— Are you finally awake now?

Sitting on the cold and hard ground of a desolate cave, Noah slowly opened his eyes. a sense of utter darkness greeted him. He had long since reached the point where darkness was not a nuisance for him.

What is the situation at hand?

— You have depleted all of your energy as you ran with that woman and faced that monster.

Tch!

Noah couldn’t help but click his tongue when he heard the Voice speak. He had been careless back there. He should have not forgotten that in this icy tundra, almost anything was possible, and there was never a lack of enemies and beings that were after his life. Though he was at the top of the food chain, mistakes could still be fatal to him. A hoard of bison was still enough to take out an injured lion.

“Ohh you finally woke up!”

Noah's thoughts were interrupted by the feminine voice that reached his ears. Moving his head, he looked in the direction the voice was coming from and then tilted his head, confusion lacing his eyes.

“You took off your armor?”

He asked quietly, watching the red haired woman who finally appeared in front of him, wearing a relatively tight skinsuit over her lithe body.

Though he could only see her face right now, she had beautiful dark skin which reminded him of his companion Leo from the time he served in the Zodiacs.

But that was all they had in common between them. Her skin had similarities to some of the Africans that he knew of in the past. But as far as he remembered, black people didn’t have red tattoo-like carvings on different parts of their skin.

Their eyes weren’t slitted like those of a reptile and they certainly didn’t have semi-long pointed ears.

‘I was wondering if I was in front of a human or not.’

Noah kept his nonchalant attitude but his eyes were slightly moving as he observed her, the situation and the overall surroundings nearly at the same time.

The last time a human met an alien, to his knowledge, it ended up in a war of survival to avoid the extinction of all of humanity.

So yeah… He wasn’t about to just stand and say that he would befriend all races that were outside the scope of humanity.

— Should we just kill her then?

In the end, he made one simple judgment. Though her prowess was still unknown, he was sure about one thing about the individual in front of him.

He could kill her in one hit before she could even react.

Thinking like this, a sunny smile appeared on his face. There was nothing wrong with being friendly to someone weaker than him after all.

“Yeah, I was finally able to recuperate my body and energy a little. Though I wouldn’t dare risk going out without at least this skinsuit. It helps me regulate the temperature of this abysmal place.”

Not knowing how close she had come to dying just now, Morgiana sauntered close to him, which allowed him to take a closer look at her appearance.

Her tribal-esque tattoos, intrigued him a lot. They were clearly not just ordinary tattoos that had been engraved onto the skin.

Looking at them closely, he had the vague impression that they were like rivers, where red flame was flowing inside in real time.

Currently, the tattoos seem rather dim in color.

Noah made some deductions based on this and nodded his head.

"How long was I out?"

"For almost two hours. Hum. You might not know about the hours. Let's say you were out for a relatively short time."

Noah was speechless. This woman was taking him as some kind of barbarian who knew nothing of the world.

— You are still buck naked, you know?

I have nothing to be ashamed of. My body is beautiful. It’s a work of art. Peak aesthetics, if you know what I mean…

Ignoring the scoff that was leaking out of the Voice in his head, Noah stood up, stretched ever so slightly, and ignored the weird looks that the woman he had saved was giving him right now.

He had never known shame even when he was on Earth, much less on a desolate planet like this with no intelligent life in sight.

What did it matter to him if she looked at him or not?

'I have been pretty careless.'

Fainting for two hours was no big deal usually. At worst, he would simply wake up in the stomach of some beast and tear his way out of it in seconds.

But fainting in front of a stranger he did not know the ability of was not in line with the way he had survived till now. It went beyond the code of conduct with which he had lived his entire life.

— Finding someone to talk to made you careless, didn’t it?

'Perhaps.'

After stretching his muscles and making himself less stiff, he finally gazed at Morgiana again who had been looking away out of respect.

"So… What do we do now?" Noah asked. Curious about the plans of the alien girl.

The atmosphere became serious as Morgiana took a seat not far from him.

"Look. I will briefly explain the situation to you so you can understand. But you will have to flee and hide with your family or clan or group quickly after I am finished with my explanation."

Morgiana scratched her hair, feeling quite helpless about it all as she spoke,

"My name is Morgiana. I won't go into the details but I am currently being chased by a group of pirates known as the Forty Thieves."

"Let me guess… Because they have Forty Thieves?"

Morgiana chuckled and she tried to ruffle his hair as if he was being cute right now, acting like a smart ass.

His eyes twitched slightly and he swatted her hand aside gently, "I am not a kid…"

She laughed not knowing that she had nearly lost her hand.

Despite his evolution and adaptation, the top of the head was still one of his weak points as a human and he had to fight the urge to lash out at her.

