Yvette grabbed Jules’s unfired musket, turning it over in her hands. It was a crude thing, but clearly well used and properly maintained. The man had even made sure to care for his bayonet, which was a level of diligence that even trained soldiers frequently forgot.

She turned to Gigi, who anxiously bounced from one foot to the other as the sounds outside continued to grow louder. Looking the child up and down, she asked a potentially pointless question.

“Have you ever fired a gun before?”

“Uhh… No?” Gigi responded nervously.

“That’s fine. I’m going to clear a path. You will try and find our foci. You do have a focus, right?”

“Yeah, I got it from-”

Yvette interrupted. “I don’t care. My focus is a longsword with a navy-blue sheath. See if you can grab my armor as well.”

Gigi looked taken aback for a second before nodding. “How will I know which one’s yours?”

“Plate mail is expensive, I’d be surprised if they had any others.” Yvette held the musket like a javelin as she gripped the exit door’s handle. “Just grab the big metal one. Ready?”

“Um…”

“Let’s go.”

Without another word, Yvette pulled open the door and looked into the rest of the airship’s hull. It seemed that the brig was at the ship’s back end, with a short hallway leading into a large open space filled with hammocks and bedrolls. The hallway was dotted with doors, likely leading into utility rooms and whatnot.

Of course, the main feature that drew her eyes was the crowd of pirates making their way down the steps from the main deck. There were around a dozen of them, all with guns and cutlasses drawn. Both parties were completely still for a few seconds as they took each other in. It was the man at the head of the horde that spoke first.

“Get that-”

His voice was cut off as his chest was punctured by a surprisingly well-sharped bayonet. With her enhanced strength Yvette could throw the musket at speeds approaching a fired arrow, fast enough for the pointed end to pierce through the pirate’s body and stop just short of the man behind him.

The trained warrior immediately followed up her opening move, charging in a dead sprint towards her opponents. The pirates, to their credit, only took half a second to process their dead friend before thinking to defend themselves.

Yvette took three musket balls to the chest before her spell finished channeling. Just like the first one, they were unable to draw more than a trickle of blood. The impact zones would absolutely turn into a set of nasty welts the next day, but that was hardly a concern for the time being.

She had gotten halfway down the hallway by the time [Silt Armor] fully manifested. Silt poured out of her palms, wrapping around her body in a brackish grey coat of shifting detritus. The effect was limited without her armor to give it structure, but it was still enough to sap away any damage the bullets may have been able to land with a lucky shot.

With this, Yvette felt confident that she would be able to take down the first wave of pirates without taking too many injuries. This confidence was only slightly tempered by the seeming lack of concern shown by the outlaws who had just learned how useless their weapons had become. It occurred to her that any competent leader would probably make some sort of plan to account for the pair of dual aligned mages they had to keep captive.

This revelation came a fair bit too late, as the moment she burst out of the corridor and into the larger hull space, she noticed a pair of metallic glints to the left and right. Before she could properly pivot, two large metal hooks had already been thrown and cleanly latched onto her shoulders. A cheer rang out through the lower decks as more pirates burst out from their hiding spots and threw yet more chains over her body.

In seconds, Yvette had been turned from a charging bull to a chained lion. She pulled as hard as she could against the heavy chains, but it did little good. They had been run through steel loops in the ground, allowing their holders to exert much more force over them. Pulled down from every direction, even a Strength and Vitality focused mage like her would struggle to move.

Worse still, it seemed that the captain was not the only mage on this ship. Yvette watched with mounting concern as a couple of her binding chains began to shift colors into a warm orange glow. Cursing, she saw a scrappy looking woman holding the opposite ends of each chain, channeling some sort of fire spell into the steel.

Farther back, another pair of mages stalked forward. Each had their hands covered in heavy looking rock gauntlets. Yvette knew that even with her incredible defense, she could only last so long. The stagnation effect from [Silt Armor] would be able to negate the fire mana in the chains, and might even reduce the impact from those gauntlets, but it only lasted for five minutes and would take far too long to recast.

These people shouldn’t have been a threat. All three of the mages were low level, with the fire mage not even having bothered to take on an alignment. Their collective levels may have been exceeded hers, but she was still confident enough in her combat experience that dealing with them shouldn’t have been hard.

Unfortunately, these were pirates that specialized in capturing and selling rare mages.

The chains weren’t warded, but they were thick enough that they would be difficult to properly break through with a single spell. The metal loops were likely designed specifically to deal with high Strength values, and the crew was trained to use the layout of the ship to gain as much of an advantage as possible. As things were, Yvette had every disadvantage conceivable. This was almost certainly by design.

Still, she didn’t lose hope. These techniques weren’t new to her. In fact, they were ones she had used herself quite frequently in the past, which meant she knew the best ways to handle them. Tricks of this sort were designed to wear down powerful mages who were used to not struggling against weaker foes. Nothing here was going to kill her, just get her tired enough that a squad of common criminals would be enough to take her down.

Instead of struggling against the weight, Yvette relaxed her shoulders and squared her legs. The stance gave her the structure she needed to remain upright without wasting too much energy, with the loose shoulders making it seem as if she had given up. The pirates looked confused, not having expected that to happen so quickly.

Under normal circumstances, this wouldn’t have done much. She may have lasted longer this way, but the end result would still be inevitable. Thankfully, her initial plan had the convenient side effect of supporting the new situation perfectly.

