Hammerhead stepped into the coliseum, the air rumbling as stone doors sealed behind him. The moment he crossed the threshold, runes flared along the arena's edge. From the opposite end, a war-golem lumbered forward, ten feet tall and covered in age-worn armor plates fused with coral. Hammerhead cracked his knuckles, then his neck. "You think I haven't punched through worse?" The battle that ensued rocked the coliseum.
Every strike Hammerhead landed echoed like thunder on steel. He moved with the speed of a he-beast half his size with the power of a siege weapon. When the golem adapted and began to absorb his force, Hammerhead switched tactics—channeling shockwaves through the floor, destabilizing its footing.
When the construct finally fell, the walls opened to reveal the next stage—an ancient treasure vault sealed by twelve layered traps, each requiring subtlety and knowledge of ancient mechanisms. Hammerhead sighed and tapped his comm-crystal. "Machkina. Bring your little tools and that genius brain. Got locks that need pickin'."
A moment later, a thin, long-fingered man with brass goggles and a pack of spiderlike machines stepped inside, on eight steam powered brass spider legs. "You break it, I fix it," Machkina muttered. "Again." Snake Man watched his rainbow tether slither toward him through the jungle, winding like a serpent. He didn't walk. He flowed, arms swaying as his limbs stretched and pulled him forward in slow pulses. His trial entrance was hidden beneath a grove of thorn-blossom trees, a narrow temple veiled by illusions.
Inside: a hall of reflection. Dozens of mirrored serpents watched him from the walls. A voice echoed.
"To command the serpent, you must become it." Snake Man smiled. "I already have." The mirrors began to shimmer—his own image, multiplied and turned against him.
Dozens of Snake Men, each wielding one of his five elemental serpents: flame, frost, poison, lightning, and shadow. He fought with twisting strikes and coiling dodges, his snakes slithering across his elongated limbs to strike at impossible angles! But the trial wasn't just combat—it was about self-mastery. Each duplicate represented a part of his soul he had not yet tamed.
One by one, he absorbed them, confronting inner truths and elemental limits. By the end, the mirrors shattered, revealing a serpent-shaped altar embedded with five elemental sockets. From behind him, his second-in-command slithered in—a woman covered in tattooed snakes, her eyes blind but glowing. "latch each of your serpents into the Altar and the next room shall unfold, Master."
Snake man marched up to the alter all five serpents lashing out, sinking their fangs deep into the altar infusing it with their elemental venoms. There was a shudder followed by a Clank sound and a whirring noise. The next room opened for Snake Man and his apprentice.
The forest parted at her presence. This trial didn't come to her—it unfolded beneath her. An illusion gate parted at her arrival, revealing a maze of glass walkways floating above a mist-filled chasm. "Speed and precision," she muttered, her wings fluttering like dragonfly blades. From above, spinning blade traps activated—hundreds of them, shifting faster the further she advanced. Faeluxe danced through the blade whirlwind, skipping from shard to shard, slicing through spectral wardens that manifested from the fog. Each defeated warden dropped a colored shard. Red. Blue. Violet. Behind Faeluxe, her three elite duelists followed, struggling to keep up.
They were winged like her, but none as fast. "Keep moving," she ordered. "If you can't keep up, fall back. This is my throne to claim." Faeluxe reached the heart of the maze: a blossom-shaped altar suspended midair, held aloft by converging air currents. She stabbed her sword into the center. A pulse of light exploded outward. The maze began to shift again—new pathways formed for the next stage of the trial, leading toward a winged citadel hanging in the clouds. Her smile sharpened.
"This inheritance... will finally give me what the sky courts denied." Back in the delta kings inheritance central spire, a set of celestial gears clicked into place. Somewhere deeper, a throne chamber stirred. Three lights on the inheritance map flared to life. Three pirate lords. Three keys being forged. And only one throne. The four of us stood shoulder-to-shoulder in the chamber beyond the underwater corridor, shaking the seawater from our limbs.
Captain Riggs took a knee beside an old iron torch brazier, brushing barnacle-crusted dust from a floor mosaic. "This isn't just a tomb. It's… ceremonial." The room was circular, built from black sea-stone veined with opal threads. Strange sea-worn statues lined the perimeter—warriors, kings, lovers, beggars. All staring inward toward a sealed vault door, crusted with rune-locks that shimmered barely visible in the light. "This door's not opening with brute force," Oria muttered, pushing a strand of wet hair from her cheek.
