Chapter 2: Blunts, Barnacles, and Bloody Waters

The Salty Serpent creaked like a stoned grandpa trying to remember where he left his slippers.

Johnny sat wedged between two leaking barrels and what he prayed wasn’t a sack of expired reef shrimp. The hold reeked of salt, old wood, mildew, and someone’s aggressively herbal cologne—which, judging by the coughing noises in the shadows, might have been a crewman hotboxing behind the spare anchor.

He adjusted his satchel on his lap, the soft crinkle of Budget Blaze #3 reassuringly loud against the groaning ship. Somewhere above, gulls screamed like they’d just lost a bet. The Salty Serpent lurched forward with all the enthusiasm of a hungover tortoise, and Johnny decided he’d had enough of the below decks for now.

He ducked his head to avoid a low-hanging beam and climbed the ladder to the deck, where the morning air hit him like a slap made of brine, bong smoke, and bird poop.

Sunlight glittered off the water in sharp shards, bouncing off the patchwork sails that fluttered like badly repaired festival flags. The crew milled about in practiced chaos—hauling ropes, swearing at ropes, arguing with ropes—while the ship itself moaned with every wave like it was regretting its life choices.

Johnny found a relatively clean spot by the railing and leaned on it, letting the ocean wind slap some clarity into his face. Pot Bay was already fading behind them, swallowed by haze and morning mist, its skyline of twisted chimneys and leaning towers just a memory wrapped in smoke.

He sparked the end of his Budget Blaze and took a long, rough drag.

It tasted like burnt sugar, seawater, and a decision he was already second-guessing.

“Careful with that one,” came a voice nearby. “Burns fast. Kinda like our rudder.”

Johnny turned to see the halfling again—Tumbler, standing barefoot on a coil of rope, one hand shading his eyes, the other balancing a carved pipe shaped like a sea serpent eating its own tail.

“Didn’t take you for a hold-dweller,” Johnny said, exhaling a curl of smoke that tried to form a thumbs-up before dissolving into the wind.

“Only when I need a nap or a good cry,” Tumbler replied with a grin. “Up here's where the good stories happen—and the good weed gets shared.”

Johnny lifted the joint in offering. “Budget Blaze. Tastes like betrayal.”

Tumbler took a whiff and made a face. “Smells like a wizard’s wet sock. I like it.”

They smoked in silence for a moment, letting the wind tousle their hair and the ship complain beneath their feet. The ocean stretched in every direction, a wide green-blue canvas dotted with foam and the occasional distant bird who looked like it had seen too much.

Johnny finally spoke. “Ever been to the north?”

Tumbler took another hit, eyes narrowing. “Been to a lotta places. North’s tricky. Cold air don’t like warm blood. But I know folk. Captains, smugglers, ice-fishers who swear their boat talks to ‘em when the weed’s strong enough.”

Johnny raised an eyebrow. “Your boat ever talk to you?”

Tumbler tapped the pipe against the railing and shrugged. “Once. But it was just telling me I left my stash in the galley oven.”

Johnny chuckled and leaned back against the mast, the sea stretching endlessly ahead.

The wind carried with it the scents of kelp, hemp rope, and faint memories of coconut smoke drifting from a long-forgotten island.

The adventure had truly begun.

Tumbler sprawled onto a coil of hemp rope like it was a throne carved from seaweed and laziness. He pulled a small tin from his satchel—engraved with arcane symbols, stickers that said “Keep Calm and Puff On,” and what appeared to be a burn mark shaped suspiciously like a goblin’s middle finger.

He popped the lid.

Inside was a meticulous arrangement of pre-rolls, crushed flower, and a small water pipe shaped like a pufferfish mid-sneeze.

“Allow me to introduce you,” Tumbler said, holding it up with reverence, “to The Blowfish Bong. It’s portable, temperamental, and might bite your lip if you’re rude.”

Johnny leaned in. “You travel with that?”

“Of course,” Tumbler said. “I don’t trust ships that don’t let me bring my own glassware.”

He packed a fresh bowl from a jar labeled Seafoam Sherbert and lit it with a match struck against his boot. The bowl bubbled with effort, exhaling a puff of minty sea breeze and diesel funk.

