Capable of awakening to become a Growth-hunter at anytime, once Reef successfully broke through, Sheyan believed that he would fuel the combat prowess of the party in unimaginable fashion!
Even if Ammand laid down countless traps or devised countless schemes, ultimately an individual’s capability had a limit. Unless his crew could reach the dreadful tier of the pirates on board the three legendary pirate ships, he would absolutely be unable to deal a fatal threat.
In Sheyan’s deduction, as long as Reef awakened, Ammand could at most beat the trio into a crushing defeat; destroying the painstakingly established Hill Maiden, and even annihilating his pirate crew. Yet if he wished to slay Sheyan, that would be an seemingly inconceivable mission.
On the verge of commencing battle where both sides had drawn swords with sinister designs, a tiny single-masted sampan glided in abruptly from afar. On board it, a pirate frantically waved a signal flag and cried out.
"Hurry and retreat!"
When that sampan encroached closer, one could hear the exasperated shouts of that pirate clearly.
"That blasted Captain Norrington has defeated Chevalle’s pirate fleet, and be returnin’ in triumph. I heard his fleets be passin’ by here soon to inspect fer smugglin’ activities on tis’ lil’island. If we tarry on, it will be too late!"
This piece of information was like a thunder from a clear sky. One could notice Ammand’s facial muscles twitching, before he seized the informant pirate as he howled furiously.
"What did ye say? What gibberish is ye spewing??!!!!"
That pirate replied with a trembling voice.
"The Truth! Son of the Black Sea, me words be truth. Norrington’s fleets would be swarmin’ here within ten minutes!"
"That’s impossible!!" Ammand howled crazily. He suddenly twisted his head to glare at Sheyan with venomous eyes that seemingly wished to carve out the flesh from Sheyan’s body, one chunk at a time.
Then, he sighed deeply before releasing that pirate, and tossed two gold guineas to him.
"Well done, Turgis. I lost myself momentarily. Weigh the anchor and hoist the sails. Prepare to set off!"
Sheyan slanted his head and chuckled as he observed Ammand, before waving farewell. Ammand completely ignored him as he turned away.
The sailors on both ships started operating. Not too long later, the originally two interlocked ships finally separated amidst the creaking of wood.
Fortunately, it had gradually became high tide. If not it would be rather difficult to separate themselves after Ammand’s ship had forcefully collided against the lateral side of Sheyan’s ship; leaving the bottom of the ship scraping against the sand.
After waiting for Ammand’s ship to sail away, Sheyan turned around and scanned briefly before he muttering to the nearby Ol’Seadog.
"Are you alright?"
Ol’Seadog was more scared than hurt and his body was filled with superficial cuts. After gaping at the distant Ammand’s ship, he heaved a sigh of relief.
"Aye."
Sheyan continued with steady demeanor.
"Spike should be fine, I just saw him returning fire with a pistol. Go inquire of him at once, if the ship can still be mobilized."
Very quickly, Spike arrived before Sheyan and advised.
"Sir, we should be able to sail out within five minutes, but only limited to several dozen nautical miles from the coast. Moreover, the consequence wouldn’t be small. Due to the lack of materials now, I will need to saw off a portion of the keel to mend the vital wreckage. But doing that will cripple the keel, causing the ship to lose its ability to withstand the stormy sea of the open ocean."
Sheyan nodded and ordered.
"Fine, carry on with it. Regardless, we must depart before Norrington arrives."
Spike’s carpentry crafting was indeed worthy of Sheyan’s gold guineas. Indeed, like what he mentioned, the ship, filled with a severely wounded crew, started sailing.
Only after leaving the island far behind, did the crew finally ease up and proceeded to count the casualties of the ship.
This time, Sheyan had indeed suffered a massive blow. Excluding the damage to the ship, his painstakingly cultivated crew had suffered grievous casualties.
According to Ol’Seadog, Philips was severely wounded as was Blacksail, while Canbi had suffered serious injuries after an assassination attempt and fell to the sea where his fate was currently unknown. Lastly, the newly recruited Springswan Killer had also been slain in battle! Apart from that, the fatal casualties totalled more than fifty, while the remainder were all wounded.
Fortunately, the pirates were accustomed to life aboard, and were used to living on the edge of life and death. Furthermore, after Sheyan had slain the berserker boss during this adversity, their morales had been greatly affected positively.
Introducing the healing treatment of the miraculous ‘Sudan ointment’ as well as Kayto’s medical skills, the remaining wounded pirates all managed to survive; without a single handicap.
One would do good to abstain from navigating during the night. Hence, after distancing themselves adequately from that small island, Sheyan ordered them to release anchor; allowing the ship to rest.
