“Sail! Out! Waters still, weather fine! Sail with Melicertha’s and Plesia’s blessing!”

“Hey! Saori, let’s go!” Grimnir called out to me, trying to bring my attention back to him, but I couldn’t help but to continue watching the workings of the dock.

The sound of sails unfurling and catching the wind, accompanied by the sailors’ and dock managers’ confirming ahoys. The anchor was retrieved from the ground of the river before water mages began to push the ship they were on forward. Another cargo ship was sent with boxes full of wares down the river to another country. Another day at the docks of Gleisvale.

Honestly, when I first came here, I thought it was magnificent, worthy of being one of the top three locations to visit when you’re in the city. I wasn’t able to go to the train station and going to the fort the merchant guild was based in wasn’t possible now, as it also doubled as the senate’s meeting chambers. Acting like a tourist, for me, was more enjoyable than coming here for business.

And, despite only being a river, Gleislane was huge. Far larger than I had thought at first. A huge pond was where the docks were, with its water coming down from the Ankoran mountain, giving the city its distinct water canals. To reiterate, the river’s beginning at the docks was like an inland sea.

And this river went under a hanging hill, which looked like an arch, from the Centipedeclaw rock formation surrounding the capital of Estralia. There were only two suitable entries into this city — the valley and the river — and both were a sight to behold. I only began admiring it once I saw the ship traffic around the docks. A natural phenomenon.

And then I brought my attention to the docks itself, noticing the seamen hanging around in nearby pubs and inns, waiting for their next voyage. Dock managers and guards would roam the area, making sure everything was working and in peace.

Rowdy sailors and adventurers were a common sight here. They either drank and ate with each other, or were arguing and fighting after a game or two. If you thought about it, sailors were like the adventurers of the oceans and seas, right? I felt that was right in a way, though I didn’t know much about it. My opinion only came from observing these people, after all.

“Miss Saori!”

“Coming!” I stopped watching after Tasianna urged me back to the group. “Sorry about that.”

“Jeez, Sensei, I never knew you were this interested in the ocean. You never acted like this when we went on the school trips,” Daichi commented, resting his staff on his shoulders.

“She’s probably still occupied with what Hestia said yesterday,” Ellaine interjected. “Saori only had a day of rest after what happened at the warehouse, right? We should allow her some time to relax before we reach our destination.”

“You only had a few days of rest, too, lass! You are not one to talk,” Grimnir stated, chastising his apprentice.

“Three days is just fine! Besides, with Hestia working on whatever she’s planning, I can’t be the only member of Aurora staying in bed just because I fought a random, ahem—” She placed her hands in front of her mouth, and mumbled, “— goddess.”

I thanked Ellaine for supporting my decision. It wasn’t as if Tatsuya, Kyouya, and Hanazawa were sitting in their beds either despite the trials they faced on their adventure in that beastmen village. They too were doing work, coordinating with Gael and the Shaturein-Layavete cooperation team to find things out about the second demonkin contractor in this city.

My group, on the other hand, were finishing up with what we started out — finding the location of the mana battery that Layavete spy found. And this time, it wasn’t some place which belonged to a senator we suspected, but the actual place itself.

Grimnir pulled up the note with the location on it, reading it out loud to us. “Close to the fifth dock, in an alleyway behind the Groundbait Kleesha. There is a manhole hidden behind a bunch of trash. Hard to detect, as it's covered by an earth mage.”

The noise of the docks hid our talking well enough.

“Kleesha?” I looked at Grimnir.

He nodded, smiling like an enthused uncle. “Sliced raw fish,” he answered.

So, sashimi.

He then continued, describing it with the hearty voice of a connoisseur. “Dipped in pickled rivergrass or seafruit, and you can eat that stuff without getting a stomach ache. But, oh boy, khohoho, that stuff hits you tongue like a bomb. It’s so sour and intense that you can’t even get rid of it with dwarven mead. It’s the good stuff, Saori.”