“You first,” he said, passing it.

Johnny took the bowl and inhaled.

It hit smooth—too smooth. Then like an unexpected jellyfish to the throat, the second wave hit: icy, heady, with a tingle behind the eyes like sea salt and secrets.

Johnny wheezed.

Tumbler cackled. “She bites!”

They passed the bowl back and forth, each hit peeling away layers of tension, paranoia, and whatever dignity Johnny still clung to after being mugged in an alley and booked into the fish-scented corner suite of the Serpent.

“So…” Johnny coughed. “You said you know people?”

Tumbler puffed thoughtfully and exhaled a ring that tried and failed to become a dolphin. “Depends what kind of people. I know smugglers who only speak in haiku. Herbal assassins from the Sativa Sages. A woman in Luna Nexus who sells black-market munchies laced with memory loss.”

He leaned in. “Why? You lookin’ to make friends? Or just score?”

Johnny hesitated.

“I’m chasing a strain,” he said slowly. “Glacier Ganja. Grows up north. Supposed to be legendary. Frost-burning. Turns warriors into walking icicles of death and poetry.”

Tumbler let out a low whistle. “Ah, one of those strains. Folklore-level bud.”

Johnny nodded. “You ever hear of the Winter Weed Warriors?”

“Once,” Tumbler said. “A sailor from the Frigid Fringe claimed to have seen them march across the ice plains. Said their armor was lined with frozen trichomes and their swords hissed with THC steam.”

“Sounds like a bedtime story for paranoid growers,” Johnny said.

“Maybe,” Tumbler replied. “But stories gotta start somewhere. And you—” he jabbed a finger at Johnny’s chest, “—you’ve got the stupid sparkle in your eye that says you’ll actually try to find it.”

Johnny blinked. “Is that a compliment?”

Tumbler grinned. “It is if you don’t die horribly.”

They both laughed, the kind of laugh you only share with someone who understands what it means to chase impossible things and smoke questionable weed on a leaky boat headed nowhere fast.

Below deck, someone dropped a crate of something alive.

Above them, gulls argued in the sky.

Between it all, two stoners dreamed of frostbitten myths and smoked seaweed while the world swayed beneath their feet.

The Salty Serpent sailed like a hungover crocodile—slow, twitchy, and mildly threatening—but somehow, it kept going.

By mid-afternoon, Johnny’s stomach had begun staging loud protests. Not dramatic rebellion yet, but definitely chanting slogans and waving little imaginary picket signs.

“Food?” he asked, glancing at Tumbler, who was mid-conversation with a passing moth.

“Galley’s down that hatch,” Tumbler said without looking. “Follow the smell of old regrets and fermented kelp.”

Johnny descended a crooked ladder into what might generously be called the galley—or more accurately, a hotbox dungeon of questionable culinary ambition.

The ship’s cook was a half-blind giant named Gravy Joe, who wore an apron made of old sails and stirred a bubbling pot with an oar. The stew glowed faintly blue, like it had absorbed the moonlight and gotten ideas above its station.

“You here to eat or hallucinate?” Joe grunted, eyeing Johnny with one good eye and one that might’ve been replaced with a dried olive.

“Depends,” Johnny said warily. “Is it extra for hallucinations?”

Joe let out a wheezing laugh that smelled like smoked anchovies.

“Just grab a bowl. Don’t ask what’s in it. If it moves, bite it back.”

Johnny obeyed, ladling a thick helping into a chipped metal bowl. The stew sloshed like semi-sentient oatmeal, pulsing gently with inner light. He sat at a nearby barrel-table and took a cautious bite.

It tasted… better than expected.

Spicy, briny, and oddly refreshing. Like seaweed had learned how to party.

A sailor plopped down next to him, wiping her hands on her pants and immediately reaching into her vest for a joint the size of a sea cucumber.

She lit it with a match struck off her boot and passed it over without a word.

“Thanks,” Johnny muttered, still chewing.

“Name’s Sooty Mae,” she said, exhaling a ring that floated sideways before dissipating. “You look like someone who hasn't held a fishing rod or a proper grudge.”

