Chapter 31  

The giant lobster territory lay a not-insignificant distance away from town; to avoid being lassoed and used as a draft (1) mermaid, Sirena enlisted the services of a pair of taxi dolphins for her slow-swimming party members.

:We’d like to go to the giant lobster territory: she said to the cetaceans.

Dolphins in Fantasia were not a playable race (due to the impracticalities associated with not having opposable thumbs), but possessed human-level intelligence and telepathic abilities.

:That’s not very far: commented one of the dolphins in a telepathic voice that was female, but somewhat inhuman.

Indeed, self-respecting merpeople would choose to make the journey under their own power.

:Humans don’t swim very quickly: Sirena explained.

As if to make her point, Fey and Blade just then caught up to the mermaid as she conversed with the taxis.

The dolphins circled Fey and Blade curiously, having never seen humans before.

:So this is a human: commented the same female dolphin.

“I’m an elf,” Fey declared.

Sirena failed to relay this to the dolphins, who continued their inspection.

:Wow, their tails really are split in half! (2):exclaimed the other, this one with a male telepathic voice.

:What are those tiny things?: the female asked.

She curiously poked Boris with her rostrum (because apparently “beak” is a scientifically inaccurate word for the pointy thing at the front of a dolphin’s face).

:Those are my friend’s pets, creatures from land: said Sirena.

:That one’s a miniature boar, the purple squishy thing is a slime, and these shadowy things are glooms.

The glooms can change shape.: After observing the dolphins’ ease of movement in water, Shadow and Onyx chose to shift their forms from tailed torpedos to miniature shadow-dolphins.

The dolphins chittered in laughter at the imitation.

:Just for that, we’ll take you for free: said the female, who appeared to be the dominant of the pair.

Fey was amused.

The dolphins made her shift her perspective to see land creatures from their point of view, and this added an extra layer of whimsy to her already random thoughts.

She gripped the handle of the kelp-rope harness the female dolphin wore, while Blade did the same with the male.

:Hello, I’m-: a series of dolphin whistles and clicks, :-and that’s-: a different series of dolphin whistles and clicks.

Fey waved hello.

:You two should really go purchase telepathy stones: commented Blade’s dolphin (hereafter referred to as “Click”).

:Having mute riders is boring.: Telepathy stones were designed to allow other races to adventure effectively underwater.

Fey wanted a stone so she could resume communication with her pets.

“Ooh, I want one!” she said over party chat.

:Okay, let’s go to the accessory shop-: Before Sirena had fully completed her sentence, the dolphins had zoomed away, towing their surprised-looking passengers.

Even burdened with passengers, the dolphins made Sirena work hard to keep up.

Their shape and musculature were much more conducive to swimming than the impractical human torso of a mermaid.

They made rapid-fire stops at the accessory shop, bank, and accessory shop again.

The telepathy stone, made of blue kyanite (3),cost 5000g, so Blade elected to save money and remain telepathically mute.

Unlike Fey, he had no pressing need to communicate with anyone outside of his party.

The stone was mounted on a choker-style necklace that Fey put on.

:There we go: she said as it came into contact with her skin.

Her telepathic voice was recognizably Fey-like.

The Fey-pets squeaked loudly in unison (“Fey-Fey!”) and converged on their owner as if being reunited after years of separation.

Even Ebony wiggled out from Sirena’s grasp and joined in the (super-adorable) group hug.

:Why are the land-pets attacking their owner?: asked Click.

:It’s called ‘hugging’: answered Fey’s dolphin (hereafter referred to as “Whistle”) in an ‘expert on humans’ voice.

:Land creatures grab onto each other in order to express affection.: :Oh.: After a pause, Click added, :Octopi do that down here, I guess.

Everyone likes their food.: Fey laughed at the dolphins’ conversation.

One by one, the glooms detached themselves from her person, while Amethyst continued to hang from Fey’s neck (she’s wearing two chokers now) and Boris was tucked under an arm.

