Social Anxiety Really Ruins the Isekai Experience
Chapter 9 - We're Going Swamp Skiin'!
Iâm trying out a different way for writing combat, so I hope itâs enjoyable. I certainly find it more fun to write.
Things will get a bit confusing here, so I shall be providing a âdiagramâ midway through. (aka you get to see my shitty art if I can get it to work)
In this chapter, we learn how many times I can call a shield anything besides a shield.
âMud mephits and wood woads⊠Tch, just our luck,â Astarion mutters with a click of his tongue, drawing his daggers.
You hold your quarterstaff close to your chest, taking a step back towards the willow. With a shrill shriek, one of those dirt impsâ mud mephits, you now know them asâ darts forward with a flap of its wings, coming straight towards you. With a matching shriek of your own, you panic and do the first thing that comes to mind: you whack it. That childhood gym class training kicks in and you swing your staff like a baseball bat, hitting the sentient mud in the side. It goes careening off to who knows where; you donât have time to check! You can only hope that you scored a home run, but you know thatâs just hopeful thinking. When you look back up, thereâs suddenly more mephits than you remember there being before.Â
âAre we standing on a sentient mud nest or something?!âÂ
Thereâs no time to think as more are coming your way. After knocking down one mephit, another one closes in on your left, diving at you with claws outstretched. Instincts kick in, and you raise your arm to guard your face. The leather braces that had ended up in the community chest, wherever they came from before youâre not sure of, were left in the chest for a reason, it seems, because they turned out to be incredibly flimsy. You learned that from first-hand experience, and that experience was right now, as the mephitâs claws tore right through them. You had to give credit where credit was due, as they did at least partially do their job, since you were only shallowly scratched instead of deeply gouged.
You avenge your ruined bracer by bringing your staff down hard on its head, swinging it like a woodcutterâs hatchet, the mephit crashing into the ground. You slam the butt of your staff down on its head again for good measure andâ Sploom!
ââŠIt exploded.â Streaks of mud spray on to you, coating you and your staff with a splotchy layer of mud. The lump of mud that remained of its body and found itself sticking to your staff melds with the swampâs muck, trapping your Gandalf stick in the shlicking mud. You tug it ouâ your hand slips. You reaffirm your grip and tug itâ and itâs not budging. You hear the creaking of wood, and in your periphery you spot one of the wood woads approaching you.
âShit,â you drop your center of gravity and try pulling sideways instead of up. âCâmon, câmon! Now is really not the time for you to be throwing a toddler fit and refusing to move!â Yet to no avail. It does not move. Itâs as if the harder you pull, the stronger it resists.
âWhat kinda shitty non-Newtonian curse was put on this swamp?!â
The wood woad is too close now, and you have no choice but to release your staff and back away if you didnât want to be on the wrong end of those literal tree trunks for arms. You gaze at your stick with sad, regretful eyes.
âIâll come back for you, my friend,â you let it slip from your grasp, quickly stepping back, moving away from the lumbering tree man locked on you.
You turn to break into a sprint to fleeâ and all too soon youâre playing limbo with a mud mephit who caught you off guard, narrowly dodging a swipe of their claws, the deceptively sharp edges way too close to your face for comfort. {Dexterity saving throw = 16, success} The mud is slippery, but you manage to keep yourself stable, quickly righting yourself after you and the flying mud gremlin sweep past each other. You would have been surprised, if you had the time to think about anything besides what the fuck you were going to do now that you had no weapon. A brief glance around and the sound of grunts coming from somewhere behind you tells you that the wood woad and mephits are blocking the path to Astarion, so youâre on your own.
« Your focus! Bring out your focus! »
âMy focâ? Oh, shit, youâre right! I have magic!â
With a blue shimmer your instrument is summoned to your hands. You bring it to ready position as you twirl around with a little hop to face the fiends who separated you from your friend. And from Astarion too.
âPlease, let pokemon rules apply here.â Your bow comes down in a ferocious tune, a vile fire bolt shooting straight into the wood woad. It stumbles back with a groan of pain, which you can only hope means that fire is still super effective on grass. Not much else happens at first as you ready your second one, but then the flames spread from where you hit it, the wood woad going up in flames, starting to resemble a wicker man.
âHoly shit, I think it was supereffective!â
Emboldened, you fire another one, stoking the flames even higher on impact, all while continuing to move back, trying to keep the distance between you and the monsters as far as possible while stuck within the little mud arena. Theyâre quickly closing in and youâre quickly running out of places to escape to, unless you want to go into deeper waters, but thatâs probably not a very good idea seeing as your most effective element is fire. Itâs also your only element, save force damage. Unless your eldritch blast is also vile damage⊠No, surely not. Astaroth would have told you if it was.
âWell, now seems like a pretty good time to try out that other spell!â
At the start of the next measure of your song, a giant cone of flames burst forth from where your bow met the strings, the fire hot and intermingled with dark, unsettling ripples staining the bright warm tones. The mephit bursts in a splatter of mud and you could almost swear you could hear the wood woad scream as it was seared alive. There was so much fire. You knew that your vile burning hands spell expelled fire in a 15 foot(~4.5m) cone, but you never truly realized just how large that actually wasâ how much pure, condensed heat it was. It startled you enough to make you pause your song and flinch away from the heat as you watched the wood woad take a few more steps before collapsing, the smoldering wood of its body slowly beginning to extinguish from the ankle deep-water it had rolled into.