Felicity hissed under her breath. "I smell a trick. qi-sensitive glyphs, probably. Hidden ones."
"More than that," I said. Something about this chamber felt… thick. Stained with memory. Old memory.
The dream stag essence that joined my spirit body stirred. "Ash," Felicity said suddenly, her voice hushed. "This room remembers something." I closed my eyes and let mu intent flow. I reached for the gift I had never dared to touch until now. The air bent slightly around me—light slowing, deepening in hue. Sound faded into waterlogged silence.
''Dream Recall.'' I spoke the word as I opened my spirit man eyes. The chamber shifted—not into illusion, but echo. Phantom figures flickered into place. Ghosts. Memories.
Three long-dead figures stood where we now did: a masked pirate with a seven-fanged glaive, a woman in high robes marked with the Delta King's crest, and a third—someone resembling Oria but older, more severe. They weren't speaking, but their chi remembered. Their movements, exact. The robed woman tapped her staff to a statue's base—the glyph there ignited purple.
The masked pirate bowed before a beggar statue and touched his fingers to its eyes—another glyph activated. The third pressed her palm to a mural of a rising tide—a final glyph flared above the vault. And the door opened. I snapped out of the vision. The room returned to its quiet, barnacle-damp stillness. I turned to the others, my voice low and certain.
"There are hidden glyphs. Three, maybe more. We have to activate them in the same order the memory showed me." Oria nodded. "Then let's get to work." We began the glyph sequence challenge.
Following my instructions, each person carefully approached a statue.
I activated the first: a glyph hidden under the base of the warrior statue—I channeled my purple crackling qi through my palm and the glyph flared to life. Felicity danced to the second, curling her qi into violet ribbons that caressed the eyes of the beggar statue. It hissed open like a held breath.
Finally, Oria placed her hand on the tide mural. Her sea-dragoon blood shimmered against the stone, blending with the purple aura. The glyph ignited. The vault rumbled. The door groaned open, revealing a staircase spiraling up into a vast chamber of light and pressure. Felicity smiled and brushed a thumb against my jaw. "Your eyes went all strange when you used that, Ash. Dream-boy looked like a spirit god."
I laughed, but felt the Dream Stag stir again, quieter this time. Captain Riggs clapped me on the shoulder. "That gift of yours? It might just be the key to surviving what's coming." Meanwhile back on the west side of the Delta Pirate Kings floating Inheritance, was Hammerhead and his Mechanism master Machkina.
"Just open the damn door." Hammerhead stepped aside, cracking his neck as Machkina approached the sealed treasure vault. It had no visible keyhole, no runes—just dozens of jagged sea-sculpted indentations forming a jigsaw across its face. "Organic qi resonance pattern," Machkina mumbled to himself. "Tied to harmonic frequencies. Lovely." He clicked a whistle between his teeth. The spider-bots crawled over the surface of the vault, chirping and whirring, releasing bursts of sound that reverberated through the stone.
For a moment—nothing. Then a low groan, like something exhaling from the deep.
CLUNK.
The vault parted, stone slabs folding open like the jaws of a leviathan. Mist and golden glow spilled out. Inside: not piles of gold—but a raised pedestal, upon which floated a bizarre and ancient weapon. A sawfish snout blade, over six feet long—its edge jagged with coral-engraved teeth, each one inscribed with faded runic sigils. The handle was bone-wrapped, and as Hammerhead reached for it, the blade twitched toward him like a living creature scenting blood. Machkina whistled. "That's no ordinary relic. That's... forged from a grand sawfish lord's rostrum. Pre-Delta King era. Semi-sentient."
Hammerhead grinned, teeth wide as a shark's. "Now that's what I call a sword." As his fingers curled around the hilt, the blade pulsed—flesh meeting steel. A flare of red qi burst from his shoulders as the blade bound to his aura. Then—zing!—the saw teeth extended in a sudden ripple, and the entire weapon curved forward like a chainsaw-wake. A savage vrrr-vrrr-vrrr whine emanated from the weapon, whirring to life like it could chew through hulls, bone, or spirit alike.
Hammerhead swung it once through the air. The very air shrieked as the saw-teeth roared. "Yeah," he chuckled darkly, resting it over his shoulder. "I'm gonna eat every bastard in this castle alive." Machkina raised a brow. "You're welcome, by the way." "Put it on my tab," Hammerhead said, already walking toward the next chamber.