They had to travel for two days to reach the next island, and once again, they reached the place at night to disembark. However, the whole crew noticed that something was off. Aside from the sound of waves, they could hear something in the distance as they approached…
"I can hear cannons…" Sauros said while furrowing his eyebrows.
Aion closed his eyes and began to focus his senses. It helped when he changed to the Sniper class. He started to her and distinguished the sounds around him with a lot more ease, and it was true, he could hear cannons as well…
"Are the pirates of the region attacking a port city at night?" Seris asked. "They are cowards as usual… considering that, I can't imagine one with a few ships doing that."
"True, even if they were caught by surprise, the sailors of these islands would need to deal with more than a few pirate ships to have a hard time agaisnt them," Sauros said. "Maybe one powerful pirate with a large fleet is attacking, or several groups of them allied themselves to do that."
"Even I can understand that this kind of thing is risky for pirates… why would they accept those risks?" Aion asked. "What is the next island that is valuable for them that much."
"... They have a dungeon that spawns some weird monsters…" Sauros crossed his arms and then replied. "The giant goo is a monster that starts small, but the more they live, they become larger because of a mana core that they have inside of them. The core draws mana from the environment… usually, they are extremely weak, but their growth can't stop. There are some legends that a single one of them managed to destroy a whole capital with a single jump."
Aion couldn't help but imagine an ever-growing slime… it was kind of grows a giant monster like that was enough to make some people slime their pants out of fear if they were careless and let a single one grow too much.
"We were going to use the magic stones to power the magic items that we were going to create… some of them can be powerful on their own, even underwater, but others will need the extra power that the magic stones can offer," Sauros said. "I imagine that the pirates are planning to do the same to become more successful in their attacks."
"What are you going to do?" Aion asked. "We can't join the battle with this ship… maybe we can attack them underwater with the tools that you have made, but I don't think it is a good idea to enter the ocean at night."
Sauros was fully aware of it, but leaving pirates alone wasn't something that he was willing to do. In the end, he decided to attack them from behind since most of the people of the Island would be in the port or in the ships around it to prevent them from landing.
Aion didn't know if that was a good idea. Still, he wasn't the Captain of the ship, nor did he have any experience with maritime battles to say otherwise. Still, he had a feeling that Sauros gets too emotional when it comes to pirates, which was weird considering that even the fact that he was drugged and put on chains didn't bother him that much.
"My apologies for bothering you like this," Sauros said when they began to prepare for battle. "I am fully aware that this might slow down our mission, and yet I am still doing it."
"While I think that you are too hot-headed when it comes to pirates, I agree that they need to be dealt with if they are a problem around the dungeon," Aion said. "I will follow your calls as long as they make some sense."
"I am grateful," Sauros said.
The ship approached while invisible, and eventually, they found some pirate ships circulating around the island and using cannons as well as magic cannons to destroy and put everything on fire. When they got within range, The Breeze of the Sea used its magic cannons to fire numerous ice spears at one of the ships, making it tremble all over.
The pirates got surprised, and when they turned around, they saw a massive ship heading toward them. They tried to dodge the charge, but they failed. The frontal part of the Breeze of the Sea collided with the enemy ship and made some crazy cracks appear all around its body. It took a while for everyone to recover from the impact, but Aion still managed to aim his bow while he was on the top of one of the sails. He needed some extra time to do it, but his aim eventually landed on the target.
You obtained 200 experience points.
You received 1500 coins.
Aion wondered why those guys had so many coins in their pockets when they couldn't spend them anywhere… Regardless, when the ships stabilized, Sauros and Seris led the free sailors to jump onto the enemy ship. Before that could happen, Aion had already killed five pirates.
"I guess this is how I wanted to practice my archery skills…" Aion said while looking around and finding the sailors that were being surrounded.
Aion used Force release when he saw a crewman being surrounded by two. His aiming speed increased tremendously because of that, and he put two arrows on the heads of two pirates in the blink of an eye. That technique was really convenient… if only Aion could increase his reserves as he had planned, all of his classes would become stupidly powerful. Perhaps not Bard, but the others would.
Thanks to the surprise attack, the pirates didn't have many chances to fight back. They also didn't have a powerful captain to lead them, so Sauros and Seris' charge destroyed them in the blink of an eye. It was a pity that soon the ship was going to sink with so many good materials and perhaps some treasure, but the group had to head to select their next target…