NOVEL NEXT Pirates Aren't The Only Ones You Need To Worry About
According to the map… We’ll have to move past one of the barracks before we get to the bridge.
The good thing was that we weren’t that far away from the bridge itself and quite a lot of the Mercs had chosen to board the ship further away than we did.
Additionally, if we were to infer from the map, the group of pirates we had encountered had been moving in the direction of the escape pods so those guys were intending to abandon their comrades still on the ship.
Amber had laughed and said that the pirate lord most likely already sabotaged the escape pods to blow themselves up since people like them despise deserters.
And as though on cue, just as we were reaching the barracks, the pirate lord’s voice came over the speakers.
“Everyone listen up! Those blasted Mercs and soldier dogs are on the ship! I know some of you fucking cowards are already thinking of running away but guess what? The escape pods are all rigged to blow when you try to escape in them! We’re standing our ground you fuckers! Make them pay for every inch of this ship and we’re not going to surrender to these bastards! Do you guys want to rot in a jail cell for the rest of your life or go out in a blaze of glory and have them fear your name?! You’re part of my crew you bastards! Make them all pay!!”
The speakers then went silent.
Amber gave me a look, “Sounds like he’s compensating for something if you ask me.”
I shrugged and was just about to enter the barracks when voices from inside stopped me.
“This is bullshit! Are you telling me we can’t even run if we wanted to?!”
“Well fuck this! We either get killed by those Mercs or we get killed by boss huh?!”
“This isn’t what I signed up for!”
“Bloody hell! I’m still a virgin you know?! I don’t want to die before I lose my V card!! Hey, do you like dicks?”
“Hey! Get the fuck away from me! Why the fuck are you taking off your pants right now?! No! No! Don’t come over here! Stop! Stop! Stooooop!!”
I then activated the door and braced myself as it slid open silently.
That was one hurdle cleared because if the door had made a lot of noise, we would have alerted them to our presence.
I placed a finger on my lips to show Amber that we should keep silent before I entered the barracks cautiously, hiding behind a bunk bed that was on our immediate right.
The pirates that were in the room were still arguing amongst themselves and two guys were trying to pull a half naked pirate away from trying to pull down the pants of another pirate.
Looking around, I found our exit diagonally opposite of us which required us to either go through the crowd of pirates that numbered at least twenty, or move around the perimeter of the room to avoid them.
The centre of the room seemed to have been thrashed by the pirates so there was just a pile of trash over there that prevented anyone from going through it, which meant that all the usable beds were pushed up against the four walls of the room.
The good news was that the pirates were concentrated in one corner of the room and the trash in the centre would provide an obstacle to their line of sight while we were in the opposite corner..
I turned to Amber and whispered, “I think we can just sneak past them.”
She raised an eyebrow, “Really? I thought we would be going in guns blazing and everything.”
“I guess we could do that too but it’s not like we have to kill every single pirate on the ship right? Our main target is the pirate lord himself.”
“Eh? Are we not looting everyone?”
I grinned, “Well you see… We can grab the pirate lord first, then make our way back to our ship and then loot them on the way. The other Mercs would have already helped us clear the other pirates so we could also loot them afterwards too! And besides, what we can loot here might be of less value than capturing the pirate lord himself because we can also get him to tell us where his treasures are being hidden!”
Amber chuckled, “Tera, you are an absolute genius~”
“Well, let’s go then. We don’t even know if we can sneak past the barracks in the first place and end up shooting them up anyway.”
She raised her two pistols, “I’m ready either way~”
I nodded at her and we began sneaking across the hallway, keeping out of sight of the pirates that were in a debate on what they should actually do.
Well, so far so good.
We don’t even need to worry about being seen over here since we have that pile of trash blocking them from seeing us anyway. It’s only at the final part where we have to reach the door that we have to worry about being seen.
In fact, we don’t even need to be worrying about being quiet because the pirates were making way more noise over there which would have drowned out any accidental noises we could make.
Just as we were turning the corner of the pile of trash however, I bumped into something which made me fall backwards and I would have hit the ground had Amber not reached out to catch me.
At the same time, her hand shot forward and pointed her pistol ahead of me, right as another pistol was shoved towards us.
Everyone froze and I looked at what I bumped into, realising that it was another Merc with his buddy behind him.
Ironically, both of us were mirroring each other right now.
The other side pulled back his weapon first before Amber pulled back hers, taking a moment to ensure I was steady before letting go of me.
The Mercenary I had bumped into jerked his thumb behind him and whispered, “If you’re thinking of finding the pirate bastard in the bridge, we’ve already searched there… He’s not there anymore.”
I raised an eyebrow and whispered back, “Thanks for telling us but… Why are you helping us though?”
“Because there’s someone else over there that’s much more--”
Before he could finish his words, I saw the door we had planned to go through slide open and a large sized man that barely fit the doorway stepped into the barracks brazenly.
He was holding what looked like an actual minigun with the bullets connected on a chain to a backpack he was wearing. And no, he was not in a power armour.
At first I thought he was a pirate until the other pirates in the room noticed him and let out a shout of alarm.
“Who the fuck is that?!”
“What the hell is even that?!”
“Is that a monster?!”
“Merc!!”
A few of the pirates picked up their weapons and started shooting at the giant guy, only to have their bullets burned away or deflected by a domed shield that covered him.
There was a loud whirring sound as the minigun in his hands revved up and he spun to face the pirates with a casual air.
Several of them had enough sense to dive for cover while the others were either still too absorbed in figuring out what the guy was or were busy shooting at him.
A high pitched whine then reverberated around the room as the large sized man fired his minigun in an arc, completely obliterating any pirates that were in his line of fire.
One of the pirates even got cut into half by the bullets at the waist, the two halves of his body dropping to the ground in two different directions.
The Merc that I had bumped into paled and shouted at me, “Run! That bastard doesn’t care if you’re a Merc or pirate! He already killed three Mercs at the bridge just for being in the way!”
He then ran towards the door that we came from with his partner hot on his heels, not even trying to be sneaky anymore.
I looked at Amber and we both nodded at the same time, prompting us to run towards the door as well while that minigun guy was mowing the pirates down like wheat before a scythe.
A few of the pirates tried to charge towards him when his line of fire passed over where they had been, thinking that he would be too slow to swing the gun back to point at them.
He then released his right hand on the minigun before pointing his fist at the pirates, the top of the arm suddenly opening up to reveal a gun barrel.
A projectile was shot out from the barrel and hit one of the pirates in the chest before it exploded, revealing that this guy had a grenade launcher installed in his arm too.
Holy shit… This guy is crazy!
Should we be more worried about the other Mercs or the pirate lord?!!