Chapter 39 : Chapter 39

Chapter 39: The Sea God's Grace is Endless (1)

Paaaaang!

Far beyond the horizon, the setting sun was visible.

With the sound of the ship’s horn, the vessel gently pushed away, and the noise of the people, which had been loud just a moment ago, along with the city's view, gradually receded into the distance.

‘We finally managed to depart before the day ended…….’

Artier, watching this from the deck, could let out a sigh of relief.

“How long did they say it would take at sea?”

“It’ll probably be about three days.”

In truth, the distance from the central region to the south isn’t short enough to be covered in just three days.

But in this world, one could use teleport gates set up on the sea while traveling by ship.

“This is probably why walking on land takes longer. There are no teleport gates there.”

“I suppose so.”

“There’s not much to do until we arrive, so get some rest.”

Gerard patted Artier’s shoulder and disappeared into the ship’s interior first.

At his words, Artier looked down at his own hand, and then stared intently at the horizon again.

“Is that so.”

‘In the game, it was an automatic skip, so I didn’t know, but I guess I have to spend the whole three days.’

Just thinking about it was boring and frustrating, but there was nothing to be done.

No matter how much this was a world where magic existed, that world also had its own set of laws.

‘Right, let’s rest a little. Three days isn’t that long anyway.’

Come to think of it, I had been running around here and there in Pons, so wasn't this the first time I had decided to truly rest without any thoughts?

Having entered the cabin, Artier lay his body down on the bed made of straw.

How much time had passed like that?

“Artier.”

Someone shook Artier awake.

It was Jeina.

“What is it……?”

“Well, I don’t know how to say this.”

A sense of bewilderment was laced in Jeina’s voice.

Did something happen?

“Did a monster appear?”

“That’s not it, but Collie collapsed.”

“He what?”

A monster didn’t appear, but Collie collapsed? Then was it an attack by pirates or the crew?

But from Jeina’s tone and expression, it didn’t seem to be such a serious situation.

“Why all of a sudden?”

Having no idea what to expect made it even more frightening.

And Artier’s gut feeling did not miss the mark.

“I don’t know, his face suddenly turned pale, he went up to the deck and was vomiting? And he’s just been repeating that.”

“……Isn’t that seasickness?”

At Artier’s words, Jeina tilted her head.

“Seasickness? What’s that?

***

Thud!

“It seems sending Jeina was a mistake.”

Gerard, who was patting Collie in his dog form on the deck, said with a sigh.

“To think she wouldn’t understand the concept of seasickness itself. She certainly must have never experienced such a thing in her life.”

“Th-that’s cheating, something like that……”

Collie’s condition was, even at a glance, a complete mess.

With a pale face, Collie was lying prostrate on the floor, twitching, while what was presumed to be drool was trickling from his snout.

“His condition has worsened in just 15 minutes.”

“I didn’t know either. That Collie was this susceptible to seasickness.”

Gerard sighed and patted Collie’s back again.

“This is the situation. Could you possibly bring back some medicinal herbs to calm the seasickness?”

“Me?”

“I don’t mind going, but this task suits you.”

Gerard said so and pointed towards the sea below the deck.

Splash!

“That’s…… a Blue Marlin?”

Information about the creature naturally surfaced in Artier’s mind.

A peculiar item from the original work where the fish itself was treated as the only consumable item of its kind.

When consumed, it had the effect of dispelling status abnormalities related to balance, such as dizziness and daze.

“That thing would certainly be helpful for seasickness.”

“Indeed. But that creature is fast and also has magic resistance. That’s why I thought it would be best to ask you.”

“I’ve never fished before, but… I’ll give it a try.”

Of course, I had no intention of leisurely catching it with a fishing rod.

“I didn’t think I’d experience underwater combat so soon.”

Taking a sword out of his inventory, Artier grabbed a nearby rope and tied it around his waist.

‘This is more like underwater gathering than combat, though.’

Still, in the end, it was a good sign.

The sensation of swinging a sword underwater would be very different from usual.

‘There’s a place in the main story that’s set underwater, right? Let’s just think of this as practice.’

“I’ll be back then.”

“Don’t overdo it. Be careful.”

Before entering the water, Artier used Telekinesis.

Woooong…….

He then aimed at the surrounding air. Then, although it wasn’t visible, he could feel a helmet-sized amount of air being grasped in his hand.

“Hmm, so it does work.”

Originally in the game, this was a function that activated automatically upon entering the water.

It was a method of coating the area around the face with a thin layer of air, allowing for free movement in shallow water for about 2 minutes.

Splash!

The time spent in the air was short.

When he closed and opened his eyes, Artier had set foot in a world where his whole body felt heavy.

[Lv.7 Blue Marlin (Low-Grade)]

Swoooosh!

Soon, a chilling sound was heard.

It was the sound of the Blue Marlins, having discovered an intruder, rushing in for an instinctive defense.

‘It’s heavy.’

Artier, who was about to swing his sword immediately, hesitated.

As if he had sandbags tied to his entire body, his movements were incredibly slow.

Because of this, an attack that he would normally have deflected with ease, Artier not only barely blocked it but was also pushed back a considerable distance.

‘It doesn’t work like it did in the game…….’

Having regained his balance, Artier muttered with a crumpled expression.

On land, swinging a sword was not that difficult.

He just had to recall the way the character in the game moved, and his body would move accordingly.

But underwater, it wasn't easy.

A discrepancy arose between the movement of the character in his mind and his actual movements.

