Groaning, I opened my eyes. All I saw was darkness. I tried turning my head or moving but it seemed like I was pinned in place.

I fought down the urge to panic as I evaluated my condition. My arms were still broken, the sharp stabbing pain when I tried to move them told me as much. I could breathe though so my organs had healed after the beating I had taken. That was something at least.

Seeing as I was in no immediate danger of dying, I checked my skills. My blood ran cold as I saw what remained of my abilities.

Rejuvenate

Multicast

Eye of the Storm

Aura of Rage

Calcifying Strike

Frostwave

Orb of Darkness

Energy Lance

Overcharge

Tempest Ball

That was the sum total of all the skills I now had. They had stripped me of every ability I had stolen from them along with every ability my second class gave me by default, making it impossible to recover skills by stealing them from others.

I let out a morbid little chuckle as I lay there. Tears of frustration leaked from the corners of my eyes which caused even more anger and frustration to bubble up as I couldn’t even move to wipe the tears away.

Seeing as self-pity wasn’t going to do me any good, I Overcharged Rejuvenate to top my health off and hopefully set some of the bones that were just fractured.

I ground my teeth through the pain as my body healed the breaks. The feeling in my good hand returned after a minute or so and I was able to wiggle my arm around.

It soon became clear that I was buried under a bunch of loose rocks and debris. My hand broke through the surface but I was too weak to pull myself out.

Groping around blindly, I picked up fist-sized rocks and threw them off my body.

The process was a slow and agonizing one and I kept having to suck back on the burning anger that threatened to overwhelm me. Eventually, I cleared away enough rubble to pull myself out of the hole I was buried in, using my one good arm.

I screamed in pain as my broken limbs were jostled around but I didn’t stop. I wanted to but I let the burning pit of anger fuel me as I slowly pulled myself out of the hole.

My legs were a mangled mess that would take weeks to heal. My other arm with my mana cannon was not much better. Broken in at least three spots and dislocated. I stored my helmet and coughed as I breathed in the dusty air but it was at least fresh air and not my armor recirculated stuff. I pulled myself over to a larger rock and braced my broken arm against it. I used my good arm to pull on my wrist. There was a slurping sound as the protruding bone was pulled back under the skin and I took a shaky breath.

The wound quickly closed as my healing did its work. The bone would still take time to move back into place but getting it close would speed up the process. With that done, I positioned my shoulder near the rock and pushed down as hard as I could with my torso until the shoulder popped back into the socket.

When I woke up from passing out, the pain in my shoulder had gone away. My healing spell was still going so I hadn’t been out long, fifteen seconds maybe.

I coughed again from the dirty air, spitting out a mouthful of blood, and dirt. Then I put my helmet back on. Looking around, all I saw was devastation. I didn’t know where I was or how far from the town I had fled during the fight with Ulq and Xiph, two names I would never forget.

I thought I saw smoke rising in the distance. It wasn’t the black smoke that was rising from the crater I was in so I thought it might be chimney smoke. It was the best idea I had for direction so I pulled myself along the ground one arm length at a time.

By the time I reached the other side of the crater, night had fallen. Everything was quiet and if it wasn't for the damage, I might even call it peaceful. I was surprised that nobody had come to look for me but when I thought about it, I probably wouldn’t have come either.

Anyone that had the opportunity to Identify those two monsters would know what was chasing me. The chances that I would survive or escape if they intended to capture me were essentially zero.

It still pissed me off though.

With a heave of effort, I lifted myself over the rim of the crater and got to see the battlefield for the first time since the fighting had begun on the ground. There was still some mist that clung to the island's surface but most of it had evaporated during the day. The smoke I saw was coming from the town but it came from a burned-out house along the outskirts. I could now see the occasional flash of magic or hear the boom of a cannon firing within the city.

Now it made sense why nobody had come to find me, the fighting was still in full swing and by the fact that the enemy had forced its way into the city it was probably not going well for our side.

The field was littered with corpses and my eyes settled on a particular pair that pained my heart. Lying in a heap was Khikall and Grulaine, who I now knew to be the older Jerboa’s son. Somehow, Khikall had gotten behind the younger one and mounted his back. His bladed whip was wrapped around Grulaine’s neck and Khikall’s tail around his son’s waist so he couldn’t be shaken off.

Unfortunately, the younger Grulaine had used the opportunity to viciously and repeatedly stab his father in the back by using a dagger held in his flexible tail. This hadn’t saved the Captain of the Forsooth but it had ensured his father died with him.

I pulled myself over to the pair and reached up to my former pilot's head. I unclipped the black ring from his ear before whispering him a farewell. “Your journey may have ended but not before you reclaimed your honor, my friend. Rest in peace.” I closed the grinning man’s eyes and ensured the son was truly dead. The bulging eyes and frantic scratching to try and remove the whip from around his neck put a smile on my face.