âHoly shit, I think I killed it! But wait, there was another one right? Whereââ It doesnât take long to spot it. Itâs a little over a quarter of the way around the tree, focused on Astarion, who is busy trying to fight off the plentiful mud mephits while dodging the woadâs attacks. Both he and the tree man are coated in mud, and the mephitâs numbers donât seem to be lowering at all.
âFuck, we canât keep this up! We gotta get out of here, but⊠how?â The small army of mud mephits were blocking the only way off this little outcrop and back into the swamp, unless you count the deep pockets of water all around, but making your retreat via swimming wasnât a chance you were willing to take without a set of gills. Then your eyes land on the charred corpse of the wood woad, specifically on the large shield it held in its vine-like hand.
ââŠI think we just found our boat.â
Shifting your grip, you clutch your violin and bow in one hand and quickly cross the distance to the dead wood man. You grasp onto the edge of the shield with your free hand and pull it taught, kicking at the viney arm, trying to get it to let go. It takes a few kicks to free it, but instead of letting go, the arm had broken at what you would count as its elbow, where it was burnt and brittle. You stumble slightly from the sudden lack of tension, but you have your prize: a slightly burnt shield!
With some grunts from your straining body doing some physical labor, you lug the shield over to a muddy dropoff, leaving it about three-quarters of the way off the edge. And then youâre back to running, except this time youâre headed towards the enemy instead of away from them. It makes your skin crawl, knowing youâre willingly headed towards danger, but you canât just leave Astarion behind! Sure your little plan you came up with on the fly is half-baked at best, but itâs better than staying here!
« Wait, what exactly is this plan? »
âNo time to explain, just trust me!â
You bring your violin back up to your chin, firing off a few decently-aimed firebolts at the mephits and woad swarming Astarion. He glances over his shoulder to see you running at him.Â
He doesnât duck. Bow still in hand, you lift it off the strings for a moment to give a quick hand signal for him to drop down. {Performance = 20, success}. He slashes at the closest mephitâs eyes before dropping into a low crouch, just in time for your bow to make your strings sing once more, a second vile burning hands spell coming out. However, this one doesnât seem nearly as effective as before, the wood woad still filled with vigor.
Any relief he may have had in his eyes from your backup quickly vanishes once you poof your instrument out of existence after shooting one final firebolt, which killed a mephit and made it explode, coating the wood woad and Astarionâs back in yet another layer of mud.
âCâmon, we gotta go!â
You donât give him a chance to point out he couldnât understand you. Your fingers hook into his collar and haul him up onto his feet with a grunt shared between the both of you and start to drag him as you sprint back to your newly-found watercraft.
âOh, my stick!â As you were about to pass it, you spotted your stick, quickly leaning down to grab it with your unoccupied hand, yanking it out of the mud, which had thankfully loosened its grip during its vacation away from you. However, as both your arms are connected to your body, you accidentally yank Astarion around a bit with your swooping motion before springing back up, never once having slowed your pace.
âWhat in theânnghâ hells are you doing?!â He shouts, twisting in your grip.
âGetting us outta here, thatâs what!â
Skidding to a halt, you all but fling him onto the shield, the force of him landing on it pushing it the rest of the way into the water and putting it into a spin.
âThink fast!â You throw your staff at him which he catches with a slight fumble as the shield-raft starts to drift away. You back up a few steps. Then, as soon as his back and the empty half of the shield are facing you, you break out into a sprint, as fast as you can, and you leap off the edge of the muddy bank.
You⊠may have calculated the landing incorrectly. And by may have you meant definitely since you didnât calculate at all other than pure guesstimation. The boat wasnât drifting away nearly as quickly as you were expecting, and you had jumped way too far. You were going to crash right into Astarion at this rate!
No time to think, only act!
You lean back and twist, as much as you can, but an aerial twist is apparently incredibly fucking hard to pull off. Itâs enough though, sailing through the air feet first and sideways, and you can reach one arm down far enough to catch onto the lip of the shield.
You feel the rough edge of the wood dig into your fingers, your knuckles popping as they feel as if theyâre all but ripped from their joint surfaces as you hold on for dear life to stop yourself. All that forwards-momentum disappears in an instant, leaving only gravity to pull your body down, landing on your hip on the side of the raft, which is now very quickly tipping over. You roll fully onto your stomach, your legs naturally ending up on either side of Astarion in an effort to right your balance.
âDear godâor my patron? I donât know how this worksâ but please let my shitty idea work.â You stick your hands in the water.
« Wait, what are youâ? »
âWhat the hells are youâ?!â
Your legs lock around Astarionâs waist as you hear voices simultaneously from your mind and your ears trying to figure out just what the hell you were doing.
âHold on tight, smeller boy!âÂ
His hand wraps around one of your ankles and pulls, âWhatâ let gooooAAAH!âÂ
The shield jolts forward as you compress and combust an eldritch blast between your hands, the propelling force against both yourself and the water pushing you away from shore. At least, thatâs how you think it works? Something about motors and physics, yada yada, who cares, it worked! Sure, it feels like you just got a double high-five from a barbarian who doesnât know how to hold back their strength so youâre left shaking out your hands afterwards, but youâre moving! Or at least, you were. You can only cast an eldritch blast once every six seconds because stupid magic recharge rules. You had moved about a total of three meters by that blast, and were drifting a bit farther as the kinetic energy carried you slightly afterwards. However, little known fact that literally everyone knows: mud mephits can fly. And they seemed to be more than okay with being three meters away from land, seeing as they were currently flying towards you.
âWhat the bloody hells are you doing?!â You barely register Astarionâs âcomment,â too busy thinking about how to get out of there quicker.
