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933050 No. 933050 ID: b5b4b5

Know, our child, that among the long and trackless eras when silence ruled the stars, and the hopes of our ancestors were spent on dried and hollow bones, there rose and crashed a cresting wave that glittered with steel and fire; an Age when sparking coals of written word and carven stone were spilled and burned away across the world, when the serpent-spiders in their secret kingdoms wove tapestries of death and cunning from sea to sea, and queens of queens tied tribes one to another, to strive with them and with each other, writing histories of dreams and nightmare onto pages doomed to crumble.

Hither came Zorya, red of fur and marked in white, heavy-formed, brazen-eyed, blade in hand, an amazon, a champion, an unrejected rogue, with affections fierce and rage the same, to rip reality from legend and become, and be, a Queen of Blood.
Expand all images
>>
No. 933051 ID: b5b4b5
File 155805287576.png - (97.50KB , 400x800 , 02.png )
933051

Here we are again.

More than sixty years it’s been, now, since one of my hivemates showed us her AU Conan fanfiction and lit the fuse to one of our species’ first cultural explosions - Zorya, Queen of Blood. Traditionally I’d discuss what it was about her adventures, and about the time those first stories were published, that aligned so perfectly. At this point, though, you’ve either heard it already or don’t care. Yet. So, that is to say, it’s getting harder to come up with anything new to celebrate these anniversaries.

We resort to technology, then! Why not? What you’re about to read is what you might call a digital remastering of Oceans Uprising, originally released in 91 a.w. as an actual for-real paperback choose-your-adventure book. You won’t need a pencil and eraser to slowly destroy the inventory page with, and you won’t need to turn to page 103 from page 7 while sneakily keeping your finger in place so you can turn back if you didn’t like what happens. Whatever device you’re reading this on will substitute for paper pages. More than that, we’ve made the experience far more flexible! With recent advances in creative writing AI, plus several long weeks of training and input by the original authors and other members of our hive, you can forsake the options we’ve given you and try to add your own takes on where the story should go. I can’t honestly say I hope the AI will be as skilled as we are, but I do think you’ll enjoy it. Keep in mind, though, that this still isn’t really a video game. Zorya is your protagonist, and she has a will of her own. If you’re a fan of hers already, you’ll be able to guess the sorts of things she will and won’t consider doing.

If you’re not a fan of hers already… I have to assume that, somehow, this is one of your first exposures to Zorya and the age she lives in! First of all, welcome, and I hope you come away with a good impression. Second, you might need to know a few things. To suit the setting, some more modern language that you might be accustomed to isn’t used, and there might be some you’re not familiar with that is. Check the glossary box under my picture for the most important examples*. More immediately, though, I should tell you the kind of story you’re in for. Zorya’s world, a fictional time-lost era in our homeworld’s distant past, is one of vertiginous highs and gruesome lows. Violence, sex, combinations thereof and other deeds ranging from uncouth to horrible, while not the focus of the tale, may all be described or alluded to depending on the path you choose.

I can’t tell you there isn’t some aspect of shock or crude appeal intended in that; we were writing to earn our food and necessities, back then, just as the long-ago pulp adventure authors of old Earth that inspired us. We hope, though, that these grittier elements also make you feel strongly for the characters and the world they live in. That, however, like the path the story in front of you will take, is up to you.

* And here’s another little note: ‘kette’ is pronounced ‘keh-te’. You’ll see!

>>
No. 933052 ID: b5b4b5
File 155805291388.png - (239.28KB , 800x800 , 03.png )
933052

ZORYA, QUEEN OF BLOOD
OCEANS UPRISING


Sea and mist and frigid sweat together slicked Korovo’s viridian hide. Taking shelter inside the ship could solve all but the last of those, but he was was wealthy, and far from home. All that kept the vessel’s crew from doing as they wished with him and his possessions were two paid guards, broad and strong but chosen most for their lack of inquisition, and the threat of finely-edged displeasure from the great Queens whose ports they visited. He had felt the thought of it, flickering between them, and had no desire to be surrounded. But that was not the worry that tightened his breath. He pulled his cloak to better fit his smallish frame.