“Johnny,” he replied. “Strain Hunter.”

Sooty’s eyes twinkled. “Ahhh, one of those. Looking for magic ganja and danger on the side?”

Johnny shrugged. “Mostly just the ganja.”

Mae cackled and slapped his back hard enough to almost knock him into his stew.

“You’re all right, Hunter,” she grinned. “Got the lungs and the stomach—rare combo out here.”

Johnny chuckled, wiping his mouth. “Still adjusting to glowing soup and unsolicited blunts.”

Mae stood, stretching her arms until her joints popped like firecrackers.

“Well, if you’re done trying to digest the sea’s secrets, come on. Let’s see if you can fish without accidentally summoning something.”

“Fishing?” Johnny blinked.

She smirked. “Best way to pass time until the next meal or the next disaster. Come on—deckhands are always down a pair of hands and up a few joints.”

Before Johnny could object, she’d already grabbed two spare rods leaning against the wall and was striding toward the ladder. He followed, clutching his satchel and wondering whether this counted as training or just peer pressure.

Johnny found himself on the back deck of the Serpent, a fishing rod in one hand, and a joint in the other, surrounded by three sunburned deckhands who looked like they’d never fully sobered up since their first voyage.

“Rule one of high-sea fishing,” said Barnacle Bill, a crusty veteran with seaweed stuck in his beard. “Never trust anything that bites first.”

“Rule two,” added a wiry guy named Rake, “always roll with dry hands. Droppin’ a joint in the sea’s bad luck and bad economics.”

They all nodded solemnly.

Johnny cast his line and waited. Nothing happened for a while—except the waves rocking the boat, the occasional curse from the cook below, and Mae playing a lazy tune on a rusted harmonica that may or may not have been haunted.

Suddenly, something tugged on Johnny’s line.

Hard.

“Reel it! REEL IT!” Bill shouted, leaping to his feet and knocking over a bucket full of very confused shrimp.

Johnny wrestled with the rod as something beneath the waves fought back. He gritted his teeth and pulled—

—and out came a fish.

A weird fish.

It shimmered green and gold, had too many fins, and blinked at him with eyes full of what might’ve been pity.

“That’s a Glowfin Snapper,” Rake said, impressed. “Good eating. Great smoking.”

“Wait, you smoke it?” Johnny asked.

“Every part of it,” Mae said. “Bones for flavor. Scales for crunch. Eyes for prophetic dreams.”

The fish blinked again. Johnny swore it winked.

As the sun dipped into the horizon and painted the ocean in streaks of coral and haze, Johnny lay back on the deck beside Tumbler and Mae, watching smoke rings drift up into the pinkening sky.

The day had passed in a blur of strange food, weirder fish, and warm camaraderie that didn’t ask questions—only passed the joint and made room on the deck.

For the first time in a while, Johnny didn’t feel like a fool chasing fairy tales.

He felt… right where he was supposed to be.

Even if the boat was held together by hemp rope and delusion.

Night came in layers.

First, the sun melted like cannabutter across the sea, golden light dripping into the waves.

Then came the haze, thick and strange—smoke that didn’t quite smell natural. Not bad exactly, but clinical, like someone had distilled the aroma of weed down to its molecular essence and then added... printer ink?

Tumbler was the first to sniff the change in the air. He stood up from his nap under a stack of empty netting and sniffed like a stoned bloodhound.

“Uh-oh,” he said, squinting toward the horizon.

Johnny followed his gaze.

Far ahead, rising out of the fog like a hallucination no one asked for, was Kyberia—capital of the THC Labs.

It didn’t look like a city so much as a computer virus had taken over a greenhouse and gotten way too into architecture.

Massive glass domes dotted the skyline, pulsing with soft green and ultraviolet light, arranged like giant dewdrops on an invisible spiderweb. Spires of reflective metal twisted impossibly upward, each adorned with spinning antennae and dangling banners that flickered with ever-changing strain names and chemical compound breakdowns.

A floating LED sign hovered in the clouds, proudly declaring:

“THC LABS: TESTING LIMITS SINCE THE DAWN OF BAD IDEAS.”

