SARGASSO SAILS
CHAPTER 9
KONKERLAND
My anger had changed to apprehension as I neared Konkerland. The cauldron of the volcano played its light against the perpetual black cloud that hung over its summit. The shoreline was crepuscular and covered in slime. It was if I was sailing into pure evil. However, the winds were steady although tainted with the smell of sulphur and something else...the stench of death...an odiferous veil of rotting corpses, maggots and decay.
As I sailed around the volcano, I heard them before I saw them. There was an assembly of sorts going on in martial style. Row upon row of shelled creatures, covered in mucus, were chanting and bowing towards an even larger creature of turpitude, ensconsed above them on a large rock. From the rock, hung a flag...with a swastika on it!
They had still not noticed me as I approached even closer. It was the Mollusk army singing praises to the creature on the rock. They were arranged in companies; the larger Tritons and Horse Conchs, looking like primordial tank battalions, were in the forefront. On the far side of them, and in the shallows, were the Coners, the ones that had been attacking me. Their toxic harpoons were formidable weapons. The slow-moving Crushtazians were closest to me. By now I could see that their leader was not a conch at all, but a giant snail wearing a conch shell as a suit of armour.
-Hail Oopslop...Hail to the King! Oopslop surveyed his forces and then growled:
-Toxic and noxious friends of mine... by force we have won the Golden Shell. Force is all these Islanders will understand. When we unleash the secret power of the Shell, none shall stand against us. We have risen from the slime and become sublime. We are the master race of the Summerlands. Those species like the Chambered Nautilus, that have not evolved, will be our servants from this point on. Now let me hear you!
-Hail Oopslop...Hail to the King!
Then I understood. The swastika, the gramaphone, and the looted paintings...all booty from the Third Reich. How long had all this been floating around before drifting into the Summerlands? Akviro talked about past centuries. Were the Summerlands the location of Leon's youth fountains? And the mystery of the air travellers...could they have been the chariots of the gods? What powers did the Golden Shell possess?
I had intended to go ashore and confront these beasts, but after two attacks, and after hearing the diatribe by Oopslop, I thought it best to head back to Mangroville and warn the others. Just then the cry went up:
-A spy!
Before I realized the magnitude of the situation, the Coners were already attaching themselves to my hull. They were dragging Sargasso into the shallows towards the lava rocks.
I tried scraping them off with the boat gaffs, but with little success. Then I remembered a piece of advice from an old fishing captain. I ran down to the galley and fetched a flask of Bourbam. After testing a sample of it on myself, I began pouring its contents all over the Coners. One by one, they began to let go. I quickly unfurled the jib, and I was free! Sailing out of that putrid fog, I made course for Mangroville.
ON TO CHAPTER 10 "JAM AT MANGROVILLE"
GET ME OUTTA HERE...THIS IS TOO GROSS