The group mowed through the invading groups of pirate goblins with relative ease, but there seemed to be no end to them. The more goblins they killed, the more steel eggs full of them rained from the sky, and to make things worse, the Ark started to list to the side.

Faster than killing them, Sofia started to transform the goblins in her range into bone urchins making it very hard for them to do anything.

“Halloooo! It’s your captain speaking to you!” Love’s voice resonated throughout the Ark, “Due to heavy structural damage, the Ark is currently sinking! Please evacuate right away! You will find the evacuation ships on the lowest level, be quick before it’s flooded!”

The group exchanged a few glances, and they all jumped into a hole left by a steel egg that led directly to the next level, then rather than to try to find the way down, Kuli punched through the floor.

Oh wow!

On the lowest level of the Ark were tens of full-on galleons lined up on each side, bow toward the walls. Multiple other teams were already on other boats, quickly unfurling the sails and preparing to depart.

To make us take those when most people here can fly… And considering the name of the event, the boat could end up being very important.

Sofia quickly scanned the room, trying to see if any boat was better than the others, but asides from the ones already damaged by the debris of the Ark gradually falling apart, they were all more or less the same.

“I can operate those,” Kuli said, jumping right onto the closest ship, “someone cut the mooring lines and open the side wall, quick!”

Pareth jumped on the ship too, helping with the sails, while Mornn started to cut the several ropes tying the galleon to the interior of the Ark.

Sofia ran up to the bow of the boat and looked at the wall. It was clear it could be opened somehow, but there was no obvious mechanism anywhere.

Thick wall… No enchantment… Hmm, gears? Where does this lead…

With her mana senses, Sofia found the way to open the gate by following the internal mechanism, it was a weight-activate mechanism. The ship was on some kind of large wooden cradle, allowing it to stay upright despite being out of the water, the gate would open by itself once it was lifted off of the cradle.

I see, I don’t actually need to do anything.

Sofia jumped up to the deck, joining the others, just as Kuli finished pulling off the ropes to deploy the last sail.

“Couldn’t open the gate?” she asked.

“The Ark is flooding,” Sofia said, “give it a minute, the side will open by itself when the water starts floating the ship.”

“But we’re already good to go,” Mornn said, “We’re wasting time, let’s just blow open the side and leave!”

Sofia stopped her, “Wait, no need, maybe. Think you can lift the ship with your gravity powers? This should open it.”

“Easy!”

Mornn raised her sword, and Sofia felt the Saintess’ mana start to spread around the ship, latching onto it like an invisible hand. With the sound of wood cracking here and there, slowly the galleon started to rise.

Everyone heard a loud clunk coming from below, and a large rectangle in the side of the Ark started to open, sliding outwards and up with the sound of rotating gears, amidst the chaos of the steel eggs constantly raining and wrecking havoc upon the Ark. Further to their right, another gate was ‘opened’, kicked into a wide hole by Tartaros.

“Onwards!” Mornn shouted as she controlled the boat through the air, making it fly through the opening. Outside, they were still a few meters above sea level.

“Let the ship down as soon as you can,” Kuli told her, “It’s getting damaged.”

When it was fully out, Mornn carefully brought the galleon down, while Sofia and Pareth observed the situation on the sea. It was no exaggeration to say that the Ark was completely surrounded by a huge fleet of goblin ships, larges misshapen hunks of steel that somehow

still floated, and were sending more and more steel eggs to board the Ark.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

That’s at least a hundred ships just on this side. Are we supposed to destroy them all?

When the galleon finally hit the water with a splash, the entire group received a system notification.

[You have reached the first checkpoint! Vote on a perk for your vessel!]

[Ties will be picked randomly.]

[You will receive a perk for every checkpoint reached, the number of available choices is random each time between two and five.]

[Available perks (4) :

* Hull Strength +100%

* Sailing Speed +100%

* Manual Side Cannons

* Automatic Hull Repair +1%/s]

“Durability?” Mornn asked Kuli.

“No need, I’ll strengthen it with bones!” Sofia jumped in, “We don’t really need cannons either, let’s take the speed!”

