straight up as you tried to sit up. “Hey, hey! Easy there champ, you’re way torn up to be doing that.”
“Captain Argyle? Where’s Merlina?” He pointed to the bed across from you as she had bandages around her waist.
“It wasn’t too deep but she still needs some rest, as do you, the doctor says your body did way more than it should.”
“Sorry, about that. I got her hurt because I was a bit greedy for a chest.”
“No apologies needed, we’ve never see bones come back to life before, and to be honest I was impressed that you could do magic like that.”
“You were the impressive one with that sword work. I’ve never seen anyone take down anything that fast.”
“Heh it wasn’t anything special, just something my old man taught me.” He took the green gem around his neck and looked it over.
“Anyway you need some rest, oh and don’t worry, we got the chest down there, and you’ve earned your share of it’s contents.” The Captain left as you went back to sleep.
You arrived back in town around dusk as you walked off the boat slowly towards everyone else who was gathered around.
“Okay guys listen up! We’re getting the chest and it’s contents appraised before we hand out the payments, but I just want to say.” The Captain pointed to you.
“That guy gets the biggest pay. Does anyone have any objections?” The crew shook their heads and applaud your as you got onto the pier.
“T-thanks, it wasn’t anything.” You rubbed the back of your head as some of the crew lifted the chest and took it away, the Captain wrapped his arm around yours and smiled.
“So guys, how about a round of drinks on me to celebrate this guy’s success!?”
The crew cheered and shouted with joy as the man with the closed eyes walked away.
“Sorry Cap’n I need to pass on that, all this scary stuff was stressful.”
“Oh Caius you’re such a baby, live a little!”
“Nah I’m fine Captain, you all have fun without me.” He said walking away.
“Well who needs him, come on Anon, drinks are on me!”
You moved Argyle's arm of yours apologizing and said you had something to do and walked into the city, turning into an alley you began to try and track down Caius. Something had been bothering you about him, and since the trip you felt your suspicions grown. You found the man walking along the 'streets' of town, and tried your best to follow him as he went into an alley. You ran after him and turned a corner, a dead end. You wondered where he went when you turned to see him there smiling. "Hello newbie. Is there something I can help you with?"
"As a matter of fact there is something I wanted to ask. This morning I asked if anyone on your crew saw a frog girl. You said something that bothered me. 'I haven't see any green gals'. I find that odd because I didn't specify her color."
"Well why is that so odd? Most frog species are green aren't they?"
"Of course, that would cause suspicion but what I find odd is what happened after that. When we went to excavate the Dragon's Bone the dragon came to life. The Captain told me that something like this had never happened before. It seems odd that on my first outing with your team something like that happened." The air began to fill with an odd tension as you spoke.
"Now even if I was to call this a mere coincidence there's still more that seems off about the issue. The creature attacked my air hose in my suit. Now how would a Dragon know about a man made device that's possible not from it's time? Why target that?" You began to feel a creeping sensation growing around you.
"Lastly the Frog I'm looking for said she was going to join your team, and if she ran into trouble I told her she should come to me, she wasn't a part of your team and she hasn't come to see me. So that leaves two theories, one she found another job despite her young age. Or two. She's hiding from something, or someone. So tell me, are these all one long string of coincidences?" There was silence between you two.
Caius suddenly began clapping his hands and laughing. "You're quite the story teller! You should take up writing a book or something. Okay, okay I'll admit it. I did see that frog of yours, I told her she was too young to join and she went off, I don't know why she didn't see you. I didn't feel like it was that big a deal."
"If it was no big deal why hide it?"
"Like I said I didn't think it was that big a deal, sure I'm guilty of lying, doesn't prove I was the one controlling that dragon."
"Hmm. I don't recall mentioning 'controlling' the Dragon in our conversation." Caius's smile turned crooked as he lowered his hand, you drew your staff.
"I think you know something Caius." You cast Light Empower and charged at the man.
