Chapter 157: Sea Devils
Coop positioned himself among the cannons on the port side of Sea Burial, nearest to the pursuing ships of the Sapphire Armada. The pyramid ships doggedly hunted the faster corvette, maintaining a formation that thrust a single ship in front with the intention of rotating it among the others if its shields started to diminish. The Sapphire Armada anticipated a tech advantage over any opponents, given their strategy of rushing settlement and naval advancements rather than early expansion. Their schemes wouldn’t be as effective when the protective shields could be overwhelmed by the firepower of their enemies.
Their tactics only left a single ship exposed at a time as they charged toward their prey. The Sapphire Armada appeared to be willing to sacrifice in the name of their goals. Ghost Reef might be the only place on the planet that could overcome their early naval superiority. Coop wasn’t confident whether or not it was a sound idea for them to try and eliminate the Armada’s potential rival so early. Certainly, he had no intention of bowing to their efforts.
From the side of the ship, Coop squeezed his eyes shut and concentrated on a controlled channel of Fog of War. Rather than continue to keep their maximum distance and whittle away at the chasing ships, the pirate crew was slowing down in order to let Coop’s abilities coalesce around them. If they didn’t change tactics, the pyramid ships would continue to occupy their time when they wanted to reunite with their allies in the settlement as soon as possible.
The purpose of his Fog of War would be to establish as large a domain as possible, enveloping the open sea and providing their own soft shield. Coop’s intent wasn’t to create a completely obscuring fog, as that would negatively impact his allies and quickly drain his mana pool while reducing the potential coverage of his area skill. They were dealing with ship combat and ranges that exceeded his normal hand-to-hand engagements. Consequently, he wanted to make sure his domain engulfed a large enough area in order to compensate for the situation. Something akin to his Primal Kite field would be more appropriate in terms of size, but it needed to also have more volume to encompass the enemy vessels. Sacrificing the density of his domain would be necessary to ensure it maintained a size that would be functional.
Even with his significant investment in Mind, he remained conscientious of his limited resources. The high mana cost of Legacy of the Mists had been a firm reminder of the restrictions when he was inside of the Coral Forest, but resource management wasn’t the only rationale for carefully casting his skill. Another reason he wasn’t just dumping his mana into creating an enormous fog bank was that he was also hoping that Mindbender would kick in and give him a boost to one of the stats that influenced the power of Fog of War. Any of the casting related attributes would be a boon.
He hadn’t successfully applied Mindbender to any attributes other than Strength, but Coop consoled himself by blaming a lack of practice. After Ledwidge had made them aware of mental blocks on properly utilizing their stats, he had made a deliberate effort during the siege event to access more of the Strength he had accumulated The results had been apparent over the course of the event, as he elevated his abilities from struggling with the first Field Boss that appeared to smashing the final Siege Boss that the Primal Constructs sent. His capacity only grew afterwards as he explored his limitations in Emmanuel’s Gravity Gym. Basically, Strength was straightforward and a well-practiced path for him, but the other stats lagged behind due to fundamental restrictions brought on by their individual natures.
Fog swirled around his hands and climbed a few inches across the deck of the ship as soon as he began channeling, smearing the ghost ship with even more spectral shadows. The movement of the ship meant that he was leaving streaks of mist to his left, which followed along with their slow wake in the dark sea. Sea Burial was still illuminated by the red glowing sparks from the trap that gave them away in the first place, and that red light was scattered into his fog, revealing the voluminous conjure to everyone that looked. The fog billowed all around Coop’s position, pushing out into the sea as it spilled off of the decks like gaseous crimson waterfalls.
When Mindbender kicked in, reducing his Strength and contributing the equivalent to his Intelligence for the first time, his fog started to change density. His mists thickened gradually as his Intelligence increased, and the fog bank he was generating became more voluminous. Sea Burial was leaving a streak of red smoke that if Coop was chasing, he would be hesitant to enter. Coop adjusted his control, letting his skill take more and more of his mana, in an attempt to push it further beyond the side of the ship and deny the chance for their pursuers to choose not to be engulfed in his domain by applying evasive maneuvers.
The pyramid ships were like torpedoes, charging through the surface of the water in a direct line toward their target. If they had better command of their direction, they would be trying to cut off their trajectory, but some limitation kept them in a constant state of making small adjustments rather than predictive maneuvers, like they lacked the typical tools of navigation humans expected to find in proper transportation. Their limitations meant that if Coop’s domain extended far enough into the ocean, he could have them driving themselves directly into the fog. They seemed to be spurred on by the lessened speed of Sea Burial, rushing forward and shrinking the gap, like a pack of hounds detecting the end of their chase. For the first time, the ships were near enough to reveal their contents: troops lined along the edges of the ships as if they stood in a trench, prepared to blast anyone that entered no man’s land.
The enemy ships drew close enough to start hurling spells toward them. The first efforts landed harmlessly in the ocean between them, but the pirates were forced to apply their own spells defensively, smashing firebolts with water beams and scattering tiny projectiles with wind blasts, letting them splash into the sea like a burst of rain. The gloom of the fog spreading along the ocean in the darkness was broken by the blasts of spells and illumination of mana scattering within the mists.