Chapter 409: Nimona’s Maiden Voyage begins
=What’s up?=
=First, that feels like a reference to something. Second, I need to check the message logs.=
=After all of the weird conversations we have? Figured I should start keeping records in case something like this happens.=
=We forget to tell our lord some crucial detail even though we swear we did.=
=And the verdict is…we did tell him! He was just so stunned by the sudden appearance of the steamship that he blanked out while we were explaining before saying, and I quote here, “gods fucking dammit, at least it isn’t as anachronistic as the arcade cabinets in the library”…I think he’s still a little cross about that.=
=I think it’s more so the attempt to plant one in his clan’s training arena.=
[Wait, you’re the reason why the kids were asking about a shiny magic blinky box?!]
[I knew it! I am heading over there right now to enact the punishment our lord is too lenient to give!]
[Right behind you!]
=You somehow managed to get Arachnidame and Lacerage to agree on something, without involving our lord. This will not end well.=
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[What was that?,] Razorstella asked, hearing the tail end conversation of an angry spider and lacewing woman about to strangle an amorphous spirit clown.
[I don’t know, but I’m going to the control room to see how the captain and his crew are handling all of the changes,] Nepherage informed the others, [what about y’all?]
[I’m heading to the boiler room,] Frosttusk rumbled, [I find the heat of the steam pleasant and would like to be more…highspeed for this trip.]
[Noted.]
[Imma check out the galley,] Hurricroak hummed, [Logos helped prepared the kitchen to make all sorts of dishes and I am curious how creative the chef is gonna be with all the tools and gizmos…well, how creative he is about to become.]
[Really?]
[Well that and I’m curious to see if anyone has the balls to mess with the jukebox I installed.]
[Ah.]
[As for me,] Razorstella interjected, [I’m going to check the navigator’s room. There’s no dance studio on-board, despite my insistence, so I might as well see how accurate/pretty the star charts are.]
[Understandable. We meet back in the lord’s room after sunset, agreed?]
[Agreed.]
With their plan set, the kaijin split off into several directions, ready for observation.
When Zhen Liu and the kaijin went about repairing and overhauling this ship, they had done so with some mild reckless abandon and left behind some goodies for the afflicted. As such, the kaijin were rather curious to how the recipients would react.
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BWOOM! BWOOM! BWOOM!
“PS Nimona is now shipping off!”
The steamship let out a powerful bellow as the helmsman pulled a rope that served as the same purpose as a ship’s bell, albeit, it was a less of a bell and more like a deep brassy horn!
“Oh I could get to used to this!,” the helmsman said with glee as he prepared himself to steer the ship out of the harbor.
‘You and me both,’ Captain Douglas mused as it was sinking into him that this absurd vessel was truly his. Keeping his eyes pointed towards the horizon, Captain Douglas prepared to instruct his cabin boy/the only man on the vessel with any technical know-how in regards to how the ship works.
“Mister Simon?”
“Yes, captain?”
“Contact the navigator and get us a heading to Roaring Tide. I believe we’re supposed to be heading back to Black Pearl Harbor. Afterwards, contact the engine room and tell the boys to set power to thirty percent. ”
“Aye-aye Captain!”
Simon made his way over to another console in the room, one with all manner of copper pipes and funnels that appeared to be connected to even more pipes that snaked all over the ship.
Each of the pipe has a little plaque underneath them, listing off the name of rooms all over the ship.
‘I really must thank whatever entity gave me the ability to read,’ Simon noted to himself as he stared at each of the plaques before finally settling on the one labelled “Navigator’s Quarters”.
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[Surprisingly good coordination, I guess that’s the perk of being part of a crew for a number of years…the captain’s still tense though, but I guess that’s a consequence of commanding an (un)familiar ship.]
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PS Nimona: Navigator’s Room
“Holy shit..,” Beauregard repeated for what he thought to be the thousandth time today as he sat at his brand new desk and looked over all of his brand new maps and navigation equipment.
“I still can’t believe this is all…real.”
Beauregard Novas was the navigator for Captain Douglas’s crew and had been for over five years. During those years, Beauregard had acquired all manner of maps and tools of the trade through painstaking manners.
Maps weren’t cheap, compasses and sextants even more so.
So when he heard the news that the Nimona had suddenly undergone renovations without their knowledge, he understandably freaked out alongside several other crew members.
“Are you fucking kidding me?! My charts!”
