The Dao of Magic

107 - Wave

"AND STAY AWAY, YOU SCALED PUSSIES!!!" Roaring her lungs out, Angeta looks at the retreating group of dragons while wildly throwing petrified strands of seaweed after them. Her frenzied motions slow down as the last winged lizard disappears from sight.

Bord saunters to the aft deck of the ship and pats the exhausted beast girl on her back. "You can regrow your tail again. Don't worry."

Angeta's fist snaps back, stopping only centimetres in front of Bord's face. The green flames of fury in her pupils dim a little as she slumps down and starts caressing the small stump. "I KNOW I can grow it back, that's not the fucking point, Bord."

"Did you retract the qi from it?" Angeta turns pale under her fur when she hears Ket's question. "I guess that's a no, then."

He rubs his eyes, his dark circles turning a single shade darker as the implications hit him. "We will need to tell Teach when he comes back. Not it!"

One by one, they all shout "Not it!". Ares looks around befuddled, realization dawning much too late. She frantically looks around, searching for Rhea. Her face falls when she fails to find the dragoness.

"Anyone seriously injured still?" Vox looks around through half-lidded eyes. He touches the still bleeding stump of Angeta'tail, sealing the wound with small rays of light. Dodging the irritated beast woman's swipe, he crawls to the middle of the deck and lies down. "So tired. Using all my qi is stupid... Wake me when... ZZzzz"

"This was stupid." Bord frowns as he looks around. The draconic siege left much of the ship in tatters, the pristine hull and deck now once again marred with a wide variety of elemental damages. The deck has a large collection of indented footprints and cracks running through it, some planks are missing and the railing is missing in some places.

"Teach is gonna be pissed again." Tess is rubbing her eyes as she slumps her shoulders.

"Lola, distract him while we tell him the bad news?" Selis holds a tired rabbit in the air, looking at it with big, blue, pleading eyes.

Meanwhile, Angeta keeps rubbing her butt and the deck. Her tail starts lengthening at an incredibly slow pace as the deck under her fingers mends itself back together even slower. She sighs deeply. "I can't do much without changing my cultivation base but I can keep us floating. What do we do now?"

"I'm not sure why, but I think it's more likely that Teach and Re-Haan are that way. The numbers are higher in that direction." Ket points to the side while frowning.

"Yeah, Teach and Ré are over there."

Ket throws a glance towards Bord and nods. He then turns the wheel, causing the limping ship to change direction.

⁂

I can move around again! I sit up while gingerly running a hand across my belly. My skin turns into a white, glossy sheet of qi in a roughly circular shape. Beneath it, the outlines of muscles and organs are now solid enough not to tear apart when I move. The single-celled sheets have multiplied into a rough network, keeping everything together. My stomach is about as sturdy as a normal human's now.

Fully healed, it should be the same sturdiness as an Abrams tank composite armour. The planetary defence system sure did a number on me. My suspicions about this planet being someone's pet project have been pretty much confirmed. No normal planet has a dantian crippling satellite railgun network, I'm pretty sure.

This planet's theme is order versus chaos, I think. I want to explore the other continent to confirm this.

Alright, enough introspective mumbling. Let's see how the world is doing. I spread my senses through the portal in Tree and feel a heavy pressure. I shoot strands of qi through into the real world and make a rough scan.