Arthur felt the deck shift beneath his feet, though the ship had not changed course.
The bound crew went silent.
The girl's face emptied.
Lucid turned his obscured head toward the storm-wrapped distance, where faint lights now flickered between curtains of rain, too many and too orderly to be lightning.
Arthur followed his gaze and saw them at last.
Lanterns.
Dozens of them.
The Shenzhou fleet had found them.
Arthur looked at Lucid, expecting some kind of answer, the girl was on the ground deeper in distress than before, and around them the crew had begun to shift, their earlier composure dissolving into something rawer and more volatile.
"Wait, is there actually an army of fleets out there?!"
"It is a bluff!"
"He is here to steal from us!"
Their previous restraint was being overridden quickly by fear and anger, both of which were now aimed squarely at Lucid and Arthur.
Arthur turned toward Lucid and waited.
"What are you looking at me for?" Lucid said flatly.
Arthur closed his eyes for a brief moment, it was staggering, Lucid was the one who had thrown them both into this situation without warning or preparation, pulled from a calm shoreline conversation into a storm rift with relic classification seeds, and he had at least expected the man to have some kind of framework for navigating the aftermath.
"I am not a naval strategist," Lucid said with the tone of someone stating something self-evident.
The irony was considerable given the circumstances.
Lucid cut through the noise rising around them, "Hey Arthur, free them."
Arthur looked back at the crew, releasing them was currently the most viable option available, a last moment exercise in practical sense dressed up as mercy, he held a questioning expression long enough for Lucid to catch it.
"We are about to be overrun by a fleet, neither of us can steer a ship, it is considerably more sensible to let them do it."
A beat passed.
"What is the worst that can happen? We sink?"
Arthur nodded once and moved, he drove the point of his sword toward the throat of the one who appeared to be in charge, the girl from the railing, not with cruelty but with the measured precision of someone communicating a point that did not require elaboration.
"You will be finished by this blade before this ship sinks below the waterline," he said, his voice carrying no particular heat, "navigate."
The understanding reached them quickly, the ship came alive with movement, crew members spreading across the deck, carrying gear, unrolling charts, moving with the coordinated urgency of people who had decided survival was the preferable outcome, the sail dropped and filled, and the vessel began to turn, cutting away from the direction of the approaching storm.
Then with a timing that felt both fortunate and deeply suspicious, a current of wind arrived from a favorable direction and pressed into the sail, Lucid stood at the far end of the deck looking back, through the dense grey of the storm the outline of the first ship was just visible sitting at the edge of the weather watching.
"This is bad," Lucid said quietly, "one of them has shown themselves."
Arthur pushed back a crew member who had drifted too close and kept his attention divided between the approaching threat and the figure at the bow, Lucid's body language had gone very still, the particular stillness of someone standing at the edge of a decision they had not yet committed to, looking out over open water with an expression Arthur could not fully read from this distance.
A hand landed on Arthur's shoulder, he turned, the girl from earlier stood beside him with her expression stripped of its earlier aggression and something more direct occupying its place.
"Hey, Vexian trash," she held his gaze, "I need you."
The words carried a bluntness that another person might have taken personally, Arthur had no particular investment in such things, he followed her below deck without comment, leaving Lucid at the bow.
The hold was extraordinary, scrolls, chests, containers sealed and stacked with the careful arrangement of people who understood the value of what they were carrying, every single item bore the signature of genuine worth, the kind that moved between kingdoms with escorts and documentation and considerable caution, Arthur stood in the middle of it and said nothing for a moment, the scale of it settling over him.
"That came from the Dao Dynasty," the girl said, her voice flat, "they are chasing us because of it."
Arthur managed a single nod.
"Why are you—" the question did not reach its end.
She cut him off before it could, "I need you to help me throw it overboard."
A brief silence followed, he studied her face and she was not wavering.
"The enemy is closing, this carries significant weight and is slowing us down considerably, help me carry it and throw it over."
He looked at what surrounded them, the labor that had gone into acquiring it, the risk, the distance it had traveled, the value sitting quietly in sealed containers around their feet.
"But you said your town—"
She shook her head once.
"If material assets hold more worth to me than the people standing beside me in arms and blood, then whatever kingdom I claim to represent is already beyond saving."
Something moved in Arthur's chest at those words, clean and immediate.
Soon the sound of boots filled the ship, the crew working their way through the hold with deliberate speed, passing loads upward and over the railing into the grey water below, Arthur took each bag passed to him with measured care and sent it over the deck edge, the weight of each throw was different from what he had expected, lighter somehow.
"That is the last of it," he said.
The crew around him were breathing hard, their faces carrying the particular expression of people who had just done something irreversible and were not yet certain how they felt about it, the girl looked up at him and said nothing, there were no words offered and none appeared to be needed.
Arthur moved back toward the upper deck and found Lucid.
"We have reduced the weight of the ship, it should allow us enough distance to pull ahead."
He stopped, Lucid was jogging after pulling with his chains against the main shaft to steer the main mast after a rope had snapped from the strain, using his own chains as its replacement tool.
Arthur walked over and spoke to Lucid, leaving the girl behind, "what do we do?" he yelled under the harsh storm.
Lucid looked back at Arthur, he lingered for a moment like he was suspended in thought, "we hold them off."
Arthur looked at the fleet, they were visible now, close enough to count the individual ships, he looked back to meet Lucid's face with astonishment but he obliged nonetheless.
"I am not adept in long range attacks, I can use Tempest Reckoning but it draws a lot of fate essence and credence."
Lucid had a moment of confusion on his face, Arthur noted it and shook his head.
"It has to be you."
Lucid looked back at the fleet, suddenly his nose started to bleed, Arthur noticed he wiped it away quickly.
"Are you alright?" Arthur asked.
Lucid nodded, "I am just seasick, that is all."
Arthur observed Lucid with a deadpan expression, not that it could be helped in any kind of way, him and Valen were starting to resemble each other more and more with each passing day, the same reckless energy, the same tendency to throw themselves into situations without fully considering the consequences, the same irritating habit of expecting everyone else to keep up.
Suddenly he looked back, Arthur just noticed, "listen to me, all we need to do is keep her alive, we need to trace the exact steps leading to the moment."
"The moment?" Arthur repeated, his brow furrowing.
Lucid briefly shook his head, "yeah."
Something whistled in the air as they both looked toward its source, it was a huge cannonball, massive and dark, its trajectory aimed directly at their position, it hit the deck with devastating force, splintering wood and shaking the vessel violently, sounds of people pleading for their lives could be heard as Arthur gathered himself in a moment, it was not right, he should have seen it coming, he should have sensed the attack before it arrived, his instincts had grown dull from disuse and from trusting too much in Lucid's chaotic presence.
Water started to enter through small cracks, slowly making its way toward the deck and the interior, luckily it was the deeper part of the shell of the ship but it did not stop it from sustaining damage nonetheless, Lucid turned to look back, hundreds of cannonballs littered the sky like a swarm of iron bees.
"Heavens..." Arthur muttered.