614 Boarding the ship Part 1 (2/2)
”Because the Holy See people tried to kill County Queen Lex's envoy, does that mean the conflict between the county queen and the prince has disappeared?” Some of the southern nobles who leaned towards Lex began contemplating. If they were asked to obey Safilos, they would definitely be reluctant, but the emperor was obviously going to value the county queen now. There would not be any estrangement.
If the prince could not suppress the emperor, allowing County Queen Lex to enter Qin's pinnacle echelon of authority, then these nobles would not mind cooperating with Safilos.
Of the southern nobles, at least one-third of them were willing to follow Lex. The county king had already maximized her capabilities in Bitter Water Prefecture. That barren place was managed very well by Lex even though the commercial aspect was average, the agriculture there was totally self-sufficient.
County Queen Lex had a huge following of mages, she herself was already a grade-6 grand mage. She could surely ascend to a sorcerer. A sorcerer's life was pretty long, the nobles could protect their long-term interests by following Lex. This was one of the reasons why the southern nobles were willing to follow Lex.
Some people even hoped that Lex could be the emperor. If Lex advanced to a grade-9 sorcerer, she could live for over one-thousand years. That way the figures of authority would not keep changing.
Fortunately, Emperor Ojarvis would not enjoy such a long life, so these nobles had the patience to wait. As long as the two people did not clash the nobles could reach a compromise with Holy Rock City.
Back in Holy Rock City's palace, Emperor Ojarvis was furious, ”Sister's envoy couldn't be located and the over one-thousand recce riders also cannot locate her. Only one of uncle's sorcerers said that the female mage didn't die, as Sister had given her a metal room. Not only did the female mage not die, the two-hundred soldiers which I sent to protect her could still be alive too. Holy Rock City's recce riders cannot locate Saleen either, where did Saleen go to?”
It turned out that on the second day, Saleen had asked Aini to lead the two-hundred men from the imperial swordsman's camp himself, while Saleen changed into a mercenary's outfit and switched to a smaller commercial route. Saleen led Narnia and Aini's parents east towards the sea where they went to meet up with the winged skeleton's pan's turtle alchemical boat.
By traveling on the sea, not only could they bypass Guderian City, they could also avoid any accidents at Phoenix's borders. Their speed would be much faster too. When the pan's turtle alchemical boat traveled on the surface of the sea, its speed could exceed one-hundred miles an hour and there was no need to rest. It was way faster than riding a horse.
From the central region of the empire to the sea, the distance was only around five-thousand miles. If they had gone to the borders the journey would be close to ten-thousand miles.
It was necessary for Saleen to be cautious. From the information obtained by Narnia, Safilos had planned to make peace with Lex temporarily. The truce between Safilos and Lex did not equate to a good relationship between Safilos and Saleen. ”I only have one city, and my Sregl Island background cannot be publicized yet. Alchemy City cannot be provoked. In Safilos' eyes I am a person who can be sacrificed anytime. Since the people in Green Dragon Stone have been sacrificed, he will have no qualms doing that to me too.”
Aini continued traveling north with the intent of surveilling the situation at the borders. Aini would stay for a week at the borders, so that he could position a large number of spirits to collect intelligence. At the same time he would purchase a batch of rations to bring back to Metatrin City. Saleen had estimated that his own city would face war in at most two years' time.
Stocking up on rations would forever be the most important matter. No matter a grand swordmaster or sorcerer, one would have to eat. Without rations one would not be able to defend their city no matter how many mages or soldiers they had.
Saleen and company rushed to the seaside. Other than Cuisi, no one was not exhausted. Using magic to recover one's body was not the same as natural rest. Seeing that everyone was greatly fatigued, Saleen stopped.
The coast of the central region of Qin had many mountains and inferior ports, but the pan's turtle alchemical boat was not very huge either. Saleen found a secluded spot, then established a Sound Transmission Magic Array. He followed the pre-determined coordinates to try and contact the winged skeleton, he managed to do so on the third attempt.
The pan's turtle alchemical boat had secretly berthed at a location one-hundred miles away, where there was only a tiny fishing village. It was winter, so the fishermen did not go out to sea while the schools of fishes were absent. The coast was abnormally quiet.
Saleen led the group of people who could barely move their feet to the seaside and a ship about thirty yards long was berthed on the sea. Saleen noticed that the pan's turtle alchemical boat had gotten larger, ”The exterior shell should have been thickened with an extra layer of tough crystalline substance.”
If Aini was present, he would have recognized that this one yard thick crystal was the giant spirit armor from the death plane. A giant spirit armor was not some exotic item, it only had above average attributes. In the face of attacks, a giant spirit armor would shatter itself, releasing energy which would negate the attacks. This one yard thick crystal was actually separated into a dozen layers. Each time it got attacked, only one layer would be destroyed.
This armor was naturally produced on the bodies of large spirits. When placed on a ship, it actually became the best armor. In a naval battle most attacks were extremely brief, a layer of the giant spirit armor would be able to negate them. A giant spirit armor with a dozen layers could at least withstand dozen of attacks at the same spot before being penetrated.