“It’s the pirates,” sniffed a woman of the ship, testing their nets in weathered hands for the struggling sensation of a fresher meal. “I’d need an arm and leg ripped off to make me dull enough to want to sail the Turtle’s Teeth.”

Even through the mist, sharp-risen hulks of stone loomed now and then on the borders of their visibility, capped and hung with improbable masses of vegetation. Once, the waters here had wormed through gaping tunnels, pulled wider by the hungry sea until the land collapsed, and left those caverns’ walls to endure the wind and waves until now only these strange towers remained. Products of their age, however, the zisura knew nothing of the histories of stone that shaped their world. Their concerns were more immediate.

“They station lookouts on the islands, watching for ships to plunder, and raise the alarm by horn-call passed from listener to listener until it reaches their hunters, so I hear. He’s heard the same.”
“That’s why you sail it when the mist is down,” growled another, “And why we stay quiet while we’re at it.”
“Going over land’s as dangerous, they say, and slow,” went the whisper of a younger crewmate, eager to show his knowledge, his inner fire trembling with a proud but fearful thrill that made his elders smile. “And deepwater needs a hold too full of food to carry anything worth the time. It’s brave of us to try the passage, and everybody knows it!” His own smile broadened in anticipation of shaming their rivals. Then he sighed. “Though better if we didn’t bring the likes of him.”

Korovo had earned his riches with a cunning seldom seen beyond a salikai’s pit. With mechanisms made of wood and rope and metal springs, cleverly disguised, he could capture all manner of creatures that skilled hunters might not even catch the sight of, selling them for meat or hide or taming. But many said he sold as freely even if the creatures in his cages thought and spoke. He lacked a soul well-made to tough out suffering himself or see it, but all zisura had their needs, and he had become an adept at avoiding thoughts that caused him trouble. As he did now.

Sparing him the effort, the attentions of all aboard were diverted as a new companion dawned to their awareness. Like the rocks that coalesced out of the mist around the ship as it sailed on, the spirit of a new zisura drifted into being, and not one that they had felt upon the shore. Barely had they grasped the thought of someone waking out of sleep before that presence suddenly burst into full consciousness, reckless and aware and gorged with terrible, enraged intent.
>>
No. 933054 ID: b5b4b5
File 155805301878.png - (312.97KB , 800x800 , 04.png )
933054

A tumbling of wood and unknown objects spoke of violent, heavy motion down below, bursting free and battering its way towards the foremost exit from the hold. A stowaway! flashed thought across the crew, but the sparks of stern anger that it would normally have brought recoiled in the face of this zisura’s blinding fury.

The cover of the hatch was thrown off with a crack against the deck, and there, glowering against the clouded sun, Zorya had emerged. Though most had only heard of her, none aboard the vessel could mistake the marks of ashen white across the textured ruby fur, dark against the grey-lit planks behind. Twisting herself sharply - for the trap door, made for passing bales and baskets, was still small enough around her massive frame to make her movements rough - the giant threw her sight across the vessel in the space of a single breath. As it fell upon Korovo, he recoiled, for with the locking of those dark-lined ochre eyes he felt, as well, the focus of a monstrous, blackened, burning hate fall on him.

“What-!?” he started, bludgeoning his back against the railing of the ship, but Zorya roared across him.
“Korovo! You motherless worm!” The question that danced across the minds of all aboard did not need asking.“Do you remember a man with fur like moonlit sand, who fell into a cage of yours a season and a year ago!? Aye, you do - you sold him to the clan who hunted on the Kartoks’ Lake, and while I regrew my legs in a cave four hundred miles away, they used him for their cruelty until he died!!”
“The Kartoks tribe-“
Are dead!” Zorya barked across the merchants’ plea. “I slew them, every one, and scattered their children to their enemies. That man was mine - and you’re the last who needs to pay for what was done to him!!”

