The sounds of seagulls and crashing tides rhymed beside Angor’s ears as he slowly opened his eyes. The view outside the window reminded him of several years ago, when he would also gaze through a small window on The Redbud as he watched the unknown world.
As he emptied his mind to enjoy the view, a gray seabird wearing panda costume landed on the windowsill and called at him.
“Good morning, Toby.” Angor waved a hand casually, and following Toby’s demand, he slowly climbed out of bed.
A standing mirror nearby perfectly reflected his wiry, well-toned inverted triangular-shaped body. His messy hair after sleep did nothing to hide his personal charm.
While getting washed and dressed, he heard someone knocking on his door.
“Mister Padt, Chief Officer Helen of The Limpet is here. She needs to know when you’re coming. The ship is bound to depart within an hour.”
“Will be there soon!” Angor replied.
“Thank you. I’ll tell her so.”
Angor then found a tight-fitting gentleman suit and used Glamor to turn into the “typical, absolutely not attractive middle-aged man”. He then left the room with Toby.
He went downstairs and saw a uniformed woman with a somewhat wide waistline waiting for him, who then removed her hat and saluted.
“Mister Padt, this is Chief Officer Helen from The Limpet,” Boro explained.
The woman walked to Angor and bowed slightly. “It’s a privilege to serve you, great wizard.”
Mortals usually couldn’t tell apprentices and wizards apart. Angor checked and noticed that the woman was a mortal about the age of 30. She looked pretty decent too, if one didn’t mind her eyes, which looked a little stern.
“Sorry for keeping you waiting, Miss Helen.” Angor gave her a friendly smile.
Helen’s expression twitched a little as she wasn’t expecting a “great wizard” to treat her with courtesy. She had served many supernatural beings in her career, and most of the time, she only earned cold shoulders.
“I-I didn’t wait for long. Are you leaving right now, Mister Wizard?”
“Yes. Please lead the way.”
They left the office building with Boro accompanying them, who then smiled at Angor and asked Helen a question, “Officer Helen, can you tell us who’s protecting the ship this time?”
“It’s Mister Roman, sir. I saw him on the deck just now.”
“Roman?” Boro moved closer to Angor and whispered, “That’s Roman Rofka, a man good at manipulating water elements. The White Clam Sea Fare Association claims that they hired him as a guard, but Roman is in fact from there.”
Boro pointed at the sky.
Angor nodded.
“That man has been staying in this city for 20 years. At first, he would never go with any ships. But he changed his mind later, since he’s approaching his limit, just like me. Don’t take me wrong, Roman is a lot stronger than me. He’s been accompanying ships across Devil’s Water in recent years, probably looking for a destiny to break through his level.”
Compared to Roman’s story, Angor was more interested in another matter. “Is a level-3 apprentice enough to keep the ship safe at Devil’s Water?”
Boro looked at Helen, who answered this one, “Sir, our ship is designed by a master engineer. We won’t have a problem with bad weather and turbulent waters. We only need a great wizard to help us when we run into monsters.”
Angor nodded. It was very rare for powerful monsters to show up because these creatures were wise enough to know that wizards would ruthlessly hunt them down, should any of them leave traces behind.
As for weaker monsters... a powerful level-3 apprentice like Roman should have no problem dealing with them. Or at least chasing them away.
Besides, since The Redbud had a nightmare stone used for concealing the ship, Angor believed that The Limpet probably had something similar.
“Is Roman the only one?”
“I didn’t find another wizard apart from him, sir,” said Helen.
“It’s almost winter. No organization will send recruiters at such a time,” said Boro. “Good for you though, as you will have no competition when looking for talents.”
Boro’s attempt to comfort Angor was quite pointless since there wouldn’t be any “competition” even if a hundred recruiters went to the same land.
The world was so wide. Even an “island” like the Old Earth had a dozen large-scale nations bordering each other. When Mara went there to recruit, he spent lots of time looking around the Goldspink Empire.
Soon, they reached the harbor of the city.
“This is as far as I can go, Mister Padt. I wish you a safe travel.” Boro removed his hat and bowed to Angor. “Hope you bring us new torchbearers that will inherit the summit of our glory.”
