The Gate Traveler-Chapter 461 B7— 41: Nature’s Fury

On the first two days, we explored the island with the Gate. It was a lovely, untouched place. The trees stood so close together that I had to open the house in its smallest configuration, and even then, it barely fit between the trunks. The canopy above was thick enough to turn the noon sun into a green twilight. It kept the ground level cool, the air heavy with the scent of moss and salt from the sea.

There wasn't much underbrush thanks to the lack of light. A few stubborn ferns and wiry bushes stretched toward the brighter patches, their leaves glossy and wet to the touch. Walking through them took some machete work, but it wasn't bad—just enough to make it feel like we were earning our way through. Al, naturally, cataloged all the plants with the seriousness of a scholar on a treasure hunt. Most turned out to be useless for potion making, but he found a few trees bearing big pink fruits, each one the size of a melon.

Some fruits were still green, but the ripe ones were a deep magenta color and warm to the touch. When we cut one open, the air filled with a syrupy aroma. They were sweeter than even mangoes, with a taste that was closest to cooked prunes, but not quite. Basically, delicious and new. Once Al made the discovery, we gathered every ripe fruit we could find. I used the Flourish spell to ripen the rest, and soon we had three crates full of the pink treasure.

Apart from that, the island was quiet. We spotted a few birds that flashed bright feathers between the branches, and some curious insects that hummed like small engines. There was a spring in the center of the island, a trickle of clear water bubbling over smooth stones, and along the beach, we found piles of shells in every color imaginable.

The next island was so close we could swim there with little effort. All of us stood on the beach in our swimsuits, the sand warm underfoot and the water glimmering with lazy ripples. Before diving in, I waded in, letting the sea swirl around my legs while I reached out with my water affinity to check the surroundings.

No sharks. Good.

Oh, what's that?

Something long and sinuous moved beneath the sand, a ripple of motion where there shouldn't have been one. I concentrated, tracking it as the shape glided parallel to the shoreline.

Mahya took a step into the shallows, but I caught her hand. "Wait. There's a snake there."

Rue perked up. "Where yummy snake?"

"Under the sand."

Before I could even blink, he bolted past me and leapt into the surf, a blur of fur and enthusiasm. My fingers brushed his tail, missing it by maybe a centimeter.

"Rue, come back here! It might be poisonous!" I shouted, splashing after him. Of course, he ignored me completely. The water churned around him as he paddled in circles, tail wagging like he was on vacation instead of possibly about to die.

The snake shot toward him in a blur of motion beneath the surface.

"No, you don't," I said, thrusting my will into the water and lifting the snake in a water bubble.

It was enormous—easily four meters long, thick-bodied, its scales a shimmering blue-green that matched the sea so perfectly it might as well have been invisible a moment ago. I dropped it onto the shore with a wet thud. Before it could even coil, Mahya raised her air rifle and fired. The sharp pop echoed against the rocks, and the snake went still.

Rue burst from the waves a heartbeat later, spraying water everywhere, tail wagging like a turbine. He dashed in excited circles around the fallen snake. "John cook snake! John cook snake!"

I sighed, watching him dance around his would-be assassin. "Later, buddy."

Mahya stored the snake, and I returned to my examination. Nothing else dangerous came up. Of course, some of the fish might've had piranha tendencies or been poisonous, but on the surface, everything seemed fine.

We swam to the next island, taking about an hour at a leisurely pace. Along the way, I spotted another of those under-sand snakes gliding beneath the seabed. I caught it in a water bubble and dragged it behind us until we reached shore, where Mahya promptly shot it as well.

Rue was ecstatic about the sudden abundance of snakes. He abandoned his doggy paddling altogether, using water magic to harden the sea's surface so he could sprint in circles around us. At one point, he nearly stepped on Al's head, earning himself a very undignified splash in retaliation.

The next island was pretty much like the previous one. It was bigger and didn't have a spring, but besides that, it was identical, down to the pink delicious fruits.

I looted the new snakes and grilled a few pieces. Rue circled the barbecue the entire time, tail wagging so hard he almost fanned the fire out. Drool hung from his jaws in long strings, and he kept inching closer until the heat made him sneeze and back up again.

When the steaks were finally ready, I handed him the first one. He snatched it eagerly, took a big bite, and immediately spat it out with an offended growl. His ears flattened, and he glared at the meat as if it had personally betrayed him.

"What's the problem?" Mahya asked.

"Snake taste like fish," Rue grumbled, pawing at his tongue.