âMaybe if I donât treat them like full-fledged spells, itâll work? Like if theyâre just utility and I donât give them as much power, maybe Iâll be able to spew them out at a faster rate? Probably wouldnât sting as much either.â
You materialized yet another eldritch blast beneath the water, this time putting in about half as much mana, or whatever they call it here, and exploded it against your hands. You were right, it did hurt less, more like a stinging high five, and you were still moving! Not as far as before though, but you were able to charge up another blast in half the time as well!
âWould you stop suddenly jostling us around like that?â Astarion had released your ankle in favor of holding onto the less-squirmy edges of the shield-boat.
âSorry, last one, I promise!â You shout then mutter under your breath, âprobably.â
âLetâs see, to not have anymore jerks, it would need to be a more steady stream⊠if I adjust the power lower, to whatever percentage zero-point-five over six is, I should be able to burst one every half secondâŠâ or wait should I go down to zero-point-two-five so I can do it every quarterâ is any of that even right?! You know what, fuck it, no more math, just do what feels right!â
 Becoming the engine for this sloppily put together fantasy jet ski, you feel the burning gaze of an unknown four-year-oldâs jealousy crossing dimensions for having the dream job their parents had told them wasnât possible. As if to rub it in their face, you burst forth once more with a large force to get your momentum going, the sudden jerk adding to Astarionâs irritation. You quickly adjust to a lower, but more consistent output. Sadly, or not so sadly, depending on how you look at it, it still ended up being a bit of a bumpy ride for Astarion since you couldnât go too low with the force output. Turns out that without enough force, the boat doesnât really want to move. So he has to put up with a slight jerk every second, putting your movement at a whopping three whole meters per second!
âŠyeah, you were hoping for something faster than a brisk jog. At least it was easier on your hands like this.
âWoah!â You steer the boat to the left with a sudden thrust, narrowly avoiding a large hunk of mud a mephit threw at you, roughly jolting Astarion again.
âCanât you be more careful!?â
âDeal with it; Iâm not about to get hit in the face by a mud ball if I donât have to!â
Thankfully, the mephits seem to give up after a few more seconds as the distance between your party of three (the stick is included) and the shore grows to a size they were uncomfortable with. They turn around and take their ugly mugs back to the willow treeâs vicinity.Â
âYeah, thatâs right; you better run!â
Not wanting to take any chances, you continue to go farther out into open water, slightly curving your trajectory, planning to run parallel with the coastline rather than go too far out. You would still need to come back to land eventually.
âWoah!â You feel the shield tilt against the direction you were turning before you heard his startled cry, then you see the blocky shape of a rock passing by you on your right. âWhere the hell are you steering us towards?! You almost hit that boulder!â Astarion shouted over the volume of the splashing water.
âWell, excuse me, princess Preminger, but I canât exactly see where weâre going!â You shouted back.
âYouâre not exactly helping because, oh, I donât know, nobody knows your weird bloody language!â
âI know that! Justââ
âWhatever it is youâre saying doesnât matter! Just go right, quickly!â
You turn your hands to the right, shooting out a blast that way, but apparently not fast enough. You feel the bump as the boat clips the side.
âWonât you pay attention?! Youâre taking us straight into a forest of rocks and boulders, so you have to be faster to respond lest you crash and get us both stranded!â
 âI think thereâs a slight delay in the translationâ itâs kinda hard to react any faster!â
âI donât know! What! Youâre! Saying!â
âAaargh, justââ You propel to the left. âLeft!â You propel to the rightâ âRight!â You repeat the words and actions again. âAstarion! Left? Right?â
You blast with your left arm, causing your water sled to veer to the left.
With Astarionâs newly acquired grasp on the complexities of two whole words of the English language, you start navigating through the stony minefield you had managed to steer your trio into. Luckily, with the comprehension speed upped, there were no more close calls or clips. Just the unique shapes of outcrops and spires of rocks passing you by, disappearing behind you, or, well, in front of you, seeing as you were facing backwards. There are a lot at first, but then they start to thin out, Astarion only having to guide you every thirty or so seconds as opposed to every five.
âShit. Looks like we got company!â
âThe fuck you mean âWe got company?â Weâre out in rocky waters in a swamp. What, is Shrek paying us a visit on his brand new fanboat?â
You take a chance and glance around as best you can from your weird prone position. Squinting, you barely spot something: there, in a dense cluster of rocks a distance to your right, you see two scaly heads poking out of the water. They look like some really weird fish that definitely belong in the deep sea, not a relatively shallow swamp.Â
âEw, why do some fish have such gross humanoid faces?â They had the teeth of a football fish, the face of a wrasse, and the fins of a zebra turkey fish. You take another quick glance around, but see nothing else. âReally? The fish? Are those what Astarion is wary about?â Your eyes land on them again, watching as they start to swim closer. Then one dips below the surface. âThatâs not ominous at allâŠâ Your brows furrow, a bit worried. âAre they some kind of weird sentient piranhas? They certainly look the part.â The one still above the surface begins to rise. âRise? How is a fish able to slowly push itself up?â Your eyes widen as it continues to vertically ascend, revealing a neck, then a torso with arms, one of said limbs carrying a trident. âOh, shit, theyâre sahuagins!â But it didnât stop at the torso; no, it kept rising. You saw the weird legs normally reserved for digitigrade creatures, and then you saw the webbed feet standing upon the back of the other sahuagin.
âAre they⊠are they copying us? Oh my god, I think theyâre copying us. How the hell did we teach them how to surf?! Weâre not surfing! âŠIâm scared to think about how this is going to affect the ecosystem going forward.â
With a sudden surge, they shot forward, beelining straight towards your sorry excuse for a ship.
