Chapter Eighty-Seven: Chase at Sea

“Quickly, raise the furnace! Back, back! Damn it! Raise the skull flag, raise the skull flag!”

With the huge cleaver Enzo had handed him in one hand, Lin Qi stood at the prow and shouted the order at the top of his lungs. From the depths of the hull came the low rumble of the magic furnace, and the great sea windmill began to gather speed, carving a vast curve across the waves as it turned directly south.

Several sailors came rushing to the mast carrying an immense black banner, and with deft hands they raised the square of black cloth, nearly ten feet across, to the top. The sea wind caught it, and the banner snapped open. Upon the inky field, a white skull and two crossed white bones stood out starkly; in the skull’s mouth was a blood-dripping dagger, lending the emblem an even more sinister and ghastly air.

Longcheng lifted his eyebrows in surprise. “Lin Qi, I thought you people were law-abiding fishermen!”

Lin Qi arched his brow and answered, entirely at ease, not the least bit ashamed. “Of course we are law-abiding fishermen! This banner is a talisman we bought at great expense. As a rule, in the North Sea, once this flag is flying, pirates won’t dare rob us!”

Longcheng was speechless. He suddenly realized that Lin Qi’s skin was at least as thick as his own, and for that reason he felt oddly closer to him. He looked up at the enormous black pirate skull flag and muttered, “Law-abiding fishermen? A talisman? Do you think I had a meteor strike my head when I was a child?”

Clang after clang rang out as the sailors of the sea windmill drew their gleaming blades. Others laid out great quantities of arrows and powerful bows and crossbows on the deck; even several small catapults were hauled up from the hold. A few furnaces were lit, and iron balls as big as human heads were tossed into them until they glowed red-hot. Clearly, once hurled by the catapults, those iron shot would be devastating.

“These things, wherever you go in the world, seem to be controlled goods?” Longcheng looked at Lin Qi with “curiosity.”

Lin Qi fixed him with the utmost solemnity and sincerity. “Your Excellency Longcheng, these are merely decommissioned military supplies. We bought them for scrap prices, cleaned them up a little, and use them for protection. After all, we may not want to rob others, but we can’t let others rob us!”

Longcheng was speechless again. He looked at the gleaming swords and sabers, obviously freshly forged, then at the excellent bows, crossbows, and arrows, and forced himself to believe that these really were decommissioned military supplies. Stroking his chin, he murmured, “All right, I’ve done such things myself. Decommissioned military supplies? Yes, if they weren’t decommissioned, where would I have gotten the money to climb into the beds of those painted beauties?”

The black banner flew in the wind, but it had no effect whatsoever.

From the Odin dragon boats pursuing them from behind came the low chant of a war song, and several scarlet war banners slowly rose up the masts. Furious, Lin Qi hacked his blade into the ship’s rail and roared, “Damn it, Odin Temple’s Odin Guard! The land-island war is over, so why are they out at sea now? Shouldn’t they be in their temples, guarding gods who have been dead for who knows how many years?”

Longcheng asked faintly, “Lin Qi, it seems your talisman doesn’t work?”

Lin Qi ground his teeth. “Of course it doesn’t. The Odin Guard from Odin Temple won’t give a damn about us. Damn it, if they were fellow merchants from the Viking Axe Gorge, the moment they saw this flag they’d absolutely stop chasing us... Hm?”

At the words “Odin Guard” and “Viking Axe Gorge,” Lin Qi looked at Longcheng with suspicion. This was the waters where the bold men of Viking Axe Gorge did business; in ordinary times, so long as they flew this black skull flag, those foreign heroes would pass by their vessel with perfect understanding, and the two sides might even trade friendly local specialties and exchange intelligence on certain cargo ships.

But today, the heroes of Viking Axe Gorge were nowhere to be seen; instead, patrol ships from Odin Guard had appeared in these waters!

Longcheng spread his hands innocently. Looking up at the sky, he sighed to heaven. “Lin Qi, do you think they came looking for me? How could that be? Sure, I did sack Viking Axe Gorge and kill more than a dozen Odin Guards, including one of those blue-skinned brutes, but that was days ago. They can’t possibly be here for me, can they?”

Longcheng laughed, though there was something distinctly false in the sound. He chuckled dryly. “Look, in this endless sea, how could they possibly find me so precisely? That’s impossible!”

Yes, in this boundless ocean, how could the Odin Guard have happened to find Longcheng?

Lin Qi circled around Longcheng once, searching him carefully. Sunlight fell on Longcheng, and a flash of red suddenly gleamed. Lin Qi reached out and drew a blood-red strand of hair from within Longcheng’s blue fox-fur coat.

He flung the crimson strand back at Longcheng and gritted his teeth. “Damn it, it’s the blood-oath curse of a temple sorcerer. Unless you get a thousand miles away from them, they can track your movements at any time. When were you cursed?”

Longcheng stared blankly at Lin Qi. After a moment, he said, “That shriveled old man I kicked into pieces, the one wearing a skull cap made of beast hide on his head—that was their temple sorcerer? I really had no idea. I only thought he was a little ugly, and he was flailing his arms and yelling at me, so I kicked him to death on impulse!”

Very good. Very bold indeed! Lin Qi shot Longcheng a resentful look and, grinding his teeth, ordered the magic furnace to full power. Bold you may be, but a sorcerer with considerable power and authority in Odin Temple was killed by you merely because he was a little ugly. If they don’t come after you with all they’ve got, it would be strange indeed.

Seizing the strand of hair, he threw it into the sea and shouted for the sailors to raise the sails, using both the wind and the magical force of the furnace to drive the sea windmill at once. The great hull suddenly lunged forward, sending spray rising several feet high from the stern, and the vessel’s speed increased by more than half.

But then, from all four Odin dragon boats, there suddenly rose the figures of thin, hideous little old men. Waving bone staffs and dancing wildly at the prows, they cried out for a while, and then a gale blew down from the north, catching exactly in the sails of the four long, narrow boats.

All four dragon boats raised full sail, their great red canvas billowing full, and their speed abruptly increased as well.

Though the sea windmill was driven by magical power, its hull was broad and heavy. It ran very steadily, but its speed could not compare with those exceptionally narrow Odin dragon boats.

Time passed minute by minute. Two hours later, the largest dragon boat had closed to within less than a hundred meters behind the sea windmill.

Hundreds of the foreign warriors aboard the dragon boats rose to their feet, the blades and spears in their hands flashing with blinding light.

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