My Life As A Salamander

I grinned a little. "Might be best if you sit this one out. I"ll take out the silver weapon stashes. once those are gone I"ll give a signal. you"ll know it." I started forward. " No you won"t!" She shouted at me. "Shhhhhh!" I said with a finger to my mouth. " That"s my daughter down there. If you are going then so am I." She said bluntly. I looked at her. " Do you want me to have to explain to your daughter how you got taken out by a shiny object or live long enough to see your daughter and rampage on the people who took her?" I asked with a huff. Marissa stopped for a second to actually think about it. "I will wait. But if I don"t hear anything in the next 10 minutes I will be coming down." She said with her eyes meeting mine. " Fair enough." I said.

I swam into the shadowy parts of the water and circled around the lit part. I managed to find a fair vantage point that was close enough to see what was going on but not close enough to hear anything. I looked about the camp. It was swarming with crab folk and merfolk. A single tower stood in the middle with a guard looking over everything. I smirked a little as I slid back and figured out how to get inside. I forced the earth to move beneath me and made a tunnel through the sand. I went beneath the group in less than 5 minutes. Using my earth sense I managed to find a cage that scylla was holed up in. 2 of her tentacles gone but otherwise unharmed. I"ve heard tentacles grow back. But that really was just my Hope"s speaking. I didn"t know for certain. I had the earth swallow her quickly and I pried it open faster than a can opener. She was balling in fear. Realizing how terrifying being bearied alive is I quickly consoled her. "It"s ok. It"s ok sweetheart. Let"s get you home." She nuzzled into my chest and I felt the heat burn in my heart. ( They hurt her. Time for them to pay. I reached up and felt for every shred of metal within the vicinity. I found the silver stockpile first. mostly coins but there was quite a few silver harpoons, tridents, and even a sword. But in the end I didn"t give a d.a.m.n. The ground swallowed them as well. I made sure to make the metal shred itself to teeny tiny pieces of sand sized specks as I did so. I decided it was time to send the signal. I whipped up my hand and the ground exploded upwards. Screams echoed through the water as people were suddenly buried left and right I put scylla behind me in my upper arms and shielded her with my wings. I rose from the ocean floor looking like an demon of h.e.l.l being unleashed from its prison.

" You b.a.s.t.a.r.ds hurt my niece. Die!" I roared. Dragons cry wasn"t with me but that didn"t mean squat. I had trained alone for years with only my claws, with and abilities. This was no different. I grabbed and tore, Bit and Ate. All while covering Scyllas ears and eyes of course. She"d already have nightmares of tonight. I didn"t need to give her anymore reason to. Marissa joined the fray and grabbed a trident. I admit I thought I was brutal. She was a monster. She shifted into her draconic form. It was 60 feet long with tentacles here and there. But She also had front and back claws. Her Claws shined white in the darkness. Her eyes the very image of savagery. " You sons of 8!÷€#€$ hurt my little girl! None of you will live to see tomorrow!" She roared as she went through the camp. It was like seeing a tsunami roll through dry land. Every being was wiped away. Not even blood remained. Bones were dusted and skin was turned to sea foam. She said she only 5 skills that were useful for battle but it was evident that those skills were heavily OP.

I managed to get some of my fill in by sending the stragglers back into the fray. It was quite comical really. I got my kicks fro. seeing mama dragon annihilating everybody in her path. Till only one being remained. A lone crabman. He stood there with a trident on the ground defenseless. "I didn"t know about your daughter. All I knew was that we were given orders to be here!" He shouted. I raised an eyebrow and brought scylla out of hiding and set her in my front arms. I floated over to Marissa. " We need a witness... We also need someone to tell us how they got the weapons and sent them after you." I whispered. She nodded with a sigh. " But can I kill him after?" She asked. I shrugged my shoulders. "Up to you sis." I said. "Mother!" Scylla cried out when she noticed her mother. Marissa instantly shrank to her normal size. I glared at the crabman and he froze in place before he could even try to run.

I leaned over and grabbed his shoulder. "You"ll be coming with us or I"ll make you into fishbait." I growled. He nodded emphatically. We spent an hour or so getting back to the city. It was a quiet swim with little to no interference from anything. Just startled fish mostly. When we returned the guards let us through and kindly gave us some chains to use for our friend. When we got back to the castle I handed him over to the guards and Marissa went to bed with Scylla. I doubt she"d let her out of her sight for a while. We still had the question of the silver to solve for tommorrow. The funny thing is Marissa loved silver. So it was ironic that the one metal she loved most was the one that could kill her.

I ventured around the castle and asked the staff who normally loked after Scylla. Many replied that a servant by the name of Orville was the youngest and most energetic hence he was best able to serve her. I searched for Orville. Unfortunately I couldn"t find him after 2 days of searching. Neither could any other of the guards or servants in their activities. We searched his room and found a journal that was worn around the edges and filled with scrawled letters. I brought it to Marissa seeing as she was the one who could read blotched letters better than I ever could. She read it and studied over it for several days before coming to tell me anything.

