Chapter 14

  Treasure Island!

  Elijah bobbed up and down in the middle of a deep blue sea. The green sun beamed overhead, reddening the young man’s skin. He sighed. He had been a fool to believe that he could just bluff his way to success.

  Initially, everything had been fine. Apparently, it wasn’t uncommon for The Mosquito to have his ship leave in a hurry, even without him if he thought there would be trouble. Where Elijah’s improvised plan had gone awry was the next part.

  The crew’s Captain would always meet up with them shortly after, usually having commandeered another ship. He had never taken more than two hours. After four, the quartermaster’s questions had become hostile.

  Since Elijah knew next to nothing about The Mosquito, he was unable to answer most of them. The situation became tense; blades were drawn. Elijah, even though he had some Skills and abilities he thought impressive, couldn’t bring himself to fight something that looked and acted so human.

  He jumped overboard. He immediately regretted it. There was a strong current, and the ship had caught the wind. In seconds, he was alone, with nothing but an empty horizon.

  Although the young man had grown up by the sea and would swim most mornings, even in winter, this had been one of his greatest fears. He kept an eye on the shifting sandbars, observing the yellowed water, which marked their positions from atop the cliffs before ever setting foot in the sea.

  His grandmother had told the story of how she had once been caught in a rip tide and dragged out to sea, only surviving because a passing sailing ship had seen her. It had given the teen a healthy phobia.

  Now that he was in the same position she had been in, with no land in sight, he found he was… surprisingly calm. He had feared that fear may grip him, causing him to drown, but that wasn’t the case.

  Maybe it was the familiar support of seawater, water that he trod with ease, or the strangely coloured open sky distracting him; the young man didn’t know. It didn’t matter; he was relaxed, and that helped him to think straight.

  Normally he would default to what was fast becoming his catchphrase, but there was nothing to focus on out here; literally nothing.

  No, wait, that wasn’t true. There was water mana. An abundance of motes danced all around him, content with their surroundings. It was a dizzying but beautiful display.

  Elijah watched as currents bobbed along, not just the surface and bottom currents, which he expected, given the difference in heat from top to bottom, but a million million different microcurrents dancing in a thousand different colourful lines that wove in and out of each other endlessly.

  It was mesmerising and had pulled him in, the same way a good fire did, with only one exception. The sea wasn’t warm. Elijah didn’t know how long he had just floated about, watching the mana in amazement, but his teeth had begun to chatter. This was bad!

  Though the sea was relatively warm, it was still not conducive to life. Elijah needed help. That’s when he had an idea. Through watching the way water mana moved in the ocean, he had subconsciously deepened his understanding of the element. He sought its aid.

  Making the mana in his body dance as the water did, caught the attention of a passing current. Once he was sure it was watching, he tried to change the movement of the mana within his veins, trying to get it to convey two ideas simultaneously. The idea of water but also that of help and support, of his need for land.

  When the motes that comprised the current sped off, he thought he had failed and resigned himself to a miserable and wet death. Just as he was debating whether he should use his first spell and dye the waters red, something caught his Mana Manipulation-infused eye.

  A dark current, far broader than he had seen before, was heading up from the depths. In its wake, the smaller currents swirled aside; they didn’t seem fearful, but excited.

  A large, familiar shape rose from below. Elijah was rocked about as it surfaced, tossed about by the creature’s mass. When he righted himself, he found he was staring eyes to eye with a giant blue whale.

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  There was an intelligence to its gaze that told Elijah it was evaluating him. In an attempt to appear as a friend, he did his best to imitate water mana with the unattributed power produced by his Mana Heart.

  Compared to the way the whale seamlessly blended with the motes of water mana around it, it was a childish display, though Elijah thought it was impressed by the way its mana moved.

  Elijah was by no means an expert, but he had a closer affinity to water than any other element, and he thought he was beginning to grasp the barest edges of it.

