“Hey old man! What are the poles in the water for?” a young Leoric cried out as he stared at the pond.

“Balance training, can’t be much of a fighter if you lose your balance.” the Old man said as he walked towards the pillars and allowed for his towel to slowly fall off his back. Leoric stared in awe at just the sheer amount of muscles on this man, and it was the ideal goal he had for himself. “And it’s not ‘Old man’ it’s ‘Master’ get it right or you will be so sore you will be unable to train for a week”

“Yes master, i apologize, but how are we supposed to get up to those poles? They are like twenty feet up in the air.” the young brawler said as he ran up and matched pace with his master as they began to wade into the water.

“You climb, it’s really not that difficult.” he flashed Leoric a knowing grin before leaping as high as he could and climbing his perfectly smooth, cylindrical wooden pole. The way he seemed to grab onto nothing and continue climbing was something that baffled Leoric. After his first few attempts he cried out in frustration.

“How did you do that?! It's not fair, i can’t do it!”

“You can, my young apprentice, you just got to use the right leverage, sometimes just flexing your muscles won’t get you everywhere.”

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Leoric opened his eyes and was greeted with blackness, the canvas cover over the rowboat doing its job of keeping the light out and some heat in. In this moment it also was covering his tears from the cold and prying eyes of the outside world. He hadn’t dreamt or thought about his old master in forever, why start now? He wiped his eyes and raised the canvas and slowly climbed out. The cold air nipped at his damp face as he shivered and put back on his cloak to try and keep warm. He checked in with Seamus and continued on his way down to get something hot to drink in the galley. He just wasn't himself, and he could feel it. He knew he had roughly an hour or so before Felicity would normally wake up from her nightmares and figured he would do a bit of watch before heading down to drag her up to the deck for training.

“Leoric! Something on the Horizon, I can just barely make it out.

“Something? Well let's go take a look before we wake up the captain or crew” Leoric finished his hot water and walked up top with Seamus and scanned the Horizon. Sure enough there was a ship on the horizon, it seemed to be on an intercept course based on the direction the bow was pointing.

“Seamus, go wake up the captain, this could be nothing, but it's better to be safe than sorry. If you're afraid of being yelled at, tell him I told you to wake him up.”

“Aye!” Seamus said as he bolted off to wake the captain. Leoric still couldn’t shake a feeling that something was off about him. Maybe it was being so long out at sea with his usual vices or if the sea air was getting to him. But something was off. He contemplated waking up Felicity so that she was ready and prepared as well for the event if this was indeed a hostile ship but there was a part of him that said ‘she needs her sleep, she gets barely any as it is.’

“Mr. Leoric, I hear you have spotted something?” The captain groggily asked as he walked out still in his pyjamas with a fur coat draped over himself.

“Aye, look off the Port Bow and you will spot a ship that seems to be on an intercept course. From this range i can’t make out who it belongs to or what flags they are flying. So we figured it best to awaken you and let you make the final decision.”

The captain sighed and looked off in the direction the hired muscle pointed too and then hastily grabbed a spyglass and peered out towards it.

“Well, you have earned your keep, that is indeed a ship and based on some information i got while in town, a few drunken sailors were bragging about being ‘pirates’ with a ship that configuration. So if we were being astute individuals, it would be safe to say that is a pirate ship trying to cut us off.”

“Well then Captain, Leoric, maybe it's best we let the red haired one sleep in, her forehead would... '' Seamus started as he was quickly backhanded across the chest. His look of surprise at leoric was palpable even without leoric looking at him.

“This isn’t the time for Jokes, start getting the crew awake, geared, and armed. I will be in the crows nest keeping a close eye on that ship and any way we could maybe gain some speed and distance on them. Also let Felicity sleep in, she isn’t crew or hired muscle, just additional cargo, she doesn't need to be around for this.”

“Mr. Leoric, you do realize we are extremely laden with cargo, if that ship is out to attack vessels such as this, she is going to be very light, very fast, and very agile.” The captain said as he bundled up his coat as a strong breeze erupted around the three of them.

“Aye, but let’s say we have one advantage they don’t, the Wind” with this the Hired muscles eyes flashed a stormy grey color as a breeze erupted from him, wrapped around the three individuals and filled the sails for a moment before fading out.

“Well then, just in case the wind in our sails runs out, Crew! Battle Stations!”