"AND YOU'RE GOING TO TELL ME!" You strike his face with your strengthened fist but the man didn't even flinch. You jumped back and fired a fireball at him and he swatted it away.
"I've got to say, you're a bit too smart for your own good." Before you could even think Caius lifted you into the air with one hand and threw your against a wall, then began to choke your with his arm.
"I'm going to give you a little warning. Stay away from that little froggy if you know what's good for your health."
He let go and began to walk away, he turned and smiled.
"See ya." He turned the corner as you got up and ran after him, he was gone.
Who was he? What did he know? Something was going on and you needed to act fast.
You didn't know how much time you had, but something in your gut said you needed to find Fran FAST. You cast Light Heal and Light Rejuvenate on yourself to get some quick energy and bolted as fast as you could to search for Fran. You checked your place first to see if she did show up, you checked every nook, cranny and underwater pocket. Nothing, you moved onto the streets and began asking random pedestrians if they saw Fran, giving a more details description. Your search became more and more frantic by the minute until you finally got some form of lead. "Yeah I saw her."
"WHERE!?" You grabbed the man as he backed off.
"She was talking to some guy whose eyes were closed shut down by the pier, well his back anyway, moments she saw his face she bolted."
"Did you see where she went?!"
"N-No." You ran into the city, looking around some more, it was clear now that Caius was probably a part of Fran's past, perhaps worked for her Step-Father she ran away from.
You kept looking around before you ran out of breath in front of a somewhat large build.
"DAMN IT! Where is she!?" You took deep breaths wondering why you were doing this for a near stranger? What if she stole something from her Stepdad, what if she wasn't innocent. You wondered if it was worth it when you were approached from behind.
"Is there a problem my child?" You looked to see a Frog girl Nun standing in the doorway of what seemed to be a Church.
"Forgive me Sister, I didn't realize I was in front of a chur...hey have you see a Frog Girl? Green, White stomach, still has her tail?"
"Sister, is there something going on outside?" A familiar head peeked around the corner.
"Fran!"
"A-Anon?" The Frog girl was shocked as you walked up and kneel in front of her.
"Are you okay? I heard you ran into that asshole Caius. Is everything..." The second you mentioned his name he pupils shrank and she began to tremble.
"Fran?"
"Go away..." You were taken about by her words as she began to cry.
"STAY AWAY FROM ME! DON'T GET CLOSE!" The Frog girl hopped deeper into the Church.
"FRAN!" You called out as she ran into a back room of the Church.
"Oh Dear, whatever has gotten into her?"
"Sister, please did Fran say anything when she came here?" You asked as the Nun tilted her head.
"She simply said she was being chased and needed sanctuary, and this was the only place she felt safe. Is something the matter?"
"Fran might be being chased by someone and I'm...a friend so to speak. I told her to find me if anything got rough, but it seems rougher than I thought."
"Well come inside at least." The Nun offered you in an you accepted the offer. Stepping inside you saw the place. At the back was a Statue of a very round Toad woman surrounded by fountains filled with Lilly Pads.
"What is this place?"
"This is a church of Cana Tal, the Goddess of Fertility. Cana Tal is a Cane Toad Toad girl, who gave birth to over 100,000 Frogs and Toads to prevent our races from going extinct. When she was near death the Dragon Goddess allowed her to ascend to Godhood where she blesses all those who worship her with fertility and life."
You looked the statue over before walking up to the door Fran ran into.
"There is no exit from that room besides that door, she should still be in there."
You stared at the door for a good minute.
You knocked at the door. "Fran?"
You opened it up to see her in a fetal position on a bed sobbing. You could only look as the energetic Frog girl was turned into sobbing mess.
"Fran listen to me. I don't know what's going on with you and that bastard, but I know it's something terrible if this is what just hearing his name does to you. Let me help you."
"...Just go away, you don't know what's going on with my family. Caius isn't some sahagin on the road, or some random thug. You can't stop him. Once he has me he'll tell my step-father where I am and that's it. I don't want you getting involved in this."
"Involved with WHAT!?" You shouted.
