"Did you come to kill me?"
I could not answer the woman's incomprehensible question. Even a single word clung to my parched throat and would not come free. Every forced breath was painful. I gathered saliva with difficulty, swallowed, and spoke.
"Water. If you share some water with me, I will repay you."
Water. What I desperately needed now was water to quench this burning thirst. There was clearly a canteen hanging at the woman's waist.
"Water? Is it that kind of curse?"
A curse? The woman continued to say nothing but things I could not understand. Studying me with suspicious eyes, she nudged her red harpoon forward as though checking something and lightly pricked my neck.
Prick.
The faint pain instantly brought back the memory of my neck being cut. The moment I unknowingly recoiled—
[I shall defend you.]
Salkenia, who had been silently watching the situation, responded immediately. Before I could stop her, the skeleton sailors came up onto the deck.
Clatter, clatter, clatter, clatter.
It was a grotesque sight, as though the dead buried beneath the earth had crawled out all at once. The woman sprang back like a startled cat, putting distance between us, and turned her harpoon toward the skeleton sailors.
Clack-clack!
Perero was the first to move. With a spirit more valiant than any of the skeleton sailors, Perero charged at the woman from the front. He was the only skeleton sailor with a sense of self. For a moment, I thought he might be stronger than the other skeleton sailors.
Crack!
Stepping forward with one foot, the woman lightly swung her harpoon, striking Perero in the temple. Separated from his body, Perero's skull rolled, rolled, rolled across the deck. His headless body staggered and waved its arms as though confused.
"Stop…… Urk!"
I tried to tell them to stop, but only a metallic rasp mixed with breath came from my parched throat. Perhaps because I had forced out my voice, a sharp pain followed from inside my throat.
Clatter!
The skeleton sailors began to rush the woman, clicking their teeth threateningly. There were some fifteen of them. No matter how nimble the woman was, she could not possibly deal with that many.
Groan!
But that worry was unnecessary. When the woman swept her harpoon sideways as though flinging it, the skeleton sailors standing to her right were helplessly pushed back.
Clack!
Because she had swung the harpoon to the right, her left side was comparatively open. One skeleton sailor slipped into that gap, but the woman did not allow it.
Whoosh!
She let go with her left hand, spun the harpoon half a turn with her right, and gripped it upside down. Then she drove it straight into the skeleton sailor's forehead.
Crunch!
But the skeleton sailor with its skull pierced did not stop. Instead, it pushed its head farther along the harpoon, trying to grab the shaft. Apparently, losing or piercing a head was not enough to kill it. No—it was already dead, so I wondered whether the word kill was even right.
Crack!
The woman seemed briefly taken aback, but she soon recovered her calm. She brought the harpoon down as though striking, forcing the skeleton sailor onto the deck, then pushed its face with her foot and pulled the harpoon free. The skeleton sailor with a hole in its forehead flailed on the deck for a moment, then staggered to its feet and rushed at the woman again.
"Whew!"
It was a wave made of bones. The woman's defense was like a cliff face, but waves that crashed without end would eventually wear it down. It seemed that Salkenia was about to join the fight, for she slowly raised her gloved hand. I forced out my voice.
"Stop."
Salkenia halted with her hand raised to her chest. So did the skeleton sailors rushing at the woman. Perero stopped in the awkward posture of trying to pick up his own skull and put it back onto his neck bones. At the sight, like time had suddenly stopped, the woman glanced at me.
"Some water. Please."
I spoke with all the desperation I could muster. Watching the motionless skeleton sailors, the woman slowly approached me. At last, she handed me the canteen from her waist.
‘Finally!’
Was this how a believer felt upon receiving a holy grail? I forced apart my parched lips and tipped up the canteen. Water ran over my tongue and fell down my dry throat, wetting it.
‘Water!’
The sense of fulfillment was beyond words. A shiver as though life were filling me again when I had been dried out and near death.
Gulp, gulp.
After drinking enough to wet my throat, I righted the canteen. Even when I breathed, my throat no longer hurt. I wanted to drink it all, but I stopped at about half, thinking that might put the woman in a difficult position. While I drank, the woman had watched only the skeleton sailors. She asked in a low voice,
"You. What did you do?"
"What do you mean?"
"When you told them to stop, they stopped. Is that the effect of your Relic?"
"I do not understand what you are talking about. You suddenly talked about sea monsters, curses, and Relics. I merely wanted someone to share water with me because I had not drunk any for several days."
The woman looked plainly dumbfounded.
"You do not even know what a Relic is? Yet you have one?"
But I was just as dumbfounded.
"I do not. And I think there is a misunderstanding. They are my sailors."
"Then you are the leader of those skull-heads?"
"Strictly speaking, I am their captain."
"Then why did they attack me?"
"It seems my ship responded because you pricked my neck."
Salkenia brought her raised hand back together neatly and spoke.
[I judged that it was difficult for the captain to give an order directly and chose the most appropriate response. There was no intention to act against the captain's will.]
Had it been the most appropriate response? I was too dehydrated to manage even a word, and the woman had pricked my neck with a harpoon. Even if she had not meant to kill me, it might have been an appropriate response in that situation. But—
‘Just as I am not, this person is not a robber.’
That prick had not been an attack. If the woman had meant to attack, my neck would have been pierced just like the skeleton sailor's forehead. The woman explained.
"I was checking because you might have been an illusion shown to me by the Unknown."
"It seems my ship took it as an attack. To be honest, so did I for a moment."
"I am sorry about that. But there is something I want to make clear."
"What is it?"
"Are you saying this ship is your Relic?"
