The Great Worm Lich

The sea breeze blew the sails till it bulged out. Relying on the wind, the merchant ships began to sail on the sea surface rapidly.

The young captain stood at the ship’s bow, with a few strands of his hair exposed outside his captain’s cap flowing in the wind, appearing to be very daring and energetic. He only felt that he was living in the most beautiful dream and still could not believe his eyes that such good luck had fallen on him.

It was only until the employer standing beside him had opened his mouth to talk that he finally snapped back to reality. “Captain Fitch, change the route and sail at full speed towards the west! Put down the anchor at noon and we’ll wait for a few ‘guests’ there before continuing to head to Sussi City as planned.”

“C-Change the route…” Changing the route without any special circumstances during the voyage was a big taboo, in particular when the captain was still a novice. Upon hearing his employer saying so arbitrarily, Fitch replied immediately in shock, with both of his eyes widened, “But, Sir! We’ll get lost easily!”

“Use your mind, my dear captain. If we note down our direction and time using the nautical instrument, how can we possibly get lost if we continue the original route and the voyage after picking up our ‘guests’? It would only take one day at most!” Zhang Lisheng turned his head to look at this quack captain who had always been in last place in the Institute of Navigation and said with a nonchalant smile.

The captain was still the leader of the ship in a voyage. Even if it was a request made by his employer, he could reject it directly if the request was unreasonable.

However, with Filch’s qualifications and insights, how could he possibly have such power? At once, he opened his mouth and answered with a low voice, “Y-You’re right. B-But why do we need to do so…”

“It’s not me who wanted to do so but it’s the Bailile and Tantorn Family who wish for me to do so. Perhaps they want me to help bring some ‘private goods’ for them. In short, Captain Filch, you’ll have a promising future if you do what I say. Today is probably the most brilliant day of your life. I’m going back to the cabin to rest now so I’ll let you decide on yourself,” Zhang Lisheng replied and turned to walk to the largest cabin on the deck.

Each of the city-state in the Kattaman City State had a unified tax law. Slave trade and tobacco trade were heavily taxed so it was not uncommon for big trading companies with authority and power to secretly carry out smuggling trade to make huge profits.

Even though the young man’s words were full of flaws, just the very small possibility and the addition of the two names of Bailile and Tantorn were immediately enough to make Filch succumb.

“Sir, I’ll do as you say right away! Right away…” When the young captain saw his employer’s back about to disappear behind the wooden door of the cabin, he immediately snapped back to reality and shouted out loud. Then, he turned and shouted to the sailors, “Send a message to the other two ships and let them follow us to the west. Adjust the sail! Full sail to the west! We’ll sail at full speed! ”

Upon hearing Filch’s shout in the spacious cabin, an odd smile inadvertently crept upon Zhang Lisheng’s face. After turning around to lock the door, he strolled to the sofa next to the window and sat down, before looking out the window, thoughtfully waiting quietly for the time to pass.

When the sun slowly ascended into the sky and finally reached the top of his head, the young man could clearly feel that the ship had begun to slow down. In the end, it stopped in the sea and a loud ‘plod’ sound could be heard, the huge sea anchor at the stern was thrown into the water already.

After a while, a series of door knocking sounds resonated from outside the cabin, which was followed by Filch’s loud shout. “Sir, we have stopped the ship. D-Do you want to have lunch? Shall I ask the sailor to send it to you?”

“You’ve done marvelous, Filch! You’ve done marvelous!” Now that the time was right. Zhang Lisheng stood up and took off his clothes while replying, “There’s no need for lunch. I’m not yet hungry. You and the sailors can eat first. Let’s wait patiently. I believe our ‘guests’ will arrive soon, in several hours minimum, or two to three days at most.”

“T-Two to three days? B-But, Sir, we only prepared for coastal sailing so do we have enough food if we have to wait for two to three days?” Now that the young captain heard his employer’s change of words, he was stunned for a while before asking in a stutter.

“The goods and food are prepared by me personally.” After Zhang Lisheng transformed his naked body using the wyrmdragon’s transformation power, he felt the abundance of water vapor around his body and began to condense clouds. “There are about 300 crates of dried meat and hard bread alone. I’ve also prepared simple fishing gears so do you think we still need to worry about food supply?”

“Since you have already prepared them in advance, of course we don’t have to worry about it.” Upon hearing his employer’s question, Filch breathed a sigh of relief. The instant he did so, he immediately saw a thick layer of fog rising from the sea surface, prompting him from exclaiming out loud, “Bad news, Sir, the sea surface has suddenly been shrouded with fog! Huge fog too! W-What shall we do?”

“Simple! Just stay here unmoved until the fog is gone. Right, light the torches on the ship to prevent our ‘guests’ from slamming into us when they come,” Zhang Lisheng said coldly with a ferocious smile. He had already transformed his mouth and nose to bulge out, his ears to become deer antlers, with countless green scales covering his body and his palms had become as dried as eagle claws.

