73. The Life Aquatic with Serac Edin

  Serac Edin’s first impression of Pretjord—that middle child of the three Lowly Realms—was etched by text that flashed through her consciousness.

  [PRETJORD Realm Boon unlocked: SYNTHESIS]

  [REVOLVER Spell unlocked]

  [Chamber Two: HARVEST]

  Then, her second impression of it was drowned out by the frigid water that flooded her airways.

  As a hell bumpkin whose home Realm had been an arid wasteland for centuries, Serac was utterly unfamiliar with how she ought to behave when totally submerged in a liquid medium. Her first instinct was to cough out the water she’d swallowed, only for more water to rush into her landbound body.

  Rookie mistake! The intense discomfort of suffocation, coupled with the realization that she was completely out of her depth, pushed her into full panic mode.

  She shut her eyes, as if turning a blind eye to the calamity could save her from it. Then she kicked and flailed, grasping for anything solid to hold onto. What she found, in the end, was Zacko’s hand, grabbing hold of hers with a firm, reassuring strength.

  I’m saved! Relief flooded in place of water. I knew I could count on Zacko! He always comes through for—whoop!

  Serac’s body was suddenly caught within a tremendous pulling force—orders of magnitude stronger than what even a NINEFOLD master could produce. All of her insides rocked and churned as the flimsy vessel that contained them shot through a watery medium at what felt like light speed. Through it all, Zacko held tight, and Serac, by some miracle, managed to hang on for dear life.

  What fresh hell is this? Who knew the lowest part of Pretjord is a prison—a ‘watery prison’, that is!

  Yet, no amount of Serac’s deranged downplaying of her predicament could mask its reality. And Pathsight made sure to let her know about it:

  [Wayfarer Status Effect: HYPOXIA]

  With her eyes shut and her senses numbed by the frigid cold, Serac was now aware of only two things: Zacko’s hand… and a brand-new Pathsighted overlay that warned of her impending demise. A status gauge with a light-green hue had popped up, but instead of ticking up, this one plummeted downwards—at a rapid rate that seemed to perfectly mirror Serac’s urgent need for breathable air.

  But there was nothing to be done. Whatever force carried the Wayfarers now was undeniable—too strong even for Zacko to resist. Serac could only pray that its destination would be at least somewhat drier than this.

  Well, she got an answer to her prayer. Though whether or not it’d be an improvement to her situation was a different matter.

  The pull transitioned abruptly into a push, expelling the Wayfarers out of one watery medium, only to dump them into another. Serac felt herself (painfully) break through a tangible surface, as the top half of her tasted the sweet embrace of air. Dragless, free-moving, oxygenated air.

  She sucked greedily, acting on the primal knowledge that her life depended on just how much of her lungs she could fill with anything that wasn’t water. She thought she saw something in Pathsight move then, but she couldn’t pay it any mind, preoccupied as she was with the immediate task of survival.

  The presence of air—as well as the relief it provided—was short-lived. Serac felt herself being pulled back into the water almost immediately. This time, however, she couldn’t point the finger to some mysterious external force.

  No, she only had herself to blame. Or, more precisely, the dense body composition that was characteristic of Rakshasa biology—one decidedly incompatible with aquatic life. She was sinking, weighed down as she was by her own onyx bones.

  Help! She thought she’d screamed as she went right back to kicking and flailing. I can’t swim!

  How could she? It wasn’t like she’d had any practice! And that was assuming she was even physically capable of swimming. She would’ve rather fought a thousand Bone Lords if it meant she could do it on solid ground.

  Somewhere amidst the desperate struggle, a voice shouted to be heard over Serac’s screams. It was Zacko, sounding considerably less calm than his usual self. Even though he was right beside her, Serac was too far gone to understand a single word he said.

  Sinking. Drowning. Dying. She could feel the strength drain from her with every kick and every flail. She understood with a fraught sense of certainty that this was the end to her journey in Pretjord—and she hadn’t even started!

  I just hope I don’t have to do the whole Naraka thing all over again…

  That was when the water ‘shifted’ again.