"You like fish," I reminded him.

"Rue like fish that taste like fish and snake that taste like snake. Rue don't like snake that taste like fish. Rue think it's not fair." His tail drooped, enthusiasm draining with every word until he sat down beside the fire, looking like a soggy rug.

I took a cautious bite myself and understood what he meant. It tasted like fish, only with a much stronger fishy flavor. It wasn't unpalatable, but it definitely needed some getting used to. Maybe cooking it with a few vegetables and a rich sauce would help balance the taste.

I scratched my poor, disappointed boy's ears. Yeah, for him, it was a tragedy. After we threw out the fishy steaks, I grilled us some dungeon beef, Rue's portion with crab, which perked him right up. Since we were on islands, I hoped some of them would have crabs, being in the sea and all. Crabs would definitely erase the snake betrayal.

For the next three months, we traveled between the many scattered islands. Some were so close we swam to them; others we reached on jet skis or E-foils; and for the distant ones, we took the boat. We didn't visit all of them. The ones that looked like mountains rising from the sea, we mostly skipped. There were too many, and it would have been pointless to explore every single one.

Every other island, I asked the wind about dungeons, but it never answered with anything interesting. The islands were clean. Al still managed to find a few plants that caught his eye. Judging by his very controlled, almost bored reaction, they weren't rare or especially valuable, but he collected them anyway, carefully trimming leaves and roots before storing them in glass jars with neat labels.

One island stood out from the rest—a flat stretch of stone with a thin forest along its edge. The rock was warm underfoot, smooth and pale, and the view of the surrounding sea made it feel like we were standing on the edge of the world. We stayed there a while. Mahya wanted to work on some large pieces, and the open space was perfect for it.

She set up the forges, one burning coal, the other fueled by propane, their heat turning the air above them into shimmering waves. Sparks danced like fireflies as she hammered out metal sheets, testing ideas for her spaceship hull. I helped where I could. Not with the smithing itself, but with the parts that needed magic. When the metal glowed too hot, I cooled it; when it dulled too soon, I reignited it, keeping her from using her fire affinity too much and getting cranky again.

The results weren't perfect. The joints were rough, the welds uneven, and more than once she muttered about "back to the drawing board," but every piece looked a little better than the last. Bit by bit, the shape of something bigger began to take form among the smoke and clatter. A promise of a space cruise, even if still a distant one.

On about half the islands, we found something edible, mostly fruit. Six or seven of them had the same pink ones we had discovered earlier, but this time I didn't use the spell to ripen them. There were plenty as it was. The air around those trees smelled sweet enough to make my stomach growl, and by the time we finished collecting, we had more than we could possibly eat.

Some of the other islands had banana trees. The fruits were huge, at least three times the size of the ones I remembered from Earth, and their peels were a deep brown instead of yellow. I hesitated before taking the first bite, half expecting them to be spoiled, but they tasted almost exactly the same. Maybe a touch richer, with a hint of caramel.

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On one lonely island surrounded by white sand and shallow turquoise water, we hit the jackpot. Pineapples. They were small, rough, and green, but when we cut them open, the scent alone made my head spin. The flesh was so sweet it almost hurt my teeth. For a few minutes, it felt like finding a small piece of home in another world. Naturally, I went searching for more, combing every nearby island in the hope of another patch, but that was the only one.

But the biggest jackpot was the crabs. Yes, mine and Rue's hopes finally came to fruition. They were smaller than the ones in Lumis or Tatob but larger than Earth's, about the size of a cat instead of a German shepherd, or, well, a "regular" crab. That meant a lot more work to crack them open and get to the meat, but the sheer quantity more than made up for the size. There were a lot of crabs.

It took us about three islands to figure out their habits. They mostly lived around islands where bare rock sloped into the sea, clinging to the stone in clusters. Once we learned that, Rue refused to let me pass a single rocky shore without stopping to collect every last one. The first time, we worked by hand and dog-jaws, which turned into a bit of chaos, with a lot of snapping claws and Rue barking his head off. By the second island, I came up with a better system. Using water magic, I loosened the crabs from the rocks and guided them in water bubbles that followed us back to shore.

The only problem was that I still couldn't store living creatures, which meant each crab had to be bonked first. Naturally, all the bonking took place with Rue dancing in circles around us, howling at the top of his lungs and chanting, "Smoked crab! Smoked crab!"