Yvette was a tank and a banner bearer, meant to draw in the focus of whatever force her unit was facing. She may not be fighting the front lines anymore, but the value of such a role was as useful as ever. A performance like this, while not terribly effective on its own, served as an excellent distraction.

Everyone’s heads turned in surprise as a high-pitched voice shouted out over the din of shouting and clanking chains.

“Yvette! Right arm!”

Deciding to trust the child, Yvette yanked her right arm up as hard as she could. The confused pirates hadn’t been expecting a dedicated move like that, and were momentarily unable to restrain the limb. For a brief moment, she was able to hold her hand out in expectation for their key out of here.

The clumsily thrown sword landed in her grasp the instant before control had been regained and her arm was thrown back to the ground. 

In Yvette’s hand now lay her signature weapon. The blade itself was unremarkable, a standard longsword forged from Tyrran steel. It was a serviceable implement, but not anything outstanding. The true value was the scabbard it was held in.

The navy-blue leather had been carved with layers upon layers of sigils and runes, so many that one would assume it was just some odd texturing from a distance. These symbols were a vital instrument for any mage, as they completely removed the one weakness they all shared. A well made focus could completely eliminate the casting time of any spell, allowing the caster to instantaneously channel any invocation that would originally have taken minutes.

The pirates barely had time to react before their best laid plans had already been dismantled. A flash of brown along the etched lines of Yvette’s scabbard shook the ground violently for a few seconds. The cast of [Tremor] wasn’t strong enough to do any real damage, but succeeded in its mission of making everyone in the room lose their balance.

With a surge of strength, Yvette pulled on her chains until almost all had been torn from the grips of their wielders. She dusted herself off as the pair of stone mages charged forward, casually gesturing with her focus in their general direction.

A cast of [Bind] sent a wave of thick mud lashing towards them. The two had chosen to move shoulder-to-shoulder, an idiotic move against almost every kind of mage, and were easily caught with the single invocation. Both fell to the ground as their torsos were wrapped in the quickly cooling mud.

Yvette moved to finish the pair off, but was quickly cut off by the fire mage stepping in front of them and conjuring a [Flame Wall]. As she shielded her eyes from the sudden light, the searing impact of a second spell cast in rapid succession lanced into her gut.

Thankfully, she managed to maintain concentration on [Silt Armor]. The main advantage of silt magic was its ability to cause other elements to “stagnate,” being ideal against energy based attacks. Though the attack still hurt, she was able to bear it and push through the [Flame Wall] without suffering serious burns. The pain was noticeable and would likely cause issues later on, but it was not enough to slow her down for more than a couple seconds.

As she finished impaling the fire mage, Yvette noted that the stone mages had broken out of her mud bindings. This wasn’t a surprise, as they were never meant to be anything more than a brief delay. The pair likely had builds similar to hers, focusing on physical attributes with magic being an extra tool rather than their entire fighting style. Unfortunately, that meant that this fight would be decided with combat experience alone.

These pirates were not fools. They knew how to fight mages. Hell, they even knew how to fight mages that were of a far higher level than them if those chains were any indication. Yvette wouldn’t have been surprised if this was an infamous group, the kind capable of capturing and selling off all kinds of local legends. 

It was a shame, then, that Yvette didn’t operate like the bounty hunters and city lawmen who served as a pirate crew’s standard opponent. She was a soldier, one who had grown accustomed to fighting while outnumbered and outgunned. The men and women she was fighting may have been used to being the underdogs, but that could never compare to her. Yvette fought every battle as if she were challenging death itself, and that had hardened her into a ruthless killing machine.

The stone mages put up their best fight. They weaved in and out of Yvette’s blind spots, peppering her with a relentless assault of stone fists. The other pirates made their own contributions, stabbing at her sides and throwing their chains in a desperate attempt to slow the mercenary down. None of it mattered.

Yvette grabbed one chain and swung it as hard as she could, taking its wielder and three other pirates along for the ride. They collided with yet more pirates in turn, crumpling against each other in a heap of broken bodies. The only one left standing from that attack was the stone mage who had stuck to her left side, a man who had been stunned for just long enough to have his throat slit with a swift flash of a longsword.

Yvette’s lack of Agility enhancements didn’t seem to even matter, with each slash being just fast enough to block and counter every attack made against her. The few remaining pirates on the lower deck were decimated with soul-crushing ease.

In the end, only the second stone mage was left standing. He didn’t try to run. Even a rogue like him had enough honor to respect his companions’ sacrifice. Yvette could respect that. He died with a clean thrust to the heart, perfectly woven around his sloppy guard.

Gigi could only watch in fascination as her ally butchered the force that had been trained specifically to kill mages like the stern warrior. She wasn’t afraid, not really at least. The violence was horrifying and all, but the twelve-year-old girl could barely even focus on it. Her eyes were firmly fixed on Yvette’s face, which remained perfectly passive through the entire encounter.

It was only once the fight was over, with her opponents lying in a pool of viscera and conjured muck, that Yvette allowed herself to feel once more. The sight of it would never leave Gigi’s mind for as long as she lived.

A woman stood surrounded by fresh corpses, her sword and clothes coated in blood, not moving a single inch for almost an entire minute. The only sign that she lived at all was a single tear sliding down her cheek, catching on her chin and refusing to slip further. 

And then, without another word, she calmly wiped the blood off of her sword and prepared for the final push out of the ship.