“Serves you right, you piece of shit,” I muttered.

I searched around but didn’t see any other crew members. I did see a few of the townsfolk dead amongst the pirates but it was far less than I had thought. I also didn’t see Sarvis amongst the dead, which meant he was still alive and likely pushing his forces into the city.

I needed to go help but in my condition, I was more a hindrance than an asset.

But I might be able to take out a few fringe pirates. I may have lost 90% of my skills but I still had some powerful options available to me.

***

Crawling to the edge of the city had exhausted me but I found what I was looking for. There were a group of injured pirates tending to their wounds or sleeping. Nobody was here guarding them, likely because none of the other pirates wanted to miss out on the action.

I targeted the most awake one with an Overcharged Tempest Ball. The man tried to scream as the ball of water engulfed him but it was cut off almost immediately as he sucked down the raging torrent of water.

The last man that was awake tried to shoot to his feet but I hit him with Energy Lance. I was going to use Frostwave as that was quieter but without overcharging it, it wouldn’t silence him anyway.

The man exploded as the force of my attack hit him in the chest. Before the others could wake up, I activated an Overcharged Eye of the Storm. They were all weak enough that I didn’t have to maintain the spell long. Even the little bit that I did, left me feeling drained. I didn’t stick around though as I dragged my body away from the fight.

I was the crippled avenger as I struck three more times during the night. Any time I located a pack of wounded pirates, I pounced from the darkness like a predator. My last attack had not gone very smoothly though. I pulled the long sharp blade from my side and threw it away, wheezing as my wound closed. The man had caught me as I was dispatching the wounded and stabbed me in the lung with his rapier before I could react.

I looked over at my attacker as he struggled fruitlessly on the ground as the calcification spread from his torso.

My gruesome work was bringing me closer to the fighting so I decided to hide in a dark alley to avoid detection while my latest wounds healed. It wouldn’t stop me from jumping any lone injured when the opportunity presented itself though.

Ten minutes had passed before I heard a voice from behind me. “Holy shit, Captain, is that you?”

I spun around, wincing at my injuries before I saw who had snuck up on me. “Em’ah,” I croaked.

“Holy shit, it is you… you look like shit. I had mistaken you for a pirate and was about to stab you in the back when I noticed your armor. Let me help get you back to the command bunker.”

She lifted me up and I groaned in pain as my mashed potatoes legs didn’t support my weight. “Fuck, those squiddies did a real number on you.”

I grunted, “What happened?”

“I’ll tell you all about it when we get somewhere safe. Try to stay quiet, we gotta move through the sewers.”

***

“Look who I found,” Em’ah said as she strolled into one of the bunkers with me slung over her shoulder. She set me down gently in a chair but I still took a sharp intake of breath as the pain shot through my body.

“Well, fuck! Glad to see you’re alive, Captain,” Barcos spoke, looking exhausted.

“What’s the status of the battle?”

He gave a tired shrug. “We have them at a stalemate at the moment. The bunkers were far better defended than they figured and they have no way to breach the shields en masse.”

“So they have breached the shields?” I inquired as I tried to find a less painful position to sit in.

“A few of their sneaky members teleported past the shields and managed to kill a few people but Em’ah and I took care of them. Now they don’t have anyone else that can try or they are holding them back. That doesn’t mean we are winning though.”

“What about the civilians?”

Barcos rubbed his face, “the kids are safe, what few were in the town. The rest have taken up arms and are the only reason we are still holding the pirates at bay. I feel like Sarvis isn’t pushing all that hard though and it has me worried.”

“You think he is hoping for reinforcements to bolster his position?” I asked.

“Yeah,” Em’ah cut in. “That’s why I was out searching the city. We had reports of explosions and was wondering what was going on.”

I nodded, “that was probably from me. I ambushed three camps of wounded pirates before you found me. I didn’t see any reinforcements though so they probably aren’t coming by land. Maybe he is hoping for a ship to arrive. I know we still got those damn guild pricks floating in the distance, waiting to see who wins,” I grumbled irritably.

Barcos looked hesitant for a moment before he spoke up. “This can be over in a moment, Captain…”

I knew what he was getting at and I sighed. He was right, I could save the rest of the people on the island and make it so the pirate kings and their cronies fucked off and left me and mine alone forever. So why was I so hesitant to agree. The terms weren’t even all that bad. I knew why, because it meant giving someone control over me, even if only minutely. “Can you signal them?”

With a relieved smile, Barcos nodded. The man was flippant and annoying at times, but he cared about the people of his kingdom.