“How many more times can you pull your stunning trick?” I asked Simon.

  “Without digging into some skill potions, just once more safely. Given the larger area of effect, we need, it takes a lot out of me, and we have a long trudge to get back out of here.”

  The ledge on which the giant oysters were perched ran farther than our light could shine, but based on the surveyor maps I had studied, I knew it went off in both directions for quite a distance. The ledge was not very wide, perhaps forty to fifty feet. It ended on the far side of where we were standing at the dropoff, which fell hundreds of feet into the dark depths below. Any given ledge section wasn’t extensive but was quite long. It stretched several hundred yards to our left and right in both directions.

  “I can give you a Lesser Skill Recovery potion if needed.” I offered. Having seen Simon’s trick, I believe the safest and fastest way to check for black pearls would be to use that. I told him, “Fighting giant oysters off one or two at a time could take all night.”

  “I’ll defer to your judgment, Gwydion. This is your quest.” He replied.

  “My fourth arcana spell, Seal Enchantment, requires expensive pearls as wyrd components, so any extra we find will be helpful, but we can get out of here once I get a lustrous black pearl. I can always buy additional pearls down the road.”

  I thought for a moment longer. “Let’s push out toward the dropoff and angle one of your stuns to get as many as possible. Hopefully, one of those huge ones will have what we are looking for.”

  I removed one of my two Lesser Skill Recovery potions and handed it to him. “Use this after you make a path for us to the dropoff,” I suggested.

  Biff led us through a narrow path that wound around and between giant oysters. We positioned ourselves as well as we could, and Simon went to work when we could go no further.

  He aimed the stun to impact as many giant oysters as possible, and we spread out quickly, picking up marble-sized, perfectly round, lustrous white pearls. There was a pearl in nearly every oyster we checked. But they did not stay stunned nearly as long as the smaller variety, and we soon had to rush back, fighting off a few of them unexpectedly.

  Adriana pushed many of them out of the way with gusts of wind or water. I don’t know which, since it was hard to tell the difference in the dim water, but thanks to her efforts, only a couple of the giant oysters had to be physically attacked for our safety.

  One such attack was near the dropoff, and Biff had used his magical gauntlets to pummel a giant oyster that got too near. After his last experience, he wasn’t holding anything back. With a terrific series of punches, he finally smashed one open and pulled out the largest pearl yet, half again the size of the next biggest. He held it up for us to see.

  I had a feeling that Bido was in danger.

  I rapidly turned to look at him, and he was looking at me with similar concern.

  We were both in danger, which meant big trouble.

  Wilma cheered. “Nice work, Biff, it’s your lucky day!”

  And before anyone could warn her not to say that again or for Biff to watch out, a large, dark shape flashed up from the depths of the dropoff and, in what looked like slow motion, took a bite out of Biff.

  Several bites, in fact.

  The first bite did not do any damage despite its ferocity, and I was suddenly grateful for Master Habberjaz’s enchantment of Biff’s armor. Its primary magical effect was to ignore the first damage done to the person wearing the armor. However, the first massive chomp was followed by another, and Biff’s life points dropped to almost half. With a second rapid gulp and a third bite, the enormous great white shark dropped my best friend below twenty-five percent. One more bite, and Biff would be a goner.

  Things happened fast after that.

  Steven cast a healing spell at Biff that undoubtedly saved his life. Biff used a healing spell locked in his ring, I gave him to bump him up an additional ten points, which seemed paltry compared to the shark’s damage, but it was something in the right direction.

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  Adriana shot the shark with a jet of water from a wand, and Wilma shot a blinding flash of light into the shark’s eyes.

  Simon and Quartz both rushed over. Simon ran through the water like air, moving faster than I have ever seen a person run, even on land. But somehow, the dwarf was even faster. One minute, Quartz was running toward the shark, and the next, he was rolling in a ball right up and crashing into the enormous shark’s side. He struck once, then twice, with his Dwarven copper ax into the gills of the great white shark.

  The shark went mad with fury and pain.

  Say what you want about Quartz and how annoying he was. When the chips were down, he was fierce. His attack was intense, and it most certainly got the shark’s attention.

  Biff was ejected from the shark’s mouth and flew toward the dropoff. Simon barely reached him in time to snag him by the boot, which half came off his leg by the time he got pulled back to the safety of the ledge. Once more, the slow movement due to buoyancy saved Biff from falling into the dropoff and even more danger.

  Bido and I sent forth a Mage Blast, maxing it at ten points of damage each. The spells hit the shark and had no effect. It was immune to our first-level spell attacks.