  It felt different still from the sheer volume of the ‘pull’ or the heartless violence of the ‘push’. Water was still water, but it now moved with delicacy, intricacy, and intent. A conscious, sentient mind now took hold of Serac’s watery prison, and their palpable presence compelled her to open her eyes.

  Only for a Ksana, but she saw them. A hooded, humanoid figure that lurked within the turbulence. With a large, polelike object—a weapon?—in their hands. And only for a Ksana, but Serac’s attention snapped onto the face that hid beneath the hood.

  Skin of vivid pink, the likes of which should’ve been confined to an artist’s imagination. Round, wide-set eyes that seemed a little too large for their frame. And somehow, these strange visual signals together stimulated the part of Serac’s brain that recognized faces she’d seen before.

  Froggy?

  However, the Ksana really did last for only a Ksana. Before Serac had any hope to make sense of what she was seeing, her world filled with sprays and bubbles. In nearly the same instant, her whole body was ejected out of the water and into the sky.

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  The relief of no longer suffocating to death would’ve been tempered by the fear of falling to death instead… had it not been for the fact that Serac was well beyond the point of caring. It didn’t help that, even if she did care, she was too weakened to do anything about it.

  [588!]

  The fall damage took away half of her max HP, yet even that was a small price to pay in comparison to the pain of the impact. Winded, exhausted, and smarting everywhere (especially in her butt!), Serac remained perfectly still for a good minute.

  Despite the pain, she relished the relative safety of her new situation. The ground beneath her was solid and firm (as her buttocks could well attest to!), and with each unimpeded breath, she could feel herself recovering in both physical strength and mental acuity.

  At some point, she’d come back to herself enough to notice the other changes to her surroundings. For one thing, she wasn’t alone. There was Zacko, of course, who even now let out a labored grunt as he pushed himself to a sitting position. But there were also other souls here. Many more.

  Perhaps a hundred more, if Serac’s eyes didn’t deceive her. As she gingerly picked herself up, she saw that she and Zacko were surrounded by a veritable throng of bodies. Then, her eyes widened in shock and wonder as this latest avalanche of visual signals stimulated the part of her brain that processed the new, the unknown, and the undefined.

  Of all souls in the vicinity, Serac and Zacko were the only ones drenched in water. Yet, it was clear even for a hell bumpkin to see that these perfectly dry onlookers were far more suited to the aquatic life.

  Glistening scales, spiny fins, and diverse body types. These Pretjordian locals, to a one, exhibited anatomical features that marked them out as fish-people.

  Even the parts of their face that might’ve passed for hair or beards kept with the aquatic theme. For upon closer inspection, Serac saw that these were made up of bristles, whiskers, algae, and even some elongated appendages that could only be described as tentacles.

  All this was made ever stranger by the fact that the fish-people were all bipedal, standing upright on two very-much-separate feet. They were also clothed, and in a manner that didn’t deviate too drastically from their neighbors one Realm below. Where Narakites wore tunics and robes stitched together from whatever rubbish they could get their hands on, these Pretjordians sported a rather similar fashion—just with much nicer material: dyed fabric, woven jute, and the like.

  The sight of it might’ve been an even bigger surprise for Serac had she not primed herself first by meeting Beatrice Sattva—a deer-person who also dressed and walked like a Rakshasa or a Manusya. In any case, the shock had been substantial enough to render her mute, as she gawked at the strangers with her mouth agape. Mute and also, as it turned out, a little deaf.

  “—okay? Hello? Miss? Do you not understand what we’re saying?”

  “Huh?”

  Serac felt a hand grab her by the armpit and pull her up. This gave her a little fright, until she realized that it was just Zacko helping her to her feet. The Manusya himself, however, kept his gaze pointed to the large group of strangers, with eyes narrowed in that slow-to-trust way of his.

  With Zacko standing to his full height, many in the crowd backed off a step. Serac couldn’t blame them, considering these Yakshas—at least on average—appeared to be just about her own compact size.