In the end, it turned into a culinary vacation. Not like in the mana portal in Zindor with its endless variety of spawnies, but a culinary adventure all the same.

After three months of endless sea and sun, all of us were darkly tanned, our noses peeling from the wind and salt, and our feet callused from walking barefoot day after day. Even Al started to look relaxed, which said a lot. He smiled, laughed, and did everything at a leisurely pace, like he had all the time in the world. His face relaxed completely, and for once, he looked his age. The days had blended together into a slow rhythm of swimming, fishing, and lazing around, the sound of waves becoming as familiar as breathing.

That was when the weather changed.

The shift came so suddenly that it felt unnatural. One moment, the sky was a clear, endless blue, the kind that seemed incapable of anger, and the next it darkened like someone had poured ink into it. In less than half an hour, the light almost disappeared, and a veil of dark purple-gray clouds rolled across the horizon. The sea, calm just moments earlier, trembled. 𝐟𝗿𝐞𝚎𝚠𝐞𝚋𝕟𝐨𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝕔𝕠𝚖

Wind slammed into us, hard enough to stagger even Rue. The air was sharp with salt and static, and the smell of ozone was so thick it burned my nose. Waves swelled from all directions, crashing together in wild confusion. The first drops of rain fell like thrown stones, stinging the skin.

Within minutes, the storm was in full rage. Sheets of water fell so fast the sea and sky blurred into one churning mass. Lightning flashed across the clouds, each strike lighting the world in white for an instant before plunging it back into darkness. The roar of the wind drowned every other sound, and the boat groaned as it fought the rising waves.

Mahya shouted something, but the wind snatched her voice away.

"We need to close the sails not to lose them," she said this time telepathically.

Al rushed to do it, his face pale and focused. Rue pressed against my side, fur slick with rain, ears flat from the noise.

We were halfway between two islands. Under normal weather conditions, the trip would have taken about three hours. Now, the sea was a living nightmare. The horizon had vanished behind sheets of rain, and the world was nothing but water, wind, and the unrelenting sound of waves hammering the hull. The boat rose and plunged like a toy in the hands of a furious god. Spray hit our faces so hard it stung, and every few seconds, lightning cracked open the sky, turning the dark sea into a jagged silver plain.

"Can you see anything?" Mahya asked, clutching the wheel as another wave slammed into us.

"Barely," I said. "If we keep the wind behind us, we should be heading toward the larger island."

Mahya held the helm with both hands, her knuckles white as the wheel jerked and fought her grip. I tightened my hold on the railing as the deck pitched beneath my feet. The whole vessel heaved sideways, rising on a massive swell before slamming back down with a bone-rattling crash that sent up curtains of spray.

Al struggled with the rigging, his soaked hair plastered to his face. I moved to help him, grabbing one rope that had come loose and hauling it down with all my weight while he secured another. The ropes strained and snapped taut, the sails thrashing as we fought together to keep the boat from turning broadside to the waves.

Hours passed in chaos and mounting damage to the boat. Despite being a mini dungeon powered by a core, it could not withstand nature's fury. The bedrooms filled with water up to our shins through invisible cracks and broken pieces. A railing tore off the back deck, and the wheels grew less responsive with every turn. No matter how hard we tried to steer toward an island, the storm spun us around more than once. Worse, every direction looked the same. Gray, boiling water and the endless howl of wind.

Lightning flared in the distance, and for a brief heartbeat, a dark shape rose through the rain. Land.

Mahya pointed, her eyes squinting through the downpour. "We could fly there!"

I shook my head. "Only Rue and I are immune to lightning. You and Al would be roasted before you got halfway."

She hesitated, then gave a sharp nod. "Fine. Then we brave the water."

"Go!" I shouted mentally, and we jumped into the sea, the cold hitting like a slap. The waves swallowed us instantly, salt and foam filling my mouth as I surfaced. Behind us, Mahya moved fast, her form barely visible through the rain. She stored the boat and dove in last, the sea closing over her.

The water was wild, pulling in every direction at once. It took me a few seconds to locate everyone before I tried to take control and use my water magic to push us toward the shore. But something resisted. The ocean itself wasn't the problem—it was the mana. The storm was thick with it, filled with too many opposing elements, too many clashing flavors. I couldn't even catalog them. Each time I tried to guide the water, the tangled storm mana fought me, pushing back with chaotic force that made every movement a struggle.

I gritted my teeth and focused, channeling mana through my hands until they burned with purple light. The sea twisted in response, grudgingly bending to my will. "Swim! As fast as you can!" I sent.