The worst case scenario for such an event was that while all of his equipment remained, all of the charts and maps would be thrown out or replaced. Thankfully, that didn’t happen.
Instead, when the crew returned to the Nimona, the navigator found that not only had his room had been refurbished with brand new maps and equipment, but all of his old stuff was still there as well. It made for a pleasant, albeit, heart shaking surprise.
“Star charts from Umbral Spider. Tide patterns from the Northwind traders. Even wind paths from the Feathered Khan tribes! There is so much here! Now, which one should I-”
“Mr.Novas!”
“Ah!”
As Beauregard was about to look over his brand new maps, the unexpected sound of the cabin boy’s voice coming from our of nowhere, interrupted him.
“Where is that coming from? Ah.”
It took him a moment to realize that it wasn’t coming from nowhere, but rather, the strange metal funnel that was sticking out of a pillar next to his desk.
While he didn’t understand how it worked exactly, he could at least understand that it was probably the reason why Simon could talk with him while they were several rooms apart from each other.
“Mr.Novas?”
“Uhh…”
Unsure of what to do exactly though, he decided to just walk up and speak through it.
“Mr.Novas speaking.”
“Oh good, it is working,” Simon said with a relieved tone, “orders from the captain, Mister Novas. We need a heading for our return trip to Roaring Tide.”
“Aye, aye. Let me just find the right…huh?”
Before Beauregard could look through all of his charts to find the right one, he turned from the speaking funnel to find that a map had already been unfurled onto his desk. When he inspected the contents, he was happy to find that it was one showing the route from Pearl Tusk Harbor to Black Pearl Harbor. Perhaps he was a little worried it appeared out of nowhere, but this entire ship was acting weird, so he might as well roll with it.
“Let’s see here…,” Beauregard hummed as he pulled out a compass and got to work.
After a few quick calculations, he gave the cabin boy the heading they needed.
“Ten degrees north portside. Once we reach open water, I can figure out the weather patterns from there.”
“Aye aye”
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[Maybe I didn’t have to help, but the sooner we get going the better. I wanna see how the stars look in Roaring Tide.]
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PS Nimona: Engine Room
“Do you guys understand how any of this stuff works?”
“Kinda.”
“Not really.”
“I do, but that’s because I found the manual.”
“There’s a manual?!”
One of the biggest changes done to the Nimona was the creation of what Simon referred to as the “engine room”. This was apparently the room in which the giant metal pipe and the paddles were connected to.
Supposedly, by using both Ignati and Aquarium aether together, or steam attributed aether in general, one could power the strange engine thing that was powering the whole thing.
Evidently, this was the reason why John, Jacob, Joseph and Jill were all sent down here, out of everyone in the crew, they were the only ones with either Ignati or Aquarii aether.
“Well, at least we got a window so we can see outside,” Joe commented as he looked out of a small circular glass port that allowed them to see outside of the engine room, “damn thing is even enhanced with an array, no way in hell anything is breaking this.”
“Oi! Stop poking around the room and look over the manual with us,” Jill called out, “captain wants us to get this going at thirty percent power, whatever that means.”
“I think it’s that dial over there,” Jacob pointed out.
“Ah.”
“Alright, from the looks of it,” John began to read, “we either need someone with equal parts Ignati and Aquarii affinity to stand in the big center chamber and release as much of their aether as possible, minimum strength being that of an Acolyte…”
“Which we don’t have,” Joe pointed out.
“Or have two Aquarri and two Ignati warriors stand on opposites side of the two metal funnels and release their power into the assembled arrays!”
“Which we do.”
Joe, Jacob, John and Jill proceeded to divide themselves into two groups on opposite ends of the engine device and prepared their aether. Before cutting loose however, Jill made an important observation.
“Wait, was the dial supposed to be set to thirty percent, before or after we power this thing up?”
“Uhh…”
The group paused for a moment as John looked over the manual.
“Before. Joe?”
“Got it.”
“Good catch.”
“Thanks.”
Once the four of them figured out where everything was supposed to go, they proceeded to power up the whole apparatus.
“Altogether now. Three, two, HA!”
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[Good to see that the instructions manual was clear enough. Was worried that Simon kid was going to be out in charge of everything.]
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As the paddle steamer began to exit the harbor, the guests aboard began to look about.
“Huh… y’all find it weird that we call ourselves Roaring Tiders but this is the first time we’ve been on a boat?”
“I think the term is ship.”
