Chapter 253: Critical Period (2)
Translator: Leo Editor: Frappe
"It’s the only map I have in possession." Coach smiled. "It seems like I’m the weakest one here, but I’ve spent most of my time doing research on herbs. I’m a member of the school in Six Ring Area. I probably can’t help you too much during fights, but I still want to assist you with all the information I know."
"Sounds great. You’re gorgeous, by the way. Without you, this trip will be very boring…" Perry’s eyes fell on Coach’s cleavage.
"Thank you for the kind words." Coach covered her mouth with her right hand and chuckled.
Nopel shook his head slightly and said, "Well, let’s focus on the trip. I think we’ll encounter the Cloud Bees soon."
Angele, at the side, listened to the three’s conversation with a smile on his face.
Coach looked at Angele for a second and continued, "It’ll take us about four months to reach our destination if everything goes as planned." She pointed at the first black dot on the map.
"This is the northern highland. The Cloud Bees are very active in the snow-covered mountains." She then pointed at a white flashing dot. "This is us. It will take us about one month to get there. We have plenty of time to prepare.
"Next, it’s the Human Snakes that have the bloodline of the ancient Siren. We’ll encounter them by the Lake of Distortion. I will tell you the information about them later and discuss the details after surviving the attack from the Cloud Bees." She stopped for a second, then continued, "There will be about 500 of them in one Cloud Bee swarm. We need to be fully prepared. Kill them all once they enter our sights. Otherwise, they’ll summon a larger swarm."
Angele was not concerned. The girl must be thinking that other wizards would protect her if they knew she had valuable information about the possible threats.
He noticed that the ten wizards on the boat had formed three small groups, excluding the missing ones.
Angele, Perry, Coach, and Nopel was one such group.
The captain named Baron and two other light wizards similarly formed one.
The couple also formed a group. Perry had tried to invite them, but they declined the offer. The two were also much stronger than Perry based on the mentality waves they were releasing.
Angele still disguised himself as a Gas stage wizard. It was a result of mentality compression. He could even disguise himself as a wizard apprentice if he wanted to. He did not trust anyone on the airship and he did not want the others to treat him as a threat.
Angele had done his homework before boarding the boat.
The wizards on the boats all had their own specializations, but the boats were not under any major organizations’ control, and their backgrounds did not matter.
Perry invited Angele to his group because he knew that Angele was a strong wizard.
Wizards were selfish by nature. They would fight together for their lives but when there was still peace, they would only make decisions that were beneficial to themselves. Power would grant them the highest right on the airships after they left Nola. Coach’s advantage was her knowledge and detailed information of the monsters. She could not fight like the others, but her knowledge was valuable to the team.
The sky cleared after about half an hour. The bright sunlight arrived at the deck and brought warmth to the wizards, but the wind was still cold as hell.
Angele stood on the deck. His upper body was cold while his lower body was hot, and that was a strange feeling.
They said goodbye to each other and returned to the cabins. Angele selected his room before he boarded the boat.
He walked down a short staircase and reached a long dark hallway. There were six brown wooden doors on both sides of the walls and there was a name tag on each of the doors.
Angele walked to the second room on the left.
He tapped on the door with his right hand, then a black snake-shaped rune flashed on its surface and the door opened itself quickly.
Angele entered the room whereas it was just a tiny bedroom. A white wooden bed was placed in the corner. There were several gears hanging on the wall as the decoration.
There were also a red table and a chair in the middle. Two large black cases were left beside the table.
Angele noticed that there was a window on the wall opposite to him.
The glass of the window was made of a special crystal and it would not be damaged easily.
Angele walked to the window and looked down.
There was a narrow river running down the forest.
There was no carriage moving between the trees. The area was probably not populated due to the dangerous beast living in the mountains.
"Nothing interesting." He sighed.
A group of blue flying snakes went passed the window. They had long, slim tails and large shiny wings.
Angele noticed that there was an elephant-sized golden lion drinking water from the river and two small lions running around behind it.
There was also a herd of yellow elks moving between the trees. The male elks had gray backs and enormous antlers that had the similar size as their bodies.
*WOO*
The noise sounded like someone was blowing a horn.
It was a beast roaring in the forest, its voice deep but gentle.
Angele stood in front of the crystal window for a while and turned around. He started to check the large cases beside the table.
*Click*
The first case was opened slowly.
A black shadow swung its wings and jumped out of the case. The shadow flew around in the room then landed on Angele’s right shoulder.
It was a black night sparrow with four wings. The bird had a pair of dark red eyes; it was cleaning its feathers with its beak.
There were also dozens of black metal bottles inside the case and their sizes varied. White labels were stuck on the surface of the bottles.
Angele closed the first case and opened the second one.
*KA*
The case was full of different potions and test tubes.
Golden liquid, red liquid, silver liquid, yellow dust, and brown pills…
Dozens of test tubes lined up on a large wooden rack and they were all made of vulcanized crystal.
The one in the center looked different. It was filled with red sticky liquid and was glowing.
"The essence of the mutated Barry Turtle…" Angele grabbed the test tube and shook it several times.
It was a byproduct of the ancient bloodline. Angele did not want to leave it in Nola, so he removed all the traces left by the ancient bloodline extraction before leaving the territory, including the two white centaurs.
The essence could be injected into creatures and make them mutate. It was a much safer method to use but its resulting effects were weaker.
Angele decided not to use it on himself as there might be conflicts between the two ancient bloodlines. In addition to that, the side-effect of the essence might also decrease his attributes.
He grabbed the two test tubes with brown pills inside after checking all the items.
Angele removed the stopper and threw a pill into his mouth, swallowing it right away.
It was tasteless, but he soon felt satiated.
"There’s no cook on this boat…Damn, I hate these nutrition pills…" He shook his head and stood up.
There was a critical problem that needed to be dealt with immediately.
A ‘captain’ for the three airships was needed to be selected in order to determine who would be in charge of navigating direction and pace. The leader would also be given a crystal amulet that could be used to control all three airships.
The rare materials that could release energy waves would be collected after the fights. Once that happened, the leader would be able to decide how to split the reward.
Furthermore, the special amulet could expel a wizard from a certain airship when necessary.
However, the crystal amulet would be activated only when the three pieces of crystal runes from the three airships were assembled.
There would be a fight between the captains soon or later.
The amulet was the symbol of power in the whole team. It could cause great tragedy once acquired by the wrong person, and that was the reason why the governing wizards forged the crystal runes. Similarly, the wizards on the boat were all qualified to join the fight for the amulet. The captains would hand the crystal runes to the winner along with the amulet.
The trip was dangerous, and the leader must be strong enough to rule the wizards.
It was much safer when the symbol of rights was controlled by just one person.
The organization did not appoint a leader because they wanted the members to figure it out by themselves.
Since the airships had left the region, wizards were no longer under the jurisdiction of the laws of Nola and so, wizards might die during the competition. It was no problem as the airships were equipped with the best medical facilities, so most injuries could be healed quickly. The wizards, after all, would do anything just to obtain the amulet.
"The fight will start before we encounter the Cloud Bees," Angele muttered. He did not want others to control his destiny. The airships were about one thousand meters above the earth and being expelled from the boat would be the worst outcome in the trip.
Angele had already decided to join in the fight for the possession of the amulet. He himself knew that most of the wizards would not let this chance slide.
‘Sadly, not all wizards here are releasing their mentality waves.’ That was the main problem Angele was facing. Without the information on the mentality waves, Zero would not be able to tell him which stage his opponent was at. He had to find it out by himself during the fight.