Chapter 6: Chapter 6: Sea People

The child frolicked in the shallow waters of the beach, kicking up splashes as it explored the new and alien sensation of wetness that accompanied water. It laughed as a wave crashed into it, throwing it off balance and sending seafoam into the air. The child battled the waves trying to out splash them but failing and being pushed back.

It was an odd feeling, being pushed around by water but at the same time it was a pleasant one since the child also knew that the waters had no malice in them. One particularly large wave rolled over the child, submerging it completely and revealing a whole new world as below the blue water’s surface lay life and creatures it hadn’t ever spotted.

Curious silvery scaly little creatures flew through the water, on wings on the tips of their tails as opposed to their torsos. On the floor it noticed odd star shaped rocks and crustaceans with pincers shuffling sideways.

The wave passed and the child was brought out of the new world. It was about to dive back in when it noticed something in the distance, a massive brown creature splitting the waves and rapidly approaching the child’s location.

Alarm bells rang in the child’s man and it immediately ran from the sea, past the sandy beach and behind the nearest tree, camouflaging itself as nothing more than a piece of bark. 

Nervously the child peered from behind cover to stare at what might’ve been one of the largest creatures it had ever seen, second only to the bird monster. In a cascade of white water, the beast rammed into the beach and came to a halt. The child took the opportunity to observe the beast carefully. 

It was a bizarre creature, having some of the thinnest, spindliest limbs it had ever seen. On the beast's sides lay two rows of long sticks for legs with paddles near the end. The whole creature was elliptically shaped, with what could only be described as a tree with one white leaf growing from its bark at the center of it all. The beast’s hide strongly reminded the child of trees, only slightly lighter than bark but slightly darker than the wood beneath.

From the bizarre creature the top of the creature a strange toothless mouth opened and out emerged more creatures, creatures that the child realized were similar to it, possessing the same body structure. However, that was the only similarity between the two. 

They were different, having fur on the tops of their heads and on patches of their faces, skin that were shades of pink and brown, and odd layers of shiny carapaces covering most of their torsos, arms and legs with strange smoothish brown and green hide underneath and in between their joints. Furthermore, they carried sticks, large metallic clams and long shiny fangs in their hands.

Remembering the rules of jungle survival the child stood still, observing as the similar but not quite same creatures jumped down from the ship and began forming groups. The child counted a lot of them, beyond its ability to count, departing towards the jungle in smaller groups.

As the child watched on with slight apprehension, they formed into neat professional looking lines, with the shiniest men at the front and the less shiny men with long wooden sticks at the back. Together the group moved in sync, marching in a uniform rhythm that reminded the child vaguely of the uniformity of the bee creatures.

As they drew closer the child began noticing how on top of being different to itself they were also all different to each other. Each of them were unique, although their shiny metallic carapaces and things they carried in their hands were uniform, their faces were not. Each man’s facial structure was different, some being boney and some squishy. The patches of fur and eyes adorning their faces varied wildly in color, from brown to red to golden. The variations from being to being were so vast that the child wondered if they were even the same creature type. 

As one of the groups neared they completely failed to notice the child, giving it a sense of relief. From its cover the child watched on with curiosity as the band moved into the jungle, barking at each other and seemingly ready for anything to approach them. 

The child eavesdropped on the barks, noticing a familiarity between the speech and the voice that had accompanied its receiving “power”. It paid close attention as a particularly loud pair barked at each other.

“Bloody ‘ell, they ain’t given us any time to rest. I’m bloody knackered and they still want me poking and prodding this patch of sunshine.”

“Look on the bright side, from what I can see we’ll finally find some cover from the sun underneath the trees, maybe you can catch some quality sleep there.”

“I ain’t sleeping here, this place ain’t right, it's unnatural. Sun doesn’t set, storms come from nowhere, and our compasses do nothing but spin around uselessly. Dying in these twisted lands’ll probably twist your soul as well.”

“Comrade, there is no need to fear death! Why? For we if we die today we die for our glorious empire, we will be remembered and honored for all history!”

“Listen here you little–”

As the odd shiny creatures marched into the jungle the sound faded until the child could no longer make out any of the barks. The child understood where it had heard the barks before, the way they barked at each other was like how the voice in its vision spoke to it. Each bark contained meaning, a deeper one then simply expressing anger or fear.

As the group began disappearing deeper into the jungle the child faced a dilemma, should it follow them?

It knew logically that it would probably not be the safest choice to make but its curiosity was immense. It wanted to study the shiny things and see what they did. It wanted to find out more in the meaning behind those meaning filled barks. It wanted to know how and why it had emerged from another creature.

