Chapter 57 - Pirates on deck!

"Pirates on deck! Do not let them down below!" a sailor cried as their swords clashed with the pirates' weapons.

"Go. Go one floor down and jump out the window onto theirs. They should have mana cannons on the flanks of their ship. You are at the Meteor Vessel Stage. It shouldn't be hard to push the cannon back with your spirit force and let the others barge in first. The panther and Lingqi will rush in and provide the distraction you need to enter and slip away unnoticed. The goal remains the same," Lance began as he held Mei back.

"I will attack the deck of their ship and attempt to lure out the captain and first mate. You have until the time they're both dead or the pirates decide to retreat. Go now!" Lance ordered as he summoned dozens of tiny bone mice while the pirates attempted to head to the ladder leading below deck.

"Be careful," Mei said as she ran below deck, with Lingqi following close behind.

"Target the weaker ones first and let the other pirates see you eat their flesh to instill fear into their hearts. You and Lingqi must blaze stronger than the sun," Lance instructed, and the panther dipped its head, following the two soon after.

"Guns! Take out the guns. Use your magical cores of the first stage! We're attacking a ship from Pangu!" a pirate shouted, Lance's eyes narrowing at the strange weapons they pulled out from under their shirts. The weapons were pieces of wood and metal shaped like cannons, with three-fourths of their length forming a long barrel. A shape of a lunar eclipse was on the back of the gun, with the pirates holding the gun with one hand under the barrel and another on a small grip.

"Fire!" a pirate roared as he and a few others loaded a small magical core where the shape of the lunar eclipse was. The core shone as a loud bang resounded. A tiny mist burst from the barrels as a small beam was fired. Lance's eyes widened as sailors cried out, the beam entering their bodies without resistance. He narrowed his gaze in surprise and bewilderment as he remained unscathed by three beams that hit him.

"Fuck! That one's someone at the Spirit Forming Stage!" a pirate yelled. "Pangu Continent's second cultivation stage."

"You idiot! He's at the fourth stage! That's a fucking Meteor Vessel! Why the hell is he here, and how the fuck does he have mana inside him?" another cursed as he shot down a sailor. "Get the captain and first mate!"

"So these guns are incapable of hurting someone of a higher cultivation? It seems they are inferior to mana cannons," Lance muttered as two lava chains swirled from his wrists. Lava sizzled, and wood burned as the chains began swirling toward the pirates.

"So many fucking mice! Somebody shoot a mana cannon at him! Get your arse on those cannons and fire!" a larger, more muscular pirate yelled. Lance narrowed his eyes as the man dodged the lava chains, ignoring the screams as the lava chains blasted and melted the pirates on point of contact. Faces burned, and arms flew after they were dismembered.

"That must be the first mate," Lance noted as he crossed his arms, the chains following the flow of his wrists and crossing as the pirate raised his sword and leaped toward him. The pirate cursed and leaned his head back as far as he could, landing on his ass and back as Lance ran past him.

Pirates screamed as Lance made the chains smaller and whipped them toward the pirates in his path. The mice scrambled onto the planks and assaulted the deck of the pirate ship as Lance burned off the forearms of two pirates and took their guns.

"How do I use this thing?" Lance said as he pointed at a pirate, but nothing happened. Annoyed, he spun the gun in his left hand and smashed the side of it onto a nearby pirate's head. Holding the other gun with both hands, he saw a small metal bar within a ring beneath the end of the barrel closest to the eclipse shape. He looked around and saw a pirate kill a sailor more closely, noting to pull the small bar with his right index finger.

"This core's too weak," Lance muttered, replacing it with a core from a magical beast of the Element Adept stage. He pointed the gun at a pirate and gasped as he felt a minor recoil before seeing a crystalline beam penetrate and shatter inside the chest of the first pirate he aimed at. His lips curled as he heard screams below and began lashing his lava chains wildly around him after tossing the gun into his storage ring.