“Ha! Then we should try it out once we’re done, Grimnir. We haven’t had a drink together since we arrived in this city. Yorshka is also swamped with work from all the company Quests, so let’s invite her, too.” I was already imagining the aftermath of this tip.

“We do still need to celebrate your birthday, Saori,” Ellaine pointed out. “Haruka-chan, too, so there'll be a ton of things we need to celebrate. A feast!”

Our small talk was great for the mood of our group, save for one person. Tasianna, hadn’t participated in any of our talks as we walked, staying silent even after we reached the fifth pier of the dock. The revelation of the real mastermind behind Princess Shcuri’s death was affecting her.

Then again, maybe it really wasn’t much better for us, either. At our current location, we had a perfect view of the warehouse at the first dock where that slave auction happened. Burned down, but its rubble and remains hadn’t been removed yet. Looking at it gave me a terrible headache.

The fire, the smoke, the heat; I thought I had gotten used to it with being around Hestia and inside a real magma chamber, but watching those slaves being scared within it was something else. Their coughing, their unanswered pleas for help, and their weeping filled the crackling warehouse in noise.

I felt as if I was suffocating in the [Shadow Armament] cowl I had on to ward off the smoke. Maybe I lied to Hestia a bit about taking my armor off to not scare the children I saw in their cages. I felt light-headed back then. I wondered if this was what my father always experienced on the job. He rarely told Mother and me about the tragedies on his job, always the moments when the “hero saved the people.”

Father…

My memories from when he was still alive began to creep back up, but I pushed it back before continuing with the others to the tavern. I wished the slaves we managed to rescue good luck inside my mind, hoping their slave contracts were burned down with the whole warehouse so their tattoo would disappear.

“Hoyoooooo loooong! On a wave of the river, the grass is tangling ‘round. Air full of life and cold, that makes the mead taste so sheit. Ooooh, but so divine, at the docks with all the maidens~! ♫” Sailors were singing sea shanties, jolly as they ate and drank despite it being in the middle of the day.

Like most inhabitants in this city, the sailors were mostly just humans and land- and air-based beastmen. There were no levianewts or merfolk among them. I thought there would be at least one or two water-based beastmen, but I guess we were too deep inland, and a single river wasn’t enough. Then again, I was just guessing and had no real idea about it.

After walking past the Groundbait Kleesha, we moved into the alleyway behind it, ignoring the shady-looking people around us. We were all wearing robes and hoods, but we stuck out quite a bit due to Tasianna and Grimnir.

Even with our hoods, Tasianna’s pointy elven ears and Grimnir’s large ram horns and height made their races a bit obvious. Dwarves were normal citizens in this city, but most stuck to their neighborhood around the train station, while elves were entirely devoid in this city. Not even half-elves.

At this point, all the power players likely know about us or whatever. Some probably know we were at the warehouse, too.

We continued on without caring about them.

The trash and junk in this alley reeked. Drunk sailors and puking homeless people populated our path forward, making it hard for us to look around the area. Some of them even came close to us, wobbling around as they swung their bottles almost to the point I was worried they would hit us.

A few of the sailors hit on the women in our group, but most of them were so unhinged from the alcohol that they thought we were here to party with them. Thankfully, Grimnir knew how to take care of drunks and Daichi was quite assertive when he’s annoyed. Teacher’s pet he might be, but he knew how to fake his confidence whenever he needed to speak.

“This note is worthless.” I threw the note away into the trash around us, now realizing how unspecific the directions were We should have just brought the spy with us because “hidden underneath the trash” leads us nowhere.

Let it be known, I’m willing to dive through the trash… I lamented with everybody before using [Shadow Armament] on everybody so they didn’t have to smell this.

After a grueling time searching around, to the point we made a mountain of trash at another location, we managed to find a spot where the ground looked weird. Ellaine cracked the ground with the beginner-level custom spell [Create Crack], revealing a metal disc underneath it.