  There were exceptions to the rule, however, and they stuck out like sore thumbs. Two fellows in particular—both of whom featured prominent, bony notches along the sides of their muscular necks—tipped the scale toward ‘enormous’, towering over even Zacko. They flanked another man who was no slouch himself—and whose rotund, corpulent figure reminded Serac somewhat of a Hellspawn Jailer. His face was also rather distinctive, with thick, mottled lips framed by impressive whiskers that lent him an air of authority if not quite wisdom.

  But the man that stood at the front of the crowd and spoke to the Wayfarers was much smaller—and therefore much less intimidating.

  “Are you hurt at all?” Upon a second listen, the man sounded rather youthful, though it was hard to tell the exact degree of maturity from his scaly, piscine appearance. Then his whole, pale-yellow face lit up with an excitable smile. “What am I saying? You guys are Wayfarers, aren’t you? Nothing can hurt you!”

  Serac and Zacko exchanged a look. This of course wasn’t the first time their Wayfaring status drew a positive reaction from strangers. But perhaps none before had greeted them with such exuberant admiration.

  “I think we’re alright,” Serac found herself replying, though a little timidly by her standards, “and we’ll be even better once we find a Waystation.” She could, of course, set one down herself. But it also couldn’t hurt to save the [Privilege] for a rainy day. So, she went on to ask, “Don’t happen to know of one nearby, do you?”

  “You’re in luck!” the pale-yellow man/boy enthused. “We’re right next to a Hubstation. Come on, let me show you the way.”

  “Sounds good,” Serac murmured absent-mindedly, even as she scanned the faces among the crowd, “but first, which one of you do we have to thank?”

  “Thank? What do you mean?”

  “One of you threw us out of the water, didn’t you? Saved us from drowning. A pink-skinned… I wanna say woman? Is she here?”

  At this, the man/boy’s smile faltered. And if Serac weren’t mistaken, the crowd took another collective step back, just as they broke out in animated whispers.

  Serac and Zacko exchanged another look—hers with a slight frown and his with one eyebrow raised. Did I say something I shouldn’t have? What’s with the weird reaction?

  “The Finless.”

  The whispers stopped on a dime, as all eyes turned in unison to the speaker. It was the large, whiskered man—he of the corpulent figure and thick, mottled lips. And judging from how the crowd reacted to his voice, Serac hadn’t been far off about his being an ‘authority’ figure.

  “Do you speak truly, Wayfarer?” the whiskered man now addressed Serac directly. “Did you really see the Finless lurking in these waters? And you claim it was she who saved you?”

  “Well, I mean, I don’t know her name, but… sure. I did see someone pink and maybe frog-like—wait, am I allowed to say that? And yes, she saved me and Zacko, alright. I don’t know how she did it, but she yeeted us good.”

  The whispers started up again in earnest. Or rather, the crowd grew so animated that they were practically shouting over each other. Serac’s frown only deepened, as she detected something distinctly akin to fear in the people’s chatters.

  Suddenly, the pale-yellow man/boy broke out in laughter.

  “What a silly guppy you are, Wayfarer!” he said in between his snickering. “Even if it were true that the Finless was here just now, why would she help anyone, let alone a pair of outrealmers?”

  The man/boy’s outburst was followed by a chorus of nervous laughter. This did little to smooth out Serac’s frown, as she recognized the phenomenon for what it was. These people would rather laugh it off than believe that Lady Pink was here without them knowing.

  From the corner of her eye, Serac saw the large, whiskered man nod to his even larger companions. The twin towers then stuck out like sore thumbs as they turned and made themselves scarce. Serac didn’t know anything about anything, yet the sight of this exchange gave her a strange sense of foreboding.

  And she might have even yelled out to stop the whiskered man… if it weren’t for her own stomach, which chose this moment to rumble.

  Serac froze, caught unawares by the utterly novel sensation. Anxious—perhaps even terrified—she looked to Zacko for reassurance, as she carefully placed a hand upon her tummy.

  Her empty tummy, which very clearly craved for something to fill it.

  And only then did Serac realize that her [Hypoxia] effect was long gone, along with the light-green bar that responded to the amount of air in her lungs. But in its place, she played host to a new status effect, complete with a separate gauge of its own:

  [Wayfarer Status Effect: HUNGER]

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