Silently Korovo called for aid against his huntress, seeing that her words were only working up her fury even higher. But the ship’s crew met each others’ glances with a thought that this was not a conflict they should step in. He turned his mind towards his hired guards - get her! The two large women reeled at being set against the fighter called the Queen of Blood, but there was a moment’s hope. Seeing the subject of her vengeance had diverted the attention of the amazonian zisura, and as she’d spit her vitriol at him with the madness of a long obsession almost closed, she hadn’t fully pulled herself up and out onto the deck. The two of them could take her while the hatch frame caught about her muscled sides. Drawing axes, they rushed in. Obligation and renown allured them.

Zorya…
a) dipped back inside the cargo hold, where the space would confine more for her than them, but they would still be forced to face her one by one.
b) grabbed and heaved the cover of the hatch, which could serve as a shield and to shove the smaller women back.
c) threw her weapon, sure that if she hit one of the attackers hard enough, she would gain a moment to take the other on her own.
d) decided to simply take their attacks, trusting to her skill to minimise the damage and her toughness to ignore it while she employed the opening to strike.
e) _________________

Some while ago, Zorya’s trusted tribal scimitar had been stolen from her. What weapon had she taken aboard in hiding with her instead?
>>
No. 933056 ID: 3458dd

>>933054
Could Zorya have brought mighty bolas with her, intending to incapacitate the closest zisura by throwing it at their feet? The other threat could be handled with Zorya's vile empathy, focusing on the horrible things that will be done to them to give a moments pause. If that doesn't pan out then simply taking the blow and preparing to strike works as well.
>>
No. 933058 ID: 86eb65

E:

Zorya having been strengthened by her fury bends over backwards and clamps her powerful arms around the ships mast. With a mighty tug she rips it from the deck and smashes her foes!
>>
No. 933060 ID: 465a14

A CYOA book with write-in options? Fancy.

A. Bottlenecks are crucial.
>>
No. 933063 ID: 0fae41

A pair of daggers, fearsome fangs ripped from the mouth of a foe with her bare hands! (And then cleaned/polished/handled with the appropriate toolset.)
B. Don't let that merchant out of sight, the fool's liable to dive off the deck if he thinks it will extend his life even a second.
>>
No. 933066 ID: 094652

E) Zorya used violence and terror on the high seas, as is custom.
Zorya weathered the woman's devastating blow so she could grab her by the face, performing a forbidden and sacrilegious technique: the Soul Burial, said to force the souls of the innocent or righteous into the raping pits of fiends where they would be denied their just reward and their virtue made rotten for it.
In truth she simply used a move that can be found in Yakuza Kiwami but was discovered on this planet by superstitious shamans and taught as a curse rather than a showstopper.
But the terror in the crew's eyes was clear: some considered jumping into the maws of the sea monsters just to get away from this literally damning she-beast.
>>
No. 933080 ID: 977456

E3: Grasped both axes as they fell, and smashed them into the deck, warping the confining hatch.

A pair of studded leather straps wrapped around her... uhh... fists?

Is there a disthread link? Something around here smells of meta.
>>
No. 933082 ID: 58b4f3

>>933054
>Zorya…
e) was completely stuck in the trap door! Unable to either pull herself up onto the deck or pull herself back below deck. But she wouldn't let that stop her! She would still fend off her approaching enemies!
>>
No. 933086 ID: acdd32

>>933080
This,
due to

>>933082
This

never seen conan, but i did listen to all of the grognak the barbarian ads on the Atomic Radio mod for Fo4, so i think i have a decent idea of the type: confident, dull-minded, but so strong in body and will as to make up for both of these to a hilarious degree
>>
No. 933088 ID: 91ee5f

>>933082
I’ll vote for this, since the idea of Zorya being unable to move, but still able to kick ass, is hilarious.
>>
No. 933089 ID: b1b4f3

>>933054
B!
>>
No. 933092 ID: 055cbc

Grognak is parody. Original source Conan is uneducated and uncultured, but cunning like a predator and apparently, a wise and just king eventually. Also: deeply distrustful of magic and dogged about vengeance. He's not really a GOOD guy, but he does fight the WORSE guys. Think Riddick in a fantasy setting, if that helps.
>>
No. 933112 ID: 419ea7

>>933054
B, with any luck this will not only buy precious moments to emerge from the hatch, but actually damage the opening and make it easier in the process
>>
No. 933122 ID: a53ea7

