Kraken I: Squid or Octopus?

The sea erupted beside the Flying Crimson as the Kraken rose from the depths. A massive wave slammed into Lina’s Holy Shield and shattered it, leaving the entire crew frozen as five enormous yellow eyes turned toward the ship.

For several tense moments, neither side moved.

Then, the Kraken’s dozens of thick tentacles slowly spread outward before suddenly lunging toward the Flying Crimson.

Skayla had begun preparing another barrier the moment Lina’s Holy Shield shattered.

“Hexagon Barrier!” she shouted, striking the deck with her staff.

A six-sided barrier immediately formed around the Flying Crimson just as the Kraken’s tentacles came crashing down, bouncing harmlessly off its surface.

“An old flame of yours, Captain Barbarossa?” Skayla asked, struggling to maintain the barrier.

“More like an old foe,” Barbarossa replied. “That bastard killed my wife.”

“I can tell there’s a tragic story behind that, but give us the short version,” Skayla said.

“I once served under a pirate captain named Anne Reed,” Barbarossa explained. “We fell in love and planned to retire after one final voyage, but the Kraken attacked our ship. It killed Anne and left me critically wounded.”

Barbarossa tightened his grip around his cutlass.

“After recovering, I spent nearly thirty years following every rumor and sighting of that monster. Somewhere along the way, I became the Pirate Lord.”

“So you became the Pirate Lord while seeking revenge?” Lina asked.

“Pretty much,” Barbarossa answered, raising his cutlass. “This belonged to Anne. It’s the only thing I have left of her.”

“Since you’ve hunted the Kraken for thirty years, what’s its weakness?” Lina asked.

Barbarossa slowly lowered his cutlass and fell silent.

“You have absolutely no idea, do you?” Lina asked, giving him an unimpressed stare.

“HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO KNOW ITS WEAKNESS WHEN I HAVEN’T FOUGHT IT SINCE IT KILLED MY WIFE?!” Barbarossa shouted.

Before Lina could respond, another barrage of tentacles slammed against Skayla’s barrier. Cracks rapidly spread across its surface before the entire barrier shattered, sending Skayla flying backward across the deck.

“For now, let’s just throw everything we have at it!” Barbarossa shouted, raising his cutlass toward the Kraken. “FIRE!”

At his command, a massive barrage of arrows, ballista bolts, cannonballs, and magical attacks erupted from the Flying Crimson, striking the Kraken’s enormous tentacles.

The Kraken immediately retaliated, swinging several tentacles toward the ship. The crew rushed forward to meet them, slashing and hacking away tiny fragments of its thick flesh.

But as quickly as the wounds appeared, they began to close.

By the time the tentacles rose into the air again, the damaged flesh had already regenerated. They came crashing down once more, sending crew members sprawling across the deck.

“Doesn’t this ship have anything stronger?” Lina asked as she parried a tentacle away from a fallen crew member. “Why are we still using cannons and ballista bolts?”

“The magic cannons can’t function without mana from the Core,” Barbarossa explained. “Our generous president prepared these older weapons in case something like this happened.”

Lina noticed a familiar engraving of flames stretching across one cannon’s barrel.

“Are you bloody kidding me?” she shouted. “Those came from your flagship, Queen Anne’s Revenge!”

“Aye!” Barbarossa proudly planted his foot on the cannon. “They originally served aboard Anne’s ship, The Southern Flame, during our first battle against the Kraken. Our president recovered them after my flagship sank.”

Barbarossa pointed his cutlass toward the Kraken.

“FIRE!” he commanded as all eight cannons unleashed another thunderous volley.

“FLY, MY BABIES!” Barbarossa shouted as the cannonballs tore through several approaching tentacles. “IT’S TIME FOR OUR REVENGE!”

Barbarossa charged forward, unleashing a furious barrage of slashes that sliced one of the Kraken’s thick tentacles into several pieces.

The moment he finished, however, a sharp pain shot through his back.

“I swear, I’m getting too old for this,” he groaned, reaching behind to support his aching back.

With a small pop, Barbarossa finally managed to straighten himself, only to notice another tentacle already swinging toward him.

“...Ah, shit,” he muttered, raising his cutlass and bracing for impact.

Before the tentacle could reach him, Lina suddenly appeared above it and severed it with one heavy swing. The massive limb crashed onto the deck, violently writhing around behind her.

“All that time playing the model citizen has made your skills rusty, huh?” Lina mocked.

Before Barbarossa could respond, another tentacle swept past the ship. Lina leaped onto it and rode it toward the Kraken, dragging her silver blade through its flesh as she ran.

As she neared the Kraken’s head, Lina ripped her sword free and launched herself into the air. The blade glowed brilliant red as an enormous amount of mana gathered around it.

“O crimson light born from unwavering resolve, gather within my blade and strike down all that stands before me. Let neither flesh nor steel withstand thy strike as I gather all my strength into this single point. Let the heavens witness thy true divine form. I now call upon the crimson spear that shall pierce through all—Gáe Bolg!”

Lina pulled her sword back before thrusting it forward.

The compressed mana formed a massive crimson spear that shot through the Kraken’s head, leaving an enormous hole behind.