However, to guard against events of minute probabilities, like Ammand returning in a swirl of dust or Norrington’s pursuit, they specifically located a hidden dock to anchor. Appointed onlookers were arranged in shifts as well.
At present, an idling Sheyan had returned to his captain’s cabin. He fished out the silver key dropped by Harrod and summoned it. This time, it wasn’t a treasure chest that was summoned, but instead a half-metre long tree trunk.
This tree trunk had been carpentry processed before, and was sculpt with the trademark viking decoration of the curved neck beast; dawning an impression of solemness and tragedy.
Didn’t this appear like a pocket-sized blood boat?
As he examined this summoned object, Sheyan couldn’t refrain this notion from welling up in his mind. Naturally, he proceeded to reach in for the loot, before retrieving the first object – a helmet.
This helmet was modeled uniquely, and was indeed that cow-horn helmet exuberating with the viking grandeur. Wearing it would cause one to appear flashy as if one was bragging, while brimming with deadliness from the medieval ages. This helmet looked to be forged with iron, but its horns were authentic horns of beasts; curving with lethal incisiveness towards its prey.
When Sheyan picked up this helmet, a list of notifications floated into his mind.
[ Murmurs of a Great Bear (beast bone helmet) ]
[ Origin: Dniper River Basin ]
[ Equipment rarity: Silver Storyline grade ]
[ Material: Pine wood, iron ]
[ Addons: Bumping horns (already added) ]
[Weight: 7.2 kg ]
[ Usage requirements: Strength 45 points, physique 20 points ]
[ Details: Unbreakable ]
[ Details: Increase your attack damage by 50% ]
[ Details: increase your explosive strike rate by 50% ]
[ Details: Healing effects are ineffective on wielder, while the damage received from enemy’s attack will be doubled! (Damage doubled is based on theoretical damage received) ]
[ Active ability: Arrogance – if your enemy views the long horns of this helmet as mere aesthetics, that would be a grave mistake.
[ Detail: Activating this ability will spur you into a speedy ferocious collision towards the front, only halting after clashing against something or after 30 metres. The collided creature will be struck into a long 5 seconds stunning duration (includes allies), and receive a (100 + (strength x2)) points of damage. When creature regains senses, creature will sustain a 15 points / 5 seconds blood loss damages; duration: (15 + x seconds), where x is determined by your strength. ]
[ Detail: If you ram into an obstacle, you will receive a 300 points damage and 10 seconds stunning duration. ]
[ Warning: You can change this equipment during combat (this equipment takes precedence ]
[ Warning: The spirit of this equipment only acknowledge warriors who have been recognized by barbarians or vikings. (Wielder must attain a ‘Worshipped’ reputation amongst a barbarian or viking tribes, or accomplish a certain mission) Otherwise, all bonus effects will be decreased by half, and negative effects will be doubled. ]
"Shit!" Sheyan couldn’t help cursing aloud after examining the helmet.
If not for the final warning property, there would still be a way for a long range combatant to attempt wielding it. Yet with that final property, although the helmet could still raise one’s damage and explosive strike rate by 25%, the recoil of amplified damage involved would be too outrageous. Moreover, the changes was based on the theoretical damage.
If Brother Black didn’t equip this helmet, a bullet would deal theoretically 100 damage to him; which is equivalent to approximately 60 points of damage after factoring defence. Once he wore this helmet under the same conditions, the enemy’s damage dealt to him would soar to 200 points; which would translate to shaving off 120 points of HP. Going further, if he wasn’t reputable amongst the vikings, a bullet would inflict 400 points of theoretical damage on Mogensha. Even worst, he wouldn’t be able to heal himself.
Mogensha observed the helmet as he asked.
"Reef, aren’t you in the blacksmith profession? How long more till you reach the stage where you can extract properties from an equipment?"
Reef shook his head in response.
"That’s still a long way! Besides, even if I comprehended the ability of extracting properties from an equipment, it isn’t merely so simple, but possesses seven levels of upgrade. At the primary level, drawing property for an equipment would be akin to disposing it. I understand your intentions, you wish to extract the negative property of the equipment right. I reckon that will only be possible after I’ve attained level 5 in my property extracting ability."
Brother Black shrugged his shoulders in pity.
Truthfully speaking, the two properties of this equipment, raising attack damage and explosive strike rate by 50%, would be an incredibly terrifying upgrade for a primary damage output dealer.
Yet regrettably, its negative effects was disastrously appalling. A long range combatant’s survivability was already their shortcoming, but in addition to this, it would probably take one shot to reduce them into near-death state upon encountering other long range combatants! Why wouldn’t this cause one to shake one’s head and sigh?