“Neh! Speed it is! Get to work with your bones! Mornn you try to locate the next checkpoint whatever it is, Pareth I let you take care of any incoming goblin eggs!” Kuli ordered everyone before jumping up to the helm to steer the ship.

“Yes captain!” Sofia answered with a smile, stating to unload tons of bones onto the deck.

[Your group has unanimously voted for the ‘Sailing Speed’ perk!]

[Your vessel speeds up!]

Despite the wind hitting the sails not changing, the galleon start to pick up some speed, moving away from the Ark. The closest goblin ship was several kilometers out, as they were in a wide circle around the Ark.

Mornn flew up into the sky and back down, “I think I found it! There’s a bright column of light behind a gigantic goblin ship, but it’s on the other side of the Ark!

“How gigantic are we talking about?” Kuli asked.

“It almost looks like a mountain,” Mornn answered as she landed next to her.

“We might get bonus points for destroying it. Stand at the bow and prepare to charge your signature skill, we’re going!”

“Good call.”

“I could bolt it,” Sofia suggested from the deck, but Kuli shut her down immediately.

“Focus on your bones for now! This is regular wood, this shit will break at the first impact!”

“It’ll take me a few minutes!” Sofia answered back, starting to spread a thin layer of bone all over the galleon’s hull both from the inside and the outside. The galleon was quite large, so covering it entirely would take a bit, but it would be pretty easy to make the layer of bone thicker after that by just melding and spreading more of her reserves into it.

Too bad I don’t have a way to make it a skeleton…

Love’s energetic voice could still be heard coming from inside the Ark, “A few groups are already at large! Hurry up everyone, the Ark is sinking fast!”

A few seconds later, as the galleon progressively got farther from the ark and started to turn, Sofia heard a faint whistling sound from above. She looked up, three goblin boarding eggs were falling straight toward the ship.

Three at once?

The others also looked up.

“Sofia you keep working, we take care of that!” Kuli ordered from the wheel.

I mean… Sure…

“Do I need to summon anything?” Bookie asked, standing next to Sofia with Pestle still sitting on his head.

Sofia shook her head, “I’m sure we’ll have our time to shine later. Just enjoy the ride for now,” she answered with a calm smile, not even looking at her teammates intercepting the goblin eggs.

Pareth had summoned a large club of light and smashed one of the eggs right as it was about to land, crushing it and sending it flying hundreds of meters aways from the ship, killing all the goblins inside in one strike. Kuli had jumped up at the last second, and given the second egg the [Crushing palm] treatment, the steel egg stopping mid-air for a second when she hit it before being sent flying so fast it disappeared over the horizon. Mornn took care of the last goblin group, simply rising a hand as the steel egg was about to crash on the ship right behind her. It was like the egg hit an invisible ground right above the deck. It was instantly flattened into a bloody goblin omelet.

The galleon slowly but surely started to be overrun by Sofia’s bones. Using some of her reserves of Lumian bones to make it even stronger, the bones even crept up the masts and around anything that could stand to get reinforced. Sofia was worried that it might slow down the ship, but despite unloading several tons of bone already she had yet to see any difference, so she kept going. Just a bit more and we won’t have to worry even if those eggs hit the ship! This is why it matters to have large reserves!

With the ship being highly boned, Sofia could even start to steer it and give it a bit more speed with her specialization, even though for such a big entity she couldn’t exert much force.

“And the last remaining intact ship is out! Sorry for those who have not managed to leave in time, the event stops here for you! Please enjoy a nice swim in Gamma-b-13’s Gobliath-infested water!”

Gobliaths?

Sofia felt an enormous amount of mana surging from the depths far behind her. She looked back, it was under the Ark.

The thing produced a deafening wail, and two huge maws surged from the sea, one on each side of the Ark, displacing so much water that it was hard to even see. The maws snapped shut, and the creature sunk back into the depths just as it had come, leaving behind only the front and back end of ark, slowly sinking, the entire middle section having disappeared, just like that. That left a huge wave that spread in all directions.

Gobliaths. Noted.

Unimpressed by the spectacle, Kuli kept yelling orders, “I’m lining up the ship. Hold on tightly and brace for impact!”