Closer now, Johnny could make out enormous pipes stretching from sea level up into towering skyscrapers—venting what looked like shimmering gas into the atmosphere. The smell was undeniable: hydroponic herb, high voltage fertilizer, and something that reminded him of burnt mint and old batteries.

“Place always gives me the creeps,” Tumbler muttered.

“Looks like a vape pen mated with a tech cult,” Johnny said, shielding his eyes as a bright green laser scanned across the deck.

“Technically accurate,” Tumbler replied. “They say the Labs were founded by a rogue collective of engineers, failed botanists, and one very angry sentient bong.”

“No way.”

“Oh yeah. ‘The Shogunate of Science,’ they call themselves now. Real hush-hush types. Half of ‘em don’t blink. The other half never stop blinking.”

The Salty Serpent began to drift parallel to the coast—just far enough offshore to stay out of scanning range. Still, the city’s presence loomed like a paranoid hallucination: twitchy, glowing, and filled with too many buttons labeled "Do Not Press."

Johnny leaned on the railing and stared.

It was like watching a dream about weed… made by someone who’d only ever read about weed on tech forums.

In one of the domes, he saw a massive plant—probably twenty feet tall—growing inside a swirling vortex of pink light, its leaves twitching slightly as if listening to music no one else could hear. Drones zipped around it, trimming, pruning, and misting with terrifying precision.

Above that dome floated a digital screen broadcasting live THC levels.

CURRENT STRAIN: NUCLEAR NUG #9
WARNING: CONTAINS TRACES OF TIME DISTORTION.

“Did you know,” Tumbler whispered, as if the city could hear him, “that they once made a strain so potent, it looped the user’s thoughts back five seconds? One poor soul got stuck in an infinite munchies spiral. Ate twenty-seven sandwiches before collapsing into a burrito coma.”

Johnny blinked. “How’d they fix him?”

“They didn’t. He works in R&D now.”

The ship rocked slightly, the waves near Kyberia unnaturally calm—as if the water itself had signed an NDA.

Overhead, a drone the size of a small cottage zipped past with a hollow hum, scanning the Salty Serpent with a long green beam that passed over Johnny’s chest and made his fillings itch.

“Just keep looking casual,” Tumbler said, already halfway through lighting another joint.

Johnny tried to look as uninteresting as possible, which is difficult when you’re holding a glowing bowl named The Blowfish Bong while standing next to a halfling muttering anti-establishment haikus.

From somewhere deep in the Labs, a faint chant echoed out over the waves.

“In buds we trust, in roots we grow...
Stems be strong and terps be low...”

Johnny turned. “Are they… singing?”

“They’re always singing,” Tumbler said grimly. “Sometimes it’s in binary.”

They stood in silence as Kyberia slipped past, glowing and humming, a monument to progress and paranoia.

Down on the docks, they saw workers in white lab robes herding glowing goats into crates labeled “Organic Cannabutter Host Vessels.” One of the goats turned and locked eyes with Johnny.

It winked.

He wasn’t sure if he blinked—or the goat did it again.

“I swear to the Green Gods,” he whispered, “this place is like if Highlon Musk ran a weed cult and gave the goats tenure.”

A final screen flickered on the last dome they passed:

NOW TESTING: FORBIDDEN STRAIN OMEGA-420
Side Effects May Include: Enlightenment, Ego Death, Jazz Flu.

Johnny took one last look at Kyberia before it faded into the southern mist, pulsing like a haunted disco ball of innovation and eldritch cannabinoids.

He shivered.

Tumbler handed him the joint.

“Here,” he said. “You’ll need this to forget what you just saw.”

Johnny puffed.

Hard.

The sea changed without warning.

One moment, the Salty Serpent sailed beneath the pastel afterglow of a Kyberian dusk—green-lit clouds reflecting in smooth water, the scent of sterile terpenes fading behind them.

Then came the mist.

Not fog. Not haze. Mist, thick and cold, rolling in over the water like a creeping memory. It slithered across the surface, dense and heavy, and the wind dropped into a hush so absolute it felt like sound had been outlawed.

Johnny leaned forward over the railing, brow furrowed, eyes searching the greying horizon.

