The Heir Who Wouldn’t Drown
Copyright© 2026 by CaffeinatedTales
Chapter 6: An Insatiable Appetite
Julian had yet to lay eyes on the notorious pirate captain Oswald, known as [Redgaze], since coming aboard. But the captain’s red-eyed shark “pets” had already led him to conclude that Oswald was a supernatural practitioner.
The [Logbook] could not peer into Oswald’s history as easily as it could examine mundane things. That was why Julian had tried to gather information through Young Peter.
Instead, he had unexpectedly discovered a new Secret.
His first supernatural Secret, [Shadow of the War of the Red and White Roses], concerning the war of succession in Hastings, had given him an extraordinary reward: [Historical Revisionist]. But the Secret ran so deep that, until he completed his initiation rite, he could look at that reward without being able to use it.
[Secret: Captain Oswald’s Unspeakable Affliction], on the other hand, was just right.
Only 4% Historical Influence. If I unravel his secret, I won’t have to keep building up my [spirituality] and waiting for it to settle. I can perform an initiation rite on the [Ladder of Glory] right away.
Young Peter’s warning had left Julian eager rather than afraid, though he still made sure to thank the young man sincerely.
“Cheers! Drink up!”
“Now that’s good beer, fresh off the Pelican! Sausages and white bread, too. No more maggoty hardtack!”
“...”
When Julian followed Young Peter onto the weather deck, he found the pirates reveling in their successful raid.
Apart from the helmsman, the rigging hands on watch, and the others needed to keep the vessel underway, most were drinking freely, bottles clutched in their hands. The ship’s stores of hardtack and salted meat had been cast aside in favor of fresh food plundered from the Pelican.
As a former naval midshipman trained at the Royal Naval Academy, Julian was well accustomed to such sights.
Whether pirates, merchant sailors, or naval sailors, their lives were nothing like the splendid adventures described in legends.
A sailor’s lot differed little from a prisoner’s, except that he could also drown. Even the worst prison was a hundred times better than the space belowdecks on a sailing ship.
Ships reeked of hell: stench, resentment, fear, fevers, dysentery, headaches, sweltering heat, consumption, scurvy, cancer, and mouth ulcers...
With medical knowledge so limited, many minor ailments became death sentences.
Fresh water was stored in wooden casks in the hold, where it soon spoiled and began to stink. But fuel was scarce aboard ship. Even water that had been boiled was a luxury, generally reserved for the wounded.
Everyone else had to mix the foul water with rum or replace drinking water altogether with weak alcoholic drinks.
The food was worse. Excessively salted meat and damp, rotting biscuits formed the bulk of their diet. At every meal, they had to overcome their bodies’ revulsion to force rotten, maggot-infested food down their throats.
Julian had heard more than one sailor make light of the misery.
“Black-headed maggots taste nice and cool. Not bitter like weevils. Pretty good, really!”
Pirates who spent long stretches at sea had it especially bad. Unable to resupply at ordinary ports, they endured even worse shortages.
Naturally, few people chose this life unless they could no longer survive ashore or needed to escape the law.
Heroes were scarce at sea. Villains were everywhere.
Armed merchantmen turning to piracy on the side were a common sight.
The two of them struggled through the crowd of foul-smelling pirates and reached the quarterdeck, where the view was clearest.
A huge wooden table had been set out there, laden with provisions looted from the Pelican: fruit, peas, beef, legs of lamb, drink...
At its center, surrounded by pirate officers, a spherical figure was gorging himself.
Julian did not need Young Peter’s meaningful glance to identify the supreme authority aboard this vessel: [Redgaze] Oswald.
One look told him why Young Peter had warned him not to betray any reaction.
The man was fat.
Enormously fat, standing only about 150 centimeters tall but weighing at least 150 kilograms.
The broad wooden chair beneath him creaked under his weight. Pale flesh filled his aristocratic silk formalwear to bursting. Fat squeezed the eyes in his round face into two narrow slits, leaving no hint of how he had earned the epithet [Redgaze].
And despite his immense size, he was still eating ravenously.
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