One more vote for B.
>>
No. 933124 ID: fd2d31

>>933092
>Riddick in a fantasy setting
In this particular case it'd be a unfathomably pissed off one, which just makes it more hilarious

Which means I'll also vote for >>933082 if that's how it's gonna be played.
>>
No. 933125 ID: a9af05

>>933082
I'll vote for this. It should be amusing to see this happen.
>>
No. 933178 ID: e95cec

B
>>
No. 933206 ID: bcc41d

>>933080
>>933082
This combination seems both amusing and appropriately badass. Imagine the look on those guards' faces as they realize 'Hah, she's stuck, we can kill her!' and then 'Oh, we just helped free her.'
>>
No. 940871 ID: 0420dd
File 156445509746.png - (280.17KB , 1000x800 , 05.png )
940871

As they rushed Zorya, Korovo’s hired women folded their thoughts tightly into pace with one another. One pulled ahead, intent plain: she would lock herself with the massive warrior, and the other swing around to take the deadly advantage. Their hearts surged - the barbarian was so choked with hatred that even as they barrelled towards her she glared past them, to the merchant, drawn and blinded by the gravity of her pitch-black grudge. She paid them no greater heed than vines across her path. For a moment. They stumbled suddenly, a fraction, when her attention splintered and snapped toward them, piercing with an obsidian shard of her bare-edged killing spirit. Vines with thorns. Annoying!

As if on its own brisk whim, one brawny carmine arm swept back behind. So quick and thoughtless an act this seemed that her opponents near dismissed it, realisation catching up a heartbeat’s length of lateness - enough to let it sweep around again with the ship’s hatch cover gripped in hand. Built to sit against the wind and storms, the banded blocks of heavy wood swung round and rammed into the ribs of Zorya’s closest foe, with a weight that the crewmates of the ship would strain to merely lift onto its edge. With the colossal warrior’s extra punch behind it, the burly guard fell sprawling to her right; Zorya tilted her snout a little to miss the sweep of her errant axe. With its momentum thus unloaded, she flipped the hatch up towards the other woman charging close behind the first, blocking and blinding her for the few brief blinks of her companion’s fall to the weathered deck. The zisura on the floor instantly flattened her hands to the boards to shove herself away and to her feet - “Aagh!!” Before she knew it, one broad palm was pinned, pierced through into the wood by a huge, serrated, wedge-shaped fang, worked into a weapon that could only be called a dagger in Zorya’s massive hand.

Not lacking her own substantial strength, the woman who remained standing heaved the hatch aside and swung onto Zorya’s left with her blade, aiming to cripple her opponent’s massive shoulder. Miraculously, for her, Zorya had remained stuck - the trap door was too tight, and the movements she had already made had wedged her, unable to even drop back down with any speed. She could not dodge. Instead the giant woman’s unerring skill and speed caught the mercenary’s arm atop her own, stalling the swing with bruising force. Every instinct in the guard immediately screamed at her to pull away from the murderous zisura’s zone of control. She leapt back, again too late - Zorya caught her axe, and in the instant of hesitation to release her weapon, the giant grabbed her arm in the other white-stained hand. To the enthralled crew, there seemed only a blur of limbs, a sickening snap, and then the guard screamed in pain - the amazon, with monstrous strength, had shifted and shoved and bent her opponent’s elbow in the wrong direction. As she bit her cry in half, to save herself at least from some disgrace, Zorya pulled her off her centre and dragged her to the side, releasing her to trip and fall on her companion’s struggling form.

The grey steel gleaming drew the watchers’ eyes to the axe in Zorya’s left hand - in those frenetic moments that they’d lacked the skill to clearly follow, she had taken the guard’s weapon. It flashed as she spun it into better hold, then with an attending growl of effort, slammed into the wooden edge that pinned her outsized hips. Her fallen foes cursed and snarled as she punched her other hand into their backs, crushing the air from their lungs with agonising pressure as she leaned almost all her weight and effort through them onto the deck below. A wrench, a splintering crack, and the framing of the trap door broke its hold. Zorya rolled forward and in one blink was on her feet again, pulling another dagger-fang out of her belt and keeping her eyes on the pair of women that had dared obstruct her. Immediately, in the shadow of her titanic form, the two guards swallowed their wounded pride and made it clear in their minds that they’d fight no more. She barely cared. Even as she’d fought, part of her had followed the sensations of Korovo’s miserable soul.

