Butcher of Gadobhra Chapter 230 (Patreon)

Mariah raced ahead, and Ozzy couldn't tell if her feet were touching the ground. Woodrat and Derrick were running as fast as they could, with Ozzy bringing up the rear. The ashy, top layer of the sargasso put up clouds of dust as they ran along and they could see similar being kicked up in the distance. As they ran further and further, Derrick began to slow down, and then Woodrat as well. They'd been running over a mile at this point and Ozzy was slowly gaining on them. As he overtook them at his steady pace, he simply grabbed each one and threw them over his shoulder.

Woodrat objected to the treatment. "This isn't proper, you overgrown guppy. What if someone sees you treating us like sacks of potatoes?"

Ozzy just kept running. "Don't worry, I'd never embarrass you in front of a giant crab. Catch your breath so you'll be able to fight and I'll set you back down."

Eventually, the three of them came upon a fight in progress. The huge crustacean was being taunted by Mariah who seemed to have no trouble dodging its large pincers. A giant of a man with black skin and red hair was dragging ashore a ship's boat with several sailors in it. None of them were moving.

The giant unhooked a heavy chain from the bow of the boat that he had used to tow it across the smoke. He advanced slowly upon the crab, swinging the chain back and forth. His movements were ponderous and slow. To Ozzy, it looked like he was exhausted. When he got close to the crab, he swung the chain at it like a flail, slamming it down onto the crab's back and cracking off bits of shell. The crab ignored him, intent on Mariah. It was only after it had been hit three times in the same spot did it react, turning on its eight legs and swinging one of its massive claws at the annoyance.

The claw caught the giant in the chest and knocked him down. The crab advanced with the intent to grab him with its massive claws, but came to a halt as a chain ensnared its right claw. Ozzy had thrown the Trammelian Chain and it wrapped around and around the crab's claw, bringing the monster to a halt. Step by step, Ozzy dragged the huge crab away from the fallen man.

Prevented from attacking the fallen prey, the crab turned and scuttled toward Ozzy, who moved away from it, and in a circle so that it presented its back to Woodrat and Derrick. Woodrat attacked a rear leg, his sword striking the joint where it attached to the body, shearing through muscle and sinew easily. "Grab ahold, Mr. Derrick, and give it a tug!" After three strikes Derrick found himself in possession of a crab leg as tall as he was.

The giant stood up, and seeing what was happening, strode toward the monster. He managed to loop his chain around the other claw and pulled in the opposite direction of Ozzy. The crustacean halted, straining to move first one way and then the other as the two large men pulled with all of their might. Woodrat continued to attack the legs on one side, his sword now aflame and cutting through the hard chitin with ease. Mariah and Derrick darted in and pulled severed legs away from the fight, stacking them in a pile.

With three legs gone, the crab's last appendage couldn't hold it up, and it fell on its left side. It was still quite dangerous, and Ozzy kept a tight hold on the chain as Woodrat severed the last leg, and then began to work on the left claw. The firewalker laughed when it came loose from the body, backing away from the crab, clearly exhausted. He tossed the claw into the pile of legs, and sat down, holding his head.

Woodrat had never seen a crab this big. It wasn't a named creature or a boss, but it was Level 16. He'd seen smaller ones cooked before that were barely the size of a man. "Drag it over to near the smoke, Mr. Ozzy, and I'll show you how we cook these up. It will take some smoke and heat, but there's nothing like the taste of a crab baked in its own shell."

The firewalker begged to differ. "I'll eat your crab. Hell, I'd eat anything right now. But if you want tasty crab, you should see how my aunt Enid cooks them! She starts with two barrels of cream and simmers them for a week with onions and peppers. That one would just fit into her big pot."

Ozzy tossed the second claw onto the pile and pulled a pouch off of his belt. "Hungry? I brought along a dozen sausages you can have." The giant nodded his thanks and upended the sack, putting all the sausage into his mouth and chewing noisily.