"Who the fucking hell is burning my ship?" a voice roared as two doors flew from their hinges, revealing a man in a black trench coat and pirate hat storming out of his cabin. His eyes narrowed, and the fire from the lava-burnt wood reflected in his gaze as he saw Lance. "A brat who barely finished sucking his mom's tits is messing with my ship? MY SHIP? What the fuck are you gents doing? How could you let him on my ship? Johnson, you're the fucking first mate! How the hell is he on my ship?"

"He's dangerous, captain. He's a Meteor Vessel Stage practitioner from Pangu, and he's even a necromancer!" the first mate cried, leaping aboard the ship as he roared at the pirates. "What the hell are you looking at? You going to kill the landlubbers or what? The captain and I can just take all the treasure."

"We're not the ones who landed on his own ass in fright," one pirate muttered as he raced past the first mate.

"Anyone else want to say something funny? Really, I'm all ears," Johnson snarled as the pirates loaded their guns and quickly continued the assault after they saw Johnson grab a sailor's neck from behind and snap it like a twig.

"As expected of pirates: your methods are crude and ineffective. All you did was inspire mutiny down the road when you are revealed to be at your weakest," Lance mocked as he made his lava chains thinner and hotter, causing them to dig into the wood. "Are you my toys to experiment on today? There's not enough...bodies. I have a theory about souls, but there are too few of you."

"Kill him," the captain began, but his first mate did not move. "Johnson? Why aren't you moving?"

"My feet....they burn!" the first mate screamed, the captain noticing the wood blackening around his feet.

"Burst," Lance grinned, and his chains suddenly surged and expanded, blowing off the first mate's feet and legs to a few inches below the knees.

"How did you do that?" the captain gasped as the chains wrapped around the arms of the first mate. The first mate screamed as the lava chains tightened until there was no more flesh, cloth, or bone to burn. With this, the first mate would no longer be a threat.

"Well, that's his problem. His cultivation was too weak—equivalent to the peak Spirit Forming Stage. You are about the equivalent of a middle Element Adept practitioner, but a warrior from the southern continent. I can sense the mana inside you. You'll suffice as a test subject," Lance smiled as the lava chains disappeared.

The pirate captain roared and brandished a sinister, barbed axe as he ran toward Lance. Lance had his arms outstretched, not caring for the pirate as orbs of water appeared and floated above his palms. The water surged as the crimson neidan converted his spirit energy into mana, directing the mana into the floating water orbs. Sweat poured down Lance's brow as the water began to leave the orbs, condensing five feet before him as the captain ran around the steering wheel and descended the eight stairs to the deck.

The water began to release a cold aura, frosting over and turning to mist. As the pirate arrived just a few feet before the condensing water, the orbs were completely drained and began taking a corporeal form of Lance's serpentine dragon body.

"Necromancers of the Darkness deal with the dead. Necromancers of the Water deal with the living. Feel despair and tremble," Lance laughed as he moved his arms toward the captain. The serpentine dragon roared, stunning all the pirates and sailors as they turned their heads to the source of the roar. The pirate captain's eyes trembled as he had never seen such a thing before.

"W, w, what kind of dragon is that? That's not shaped like a lizard," the pirate captain stuttered.

Lance said nothing as the dragon coiled up into the air, a frosty mist radiating from its body before it coiled down at the captain, its mouth opening as it reached him. The pirate's body jerked violently, stunning everyone on the decks of both ships into silence as the ghost dragon disappeared into the captain's body.

"AUGH!" an ear-piercing scream echoed from inside their minds, many ears popping and people on both ships fainting as the ghost dragon emerged from the body with the ghost of the captain in its jaws. The body of the pirate captain fell to its knees, living but without a soul. Lance then motioned his hands, one forming a fist as the other grabbed it.

"Oh gods," a sailor gasped.

"What are we seeing?" a pirate rasped.

"C-captain," Johnson said, his vision blurred from blood loss but still strong enough to sense the mana of his long-time friend and captain. It was supposed to be a simple raid after their last successful venture had made them enter the big times. They never expected this. Not this.