Free Web NovelLudger took the silence as confirmation, or at least lack of objection.
He shrugged.
“Then maybe we can help instead,” he said.
Luna looked at him sharply, but didn’t interrupt.
Ludger lifted one hand before the beast, palm out in a practical gesture. “But without more information, it’s hard to do anything useful. We need to know what they’re fighting, where, how often, and whether they’ll kill us on sight before we get close enough to ask.”
He hesitated, then added with obvious irritation, “And thanks to our fight, my mana circuits are a mess. I’m not at full power.”
The giant eye narrowed.
The look it gave him was so specific that Luna almost laughed despite herself.
Annoyed.
Profoundly annoyed.
Like the beast was some overworked commander trying to hire emergency help and the first candidate showed up injured, under-equipped, and immediately started listing limitations.
Ludger met the stare without backing down, though his mouth twitched. “I’m just saying. Expectations should be managed.”
For a long moment, nothing happened.
Then the monster exhaled hard through its nostrils, a wet, heavy burst that sprayed mist over the beach one last time. It held Ludger’s gaze for another heartbeat, then slowly turned.
The movement was enormous and deliberate. The visible section of its body twisted, scales grinding against each other with a deep, armored rasp as the sea surged around it. It lowered its head, then the long mass of its neck-body began to descend back into the ocean. Water thundered down in sheets. Waves rolled outward. The dark shape slipped lower and lower until only ridges remained above the surface.
Then those vanished too.
The giant beast disappeared beneath the water, its shadow fading into the blue-green depths as it resumed the silent, impossible world beneath the waves.
Ludger stood there a second longer, still dripping, and let out a breath.
Luna finally found her voice. “…Did we just accept a job from a sea monster?”
Ludger wiped his face again and looked toward the forest.
“Looks like it,” he said.
Luna stared at the ocean for a long second after the monster vanished, then looked at Ludger like she was trying to decide whether to be impressed, concerned, or both.
“What now?” she asked.
Ludger didn’t answer immediately. He kept his eyes on the water, shoulders still squared toward the shoreline, as if the conversation wasn’t actually over yet.
“I think we'll wait a bit,” he said finally.
Luna frowned. “Wait for what?”
Ludger wiped the side of his neck with the back of his hand and flicked monster saliva into the sand. “A follow-up.”
She blinked. “A follow-up.”
He nodded, annoyingly calm. “It had the look.”
Luna gave him a flat stare. “The look.”
Ludger held out a hand, searching for words. “I’ve gotten used to Silva’s moods. Enough to read some things even without using mana. Not exact thoughts. Just… intent. Timing. When an animal is done. When it’s deciding. When it’s about to bring you a problem.”
Luna looked back at the ocean, then at him. “You’re comparing the giant sea horror to a direwolf who follows you around and licks your face all the time.”
Ludger shrugged. “Big creatures still have moods.”
“That thing is not a ‘big creature.’” Luna pointed at the water. “That thing flips ships.”
“Silva also bites through armor,” Ludger said. “Scale is different. Pattern is familiar.”
Luna opened her mouth, closed it, then muttered, “I hate that this almost makes sense.”
So they waited.
The surf rolled in and out. Wind moved through the palms behind them in dry rattles. Ludger stayed near the waterline, arms loose at his sides but posture alert. Luna stood a few paces back, still tense, still unconvinced, watching him and the sea in turns like she expected one of them to do something stupid.
It didn’t take long. The ocean shifted again. A broad current twisted near shore, then deepened into a moving shadow. Water bulged upward, white foam racing aside as the giant beast rose once more from the depths.
This time it didn’t rear as high. free𝑤ebnovel.com
It surfaced lower and closer, enough that its massive head alone dominated the beach view, a wet mountain of scales, ridges, and old scars. Seawater streamed from its jawlines in heavy ropes. Its huge eye fixed on Ludger with the same weary irritation as before, like it had returned because the incompetent employee was still standing where it left him.
Luna took an involuntary step back. The beast leaned in. Slowly. Its head lowered until the front of its snout hung above Ludger, blocking out a slice of sunlight. The smell hit them first, salt, deep sea, blood, and something sharp and mineral that clung to the back of the throat.
Ludger squinted up at it, expression flat. “You came back.”
The monster opened its mouth. Not in a roar. In a deliberate, controlled motion. Rows of teeth separated. Thick strands of saliva stretched between them, glinting in the light. Then it dropped something. A heavy, tangled mass of golden, seaweed-like strands spilled out of the beast’s mouth and fell directly onto Ludger in a wet slap.
He disappeared under it for half a second.
At the same time, a fresh cascade of saliva poured down with it, an actual waterfall of warm, sticky monster drool that hammered over his shoulders, head, and chest before splashing across the water.
Luna recoiled with a horrified sound. “Ludger—!”