Pulling it up, we discovered the manhole, and sure enough, I was glad I had my shadow mask on. One whiff of it, and I already had a terrible feeling with how atrocious it smelt.

“… I don’t think anybody is in there.” I couldn’t find anybody with [Detection Sensor] and I thought it was suspicious that the smell was this bad.

“Yeah…” Grimnir nodded. “If a beastman were in there, they would try to make it smell less terrible. Most of them have extremely good noses, and I don’t think you would want to wear a mask all the time.”

To not enter a trap, I took out a wooden slate from my storage. On it, there was a magic circle and a chant for the custom spell [Manalocation]. Muraina had given it to me when I was still sparring with her. Not like I won any of the spars, but it was still a good learning experience.

I planned on learning the spell at an earlier time too, but I never had the chance to do so. [Manalocation] was easy to understand and use, so I had no problem reading everything. It was simply using wind mana to send a wave out and having it return to the magic circle as a signal. Like a bat’s echolocation. Thankfully, you didn’t need to have [Wind Magic] to cast it.

The magic circle only has a few letters, unlike what Hestia and I make. Is it more efficient, I wonder? Or just easier to learn?

I released my mana out through my fingers as I looked and memorized the magic circle on the slate, before beginning the chant for the translated version of the spell. Obviously, I couldn’t read elven.

“Seek thy mark within obscurity and the unknown, fill the air with wind goddess’ magicks. Call forth thy mana of pure, for thou’rt the conduit of the storm. Thine will, the gods’ commandest. Manalocation.”

Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

Custom spell gained: [Manalocation]

The green magic circle began to morph, changing from its standardized form into what looked like a spider web with a large circular plane in the middle. Tapping into it hard for a second, the magic circle wobbled around, and nothing really happened. However, since I knew from watching Muraina use this spell, I understood the spell was working. I just couldn’t see it without [Mana Eyes] like Hestia had.

After a few seconds, the circle began to vibrate again, but this time on its own. Certain words on the magic circle lit up, informing me there were multiple medium sized targets down the manhole. I informed this to the rest and we decided to venture down.

Climbing down it with the ladder next to it, we eventually made it down to the bottom. Daichi conjured up a flame to use as a torch and we began to move forward. I still couldn’t detect anything with [Detection Sensor], but [Manalocation] kept repeating something was in front of us.

After a while, I finally understood why the information was conflicting. All of the people the spell was detecting were the rotting remains of beastmen and humans. And as we kept looking around, this whole place looked like it was burned down or something.

“Tasianna?” I wondered if she noticed any faefolk around, but she simply shook her head.

“There are a few, but none of them want to speak with me. Most of them are simply celebrating that they could finally leave this place, since we opened up the hole.”

A bit ungrateful.

We pressed on. [Detection Sensor] wasn’t notifying me about anything, and I couldn't hear anything else but the breathing of my companions. The silence of the dead was too eerie to fully ignore, though.

“Some of them have their version of the Haireti’s armor on them,” Tasianna noted, pointing at the dead beastmen. “Some were burned, but others died through other wounds.”

“Same thing could be said about the humans,” Ellaine noted as she picked up a sword with dried blood on it.

[“It seemed like a battle ensued here. The bodies have become quite stiff already, from the looks of it. We probably missed them by a few days,”] Klea’Hatma added. [“Guess all of you were too late. I don’t think we can find anything else here.”]

“Hmph. Who knows.” However, Grimnir decided we should look into it more, leave no stones unturned. “But, I guess if this base belonged to the Resurrection, then the attack they made on the warehouse probably was retaliation for whatever happened here. If more of those mana batteries were around, then the attackers probably took them. Any emblems on the people?”

Daichi searched through the bodies of the dead with a queasy face at Grimnir’s question. “None, Master. Only the same snake one the Resurrection likes to keep around.”