âWell isnât this just what we needed,â Astarion mutters with a scowl you can hear, then in a louder tone speaks to you, âCanât you go any faster?!â
âIâm going as fast as I can!â
âThat didnât sound like a yes to me and that is not what I want to hear right nowâ whatever, just donât you dare stop!â
âWasnât planning on it.â
Since they were coming in from the shieldâs right from a fair distance away, you had managed to pull ahead, but they were sliding into the inner region of the wake left behind you, slowly but surely bringing up the rear.
âTheyâre gaining on us!â
âYeah, I can see that!â
Teeth clenched, you try to pump out more eldritch bursts but your output just wouldnât increase while maintaining the same strength.
In but a minuteâmaybe thirty seconds? You canât tell; you werenât countingâ they had managed to close the distance, leaving you nearly face-to-face with the unwelcome sight of a fishmanâs face. Glancing up, you see the other sahuagin, trident in hand, raised above his head.Â
It was going for a thrust.
A thrust aimed straight at your head.
âLEFT!!!â You belt out loudly before sharply veering to the left, narrowly dodging the trident, the prongs harmlessly hitting the water where you just were.
As water is a liquid rather than a solid, there was practically no resistance when it pulled the trident out. Turns out, water doesnât buy up a whole lot of time in weapon recovery, and they all too soon pull up beside you in favor of sticking in the turbulent water trailing behind you.
âShit,â Astarion cursed shortly before you felt him twist within your legsâ tense hold. You felt a flick to your left calf. âI know how much you just adore holding me all close and tight, but youâre going to have to let go for a bit!â
âWhat?! No, what if I fall off?!â
âHurry up and let go, damn it! Iâm trying to save us both!â
âIf you kill us both, I swear to whatever gods exist in your silly magic world Iâll find a way to resurrect us both so that I can kill you again!â
Reluctantly, you loosen your grip, letting your legs drop from his sides. The toes of your shoes clumsily nose around, desperately digging into whatever grooves and crevices scattered across the natural wood they could fit into as you hope to high hell that whatever measly footholds you find will be enough to keep you steady. Balancing a hunk of uneven wood not meant for water travel with two people on it is much easier said than done, you find, as your little canoe rocks precariously as he shifts around. You scramble to balance it out with your blasts, and like a wii fit minigame, you use your hips to shift your own weight too, unsure if the miniscule changes even help, trying to keep it from tipping over. Glancing over your shoulder as best you can, you see Astarion now on one knee, opposite foot braced against the shieldâs lip, unslinging his bow.
âHeâs gonna shoot like this?!â
âHey, either go faster or drift us leftâ er, left! I need some distance to get a good shot at these things!â
âLeft it is then,â and with a slight adjustment of your arms, your watercraft begins to slightly strafe leftwards. You hear the faint twing of a bowstring and the fweet of an arrow being shot, soon followed by a second one. A growly grunt from the water to the boatâs right is your only indicator that at least one of the sahuagins was shot. Youâd have to trust your ears, since you were too busy focusing on being an overclocking magic engine to look.Â
Another quick thwip and a curse from Astarion are what you hear next. âNow would be a good time to â woah!â
You barely had time to register a loud clunk as the shield tilted dangerously far to its rightâ your leftâ some water splashing over the side, soaking into your clothes. You yelp, your blasts sputtering for a moment as youâre taken off guard from a mix of the sudden cold against your front paired with the violent rocking.
âWhat the fuck was that?!â
âOh, nothing to worry about, just a trident impaling our vessel! Now do something, would you?! Theyâre closing in again, and Iâd rather not give them an opportunity to retrieve their generous gift!â
In the time it had taken you to reorient yourself, they were able to close the distance again, getting into melee range. A webbed hand reaches across the small strip of water separating you, its clawed fingers wrapping around the end of the trident. They give it a tug, the shield briefly bumping into the other sahuagin, who snarls, before the trident dislodges from the wood. Luckily, the ricochet from the bump pushed you a small distance away, but they were readying themselves to get back into relatively close combat.
âAstarion, Iâm gonna juke âem out! Hold on tight if you donât want your new nickname to be sharkbait!â
âIn a way I understand, please!â He shouted at you, firing off another arrow.
âAstarion!â You briefly raised a hand out of the water to point at him, leaving your one hand to take the brunt of the blasts. You then grasped the edge of the shield, then released and repeated the action multiple times before shoving your hand back into the water, not interested in letting your other hand suffer from the one-sided magical high fives for long.
You hear some shuffling and the slight rocking of your shield. âAlright, Iâm holding on, now what?!â
You squeezed your legs shut around him, just like how you did when you first boarded, ankles locking onto whatever parts of him they could find. He jolted as he was pulled closer to you, the bow of your little ship tilting to a degree that you felt was dangerously high, the sternâyou know, the end where your head was currently atâ dipping into the water.
The sahuagin had veered leftââwait, is it their left or your left? No, wait, shut up, nowâs not the time for this! Theyâre veering closer to us, whatever direction that is for themââ quickly closing in. You waited until they almost reached you, then pivoted your hands, tucking your entire arms under your ship, aiming the blasts towards the bowâ towards the direction you had been headed, effectively killing your momentum. Like a slingshot, the sahuagins raced past you, creating the distance Astarion had previously asked for.
The sudden change almost had sent you immediately careening off the end and into the water if not for your death grip on Astarion, but the jolt was still strong enough to force you to release your hold on him once again, though involuntarily this time, feet scrabbling to find holds to hook themselves into instead.
