Raiding The Galleon’s Graveyard

They’re down, drowned in the depths below
Where the sun don’t shine and the winds don’t blow
And the timbers crack and the mainstay fails
We’ll all find peace wrapped within our sails…

“Can’t you move the dome any faster?”

“Oh, I’m sorry. Are you the spell caster who knows exactly how to keep the two of us from drowning from miles of cold dark ocean? I thought I was! I must have been mistaken.”

“Ugh, sorry I just… we’ve been walking for almost half an hour with nothing happening. I figured we would be at the graveyard by now.”

Anna gave off a soft sigh, and if her hands weren’t busy maintaining the air pocket she would have probably facepalmed. “Darren, I told you that if you wanted to move faster we would need to have a second spellcaster to help me with this spell. Its not exactly in my magical school, so it’s kinda hard to maintain and move quickly.”

Darren shook his head. “No way. The more people we add the less money we make. Honestly, if I could do this myself I would have come alone.”

“Gee, thanks soooo much for sacrificing part of your profits to bring me along.” Anna said with an eyeroll. “But isn’t this quest supposed to be for a party of four? With a MINIMUM of two spellcasters?”

Darren gave a dismissive wave of his hand. “Nah. I checked on the forums before we logged on about this quest. Basically we go down into the graveyard, kill a few ghosts, find a treasure in one of the wrecks, and go back home. They only suggest four people because most players don’t spec their character like I did.”

“What, ugly?” Anna said with a chuckle.

Darren glared at her. “Not ugly. I just didn’t put any points in useless stats. I maxed out all my damage dealing stats, so now I can kill most things with just a single hit.” Darren gave a small self-satisfied smirk. “All I need is to buy a weapon to pair with the build and I’ll instantly be the GOAT on any raid team.”

“And the reason we couldn’t bring another spellcaster to help me with this is because….”

“Cause it would double the amount of time we have to do this quest. Duh.” Darren said, tossing a knife in his hands while they walked. “I mean, we are already gonna have to do this quest like 4 more times anyway to ma-”

“WAIT FUCKING WHAT?!” Anna yelled, halting in her tracks. “You didn’t say anything about having to REDO this quest! Let alone FOUR FUCKING TIMES!”

“I mean… it was kinda implied…” Darren says with a shrug.

“IT FUCKING WASN’T!” Anna yells out, with the threat of dropping the spell being the only thing keeping her from walking over and smacking Darren. “I thought we would just have to do this once and be done!”

“Not if I wanna get the weapon I need-”

“No, fuck this and fuck you. I’m out.” Anna turns on her heel and starts to walk back, only stopping when she feels Darren put a hand on her shoulder.

“No, wait! Look, I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about needing to do this multiple times, but we are already down here! We might as well grab the pearl and at least get ONE completion under out belts, right?” He smiles, even though the lack of his charisma and appearance doesn’t exactly make his avatar the best looker.

Anna sighs, shaking her head before turning around. “Fine. We will do this ONE time, and then you find someone else to help you with this stupid shit.”

“Deal.” Darren says before turning back around and walking alongside Anna into The Galleon’s Graveyard. Both adventures can feel a sense of unease and dread settle in as they walk past the broken corpses of ships long since forgotten, and Anna can feel a shiver going up her spine as she watches the shadows of something swimming through the wreckage.

Both feel like they are being watched, but whether it was some creature or just the unblinking faces on the figureheads of various ships, neither could be sure. After a few more moments of walking, Anna chose to break the silence. “S-so. Where is the pearl?”

Darren looks around confused. “It… it was right in front of us, but its moving.”

“Moving?” Anna asks. “How the hell is it “moving?” Is the pearl haunted or something?”

Darren sighs. “No. One of the mobs around here must have picked it up or something. I think the forum said that this place is filled with drowned ghost sailors, so probably one of them grabbed it on accident or something.”

“So… what now then?”

“Well…” Darren looks around the two of them, noticing the shadows of fallen sailors starting to get closer. “Here. I can go out into the water and prock the ghost’s aggro. I’ll bring him back here, get back in the air bubble, and kill him while being able to breathe. Then we get the pearl, go home, and get our payday.”

“What about me?” Anna asks. “I can’t fight and keep this air pocket up at the same time.”

“You should be fine.” Darren says. “These things are weak to magic, and are programmed to avoid spellcasters. Plus this should be easy… There’s no way these things are smart enough to avoid me!"

You give a small smile as you watch and listen to the two adventures talk. This was going perfectly. The ugly fighter one was going to come out into your territory and get you to follow him. But he had to kill you, so as long as you could keep your distance you could probably lead him wherever you wanted to.

The spellcaster one was going to stay behind, which was good. While she said she couldn’t fight and keep up the air bubble, you didn’t want to chance it if she happened to find the strength to do both. Better to split the two of them up and then deal with them. While the two of them were approaching, you had taken the time to talk to your fellow drowned telling them your plan. They were just supposed to keep the spellcaster where she was and stay out of the way of both you and the melee guy. Or at least some of them were doing that. The rest you sent to go gather up as many of the snapjaws as they could and bring them to the wreck of Neptune’s Fury, an old ship that happened to have only one easily accessed entryway, aside from all the small portholes. Said entry was never a problem for you, as you could always just go spectral if you needed to get out. But for some flesh and blood adventurer? It would be the perfect trap.