The golden stuff slid down him in slick ropes and clumps, draping over his arms and sticking to his clothes. It looked like seaweed, but wrong, thicker, almost fibrous, with a metallic sheen under the sun. Some strands glowed faintly beneath the slime, not bright enough to call magic at a glance, but enough to look unnatural.
Ludger stood there dripping, covered in gold tangles and spit, and very slowly pushed a strand out of his face.
He exhaled. Then sighed.
“…I’m going to assume,” he said, deadpan, “the seaweed is supposed to be some kind of medicine.”
He peeled another slimy golden ribbon off his shoulder and glanced up at the giant beast’s unimpressed eye.
“And not the saliva.”
Luna stared at him, then at the glowing golden mass, then back at the monster, her expression hovering between disbelief and fury.
The beast blinked once. Slowly. As if to say: obviously.
Ludger looked down at the golden tangle draped over his arms, then back up at the giant beast’s face.
“Question,” he said, like they were standing in a market and not under the jaw of a sea monster. “Do I eat this as is, boil it, or use it as seasoning?”
Luna made a choking sound behind him.
Ludger pinched one of the strands between his fingers, squinting at the faint sheen under the slime. “I’m going to wash it first, obviously. Just in case.”
The beast let out a deep snort.
Warm mist and spray blasted across him, making the golden strands flop wetly against his chest.
Then, with the exact energy of someone done entertaining nonsense, the giant sea monster turned away and slid back toward the open water. Its massive head lowered, ridges disappearing beneath the surface one after another until only the dark shadow remained for a moment… and then that too vanished into the sea.
Ludger watched it go, then finally turned around. Luna was staring at him. Not just staring. Giving him a look so flat and severe it could have cut wood.
It was a very clear: Do you have a death wish?
Ludger shrugged. Then he crouched at the edge of the surf and started washing the golden seaweed, running seawater through the strands and picking out bits of slime and grit with careful fingers.
“In situations like this,” he said, as if he were explaining basic etiquette, “you can’t come across as a weakling while negotiating.”
Luna took two steps closer, still looking at him like she might hit him herself if the monster didn’t do it first. “You just told it you couldn’t use magic.”
Ludger shrugged again, still rinsing the seaweed. “Yes.”
“How is that not coming across as weak?”
He gave the golden strands another swish in the water, then glanced up at her with his usual dry expression.
“Because lying is also a bad idea.”
Luna opened her mouth, stopped, then narrowed her eyes harder. “That is not a real answer.”
“It is,” Ludger said. “If it can tell I’m lying, I look weak and stupid. If I tell the truth and still stand my ground, I only look injured.”
He lifted a cleaned strand, inspecting it against the light.
“That is the difference.”
Luna crossed her arms. “Only you would argue over something like that while covered in monster spit.”
Ludger looked down at himself, shirt soaked, hair sticky, gold strands hanging from one sleeve, then back at her.
“…I guess you are correct,” he said.
That was apparently enough of an apology for him.
He went back to washing the seaweed while Luna watched, still exasperated, still unsettled, and now increasingly convinced that Ludger’s survival instinct and his common sense were two different systems that only occasionally cooperated.
A while later, Ludger was crouched beside a small fire on the beach, doing everything the slow way.
No magic spark. No earth stove. No neat mana-controlled heat.
Just dry palm fibers, scraped bark, split twigs, and a stubborn amount of patience.
He’d built the fire with his own hands, coaxing it alive until it caught properly and began to crackle under a frame of green sticks. Above it, balanced awkwardly but securely, sat half of a large coconut shell cleaned out and filled with water.
Inside, the golden seaweed boiled.
If “boiled” was the right word for what happened when a giant monster’s mystery gift turned into a bubbling, stringy mess that smelled like rotten fish, burnt herbs, and old salt dragged up from the bottom of the ocean.
The steam hit like an assault.
Luna stood a few steps away with one hand over her nose, eyes narrowed. “That smells criminal.”
Ludger stirred the mess with a carved stick and watched another clump rise and sink in the cloudy water. “That usually means medicine.”
“It usually means poison.”
He glanced at her. “Sometimes the line is branding.”
Luna gave him a deadpan look that said I regret surviving with you.
The smell got worse as it reduced.
The strands softened and darkened from metallic gold to a murky yellow-brown, releasing oily streaks across the surface. Whatever faint glow they had before was gone now, drowned under heat and stink.
Ludger’s expression didn’t change, but he was not enjoying himself. It would taste terrible. Probably worse than terrible.
But if the beast had gone out of its way to bring it, gone, found it, came back, and dumped it on him like an irritated healer, then there was a decent chance this was meant for his circuits.
And right now, “decent chance” was enough.
Luna watched him for a moment, then asked, more seriously, “Do you really trust the medicinal knowledge of a giant sea beast for this?” freeweɓnovel.cøm
Ludger shrugged, still staring into the boiling sludge.
“Trust is a strong word.”
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