"Please Anon. Just don't get too close to me, it'll only end badly for you."
"Fran! Listen to me! I WILL help you if you want me too or not. That's the kind of guy I am, I see a pretty lady I need to help her out. So please, just tell me SOMETHING!" There was silence as the Nun began to pull you back as you were starting a commotion.
"Anon, Caius is the kind of person who can see anything coming, that's all I can tell you." Fran said as the Nun closed the door.
"Forgive me Sister."
"No no it's fine. I just didn't realize how much trouble the little one was in."
"Same here, but I won't let that stop me." You said walking out.
You began to suspect Caius was much more than what he appeared even when he showed off his power. Something was sinister about him and you needed something to fight back.
You went home as soon as you left the Church, you knew that you needed more magic in order to fight Caius. Sitting down and lighting a lamp you cracked open the books and began to read through them carefully. If Caius was really behind the Bone Dragon you needed new spells, something he wouldn't expect. Page by page you studied into the night, casting Light Rejuvenate over and over to give yourself bursts of energy, each hour your staff glowed less and less. Soon all that was keeping you up was that crying Frog girl hiding away in a church. Why a Church though? That thought rang through your mind as you switched over to the book on basic holy magic. Soon all sounds vanished from the city as it became the graveyard shift. The lamp flickered as you kept your eyes open as hard as you could. You stood up and walked around to try and get the blood flowing. You passed by your things and began to wonder about what Captain Argus said. Was this the kind of thing he was talking about? You had no money to gain from this, what you were doing was because you felt it was 'right'. So many thoughts filled you head. Including inspiration. You took out a blank book, and a pen and began writing down your idea. You figured it out, something that could beat Caius no matter what he threw at you. You continued your study until you heard the noise of the city starting up. It was a new day. With bags under you eyes you shut you books and got dressed. You made last minute checks before you walked out the door, today you were going to wake Fran from whatever nightmare she has.
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Before challenging Caius you decided you should check on Fran to make sure he hadn't gotten to her yet. You walked back to the church and knocked on the door once getting there. "Hello?"
The door was opened to a sight you were not expecting at all. The Nun from last night, stark naked and men plowing various human and monster girls into the night, your mouth was left wide open. "Hello again, are you here to see Fran?"
"Y-Yeah, uhm."
"Oh don't worry this is just our morning sermon. The goddess of fertility encourages healthy sexual relations between lovers here under her gaze and will bless those with the miracle of life."
"I see..." You only read small passages about the religion when studying in your books last night but you never imagined an orgy in a church.
"Fran is in the back if you want, but I'm also here if you wish to join us, I'd love to have another child." The Nun said in a blunt way to imply she had too many kids.
You passed by the scene and knocked on Fran's door and opened it, seeing her eat a large breakfast of toast, eggs, bacon, an orange and a banana. "Anon."
"Feeling better?" She looked down at the food as you sat down on a desk.
"I'm going to fight him today, what will happen when I win?"
"I don't know. I never imagined it would happen. Anon, why are you doing this? I'm just some runaway, one who tried to steal from you, gero."
"Cause it feels like the right thing to do. Besides haven't you ever imagined a dashing knight coming to your rescue? Well this time it's a wizard." You smiled as she looked you in the eye, the sounds of orgasms ruined the moment but Fran smiled nonetheless.
"Anon, if you do win...can I come work at your shop?"
"Of course." You nodded and walked over patting her head.
"HEY!" You chuckled as you walked out of the church. The moment you closed the door you saw a figure standing across the street.
"Yo, Anon. See you didn't listen to my warning. Now you lead me to that little frog."
"Caius. Tell me, why are you after Fran?"
"What does it matter? I'm going to take her here and now."
"Answer me!"
"Heh fine, you won't be alive soon anyway. See I was given some orders by her Step-pops. I was to join the Underwater Exploration team to search for some 'useful' things to our leader. He recently gave me a second order to return her to him."
"Why, who is her Step-father?"