With so much curiosity itching its mind it decided then, yes it was going to follow them.

In the distance the child spotted orange lights right around where the shiny creatures had disappeared. Using that as a marker the child caught up to the group where it saw the men lighting small fires and placing them in cages. The acrid smell of smoke filled its nose and the child recalled its earlier encounter with the bird.

It wondered then how they did it. How did they light fires, keep them lit, and then cage them? Did they have the same power as the bird?

Just to be safe the child gave itself some more distance from the group, recalling that fire and jungle did not lead to anything good. Perhaps due to the fire being caged or perhaps due to the fire being small a repeat of the bird’s death did not play out and the jungle seemed content with ignoring the band of men.

The men continued forwards with what the child could only describe as pure ignorance. They carelessly marched through the jungle, not checking the ground or surroundings for danger, just marching together as if that would miraculously keep them safe.

In seeing this the child wondered how the men had survived for so long. They neither sweeped the surroundings nor try to disguise their movement in the slightest. Did they have some super power that let them beat any creature that approached them? Even if that were the case fighting was the always bad option.

Due to this the child found it deeply unsurprising when finally their foolish tactics failed them. A orange and black furry striped beast leapt out from a nearby bush and snapped its jaws on the turned head of one of the less shiny men near the back. 

He only had time to gurgle as his throat was ripped out and his body dragged into the darkness of the jungle. The men around him barked words at each other that the child couldn't understand. 

The men moved to chase after their comrade but that was a foolish mistake as again they failed to check their surroundings. Honestly, they might’ve been the stupidest band of creatures the child had ever seen!

As they blindly rushed through the jungle one of the men stepped on a tendril, a tendril that was just waiting for an unsuspecting soul to trigger it. In a flurry of movement the now nine man squad was grabbed by a series of tendrils that began dragging them to a mass of gelatinous flesh.

Screams of pain and curses of rage rang out as the tendrils began crushing the men in its grip. The men tried to cut at the tendrils with their shiny long fangs but they failed to bite into the gripping flesh. 

The child was again shocked at the men’s stupidity. If the child hadn’t been able to cut it there was no way the men would be able to. This whole situation could have easily been avoided by simple carefulness.

One of the men pointed their stick at the tendril monster. The child was again again shocked at the stupidity of men, what good would pointing a stick do? They were so stupid the child genuinely wondered how the shiny creatures had managed to live as long as they had. 

The child flinched as a ball of fire emerged from the end of the man’s stick and a deafening crack louder than anything it had ever heard thundered forth so loud that it caused its ears to ring. One of the rocky teeth in the maw that was readying itself to swallow the shiny creatures shattered, sending shards of tooth spraying in the tendril monster's mouth.

A roar of agony split the air as the tendril monster flew into a frenzy, trying to crush the men in its grip. With a pop some of the men began spitting blood and dying however, a few of them managed to remain focused.

A gurgling order from their dying commanding officer “Fire at will!”

At point blank range three more fireballs filled the air as a volley of thunder was sent into the tendril monster's jagged teeth. 

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Bones shattered and more organic shrapnel lodged itself in the beast’s mouth but by then the men were too close. Three poor souls were chomped down on, the broken teeth of the gelatinous monster shearing straight through the shiny carapaces of the men. The men seemed doomed but the racket caused by the firing and fighting had drawn the other squads.

The arriving human stick holders kneeled as they unleashed a volley on the monster, severing tendrils and punching fist sized holes in the beast’s flesh. Another squad arrived from the flank, pouring more fire on the beast and after receiving so much punishment the creature finally shuddered and went limp, dropping the dead and injured bodies of half a dozen men.

The other squads moved to attend to the men on the ground before shouldering the bodies and leaving the scene. The child watched, perched on a branch above, as the procession of men clumsily navigated their way back out of the jungle, all the while being whittled down by ambushers.

—

Time passed and the odd shiny men made multiple attempts at moving through the jungle. Every time they set forth to move deeper more men died and even more were left on the boat, wasting away from either injury or disease.

The child didn’t know all this, all it saw was a band of fools constantly failing at the most basic aspect of life, living. It saw countless groups of men varying in number move into the jungle and leave with far fewer numbers. At this point the child suspected that they might be trying to die, what else could explain their stupid behavior.

In all its time the child had never seen a creature willing put itself into situations of near certain death time and time again. It was baffling. The child watched as the shiny creatures willingly let themselves dwindle in numbers as they continuously threw themselves at the jungle.

