Vega woke up gasping for air.
"Hey, are you okay?" Dion sat down and looked at his side worriedly. He always felt his friend always dreamed something terrible but wouldn't tell him what it was about.
Vega started to calm down. "I'm okay." He put his hand on his pillow and smiled. "Yes, I think I'm okay."
Several days on the ship went as usual. Aside from more and more apprentices joining the fight with the creatures of the ocean, Vega and Dion chose to stay in their room studying and learning. They agreed to stay inside when they found out the ship could deliver some food to their room.
Suddenly, while they were reading, the boat shook hard. Vega stopped his glass from falling and looked around the room. The lamp shook and flickered. He put away all the books and brought Dion outside to see what was happening.
He sensed the mana squirming from the edge of his soul and swirled angrily. Another fight was going on. But from the intensity of the mana around him, the fight wasn't simple.
Looking at the deck, the crews shouted, asking all the commoners to return to their rooms. Only the apprentices could stay outside and fight. Even the ones who couldn't fly joined the fight, summoning their own spell and fighting several huge tentacles shot from the ocean that hit the ship.
One huge arm swiped through the deck when they edged closer to it. Vega summoned his own barrier, stopping the attack from reaching him. He felt the mana was harder to reach, and it took him a while to summon a simple water lance and aim it toward the other tentacles wrapping around the hull.
Dion did a similar thing without using his sword; he summoned several flaming spears and hit the other tentacles coming from their back, splitting them in half.
An apprentice flew on top of his magical item and shouted, "Use your simple spells toward the kraken. I'm using my most powerful spell to kill it fast."
"Yes!" The apprentices shouted toward him.
Vega nodded and summoned several ice needles, aiming toward the creature's suckers. Dion did the same and stretched his arms, using the three fire blades floating around him to slash the kraken.
The ship was full of different spells connected, hitting the kraken repeatedly. But the kraken was on a level above them. It shrieked, and a ball of water gathered on top of the ship, and with its arm, he let the water down. The pressure from the water blasted toward the deck, and even with some of the high-level barriers, it managed to crack the deck.
One apprentice did her best to throw some seeds toward the kraken. The seeds grew quickly with her spells, absorbing the water from its skin and creating twisting vines.
While everyone was starting to get tired of casting their spells nonstop, the apprentice shouted, "Stop the spells, now!"
When Vega cut his connection with his mana, he felt a huge pressure emanating from the flying figure that shot fast toward the kraken. Boom! The sound made his ears hurt, and when he closed his ears, the kraken was getting angrier and summoning its own strongest spell, killing the apprentice right away.
Vega whistled. The kraken heard the whistle and became scared. It twisted its body, and with its eyes focused on the sound, with one of its tentacles, it slapped the ship. The ship groaned, and some of the wood broke.
When most of the people are screaming, take cover. The kraken lifted one of its tentacles and shrieked. From all of the suckers on its arm, spears shot toward the ship landed near the spot where Vega stood earlier.
Vega sat down and, hoping no one noticed, took out his flute and started to play a screeching melody, focusing on the kraken. While the creature was wriggling around, trying to detach itself from the ship, Dion screamed, "Use your strongest spells!"
Hundreds of gleaming spells landed on the Kraken. The creature closed its eyes and drew back from the ship.
An adept finally came out of hiding. With a wave of his hand, he sent a huge fireball hurtling toward the Kraken, blasting half of its body. The creature tried to retreat, but the adept clenched his hand. Out of nowhere, a thick vine shot out from the deck, wrapping around the creature and holding it closer to the ship.
The vine grew, sprouting leaves, and some buds bloomed into flowers. Opening their pink petals, the flowers shot a thick yellow smoke, filling the air. When the smoke touched the kraken, it screamed, and the skin started to wither. With its last try, the kraken screamed, summoning a huge wave, trying to bring the adepts together, but the attack stopped halfway before it reached the adepts.