Which, with her victory, had changed.
>>
No. 940873 ID: 0420dd
File 156445515333.png - (106.40KB , 800x800 , 06.png )
940873

His terror had surged the moment that he saw her, and had only deepened as she’d tossed aside his guards. Through the last few moments, though, a knot of guilt had coiled around his drive and desperation to save his hide, and now she sensed it slip. She felt him move, felt a disbelieving shock strike through the crew around them, then heard: the loud rolling call of a hornblow.

She looked. There, Korovo, perched upon the railing of the higher deck, and in his hand, against his lips, the white ivory curve with its slim metal bands, into which he poured his breath with all the pressure of his fear.

Then he leapt into the sea.

“That back-biting slug!!” one of the quicker wits of the ship snarled, riding on the forward edge of anger, panic and confusion surging suddenly through her fellows. But - Quiet! Listen! The thought cut back across the crew, holding the curses in their throats. For a moment, breaths held, they strained their ears. The creaking of the sail. The splash and gasp of the merchant as he resurfaced off the side. The quiet groaning of Zorya’s fallen foemaids, and of the boards beneath her feet as she moved up to where her prey had leapt. The waves. The wind.

The echo of the horn, wailing in the distant depths of the rolling mist.

A deafening clamour engulfed the ship, and Zorya growled as she pushed aside the cutting, here-there flash and thunder of the sail-tribe’s thoughts, too swift and desperate and dense for even her well-traveled skill to easily decipher, now. “The pirates!! We need to go!” “To where!?” “They sink ships and use their animals to scavenge them! Out the deeps they’ll have nothing to gain!” “We can’t stay on the water! We have to go aground!” “We can’t just sail off course into the Teeth! The rocks!!” She heard leather slap as the painted hides that showed their routes were tossed about. “Here!” “They know every foot of these islands!”

The Queen of Blood still boiled with long-stewed anger, stoked the further by this delay. Her eyes looked only to her enemy, pulling through the water with his cloak and half his gear abandoned, drifting in his wake as he strove for greater speed.

Zorya…
a) jumped overboard to pursue Korovo herself, eager to finish matters with her own hands and as willing to abandon the ship as it would then be likely to abandon her.
b) swiftly retrieved one of the ship-tribe’s spears and threw without delay, aiming to strike an incapacitating blow through the trap-maker’s belly before he got too far.
c) took the time to secure harpoon and rope, intent on striking anywhere that would serve to drag the merchant back to meet her. She would take her time with him!
d) felt the flicker of a thought: that the man she burned to avenge would not want her to be so entirely heedless of danger for his sake, and that she should turn against the threat that now faced everyone aboard the ship. What did she tell the vessel’s crew to do?
e) _________________
>>
No. 940879 ID: 0fae41

C. GET OVER HERE! Throw the anchor at him if you have to!
>>
No. 940883 ID: b1b4f3

>>940873
C, D. Harpoon him so he can't get away, then tell the crew they should go out to the deeps, to force the pirates to board the ship. You will face them in combat.
>>
No. 940887 ID: 094652

B, D) Don't waste time humiliating him. You've stolen his ship, just finish the job so he won't come back. Then rally the surviving crew to get out of these pirate-infested waters alive.
>>
No. 940896 ID: 91ee5f

>>940883
Do this!
>>
No. 940897 ID: 2202fb

>>940883
This.
>>
No. 940908 ID: fd2d31

>>940873
If possible, then C while commanding the ship crew to prepare for pirate attack by taking the ship to a advantageous position, while she reels him up and ties him up like a figurehead.
>>
No. 941153 ID: f87971

>>940883
This seems like our best option, particularly because it should (hopefully) level the playing field.
>>
No. 941204 ID: a9af05