“Daichi-kun, you don’t have to do everything you don’t like whenever Grimnri asks for it.” I massaged my temples. I couldn’t help but wonder if he will ever outgrow the sycophant side of his.

After walking in deeper, we learned that this place was like a maintenance tunnel for the water canals. There were a lot of dead ends as such, but following the trails of bodies, we made it into a self-dug hole.

Behind it was a hallway leading into three different rooms. None of them had any flame marks like the tunnel in the beginning, so it was easy enough for us to identify what they were.

One was a supply room with piles of broken crates. Moldy food could be seen scattered around, and also other supplies like wood, ores, and also tools.

The second seemed like an abandoned sleeping bunker. Beds were inside with furniture and a few trinkets like plush toys, small wooden sculptures, and self-made amulets to name a few. If you ignored the brown blood puddles and corpses within it, this probably would have been a bittersweet sight.

The last one was definitely the most interesting, though. Especially since it drew Grimnir’s interest as he charged towards a workstation.

“Ellaine, lass, come’re.” He called her over to him with Daichi following behind her. “Look at these tools. Tell me, what are they?”

“… Master, if I may be presumptuous, don’t they look a bit similar in design to the ones your cousin used? The ones you safekeep?”

“Aye, they are, lass. Every tazongn artificer orders or makes their own set of tools, as every hand is different. That’s why I made your own set after measuring your hands and how you like to use them.”

“And I will treasure them eternally, Master Grimnir.”

“Mhmm.” Grimnir nodded to Ellaine’s loyalty. “But, that’s besides the point, these tools were obviously made using dwarven technique and hands. Every blacksmith makes manatech tools differently, and that shows when you inspect those made by the different races. The size, the durability, and how refined the metal is. All of this contributes to how well they conduct mana.”

“Do you mean human smiths have a different style of tools, Master?” Daichi asked before turning around to Ellaine. “Ellaine-chan, you should still have your old set of tools, right? How do they feel?”

“The ones I received from my mother were made in the Groushia duchy, so from human blacksmiths tutored by dwarves. They conduct less mana than the ones Master Grimnir made for me, but they feel more dexterous to use.”

“Aye, dwarves have less mana in general compared to humans, as it's harder for us to train and increase our capacity. So, we make tools which conduct our mana better, but are bulkier to use since our hands are larger than yours.” Grimnir then picked up one of the tools. “These were made for dwarven hands. Either a tazong was working ’ere or some rat piece-of-shit stole it from them. Tazongn blacksmiths never have spares of their tools to sell, they always make them upon commission according to the customer’s hands.”

Whether it was a dwarf or not, what this confirmed was that this really was the place where the mana batteries came from. Unfortunately, we couldn’t find any signs of faefolk cages, onnikai, or even additional mana batteries. Were they taken during the raid?

Looking at the dead bodies around, beastmen and humans, there definitely was a clash here. No magic, but I could see bomb marks and arrows laying around. It was mostly a melee scuffle, but a deadly one, nonetheless.

With nothing more to find, we left the hole with even more questions than we came in with. I dispelled the [Shadow Armament] around us and Tasianna began surrounding us individually with scented flower oil she made at home.

This place should have been the last place we hit until we went after the Reslaves and whoever the second demonkin contractor was, but this search led to nothing. I could see Tasianna’s disappointment in her gloomy face.

I felt dejected, as I could hear my garms pestering me to find the person who had their pelts. Loyal as they were, their garm memories were affecting them, and they wanted to track down the people who had their bodies. I retrieved Song’s former pelt from the Layavete cartel’s boss, but we were still missing Uno’s, Sarasa’s, and Quatre’s.

Sulky, we made our way back to the RV. We needed to inform Hestia about everything, and hope that Hanazawa’s side would find something about the other demonkin contractor.

“Captain! Stop!”