This woman is either stupid or she doesn't see me as a threat or…

But after what she witnessed, how could she not take him as a threat?

His eyes narrowed ever so slightly.

— Or she is playing dumb right now.

Ignoring his look, Morgiana continued on, "Anyway, you are right and wrong. The Forty Thieves aren't exactly forty, rather…they represent an alliance of forty great pirates, each with their own fleets."

She looked up and spoke in a grave tone, "The one chasing me should be the fleet belonging to Omid."

"Omid?"

"Yep. Ranked 7th among the Forty Thieves. One of the true leaders of the alliance of pirates, so to speak."

Morgiana explained this lightly. The Forty Thieves weren't all equal and even in an alliance there was a Hierarchy.

The top seven outside of the leader were all dangerous individuals who were strong enough to destroy entire armadas by themselves.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

Out of the Forty Thieves, 33 were replaceable. Only the top seven and the leader were the true core of the group.

"As for the leader… His name is Casim.”

Morgiana closed her eyes for a moment, as if she was thinking of something but in the end simply shook her head before adding, "Anyway, Omid is dangerous and has a particular taste for enslaving people from type zero planets like this one."

Only type one planets and above were protected by the Galactic covenant and the Galactic laws that were put in place to hold the equilibrium of the entire galaxy.

Pirates would rarely attack such planets as the danger generally wasn't worth the hassle.

But for Planets below Type I, not only were they not protected— they didn't even have the strength to protect themselves.

Easy prey, high returns.

There was no reason for the pirates to not attack.

"So what you are saying is some people with spaceships are coming to this planet and will try to enslave or kill us, right?"

"Yes. So you should flee as fast as you can. If everything works, then they won't find your existence."

Noah, though, had stopped listening to her nagging and entered in deep thoughts. He still had scruples and didn't wish to attack someone who had done nothing to him.

But this—?

'Haha…'

Glee filled his mind.

There was nothing more beautiful than food coming toward you of its own volition.

This was going to be a whole lot of fun.

But first thing first —

Growl!

Noah looked around, while touching his stomach that was complaining.

"Where is my food?"

"Ah…Sorry. I wasn't strong enough to bring it with me."

"Noooo!"

***

[???]

While Morgiana was apologizing to Noah…

Deep in the vestiges of space, in a system completely different from the one that Noah and Morgiana were stranded in, a few small drones were probing around celestial bodies while analyzing the situation.

Further behind them, a small armada consisting of more than ten ships, advanced menacingly. Above them lay a black holographic flag that was swaying as if under the wind even though they were in deep space.

The picture of the flag was that of a skeleton head with one eye forming a Four and the second one forming a Zero.

The Forty Thieves.

In the Grand Sea of Space, the Forty Thieves may be nothing but a small or medium organization at best.

But few people would dare to underestimate them in the whole galactic order.

The main ship at the helm had a completely round form, looking more like a floating ball than a spaceship.

This was none other than Omid's ship.

.

.

.

The interior of the ship was pretty standard all things considered. Decorations were sparse and all rooms had a purpose embedded in them rather than just being there for comfort.

Many screens were floating around one man who was sitting on the equivalent of a throne.

The man was huge in stature, easily reaching nearly 3 meters in height alone. His body was of a black ebony color while yellow-colored tattoos could be seen covering most of his skin.

Those tattoos shone brightly, pulsating with life and a sense of energy.

He was wearing nothing but a pair of pants. But those pants seemed to be struggling to simply not burst open due to the massive size of the muscles of his legs.

Ignoring the seven screens floating around him, Omid listened to the report of his subordinates.

"Did you find any traces regarding her whereabouts?"

"Yes! Though faint, we managed to track remains of hyperspace breaking the Sea. We should be able to locate her in a few hours at most."

Despite his boorish appearance, Omid was anything but stupid. He looked at his subordinates quietly before giving him the final order…

"You have one hour."

"Yes, Captain!"

The man did not argue. He knew very well that doing so was useless in front of his Captain. Standing up, he gave Omid a salute and immediately left the room.

｢You are as boring as always. Your pirates are not very pirate-like.｣

From one of the seven screens that had been floating around him, the voice of a woman registered in Omid’s ears.

"Only discipline can create the strongest force. I already asked Cassim for permission to reform the whole alliance but he never listened to me."

A few chuckles filled the room and someone finally spoke up,

｢My Captain believes in true Freedom.｣

It was another woman. Her voice caused Omid to raise an eyebrow.

"Esther? Where is Cassim? You have been serving as his replacement for some time already."

｢Training.｣

"I see."

He nodded. This was indeed something Cassim would do. Even more in this situation.

"I am about to catch Morgiana. Any directives you guys want to share?"

