It only took a matter of minutes and the order of another cup of wine before the Captain hopped off the table. "Did I ever tell you how I vanquished an assailant with eight arms? He was a proficient foe, to be sure, and it was one of the few times I felt that my time had truly come...."
Patrons naturally looked up, some curious to hear a new tale while others did so only because he was speaking loud enough to be heard. Regardless, Seishuku had an audience once again and so, he began his tale.
                 Â
Patrons naturally looked up, some curious to hear a new tale while others did so only because he was speaking loud enough to be heard. Regardless, Seishuku had an audience once again and so, he began his tale.
Captain Seishuku VS The 8-armed Assailant
Twas deep in the ruins of Amdapor Keep where the Good Captain delved, seeking riches buried long ago beneath piles of rubble and debris. His red eye gleamed in the darkness, brightened only by the flickering halo of light from a torch he'd propped up in a cluster of broken stone. All was silent as he spelunked, save for the clatter of rocks pushed aside and the occasional breath of exertion; for rocks are heavy as we all know.
When suddenly, the stillness was disturbed by an echoing voice that brought Seishuku's attention away from his plunderings. The words were difficult to hear from such distance though, so the intrepid Captain abandoned his efforts and began to stealthily approach. He skulked out onto the precipice of a broken bridgeway and knelt down in the shadows to look below where a great looming shadow enveloped the lower floor. Some ancient monstrosity freed from its aeons of imprisonment, no doubt.Â
"Soooooooon. Sooooooooon, I shall have the legendary blade all to myself and with it, I'll take over this accursed world. Heeheeheehee!" It babbled to itself, causing the hidden Captain to frown. Plots of domination were not his cup of tea, of course, and though he had no great love for the city-states; even the great Sky-Pirate could not turn away from a peril that would befall all of Eorzea. More importantly than that, however, was the sense that this devil below him may have some relic of the keep's former glory in its possession. Lets not forget who our beloved Captain was, after all.
Summoning his wellspring of courage, the Captain tethered himself to the bridgeway's rail and swung down from on high with great aplomb to the cracked stone floor below and with boots on the ground, raised himself up proudly. "STAND AND DELIVER!" He shouted into the gloom, drawing his favored blade and aiming the tip at the source of the massive shadow ahead.
"Deliver what???" Shrieked the unseen beast, sounding quite surprised! The Captain was momentarily shaken by this, fearing he had made some sort of faux pas in his grand statement. "erm...Deliver your treasures unto me, foul spawn!" He said, which resulted in high-pitched laughter from the dark. "Teeheehee, you're robbing me? How unfortunate for you..."
A slimy tendril whipped out from the gloom with a wet SMACK as it slapped Seishuku's sword aside, but the Captain was no coddled boy to combat and as the gross appendage flicked back to bat him away; he flipped backwards with ethereal grace while the shadowy arm passed harmlessly beneath him. Landing squarely, the good Captain raised his sword once again. "Stand.....and Deliver, monster."
From the shadows, the creature snarled. "Monster?! MONSTER?! I'll show you a MONSTER!" Furiously, tendrils shot from the black all around him. It's grotesque arms came at him from all sides, but Seishuku parried and deflected as many as he could with lightning alacrity. Ichor splattered upon darkened stone and splashed across the Captain's splendid coat. This infuriated Seishuku, for he is VERY fond of his splendid coat and with a roar, the Captain charged the looming shadow through its tangle of tentacles.
There was a disgusting squirting sound and he was swallowed in pitch blackness. No faint flickering firelight illuminated the shadow, no hazy outlines of writhing limbs could be seen. Worse still was the sensation that his eyes were all goopy and it made Captain Seishuku want to wretch violently. Despite the loss of sight, including his gleaming red eye, he could hear the cruel creature laughing. "Heeheeheeheeee, now you can't see." It said cheekily. The Captain spat on the floor? Possibly one of the tentacles, it was very hard to tell, and held his blade defensively before him. "I know naught what's worse, this blinding fluid or your terrible rhyming..."
"Oooooo, I'll show -you-!" It roared and before Seishuku could retort with another groan about rhyming, he was assaulted by so many tendrils that it seemed as if the blows were coming from every which direction. Wet, disgusting slaps and thwacks knocked him about. One slapped his sword away, the sound of it skidding across stone seemed to come from the left right before another gross appendage cracked across his cheek. Blows pounded across his belly and back, two whip-snaps lashed across the backs of his knees and forced our Hero to fall.
The end seemed near, the Good Captain on his knees against a foe he could no longer see. There was silence in the emptiness for what seemed like an eternity, broken suddenly by the sounds of metal scraping upon stone. "And now..." The creature said, its putrid breath washing over Seishuku's face. "...the coup de grace!"Â
The Captain threw caution to the wind, balling his right fist as tightly as he could and thrust forward with all his might. His knuckles crashed like a tidal wave into something spongy and soft, milky goo spurting around his fist. "GRAAAAAAAAAGH! MY EYE!" The creature bellowed and metal clattered all around him like rain on a steel shields. Seishuku frantically fumbled about in the blackness until his gore-slick hand wrapped firmly around the grip of a sword and he swung it upward as hard as he could but it struck nothing.
Scrambling sounds were heard, tendrils slapping against stone and scuttling retreat as the monster groaned and whined in pain. "Bastard. Bloody hyur bastard. My eye!" It cried, cursing the Sky-Pirate as it escaped further into the gloom and left the blind Captain alone in the dark.Â
A voice boomed above him, but he couldn't make out the words. Echoes of other voices faintly touched his ears as he rose to his feet and felt about for something to guide him. After what felt like hours of sightless searching, faint vision began to return to him and when the blinding effects finally wore off, he looked down at the blade in his hand. It was a beautiful sword, unlike any he'd ever seen before! Seishuku felt great pride in this find, grinning from ear to ear as he collected his trusty sword and stashed it upon his belt once more.
An hour passed as the Captain worked his way back up and out of the ruins of the keep into the low-light of Snakemolt once more. He emerged, blinking from the broken crevice with the glorious sword of legend resting on his shoulder and praised his good fortune. When surprisingly, he stumbled upon a jutting stone and in his panicked haste to catch himself from falling flung the incredible weapon forward. Skinning his knees on broken stones, his palms pressed hard into the grassy earth, Seishuku looked up in shock as his new prize twirled end over end through the air and down the rise to land tip-first in the dirt....mere steps from a well-dressed highlander with dashingly coiffed hair and a monocle.Â
Captain Seishuku watched as the highlander peered at the blade, then reached out and plucked it from the ground. The Sky-Pirate groaned at such misfortune, watching the other man talk animatedly to himself then turn away to carry the sword off down the dirt path.
He gave chase, stumbling and fumbling through the underbrush, but stopped short when he saw the other man approach a large group of adventurers who cheered (or facepalmed for some reason) the dashing man's approach. Turning away, Captain Seishuku sighed heavily and decided to cut his losses. After such a terrible thrashing at the hands of the 8 armed beast, he had no desire to take on a small battalion.Â
And so, the Captain called for his ship. As it rose high above Snakemolt into the clouds, Seishuku wondered if he might ever get his hands on that very fine sword again. As if the Twelve were answering him, he heard a mighty strange sound and turned to see the finely dressed highlander flying through the air past his ship with the sword in hand. He gawked for a moment, watching the man disappear over the horizon then simply muttered "...Balls."
                                  Â
What a colossal waste of time and energy.
