Mayhem has taken over the vessel. The process was speedy and gradual, starting from one merman into the several of them now fighting with the men of the sea, feral anger against trained power.

The young man was good with a dagger, and as a warrior of the sea, they were his weapons of choice. The weight and feel of his trusted iron daggers felt comfortably familiar in his blood-red stained hands; they were a gift from his wife. She had sold her only remaining possessions left of her family to buy them, something meant to protect him on his travels. Every time he used them, every time they saved him, he remembered her. This time the memory was bitter, though. They had fought, and he had left her alone. That action weighed heavy on his mind now.

But the situation was growing direr by the second. He had to forget, forget about the fight, let go of the resentment, the remorse, and regret he felt, and forget even the love. 

He gave himself unto the blade, unto what was in front of him, the reality of the blood and salt battlefield that the merchant ship had become into. Otherwise, he wouldn’t survive. The monsters would take him.

His enemy wasn’t a powerful one, admittedly a lone merman was weak, their scales gave them a good defense, but they were far from offering them full protection, there were many unguarded parts on their bodies, and on top of that their deadliest weapon, long black claw-like fingers weren’t used with any sort of finesse, strategy or skill, the mermen didn’t seem to be intelligent creatures; they throw themselves unto their prey like the feral wild animals that they are, dumb and weak alone.

But they weren’t alone.

The young man sliced a merman’s throat, then kicked the body on top of the merman behind it. He felt a dangerous presence at his back and turned around to the image of a merman lunging at him. It wasn’t possible to avoid the attack, so he decided to block it with his daggers, but before the merman’s claws could connect with the iron of his daggers, a bolt pierced through the merman’s head.

“We’re all kind of busy now, Kid so you’ll have to pay some attention to your behind if you don’t want it penetrated by a green one. Don’t die now, yes?!”

The captain had saved him, but the battle wasn’t over. He got a brief opportunity to recover his breath before seeing another contender approaching him.

“Gentlemen! The first idiot to croak on my ship gets a dirt burial! I won’t allow such kind of pansy behavior on my vessel, so get to killing!”

The death churns and guttural, animalistic roars were suddenly drowned out by the battle screams of a reinvigorated group.

He felt a new surge of energy. His second breath had come to him.

I can’t die right now, or they will laugh at me. At least I can’t be the first one to.

His mind was focused, and the grip on the steel daggers became stronger, so much so that he wouldn’t be able to tell where his hands ended or the dagger begin. To kill, that was the only thing on his mind.

If I kill enough, I’ll get to live. If we kill them all, we get to continue our work. If there’s not one left, I’ll get another chance to apologize.