The ship groaned louder than the waves, sails limp above. The crewmates, loud and lazy hours before, now moved with a quiet urgency—tightening ropes, checking lanterns, muttering charms under their breath.

“Where are we?” Johnny whispered, barely audible over the eerie silence.

Tumbler stood beside him, unusually quiet.

“We’re sailing past the Coast of the Astral Hash Artisans,” he said, voice low. “Don’t say it too loud. They might hear you.”

“What kind of faction lives out here?” Johnny asked.

Tumbler lit a joint just to keep his hands busy. The flame sputtered like it didn’t want to be part of this moment.

“The kind that whispers back when you exhale,” Tumbler muttered.

As the fog thinned slightly, Johnny saw it.

The coastline loomed out of the greyscape—tall and jagged, like a fortress of bones carved by angry gods. Black cliffs rose from the ocean in sharp, unnatural angles, streaked with veins of silvery moss and pulsing green fungi. Massive archways cut into the cliffside, their shapes twisted—never quite symmetrical, like architecture dreamed up by a fevered mind mid-trip.

Above the cliffs, strange towers stood crooked against the sky, built from obsidian, pale driftwood, and dark coral. No two looked alike. Some spiraled like smoke in reverse; others split into antlered silhouettes, as if grown, not built. Faint torchlight flickered from narrow balconies carved into the stone—green flames that shimmered and hissed like they were barely tethered to this reality.

Thick smoke poured from chimney spires and crevices, but it didn’t rise.

It slithered downward—cascading off rooftops and terraces like molasses made of nightmares. Some of it drifted in shapes. Too specific shapes. Hands. Faces. Words.

Johnny’s throat tightened.

“Are those...?”

“Yeah,” Tumbler cut in. “The smoke here listens. Sometimes it speaks.”

They passed a jagged sea stack shaped like a robed figure holding a blunt to the sky. The stone glowed faintly from within. At its base, smaller figures knelt—either carved, or... something else. Johnny squinted. One had a face twisted in eternal cough-laughter. Another wore what looked like a plague mask made from coral and carved bone.

The cliffs themselves seemed alive.

Whispers floated across the deck—impossible, layered, like a dozen languages trying to harmonize.

Johnny instinctively clutched his satchel.

“What do they do here?” he asked.

Tumbler took a long drag before answering.

“Art. Ritual. Smokecraft. The Astral Hash Artisans believe cannabis is a spiritual force—one that can shape reality, memory, even the future. They inhale visions and exhale fate.”

“You’re making that up.”

Tumbler pointed.

Along the cliff, hundreds of tiny glass orbs floated mid-air—drifting like jellyfish, each glowing with a soft pink or teal light. As the ship passed, one orb floated closer to the deck and shimmered—projecting an image in smoke above it: a lone figure meditating inside a storm, marijuana leaves swirling around them like galaxy arms.

Then the orb popped silently and vanished into ash.

“I wish I was making it up,” Tumbler said.

They passed a wide cavern entrance near the base of the cliffs, where tidewater surged in and out like a breathing lung. Hanging above the entrance was an enormous dreamcatcher woven from hemp fibers, seashells, and bones.

A foghorn moaned in the distance—but it didn’t sound like a ship.

It sounded human.

And deeply stoned.

On deck, the crew had stopped talking entirely. Even Sooty Mae pocketed her harmonica, as if music itself might offend the coastline.

Johnny stared at the cliffs, entranced.

The way they loomed felt unnatural. Not just tall—wrong. Like geometry was misbehaving. Like the coast itself was testing reality’s boundaries, drawing in sea travelers not to destroy them… but to observe them. Sketch them in ash. Memorize the curves of their minds.

“They say,” Tumbler whispered, “that if you smoke too close to shore, your exhale joins their choir.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning the next time you get high, you’ll hear them… whispering back.”

Johnny blinked. “What do they whisper?”

“No one remembers,” Tumbler said with a haunted grin. “Because those who do, get too high to care.”

They both stared as a floating structure came into view—a tower that wasn’t connected to the cliffs at all. It levitated above the water, tethered by strands of luminous smoke to the cliffs.

At the very top of the tower stood a lone figure.