"That I can't tell you, but it's not him that makes her important it's her mother. She never told you her full name did she? She isn't 'Fran' She's Francesca Tadel the 12th. Her mother was a Duchess."
"Fran's, a noble?"
"WAS, until she ran away from home 2 years ago. Now that I found her, I'm going to be given a huge ransom for her head."
"Like Hell you will." Caius began laughing hard.
"Like Hell I will? What do YOU know about Hell. I'll tell you what it is." Suddenly Caius' entire body began to have eyes opening up all over his body and horns began to grow from his forehead.
"Allow me to properly introduce myself, while I am 'Caius' I have my Demon name. 'Seeker'. Pleased to meet you. Now, will you let me kill you?"
    You drew your staff as Seeker vanished and appeared behind you ready to chop your head off with his hand. “Too slow human.”
Just then he stopped and leaped away as spears of water shot through the wood towards where he was. “Water Spear.”
From under Seeker more spears of water shot out, each time he dodged by leaping backwards, you moving forward towards him, levitating the spears towards you after missing. “Oh I get it, you’re trying to keep me away from your little Froggy. Idiot, that won’t work. I’ll take those weak spears of yours if I have to!”
You fired the spears at him as he ran forward, his body taking the spears like nothing, when they then began to shift and wrap around him. “Water Chain!”
You walked towards the Demon as water sprung out and added more chains to the demon. “I promised Fran I’d stop you, and I intend to do that. I don’t care if you’re human, demon or whatever else. I’ve already planned how to beat you Caius.”
You put your hand around his face and your hand glows with a holy light and Seeker’s face begins to steam and sizzle. “Beat me? That’s so funny I forgot to laugh.”
Suddenly  bombardment of beams shot from Seeker’s eyes on his body, however you had already launched yourself into the air with a geyser of water. The beams turned the water chains around him and thick stream of water to steam instantly leaving you floating in the air for a few seconds as Caius aimed at you. He shot the beams at you once again but a stream of water shot up and curved to give you a foothold. “Lightweight Spell.”
“I see you certainly came prepared, but tell me this. How much mana do you have?”
You stood on the floating water flow silently. “You clearly spent all of your time researching magic, learning new spells and figuring out how you could ‘beat’ me. You made one huge oversight, you humans need rest to regain your strength, to restore mana. Tell me! How much mana have you spent to learn these spells, and how much have you gotten back!? This battle was already decided before it even began!”
Seeker leaped into the air and swung his arm as you changed the water direction downwards and slid down, then you wrapped him in the trail behind you and pointed your staff. “Shock blast!”
You fired a ball of lightning that ran through the water and electrocuted Seeker before he broke free and landed on the ground, he bent down and vanished and struck you in the gut, you felt the blow dig deep into your body and even begin to pierce the flesh. He raised his other fist to strike you, when you stopped the fist with your glowing palm and then grabbed the arm digging into your gut. “I already know your weakness. You demon types hate Holy magic, even a healing spell hurts you. You can preach as much as you want about demonic powers and strength, but even the frailest of Holy magic users can beat a Demon, isn’t that right?”
Seeker fell to his knees as his fist’s and wrist’s flesh began to burn off. “That may be true, but we demons aren’t so weak we’ll fall to pathetic heal spells like this!”
He lifted you up with his fist and smashed you against a wall, again, and again and again. He then tossed you straight through into the building. “You’re still years too early to use Holy magic than kill me.”
Seeker walked in, his body drenched in a black aura that slowly healed the wounds on his body. You tried to get up but his foot stomped you back down. “You’re just some novice doing simple parlor tricks. A true magic user is something that strikes fear even into demons, but you’re nothing more than some kid who learned that magic existed compared to me.”
Just then he leaped to the side as spears shot from behind him towards him. “How long do you intend to use this tactic? My entire body has eyes all over, I can see any attack from any direction! You can’t win!”
He kicks you off the ground and into a wall of the building, you put the staff on the ground to help yourself up, you slip and fall to your knees as he walks over cracking his knuckles.