But as we passed the Grounbait Kleesha, the louder than before commotion drew our attention. Four lizard—

“Levianewts?!” Tasianna blurted out before I could end my thought.

Now that I looked at them, these four scale-kins looked nowhere close to the lizardmen we met in the Belzac forest. All four of them had dorsal fins, spikes, and shimmering scales ranging from green, blue, and yellow.

Being full-animalistic beastmen — so their whole appearance looked more like bipedal lizards, they had some similarities to the dragons — dragonewts, and wyverns in our company when they were in [Humanize Lv. 1] form. In that their scales looked like hard armor rather than skin, and their heads were intimidating.

If I were to rate which scale-kins were the most intimidating in appearance, it would go from levianewts, dragonkins, saurians, and lizardmen in that order, based onthe ones I’ve met up until now.

“Captain, please! Stop talking with him!” One of the levianewts grabbed onto a well-dressed one with a blue suit and a bicorn hat.

The one called “Captain” opened his large mouth, showing off the two fins underneath his neck and the barbel on his chin. “What are you talking about, mate?! He just said he knew somebody who can make curry! Oh, woe on the sea, a blessing from the depths! The Goddess has decided to bless us with some actual real food! Not this knock-off seafood coming from a puny lake!”

“Captain, don’t say that!”

Some of the sailors bashed the bottom of their mugs hard on their tables before standing up, clearly feeling insulted at a foreigner's criticism of their local food. Like a bunch of rowdy adventurers, they cracked their necks and knuckles, looking like they wanted to fight.

“You!” But, the green and blue scaled captain didn’t give those people a single look. He simply kept speaking with the adventurer before him. “Tell me! Where is that eatery with the curry! I wish to delight myself in the sea’s bounty once again! A hearty curry for the weary sailor trapped in land without his boat! Gahahahaha!”

Huh… what a jolly good fellow. Well, hope he looks around in time.

The sailors were approaching and the captain’s companions were trying to turn him around, but the cheerful levianewt wouldn’t. At this point, we should probably go before a fight began.

“Miss Saori!” But, as all of us were about to leave, Tasianna grabbed my arm and pointed at the brooch on the suited levianewt’s chest. “That’s the church of Plesia’s emblem. Those levianewts have to be Caedhulen!”

A small engraving of the sea’s beauty on an oval shield framed with tentacles looking like waves. It looked a bit different from Tasianna’s amulet of Plesia, who had the Goddess of Water more in focus, but I guessed both had tentacles?

Regardless, that was the important part. What was important was how Tasianna reminded me of the documents I gave Hestia, about a levianewt handing the O’Blooms the elven yeast supply. His name was something-something Bayudra, but maybe this was all just a coi—

“Captain Bayudra, turn around!”

… Okay.

“Hmm?” The levianewt turned around, looking at the angered sailors with no sense of danger. “Ahhh! My fellow seamen! Are you also in search of the wondrous power food that is curry! Caedhul’s greatest dish, made with powerful spices and plenty of fish to satisfy even the wildest storms we call our stomachs. An amazing voyage ration, I must say!”

Oh goodness!

But, against his expectations, these sailors weren’t here to make friends and break bread, they were here to solve the dispute in the one way they knew best.

“You don’t come into a man’s home and insults his favorite tave—”

“Stop!” I dashed in between the two men and catched the aggressor’s fist before it hit the levianewt. “This is all just a misunderstanding. Please, you do not need to get into a fight.”

“Tch! Woman, get out of the way! This isn’t ya damn business! This is between us men!” The sailor retrieved his arm, massaging it as he looked in confusion at how I was able to stop his burly arm. “Some random stranger has no right to come into our city and insult our food! That ain’t right. That ain’t nothing but rude!”

“Yeah! Storm in the water, if river fish ain’t to his liking, then get back to the sea! Taste your damn ocean bounty, we can do without all the damn jests on our behalf.”

There was clearly some animosity between the freshwater sailors and these levianewts, or maybe saltwater sailors in general?

