Barbossa didn't crawl out of his hammock until the sun was high enough to bake the salt into the deck.
The hangover was a physical entity, a dull, rhythmic throbbing behind his eyes that felt like a carpenter hammering on his skull. He gulped down a large mug of room-temperature rum, a psychological cure that only served to make the dehydration worse and staggered onto the deck of the Sea Serpent.
The ship was humming with a strange energy. Usually, a morning in Tortuga meant half the crew was face-down in the scuppers and the other half was nursing a grudge. Today, however, they were huddled in small, animated groups, their whispers carrying over the gentle slap of the tide.
"Gibbs!" Barbossa croaked, squinting against the glare of the Caribbean sun. "Where's the boy? Where's Hugo?"
Gibbs hurried over, his lone eye bright with a mixture of confusion and excitement. "Master Hugo was up before the gulls, Captain. Said he had business with the Port Authority. He's back now, but... well, he's not on our deck."
Gibbs pointed toward the northern end of the wharf, toward the graveyard of Berth Three. Barbossa followed the finger and saw Hugo standing on the canted deck of that rotting merchant sloop, the Sea Fairy. He appeared to be measuring the stump of the broken mast with a length of twine.
"Let's see what the lad's bought with my gold," Barbossa grunted.
He led a small contingent of curious pirates down the pier. The closer he got, the more Barbossa's lip curled. The Sea Fairy was an even more pathetic sight in the harsh light of day. She was a splintered carcass, held together by barnacles and stubbornness. Fifty doubloons for this? He started to wonder if Hugo's "genius" had its limits, perhaps the boy was brilliant at sea but a babe in the woods when it came to the dry land.
"Hugo!" Barbossa called out, jumping onto the ship. The deck groaned beneath his boots, a sickening, hollow sound that made his teeth ache. "You actually threw my coin away on this ghost? This isn't a ship, lad. It's a funeral pyre waiting for a spark."
Hugo turned, and for a moment, the exhaustion of the previous night was visible in his eyes, but it was overshadowed by a sharp, triumphant spark. He held up the parchment deed, the red wax seal glinting.
"She's mine, Captain," Hugo said simply. "And she's exactly what I need."
"What you need is a sanity check," a pirate behind Barbossa jeered, drawing a round of snickers.
Hugo ignored them. He stepped toward Barbossa, his voice dropping to a low, serious tone that immediately silenced the mockery. "Regarding our 'final run,' Hector. I've chosen the target."
Barbossa's interest sharpened instantly. The hangover seemed to recede, replaced by the familiar itch of greed. "Tell me. If it's worth the seventy percent, I want to hear the name."
"The Santa Trinidad," Hugo said.
The silence that followed was absolute. Barbossa stared at him, his mouth slightly agape. Gibbs crossed himself instinctively.
"The Trinidad?" Barbossa whispered, his voice cracking. "The Spanish Silver? Lad, that ship's been a ghost story for sixty years. Every treasure-hunter from here to the Old World has chased her wake and found nothing but empty blue water. She's a myth. A tavern-tale told to keep the drunkards dreaming."
"She is a three-decked galleon sitting on a limestone shelf," Hugo countered. "And I know the coordinates."
"Coordinates? No man has coordinates for a legend!" Barbossa snapped. "What evidence do you have? If we chase a ghost on your word alone, the crew will mutiny before we hit the first doldrum."
Hugo unhurriedly reached into his coat and pulled out a simple, hand-drawn chart. He had spent the early hours of the morning sketching it from the deep, academic recesses of his memory, knowledge from a future where the Trinidad had been salvaged with satellite imagery and submersibles.
"Look here," Hugo said, pointing to a blank, terrifying stretch of water southeast of the main Spanish shipping lanes. "The Razor Reef. Every captain in this sea avoids it because the charts show it as a graveyard of hidden stone and chaotic currents. They call it a dead end."
Barbossa leaned over the parchment, his braided beard brushing the paper. He knew of Razor Reef. It was a place where the sea boiled over jagged teeth of rock, a place of broken hulls and silent graves.
"According to the records I... discovered," Hugo continued, choosing his words carefully, "the Trinidad didn't return to the main lane when the English privateers gave chase. Her captain was a desperate man. He chose a route he thought no one would dare follow, hoping to slip through the Razor. He failed. The galleon is wedged in the center of the reef, shielded from the heavy swells by the outer limestone walls."
The detail in Hugo's voice was unnerving. He wasn't speaking with the "maybe" or "perhaps" of a dreamer. He was speaking with the cold, clinical certainty of an eyewitness.
"How?" Barbossa asked, his voice dry. "How did you even know this? Who gave you these secrets?"
"An old man I knew," Hugo lied smoothly, crafting an excuse that fit the world's logic. "A navigator who spent forty years obsessed with the Spanish manifests. He died in my arms and gave me the key to his life's work."
It was a classic trope, but in the Caribbean of 1720, it was the most believable explanation for impossible knowledge. Barbossa stared at Hugo, his mind whirling. He thought back to the Devil's Triangle, to the "upwelling" and the "slingshot." Hugo had proven he could see the invisible architecture of the ocean. If he said the Trinidad was in the Razor, it was a gamble Barbossa was now willing to take.
This boy isn't just a navigator, Barbossa realized, a chill of both fear and greed running down his spine. He is a living treasure map. A human key to the vaults of the world.
"Good," Barbossa said, his eyes burning with a dark, predatory fire. "We sail for the Razor. But if we reach those rocks and find only foam, Hugo... not even your genius will save you from the crew's wrath."
"We won't find foam," Hugo said. "But I need preparations. I need specific materials to ensure the Sea Serpent doesn't share the Trinidad's fate."
"Name them," Barbossa said, waving a hand dismissively. "Whatever you need, Gibbs will procure it. We leave as soon as the tide allows."
Hugo handed a list to Gibbs. It was a strange assortment: massive quantities of tung oil, raw hemp, crushed limestone, and several specific acids used in metallurgy. To the pirates, it looked like the shopping list of an alchemist.
"Also," Hugo added, glancing at the Sea Fairy. "While I am at sea with you, I want this hull hauled into the dry shallows. I want a guard on her night and day. No one touches her. No one strips her for parts. She is to be waiting for me when we return."
"Done!" Barbossa barked. In his mind, he was already counting the silver ingots of the Trinidad. He would have given Hugo a palace if it meant getting his hands on that Spanish gold.
As the crew sprang into action, driven by the frantic energy of "gold fever," Hugo remained on the deck of his ruined ship. He watched them go, the smile on his face fading into a look of grim determination. He turned his back to the pier, standing in the shadow of the broken mast, and focused his mind.
He reached into the "Classical Shipbuilding" interface, his thoughts pressing against the 10-gold-coin requirement.
[Prerequisite Met: Ownership Confirmed.]
[Consuming 10 Gold Doubloons...]
[Classical Shipbuilding Tier 0: ACTIVATING.]
A low, resonant hum began to vibrate in Hugo's marrow, a sound that seemed to come from the heart of the ship's keel. A faint, golden lattice of light, invisible to everyone but him began to trace the grain of the wood beneath his feet.
The transformation had begun.