  It was then that I noticed two things. First, the shark was outlined in a thin red line, which was a game warning that the creature was beyond our ability as a group to defeat. All creatures' name tags, or cognitos, reflected their difficulty. Green was easy, blue was a slight challenge, yellow and orange were real challenges, and red meant not defeatable under probable conditions.

  Red meant dead.

  The second thing I noticed was that, like Blinky, who was orange to me when I was alone with him, the shark had a name. Its name was Old Sergeant.

  I suddenly remembered tales from Keelwell sailors and fishermen who told about a massive shark that would attack small boats and tear up fishing lines. It was the terror of sharks in Shark Bay. It was THE shark that some said the bay was named after.

  It was here with us. It was obviously hungry. It was not happy. And it might be immune to first-level spells.

  Bido looked at me, coming to the same conclusion. “We’re in trouble.” He said urgently.

  The shark shot off away from Quartz, and for the briefest moment, I thought it was fleeing. Instead, it was gaining momentum and swung back for another attack. It targeted Biff again. Even getting healed after the attack left him wounded and weakened.

  Biff saw it coming. He backed away from the ledge and right into a giant oyster, which clamped down on his leg.

  Biff made eye contact with me briefly, knowing what this meant. Then he turned and smacked his gauntlets together. Sparks flew through the water and lit up the area around him.

  If anything, the electrical discharge made the shark even more aggressive. It lunged and chomped once, twice, three times.

  Biff went limp, and his cognito turned gray.

  My heart stopped. My friend died because I wanted to impress the alchemist and get a fancy pearl. What kind of selfish monster was I?

  In the very next moment, Biff gained color and started struggling again. Steven yelled, “That’s all I have; get him a potion, and we need to get out of here!”

  Wilma and I rushed forward toward Biff and the shark. Bido and Adriana joined us.

  Adriana said, “I’ll use earth magic to keep it busy, but Bido has assessed that the shark is immune to first and second-level offensive spells. We are really limited. Do you have a big bang in that staff of yours?”

  It didn’t even occur to me to offer a witty reply. I pointed the staff at the shark and thought about some powerful offensive spells I could access. However, none of the spells would be enough to kill the creature. I could damage it. I could hurt it for sure. But given the maybe one percent drop in its life when Quartz double struck it in its gills of all places, we would need way more.

  This thing was way out of our league.

  As I thought all this, Quartz and Simon closed in to attack, further limiting my spell options without killing them as well. The shark spat out Biff for a second time as the dwarf and monk struck. Old Sergeant was taking damage, but it was down three or four percent after our best fighters and mages did their worst to it.

  Simon shouted, “It is immune to my stun attacks!”

  The shark did not swim off again as I was expecting. Instead, it twisted and launched for Quartz, who had been chopping at its gills again. The shark did not like attacks on its vulnerable gills. That made sense. It used the gills to breathe.

  And suddenly, I knew what I needed to do. But I needed to get closer.

  Turning back to the other two mages who began to follow me out of pure loyalty, hoping I could save all of them, I said, “I need to get into range. They need to survive one more attack from the thing.”

  I ran with all my strength, leaping over and around giant oysters. Adriana and Wilma shot at the oysters, clearing as much of a path as possible. A jet of air swooshed by me and almost sent me careening into the open maw of a giant oyster.

  Steven grabbed my shoulder just in time. “I hope you have a good plan!” He said as we ran together.

  “I do. Sort of!” I shouted back.

  He did not look comforted.

  The shark was not done by a long shot. Quartz was his next target, and the shark's jaws were large enough to take the dwarf whole. Biff was huge, and even as large as the shark was, it could not swallow him outright. It was the only thing that saved Biff’s life—that and Steven’s healing spells, at any rate.

  The shark closed on Quartz and had a one-bite meal in mind. As Old Sergeant chomped, Quartz shoved his Dwarven bronze shield into the shark’s mouth through sheer nerve.

  The clanging sound of a powerful shark jaw on magical dwarf metal echoed across the ledge. The shark froze for a second and then lost its mind in a fury of movement. It thrashed and choked, trying to rid itself of the object in its mouth.

  “That’s right, baby, I’m your Orca-dontist!” Quartz screamed at the massive shark.

  There was a high-pitched squealing sound, and Quartz’s shield slowly bent in half. As Old Sergeant closed its massive jaws, its glowing red, intelligent eyes slowly became visible, and they stared right at Quartz.

  It snorted inches from the dwarf, and little twirls of bubbly water circled around Quartz’s head and blew his long, braided Dwarven hair behind him.

  Quartz took a step back. “Well, crap.”