Metafiction (BL)

12. under the sea

A/N: Poll results were all uanimously for Dan to jump, lol.

P.S. In the beginning we had Dan more aware of polls as they happened. As the story progresses, polls will be more like the one in the last chapter, where they change the flow of the story whether Dan realizes it or not! I hope that makes for a more seamless reading experience with less immersion breaks...or something. Lol anyways, enjoy the outcomes of your choices, now and in the future! (For better or for worse...)

—

Dan could hear the panicked guards' voices, but it was Window's text that burned itself into his mind's eye:

IF HE DOESN'T SERVE A PURPOSE AS A LOVE INTEREST, HIS LIFE COULD VERY WELL BE FORFEIT.

Love was sweet, but here in this world of make-believe they made it all or nothing. Anyways, when it came to dying between him and the king, he was pretty sure he had better survival odds.

So Dan jumped.

There were a few seconds of terrifying, screaming-winds descent before he fell with a splash into the water. The icy embrace of the sea chilled him to his bones, numbing his senses to his surroundings. Dan forced himself to open his eyes and saw, between all the bubbles, the distant form of the king of Brog already swimming off into the waves.

Wait! He wanted to call out, but that was impossible underwater. He tried moving towards the man and soon realized, like General Orsic had feared, that he really couldn't swim at all.

With a gasp Dan broke through the surface of the ocean, treading water by instinct to stay afloat. The waves kept him strangely buoyant instead of dragging him down—Dan suspected this had something to do with his Bounty of the Sea, but he was too busy to bother with that now.

"Hey!" he shouted at the king plowing through the waves. "Stop!"

But the waves were too loud to hear him. Instead, Dan heard the shouts of the guards from above as they told him to hold on while they found help. This wouldn't do! At this rate, the rest of the castle would catch up with him before he ever caught up with the king. Dan looked around, but all about him were rocks and water with no boats in sight. Obviously this wasn't a safe spot for them to dock, but how was he supposed to get anywhere at this rate?!

As he struggled and thought, something bumped into his thigh. Dan startled and looked back, only to see three to five fins bobbing out of the water behind him.

Sharks?!

But then he heard something that sounded like a squeak, before one fin rose out from the waves to show a sleek gray body.

—

Some time later, Dan was surfing over the waves while hugging the dorsal fin of the lead dolphin he'd met in the waves. Things were definitely looking up...! Though he couldn't help sneezing because of the cold.

"You guys can understand me, right?" Dan asked while squinting at the single spot of brown that marked King Gravensleuth's hair some hundred feet ahead. "Don't lose that guy!"

Clicks and squeaks greeted him as the dolphins kept swimming to close the gap. Frankly, Dan was impressed: he didn't remember reading anything about this with the previous Saintess blessed by the sea. She could control water and waves with a flip of her hand, but she hardly talked to animals. Or maybe she never tried?

...since she was using her power while monsters were attacking the sea, maybe she thought it was better to stay quiet.

By the time King Gravensleuth finally stopped swimming, they had left the coastline far behind. Dan chanced a glance back at the castle and saw that it was just a distant speck on top of its cliff.