People always seem to underestimate just how dangerous pirates can be. I mean I can see why they are underestimated so much. They don't have any individual strength. I am sure that I could easily fight an entire troop of pirates on my own just like that.
Yet, I have seen mighty people fall when they underestimate pirates. Men who have hunted ghosts, werewolves and vampires, (these are powerful men.) have fallen to mere pirates.
The problem here is not the pirates themselves, but their quantity. I can fight ten pirates, but then a hundred of them will be able to do me in. A single pirate swinging at his full strength might be able to leave a flesh wound at most. A hundred such wounds though is a different matter. A thousand such wounds would be fatal.
I can think of a couple of cases just from history about how effective pure quantity can be. The dragonsword and his fight with the necromancer lumen is one such example. It might have taken a week for the dragonsword to die and he did manage to decimate half of Lumen's army. The dragonsword still did end up dying against Lumen.
Thankfully there are just so many people that can be fit on a ship. There shall be no pack tactics here at least. I am sure that every inch of the enemy ship was packed to its brim. Even then the enemy would have struggled to fit more than fifty soldiers in that ship.
After all, you could easily fit a hundred soldiers in the ship if you were to squish everybody together. Where exactly will you be storing the food that is needed for a hundred soldiers? You can't cheat with that. The nearest city is about three weeks away in any direction. There is also no possibility that the land here will yield any food. I have never seen a more barren land.
Still, if the other side had managed to send even ten to twelve people it is going to be a fight. An easy fight but still a fight. Fighting them will be easier in these cramped quarters. Here their swords will hit the walls more than me. Their shields will make it harder for them to move in this place. That is if they have shields. Shields tend to be costly and the people that they send are cheaper to replace.
Right now, I have been making my way to the storage room of this ship. It is the best place to hold against enemies. It essentially splits the ship into two halves, with the storage room in the middle. The enemy would have most likely occupied the latter half of the ship. There could be a few in the former half, but nobody has attacked me yet, so it is unlikely. The storage room is also the largest in the ship so fighting is going to be a bit easier.
Right now the room is being held by the other two soldiers from my troop. Their names are Jacob and Andrew. Right now they are reinforcing the door to this room by blockading it with furniture in the room. (Don't even get me started on that. The people at the shipyard were using this ship to store all of their broken furniture.) It won't hold the boarders for long but it should buy us some time. At least that is the theory.
They have been trained very well but training can only let you fight an enemy that is stronger than you. It doesn't help when you have to fight with a large number of weaklings. That is something that you can only do with experience.
They have finally stopped their boarding up of the door.
"Jacob, describe the situation to me.", I speak.
"Yes, my lord. We have confirmed that enemies have managed to pierce the ship.", he speaks. "We can't yet confirm their numbers but they all seem to be concentrated on the other side of the ship. We plan to use this door as a chokepoint. When the enemy does end up coming we will hold them off."
They don't even need to speak for their plan to be clear. They have surrounded the door. The minute that anybody pierces the door they are going to attack and kill the other side instantly. Then they will use the corpse as an additional blockade to make getting into the room harder. It is a pretty standard strategy, one that I can counter in at least three ways.
I am sure that the people on the other side of the room will also be able to do the same thing. For how barren the land here is, the men here are more resilient.
"Andrew, retreat to the formation room.", I speak to Andrew, directing the duo to the room I had just left. "You shall find Trevor nearby. The three of you make sure that the formation room is secure."
"But, captain", replies Andrew.
"Can you confirm if there are any boarders behind us.", I ask.
"No, we can't", Andrew speaks.
"Then, if said boarder were to stumble into the formation room, do you think Trevor will be able to hold them back?", I ask.
"No", this time it is Jacob.
"Then go and reinforce the formation room.", I command them.
Within a few moments, I am alone in the room, preparing my armor. Well, calling it armor would be wrong as it is closer to a frame of vines covering my vitals. It will do well to stop an enemy strike or two but it won't be able to do much beyond that. Well, this armor is not meant to protect me. This thing is a weapon.