>>940883
This will work.
>>
No. 941207 ID: 58b4f3

>>940883
This with the obligatory Mortal Kombat, "Get over here!"
>>
No. 941281 ID: 864e49

>>940883
From Hell's heart, I stab at thee!
>>
No. 941304 ID: 15a025

Agreeing with the C & D combo. He can suffer a little while we focus on not getting completely swamped by pirates.
>>
No. 941313 ID: 094652

>>941281
For Pete's sake, I spit bad breath at thee!
>>
No. 975248 ID: 831d71
File 159865687593.png - (172.08KB , 1200x800 , 07.png )
975248

In the iron tendons of her fingers, Zorya felt a need to paint the bruises on that prison-peddler’s hide herself. Her claws itched to tear at him, her fangs to kiss inside his neck. But… survival, first. A lesson she’d ignored before and would again, carved deep in living bone though it had been, but the voice that spoke it in her ear this time was one she’d never hear alive again. Those twin pains, remembered grief and hate frustrated, blurred her eyes and scraped her pride. Her tail lashed. She could manage both.

The lighter spears would not be strong enough. At her shout, and moreso at the slap and snarl of her soul’s demand across their senses, the zisura of the crew looked up to see the giant towering above upon the sterncastle. Impatiently she shoved her spirit through the confusion and concern amidst them, and caught their anger into hers. “Harpoon!” she barked, commanding, and in resonance with her intent to capture their betrayer, two among them dashed to serve with glee. “Head out and make them board!” she snapped toward the others, as line was fixed. “Fight, and I’ll fight with you.” With that encouragement, and haft to hand, she twisted back, unable to keep her eyes pulled from her target any longer.

A thin blade of alarm stabbed through Zorya’s anger; he was fast, and further now than she’d thought that he could reach. Before Korovo earned her hate, she had seen him on the land, and known he trod and traded in the hightowns, so she had assumed he’d be a greater lubber than herself. Now she saw instead that he was more adept in water than most among their race. Despite his blinding fear his hands and feet hauled water with a practiced pull and push. He was trained to it. If his panic cleared - no! In the blink that these thoughts struck her, the harpoon was raised. In the time it took to set her feet and draw her arm, thoughts of power and weight flashed through her limbs. Her legs felt the wave-swell and the sway of the ship; her hands the heft and drag of rope and barb; her eyes measured distance, saw wind on the sea. Beneath her own awareness she split smoothly, calculated, rejoined, and knew a single instant intuition. Faster, stronger, more unwavering than it had ever been hurled by smaller sailor’s hands, the heavy wood and metal flew.

She struck. Korovo’s scream was spluttered on the waves as his leg was punctured through, near the knee, bloodying the water. Some few spare feet of the rope loosely piled into the waves around his thrashing form before it caught against its limit - Zorya’s fists. Working fast to haul it back, her grimace at the inaccuracy of her cast turned to a curse as she felt the slaver’s thoughts: where he had drowned himself a while in fear of an anticipated agony, the real and present suffering now pinned him back into the moment, sharpening his wits. He handled pain much better than she would have guessed, as well, for such a coward. She pulled with all her terrible strength, and the merchant yelped again as the hook of the harpoon caught back into his flesh, the barb made to hold against more monstrous and sea-suited creatures than he was. Yet he was, still, a zisura, and with the strength lent by his terror he twisted himself, torso round, leg up behind, pushed past the grinding of the weapon on his bones, and set his teeth upon the sailors’ knots. Fumbling, but not enough, he pulled a knife. ”Another!” the red giant yelled, harpoon unspoken, freeing one arm for the taking and the throw again. The hottest-blooded of the ship-tribe swarmed beside Zorya now, one obeying, two to rope, another diving at the smaller spears. But now Korovo’d felt her mind line up on him before, and even as intention swung to action, he pulled upon the very line they hoped to take him with and used the slack to dive. The twin to the skewer in his thigh plunged barely inches to his side; thinner lances rained beside it, but turned upon the waves.