:Okay, let’s go kill some lobsters: (*end tangent*).

Click and Whistle led the way to the giant lobster territory, followed extremely closely by Blade and Fey, and less closely by Sirena.

The dolphin-shaped Shadow and Onyx raced the torpedo-shaped Inkblot, Obsidian and Midnight, with no clear winner in speed (because the author doesn’t know enough about fluid dynamics to determine which one would win).

Ebony, straggling behind in her very un-streamlined bunny-eared mermaid shape, was recaptured by Sirena and pulled along.

“Hey, what spells do you have?” The question was posed by Blade.

(As it was practical, there were even odds as to whether it would have occurred to our heroine to ask.) :My level 10 spell is an electric-type elemental bolt, “Charge Jolt”.

My level 20 spell is a non-elemental area-of-effect attack, “Magic Bomb”.

I also bought a spellbook and learned “Ice Slice”, which deals physical damage.: Merfolk had naturally high water affinity, and mermaid mages could cast water-element spells with 30% more effectiveness.

However, all aquatic monsters also had high water affinity, and took less damage from water spells.

Sirena had chosen an electric-type beginner spell to exploit the weakness of most of the local monsters.

Ice and water element affinities had 50% overlap, so she had chosen an ice spell to deal physical damage.

“Cool,” said Blade.

(Fey snorted at the unintentional pun.) “So what’s the strategy?” :Um.: said Sirena.

:Hit enemies until they die (4): said Fey.

“…Got it.” (As plans went, the best that could be said of this one was that it was ‘flexible’.

The worst that could be said was ‘that’s not a plan’.) When they arrived at the giant lobster territory, Fey remarked, :They weren’t kidding about the “giant” part.: Real-world lobsters continued to grow throughout their lives, but were limited in size by the energy requirements in growing ever-larger exoskeletons during moulting.

Apparently, Fantasian lobsters had no such restrictions.

Each of the bluish-brownish crustaceans was longer than Fey was tall, reminding her of alligators in their long, low silhouettes.

Though some species of lobster lacked large front claws, these did not, armed with pincers that looked like they could crush a person’s head.

:Thanks for the ride: Fey said to Whistle, releasing her grip on the harness.

After Blade separated from Click, the two dolphins decided to loiter rather than head back to town for more fares, curious as to how the humans would fight.

Sirena shared her experience in fighting the lobsters.

:They can’t really get off the seafloor, so don’t worry about protecting me; I’ll just stay up here and shoot spells at them.: :Okay.

Try not to hit us.: Fey swam down to engage a lobster in combat, as did Blade with a different lobster.

Sirena began a spell.

:Charge Jolt: she intoned.

Combat spells in Fantasia had a unique casting mechanic.

Spells had no cool-down, but rather a required build-up of magical energy before they manifested.

This minimum value was listed as the ‘mana intensity threshold’ in each spell’s information.

Accompanying the measure of mana intensity was a mage-only attribute of “concentration”.

Unlike the base attributes of vitality, strength, dexterity, agility, intelligence, and willpower, it did not increase automatically with each level.

Concentration affected a mage’s performance in two ways: one, its value was the mana intensity the mage could produce per second; two, higher concentration meant that the mage was less likely to be distracted and interrupt the spellcasting.

While a warrior’s attribute points were spread between vitality, strength, dexterity, and agility, a mage ignored those attributes in favour of intelligence for mana reserves and magic attack, willpower for mana regeneration and lowering spell costs, and concentration for spellcasting speed..

Charge Jolt had a mana intensity threshold of 100 while Sirena’s concentration was 36, so approximately 2.8 seconds were required to cast the spell.

However, Sirena chose to build the mana intensity past the minimum threshold in order to increase the spell damage; after a full 10 seconds, she released an overcharged Charge Jolt at the nearest lobster.

Electricity flashed between her fingertips and the monster, then arced to chain attack two more lobsters.

Instantly cooked, all three turned a bright orange-red.

<Sirena has defeated the giant lobster!>