Well, I was studying this thing mainly to pass the time. I never actually expected to use it. After all, with my sword at hand, why would I need such a weak weapon? Still, to speak of my armor's ability. It has only one, called thorn growth which allows me to manifest thorns from anywhere in the armor. It might make my armor sound quite useless, but it just depends on how you make use of it.
It does not take the boarders long to appear, as I manifest a couple of thorns in either hand. It isn't particularly durable, but that is how it is meant to be. After all, I can summon quite a few of these thorns. I can certainly imagine a formation like this causes a lot of damage if used the correct way. Now, if I can just get the efficiency of the damn thing right.
The door breaks open with a snap as the enemy raiders swarm into my room. They are using an old bookshelf to break open the door (this ship has a lot of junk stored in it. The people maintaining this ship never expected the ship to fly ever again.).
At the very least these guys seem to have been trained, if not particularly well. I would say that they were part of a militia. There are five of them in the room now, with three more in the room beyond. They know at the very least that overcrowding a room is about the quickest way for them to get killed. Well, it is not going to help them thou....
(After about five minutes.)
....m going to break this stupid thing. Oh, it's on again.
I am surprised that I managed to get the thought logger working again. I half expected that it would take me one more month for me to get the damn thing working again. Well, I have taken care of the enemy boarders. Right now all eight of their corpses lying around me. I am still not particularly good with the thought logger. Otherwise, I would have managed to keep it working even during the fight. Well, I will learn that soon enough as well.
To summarise the fight I was just in. The logic of this fight has been one of experimentation. How much mana do I need to supply to the Armor to keep it working? The amount of durability and strength of a thorn that I will get for each unit of mana that I provide. What is the maximum length of each thorn? How many can be summoned in a single burst? I answer each question that pops into my mind related to the Armor. Well, I have to admit that combat is not the ideal way to be testing a formation. This formation wasn't meant to be in use at all right now. I just don't have anything else right now.
My testing has mostly been basic. I have tested out everything I can with only the formation at hand. Any testing that requires more tools is beyond me. For example I can't experiment with poisons now. The armor that I am wearing is most used by assassins due to how easy it is to infuse poison into the entire thing. That was my plan. I wanted to infuse the armor with the vampire's kiss. It is a poison that prevents your blood from clotting. (For obvious reasons it is the favorite poison for vampires.)
Before doing all of that though, I will have to increase the efficiency of the formation. Right now the formation is not up to my standard. It is going to be a long process, one that will require me to get used to the Armor and modify it to a certain degree. I already have quite a few ideas popping into my head. For now, I have to shelve all of those thoughts. Experimentation takes energy and time. Right now I have to devote both to keep the ship flying.
I think that the boarders were forced to attack our ship. Trevor suspected that to be the case even before the pirate attacks had begun. Now I am pretty sure that is the case as well. Cowardice is the nature of a pirate but these pirates attacked me like their life depended on it. Well, Trevor has his theories about it. I am never going to admit it to the man though since he doesn't let you forget about it.
Returning to me, I have to admit that this fight has left me more injured than I would have liked to admit. There is a stab wound on my back, that stings pretty nastily. Other than that, there is a dull ache in various parts of my arms and my chest. This is where the enemy clubs struck me. I am sure that something is broken in my body, but it is already healing.
At least I am cycling my mana to make sure it will heal before becoming anything more serious. If I had my sword here I would not have had to worry about such paltry injuries. I can't even complain about not having it, I was the one who had left it at home after all.
My injuries are why I am not already in the formation room. I have already taken a risk by leaving it unmanned like this. I am hoping that the destruction of the third ship will spook the other two ships. I would hope that they have run away. For now, I will settle for them not attacking my ship.
I will have to get up soon though. The room stinks of blood. That is a major problem with using a stabbing weapon in a group of enemies. Too much of what should be inside is on the outside, to my liking. That is also something I would not need to worry about with my sword.
Well, I have complained enough. It is time to return to the formation room even if it is a bit of a pain.