Chapter 120: Book 2: Chapter 21

Chapter 21

 

I decided to wait until we were safely back in port and had unloaded our booty into the black-market stores before retiring to my palace and levelling up.

Susan and Quinntexxis delayed this plan further as they pounced on me before I could get through the gatehouse that led to the palace’s inner courtyards.

The need for some administrative attention on my part was understandable if irritating. There had been a large influx of new people, ergo that meant more work, but that was why I appointed Susan as my castellan. So that I wouldn’t have to be bogged down with all that shit.

Evidently her appointment was not sufficient to evade being vital for the thankless tasks. More administrative staff featured as number seven on their seemingly endless list of things that required my attention. When I was finished with that, I finally got a moment to myself and practically ran to my bedchambers. Once inside, I shrugged off my boots and settled into a comfy burgundy armchair purloined from some wealthy, and likely dead, stockbroker’s summer retreat.

Quixbix summoned the level-up prompt for me, and I quickly selected yes. As I wasn’t in physical contact with Shana or Fang Mei, they couldn’t be brought along. I also chose not to summon Anastasia this time.

Following Dean’s naked Ana on my shoulder prank, both had continued to antagonise one another incessantly whenever they interacted. Or to be more accurate, Dean baited Anastasia and she couldn’t help but bite back hard and refused to let go. Whenever we returned, she would always be in a foul mood for a day or two and as she already had her nose out of joint about the future ferrying task, it was best to leave her at home.

 Besides, we knew from a previous interview that Anastasia would get access to death magic enchantments at level ten. So, with no decisions to make her presence wasn’t necessary.

Blink.

 

***

 

Blink.

I was back in the admissions office. Dean’s secretary was behind her desk as usual. The dark green wallpaper that covered the upper half of the office walls was now bedecked with rather familiar paintings.

Munch’s, The Scream, Vermeer’s, The Girl with a Pearl Earring, Constable’s, The Haywain, and half a dozen colourful Van Gogh’s to name but a few. Art was not really my thing, but I recognised quite a few of these regardless.

“Are these the real things or replicas?” I asked Dean’s secretary as I approached her desk.

She smiled conspiratorially at me. “They’re real. One of the perks of the job,” she chuckled and winked. “During integration, the Framework secures and stores culturally significant items to preserve them. Otherwise, most would almost certainly be lost. Rest assured, once Earth has achieved an acceptable equilibrium in the Darkwyrlds, and if the dominant factions have prepared suitable accommodations, these will all be returned. Until then, I and my visitors get to enjoy them.”

I nodded in understanding. Although the loss of prized artwork like the Mona Lisa wouldn’t bother me much, not an art guy as I said before, it would be a hammer blow for some.

Pride of place was reserved for a large oil canvas painting of a twelve-point stag with a mountainous backdrop. Like many of the other paintings, it was surrounded by a frame of lavish gold filigree.

“Which one is that?” I asked and pointed at it.

The secretary swivelled about in her chair in that way people do to look at something you are asking about, even though they are fully aware of what it is. Like when you ask someone what book they are reading and they automatically peep at the front cover, as if they needed a reminder of what they held in their hands.

“That is Monarch of the Glen by Sir Edwin Landseer. It’s not nearly as valuable as some of these others, but it is my favourite.”

That was when I recalled her fondness for deer.

I was about to head in and see Dean when it occurred to me that it was a bit rude to keep referring to the helpful woman as Dean’s secretary.

“Pardon me, but what is your name?”

She smiled mischievously. “Thank you for asking, Torin. It is nice to be treated with a little respect and understanding.” Her eyes flicked to the grandiose doorway to my right, making it abundantly clear who had not been acting in such a manner. “My name is Violet. After the colour, which is quite beautiful.”

I bowed my head at her. “Thank you, Violet. Until next time.”

I wandered into Dean’s office unperturbed by the slamming doors. The crashing noise they produced had increased substantially, no doubt the raised decibel level was intended to cause me to flinch.

The room had expanded once more and now about halfway down standing majestically was none other than probably the most famous statue on Earth, Michelangelo’s, David.

Sloppily propped up against the plinth of the marble masterpiece was Dean. He was attempting to imitate the pose and failing spectacularly. He had taken his shirt off, displaying his flaccid moobs, patchy chest hair, and pasty skin for all to see. Blessedly, he had kept his denim shorts on, and I was spared that particular horror show.

The ringing sound of my laughter was probably not the reception he had been hoping for and his expression quickly soured.

“Very rude, you dick,” he harrumphed as he put his black Hooters T-shirt back on and sulk-stomped all the way to his bean-bag discussion area.

Without a word, I came and joined him.