As Lina slowly descended toward the sea, she watched in disbelief as the wound began closing before her eyes.

“TSK!” Lina clicked her tongue. “I knew this wasn’t going to be easy.”

“Air Cushion!” Skayla shouted, casting a wind spell to soften Lina’s landing.

“It looks practically untouched and completely unfazed by your concentrated attack,” Skayla commented, staring up at the Kraken as the last traces of its wound disappeared.

“I agree,” Lina admitted. “My poor imitation of Master Atena’s Gáe Bolg is still nowhere near the power of her actual spear strike. I’d say that was maybe ten percent of what she could do.”

“Now, let me try,” Skayla said, stepping forward and raising her staff.

“Fly, Shock Bolt!” she shouted as a tiny ball of black lightning shot toward the Kraken.

“What is that tiny thing supposed to do?!” Barbarossa shouted.

The spell struck one of the Kraken’s tentacles and disappeared into its flesh without making a sound. Several seconds passed, but nothing happened.

“IT DID NOTHING!” Barbarossa shouted.

The Kraken resumed its attack. As the affected tentacle swung toward the ship, it suddenly burst open, spraying chunks of flesh and slimy goo across the deck.

“EWWW!” Skayla shouted, quickly casting Bubble Wash on herself and Lina.

“What did you do?!” Barbarossa demanded, wiping the goo from his face.

“I layered hundreds of Shock Bolts together and added piercing, bouncing, trapping, and delayed effects,” Skayla explained. “The first bolt entered its flesh and remained inside. The others followed through the same wound and spread throughout the tentacle.”

Skayla proudly twirled her staff.

“Then I activated every bolt at once. Basically, I turned a beginner spell into an advanced explosion spell without using a long incantation.”

“T-That’s insane!” Barbarossa shouted. Even with his limited knowledge of magic, he understood how difficult controlling hundreds of spells at once would be.

“Unfortunately, it’s already regenerating,” Lina pointed out, gesturing toward the damaged stump.

Everyone watched as new flesh rapidly sprouted from the stump, twisting and expanding until an entirely new tentacle had formed in its place.

“Boo! That barely did anything,” Skayla complained. “How ridiculously powerful is its regeneration?”

“At this rate, we’ll exhaust ourselves before we can subdue it,” Lina said, slicing apart another approaching tentacle.

“Float!” Skayla shouted, lifting herself into the air and weaving between several attacks.

“If those tentacles keep striking the ship, we’re going to sink!” Barbarossa warned.

“We need something decisive,” Lina said. “I could use Gáe Bolg again, but gathering that much mana takes too long. The wound would regenerate before I could strike a second time.”

“Don’t you have a technique that could split it apart?” Skayla asked, releasing several wind blades at an approaching tentacle.

“I do, but using it against something with multiple hearts is dangerous,” Lina replied. “If I split it apart and both halves regenerate, we could end up fighting two enormous squids.”

“Squid?” Skayla suddenly stopped and stared up at the Kraken.

“Wait. That’s not a squid. It’s an octopus!” she shouted.

“HUH?! IT’S A SQUID!” Lina shouted, pointing toward the monster. “LOOK AT ITS POINTY HEAD! AND LOOK AT HOW MANY TENTACLES IT HAS! I COUNT WAY MORE THAN EIGHT, SO IT HAS TO BE A SQUID!”

Skayla lowered herself back onto the deck and struck the wooden floor with her staff.

“Aqua Bind!” she shouted.

Dozens of thick ropes made entirely of seawater rose from the ocean and wrapped themselves around the Kraken’s massive body and tentacles, tightly holding the creature in place.

With the Kraken temporarily restrained, Skayla angrily stomped toward Lina.

“THE NUMBER OF TENTACLES DOESN’T MATTER! IT’S OBVIOUSLY MUTATED!” Skayla argued, pointing furiously toward the Kraken. “I MEAN, LOOK AT ITS SIZE! HOW MANY SQUIDS HAVE YOU EVER SEEN THAT WERE THIS GIANT, HUH?!”

Before Lina could make another claim, Barbarossa finally snapped.

“BOTH OF YOU, STOP BICKERING!” he shouted, struggling to catch his breath. “IF YOU HAVE TIME TO ARGUE, THEN FIND US A WAY OUT OF HERE!”

A thunderous crash suddenly echoed across the sea as a massive bolt of lightning tore through the darkening sky, startling everyone aboard the ship.

Barbarossa slowly looked up as ominous clouds gathered overhead. His expression immediately sank when he realized what was happening.

“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me...” he muttered.

Within seconds, heavy rain began pouring from the sky as powerful winds swept across the sea. The Flying Crimson rocked violently beneath their feet, forcing the crew members to grab onto anything nearby to keep themselves from being thrown overboard.

“THIS IS JUST GREAT!” Barbarossa shouted, throwing his arms into the air. “WHAT IN THE SEVEN SEAS DID I DO TO DESERVE THIS?!”

Meanwhile, Lina and Skayla weren’t paying attention to his complaints.

The two silently stared toward the dark clouds above, watching flashes of lightning dance between them as thunder rumbled across the sky.

Lina and Skayla exchanged glances before suddenly bursting into laughter, both realizing they had come up with the same idea.