“Give it up! If you surrender now I’ll let you live, just without a few arms or legs.”
He stood over you before smacking your staff away forcing you to the ground and then lifted you up by your collar. “Never, I saw how much fear you put in that cute frog, and I knew right there and then that I was going to kill you.”
He only laughed as he clenched his fist ready to strike. “So are you going to be some big damn hero? Saving the damsel in distress?
“No.”
Just then large collections of rock came up from under the pier and formed on your arms, two spears shot through Seeker’s feet and your staff levitated behind him. “I’m going to be a Wizard.”
You cast Light Empower on yourself and with the rock gauntlets you began to strike the now stuck demon over and over, targeting his eyes on his body as the staff’s jewel glew more and more bright red. You leaped back and formed a bubble around yourself and blocked with your stone gauntlets. “Fire Blast!”
A Fireball the size of Seeker launched towards his back and exploded on contact, launching your back outside. Smoke billowed out of the hole as you recalled your staff to you, just then the smoke split and a single punch sent you flying across the alley. Seeker stood there, breathing heavily and his body burned all over, the dark aura covering him again as he slowly tried to heal. “You little shit. You hurt me, YOU HURT ME!”
“It’s going to hurt a lot more Caius, I swear on that.” You slowly stood up as he walked over, you cast Lightweight on yourself again and blasted off with a Wind Blast to leap over buildings in a single bound. You looked behind you to see the burnt demon following you.
“Good, I’ve turned his full attention to me. I still have a few spells left to pull out, but he was right, I’m already feeling myself running low on mana. Let’s part one worked.” You stopped and found the building you were looking for and ran inside. Second later the demon burst down the door looking around.
“What’s the matter Caius? Can’t see me without your eyes?.” He smashed crates and barrels in the storehouse looking for you as a cannonball rolled off a rack and landed with a loud thud, you walked out in front of it.
“It’s time I show you a trick I made up myself. I got the idea from seeing Sharla shoot water at such speeds it sounded like a cannon going off.” You used Wind Blast to launch the cannonball to your face level and placed your palm against it, your palm glowing red.
“Original Spell #1! Magic Launcher!” You blasted the cannonball towards the demon who braced himself with his arms, the metal ball indenting into the demon’s skin.
“I figured out a way to use elemental magic to fire something at high speeds, like a canon. It’s an offshoot of imbuing  magic, I couldn’t learn the art fully but adapted what I knew to this.” You grabbed a spear and pointed it towards Seeker as the Cannonball fell off his now bent arms.
“Magic is truly an amazing thing, don’t you think?” Your hand glowed red again and the same thing happened but this time he caught the weapon, and bent the spear like nothing.
“So what!? Do you think this can stop me!?”
He began rushing towards you as the Cannonball from before broke through the wood into the water below, then launched towards his back and buried into it. You levitated another cannonball and this time launched it with Wind magic, sending it spiraling into his stomach and bending him over, once that ball fell you repeated the Water variant launching the iron ball into his face. His aura glowed black as his eyes opened back up, now glowing red. Seeker appeared in front of you in a single moment and began to barrage you.
“STUPID HUMAN! YOU ONLY MADE ME MORE ANGRY! DEMONS DRAW ON HATE!”
You could feel bones crush and crack under the power of these blows. You floated in the air as the attacks kept coming, a strong right sending you into a wall and blood dripped from your mouth.
“Damn, I can’t believe a human made me lose my composure. Whatever. Once this mission is over I can just live in the lap of luxur…”
The sound of lightning striking was head as a spear shot through the Demon’s stomach and then dull thuds of two barrels embedding themselves on the end of the spear shaft, Caius turned to see you still on the ground but smiling.
“You survived!? You humans are really like roaches, never learning when to die!”
You launched another barrel, this time getting stuck on the spear head.
“What the hell are you doing?” He looked to see the word ‘Powder’ on the barrel as you pointed your staff and smirked and became covered in rocks.
“Fireball.”