In a single pounding heartbeat, Zorya and the haulers with her pulled the line sharp tight again - yet but two heartbeats more, its resistance broke. The pathetic part-cut end popped to the surface by itself, and so desperate to vengeance had Zorya heaved against the water’s drag, she flung herself away on the release. She caught herself from falling to the deck with only one flailed hand, clawing on the wooden framework where the sailors worked the tiller; it groaned in pain to match her own as it took her weight and force to let her to throw herself back onto the edge.

Too late. She felt him diving deeper, a stab of pain from him - too little! - as, she knew, he pulled the harpoon through himself. Would that wound slow him? Could she catch him?!

No. She was bulkier than him, denser, heavier with muscle, broader in her curves. The water would impede her. The ship’s crew - they recoiled from her enraged attention - they would not slow the ship, as retrieving one of them would make them do if they made chase themselves. Escape was more to them than vengeance was - as it was to her, though it was agony. They would leave her if she went. She could still feel him down there, still alive, getting further yet still close but he was gone!!

The roar from Zorya’s massive lungs set the sail-tribe covering their ears. They winced, although too frightened to object, at the creak and snap of wood as the maddened giant cracked a portion of the rail beneath her hands and, finding it an outlet for a fraction of her feelings, tore out a length of splintered plank to hurl into the callous sea. Wordless rage passed into curses in a language none of them could understand, though the lashings of the fire in her soul were all too clear in nature and in force.

He had managed to escape her. Was it because that tiny moment of diversion, as she had told the sailors what to do, had snatched a fraction of her focus? Given him another inch of water? Perhaps that was one reason. Another was more certain.

Because he was with the pirates.
>>
No. 975249 ID: 831d71
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975249

The anger, now incapable of much except to blister all her hearts with its denial, had no worth. Not until later. So, then, looking out across the wake of her failure, the amazon sat herself upon the deck, and breath by breath she pushed that anger back; grappled with it, took it to the ground, and then bled its strength into lending labour to the ship. Zorya lacked the degree of skill that the seafaring zisura honed with every day, but she had traveled wide, and paid attention to practical knowledge. Rope she could haul, and sail pull, well enough, and gradually she cleared her head. Korovo’s hired guards, uncertain of their situation, turned their remaining useful hands to task as well, for what good will it could get them. That left the sail-tribe to watch, and fret, and argue over currents and position, and work the oars below when they turned against the wind. The slip of the trader through her hands had cost the giant a few shreds of awe, but much the better that they didn’t think she could save them single-handed. They still feared her, well enough.

She considered what she had to work with. The vessel, though the sailors thought of it as one, had once been two, a greater and a smaller. They had fastened them together by bridging frames of wood, spars creating a squared space they hung with nets. That smaller hull was where they carved and stored the fresh-caught fish - some they brought out now, and for fear of sight or smell of cooking passing across the water, all aboard enjoyed it cold and bloody - and where they carried, underneath, the messier or more pungent cargo, leaving a more pleasant home on board the larger. Nineteen zisura made the fraction of their hive that crewed this ship, and Zorya understood they had three others on the water. With their queen commanding one of those, the sailors here did not have formal ranks among themselves, only intuitive gradations of respect and skill. She singled out a woman called Lerini as the elder others looked to when it came to talk with outsiders. “We charge a different price for passengers,” she had said, after another distant horn had told them that the pirates still had their trail. She did not mention the damage to the ship. Zorya didn’t have a perfect grasp on interpreting the fire from the sailors’ souls, but she could make a guess. “I’ll pay the difference,” she’d responded gruffly, though she considered whether she should be offended. It took fools to only look to save their own hides when there was an ally for a larger threat, and it was poor of them to think she might be foolish in that way.

Again she smithed her feelings into muscle-work, the wrangling of cords and the wrestling of tiller as the craft was forced to twist and turn a close-cut path that tested its agility and the vigor of its crew. Built more as a home than as a cutter, it demanded much for little gains, but after putting a steady push of wash behind them, some sense of safety tempted as the rocky Teeth finally fell back. The waves swelled larger, darkened by the depth, promising free running, and the tension humming through the spirits of the ship almost began to slack. Until the lookout yelled.