Wrapped in a black and emerald cloak, the figure raised what appeared to be a gilded bong toward the sky. Lightning cracked, briefly silhouetting the figure in stark detail—a long mane of hair, a mask shaped like an inverted skull, smoke wreathing their form like divine armor.

Then the figure vanished.

Gone.

No ripple. No sound.

Only the creak of the Salty Serpent, and the rising wind.

Johnny’s lips were dry. He hadn’t realized he was gripping the railing hard enough to turn his knuckles white.

He looked at Tumbler.

“You ever met one of them?”

Tumbler didn’t answer right away.

Then: “I met a guy who used to be one.”

“What happened?”

“He sculpted a statue out of smoke that told him the meaning of life.”

“And?”

“He laughed for three days. Then became a mushroom farmer. Wouldn’t even touch a joint again.”

“Why?”

“Said he already smoked the truth. Didn’t want seconds.”

The mist grew heavier again.

The cliffs began to fade behind veils of spiraling smoke, and the ship slowly returned to its creaking, rocking rhythm.

The moment passed. Like the whole coastline had exhaled and let them go.

But Johnny felt it still.

The echo of something ancient, artistic, and very, very high.

A bell rang above. The lookout called down.

“Ship spotted—astern! Closing fast!”

Tumbler swore under his breath.

“What now?” Johnny asked, spinning toward the sound.

Tumbler’s eyes narrowed, the ember at the end of his joint flaring like a warning light.

“Trouble.”

The lookout’s voice was like a blade through the fog:

“Ship astern! Royal colors—closing fast!”

The crew scrambled like startled rats on a floating hotbox.

Ropes snapped taut, sails dropped hard, and boots slammed against wet wood. All the lazy stoner warmth of the voyage vanished in a heartbeat—replaced by barked orders, pale faces, and the sour scent of adrenaline tainted with terpene.

Johnny rushed to the stern rail, nearly slipping on the slick deck.

There it was.

A sleek silhouette cutting through the mist with terrifying grace.

The ship bore the unmistakable architecture of the Royal Realm—sharp lines, cruel symmetry, and an obsidian hull etched with glowing crimson runes. Its sails weren’t cloth, but veils of light, shimmering like magical silk woven from crimson smoke and noble arrogance. Every inch of it screamed power, precision, and an utter lack of chill.

Its name shimmered across the bow in searing gold:

Righteous Flame

Above it, a banner unfurled—red and black, stitched with the Royal sigil: a crowned skull smoking a cigar, encircled by twelve burning thorns.

“Damn it,” Tumbler spat. “It’s a patrol-class enforcer. They're not here for snacks.”

The wind shifted—and with it came the hum.

Low, electric, and pulsing like a bassline made of tension.

Then the glow.

Dozens of thin cannons emerged from the Righteous Flame’s sides—elegant, arcane-looking tubes etched with red-gold vines that pulsed like living veins. Each one hissed with building heat, charging with compressed magical energy.

“They’re gonna fire,” Johnny breathed.

FWWWWMMMMMMMM.

The first blast hit the sea beside them, exploding not with fire—but smoke.

Thick, hallucinogenic, and alive.

A shockwave rolled over the Salty Serpent, rattling bones and knocking crewmates off their feet. Johnny stumbled, eyes watering as the smoke crawled into his lungs and danced on his nerves.

The sea screamed.

No—he screamed. Or someone did.

Tumbler grabbed him, coughing. “They’re using Psycloud shells! Designed to disorient and confuse—don’t breathe too deep, or you’ll start confessing your ex’s birthday by accident!”

Another blast tore through the portside rail—wood splintered, sails ignited in floating green flame.

Captain Whalebraid—previously unseen since departure—emerged from the cabin swinging two blunderbusses and wearing nothing but a joint-filled bandolier and a bathrobe made of weed leaves.

“TO ARMS!” he bellowed. “OR AT LEAST TO DEFENSIVE PARANOIA!”

He fired both blunderbusses into the air, where they exploded in clouds of lemon haze and glitter.

“Mae, man the cannons!” he roared. “Bill, light the defense joints!”