“It was my assistant’s idea anyway,” he grumbled. “The ladies would have been impressed if you had brought them. They are sophisticated and cultured, unlike your brutish ass. I bet even the new girl would have been blown away at my display. Why didn’t you bring them? Are you ashamed of me or something?” he accused with manufactured outrage.

“Or something,” I answered glibly. “And you have met Ana, right? As impressed as she might be by the pilfered masterpiece, we both know what kind of reaction she’d have to your…imitation.”

“What do you mean? Look at these guns,” Dean sputtered and proceeded to flex his biceps for my benefit.

At least, I think he was flexing his biceps. It’s not like there was any discernible movement in his upper arms. Strangely, Dean’s disbelief seemed entirely genuine which is when the lightbulb moment hit me.

“Dean, you do remember that we see you through an expectation filter, right?”

“Of course, I remember. I’m the one who told you about it,” he snarked excessively.

However, I saw his eyelids flicker as he said this. A sure sign he was checking something which was confirmed by his next explosive outburst.

“Motherfucker! That’s how you see me. As a pathetic weakling. What bullshit is this? The filter has to be fucking busted or your brain is. Maybe both. Heads will roll for this. Ashli’s non-existent balls! Damned maintenance people, always slacking. By the time you come back, I’ll have cracked the whip and you will see me in all my magnificent glory.”

I rather doubted there was anything wrong with my brain. During my many conversations with Shana and Anastasia, it was clear they saw Dean in the same manner that I did. As for the filter being broken, I had my doubts about that too.

“Anyway. Let’s get back on track. Level ten, what goodies have you got for me?”

Dean’s scowl faded and he produced the tablet from his shorts pocket. “The third tier for Dungeon Corsairs is the command tier. What you pick will affect your crew and bonded. It won’t count for your militia or other Shattered Storm faithful, well, not until it is significantly upgraded.”

I took the tablet from him and nodded my thanks before scrolling through the options. “Any advice?”

“They are all good options. It rather depends on what kind of captain you envision yourself as and what you feel you need the most. You can mix and match to a certain extent with future ability bumps. Some of them don’t even have ten ranks of progression, so you would have to with them. But the only caveat is that once you switch out from one, you can’t switch back to it later. Any further progression on that ability is permanently locked.”

“Okay,” I said and returned to the perusal of the information on the tablet.

There were five options for me to choose from and they could each aid me in different ways.

I read through them in order.

 

The Corsair’s Gift 1

Type: Crew Advancement

Cost: None.

Cooldown: This ability is a passive effect.

Description: This ability grants your crew and soulbonded an extra 1% of experience for slaying monsters or completing quests related to piracy.

Range: When in a party with you and within 250 metres.

Rank: The maximum rank for this ability is 10. Each extra rank increases the experience gain by 1% and extends the range. Recipients must still be in a party with you.

 

A promising beginning.

A straight-up increase in experience accumulated by my crew and bonded. There were a couple of drawbacks I noticed which meant this was not an instant purchase, though.

Mainly it was because most of the crew were at or near the first threat threshold which kicked in when you made level eleven. From then on experience for slaying monsters was reduced based on the threat of what you killed. This ability required them to be grouped together along with me to work, which inherently reduced the threat they faced and therefore increased the amount of experience which would be held back.

The bonus experience from the ability would be similarly garnished by the lowered threat, greatly reducing any benefit. Especially as we continued to advance and surpassed the other thresholds at levels thirty-one and fifty-one.

And I noted experience for killing or defeating characters was excluded from the boost by the nature of its omission.

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Another consideration was that I didn’t benefit from this personally. A stronger crew was a good thing. A crew that was stronger than me, not so much. Not if I wanted to stay captain.

There were other ways to get their levels up that didn’t require me to be on hand while getting nothing extra for my time. Like sending them through the plethora of dungeons under my control. Perhaps it wasn’t such a promising beginning after all. By the time my initial deliberation of the ability had concluded, I’d effectively ruled taking it out.

 

The Corsair’s Collobaration 1

Type: Crew Enhancement

Cost: None.

Cooldown: This ability is a passive effect.

Description: This ability grants your crew and soulbonded an extra point in their two lowest stats in either the Physical, Mental, or Social groupings. You may choose which grouping is affected, but the choice is for the group as a whole, not individuals. 

Range: When in a party with you and within 250 metres.

Rank: The maximum rank for this ability is 10. Extra ranks can either increase the number of stats in a group that are bumped or can be added to the stats already boosted. Recipients must still be in a party with you

 

This was more like it. Stat boosts for my people.

Again though, once I thought about it a little more deeply, issues arose that could limit its usefulness. It had the same problem of me not directly benefiting from the boost, which I was beginning to see as a theme with this ability tier. The other problem is that this was more about shoring up weaknesses rather than enhancing strengths.