“Hold on! Our captain didn’t mean that! He talks too much and exaggerates a lot when he goes on a tangent.” The levienewts tried to diffuse the situation.

“Yeah! Captain Bayudra, just apologize to them already! We can’t just get into another fight after only two visits!”

“Hmm?” But the captain only tilted his head to his crewmates’ pleading. “What are we talking about? What is with this fight? All I said was the truth! Freshwater fish cannot hold up against the myriad tastes and the abundance of fish the ocean can deliver to a hard-working sailor. This place is watered down, and they don’t even serve any curry! What is the meaning of this?”

But the fuse wasn’t blown out; in fact, the bomb just became even larger.

“You bottom-feeding chum! Riiiargh!” Without any warning, the sailor sent a sucker punch at the levianewt, which I barely caught in time without hurting him. Any faster, and I wouldn’t have been able to cushion his arm, causing it to break from the impact and force.

“What in the hell, you damn wren—!!!” He tried to swear, only to stop and take a step back with the other sailor.

Huh?

“Oh fuck! That’s the ‘Jet-Black Thunder Wolf!’” The adventurer the captain was talking with a second ago shot up and pointed at me, calling out my nickname.

“Huh? Jet-Black Thunder Wolf? Who’s that?” Another patron of this tavern spoke up, prompting the adventurer to explain it in detail.

“One of the heroes who stop the capital of Artorias, Griffonpeak, from being destroyed by two giant B rank and A rank threats! She was in the front, taking out a giant A rank monster by herself with her giant wolf. They call her the Thunder Wolf because she can shoot out black lightning! Those eyes! Those red-blood misty eyes are her trademark I heard from a friend over at the place!”

“What? She’s an A ranker? I guess she did stop two punches without any effort.”

“Oh shit, I think I heard about her. Didn’t she fight with that random dragon that appeared out of nowhere over there?”

“A dragon? You kidding me? Who would believe that crap.”

It seemed my reputation preceded me… I really did not know how to feel about this. I also noticed my hood blew off due to the force of the sailor’s punch. No wonder my ears felt the wind again.

“Hey, hey, levianewt!” The adventurer suddenly grabbed the captain. “That’s one of the women I was talking about! She’s part of the hunter company managing a small eatery which serves that curry you wanted! I went over there! By the Goddess, it tastes exactly like what I experienced in Port Hevalentus when I sailed over there for a visit, no, it’s even better!”

“Oooooh! Truthfully! Then, my lady!” The captain then grabbed my shoulders and turned me around, breathing down at me as he spoke with his large sea dragon mouth. “Then you must lead me to your establishment! I beg of you! By the Goddess of the Ocean, I have not tasted good curry ever since I came to this city. Please, my men and I, Adhi Bayudra, must taste our home’s dearest food!”

“Uhm, I mean—” I wanted to agree, but the levianewt lived in his own present.

“Oi, you men!” He called over the sailors from before. “You want curry, too, right? Then come! I shall pay for your meals and drinks for today! This is worthy of celebration with mead, ale, and food! Jubilation! We sail, seamen!”

“““Ahoy! Blessed the Goddess!”””

“““Blessed water to you, Captain!”””

And just like that, the previous animosity was bribed away. And for some random reason, my group and I were now leading a pack of cheering sailors to our bistro. They sang sea chanties together as if they have been friends for years.

“Welp, I guess we’re gonna have our drink sooner than I thought, Saori. Gahahaha!” Grimnir joined the seamen despite hating oceans and lakes. Men were men.

“Miss Saori, don’t forget, this is a good opportunity to find our next clue.”

“Yes, we need to get information from him, Saori. We might be able to solve who actually is our second enemy here.”

Both Tasianna and Ellaine urged and comforted me that this was the correct decision, but all I could wonder was how this came to be. How did we end up going from a stinky manhole to leading customers to our bistro?