âHmm, not bad. Wasnât very enjoyable, but I can work with this.â
âAt least I can actually see where Iâm going now.â You never stopped blasting, your momentum now slowly picking up speed after you shifted into reverse.
âThat wonât keep them for long, so you better get us as much distance as you can!â He readied another arrow.
âYou know, it would be much easier if you helped balance our weight by staying towards the back!â
With Astarion positioned near the middle like this, your boat was very front-heavy, your blastsâ power being the only thing keeping you from getting a taste of swamp water.
âCare to try again, darling?â
You wave him away, daring a nudge with your foot. [Scooch!]
âGetting shy now, even after you pulled me in so close earlier?â
âShut it, asshole! Thereâs a time and place for everything, but nowâs not the time for your mockery! Now get back before we tip over!â You give him a light kick this time.
âAlright, alright, Iâm going.â He looses another arrow, then you hear him click his tongue.Â
âHa! He missed. Serves him right, making fun of me like that⊠wait, no; thatâs bad for me too!â
âYou wouldnât happen to have any more surprises up your sleeves, would you? Because theyâre closing in on us again!â
âAlready?! But I donât think juking themâs gonna work twice!â
âIâll take that as a no.â You hear a sigh, then shuffling, followed by some rapid patting. âShit,â he curses under his breath, then he speaks with a placating tone. âI donât mean to alarm you, buuuuut, we may be out of arrows.â
âWhat?! So we have to go melee?!â
âWell, weâre out save for a lightning arrow, but Iâm afraid theyâre too close for me to risk using it.â The boat wobbles slightly, then you hear the light thunk of wood against wood. âI never imagined I would be one for jousting, but I donât think my daggers will be of much use here.â
You take a quick glance over your shoulder to see him holding your poor Gandalf stick.
âI swear to god, if you throw my stick at them I will tip this raft over.â
âSorry darling, canât hear youâ woah!â You hear another thunk, but coming from above youâ âIâm a bit busy keeping us alive here!â
The boat bounces and rocks with each clash, the fear of tipping over ever present in your mind. If your vessel capsized, then these weird swamp goblins would steal your bones, but youâd rather not do that as you very much like your bones where they are! âCâmon, câmoooon! Faster! We need to go faster!â You try desperately to quicken your shots, to make them more powerful, whatever it took to try and pull away from them. Unsurprisingly, like the many times youâve tried it before, it still didnât work.Â
« You seem to be in a bit of a precarious situation. »
ââSeem?â This is a very precarious situation! Maybe Iâd even call it dire if youâre feeling adventurous! And where have you been this whole time? Wait a sec- youâve been watching the whole time, havenât you?! Donât pretend like you werenât!â
« I can neither confirm nor deny. »
âYeah, yeah, whatever, laugh it up, get it outta your system later, just help me, will you?! Iâm busy trying my goddamned best to not, you know, die!? Is there any way for me to pump out more mana or whatever it is you call it here?â
« Iâm afraid you would not be able to accomplish such a feat in your current state. You could end up severely damaging yourself if you were to force a higher exertion of âmana.â » Before you could voice your disappointment, he continued with a lighter tone. « However, I do have a different solution. »
âIâll take it! âŠWhat is it?â
« âŠAt least hear what it is before rushing into a decision. Itâs quite dangerous to agree to something withoutâ »
âAlright, alright, I get it, Iâll listen, justâ tell me already! Iâm getting a little desperate here!â
« Now normally I would be against doing this, however, as you would say, desperate times call for desperate measures. You know that sensation and growth of power that you have taken to calling âlevelling up?â »
âAre you saying you can level me up right now?âÂ
« Yes, I can, but it will not be without its detriments. I can give you access to your new level of powers, however it will end up greatly fatiguing you after a short while. But with this, I can give you the knowledge for this groovy cantrip called shape water. With your creativity, Iâm sure you can find a way to more effectively propel yourselves using it instead of whatever it is youâre doing now. »
âSounds great, but why would it make me tired? It hasnât before. Also, where the hell did you learn to use âgroovyâ from?â
« We can get into the particulars later; now is hardly the time. And as for your other question: who do you think I got it from? »
« Now, would you like to go forward with this? »
âI get to keep my life in exchange for sleepiness? Is that even a question? Of course Iâll do it!â
« Very well. I hope this does not put too much strain on you. »
On cue, a wave of energy flows through you after his wordsâ a surge of power stronger than what you were capable of beforeâ and with it the knowledge of a new spell.
 âŠAn awful idea comes to mind.
âAstarion! Youâre gonna wanna hold on again!â You mime to him in the same way as before.
âJustâurk!â a moment!â He grunts and the boat tips dangerously far to the side, some water splashing on, only to slide right back off the end, but not before wetting your legs more. âReady!â
Needing no other signal, you pull your hands out of the water and thrust them skywards, urging the spell to activate and launch your make-shift ship away. Without your blasts pushing you forward, your momentum slows and the surfing sahuagins pass you again, but as they do, the water below you dips slightly. They swerve in front of you, the rider twisting to face you, trident raised and ready to throw. Then like a sudden punch to the gut, the wind is almost knocked out of you as your direction changes, the water below you thrusting up and forwards. As if it had gained the strength of a mechaâs rocket punch at full throttle(perhaps an exaggeration, but from your perspective thatâs what it felt like), your little raft is launched like a stunt motorcycle off a ramp, a wave of water following you as you go airborne. You fly over the sahuagins, two fishy faces staring up at you before theyâre confronted by the pressure of one hundred twenty-five cubic feet of aggressive water, the rider letting out a silly scream like an extra in a sci-fi franchise as theyâre knocked off the living vehicle that is their brethren.