There, distant, was the pirate’s ship. In the mist beyond the stern it was only a shadow, yet, but it was broader and bulkier in hull than the traders’ ship, with a mainsail looming high and wide and two smaller stretching winglike out in front. Despite its size, it seemed to glide out from the treacherous passages of the maze that they’d just left with easy expertise. A fancy struck Zorya that, somehow, that ship was mocking how they’d fled. Its coming into view was worse. The prow was carved with the weathered visage of a snarling scaly carnivore, but the message of savage bestiality was clearer in the realities following behind the decoration. An irregular, stitched-up patching of the massive sails that first appeared to be battle damage was revealed as the leathered skins of giant creatures. Half the ribbing of the ship itself, too organically curved and smoothed, was truly built of giant ribs, and other bones, harvested from similarly massive carcasses. Even among the timber, the mismatched colors and weathering of planks suggested that most or all was sourced from wrecks and driftwood. Despite its grisly materials, however, the craftsworkship was fine. The stitches of the sails were even, the wood and bone fit neat and tight, and the riggings that arced across its heights were a complex, ordered web well beyond the workings of the ship Zorya stood upon. As she drew in the focus of her sight, she saw away to its rearward height that there was no tiller she could find. There was only a strange wheel whose attendants, though only small shapes yet and beyond the range of sensing through her soul, Zorya felt were laying eyes upon her. Other strange protrusions of wood and metal dotted the ship where ropes converged, to no immediately sensible purpose, though some resembled massive bows with odd assemblages attached. There was a suggestion, too, of shapes moving on the quarterdeck that were larger and of different form than most zisura.

Whatever the means, one advantage that it had came clear: it was faster. The winds were not strong, and their enemy could catch far more of what there was than them. Some among the merchant crew who still favoured an attempt to flee began to shout for dumping cargo and cutting the second hull. But to the older sailors, keener to the measuring of weight and wind and pull, it was obvious that it would do nothing other than extending the inevitable. Zorya felt attention turn to her again, seeking the reassurance of her massive size and reputation.

It could only come to boarding, just as she’d thought. In her mind, the best tactic was to…
a) Take up spears and bows - if there were any - climb the masts, and shower pain onto the pirates as they came, to test their courage and slow their striking arms as much as possible before meeting them in closer combat.
b) Bring up cargo on the deck and build makeshift walls and barricades, to bleed the boarders with a miniature siege.
c) Turn around and counter-charge just before the pirates reached the range of sensing their intentions, and take the fight to their ship, hoping to gut their leadership.
d) Combine their tactics, splitting the ship’s efforts for a less effective but multi-layered strategy.
e) _________________
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No. 975253 ID: e2f5cc

Let's go with a variant of D, mainly focusing on creating a fortress of shields, spears, and walls with a small detachment to harry foes with bows and from their sides.

When things start to get hairy for either us or them Zorya will charge their ship to take out their leader as either a last-ditch effort or a finishing blow, letting those who follow her follow but otherwise doing so alone.
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No. 975275 ID: f57349

C. Sounds like the pirates have better tech, including ranged weapons and maybe even steam power, so our best bet to get close and threaten to break those fancy toys.
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No. 975277 ID: e77a36

If their ship is bigger than ours, barricades will do nothing: they'll simply leap and swing from their ship above them.

I say C: Take the fight to them.
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No. 975278 ID: 4c882c

>>975249
The pirates can't rape, murder and pillage you, if you rape, murder and pillage them first.
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No. 975279 ID: 15e14d

>>975249
C
The very trade of these pirates is to chase down those who try to flee, also if the devices on their ships put Zorya in mind of giant bows then those instincts should be trusted: they would likely have the upper hand in a ranged confrontation.

Better to engage them in as close to Zorya's terms (and by extension the crews) as can be.
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No. 975302 ID: 977456

Her ship is fatter and has more insurance. Turn around and ram the small-fry then harpoon them as they tumble to the drink.
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No. 975383 ID: 5b93d3

e)
Two hulls, one with twin masts and a crew, one soaked with fish oil. Cut the smaller hull loose, set it alight as a fire-ship to force the pirate to break away, and gain the speed of not having to drag a second ship around.
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