Chapter 26

The Marlin’s voyage began with the ringing of the large bell beside her bow. At the captain’s command, the anchor was raised and three enormous sails unfurled. They filled taut with wind, pulling the ship along.

While the sailors worked hard, Turan lay comfortably on his cabin bed, reading. He began with the book of sailing-ship regulations. It explained the various positions aboard a ship, starting with the captain, then listed unwritten rules and superstitions. Quite a few were peculiar.

No women aboard, no looking down at the sea at night, no whistling... There were so many prohibitions that he wondered why everything seemed to be forbidden. The punishments for breaking the rules were uniformly grim, too. It seemed almost any offense could get someone tied to the mast and flogged.

Next he read the book about merfolk. Perhaps because it had been written near waters where merfolk actually lived, it contained many accounts more detailed and specific than those in the library in Orem City. They ranged from a magical mirror connecting the North Sea and South Sea to merfolk royalty capable of transforming into giant fish. For something he had bought simply because it caught his eye, it held plenty of exciting tales and proved a pleasant way to pass the time.

After enjoying a couple of hours of reading, Turan began to feel confined in his cramped cabin. He closed his book and went up on deck. By then, land had long since disappeared beyond the horizon, leaving nothing but blue sea in every direction. As a result, he had no real sense of making progress, even as the ship cut through the wind.

“Ah, there you are, Sir Knight!”

First Mate Osvan greeted him as he came on deck. Thanks to the book’s explanation of shipboard ranks, Turan now knew that Osvan was second only to the captain. Hadn’t it said he was responsible for everything from the cargo to running the ship in the captain’s absence? For someone with such duties, though, his excessive bowing and scraping made him seem rather frivolous.

“I was getting restless staying inside, so I came out for some air.”

“The cabin leaves something to be desired, doesn’t it? Haha... Not all merchant ships are like that, actually.”

Osvan explained apologetically that it was all because the greedy shipowner had expanded the hold far too much to cram in more cargo. Normally, senior crew members would each have a room slightly larger than Turan’s cabin, but aboard this ship they had to share a single, somewhat larger room. Turan decided to be grateful that he had a room to himself.

“I heard it takes twenty days to a month to reach the Enril Desert.”

“Yes. With favorable winds and seas, of course. The North Sea is a rough place.”

Osvan said he had sailed the South Sea when he was young. The waves were small and the winds light there, so although ships could not travel fast, there were few unexpected complications on a voyage. The North Sea, by contrast, was a place of extremes. With a following wind, a ship could quite literally fly along like the wind, but one misstep could send it far off course or sink it. Pirates and merfolk went without saying; those were thick on the seas everywhere.

“Still, having you aboard this time puts our minds at ease, Sir Knight!”

Though he had never even seen Turan’s abilities, Osvan loudly declared that with him aboard, no pirate or merfolk would dare touch their ship. The flattery was almost embarrassing. Turan smiled wryly, but did not tell him to stop.

Doing so would only sour the mood for no reason. More importantly, the junior sailors nearby were visibly reassured by Osvan’s words. He was probably boasting like this deliberately to put his subordinates at ease.

In truth, however flimsy the basis for his confidence, that confidence was not misplaced. Few enemies would be able to threaten a merchant ship guarded by someone who ranked in the upper-middle tier even among nobles.

After listening to his continued praises for some time, Turan asked Osvan something he had been wondering about.

“To be honest, I don’t quite understand why knights command such high fees here. Wouldn’t House Karmine benefit more by assigning knights at reasonable rates to keep merchant ships from being plundered? They must collect taxes on every trade anyway.”

Even in the territories of Arabion’s vassal houses, hadn’t knights worked as actors? He had never looked into the matter closely, but surely a theater troupe could not be paying salaries that even a merchant ship struggled to afford.

“Well, you see...”

Osvan scratched his cheek at the question, then answered rather cautiously.

“I hope you’ll forgive me for saying this, but at sea, you never know when you might die. When we sailors haven’t heard from someone for a few years, we don’t say he must have gone somewhere far away. We say he must be dead. So...”

“You mean they’re frightened because knight or not, they’ll still die if the ship sinks?”

“I-I wouldn’t go that far!”

“No, now that you mention it, that makes sense. There really is a reason for everything.”

Thinking about it, even Turan doubted he could readily make his way back to land if the ship suddenly sank in the middle of the sea. There was more than enough seawater to purify into drinking water with magic, and he could catch fish and roast them for food. But how much effort would it take to swim to shore? And how would he sleep?

If even Turan would have such difficulties, an ordinary knight would soon exhaust their mana, become no different from an ordinary human, and drown. Perhaps House Karmine had once actively stationed knights on merchant ships, only to raise their fees when the losses became unbearable.

“Sounds like an interesting conversation.”

Captain Pires emerged from below deck, adjusting his eyepatch as he spoke. His first act was to bow to Turan.

“We’ve had an honored guest aboard for hours, and I haven’t even come to greet you. I hope these halfwits haven’t made you uncomfortable?”

“Not at all. I’ve been learning all sorts of useful things.”

“I’m glad to hear it. Osvan? It looks like water might leak into the area where we’re keeping the wheat. Rearrange the cargo.”

“Aye!”

At Pires’s order, Osvan thumped his fist against his chest and went below deck. Watching the captain, Turan posed the question he had been about to ask.

“Come to think of it, what do you mainly sell in the Enril Desert? I know very little about the place.”

“All sorts of things. The desert really is nothing but sand, so they can’t grow cotton. Raw cotton and cotton cloth sell well, and since overland trade with Arabion was cut off, they’ve been buying plenty of grain too. But the return voyage is where the real money is.”