Screaming, the adept waved his arm in one motion. With a simple stroke, the fire severed the creature's head. The adept looked around the deck and stared at Vega.
Vega felt a growing pressure attacking his source. But then the adept scoffed and went back inside.
The apprentices cheered loudly and bowed toward the place where the adept disappeared. They took some knives and slit the kraken open, collecting its blood. Several high-level apprentices summoned their own magic items and floated close to the kraken with their eyes full of greed, trying to find any magic stones from the kraken.
Dion rolled closer to Vega and offered his hand. "You should be more careful. I think we're in trouble." His chin tilted toward the flute in his hand.
Vega thanked him and immediately put away the flute inside his space ring. He pretended nothing happened, and after patting his clothes, he pushed Dion back toward their room.
When he finally closed the door, he sighed, laid on the door, and slid down. "That was scary." Vega remembered the scene where a huge wave blasted the flying apprentice, killing him on the spot.
"I know, but at least the pressure from the kraken would guard the ship from any other creatures. I think this could be the last disturbance we face before arriving at the capital. Let's go." Dion helped Vega stand up and carry him to the bed.
With practice, Dion could drive the wheelchair without his friend's help, but Vega kept insisting on pushing him around.
Dion laid Vega on the bed and went to the bathroom. He took some water and cleaned the blood stains from his friend's arms. The blood wasn't his, and after he cleaned himself of the blood, several low-level apprentices lost their lives during the fight. Dion laid on the pillow, looking at his friend, who had already started to snore.
Dion closed his eyes to meditate.
The time went by fast. As usual, he heard Vega move in his sleep. Sometimes he cried and screamed. He couldn't concentrate any longer and stopped gathering the mana around him. Putting his hand on the crying boy
He heard some of the stories that Vega was brave enough to share. But apparently, the boy still had more traumatic things he hid from him.
Dion ordered the food and waited.
Vega opened his eyes, greeted by a nice-smelling soup and a smiling face looking at him. Vega smiled back and thanked Dion. "I love this humunael soup." He recalled the first time he shouted at his friend for recommending the weirdest soup name ever, but he turned out to like them.
"Yeah, I notice, but you won't gain anything from them. It only works for low-level apprentices."
"I know, but it's delicious."
While Vega was enjoying the soup, Dion asked him, "What are you going to do with your flute? The adept saw it, right?"
"Yes, but unless he asks me about it, I will pretend that he didn't notice anything." He was also afraid the adepts would figure out that they were from the tower, especially those sent by Professor Addilyn.
"Yes, but--"
"That's okay, Dion. Don't worry. My mentor gave me a list of some of her friends. I'm hoping that the adept earlier was one of her contacts."
Dion nodded and went back to his own food.
Suddenly someone knocked on their door. Vega rolled his eyes, hating that his time eating was disturbed.
"What?!" He opened the door and glared at the person standing outside.
The maid looked scared and apologized to him several times. "Here, from my master." She offered him a paper and ran back.
"Who is she?"
Vega shrugged. "But she gave me something."
He opened the paper and saw the sentence written on it. "It's the adept. He asked me to come to his place."
"I'm going with you."
"You can't. He specified that I have to come alone. Look!" Vega looked amazed at the sudden change on the paper. The ink on the paper moved around, creating a simple map.
"That's amazing. I've never seen a magic paper before." Dion took the paper from his hand, staring at the moving ink with interest.
Vega felt the guilt creeping on him. He still didn't tell Dion about his magical book that could do the same thing and even better. He let Dion play with the paper and went toward his wardrobe to find any clothes to meet the adept. But looking at his choices, he shook his head and chose the simplest option. A black robe. After putting the robe on top of his clothes, he put his sigils inside his pouch.
"Can I have the paper back?"
"Wait, you're going right now?"
"Yeah. I don't think waiting is going to help. Don't follow me; just stay here."
Dion nodded. "Be careful."