Just like this, the three ships stayed in the thick fog for three days. the fog was abnormal and did not disperse, causing the people on the ship to start to panic.

At noon on the fourth day, the sun sprinkled through the thick white fog onto the large merchant ship. Filch looked up at the fog that he could not see through and patrolled around the deck while telling the second mate beside him, “Apulila, it has already been four days and three nights but this fog hasn’t dissipated. I think something is not right. Have you heard of any sea fog that lasted for so long?”

“I have never, Captain!” The short second mate sighed and answered. “It’s winter now so by right, there shouldn’t be any fog in the sea. Maybe you should try to talk to Boss again? We can try sailing blindly and see whether we can throw the anchor to wait after sailing out of this fog. No matter how big our ship is, we can’t be seen by anybody in such a great fog…”

“It’s useless. I’ve told him this before but our employer said that the place of the appointment is here so we can only wait here. He said that we’ll just have to light more torches if we’re worried that our ‘guests’ cannot see us,” Filch shook his head and sighed, interrupting Apulila’s words.

“This is really, really…” The second mate was stunned for a while and suddenly lowered his voice. “B-But this really doesn’t make sense, Captain! Look, Mr. Lisheng hasn’t come out of the cabin for four days already! He only ask people to send in dried meat and bread midnight and his instructions are so absurd. Our plan was to sail along the coastline to the neighboring city-states, but now we’ve parked here in the sea for more than hundreds of hours! Even though it’s still quite safe given that we’re close to the shore, there is still a small possibility of encountering sea monsters, especially the news of the Hellfire hijack that has been so tumultuous recently that allowed boss to gain these three ships by luck…”

“Stop saying that, Apulila. It’s not good talking so indiscriminately at sea…. Sigh, Mr. Lisheng is our employer and is Bailile and Tantorn’s VIP. Even though there’s something fishy about it, it’s best for us to not disobey his orders unless it’s out of absolute necessity. Right now, we have plenty of food and everything is calm and tranquil so there’s nothing wrong for us to wait for a while more…” The captain interrupted Apulila’s words again and at this time, he suddenly heard the watchman shouting from the watchtower.

“Sir, something seems to be approaching us from the sea… Oh God! T-That thing has a speed that is impossibly fast so it’s definitely not a ship! Everyone, be on the alert! Be on guard! A sea monster is swimming towards us…”

When the people on the deck heard the shout from the watchman, they became panicked immediately.

Filch froze right away. He abandoned his second mate who was at a loss on what to do and rushed to the ship’s side. With a slip of his foot, he almost fell to the ground but fortunately, he managed to grab a hold on the ship’s side. Blood began to flow out of his hand but he ignored it and still continued to look outward. when he was feeling nervous, he suddenly heard the watchman shout again, “It’s a ship! It’s a ship! Even though there’s no sail, it’s very fast! It’s not a monster but a ship… Don’t panic, everyone! Looks like the ‘guests’ we’re waiting for are here!”

“Who is the one on duty on the watchtower today?” The young captain’s face turned grave right away as he roared angrily, “Do you know that I can give you ten whips because of the commotion set off by your nonsense?!”

“I-I’m sorry, Captain. T-That ship is just too weird! The hull is low, there is no mast nor sail but it’s sailing fast at sea…” When the watchman standing on the high side heard the captain’s words, he forgot about his own responsibility and hurriedly climbed down from the watchtower to explain.

“Low hull, no mast nor sail but it’s sailing fast at sea? There’s no such ship in this world! You must be… You must…” Upon hearing the sailor’s defense, Filch raised his voice in anger and reprimanded even more in rage.

However, as he was speaking, a jolt kicked in his heart, faintly reminding him about this description that he had heard from somewhere before. “Short hull, no mast nor sail but it’s sailing fast… I-Isn’t this, this the rumored F-Fire…”

When the young captain was stuttering the word ‘fire’ continuously, he was suddenly horrified to see a huge spider covered in long purple hair, carrying a short ugly midget climbing over the ship’s side to stand beside himself. Chills ran down his spine and he finally shouted a complete statement, “The Hellfire people are here! They have made it onboard! Fight! Prepare! Prepare to fight…”

Amidst Filch’s hoarse shouts, the dense fog on the sea slowly dissipated. The sailors, who had gone completely pale, stood frozen on the deck watching the barbarian warriors riding huge spiders gushing up the ship in increasing numbers. Only a few of them responded to the captain’s words and rushed to the lower deck to take out their weapons.

Unfortunately, these brave mainlanders did not have the opportunity to approach the wooden door leading to the bottom of the ship, as they were immediately stabbed cruelly by the javelins the Hellfire people threw at them and died just like that.

The blood spurting out from the huge penetration wounds also caused the other sailors to lose the intention to resist. Their legs turned weak and most of them slumped and sat onto the ground, only Filch and a few others were still standing with great difficulty.