Angor returned the courtesy and whispered to the old man, “Thank you very much for your hospitality, Mister Boro. I left a small gift for you in my bedroom. Hope you like it.”
He then turned away and left with Helen, while Boro was left confused.
A gift? For me?
The Limpet was already setting sail, allowing more rays of the morning sun to enter the harbor and brighten Boro’s long beard.
...
Boro returned to Brute Cavern’s office and saw a number of crates scattered all over the main hall. The workers had placed their books elsewhere just to make room for the new “shipments”.
“Hey, Boro, the HQ sent everything we requested!” the fat apprentice yelled to Boro happily.
Each time they accepted new materials from the headquarters, they would spend some time celebrating as if enjoying a festival, which was rare in this remote city far from home.
“They have no reason to disappoint us, as long as we don’t ask for absurd items like some music box.” Boro chuckled.
Hami cursed something under his breath, but he soon enjoyed himself by arranging the items.
As the “second-in-command” of the office, Hami was usually in charge of everything that Boro didn’t interfere with, such as allocating prizes.
Naturally, he demanded all the better items, which frustrated the others greatly. Yet no one could protest.
It was when Hami almost put one-fourth of all the new items into his personal storage that Boro finally decided to stop him.
Hami looked at a colorful whelk in his hand and showed a hesitant look. “This is the last one, promise! I won’t mind any of the remaining stuff.”
The whelk was an Echo Conch usually used by Matter Handlers. But there was no Matter Handler here, so the item could be considered a plaything at best.
“You said it! We’ll have the rest of the stash, and you will NOT get your hands on anything again!” The others agreed to Hami’s “offer”.
While most of the apprentices continued looking through the crates, some of them joined Boro to read The Mirror together. The crisis at the Evernight Kingdom had not reached Brute Cavern yet. They all wished to know how their organization was going to prepare against the matter.
“Stop accepting visitors, forbid apprentices from leaving the city, decrease quests that involve fieldwork... Assigned workers apart from those working inside the Evernight Kingdom shall return to the HQ at once...”
Everyone was shocked to see the message. Even Hami left his items and came to read the magazine more carefully.
“Did they just say that we will stay here longer?”
“So that’s why they sent us resources so generously! They meant to keep us here!”
“I knew it! I should never have accepted this damn job!”
Boro sighed. “Perhaps the organization is protecting us from harm. Maybe the HQ isn’t exactly safe right now.”
“But that Padt guy just came from there. Safe or not, we can ask him!”
“He already left,” said Boro. “Maybe he went on a recruiting mission just to escape from the crisis... Oh right, Mister Padt said he left me something in his room.”
Boro went upstairs and returned with a simple-looking silver cape in his hand.
The item looked plain from afar. But when looking more closely, people saw inconspicuous gray patterns, which looked like sea tides, weaved on the cape.
“What the heck is that, old man? Wait, I feel energy signatures,” an apprentice commented.
Boro carefully removed a piece of note attached to the cape.
The fat apprentice moved closer and began reading the note aloud, “Mister Boro, this is called the ‘Swimmer’s Bless’. It’s used for hiding your presence from detection, and it can help you breathe underwater and stay safe from water pressure. Consider it a reward for giving me the detailed schedule chart. Hope you enjoy it.”
His voice was trembling when he finished reading.
“This is like a Blood Shark Suit but way better!”
Hami stared at the item with pleading eyes. “Mister-Mister Boro, I—”
“Quit it!” the fat apprentice interrupted. “You will not take ANYTHING from now on, right?”
“But this is not from the HQ! It’s an extra gift for Boro!”
“Ah, so you know it’s not for you? Didn’t you say that mister was a coward and that Boro was helping him to no avail? Changed your mind already?”
Hami couldn’t find the right words to retort this time, so he only tried his best to make himself feel better. “But maybe this is a fake! I saw him working, and he was only using cheap materials!”
Boro was checking the cape, and he suddenly pointed to the inner lining of the cape’s hood.
“This emblem...”
The others heard him and looked his way. They saw Boro pointing at an embroidered picture, which was a lion entangled by thorny vines. Also, the picture was pulsing with faint energy ripples.
“I think I just saw it from somewhere.”
Everyone turned around to look at The Mirror magazine, which was left on a desk nearby.
It showed exactly the same emblem on its cover.