âHah! Suck it, losers!â You yell out over the lip of the raft, your head just barely peeking enough over the edge to see.
You hear the little splashes of water as the stream of water trailing behind you reaches its apex height before your raft, the trail of liquid falling flat as the droplets lose momentum.
âAh. Right. Gravity⊠oh god, gravity!â
âAstarion! Fwip! Bzzt fwip!â You frantically shout at Astarion and twist awkwardly to make eye contact as you point at his bow then at the fishmen, trying to signal him to shoot from this vantage point before you both fall back down to their level.
By some small miracle, he understands the meaning behind your shitty sound effects. You feel the wood of your staff hit your leg as he drops it in favor of his bow, taking little time to ready the shot before he releases the lightning arrow. You hear a pair of gurgling shrieks timed with the zapping of electricity, followed soon after by Astarionâs satisfied âHah!â He hit them! You grin in turn, but your joy is short-lived as your bodies begin to lift from the shield. Or rather, the shield was falling out from under you, giving in to gravitational physics once more. Its momentum was gone, and the boat was falling, the both of you soon to follow.
You feel the odd sensation of your stomach dropping; that weightlessness you recognize from the downhills of rollercoasters or particularly steep roads. In those situations, it may have been a very welcome or even fun sensation, but definitely not here where you have no safety equipment to help ensure you keep not just your arms and legs, but your whole body inside the vehicle at all times.
The terror keeps you from realizing itâs four voices screaming as the boat-turned-rollercoasterâs air time runs out and enters into free fall; though you only hear your own yells, the barbershop quartet ringing out in unison: A duet of gurgling screams comes from the two not-fish people and Astarionâs own panicked screaming harmonizes with your own.
Your hands reflexively retract to grab onto the rim of the shield, but your feet are left raised in the air as gravity pulls you back down like a tether. Thereâs movement out of the corner of your eye: your stick! It was floating off!Â
Without thinking it through at all, you grab it. It registers too late that youâre now only holding onto your fantasy jet ski with one hand. Unfortunately, fantasy jet skis donât come with handlebars, so itâs a very uncomfortable grip.
âAre you an idiot!? What are you doing!?â Astarion shouts, voice raspy and breathless from a mix of everything that was happening: the earlier screaming, the incredulousness, exasperation, etc.; You didnât quite have the leisure to think of more adjectives as you were a bit preoccupied with falling to your death!
Your chest takes the brunt of the impact, your body hitting the wood hard less than a second after the shield breaks the waterâs surface with a loud crash. Your grip on the shield is forcefully broken as the wind is knocked out of you, the movement too rough and sudden for you to have even had a chance to hang on. The swampâs stagnant water caves beneath your raft from the force of your impact, walls of agitated white spraying up on either side of you. Forced to obey the laws of physics, the water soon floods back in, eager to patch the dent on its surface and return to equilibrium. Then, as if to take vengeance on the ones who disrupted its natural state, the strength of the mass of liquid causes your small ship to slightly bounce back out of the water, your battered self along with it.
Without your hand acting as an anchor, your body once again leaves the safety of the solid surface beneath it. The muscle memory honed in your childhood that you didnât even realize you had activates, and you amateurishly maneuver yourself mid-air like a third-rate child acrobat to make sure you would at least land on your ass instead of your chest again because that hurt bad enough the first time. The landing is still rough, but doesnât hurt nearly as badly. The impact causes your end of the boat to dip, your lower legs left hanging off the end to get dunked into the water, socks and clown shoes now completely soaked.Â
As the rocking ceases and the waters settle around you, you canât help but let out a giddy laugh as you turn in your seat to face where the sahuaginsâ electrically-charred corpses lazily float in the water.
âHahaha! Eat shit and die, fuckfaces!â With a happy and relieved breath in, you turn to Astarion instead. âWe survived!â You threw your hands up, fingers spread wide on one to reveal the agitated skin of your palm, red from the repeated magical high fives you gave yourself. Your other palm is hidden by the staff tightly gripped in it, but it is no doubt just as red. âI canât believe any of that actually worked!â
âYes, yes, Iâm glad Iâm alright too, but can we please save the celebrations for when weâre on dry land?â
Itâs only now that you take in Astarionâs state: Heâs sat almost, but not quite, criss-cross-applesauce, hunched over, hands tightly holding onto opposite sides of the raft with a white-knuckle grip, his hair damp and dripping, curls flattened by the water. All in all, he looks like a thoroughly annoyed cat after a bath they definitely did not want. Ignore the fact that he was still covered in mud.
âHuh? Oh, yeah, right, thatâs probably a good idea. Letâs see, umâŠâ You look around. Youâre out in open water, having drifted quite a distance from the rocky shoreline of the more solid portion of the swamp. Turning to face the shoreline, you lean forward and squint, trying to find anything familiar.Â
ââŠYepâŠI have no idea where we are. The only landmark of the shoreline I had was the big tree but I canât see it anywhereâŠâ
You sheepishly turn to look at Astarion. âSo, uh⊠which way was camp?â
He gives you an unimpressed look, releasing the raft to instead sit up straight and cross his arms.
âOh. Wait. Thatâs right. He only knows cOmMoN. Why do I keep forgetting that? Itâs really not that hard to rememberâŠâ You kind of forgot that during everything since he seemed to pick up on your meanings fairly easily. That and probably because your little translation module makes it sound like heâs speaking English but whatever.
âLeft?â You point to the left stretch of the shoreline, tilting your head inquisitively. âOr right?â You point to the right and tilt your head that way.