Also, as my crew advanced, an extra point here and there would be less meaningful. Particularly if we were racking up gear that did the same. This was better than the gift in some ways, but also impermanent. The temporary nature made the crew more dependent upon me, but it was also be a point of weakness. Either way, this was an all-or-nothing pick as far as I was concerned. I would likely need to commit all my future T3 advances to this to make it worthwhile.

 

The Corsair’s Clarion Call 1

Type: Communication

Cost: 1 mana is permanently ring-fenced for the maintenance of this ability

Cooldown: Number of daily uses is Leadership / 10

Description: This ability allows you to communicate mentally with those bonded or signed to your canon. You may choose to open a link to an individual or group. This communication is from you to them only.

Range: Continental.

Rank: The maximum rank for this ability is 5. Each added rank increases the range and number of daily uses of the ability. At higher ranks, the ability can be extended to include contacting those within your faction. (There are additional costs associated with this.)

Hidden Bonus (revealed by Preternatural Insight): As you have an imp, if Corsair’s Clarion Call is taken as your first selection it will advance in rank automatically when you reach the T3 level thresholds without using your selection for that threshold. Secondly, your access to a suppressed Framework communication layer may allow you to insert new ranks into this ability that allow responses from those you have connected with.

 

Well, now we had something the complete opposite of the first two. An ability that at first glance seemed a bit meh, but on closer inspection took on a much shinier gleam.

Being able to contact my people instantly would certainly be useful, but it wasn’t exactly vital. There were technological methods we could employ to achieve the same thing. However, this would be both private and one hundred percent reliable.

Communication on the battlefield could mean the difference between victory and defeat.

Plus, I can’t lie, I was a sucker for a hidden bonus. Especially one that maybe nobody else had access to and that came with free upgrades to boot.

My gut was telling me this was the one, but for completeness’s sake, I forced myself to give the final two options as thorough an assessment as the first three.

 

The Corsair’s Favour 1

Type: Crew Loyalty

Cost: None.

Cooldown: This ability is a passive effect.

Description: This ability increases the loyalty of your crew, filling them with a greater sense of satisfaction under your leadership.

Range: Continental.

Rank: The maximum rank for this ability is 5. Each extra increases both the range and the loyalty boost by the rank. At rank 3 it begins to have a small overflow effect on your faction at large.

 

No. Absolutely not. I knew some might disagree, but for me this one was a complete waste of time. It was an ability for losers, despots, and fuckups. None of those monikers applied to me.

Taking this would just make someone lazy and over-reliant upon it to maintain morale. It could easily become a crutch to be leaned on and then what happens when someone kicks that crutch away? You fall flat on your face. It offers no guarantees that your crew won’t still orchestrate your downfall if you gave them enough reason to do so.

As Admiral Ackbar aptly pointed out. ‘It’s a trap!’.

Better to keep the crew happy by being a good captain.

 

Pressganging Corsair 1

Type: Crew Expansion

Cost: None.

Cooldown: This ability is a passive effect.

Description: This ability increases the crew cap. The current tier cap is multiplied by the rank of this ability.

Range: Not applicable.

Rank: The maximum rank for this ability is 10.

 

This one may have had the least detailed description and was actually pretty good in its simplicity. It was the frontrunner from amongst the other four options that I could start taking at level sixteen when I picked up the second instalment of my third-tier abilities.

My current tier allowance for my canon was two officers, five crew, and ten deckhands. That is how many extra crew members could be added every time I selected this ability.

That didn’t sound like a lot, but this would be compounded when I upgraded my class to the F-grade Dungeon Corsair Lord. The flat tier increase would be trebled to six, fifteen, and thirty. Then the Pressganging Corsair ability would kick in, doubling, trebling, quadrupling, etc. that amount.

That made sense. You would think someone capable of hitting the Lord levels would be looking at running a fleet, not just a ship, and that would require significantly more people under his direct banner.

But I was getting ahead of myself, I hadn’t reached that point yet. Plus, there was always the chance that different options might be revealed as I advanced which might make me reconsider future choices.

For today, I locked in my selection of the Corsair’s Clarion Call.

I chilled with Dean for a bit after that, enduring his dirty and not particularly funny jokes. Well, I didn’t find them very funny as I seemed to be the punchline of most of them. Dean had a lot to learn about making someone feel like you were laughing with them and not at them.

But all things come to an end and eventually, I made my excuses. There was probably a queue of people with requests and reports lining up outside my bedroom door.

Well, not literally.

That would be a ridiculous lapse in security. They would be out in the town somewhere, though, waiting for me.

Blink.

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