｢Be careful. Morgiana is nothing but bait at the moment.｣

"How could I not know?"

He gave the speaker of those words a bold smile, "She is a bait to lure me in. But once I capture her, she will be the bait necessary to pull in Alibaba and end this farce once and for all."

｢You should move fast then. The leader of the Emerald City might take action if you don’t move fast enough and capture her.｣

"Dorothy?"

This time his voice was less calm than before clearly disturbed by the content that he was hearing.

The Witch of Oz, Dorothy Gale. Supreme leader of Oz and the Emerald City.

She was a true big shot.One of the reasons she was so dangerous was her ability to manipulate space.

He couldn't help but frown when he thought of that crazy woman,

"Wasn't she at war with Princess Ozma?"

｢They entered a truce. The details of the matter are still unknown.｣

He cursed under his breath after hearing that remark.

The Emerald City was a behemoth even with those two fighting for the right to rule. Once the Four Witches as well as Dorothy and Ozma stopped fighting, everyone would be in deep trouble.

"Shit."

He cursed again before sighing and standing up.

"Very well. The situation has changed then. The moment we find her I will descend myself and capture her as fast as possible and then flee."

He had planned to simply watch and let his subordinates do the job. After all, Morgiana did not have access to her full power at the moment so he didn’t need to do the heavy lifting himself.

But now, a too-big variable was interfering in the work.

He didn't know if the Emerald City wanted to interfere in their problem or if this was simply a personal matter, but either way, he couldn't afford to waste time now.

｢Do not worry. We are already in place to stop her from advancing. Be it Dorothy or Princess Scheherazade, none of Alibaba's allies, will be able to attack soon. The rest is on you.｣

A complicated light flashed in his eyes at the mention of Scheherazade. But he simply dismissed those thoughts and focused on his work instead.

Recollecting old memories was nothing but a waste of time at this very moment.

It was time for action. And he needed to be swift and decisive in his execution.

As if on cue, the voice of his subordinate reached him…

"Captain! We have found her coordinates. We will arrive in three standard hours."

A large grin formed on his face at the content of his report.

"Time to go."

———

While the meeting between the higher-ups of the Forty Thieves was taking place, back on the planet where Noah and Morgiana currently were, Morgiana smiled helplessly as the young boy stopped talking to her, sulking to himself.

She had apologized about not being able to bring his food with her but she didn't have much of a choice.

After all — He was just too dangerous.

Morgiana did not think of herself as particularly smart. She had lived half of her life being pampered and spent another good portion living as a slave before finally escaping and going through many trials and shaping herself to be the person she was now.

Thanks to all of those experiences, Morgiana had developed a clear grasp of what could be dangerous for her.

She doubted there was anything more dangerous than a young-looking kid who could seemingly destroy half of a giant abyss beast in one go without her even being able to tell what happened.

She couldn't help but curse inwardly.

I thought humans were supposed to be physically weak?

Even for a Djinn like her, surviving in this cold place was hard without any equipment. But the boy was running around with his willy out without fear of freezing his balls off.

Can I even beat him?

The clear cut answer here was no. Perhaps if she had her mecha with her it would be possible or if at least her reserves were full then she could try putting up some semblance of a fight. But as she was now, it was nothing short of impossible for her.

While he was down, her reason and survival instinct fought against her morality as she wondered if she should kill him while he was out to avoid any danger or simply flee from this place to save her life.

But the boy had helped her and repaying kindness with evil simply because of suspicion and fear was an all-time low that Morgiana did not wish to reach.

Argh!

She fought the urge to scratch her hair. She knew that making emotional decisions in space was a ticket toward death.

But he had not attacked her while she was unconscious and she would not attack him while he was.

In a way, I have repaid my debt, right?

This was as far as she was willing to go. But there was one thing she wanted to ask the boy,

"This planet is tidally locked, right? Do you know how I can reach the bright side of the planet?"

She asked quietly, not expecting much of an answer. After all, for all she knew she could be deep in the icy tundra. It would be hard for indigenous tribes to know the geography of their planets.

"I know. It is not far from here."

Morgiana perked up. The bright part of this tidally locked planet was constantly bathed in light by the sun.

This place would undoubtedly be the best place for her to recuperate her energy.

"Can we go? Please?" She asked

He looked at her and caressed his stomach. Analyzing the situation.

In the end, he just nodded his head. "I want something in exchange."

"Ask away. As long as it's possible, I will do what I can." This was normal. Nothing was free in this world and Morgiana was happy to pay him back.

His eyes shone as she answered,

"I want to know about what is above the sky."

He pointed upward,

"Tell me everything."

She shuddered slightly. For some reason she didn't think this was just a mere request.