You watch as the spellcaster and him talk for a moment more, the fighter asking her if she stays still can she make a second pocket of air around his head. She nods, shrinking her own pocket before creating a small ball of air around his head. The look reminds you of… something, but you can’t quite place it. A memory long since forgotten, perhaps?

Eh, time for said thoughts later. You quickly push back against the wreck you were resting upon, swimming just enough into the open to ensure the melee guy sees you, but also low enough that you can quickly dodge into the wrecks if need be.

“There you are.” You hear behind you, and without even bothering to turn around you quickly start swimming off towards your target wreck.

“H-hey! Get back here you stupid corpse!” You hear, and you suppress a chuckle. He had no idea what he was in for.

The swim doesn’t take that long at all, and you only end up having to dive into the wrecks once after the fighter tried to throw a knife through your undead skull. He missed, thankfully, but you could tell with the speed and sound made by said knife that it would have hurt like hell if he had made the shot. Thank the gods this guy was clearly not used to fighting in the water.

“Stupid fucking… AI… bugged out to…” You tune him out a bit as he mutters random insults, and quickly dive through the opening in the hull of Neptune’s Fury. You can hear him swimming closer, and with barely a moment to spare you shift into your spectral form and pass through the walls of the ship, then move to swim up behind him as silently as you can.

This was going to be easy…

Darren already hated this quest.

Not only did he have to deal with the slowest mage in the entire fucking game, but she just HAD to wear that low cut robe thingie that had her tits basically popping out of her clothes but noooooooo, Darren was apparently too “ugly” to do anything with. So not only did he have to deal with THAT the entire way down, but now this stupid ghost kept running from him and leading him on some stupid chase that wasn’t even supposed to be part of this whole quest!

Well, if this was the price he had to pay for fame and power in this game, he would pay it. He would bitch and moan about having the pay the price, sure, but he would pay it nonetheless.

He quickly followed this ghost guy into one of the wrecks, one that was smooshed between a couple of other smashed ships. Maybe this is where the guy found the pearl or something? Maybe this was the spawn point? Ugh, either way the faster Darren killed this guy the faster he would get his money.

He pulls out one of his knives, ready to sink it into the skull of this guy, but as he swims a bit further he sees…. Nothing.

Well, not nothing. There’s a dilapidated dining table and chairs, as well as a few skeletons sitting at said table. There are a dozen or so port holes, and a big glass window that somehow has managed to stay unbroken despite the rest of the ship being in a shit state, but no ghost and no pearl.

Darren swore he saw the guy swim in here. Where the hell did he-

Then, before Darren can even react, he feels a sharp pain across his back, causing him to cry out before quickly spinning around. There he is. Swimming a few feet away from him, carrying some weird looking sword and the pearl is that ghost-fuck that Darren chased all the way here.

Darren grins, flipping the knife in his hand before quickly hurling it at his target. But just as the blade is about to make contact with the ghost, the guy turns incorporeal and swims backwards, phasing through the ship’s wall.

“Hey! No fucking fair! Come out here and fight me like a man!”

Darren hears a bone-chilling laugh echo after he yells that, and his vision starts to go a bit red. Not metaphorically, mind you. The water in front of him is actually turning red ever so slightly.

Oh right. He got his by the ghost. He reaches around and touches his back, feeling the warmer water and the slight sting of pain.

He was bleeding.

“Why would I fight you like a man?” He hears come from somewhere around him. “You’re nothing but fish food.”

“I’ll turn you into fi…”

Darren’s retort tapers off as he notices something out of one of the port holes. A smaller fish, about a foot long if Darren had to guess, with green eyes and a slit pupil. The creature had some sport of boney outer structure with small scars, and red fins giving it a bit of color. However, the thing that Darren noticed most was the mouth full of razor sharp teeth, each one about as long as one segment of his finger. He then watched as another appeared in a different port hole. And another. And another. And two more in another one. Then three in the first one. Then more and more and more and-

And then the first one smelled his blood in the water.

Instantly the creature’s pupils dilated, turning its eyes from green to almost pure black. The fish quickly changed its course, swimming straight for Darren with its jaws open wide. Darren didn’t waste any time, quickly pulling out another dagger and letting it fly. This one managed to hit and impale the dangerous little fish against the wall far away from Darren.

However, that did nothing to stop the others. And as he turned to face the other fish, he watched as their pupils dilated too from the smell of his blood.

Darren was very good at single target damage. He built this character to take on raid bosses.

He did not build this character to deal with swarms.

Darren kept pulling out daggers, trying to hit as many fish as he could. But for every fish that he did manage to hit, two more replaced it and darted straight towards him. When they finally reached him he screamed out in pain as their teeth dug into his skin, trying desperately to eat him alive.

The last thing that Darren heard before being sent back to respawn was the bone chilling laughter of the ghost that lead him into this trap.

And then… nothing.