Chapter 15 - Stranded at Sea(Part 2)

Point-of-View: X

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Okay, now that's it's getting closer...I can see that that's definitely a ship! As I got within ten meters of my position, I swiftly jumped off my makeshift raft and swam towards the ship as fast as I could, with a rising sense of hope and relief...this'll probably be my only chance to get out of this situation, I can't afford to miss this!

I drew out two daggers and jammed them into the side of the ship, before lifting myself up and climbing up bit by bit using the daggers...this is a pretty big ship, and based on the shape, it's a cruise ship...it's pretty likely that there might be a lot of people on board.

Eh, whatever, I'll just kill them all, I've got some serious pent-up rage right now, and I gotta take it out on someone. This looks like a modern ship, so the controls will probably be computerized, meaning that even an amateur can steer it...in other words, I have no reason to spare a single person.

Oh, wait...even if it is computerized, I have no idea how to steer a ship, so guess I'll have to spare at least one or two members of the crew. Yeah, I'm starting to think that I'm kinda delirious right now, from being in the cold water for so long. After I kill everyone on board, I'm gonna need a warm shower and a nap...

"Wh-what the-...!? Who are you!? Where did you come from!?" Someone exclaimed in Swedish...looks like a crew member, based on his outfit.

There were a bunch of people lounging about, staring at me in bewilderment. Wow, this is quite a swanky ship...that means these must be all rich assholes, no one's going to miss the likes of them. I turned my attention to the crew member who had reacted when I jumped on board, a smirk spreading on my face as I responded in Swedish...

"Oh, who I am isn't important...you should be more worried about staying alive," I remarked as I drew out my daggers, the passengers screaming as I flung one at him, hitting him right between the eyes.

Nice, even with my body all frozen and my mind kinda messed up, my aim is as accurate as ever. Now, then...time for a massacre!

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About an hour later, nearly everyone on board was dead, their bodies tossed overboard to avoid any rotting stench. All the passengers were middle-aged to old rich people, so I had no problem murdering them all. Though in my current mood, even if there had been children or whatever on board, I probably wouldn't have spared them.

I had temporarily spared the captain though, since I needed someone to steer the shit for me.

"Wh-who are you?" Stuttered the captain in fear.

Oh, and I speak ten languages, I had a ton of free time between missions for Eden, since I was held in a locked cell, and I used that free time to study up, out of sheer boredom. I wasn't allowed any electronics, but I was allowed to have books, so yeah.

I studied geography, learnt random general knowledge and trivia, and most significantly right now, I also learnt to speak nine new languages. Though, well, my pronunciations weren't that great, since I only had books to study with, so I had to guess for the most part...

"Shut it, I'm the one asking the questions," I responded, as I hungrily munched on some prawns and cheese, "First off, where's this ship headed to and from where?"

"It's a c-cruise, we started from Finland, we were last in the Svalbard archipelago, and currently heading to Greenland!"

Oh, well that's convenient...also, I can't believe the nerve of that bastard Neo, he seriously dropped me in the middle of the Arctic Ocean!?

I've been to Greenland on an assignment before, and I know of an Eden base there, guess I'll head over there and reveal that I'm still alive...sure, I could run away from Eden, and I definitely want to, but if I ever seriously consider doing so and take action towards accomplishing that, I'll die on the spot. The only reason I do Eden's bidding is because of this stupid Dark Skill spell that's been cast on me.

The caster was a deep-kept secret of Eden, and revealing any details about him would also result in my death. The technique he used on me is known as Dark Skill: Condition. I don't know all the exact details of how it works, but based on the effects cast on me, it basically places something like a curse on the person that it's cast onto, and breaking the Condition activates the curse.

In my case, it'll activate and kill me if I betray Eden, which includes stuff like intentionally revealing sensitive information about Eden, attacking a member of Eden without justifiable cause or running away, stuff like that. I didn't exactly like being bound by something like this, but I don't want to die either...my life has been pretty shitty till this point, but even so, I've never really desired death.

Well, anyway, until I get to Greenland, I might as well enjoy whatever amenities this ship has to offer, I feel like I deserve something nice after the past day or so.

I then turned my attention back to the captain, causing him to flinch and shrink back in fear...

"Hey, how long till we get to Greenland?"

"Th-three days, a-at most."

"I see. Alright, get us there, but take your time, I want to enjoy this for as long as I can...instead of three, make it four days. Do your job as I say and I'll spare you," I lied, despite having no intention of letting him live once this is over.

"Y-yes, of course!" He cried in response, a glimmer of hope in his eyes.

Aw, I almost feel bad for him. Almost. But not really.