Mahya and Al fought the waves beside me, their movements strong but with little progress. Each stroke barely carried them forward before another wave dragged them back. Rue clamped his jaws around my leg, trying to stay close. Every time his jaw locked, it hurt, but he was careful, biting just enough to hold on without breaking skin.

The storm fought me. The mana inside it churned with too many wild flavors, clashing and snapping against my control. For a moment, the opposing forces tore my hold apart, and the water slipped from my grasp, throwing all of us back, before an enormous wave covered us. I fought to resurface, clenched my teeth, and forced more mana into my channels until they felt like molten wires under my skin. Pain flared through my arms, but the sea obeyed again, reluctantly. I caught the current, pulled it into shape, and pushed us up the crest of a wave, driving us closer to shore.

Every meter felt like a victory wrestled from the storm's hands, a battle of sheer will against the surrounding chaos.

At last, the sand rose beneath my feet. We stumbled through the shallows, waves crashing against our backs. Crawling the last stretch, we dragged ourselves onto the beach, soaked, shaking, and half-blind from the rain. I took out the house, and for once, the process of it rising from the core wasn't fascinating but agonizingly slow. The moment the door formed, we burst inside.

The door slammed shut behind us, cutting off the roar of the storm to a distant, muffled fury. The wind still screamed outside, shaking the walls.

Mahya collapsed onto the floor, soaked to the bone, water pooling beneath her as she gasped for breath. She let out a low groan before leaning back against the wall. Al stood nearby, pale and silent, his hands trembling as he braced himself against the bar. His shoulders rose and fell with heavy breaths, the lines of exhaustion plain on his face.

Rue shook himself in a full-body tremor, spraying water in every direction. The floor immediately turned into a puddle, and he gave a long, rumbling sigh before flopping down in the middle of it.

For a long time, none of us spoke. The sound of rain pounding on the roof filled the silence.

"Son of a bitch," Mahya finally said.

Rue growled.

"Sorry, Rue," she said. "Son of a monster."

I chuckled, and Mahya and Al joined me, the laughter tired but genuine.

Eventually, we managed to move. Mahya stumbled to her room, and a moment later, I heard the faint rush of her shower starting. Al disappeared next, and the sound of running water echoed from the other side of the hall. I turned on my own shower and stepped under the stream. The hot water hit like a wave of relief, washing away the sting of salt and the ache in my muscles. Bit by bit, the cold left my body, and the tension eased from my shoulders.

Rue waited for me on the other side of the door, looking miserable and droopy. I rinsed him off, then dried him with a towel before finishing with the Heat spell. He drank some water, stumbled to his beanbag, and fell asleep in half a second.

Wrapped in a towel, I made coffee for all of us. The first sip hit like a spell of its own, warmth spreading through my chest and clearing the fog from my head. For the first time since the storm began, I felt almost human again, the strain finally loosening its grip. Outside, the wind still howled, but it no longer sounded like a threat, only a reminder of what we had survived.

The storm didn't ease that night, or the next. For three days, it raged without mercy. Rain battered the windows in endless sheets, lightning painted the sky white every few minutes, and thunder rolled like the growl of a mountain. We stayed inside, cooking, reading, and watching the fury through the glass, powerless to do anything but wait.

When the storm finally broke, the change came just as suddenly as its arrival. One moment, the wind howled, the rain hammered the walls, and thunder shook the house. The next, everything stopped. Within half an hour, the sky cleared completely, and the midday sun blazed down with merciless brightness. The ocean shimmered in the light, calm and bright, pretending the last three days of chaos had never happened.

We stepped outside, squinting against the glare. Everything looked battered and raw. Torn seaweed and shattered shells covered the beach in uneven piles where the waves had hurled them. Trees near the shore lay broken, their trunks split, leaves strewn across the sand like soggy confetti. One of the big blue snakes lay dead, wedged between the rocks. Heat thickened the air, making my clothes cling and sweat roll down my neck.

I dropped onto the sand and looked out to sea. The world had gone still again, as if the storm had never happened. The sky was spotless, the waves calm, and the light shimmered on the water just like it had on our first day here. Only the wreckage along the beach told another story.

I rested my arms on my knees, watching the slow rhythm of the waves. I could only hope this had been a "once in a while" thing, like the big storms back on Earth, and not a daily occurrence. Either way, there wasn't much I could do about it. For now, the sun was warm, the sea calm, and we were alive. That was enough.