  His display was enough. The whale snorted out seawater, sparkling turquoise in the light of the green sun, then surged towards him. For a moment, Elijah thought he had misread the mammoth mammal's intentions and feared he would be eaten, forgetting that whales didn’t even have teeth, but his worries were proved unfounded.

  The creature scooped him up with its back, lifting him out of the water. His aching leg muscles gave out beneath him, and he gratefully collapsed upon the fleshy rock. Once Elijah was aware enough not to fall off, the beast of the depths took off.

  Elijah had no idea where it was taking him, but anywhere was better than the bottom of the ocean. As they cut through the waves, the teen tried to converse with, and to learn from, the magical animal. It was difficult; although both could impart intentions into their mana, it was not the primary source of communication for either of them.

  Elijah knew this because, when the whale grew frustrated with its inability to convey a message, it made a low, clicking, rumbling sound he guessed to be whale song. It didn’t help matters that neither of them shared similar points of reference; the majestic creature lived entirely below the waves and the teen above.

  Elijah tried to learn the name of his rescuer, but whatever it tried to impart through the medium of water mana was too complicated. It appeared to be a mix of large rocks, maybe a wall, and perhaps the idea of immovability, combined with some other things Elijah couldn’t even begin to guess at.

  In the end, he gave up and just called the whale Laboon, because she was so big and apparently still only considered a child amongst her kind; she was already as long as Nelson’s column was tall.

  He didn’t understand the name she gave him in the language of whales, though given how she seemed to snicker whenever she said it, he suspected it was some kind of joke at his expense. It didn’t matter, given she had saved him; she could call him whatever she liked, just not late for dinner.

  After the pleasantries were out of the way, he tried to discuss magic with her. He saw how she seamlessly blended with the water mana around her and wanted to know how she did it. He had seen the Water Buffalhigh do the same thing but assumed it was only possible because that monster was made entirely from water.

  The whale being able to do the same thing made him think there was a better way, a way to circulate water mana rather than just sucking it in.

  Unfortunately, his saviour was no help in this regard. It was something she just did, like breathing or like her heart beating. It was not something she could teach. That was a shame, but not all hope was lost. Just knowing that it was possible gave him a goal to work towards.

  Before the young man knew it, time had flown by, and land was in sight. What’s more, it was the Treasure Island he had been seeking; there could be no doubt. On the map, the map that he had lost but memorised, there was the image of a great treasure chest in the centre of the island. Elijah thought it was artistic license, but he had been wrong.

  In the centre of the landmass was a great mountain range, formed, as if by design, to exactly resemble a chest, locks and all. It was quite something to look upon. It was also the most conspicuous place ever to bury treasure. Elijah wondered how many pirates had hidden their plunder here.

  All too soon, the water became too shallow, and Elijah and the whale were forced to part ways. The teen waved her off and the whale splashed her tail excitedly. He had become fond of the creature, but already his skin was wrinkled, and he needed to get back to proper land.

  After wading a couple of steps, a thought struck him, and he turned back, intent on asking Laboon something, but it was too late; she had already taken off.

  How was she here?

  Up until this point in the Trial, the people had clearly been constructions. Most of them only repeated the same words. The Mosquito’s crew was slightly more developed, with some ability to think, but they too could only respond to certain questions; they were too limited to be real. Laboon was not.

  She had been an actual, thinking creature. Elijah had thought that this Trial was some kind of illusion, but now he started to wonder. Had he been transported to some remote corner of Terra Torus and surrounded by Trial apparitions? Was Laboon the inhabitant of another Trial and had somehow crossed over? Were there…

  Elijah shook his head. Speculating like this wouldn’t get him anywhere. He needed to focus. Right now, passing this strange Trial was his only goal. To do that, he needed to find this treasure before the monster….

  …Without the map…

  …Without a crew to help search….

  …Without even any food and water.

  As Elijah’s sodden shoes sunk into soft white sand and he stretched his neck to look up at the palm trees and jungle beyond, the teen thought to himself:

  Let’s find some buried treasure!

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