"Alright, guess I'll go explore this place and find myself a nice room," I muttered to myself as I began to leave, before stopping and asking him, "Oh, by the way...where do you keep the booze on this ship?"

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This is pretty great...top-shelf liquor, needlessly fancy food and insanely luxurious facilities. About thirty-six hours had passed since I climbed on board this shop, and I felt like I was living the life.

Also, I was kinda regretting massacring everyone on board, should have spared another crew member to wait on me...and among the passengers, there has been a few hotties, maybe I could have spared a couple of them to hook up with.

I've been a tool of Eden since I was around eighteen, and I'm now around twenty-six or twenty-seven, though I look around sixteen or seventeen. When I was twelve, I was kidnapped, tortured and experimented on by a deranged Eden lunatic for about five years, which seems to have stunted my physical growth.

Eventually, the Eden higher ups found out about what he was doing and executed him, because such experimentation was apparently forbidden. It's one of the few things that both Eden and Harmony agree on; creating unnatural Meta-Humans by awakening the dormant Meta gene in regular humans by force is forbidden.

Both Eden and Harmony severely disapprove of unnatural Meta-Humans, so I was to be executed too. But once they found out what my power was, they reluctantly let me live. They then trained me with merciless harshness, there were several times where I thought I was going to die.

Eventually, by the time I was twenty-two or twenty-three, the hellish training was over, as the Eden higher ups were satisfied with my capabilities at that point. They had sharpened a tool and were ready to use it. Initially, they sent me out as backup to other members whenever there was a clash against Neo, since they had very few other Meta-Humans that could actually fight him without falling into his damned portals.

And since I was disposable, they had no problem sending me out. Though even as they began grudgingly acknowledging my capabilities, they never gave me any degree of freedom in between assignments. No, my freedom was taken away the moment I was cursed with the condition to never betray them.

In between missions and assignments, I was locked away in a small room with nothing to do. Initially, they rejected most of my requests for entertainment, like books, game consoles or laptops, but they eventually gave me some books...which included geography & economics books, trivia & random fact books, a bunch of dictionaries in other languages, to name a few.

I ended up spending most of my free time engrossed in those books, which served me well during missions, so they ended up supporting those efforts and gave me more reading material that they felt would make me more useful to them, and they mostly helped me learn other languages.

But after they did that, it felt more like a chore than something to pass the time, so learning new languages started to bore me too.

It got to a point where, after a while, I actually began looking forward to getting sent on missions, because to a small extent, I got to do as I please, so long as I completed my task. The incident that scattered the Meta-Orbs was the first time I failed to accomplish my mission, and now, I've failed to retrieve the Outlier that I was sent to capture.

No telling what they'll do to me when I get back, so I might as well enjoy this cruise while I can. This is definitely the most I've relaxed since-...well, maybe ever. I don't really remember much of anything about my life from before I was captured by that maniac who tortured me.

Whenever I've gotten the chance, I have had bits of fun here and there on some of my past, lengthy assignments. I just couldn't help myself. There were just so many things that I had never done before at the time when I first started getting sent out on Eden's commands, though I didn't start taking my time with missions till like, maybe, the fifth or sixth one.

Some of my missions involved staking out potential Harmony members and assassinating them, which could sometimes take a few days, since intel gathering would also be a regular part of my assignments. So, yeah, I'd sneak off in the middle for a bit and go have some fun.

A lot of things that were normal, everyday experiences for most people, were firsts for me at the time. Drinking alcohol and smoking, I found both pretty disgusting initially, though I've come to like getting drunk after a while, it feels nice, so long as I don't drink too much...cigarettes are gross though, I don't see why I'd intentionally get addicted to something that tastes so bad.

About sixteen months ago, I got laid for the first time, found a male escort service while on a mission and figured why not, right? It was okay the first time, couldn't really focus on it since I was kinda nervous. Got laid three times since then, and it felt better and better each time, I can see why people do it so much when they have the opportunity to.

Last year, on a particularly long mission, I snuck off to an amusement park and tried cotton candy for the first time, and more than any of the other things I've done or tried in the past few years, for some reason, that's the experience that's stuck with me the most.

I don't know why, but when I took a bite and the sugary cloud melted in my mouth, I felt overcome with emotion, and before I knew it or could even understand why, I was crying, tears pouring down my face as if I was a little kid.

I mean, it's not like I hadn't had any sweets before that, I'd tried chocolates and cakes and stuff, and those were pretty surreal experiences too, but nothing compared to what I felt when I had the cotton candy, it felt almost...nostalgic?

I still don't understand what I felt back then, but either way, there's no point in trying to figure it out. No matter what I do, nothing will ever change for me. There's no doubt in my mind that I'll be a pawn of Eden till the day I die...

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