"……No. I mean, what is a Relic?"
***
"I'm Howell Crave. The captain of this ship."
"Kalena. Sea monster hunter."
Kalena and I exchanged brief introductions. She was alone at sea in a small boat and carried a harpoon, so I had guessed she was a sea monster hunter even without her saying so.
"Relics are cursed objects. It is a well-known story among sailors. Have you really never heard of them?"
"I'm not a sailor."
"You said you were a captain."
"It's been three days."
"That's why you don't know anything."
Kalena showed me her red harpoon. Its unusual structure had three spearheads that curved outward, then bent back inward from the middle to meet completely at the tip. It looked almost like a flower bud.
"Things like this are called Relics. Your ship is probably a Relic, too."
"How can you be certain my ship is a Relic?"
"The Brand."
Kalena turned over her wrist. A blue circle rippled like fire beneath her pale wrist. It was identical to the one that had appeared on my wrist.
"Every Relic owner bears a Brand. There are no exceptions."
The unknown mark that had appeared after I became Salkenia's captain. I looked down at my Brand. Brand and curse were not words with pleasant connotations.
‘It looks like this is the first time Salkenia has heard of it, too.’
Though Salkenia said nothing, she seemed interested in her own nature and stood a little closer.
"Is it different from an Artifact?"
"The magical tools made in the age of swords and magic? Relics are far more powerful than those. They are also dangerous and rare."
Kalena lowered her harpoon and continued explaining.
"Howell, your ability to command skeletons is probably your Relic's power."
"Then what is the curse?"
"This."
Kalena lightly tapped the flower blooming from her left eye.
"It is easier to think of it as the price that comes with power."
"Then will flowers bloom on my body, too? I do not think that would suit me."
"No. A Relic's curse differs from one Relic to another. My curse is these flowers."
A curse that made flowers bloom from one's body. It was unusual, but it did not seem especially threatening.
"These flowers slowly absorb my blood. If they drink too much, too quickly, I will probably die."
I take that back. It seemed threatening.
"Can you not pull them out?"
"I would die from excessive bleeding. They are already like parts of my body."
"I see. Then what is my curse?"
"I don't know that, either. You haven't had your Relic for long, so it may not have manifested yet."
I examined my body from head to toe, but apart from being a little thinner after going three days without food, I could find nothing unusual. Kalena shrugged.
"You'll find out someday. It'll show itself naturally as you use your Relic. But more than that, it's unfortunate."
"What are you sorry about?"
"About you coming to own a Relic. You are fated to be slowly consumed by its curse and die."
"It does not matter. Humans all die slowly anyway."
Kalena looked at me as though I were absurd.
"Are you serious?"
"I am."
If not for Salkenia, I had been fated to die with my neck cut open.
"Because I chose it. The responsibility is mine, too."
It was I, and no one else, who had agreed to become Salkenia's captain. Therefore, if I had received a curse, it was right for me to accept that curse as well. Kalena looked at me strangely.
"If that is how you think, you will keep your promise to repay me when you see how responsible you are, right?"
"Of course."
"Then I will take my repayment in your blood."
No sooner had Kalena finished speaking than the skeleton sailors clattered. I, too, reflexively put a hand on my pistol. But Kalena did not seem to intend to rush at me.
"Do not misunderstand. Why do you think I explained Relics to you in such detail?"
"……The curse?"
"Right. You are smart."
It was something I could have guessed with a little thought. Kalena had said that her curse absorbed blood, after all.
"A Relic's curse can be delayed. It cannot be cured completely, like an incurable disease, but its symptoms can be eased. In the case of my Relic, feeding it blood is how I ease it."
"How much do you need?"
"I haven't fed it the blood of a Relic owner, so I don't know. But I'm not asking for much."
"Then I will give it to you."
Kalena's eyebrows rose slightly.
"This willingly?"
"I said I would repay you."
"I'm grateful. I won't even need to use force. Just until this flower turns red."
"All right."
"Let it run over the harpoon's blades."
Kalena held out her harpoon, and without hesitation, I gripped the blades in my hand. Pain flared as my palm was cut, and hot blood gathered beneath my fist. But the blood did not run down. It soaked into the harpoon's blades. In turn, the flower blooming from Kalena's eye gradually began to redden.
"That was quick. Even a whole bucket of animal blood was not enough."
"Were you planning to feed it a whole bucket of my blood?"
"Of course not. I'd have stopped if it seemed excessive."
Its color gradually deepened, and soon the flower became completely red. When I opened my hand, Kalena held out a clean cloth.
"Use that to stop the bleeding."
I wrapped the cloth around my palm. I seemed to have lost quite a lot of blood, and my hand did not have much strength, but strangely, the wound was not severe.
‘What kind of metal is it?’
Unlike when I first grasped it, the harpoon's blades were red like the flower rather than white. The desire to own it welled up inside me, but I gave up on the thought when I realized it belonged to someone else.
"Ah. You should be careful when you see other Relic owners."
"What do you mean?"
"……It is only a warning. You look like you might die from being too naive."
Come to think of it, the innkeeper I had met in Semeln had said something similar. It was not as though I were some frail sunfish. Why was everyone so determined to see me dead? I had actually died once, though.
"You said you were a sea monster hunter, right? Were you sailing alone?"
I went to the edge of the deck and looked down at Kalena's boat. It was too small even to call a small vessel. The ship broker had said people who traveled in ships like that would die.
‘Huh?’
Then I saw something strange. The moment I recognized what it was, goosebumps rose all over my body. A bloated person, as though the sea had spat them out, floated beside Kalena's boat with only their face above the water.