The armory you had hid yourself in exploded, you were launched out, the rocks covering you were red hot and smoking as you landed in the middle of the street, the rocks fell off as you breathed hard. You were spent on Mana for sure. As the people around you began to clamor about you saw a figure coming out of the smoke. Seeker walked out, a hole in his chest and his skin completely burned off, his burnt muscles and event places of burnt bone billowed smoke as his dark aura grew stronger than before, and his hole filled up and his skin reformed but now black as night. Everyone screamed and ran away as you laid on the ground, the demon loomed over you before picking you up. “To think, I have to use my full power just to survive. I actually have to commend you. That still doesn’t mean I’m not pissed! You’re out of mana, I have you right here. Any last words?”
“Yeah, look behind you.”
“Oh come now, do you really expect me to fall for such a simple…” Just then a giant shark woman leaped from the water and a massive chunk of flesh vanished from the demon’s neck.
Sharla spat the blackened flesh out and coughed. “Nasty! I’ve tasted burnt steaks that tasted better than that.”
The shark woman then surveyed the scene before seeing you. “YOU! I should have known you were up to this.”
She then looked at Seeker and narrowed her eyes somewhat. “You? Aren’t you...Caius from the Underwater Exploration Team?”
Seeker sighed and shook his head. “Here I took you for a Moron Miss Captain of the Guard. Shame, you would have lived if you didn’t recognize me.”
“Is that supposed to be a threat? You call ME and idiot and think you can kill me? That’s so funny I forgot to laugh.” You feel as though you heard that line as the Shark woman leaps back into the water.
“Sharla, you really think you can beat me? You’re as funny as this human here, even a monster species can’t handle a demon like me without some serious tra…” As Seeker punched towards Sharla’s location in the water, orbs of water shot out and left dozens holes in the demon before the shark woman leaped back out, spinning with her mouth open and burrowing through the demon and landing back onto the pier. The demon stood there and healed his wounds before shooting a beam from his eyes on his back, the shark woman dove down and dodged the barrage before leaping back up and removing an arm from the Demon. As Sharla looked down the arm moved on it’s own and began to choke her, she fell on the ground and flopped around as she ripped the fingers off and tossed the arm away. The arm returned to it’s owner along with the fingers. Sharla then grabbed some water and tossed it in a way they became blades and sliced his arms off, she dove back into the water and came back up, this time punching him. “Are you really underestimating me Demon!? I didn’t get this job for nothing!”
He kicked her away and launched his dislodges arms at her to put her arms behind her head. He ran towards her and kicked her in the stomach over and over. “WHY!? Why the hell is everything getting in my way? WHY! WHY! WHY! All I want to kidnap one damn frog and leave this wet shithole! Why the Hell does this need to be so hard!?”
Just then the Demon realized he was surrounded by floating lenses of water. He turned to see your staff glowing with a holy light. “Sorry Captain. I needed a distraction to catch my breath.”
“You! You planned for her to come here!?”
“Of course. The first explosion from my Fire Blast was to get her attention, the second was to tell her where to find you. I needed some time to get back some Mana. I knew I didn’t have much mana, however if you noticed I had dozens of opportunities to heal myself, but I chose not to. I had the spells planned from the very start.”
“You mean…”
“Yes, I’ve planned this from the very start. You weren’t going to win Caius.”
The demon grit his teeth and tossed Sharla away turned to you. “YOU! YOUUUUUU!”
You smiled as a lens of water appeared before you. “Holy Light!”
A shining, blinding light shone brightly and focused through the lens becoming a concentrated beam of holy light that pierced through Seeker, burning him. That beam hit a lens that reflected it to another lens that reflected it through him again, the beam bounced all over before the demon was impaled with Holy light all over. “I couldn’t learn a true holy spell that could hurt you, but I figured something out, by turning my bubble barrier into a thin lens I could focus the light like a magnifying glass does for the sun I could turn a spell made for illuminating dark paths into a holy beam. Spell Combination #2. Focused Holy Light!”
