The Alchemist at Hell's Gates

33

^^ the Lady Luck ^^

It turned out that I had severely overestimated the Scales of the Gemstone Dragon, as they were much heavier than anticipated, and not fit for Ship Design at all. So, considering I couldn't use Gemstone Scales to make the ship look resplendent from the exterior, as I'd wanted, I decided to up the Gaudiness and Presentation up to 11 in other ways; the Figurehead of the Ship became a snarling recreation of the Gemstone Matriarch, made from her Scales on the exterior and Clockwork Golem on the interior, affixed with an Arcane Turret tuned towards Ice for a little Spice. The Hull was now to be made of Bog-Wood, with a Dragon-Bone Frame, and the Gun-Decks (I'd added a second, because why not,) were swathed in Gold Casing, holding within them several hundred Floating Disks pointing in different directions, which would be controlled from the Helm to direct the ship in any direction I pleased, regardless of Wind.

Instead of the Sleek, efficient design I'd wanted originally, I had changed it to a massive Behemoth of a Lady, decked out in Royal Purple and Gold, with Five viewing decks, (four on the stern and castle and one under the figurehead on the Entertainment Deck, encased in glass,) six Decks of the Ship, (the Cargo Hold, two Gun Decks, a Brig, the Entertainment Deck, and the Top Deck, which had its own Cabin Castle with individual rooms for the entire Party, each with their own Viewing Deck,) a grand total of 82 Cannons spread around the two Gun Decks and then beside the Viewing Decks, as well, to make sure I had a 360 degree coverage of all of the area around the ship.

The Range of the Cannons would be to be determined, but seeing as most Gunpowder Cannons had a range of 400 Feet or so before they were useless, I was hoping mine would have at least double that, given their non-powder-based ammunition. The Defense of the Ship would be left almost entirely to the Levitating Disks, which did produce and outward force to repel gravity, and when I tested throwing a rock at the smaller disk, it bounced off an invisible field; with several hundred such disks, I imagined that it would spread to the entire ship, or at least the Hull, which was the most important part of the ship anyway.

The Artificers from the Hidden Room of the Dungeon, off to the side of the Boss Room, were very useful in assisting me in building the massive ship, all 200 feet long and 50 feet tall, -not including the Masts,- and the Materials only cost me about 100 Gold's worth of Glow-Stone; having my Acid Slime eat the Stone and then the small amounts of other types of materials for the Ship, it spat out the amounts we needed, having converted the Glow-Stone into other materials along the way.

A network of Silver was apparently impractical, in the long run, because the silver would drop the magical energy along the way if the silver wasn't shielded; therefore the silver was useful to disseminate the energy evenly throughout the ship, but not so much to allow fine control of the distribution, and I had to create something different. The Frame of the ship, made of Dragon Bone, was a perfect choice due to the fact that I still had the Lich Phylactery and Dracolich Muisak to build with. I had intended to keep them and build a Lich Dragon inside my Dungeon; my dungeon was called 'The Dragon's Widow', after all, and I had one female dragon, but no dead dragon to complete the narrative.

As such, I used the Muisak and made the Sun-Crystal Pedestal in the Light-Room a 'Divine Phylactery', (mixing Light and Dark to create Grey, in order to maintain my neutrality,) and turn the Frame of the Ship, and the ship itself, into one large Undead Construct, a 'Ghost Ship'. It remained under my control due to the Command Skill, the portion of the Spider-Queen's Legacy that gave me control over Undead Servants, but whoever held the Helm would be considered the Master of the Ship, -if they'd been given permission by me,- and the Ghost Ship would follow their orders. Using the Bones to spread specific orders by making it 'flex' certain portions of its body, the mixture of Necromantic and Arcane Magic would negate the issue of the silver releasing too much energy, and maintain itself off of its own Necromantic Aura even if it had no energy remaining in the Sun-Crystals.