Oh sure, the men would change tactics, send more at once, send them all together, move slower, send only men with the thunder sticks but it didn’t change the fact that they were dying. It was truly baffling, all they needed to do was send a light to scout out the area ahead of them, be ready to stay still at a moment's notice, and run away the moment they were attacked by something. Surely learning that couldn’t be too hard.

After a particularly large group of men disappeared something finally changed. A man who was particularly unique emerged from the bowels of the large wooden creature, a man not wearing any shiny carapace. Instead, the man was draped in shiny blue finery whose intricacy and beauty reminded the child of the urn it had received its powers from, though far inferior. 

With the fancy man taking the lead this time the expedition to the forest had ended with no fewer men. It seemed that the stupid creatures were finally learning a lesson.

Curious to see what had changed this time, the child decided to follow the group with the fancy man, wondering how just one creature managed to change so much. Upon reaching the group it was astonished at what it saw. 

“Ladoga, Kop’ye”

With just a word the fancy man conjured water from thin air, forming it into a spike of white rock and slung it at blinding speed straight through the tiger-creature’s head all while not making a single move.

The fancy man nonchalantly turned to other regular men and said “Take it back to the ship, it will make for a fine rug.”

The men scrambled, working together to carefully carry the now dead form.

As the group of men traveled deeper into the jungle it encountered monster after monster and monster after monster were quickly dispatched. Tendril monster, turned into a pile of gore. Furry brown creature, shredded and skinned. Flying leathery brown creature, speared and gutted. Eight legged horror, a squish mark in the earth.

Every creature the child had ever taken mental notes on how to avoid were effortlessly turned to piles of gelatinous meat by this lone man with just a word. Somehow, the man used the always wrong decision of fighting and always came out on top.

How did the fancy man do that?

Could the child do that as well?

It needed to know and so it stalked the group as it massacred its way through the jungle. However, the fancy man finally made a mistake. The overconfident man made the penultimate mistake. He had slain an evil bug, letting its black blood spill onto the surrounding men.

Before long a trickle of the evil black bugs began arriving and were easily dealt with by the fancy man. However, the trickle grew into a tide as the full fury of the evil bug swarm made its way to strike the suicidal group of men.

The child sighed, it had been fascinating to watch the fancy man kill things but at the end of the day it seemed he was as stupid as the rest of the other humans. The child prepared to leave the spectacle of evil bugs overwhelming and eventually devouring some dumb creatures.

Two words were spoken by the fancy man, “Ladoga, Zamorozit.”

In one instant the world around became cold, ice cold, so cold that the air itself seemed to grow heavier and every breath exhaled turned misty white. Confused at the sudden change, the child stood up to see the overwhelming army of evil bugs encased in a cold clear wet solid and at the center of it all stood a band of completely unharmed men.

Somehow, in some way, the fancy man had beaten the whole evil bug swarm in a fight. 

How did that fancy man do it all?

That shouldn’t have even been possible! 

That was beyond all reason, it was ridiculous!

The fancy man then turned to stare straight at the child. In that moment the child felt ice run through its body as the chilly feeling of fear that had nothing to do with the cold air around it filled it. As it had been preparing to leave it hadn’t been camouflaged and also hadn’t been standing still. 

Maybe the fancy man wasn’t staring at it, after all it was quite far away and only barely in the range of the firelight the men carried. 

The fancy man raised his hand to point at the child and spoke to it, “I thought I sensed something looking at us, you there kid, if you value your life get down from there.”

Well that was that possibility ruled out. The child employed its most reliable tactic, the clone and run. It exhaled and out came six clones, the most clones it could summon at once. It sent them running in all directions to throw the fancy man off before letting itself take off. leaping through the branches the child made it a good dozen strides before two words were uttered.

“Ladoga, Kop’ye” 

Agony erupted from the child’s leg and it missed its jump to the next branch, tumbling and falling to the jungle floor. It looked down to see an icy spike impaling its foot to the nearby tree. It tried to move but the spike had it stuck in place.

Forming its hand to a blade the child tried to hack through the spike but it was like it was trying to cut through the tendril of the tendril monster. Nothing worked and in the distance the child heard footsteps. 

Remembering what had happened to all the creatures before it it tried hacking through its foot to escape, but by then it was too late.

The fancy man loomed over the child, speaking once more “You have a unique power, how intriguing. It seems that not every creature here is mindless, which is good! Ladoga, Zamorozit”

In a flash of cold the child’s consciousness disappeared.

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