The Demon coughed up blood as his body was skewered with beams of light. “Being defeated by a human...how?”
“Simple. YOU’RE the one out of mana now. I weakened you with so much damage that you spent it all healing yourself. You’re too self centered Caius.” The demon’s body began to burn away.
“Fine, it seems I’ll die here...BUT I’LL TAKE YOU WITH ME!” Standing up and running through, the beams ripping his body open his arm grew to giant sized, bursting with blood from it’s own power.
You stood there smiling. “Fran told me you were the kind that could see anything coming. She was wrong, you can’t see the heart of someone willing to give it their all for a cause.”
As he drew near to you three spears of water shot through your body and stabbed the demon just as he was in front of you.
“Impossible, you shot your own spears through your own body!?”
“This pain is nothing compared to the pain you showed that girl. You’re done.” You walked backwards, dislodging yourself from the spears and watching the demon fall to his knees.
“I don’t understand. How could you beat me a Demon? You’re just a human.” You shook your head as your staff crackled with electricity.
“I Already told you. I’m a Wizard. Lightning Strike!” You raised your finger in the air and lowered it quickly, a large bolt of lightning struck the demon, he screamed in pain as his skin turned to black ashe. You made the motion again and struck once more blowing the skin off and burning the muscle. You struck again and blew off the burnt muscle ashe leaving the bones and organs.
“Waaaait. If you...k-kill me. Others will eventually learn of my d-death and nothing you do can stop w-what will...come. You’ll only bring a b-bigger fear to that girl.”
“Thanks for the warning.” You raise your finger again
“NO! YOU FOOL!” You bring it down with as much authority as you could and with one last blast you turned the organs and bones of Seeker to ashe. As the wind blew away the ashe you stood there breathing heavily, you chuckled and began to laugh before falling over. A Demon! You killed a demon. You couldn’t believe it, you swore you were dreaming. You felt like you were flying, no really you were! You looked down to see you were off the ground, then looked behind you to see you were being held in the air by Sharla.
“Alright you, you’re coming with me! This whole situation is your fault!”
“Hey! Wait! It was him that caused all this! He was a demon!”
“Well I can’t arrest ashe now can I?”
“I guess not, but…” Suddenly water chains ensnared the shark woman forcing her to let you go.
“I have a friend I need to give some good news, sorry Miss Captain!” You ran off as she struggled to break free.
“WAIT! WAIT A DAMN! GOD DAMN! I’LL GET YOU FOR THIS!” You ran as fast as you could back to the church, looking back to make sure the Shark didn’t follow you, you knocked on the door.
The large door slowly opened to reveal something you were not expecting, the Nun was pregnant. “Uhhhhhhh?”
“Oh it’s you! Are you okay, you look terrible!”
“I’m fine, but…” Your puzzled look confused her for a moment before she realized you were looking at her stomach.
“Oh silly me, it’s tradition that higher female members of the Church of Cana Tal are blessed with the miracle of life with each Sermon. This is going to be my 127th child since becoming head of this church.”
“That’s...nice. Is Fran still here?”
“Yes, she’s in the back still. OH! this one is a tail whipper for sure!” As you passed the Nun rubbing her stomach you knocked on the door to the back room.
“Fran it’s me.” You opened up to see Fran was moaning and holding her stomach.
“Fran?”
“Sister didn’t tell me Cana Tal was also Goddess of the harvest. URP, Geroooooo. I don’t want to see fruits or veggies for a month.” Just then Fran noticed you and how beat up you were and stood up.
“Are you okay!?” You smiled and walked over.
“It’s over, Caius is dead.”
“What. You mean it?” You nodded and her eyes began to water.
“Y-you really went and did that for me?” You walked over to her and held her arms kneeling getting to her eye level.
“It’s okay now, you don’t need to cry anymore.”
“N-No one has ever been so nice to me, I-I don’t know what to say.”
“Yeah you do, remember?” She blinked before realizing and smiled.
“Anon, can I come work at your shop?”
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