“The return voyage?”

“Yes. Everything the Enril Desert needs is heavy and bulky for its price, while the goods coming from there to Abacha are expensive and easy to store. They’re mostly spices and gems, so we even sleep more comfortably on the way back.”

“A pity I can’t join you for the return journey, then.”

Pires chuckled at Turan’s lighthearted remark, then asked a question of his own.

“Will you be staying in the Enril Desert long?”

“Yes, probably.”

In truth, Turan still had no clear idea how to go about finding his roots in Zahar territory. Walking straight into the main house without even knowing his father’s status would be like thrusting his hand into a box without knowing whether it held treasure or a blade.

But with that option ruled out, his only clues were a portrait of his mother and a few of her belongings. Searching with those alone might require him to spend years in the desert, perhaps even longer.

* * *

Fortunately, the first week of Turan’s maiden voyage passed smoothly. No storms, no tidal waves, no attacks by pirates or merfolk. Which meant one boring day after another with nothing to do.

“So this is line number five?”

“Yes. When a strong headwind blows, you have to release this and those two middle lines over there to take in the sail quickly. Otherwise the ship just goes around in circles.”

“Oh, I see.”

Having finished his books, Turan satisfied his thirst for knowledge by seeking out sailors with time to spare and learning various skills, starting with how to sail the ship. At first, the crew were bewildered that a knight so far above them would want to learn skills fit only for lowly sailors. But when they saw how attentively he listened and how readily he retained what he learned, they freely taught him all their tricks. Besides, judging by appearances alone, Turan could have been one of the youngest sailors aboard, so teaching him did not feel particularly strange.

“Mealtime!”

“All right, let’s eat first! Everyone to the mess!”

Meals were served three times a day, and as expected, they were incomparably worse than meals ashore in both quantity and quality. Not only had little space been allotted for provisions, most of the preserved food was poor-quality stuff. The captain’s cabin was not particularly spacious either, so Pires and Turan ate with the crew in the ship’s largest mess.

“At least they didn’t leave out the pickled cabbage! Without it, we’d all have died of bleeding gums long ago.”

“Bleeding gums?”

“Yes. It’s a disease where your gums bleed and you die, but sour food cures it. Fruit spoils quickly, so pickled cabbage is best. Tastes like shit, though. Heh.”

Beside him, Boatswain Renak laughed as though trying to scare him, eating hardtack with salted meat and pickled cabbage. Perhaps because Turan had asked him so many questions while learning to handle the ship these past few days, Renak now treated him like one of his fledgling sailors, with only his polite forms of address remaining.

“How interesting. How did people discover that?”

“Well, someone must have figured it out at some point, and word spread. They say that before it was discovered, people even caught merfolk and ate them raw.”

“Oh.”

Suddenly reminded of the Dark Elf wraith sorcerers crunching their way through human flesh, Turan lost some of his appetite and set down his food. Just then, the lookout at the top of the mast gave a startled shout.

“Ship ahead! Two o’clock! Midsized vessel!”

“What?”

“Pirates?”

A moment after one of the sailors at the meal shouted the question, an answer came back.

“Can’t tell! She’s not flying a house banner!”

“I’ve got a feeling they’re pirates. I thought the weather had been a bit too good, without even any rain. Prepare for battle!”

At the boatswain’s order, the sailors abandoned their meals, scrambling onto the deck or handing out weapons without a moment’s hesitation. First Mate Osvan turned the Marlin to the left to avoid the approaching ship. Captain Pires remained seated at the table, watching his men handle the situation with considerable composure despite looking somewhat tense.

Slipping past the busy sailors, Turan came on deck and used Search magic to inspect the approaching ship. At a glance, it was a little smaller than the Marlin and carried four sails. Judging its pace, it seemed slightly faster than their vessel. A moment later, the unidentified ship turned right, as though pursuing the Marlin.

“Damn it, pirates after all!”

“What should we do, Captain? Try to outrun them? They’re a little faster, so they might catch us if they keep up the chase. If the wind favors us, we might be able to put in at a nearby island before they catch up.”

Turan felt Pires glance his way. Though the captain had tested his abilities once, he had never seen him in actual combat and seemed somewhat uneasy.

“Can you handle this?”

“As long as they don’t have a knight or a noble aboard, there won’t be a problem.”

“... Very well. Bring her about! We’ll fight!”

“Hurrah for Sir Knight!”

“Kill them all, sir!”

Turan’s confident answer left the Marlin’s crew still a little anxious, but willing to put their trust in him. The Marlin changed course again, and the two ships rapidly closed the distance. The other crew, presumably pirates, seemed taken aback by the Marlin’s sudden turn, but showed no sign of losing their aggression.

“You there! Heave to! Do that, and we’ll spare your lives!”

When the gap had narrowed to a few hundred meters, a man standing at the bow shouted in a booming voice. Curious at his words, Turan asked the boatswain beside him a question.

“Will they really spare us if we surrender?”

“From what I’ve heard, it depends on their whims.”

“I thought as much.”

Indeed, it would be strange for pirates who ignored the law to honor their promises. Thanks to that, Turan could act as freely as he pleased without a twinge of conscience. In the end, humans who killed other humans to satisfy their own desires were simply wolves to be hunted down.

The two sailing ships drew ever closer. When only thirty or forty meters remained between them, Turan leaped with the superhuman strength of his legs and landed on the pirate ship’s deck. The pirates stared blankly as the deck splintered beneath him with a thunderous crash.