The young man watched with a strained expression as the old and time-worn captain of the merchant's vessel took a new bottle he had brought to him by another member of the crew.

“Have you ever been Sauth?” The captain asked as he opened the bottle and prepared to gulp it down.

“No” He replied.

Is it really safe to let him drink like this? No wonder he believes something is wrong tonight. The old fart drunk himself into a stupor.

“I went a few times to haul some cargo, nice town, quite a few nice bars and lots of women… the point of this is” He took a sip “Alpo is actually from somewhere around Sauth, he grew up among a bunch of old drunken old sailors and poor as a rat, but such is life so what ya gonna do, you know?”

The captain said matter-of-factly, and the young sailor didn’t bother to reply. He agreed with him since he, like most people he knew, had also been born into poverty

“one day while working on the docks he saw a young lady in the distance, you the know the type, beautiful and dignified with a stench of expensive perfume, who knows what the hell a person of her standing was doing there that day, maybe it struck her fancy to go for a walk; either way you know how these things go, he fell in love at first sight and couldn’t think of anything else, probably wanked himself to sleep thinking of her,” He laughed “He was young and of course fucking stupid so he decided to get a job on the house of that noble lady and maybe he would get close to her to make her fall in love with him”

“Can’t image that turned out fine,”

“Well, no shit kid, of course it didn’t, only it went tits up in a different way than the one you are thinking of. "

“Huh really?” He had seen a few kids stupid enough to try to mess with a noble’s daughter. Usually, they get beat up black and blue and left off the street.

“He must have been a good-looking lad back then, or maybe he had the right sized tool if you know what I mean; He actually made the lass fall in love with him. Obviously, the father was less than satisfied with their relationship and so he tried to get rid of the nuisance. "

“He tried to kill him?” He asked just to be polite, but the answer came naturally to him.

“Of course, he did, it’s not like noblemen think twice about recurring to violence, not that they would ever dirty their own hands, the cowards, he sent a few cronies to do the job, but he and the lass had already left by then,”

“Holy shit, so he convinced her to leave her family?” He was surprised. It was unheard of to him that someone would leave nobility aside for love.

“Yes, they were young and fucking stupid. It’s not uncommon for horny kids to make irreparable mistakes,”

“And where did they go?”

“The sea” Anxiety was clearly visible on the old man, his wrinkled face contorted with worry.

“Everything good, captain?” He felt he had to ask him.

“Yeah, don’t worry about it, it’s my old sailor senses failing I guess,” He then looked for the nearest crewmate and shouted “Hey, you! Einar, stop playing with your balls and stay alert for anything fishy”

“Yes, captain!” The man, built like a stack of bricks, waved back and started walking around the ship; A big double-handed steel sword strapped to his back was his only partner.

Once his order was carried out, the captain continued with his tale of love and loss.

“They boarded the same fishing boat he worked at to get scape. Of course, no sane captain would let a young lass sail on their ship, much less a noble one,”

“So, he stowed her away. "

“Yes, he brought the land to meet the sea, and that never ends well… I’ll tell ya that much kid. "

“I heard it before, so what happened to them? there’s no way you can hide someone for long on a ship,”

“of course, you can’t, but he managed to do it long enough for there to be no way back, once they found out he got chewed out and told to get off the crew as soon as they anchor, and rightfully so ya know?”

“Well, I guess it’s the normal thing to do. We are always in danger out here, and bringing aboard someone that can’t protect themselves puts everyone else in danger”

“See? I knew you had a good head on those shoulders kid, anyway as usual things went to shit in no time, we don’t really know what happened, he never said, maybe they fought and she wanted to make him jealous, or maybe the flame just went out, but one day he found her with another cremate,”

“Damn, and how did he react?”

“About as well as you can expect, I guess. She said she would go back to her family as soon as they were back. She said she would convince her father to leave him alone, but that they were done,”

“So, that’s what happened to him?” He knew Alpo, and he wasn’t about to call him weak, but for a woman to ruin him that much.

Well, who am I to judge? Shit, I have to apologize as soon as I get back. I was an asshole to her.

“Actually kid, that’s when things truly went to shit” That caught his attention. He expected that to be all there was to the story, but it seems it wasn’t “the snake moved”

“oh”

That was all he had to say for him to understand. Garganomr, the snake waiting in the heart of the ocean, is so big that sometimes when it moves close enough to the surface it creates seaquakes. Sometimes big enough to reach land and cause terrible floodings.

It’s a rare occurrence, but every man stupid, courageous, or crazy enough to brave the dark waters still fears being unlucky enough to get hit by one.

“Yeah, it caught them with their pants down, to say the least, somehow only Alpo survived everyone else drowned but him, he washed up on a small island and lived alone for who knows how long, I eventually found him and me and the crew at the time rescued him, he wasn’t right in the head anymore”

He was about to say something when a scream cut off the conversation. It was Einar from the other side of the ship.

“CAPTAIN! ATTACK!!”