The deeper I go the more I appreciate my enhanced vision, without it this would be terrifying. I still am not used to the meg's other senses, they feel weird and give me a headache. Being able to feel anything moving within a couple of hundred feet is too much information.

Most of the time I have no choice but to ignore all the information coming from the other senses. I get the feeling that, like the drake, this form is too powerful for me to use for long periods. So, despite wanting to stay out longer, when the sun goes down I return to the village.

This time I set out a small feast for everyone before anyone can even ask me to. However, I am still not feeling hungry, I haven't since I ate the turtle thing. So I head back to my hut, set up the hammock, and sleep for the rest of the night.

When I wake up the next morning the first thing I do is meditate to recover my sacred power. Then, since I am finally hungry, I eat some breakfast before heading to the tree. The tree has grown enough that it is hard to gauge the size by sight alone.

It is over twenty feet tall now, but I can't tell the exact height just from looking. The stone I left by the roots is gone, there isn't any trace of it at all, not even dust. When I get close to the tree I am surprised to feel that the tree is welcoming me.

The feeling is faint and weak, but this feeling is definitely coming from the tree. I can't help but wonder if the tree is like this because of its growth or because of what Ekertan did. Either way, it is definitely a good sign that the tree is becoming stronger.

As I sit down and pull out a piece of the gate, I feel the tree establish a connection with me. It looks like the tree is really eager for its daily mana feeding, so I start channeling it. As soon as I start channeling I can feel waves of happiness coming off the tree.

The tree happily swallows every drop of mana from the two pieces of stone. When the second stone is gone I again place a third by the tree's roots. As soon as I do I see a small root come out of the ground and wrap around it.

Seeing that the ground around the tree looks dry I get some water from the river and water it. Again the tree gives off an emotional response, at a guess it feels like gratitude. It is something of a relief that the tree agrees with my plan, I wouldn't want to cut it down otherwise.

Especially when it could very well be the last of its kind, I would have to find an alternative. However, since the tree is in agreement that means that the plan can continue without modification. With my mind set at ease, I leave and head back to the ocean to continue swimming around.

First I head out into deeper waters, then I make my way south and around the island. When I don't find the legendary beast to the south I decide to take the shallows between the island and the mainland. It is a much shorter path than swimming all the way back around the island.

As I move through the shallows I happen to spot the underside of a ship's hull. Since it is sailing towards the island I surface to get a better look at it. Just from the size of the hull I can tell it is decent sized, bigger than the ones that were at the fort.

When I surface I can see that it is a two mast warship, it has a catapult and several ballista. As I am checking it out, the sailors on board start running around and man the weapons. It is only when I notice them pointing at me that I remember that my dorsal fin is sticking out of the water.

Soon a couple of ballista bolts come flying my way, but they don't even come close to hitting me. Not wanting to give them a chance to improve their aim I dive down a bit and circle the ship. Now that I know it is a warship I am seriously considering if I should sink it or not.

I was expecting the humans to come back to the island, maybe not quite this fast though. Even if I sink this ship, the humans will just send more, humans are tenacious. Having claimed some land on the island, they won't give it up easily.

The humans returning to the island probably wouldn't affect my plans or harm the elves. It would take a while before they could send people around the mountains to harass the elves. On the other hand, the humans returning might distract the orcs from targeting the elves.

So letting the humans reach the island is probably a good idea, but I really want to see what sinking a ship would be like. Attacking the ship as a meg sounds like it would be really fun, especially a warship. They can at least try to fight back and make it a bit more interesting.

As I am debating with myself I surface again for another look at the warship. As soon as I do several ballista bolts are fired at me and to my surprise a spell crashes down on me. The ballista bolts all miss but the lightning bolt doesn't and I end up stunned for a second causing me to sink.

Of course the lightning bolt didn't hurt me at all, I was just really surprised. I really wasn't expecting this ship to have a mage onboard since the fort didn't have any mages. It would seem the humans are being more serious about the island this time.

Yet if that is the case, why would they only send a single warship, it doesn't make sense. A ship that size can probably only carry between two and three hundred. Nowhere near enough to protect and rebuild the fort, no matter how elite they might be.

Maybe it is just an investigation team sent to find out what happened to the fort. If that is the case then I probably don't want to allow them to reach the island. If they have a mage then chances are that they would be able to find out what happened.

Once my mind is made up I immediately turn and charge at the ship at full speed. Just as I ram into the ship the Jaws theme once again starts playing in my head. However, this time it doesn't bother me, instead it makes it more fun.

When I ram into the ship's hull several boards crack but that's all that happens. The fact that I didn't make a hole must mean that the hull is magically reinforced. So I circle back and get ready to make another run at it, as I do arrows and ballista bolts rain down.

Unfortunately, for the humans, water is great at stopping projectiles so I don't have to worry. However, as I am charging again, ahead of me several small objects hit the water and start sinking. As soon as I see that they are a bunch of small barrels I circle away from them.