Should I say it felt like lagging? The character being sluggish was a bonus.

‘In that case, I just have to act half a beat earlier. By predicting the enemy's actions.’

Pow!

In the meantime, a Blue Marlin charged again.

This time, Artier deflected them with ease, but no matter how much he predicted their actions, overcoming the slowness of his own body was not easy.

Eventually, the Blue Marlin’s sharp, spear-like snout struck Artier’s abdomen.

“……?!”

But the Blue Marlin must have been bewildered.

Instead of Artier’s abdomen being pierced and gushing blood, its own sharp snout was miserably crumpled.

Artier also made a bewildered face, but soon realized something and smiled.

‘The performance is guaranteed.’

[Sword Dancer Leather Armor (Rare)]

Defense: 35

Option: (Sword Dancer) When a sword is equipped, damage received from slashing and piercing attacks is reduced by 20%, critical damage received is reduced by 5%, Strength +5

A leotard-style leather armor with a mix of light brown and dark black here and there.

At first, it was a mystery.

How this armor, which felt lighter than chainmail, could have higher defense.

Woooong…….

The answer was the very fine protective magic coated on the exterior of the armor.

Right where the Blue Marlin had struck, a tiny protective barrier, almost invisible to the naked eye, was protecting Artier’s abdomen.

[Flame Cleave activates.]

Fwoosh!

When he used Flame Cleave, which shoots out flames, in the water, bubbling foam surged up from all directions.

But the Blue Marlin couldn't even withstand the weakened sword energy in the water and was cut to pieces. The remaining ones stabbed at Artier as if in a last-ditch effort, but the result did not change.

[You have acquired Cooked Blue Marlin.]

‘Whoops… I shouldn’t cook it. I should just use normal attacks.’

As I said before, this wasn’t underwater combat. It was a form of gathering.

No matter how new Artier was to the underwater environment, at this point, there were no low-level monsters or aquatic creatures that could pierce a rare-grade armor.

[You have acquired Blue Marlin.]

[You have acquired Blue Marlin.]

After grabbing two more Blue Marlins, Artier felt his breath getting shorter and kicked his feet to head upwards.

As he got on the ship and was wiping his drenched body, Gerard came over and patted his shoulder.

“Good work.”

“It’s not as refreshing as I thought.”

“It’s seawater. Besides, leather armor soaks up water.”

It was definitely different from jumping in naked.

Should I say it felt like going into the water wearing a thin padded jacket and then coming out?

[Using Evaporation Magic Stone.]

Chiiiik…….

The water drenching his body dried up quickly, but there was nothing he could do about the salt stuck all over him.

As I was frowning, Gerard raised his Grimoire.

“Shield.”

Just as Artier was looking bewildered, the salt grains stuck to his body fell off all at once.

“What did you do?”

“I deployed a shield closely against the entire body, and then expanded it again. This way, you can remove foreign substances attached to the exterior.”

“……This was possible.”

“It wasn't possible from the beginning. As you said, I just became able to do it after focusing my training on the Shield magic.”

Gerard then sighed and closed his Grimoire.

“Though I couldn’t use it in the way I first thought of.”

“What do you mean?”

“This is a method I came up with based on when you asked me to remove the shield during the Magica Mercenary Corps’ ambush.”

A spherical shield is affected by the wind, hindering the user from moving nimbly.

Gerard knew the reason why Artier had asked him to remove the shield, but that was the first time he had experienced it firsthand.

“Indeed, for a swordsman like you who catches openings and continuously rolls or moves sideways, a shield could be cumbersome. So I wondered what it would be like to make the shield adhere to the body. Then it wouldn't interfere with movement.”

“That sounds like it would be fine. Why do you say you can't use it?”

“It consumes much more mana than the original shield, yet the amount of damage it absorbs is even less. Plus, there's a fatal problem.”

“A fatal problem?”

“It’s like this.”

Gerard attached a thin shield to a nearby pillar.

And then he threw a Mana Bullet at it.

Crash!

“……Ah!”

As the shield shattered and disappeared, the wooden pillar was left with numerous scratches as if it had been scraped by something sharp.

The fragments of the shattered shield had mercilessly stabbed the wooden pillar before they disappeared.

“Because of this, it’s a failure as a protective magic. It could injure an ally.”

In the first place, Shield magic consumes a higher amount of mana than other magic.

But if this consumes even more and also has the possibility of friendly fire, it had to be considered difficult to use in a real battle.

“Still, I think it could be used for other purposes. Let’s try to modify it a bit more.”

“For now, let’s go check on Collie.”

Gerard handed the two Blue Marlins Artier had brought to a crew member.

The crew member who received the wonderful fish showed a happy smile.

“Thanks to you, dinner will be plentiful tonight!”

The crew member took one for himself and prepared the remaining one as sashimi.

Artier took it to Collie.

When he touched the panting Collie, the weakly closed eyelids slowly lifted.

“Collie, try eating this. You’ll feel much better.”

“What is that……?”

Collie briefly brought his nose to the sashimi on the plate and sniffed it.

And then he cautiously brought it to his mouth, but…….

“Uweck!”

He seemed to chew for a bit, but then he immediately scrunched up his face in disgust and spat it out.

“Ugh……. I feel so nauseous, I can’t possibly swallow it…….”

“What?”

Beeep!

[Collie has been afflicted with the Seasickness status abnormality.]

[Consumption of all forms of food is restricted.]

Soon after, a red warning sign appeared before Artier’s eyes.

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