"I owe you a meal sometime. I haven't eaten in over a week and I was sure my stomach was already eating my liver."

"There's more back at our ship. We'll head there next. I'd best see to your crew mates." As Ozzy suspected, they were unconscious from too much heat. Pulling heat from another creature was tricky and dangerous, and Ozzy wasn't sure that he liked the feeling of it. Like Smokestealing, he was taking the life force of another creature. Unlike Smokestealing, it felt good. That bothered him.

He made room in his own furnace by shifting fuel and heat to smoke, then reached for the first man. Even full up, he had only a fraction of the heat that Ozzy did. Trying to pull as little as he could, Ozzy removed over 200 heat, dropping the man out of the danger zone. He did the same to the next two and then check on all three. They were breathing normally and starting to stir.

"Here we go, have a swig of this and swallow it down." Ozzy had ground up a handful of the berries from the sargasso weed and added the dust to a bottle of cheap rum with the idea that no sailor he'd ever heard of refused a drink. As he'd expected, his first patient eagerly took two long swallows of the rum. His eyes opened, and he looked around, confused, before putting a hand to his stomach. Ozzy picked him up and squeezed. "Let's get a little of that fire out of your belly so you feel better." The man burped up a mixture of smoke, fire, and the smell of rum. Ozzy set him down and repeated the process with the other two. Soon all three were awake and asking questions.

Ozzy had Derrick sit and talk with them while he helped Woodrat. The captain had removed the last of the crab's legs and was moving around the creature, forcing smoke into every crevice that he could find. "We need to fill it with smoke for some flavor, and then slowly add the heat. It will sit and cook for a day and be as tasty as slow-roasted octopus."

The giant heaved himself up and dipped his head to both Mariah and Derrick before coming over to talk to Ozzy and Woodrat. "I'm happy as a roasted clam to find myself with a crew that takes their cooking so seriously. That was a bad situation you saved us from. I've walked a week on an empty stomach and was happy to find a bit of solid land but that damned crab was as hungry as I was. Those lads offered my oversized carcass a spot in their boat, and I owed them a debt so I couldn't leave them. Now I think we all owe you one. I go by the name Butterbelly when traveling away from home. Over there is Finn, Galen, and Raj. We sailed on the Golden Truffle out of Queensland."

Woodrat finished his cooking and shook the large man's hand. "Captain Woodrat of the Splinter. Good to meet you and glad to help. I sailed on the Truffletwo dozen years ago. Is old Bilgey still the captain?"

Butterbelly was careful as he shook hands with a man who only came up to his waist. "Captain Bilgewater retired and is bouncing grandchildren on his knees. The queen gave him some honor making him an Earl or Duke or something fancy. His eldest son, Bartholomew was Captain after him. Last I saw he was yelling at the crew to take to the boats and get to safety. The Truffle was dead in the smoke. No sails left and half the crew had become charred and were tearing apart the hull after we locked them below. A bad situation and I hope the rest of them made it out."

The other sailors had wandered over as they talked. Finn nodded his head at Woodrat. "Begging your pardon captain, but did I hear you say you had a ship? If she's seaworthy, I'd be happy to sign on as crew. I think all three of us would." The other two nodded.

Woodrat looked them over. They had the look and dress of common seamen, and not of the surliness he'd seen in Tommy's crew. "I can use hardworking sailors, but I'll tell you right now that it's not an easy voyage your on, and my crew tends to stir up more trouble than most. Standard shares of loot and we eat better than most."

Finn seemed to speak for all three after some whispered discussions. "That sounds good to us captain."

Woodrat turned to Butterbelly. "And what about you? Take a spot in the crew, or are you walking off on your own?"

The giant looked out over the choppy smoke. "Plenty of heat in the smoke to walk up top, that's for sure. I was surprised as the rest of the crew when that eruption happened. I came up on the last one, twenty years back, and have been enjoying my vacation ever since. Unless I get a message saying they need me back in Muspelheim."

