Chapter 9: Cang Xu’s Pain |
“Let me!” As the young captain was pondering rapidly, Zi Di stepped forward bravely, “Don’t forget that I am a ghost!”
But Cang Xu shook his head, “President Zi Di, please don’t put yourself in danger.”
“You’ve seen how the fish souls were depleted to deal with the tower spirit. Without my meticulous hand, many of the fish souls would have dissipated already.
“You’ve just become a ghost, it is not wise to risk you.
“When a ghost is damaged, the damage is not only to the body, but also to the memory, the nature, and more.”
“Among us all, we are the only two magicians, and can contribute more.”
“Furthermore, this is only my hypothesis.”
“Don’t forget, the tower spirit is very craft, maybe this is a ploy of theirs.”
“Therefore, sacrificing an insignificant member is the most dependable option.”
The young captain grinded his teeth.
He didn’t want to send Zi Di into danger nor did he want to sacrifice one of his comrades.
“Hold on, maybe I can do it?” The young captain decided to volunteer himself,
He had the dragonman form.
He also had similar racial magic!
“Do you want to turn into a ghost?” Zi Di shook her head.
She knew the youngster’s new form was not suited to be a magician.
“Be at ease, I only wanted to try, I wouldn’t make a fool out myself. I am not so abundantly generous to sacrifice myself as an insignificant person.”
Defending the young captain’s position as leader corresponded with her interests.
There was a more important factor, she didn’t want to make things difficult for the young man!
Zi Di spoke as she floated over, taking advantage of the two people’s astonishment to stretch out her hand towards the crystal ball.
“Ah!”
The ghostly Zi Di couldn’t help but shriek in pain.
She directly confronted the tower spirit.
Seeing the situation was anything but good, the young captain immediately rushed over.
But Zi Di had already drawn back her hand, then floated away as if she was running from a snake.
Her entire ghostly form was much darker, but she was spirited.
“Quickly, I have beaten back the tower spirit for the time being, its control over the crystal ball is gone for now!”
Cang Xu left the alchemy formation and went to control the two alchemy crab puppets, using them to quickly absorb information from the crystal ball.
“Extracting it!” Cang Xu exclaimed with excitement.
Then because of his excessive emotions, his eyes rolled back, and he fell unconscious on the spot.
The crystal ball began to emit white light again, causing the young captain to kick it out of the alchemy formation.
The crystal ball rolled into the wall, then stopped.
The white light blinked several times with blinding rays, as if the tower spirit was roaring its anger. The light quickly dissipated, and the crystal ball became calm once again.
“Cang Xu over casted his magic.” The ghostly Zi Di floated above Cang Xu’s head and examined him.
“Let him rest.”
“Unconsciousness is the body protecting itself.”
“We must return to the cockpit now!”
With great difficulty, Zi Di excavated the precious information as she and the young captain rushed to the cockpit.
She floated to the controls.
The control panel was a long metal board, with many engravings on it, runes that dazzled the eyes, lines, and diagrams.
Zi Di connected her spirit to it, then spoke out the code word she just extracted, causing the entire control panel to light up. One by one, the runes, lines, diagrams broke away from the rectangle metal panel and flew into the air to revolve around Zi Di.
Zi Di looked left and right, after surveying it all, she immediately drew her spirit into a part of it.
The runes responded and the lines joined together, with a diagram in the center.
They quickly formed a small three-dimensional formation.
Zi Di spoke another code word, causing the interlinked lines in the formation to shine with white light.
A moment later, the Deep Sea Monster Fish’s fishtail suddenly morphed. Its whale like tail turned into fan blades.
The fan blades rotated rapidly, creating a spiral stream behind it.
The Deep Sea Monster Fish’s speed shot up and fled in a diagonal angle, and in a short while, it completely broke away from the sailfish school while increasing the distance between it and the sunfish.
“We’ll carry on like this.” The ghostly Zi Di’s spirit then concentrated on a second floating formation.
This small formation was the most complex, to the young captain, it looked like a small castle.
As a matter of fact, this was the foundation of the Deep Sea Monster Fish’s control formation.
The ghostly Zi Di made it shine, and soon after, the Deep Sea Monster Fish’s lingering alarm finally ceased, ending the torment on everyone’s ears. At the same time, the flickering red lights also changed back to being blue.
The dispersing sonar wave also ceased.
The survivors were caught off guard due to the sudden increase in speed, causing many of them to fall to the ground.
“What’s going on?”
“It seems the captain and the others figured out how to control the ship!”
“We’ve freed ourselves from the fish school, we’re approaching the ocean surface.”
Everyone cheered at this pleasant surprise.
The situation was getting better.
Uinsg the portholes, they watched the seawater become light blue and the sunlight permeate the water, the sight made everyone’s heart quicken.
Zong Ge’s brows were still tight and didn’t relax, but his gaze contained his expectations.
“Hold on, why are we changing direction?”
Everyone quickly sensed that the ship was turning around.
180
The fish head bow quickly turned 180 degrees to face the pursuing school of sailfish and the sunfish.
A moment later, the fish mouth on the bow slowly opened, and from within extended a cannon.
