Tales of the Pearly Kingdom (Pearly Tales Vol. 2)

117. The Nightmare Raid Team

Kadoka stood proudly in front of the class in the magically reinforced training room. "Alright class, since I have Dakota here with me today, we are going to talk about effectively in a party." She puffed her chest out as Dakota stood perfectly at attention next to her.

"Both Kadoka and I have high-powered dangerous abilities. It is important to work as a team." Dakota said.

"Dakota is an uncontrollable berserker with area buffs and debuffs."

"And Kadoka is a cool-headed mage who specializes in high powered attack magic over a wide area and leadership."

"It is absolutely essential that we are in sync. Even if Dakota goes on a rampage every time he changes." Kadoka said.

"I am still required to be mindful of not only my party's needs but also utilize the environment to better optimize my passive abilities." Dakota said.

"In order to illustrate our points, we have invited some of our crew, Don from upstairs, and Sieg in order to aid us in our demonstration." Kadoka pointed at the door and four of the pirate crew, Don, and Sieg entered.

"I can do enough magic for this without releasing my limiter and transforming, will you lot stand over there?" Dakota motioned the gathered assistants to the middle of the room.

"Okay crew, you know what to do." Kadoka shouted and they all drew they swords.

"First, a simple buff for our allies." Dakota held out his hand and the swords of the pirates and Sieg began to glow with blue light.

"This spell adds freezing damage to their weapons." Kadoka explained. "Notice how Don's sword has remained unchanged. He is going to be the enemy in this scenario. It is very important to be aware of ally and foe. Every battle plan should start before the battle itself, and distinguishing friend from foe from bystander is important. Also, not every bystander is a non-combatant. We will get into that part later."

"Next a simple debuff, please Don hold up your hand." Dakota cast another spell and Don's hands and feet coated with frost.

"A simple Buff and debuff combination. Never underestimate the mingling of magics like this. If your attack is twice as strong, and their defense twice as weak, then you do four times as much."

"You must also be aware of area effects they can effect both ally and enemy." Dakota stomped on the ground and everything froze over except where the students were.

The four pirates began to skate around as if it were more natural to skate on the ice then walk. However, both Sieg and Don struggled to remain on their feet.

"As you can see we have changed the environment, even though our four seasoned crewmates are four different types of elementals, they use the change of environment to their advantage. Sieg and Don, who are unused to this way of fighting are at a disadvantage despite Sieg being a friend and Don a foe." Kadoka explained.

"Then let's say that Kadoka uses a wind blast." Dakota said.

"A perfectly non-lethal ability." Kadoka manifested her wings and flapped them.

"Watch as the knocks over both Sieg and Don who are unsteady on their feet, in the meantime the pirates were all ready for it and used the gust of wind to increase their speed. This is a more complex type of buff and debuff system that relies on the combination of my environment changing magic, the simple flapping of Kadoka's wings, and the preparedness, experience, and ingenuity of our crew." Dakota explained.

"Notice how lack of communication, and oversight can be just as damaging to your allies as your foes if you are not careful. However, if my crew should choose to strike Don they are at significant advantage." Kadoka stated.

"We are a raid party. The elite warriors that fight opponents bigger, stronger, and faster than any single one of us. Sometimes they are so much more numerous we can't even count them."

"We are built to be out-numbered by bigger, stronger, faster opponents, and still come out on top." Kadoka puffed out her chest.

"Consider this: Kadoka and I were able to make our team significantly stronger with only a few simple spells, but our team out there aren't just brutes with fancy footwork and pointy knives." Dakota pointed at the four pirates each of them held up an orb of their respective element.

"If they cast just one spell each [Silence] [haste][reflect][magic boost]. Consider how much more powerful we'd be as a unit before we even started fighting?" Kadoka pointed each of the pirates and they made a flashy but harmless show with magic.

"Our crew is twenty-four strong. Each working in sync with one another. We become more than just a sum of our parts. And that's all before we consider attack magic, flanking, and fancy combinations." Dakota nodded.

"That's only the beginning over how terrifying we are. A single attack can do some damage, but when you combine say... a fire attack with a wind attack the power and range of the attack is significantly increased. Consider the potential if every attack helped our allies, put our enemies at a disadvantage, and combined with an ally's attack to become stronger." Kadoka gave a wicked grin.

"Every sword swing, every spell, every movement, every breeze, every wave, every drop of bloodlust." Dakota's evil smile matched his sister. Until this moment they seemed like complete opposites, they didn't match as twins at all except for the way they were able to teach as one. But now the bloody confidence they had in themselves was clear.

"And that is still only scratching the surface." Kadoka grew into a six-foot-tall glowing woman with flaming wings.

Dakota pulled out his mask and slipped it on while the four Pirate elementals stood on either side of them as glowing skeletal pirates of pure elemental fury. Dakota turned into a frightening smoking monster of ice and driftwood. His voice was sinisterly low and eerie when he spoke. "And that's why we are called..."

"""~The Nightmares~""" The pirates all said at once with a terrifying resonance that sent the worst kind of chills down the spines of the students and strangled their souls with six icy hands. 

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A/N

Ahoy crew,

Two things. One, normally I don't like to post so many chapters so close together. It messes with my schedule and numbers game you have to play with the wattpad algorithm. But I promised this chapter when we hit our goal and it's a little shorter so it fills in nicely as an extra for a day with two Pearly Kingdom chapters... it will be three if we hit ten Patreon Pirates.

Two, that said, here are the shout outs to the crew who made this possible.

Pirate Boatswain De Smiley, who can't hold a tune but can hold their ale. They out drank a crowd at the last tavern and got away with more coin than when they entered.

The Pirate Gunner Alfie9261, who hasn't missed a single shot with pistol or cannon since the day their mama let them loose on the world. Our gunner hit the side of the lock on a treasure chest we placed on the beach from the ship just right so that the lock came off and the booty wasn't damaged.

And Finally, Captain of the Fleet Colton Douglas who joined our illustrious band of renegades after nabbing a ship from the dock all by his lonesome to prove he had what it took to not sail with us but Captain his own ship... literally. The faces on the rowdy jerks form the pubs were priceless when they learned he not only stole their ship but every pair of pants they owned.

We're shaping up to have a proper deck full of misfits, I like it. At 10 Patreon Pirates there will be another extra chapter for both Foxtails and Pearly Tales.

Thanks everyone who are showing their support by reading, and those that joined the crew to make this extra chapter a reality.

May the winds of fortune ever fill your sails.

-The Captain