Sooty Mae sprinted across the deck to a mounted cannon that looked more like a heavily modified volcano vaporizer.

Barnacle Bill opened a locked chest and began handing out Battle Blunts—massive, tightly rolled joints wrapped in paper made from dried sea algae and infused with calming enchantments.

Johnny lit one on instinct. It sparked blue and smelled like rosemary and gunpowder.

The next Royal shell didn’t miss.

It struck the mast clean through—shattering it in a burst of enchanted flame. A flare of red light cracked the sky like lightning as shards of timber rained down, one spearing into the deck just inches from Johnny’s foot.

He rolled, smoke swirling around him, and caught sight of a second volley incoming—this one shimmering purple and gold, spiraling like a corkscrew.

BOOM.

Everything went sideways.

The blast wasn’t just fire—it was sound. A thunderous chorus of trumpets, coughing fits, and echoed laughter exploded across the ship. The sails burst into flame, the ship’s wheel spun madly, and the sea itself seemed to ripple with magical resonance.

Reality bent.

For a heartbeat, Johnny swore he saw his own face staring back at him from the water—only older, stoned, and giving him a disappointed nod.

“Am I tripping?” he gasped.

“YES,” Tumbler shouted, dragging him toward the forecastle. “ALSO WE’RE UNDER ATTACK.”

The Salty Serpent was dying.

One side of the hull had begun to buckle under the impact, green fire climbing the walls, crew slipping on a flooded deck now slick with algae, broken glass, and stray fish.

Somewhere above, Captain Whalebraid was dueling an animated smoke golem conjured by one of the Royal mages—his bathrobe billowing behind him like the world's most chaotic flag.

“FOR FREEDOM AND FLAVORED WRAPS!” he screamed, swinging a saber made of compressed kief.

Johnny and Tumbler ducked low, sliding under a burning spar as the Righteous Flame loomed closer.

“We have to jump!” Tumbler yelled.

Johnny shook his head. “Where?!”

“Anywhere but here!”

The final hit came like a judgment.

The Royal warship launched its central cannon—an enormous, rune-etched barrel that pulsed with bright crimson light and exhaled a mechanical groan.

The moment it fired, the entire world seemed to pause.

A beam of compressed ganja-energy surged across the water like a divine laser, hitting the Salty Serpent dead center.

KRRAAAKTHWOOOOOOOM.

Wood exploded. Flame bloomed like flowers from the hull. The entire ship lurched up and then down—violently—its spine cracked open by the impact.

The deck split.

Johnny flew backward, crashing against a crate of salted fish that exploded around him in a reeking cloud of scales and panic. He rolled once, twice—then felt water slam into him as the ship listed hard to one side.

He saw Tumbler’s hand reaching.

He grabbed it.

Together they were dragged toward the edge of the deck as it tilted sharply toward the sea.

Crew members screamed.

Barrels tumbled past them.

Above, a lantern burst—showering them in sparks and embers.

Johnny’s foot slipped—he lost grip—

And then:

SPLASH.

The world went cold.

Salt water burned his nose and eyes. Smoke still clung to the surface, drifting in oily tendrils.

He kicked, coughed, surfaced—gasping for breath.

The Salty Serpent was capsizing, its broken hull groaning as it slowly folded into the sea.

Somewhere, he saw Captain Whalebraid surfing a floating door while still fighting the golem, both of them yelling at each other in rhyming couplets.

He turned.

The coastline was there.

Close now.

Closer than before.

Sharp cliffs. Flickering green fires. And movement—shadowed figures gathering at the edge, watching.

Not helping.

Watching.

The Astral Hash Artisans.

A piece of debris floated by—he grabbed it.

Behind him, another blast echoed across the water.

He turned—just in time to see the Salty Serpent slip beneath the waves entirely, leaving only fire, smoke, and bobbing debris in its wake.

Johnny clung to the wreckage.

Chest heaving. Eyes burning.

Alone.

Then:

A faint cough beside him.

Tumbler’s head popped out of the water, clutching an empty stash box.

“Still alive?” Johnny croaked.

“Regrettably,” Tumbler rasped.

They drifted in silence, the sea carrying them toward the shore of nightmares.