I was called to the study by one of the maids.

The room I"m talking about is the one that was covered in journals and was filled with kids. When I arrived I found the room clean, clear of children, and a desk covered in a mountain of journals that acted like a barrier for the person buried underneath. I knocked loudly on the entryway. "You may enter." I heard a m.u.f.fled voice from beneath the books. I floated through and tapped on the book mountain. "Sis... You gonna come out or do you need help so you don"t destroy the books?" I asked as I turned about the room with a slight grin on my face. After a moment I heard a m.u.f.fled " Please." I smiled even wider as nostalgia hit me. We had had a large library back home which Marissa would cover herself in like a pig in mud. It was a common occurrence that I had to dig her out of said mountain so she could come eat.

After half an hour I was able to see her head and 15 minutes later she swam out of the pile holding two books. Orville journal and another book made of blue scaled material. "I have been hunting through the books to find someone Orville was in contact with. A person by the name of Larimer. Turns out he was an old adventurer friend of mine. Also turns out Larimer had a son. Not only did he have a son but he had a son with a mermaid who currently is buried in the graveyard within this city. Larimer was never one to keep his bull in so I would wager he had many a partner in his days. Now Orville has written that he was contacted by Larimer 10 days ago with an offer. He doesn"t say what but I would wager his disappearance was because of Scyllas abduction." She said as she opened the journals and compared them to each other. I read over them quickly. Marissa"s handwriting was better than I expected and was very easy to read. " But it says here that Larimer died 60 years ago... How could he contact anyone from beyond he grave without a necromancer present? Not to mention even a necromancer cant stop a corpse from rotting or bones from disintegrating from weathering." Marissa shook her head. " Half human. Larimer was a half elf. They have ways of overturning the human side and becoming a complete elf or human. It all depends on connections. He could still be alive. We just need to find him."

I nodded as I lightly tapped my chin. I thought about it for a moment. "What kind of person was this Larimer?" I asked. Marissa thought for a moment. " He was a lovestruck idiot but and honest man. Anyone could ask him anything. We just avoided giving him liquor. That was mostly due to liquor being like truth serum. One shot of wine would have him singing like a shadow siren to a gravedigger selling corpses." She said. "Honestly I"m not surprised if he let the secret slip. But that also means our a.s.sault came from the continent of water. Melra." She crossed her arms and paced back and forth in front of the boom mountain. I raised an eyebrow as another question came to mind.

"By the way Marissa... How did you get bit by a werewolf... when they"ve been extinct for a couple centuries now?" I asked slowly. She stopped pacing and seemed to cringe a little.

"After the city sank my parents only had me. They were very overbearing and tried to keep me close. Unfortunately I was a bit young and restless. So I went adventuring for a time. I had already been chosen as Vara"s champion when I left so I thought noone would try anything. I was wrong. A couple days after I arrived on Weremar I was attacked by a group of werewolves. The prince at the time was among them. I clawed, bit, and killed my way out of there. But I was covered in bites and I ended up spending a night in a lagoon eating wolfsblight roots and praying I wouldn"t change. For several nights I waited. Then.... a tracker found me. My parents were wise enough to always have someone following me around. When I got back my parents were furious. I spent a few days in a my room under tender care but I was unable to leave. It was later I heard how Vara annihilated the continent in her rage. I visited later to find a place of ice, water, and death." She sat on a chair before the large window behind the desk.

" I realized my aversion to silver after accidentally touching some silverware at dinner with my parents. My hands had steamed and were instantly covered in blisters. It took weeks to heal. I rarely left home without guards after that. Hence my lack of combat a.r.s.enal." She sighed. I nodded as I raised on of my wings. The lowest one on my right side had a scar still. I didn"t understand how. But I figured I"d leave that topic alone. " This is from my time in a forest. As you know I was a familiar once. But I was growing to fast for my tamer. So they sent me off to live in a forest while she got better. I lived in that forest for 4 years. I suffered through a monster stampede for crying out loud. But that wasn"t the worst of it. I had an enemy in that forest. A Scaled Lion as they are called. Nasty b.u.g.g.e.r. I met him a few times. One of them left me with this. A constant reminder that I need to always stay on guard." I spread the wing wide so she could see clearly. It had expanded with my growth apparently. It was white and puckered. But it didn"t hurt.

Marissa reached out and touched it. It was a strange sensation. Even Sam never touched my wings. " Seems like we both went through h.e.l.l." She whispered. I smirked a little. " Yeah. But I rose out of it. Why? Every h.e.l.l needs an angel." I said with a chuckle and unfurled all my wings. Marissa almost died laughing.