Upon the Flying Ship: Rewritten Records of the Illiterate Author

Chapter 3

"I have called this impromptu meeting to welcome three possible future DeSSers. Zelda, Sulliana, and DeMondine. This, by the way, is usually not done, but since there's three of you, which is a lot compared to the usual no people, we're doing this. Plus, most of your situations are pretty unusual, which is why the council is here to decide your worthiness." Liblie pointed to a female whose hair burned like fire above her head. Her clothes plain brown, but fire designs, embroidered on the edges, added a personal flair to the overall look.

"That hot lady over there is Fyeuin, a fire Mage. Get it? Hot?" Liblie laughed at her own pun. "She's probably becoming the next ruler after I accidentally kill myself or get killed."

"Gloomy old man over there is Pteppic, whose specialty are knives and axes." Pteppic had a belt with all kinds of knives in it. An axe was leaning against his seat.

"Desert beauty over there is Miyana, an oasis-finder." She had a light veil-mask on, covering only her nose and mouth. It was probably to keep out sand, since Mondy guessed by the 'oasis' part, she spent a lot of her time in deserts.

"Which desert beauty?" asked Zelda. Oh. There were two. Miyana stood up, waving, and the woman sitting next to her blushed. Okay, so Mondy got Miyana right. Who was the second one, in the flowy gold dress?

Liblie laughed again. "The other desert beauty, in the greek dress, is Surrus, a sand Mage."

"Gruff hulk is Kota, shield Mage. If you can get him to say more than one sentence in a row, and the topic isn't Gods, I will congratulate you." Kota looked boring and nondescript. And muscly.

Then Liblie flashed a smile, pointing to herself with both hands. "And you know me, I'm Liblie - call me Liberty, as a joke, if you want, DSS Ruler, a blood Mage."

"There used to be Irony, an iron Mage. She was murdered, but we have a bit of evidence she didn't even bother fighting back. Just so you know: the ship isn't the safest place."

Liblie completely missed Mondy's appalled face expression at the "iron Mage" part.

"I'm not going anywhere. Nowhere is safe." Zelda said.

Sulliana nodded.

"Well," Liblie stretched. "Hope you don't regret your decision."

"Hey, besides being the police force, what else do you do, politically?" Zelda asked.

"Oh! Who can answer that question?"

Pteppic stood up. "Well, as you already mentioned, we're the police force for the five Northlean countries: Northleans, East Northleans, South Northleans, West Northlands, and Northleans Island. We're also the main war force: there's way more people on this ship than it looks. Most of them belowdecks, in training. Everybody is sent to training at either twenty or when they come, if they're already older. Ten years later, like at thirty-ish, they come out of training and are official DSS officers."

Miyana stood up. "We also do detective and judge work. If needed, we can act as lawyers, judges, or detectives, and other work in the law. We have a tome of all the laws in all the Northlean countries, and we have to know them to figure out what we should be doing in each place."

Pteppic continued. "We protect the five countries from dangers inside and out, but the 'out' part hasn't really been a problem. Yet."

Surrus stood up. "We act as an orphanage, too. All the younglings are held belowdecks, and have around a fifth of the ship to call theirs. They have classes, and they are taught to use their powers."

"And, of course, there are missions off-ship." Liblie finished. "Those are when the ship is somewhere else, if the work the DeSSer has is taking a long time. DeSSers then will travel to the ship on their own. These missions are pretty rare, but they happen often enough that we should mention them."