The cannon was thick, blue, and emitted a golden luster. There were many alchemy formation lines engraved into the cannon, and when they were imbued with magic power, the lines began to quickly glow brightly.
A gold level cannon!
After mulling for a few seconds, the entirety of the Deep Sea Monster Fish slightly shook as a gold level artillery shell was fired.
A Python Bullet!
After the shell was fired, it exploded into lightning that flashed through the entire fish school, the sunfish, and all the way down into the seabed.
The sailfish school was swept away, and after a struggle a little, the sunfish too began to slowly sink downwards.
The single shot killed everything.
“We won?!”
“What kind of artillery shell could do that?”
Ah, this ship really is War Merchant’s, War Merchant!”
Everyone was jubilant, the victory made them forgetful.
Zong Ge’s brows relaxed, he had been observing how the hull had changed. In his heart, he sincerely exclaimed in admiration, “Such capable companions!”
Soon after, Zong Ge passed by a porthole and saw four alchemy puppets that looked like naga hurrying over to the fish corpses with large nets to industriously clean up the battlefield and rake in the spoils of war.
Everyone discussed what had happened with keen interest and enthusiasm.
“This is a bountiful harvest!”
“This much magic beast meat will be worth a lot.”
“I didn’t expect that these fish would be our food instead. Ah haha!”
Tripleblade walked over to Zong Ge and whispered to him, “My Lord, it seems the captain and the others have made headway, they must have found out how to thoroughly control the Deep Sea Monster Fish.”
“We also should have a share in the authority over this vessel.”
Zong Ge glanced at Tripleblade and slightly frowned, however when he thought of Cang Xu, he couldn’t help but nod, “We will go to the cockpit.”
He trusted the young captain.
But Cang Xu…
Zong Ge was vigilant against him.
En route, Zong Ge secretly decided: if the authority was in Cang Xu’s hands, he would wrest control from him! Perhaps he’d give it to the captain.
Even Zi Di was someone Zong Ge was wary of.
Zong Ge firmly remembered one fact, Zi Di was a ghost, and had been roused by Cang Xu’s magic.
……
The scorching sun hung high in the empty sky.
In a far off place, there was an unbroken range of sand dunes. The air was scorching and twisted one’s vision.
Crowds were congesting in an execution ground, all excitedly awaiting the beheading of a criminal.
The executioner unrolled a sheepskin scroll and shouted the criminal’s crime.
There was only one line.
The criminal was a confirmed necromancer!
In a distant castle, Cang Xu stood by a Sha Ta Clan elder and gazed at the far off execution ground.
“But your Lordship, there is no actual evidence that proves he is truly a necromancer.” Cang Xu couldn’t hold back himself.
“Based on the information I have collected, I have reasons to believe that they are being framed.”
“The priest who denounced him was the Sheng Ming Sect’s newly promoted bishop, Mu Bian. When he was a lowly man, he had many conflicts with and been bullied by many criminals.”
The Sha Ta elder nodded, “You said as much to me.”
“But Bishop Mu Bian has already been appointed to be the leader of my domain’s parish.”
“Since he believes this criminal is a necromancer, then it is so.”
“This is our Sha Ta Clan expressing their benevolence to Bishop Mu Bian.”
Cang Xu hesitantly responded, “But if a necromancer appeared in our territory, would that not negatively impact the clan’s reputation?”
“No.” The Sha Ta elder laughed, “The necromancer was captured without incident, furthermore this public execution will increase our clan’s prestige instead!”
“Necromancers…hmph, I’d rather kill an innocent man than let one slip away.”
“Hehe, I actually hope there are more necromancers like this.”
As they spoke, the executioner raised his axe high and took the criminal’s head.
The crowd cried in surprise, then cheered.
Cang Xu did not speak.
The Sha Ta elder had left, leaving him to stand by the castle window as he gazed out at the execution ground for quite some time.
Bishop Mu Bian’s vengeance was successful, the local lord could annex the criminal’s family’s riches and wealth, and the commoners had a great show that could be discussed for many years to come.
Everything was to everyone’s delight and satisfaction.
Only Cang Xu’s heart was trembling.
He stared at the head as it tumbled into the audience, he watched its blood dye the surrounding sand.
The head’s eyes were wide open, full of the fear and anger one had at death’s door.
Cang Xu gazed at it, and began to feel that that head looked like his own.
The wind blew across the sand.
Cang Xu seemed to feel the pain the scraping sand inflicted on the head.
Pain…pain…pain…
The pain tormented him, and it caused him to finally wake up and struggle from the nightmare his memories created.
He was in a sailor cabin.
Cang Xu opened his eyes and found himself on a single bed.
“Eh…where am I?”
As his field of view became clear, Cang Xu recalled something: he had lost consciousness due to excessive spell casting.
His head was still very sore.
But it had diminished a lot compared to the last time he was awake.
The walls around him had densely packed magic runes and lines.
Cang Xu ran his eyes over them, making out at least five spell formations, they seemed to be connected to form a singular complex system.
“Zi Di must have succeeded.”
This must be the alchemy ship’s medical functions being used.”
“Every sailor room must have one of these spell formations.”
“How long has it been since I lost consciousness?”
Cang Xu did not know the answer to this question.
From the cabin door, he did not hear any sounds of fighting.