âWhy are you asking for a direction? Just take us back to shore.â He flicks out an uncaring hand, clearly antsy to get off the boat.
âAh, heâs probably motion sick, isnât he?â You rationalize. âPoor people here have never even seen a roller coaster. Well, they probably have minecarts but I doubt they make any of those Minecraft-style roller coasters with them⊠besides, Mr. Fancy Pants here doesnât seem the type to even entertain the thought of getting near a mine, not with perfectly manicured nails like that.âÂ
You raise your own eyebrow at him in turn and return to your regularly scheduled program known as charades. [You really wanna go trudge through the swamp? And an enemy-infested one at that? We have no more arrows, in case you forgot.] {Performance = 15, success. Persuasion adv. = 8, success}
âYou knowâ you can make a convincing point sometimes.â
[So. Camp.] âLeft or right?â {Performance = 13, success}
âWell, since you donât seem to recall, we had so gracefully disembarked from somewhere along the right coastline, and our camp was further northeast of there. As long as we follow the shore, we should eventually come across an entrance to the river we camped along, or at least get closer to it.â
âAs good a plan as any.â You give a half-shrug with a head title. âCool, letâs go with that. Now thenâ itâs motorboat time again.â With a slap to your thighs, you slowly stood up, back turned to Astarion, shifting your feet until they were positioned to give you the best balance possible on the shitty excuse for a raft.
âWhat are youâ why are you standing up?! Are you trying to flip us over?!â
You look at him over your shoulder, squinting in mild confusion. [What? No. Iâm gonna drive us back to camp.] {Performance = 8, failure}
âYouâre going to swim back? Seriously? If you want to send yourself careening off into the water with your weird blasting thing, be my guest, but donât you dare drag me into it.â
[No, no, I leveled up and learned a new spell. Thatâs how I was able to launch us before.] {Performance = 18, success}
âOh, no no no, we are not getting back by you launching us!â
âUgh, you know what, Iâm done explaining. Here, youâre on guard duty,â You toss your staff to him. He easily catches it. âNow shut up and sit tight.â [Now shut up and sit tight.] You gesture alongside your spoken words.
Facing forward again, you bend your knees, lowering your center of gravity, one arm thrust out straight in front of you, the other straight back.Â
Mimicking a freestyle stroke, you move your arms as if you were swimming, the water beneath your craft shifting to start accelerating you. You lean to the side to guide your craft into a turn, curving your trajectory until you are on course before straightening out again. Though, the spell has its limitations, and you can only change the current of the water within a five foot cube, meaning only five feet of the surface, and you can only cast it every six seconds. So you drift at your leisurely speed until your cooldown resets.
You recast your spell, making the current go faster, but being careful not to go too quickly lest you risk losing your already precarious balance.
Your face contorts in mild confusion. Another six seconds pass and you hit your spell again, increasing the speed.
Is he⊠Is he trying to compliment you? You hit another speed boost.
Is he being facetious? You canât tell anymore! The next increased current is even faster as you continue with your windmilling arms, reaching forward with each spellcast, leaving the smoky smell of grilled fish behind you.
You reach the max speed you feel comfortable with, each accelerating block of water feeling like hitting a boost pad in Mario Kart, the wind whipping past your face, your eyes forced to squint.
âOkay, thatâs it, I canât take itâ what are you doing?â
« I found this memory of yours where a disembodied voice compliments you at the same time a sea vessel gains speedâ is this not what was supposed to happen? »
âWhat are youâ oh my god, you dug up wii sports resort? Out of all the stuff I have stored up there, thatâs what you took an interest in? I mean, based pick, but seriously?! I honestly didn't take you for the type.â
« Pardon my rudeness, but I donât believe now is quite the time for this discussion. I fear you may end up getting yourself hurt if youâre distracted. »
 Or so he says, but he doesnât stop with the interjections. Each time you get the water to push your vessel again, you hear the voice of the wii sports announcer overlapping with Astarothâs. You donât know how to feel. Grateful? Annoyed? Embarrassed?
âYou know, I wasnât going to say anything, but youâre practically forcing my hand like this.â
You look at him over your shoulder and raise an eyebrow.
âOkay, so maybe I was going to say this no matter what. First of all, you look ridiculous. Second of all, if you could do this, why did you bother with that awful jerking and jostling method before?â
Well, that solidified your feelings. Definitely annoyed.
[Well, if youâre going to be like that then first of all, we want to move, donât we? Second of all, I learned this spell during the fight.] {Performance = 19, success}
â⊠you learned it during the fight?â
Hearing nothing from him, you glance behind you to see his brows furrowed in skepticism, lips drawn in a tight O.
[Hey, thatâs how it happened; donât know what else to tell ya.] Your arms only briefly pause to give another exaggerated shrug to accompany your words before you turn your eyes back to watch where youâre going. {Performance = 7, failure}
âWhat, are you not even going to bother with trying to explain anything this time?â
â...nope. Ainât worth it.â
Itâs silent from then on for your cross-swamp-country journey. By your standards, itâs a decent speed, but not what youâd call a fast ride as you follow the shore from a safe distance. You may have veered off a bit farther as you began to approach the looming willow, not eager to be anywhere near the aggro range of those weird little mud things with wings. The only good things about that tree were knowing you were on the right path and when you left it behind you. The way back is pretty much silentâ not really much to talk about when you canât speak, nor can you emote with your arms busy keeping up your momentum with your cool new waterbending trick. Itâs as you near the beach of the nautiloid crash that your adrenaline wears off, and the fatigue of the mid-day level up starts to hit you. For a brief moment, your balance falters, jiggling the shield slightly, and you're forced to brace your hands on your knees for a moment to regain it.