"One thing though, before I sign on..." He didn't get to finish the sentence.

A huge reptilian head rose from the smoke on a neck fifty feet long and eight feet thick. The creature opened up a maw full of needle-sharp teeth and a long tongue. Ozzy thought it looked like a type of marine dinosaur, more than a dragon or snake. That theory was confirmed as two huge flippers emerged from the smoke, and pressed down into the sargasso. The whole area the group was standing on started tilting and sliding into the smoke from the immense weight of the creature.

Longneck Sea Queen (Plesiosauroid Aristicraticus) Level 57   Elite Boss
Deepswimmer, ?????, Voracious Hunter, Swift, Intelligent, ???, Very Hungry

Woodrat took one look at the creature and yelled out in a commanding voice, "Run inland. This isn't a foe to fight!"

Moriah was suddenly in front of the group, in the form of a white cyclone, and threw out such a blast of wind that Woodrat and the sailors were thrown thirty feet inland, where they quickly got up and ran. Derrick had been safe already. Ozzy had brought the ship's boat up to the pile of crab parts and he was loading it up when the creature made its appearance. Butterbelly fell over backward as the sargasso under his feet tilted and became unstable. Ozzy had managed to keep his feet and was turning to run when he saw the firewalker fall and the Longneck begin its strike on him.

Woodrat had told him that the creatures of the smoke were having trouble with this much heat and were coming to the surface or onto the sargasso because of it. He hoped that meant it might be averse to some more heat. The Butcher opened his mouth and fire exploded out of him, bathing the Longneck in flames as if he was trying to light a sail on the Splinter. The Sea Queen was overheated and starving. The smell of roasting crab had drawn it to this little nest of creatures. It was surprised at the sudden burst of heat and drew away from it.

The surprise lasted perhaps ten seconds before the huge creature knew it had little to fear from the flames. Ozzy had vented over 10,000 heat at the monster, dangerously dropping his heat. But even that much was just a sting to a creature in the sixth Tier. The surprise was long enough for Ozzy to throw his Trammelian Chain and snare Butterbelly before he turned and ran, dragging the firewalker in his wake. The Sea Queen wasn't after such small, quick prey. The huge head took ahold of the delicious cooked crab and began ripping it apart.

The party went inland as far as they needed to find a large ship and climb aboard, feeling much safer with a deck beneath them. They stayed there long after the monster ate its fill of crab and then took the rest with it, down into the smoke. As luck would have it, there were no charred aboard the ship. Mariah ventured into the hold as a whirlwind and brought up a small keg of what turned out to be the worst rum any of them had ever drunk. The taste stopped no one from drinking several mugs. She said there were a dozen more of the small kegs, and two dozen large hogsheads in the hold. A stunning amount of drink for a crew of their size.

The exhausted sailors went to sleep, as did Derrick. Woodrat turned toward Butterbelly. "We were talking of you signing on as crew before we were so rudely interrupted by that crab-stealing beastie. You had a question?"

Butterbelly smiled, showing bright white teeth that contrasted with his jet-black skin. "Yes, I did. I was going to point out that I hold the rank of Mate and then challenge the little guy over there for his spot on your ship. But I'm over that now and know my place. I'll sign on as your second mate and not give Mr. Ozzy a bit of grief."

He turned to Ozzy. "Doesn't mean I don't owe you a debt. You could have turned and run and not a man alive would have blamed you. Instead, you nearly blew yourself cold to distract that lizard and drag my sorry ass to safety. You've got a spot at my clan's table any time you choose to visit. Best food in all of Muspelheim. My mom knows how to barbecue a rhino and keep it tender. She brushes on bear fat to keep it moist."

The night passed without something else attacking, and Ozzy learned a few new recipes.

You have learned the recipe for Tender Bear-Braised   Barbecued Rhino.
 You have learned the recipe for Herb Encrusted Baked Shark.
 You have learned the recipe for Fire Roasted Boar in Rum Sauce.

You have gained a new option for Heritage.