Deep breath in⊠Deep breath out.
âNext time we better have at least a fanboat or something. No more unmotorized watercraft for me, thank you very much.â
The much needed breather was wonderful, no matter how short it was, but you didnât have the leisure time to extend it.Thankfully, it seems lord backseat driver decided to let you off after seeing how tired you were, or he was also just as exhausted and couldnât be bothered to snark. Whatever the reason, youâll take it. With a pop of your spine you extend your back to be mostly straight once more and continue forwards. Luckily, right where the crash ended also happened it be an inlet to a fairly wide river, likely either the river you camped along or one that the camp river fed into.
âWeâre taking the next turn.â Your hands move in the likes of one moving a shipâs wheel, your unmotorized vehicle turning in time with your motions, straight into the riverâs mouth.
Unlike how it was in the still water of the swamp, the river has a current to fight against. It wasnât a strong one by any means, but it was a bit annoying to deal with. With it battering against your shipâs flat front, your speed has reduced to a slow, lazy ride, even with the help of your boost pads. Turns out thereâs a reason boats tend to have a pointed bow.
âOkay, weâre turning right next,â you announce as you approach a bend in the river.Â
Without the wind in your face from the faster speeds, youâre getting more and more tired as your journey continues, the exhaustion seeping into youâ not to mention the soreness blooming in your arms. By the time your legs start to get a little wobbly from having been tense for such a long period of time, something you hadnât even realized you were doing in order to keep yourself balanced, you start to wonder if there was a reason why you thought you had to stand up for this in the first place just as you pass by some particularly dense foliage that reveals a sight for sore eyes in the shape of some familiar tents and scattered wooden crates and barrels to your immediate left.Â
âWait, thatâs camp! Finally!â
With a flick of your hand, or really it was both of your arms flinging themselves to the left, you push the shield into a sharp turn, ready to beach your boat on the shore.
Within the ever-burning pit of resurrection, Astaroth finds himself wishing he had one of those things you call a phone or a camera if only so he could get some of those magical instant portraits you called photographs. Sadly, even if he had one, it would not be able to withstand the heat, so he must make do with memory and magic.
With an exaggerated flourish, Astaroth mimics taking a seat in his imaginary plush arm chair, reclining back against the non-existent cushioned back, and crosses his legs. There is no chair, but to an outsider, he would make a very convincing mime.
He holds his hand out, palm up, and conjures up an illusory object straight into his holdâ an object he found in your memories called a photo album. He flips it open to show all four of his faux-photographs present in the binder, four of which are his favorites. He smiles at them fondly as if recalling a pleasant, distant memoryâ for that is how you appreciate photos; the fact that these lovely moments happened not even two minutes ago did not matter.
The first photograph was fairly normal, all things considered. It captured the rising water that was commanded to steer the vessel into a sharp turn in the form of a small wave. Both ridersâ faces shared a look of exhaustion and relief at finally being back at camp. While nothing special in itself, the photo was necessary to highlight the features of its successors, for it was the calm before the storm.
His eyes lazily flit over to the next picture in his collection: the realization that they had, in his warlockâs terms, âdone goofed.â He loves the look of panic and realization of their mistake in his warlockâs eyes here. The matching expression on the vampireâs face was also an enjoyable aspect. The cause of this mutual panic was, of course, seen in the position of the shield-dingy: it was tipping much too far to the left. His baby warlock had underestimated how much force they had commanded the water to utilize in their eagerness to land quickly. Their magic had responded to their desire and had in turn generated a wave much too large, the water once meant to direct instead lifting up the right side of their watercraft.
The third photo proudly presented the point of no return. Just shy of half the frame was occupied by the glistening splashes and droplets of water, agitated into motion by the impacts the two humanoidsâ bodies made after they lost their footing and fell into the river. The vampling was completely submerged save for his feet, which were still partially obscured by the splashâs impressive vertical height. His warlock, on the other hand, was completely outstretched, their torso arced as they did what he had recently learned was called a âbelly flop,â something particularly painful to experience, if their memories are to be believed. How they had managed to alter their expression from one of panic to one of resignation so quickly was a mystery to Astaroth, but was nonetheless quite entertaining. What a funny expression; if his lungs were in a complete state, he may have even chuckled aloud. It was quite a relief indeed that the droplets did not obscure their face. The hilarity of it all was only further complimented by their raft now nearly fully flipped, more of the underside showing than the dry side they had sat on. The raised rim was perhaps at most half a second from hitting the water to complete its capsizing.
The final favorite photograph, the fourth in his collection of four whole photographs, exhibited the two ex-boaters standing in waist-deep water, looking not unlike a pair of drowned rats and about as happy as a stray cat would be in a similar situation.
Mortals truly were entertaining beings.
Astaroth sighs in contentment and closes the illusory album, his hands phasing through it and meeting in a soft clap as it shuts and dissolves into millions of particles of blue light. He tilts his head back to lean against the top of the imaginary backrest of his equally imaginary chair as his cycle of death and rebirth continues on in the everburning flames.
#Why did we call him smeller boy? The world may never know. I donât know either.
#Hello, yes, hi, local internet funnyman here. Breaking news: I think I am very funny. I thought forcing some swamp skiing in here would be quite hilarious, so I dedicated this chapter to my wonderful brain which thinks up these silly scenarios⊠Whatâs that? There was no skiing to be had?
âŠeh, it was close enough.
Taglist: @beppybeesnuggets
