Chapter 141: Strange Guests
The gigantic turtle moved steadily forward.
In the small building, Si Wen Ming was teaching Man Man some rules about traveling away from home, such as having to stay humble and being careful; he pulled Man Man’s ear till near his mouth, trying to force her to listen to his speech. As for Man Man, she was holding the broken magic storage bag in her hands and was ceaselessly complaining about what kind of crap Zhu Rong Tonggong had given her.
Ji Hao had walked out of the building, and was leisurely taking a stroll in this magical city of the Spirt Turtle Caravan, which was being carried on top of the turtle’s shell.
This city was six miles in square, not small at all; additionally, this city wasn’t a flat city, it had three floors, the upper, middle and bottom. Where Ji Hao, Si Wen Ming, and Man Man were staying was the upper floor, and also the only area that was open to guests who had paid for a ride.
The roads inside the city were all poured by metallic liquid. The broadest road was only one zhang wide. Small buildings were built in orderly fashion beside the roads, high towers and watch houses were scattered among these small buildings. Armed guards walked across the roads from time to time.
Although Ji Hao couldn’t go down onto the other two floors to have a look, he did sent his spirit power down without any obstruction.
The middle floor was the living area of the Spirit Turtle Caravan’s people. Compared with those small buildings on the upper floor, the living area on the middle floor was like hives, formed by closely connected small units, which were separated by thick metal walls. The paths inside the area were spiral and interleaving; without any doubt, this construction had an extremely great defensive function.
If enemies would invade the city from the outside, this construction would cause them huge trouble.
The bottom floor was the storage space, which was constructed with metal and was clinging to the turtle shell. The bottom floor was a few times broader than the other two floors. In those commodious storage spaces, huge amounts of roughly melted metal pieces had orderly been placed; all of these metal pieces were completely processed by magic power and had amazingly high density.
Apart from these metal pieces, which were filled with fire power and were specially produced in the Southern Wasteland, the storage floor also contained piles of jade and gold pieces and all kinds of other rare precious stones. Ji Hao also discovered large amounts of natural treasures, like thousand vats of earth essence milk, with each vat being large enough for Ji Hao to have a nice bath within.
But what was taking the biggest percentage of the available space amongst all the goods were the carcass of beasts, which had been sealed with the help of ice crystals. Judging from the sense of powers that were being released from their bodies, more than fifty percent of these beasts were at the Junior Magus Level, forty percent of them were as powerful as Senior Magi, and a small part of these beasts’ carcass, which had especially been sealed hermetically, were releasing strong senses of power, which were similarly great as that of the lava giant who was one of the leaders of the Zhu Rong Country’s armies, and had met Ji Hao earlier.
Ji Hao perceived through all of the storage spaces with his spirit power, and couldn’t help but be shocked by the rich stock over and over again.
If he only could swallow all of those beasts bodies, Ji Hao was sure that his physical strength could reach the Magus-King-level after that, and he could also break into the second level of his [Bu Tian Bu Lou Magic Spell].
But all these stocks belonged to the caravan, and Ji Hao would never do things like stealing.
Measuring up the content of the magic storage bag, which had been seized from one of the three unknown young men, and were now tied around his waist, Ji Hao helplessly realized that it seemed that he couldn’t afford one beast body at the Magus-King-level even with all what he currently possessed; therefore, he sighed and killed the thought of purchasing one beast carcass from the caravan.
On the upper floor, other than Ji Hao, Si Wen Ming and Man Man, a few other passengers had also paid for a ride to the Midland. Ji Hao had silently glanced at them while measuring them up. These people were wearing different and strange clothes. Less than a hundred among these people looked like elite young warriors from the Soutern Wasteland, who just like Ji Hao also intended to explore the outside world. The other few hundreds of people seemed very unfamiliar to Ji Hao, and he had absolutely no idea where they were coming from or what they did.
Hanging around for quite a while, Ji Hao got close to the city wall, which was located near the head of the gigantic turtle. At the moment, Gui Three had just leaped down from the tower, his face filled with a friendly smile, and landed right in front of a few men, who had been expecting the ride in the jungle.
Gui Three crossed his hands and saluted the five men, then said smilingly, “My honored guests, do you need a ride to the Midland? We are the Spirit Turtle Caravan, and have been traveling around the world for tens of thousands of years. Our price is reasonable, a hundred jade coins for each person, absolutely no bargaining please.”
Ji Hao curiously looked at the five men.
Unlike Ji Hao, Si Wen Ming and Man Man, or like the other passengers, who apparently came from different cultural backgrounds, these five men were wearing exactly the same black cloaks, had all their hair shaved and bared light cyan scalps, which were tattooed with tens of thumb-sized, twisted spell symbols. Obviously, they worked for a certain big organization, which seemed to have strict rules.
Especially the man standing at the front, who seemed to be the leader of the five people team, had a fist-sized, black monkey sitting on his shoulder in a nice mannered way, with its long and thin tail raised. The tiny monkey’s tail was even a lot longer than its body, making it look quite adorable.
The black tiny monkey was apparently some kind of special species because it had three green shining eyes on its face. Realizing that Ji Hao had been staring at it, the tiny monkey, which seemed pretty docile and adorable, abruptly showed a fierce look and began screaming at Ji Hao; moreover, the tiny monkey waved its arms hard in the air, and showed sharp claws on its fingertips, which even sliced the air and made swishing sounds.
Gui Three frowned, turned around and took a glance at Ji Hao, then satisfyingly yelled to the five men, “My five honoured guests, our Spirt Turtle Caravan has a strict rule, which states that any kind of fighting beast, contracted beast or spirit pet, as long as it dares to hurt others, will immediately result in you being kicked out from the ride. If such thing really were to occur, don’t blame us.”
He then stared at the tiny monkey and continued, “All passengers should keep an eye on the fierce animals they have with them. When we travel across spaces, if any of you were to be dropped in the middle of nowhere because you have violated a certain rule, you can’t blame us even if you were to die there.”
The man who had the tiny monkey on his shoulder, let out a cold smile, then took out five jade tablets and threw them to Gui Three, while responding with an extremely bland tone, “Such a tiny monkey, it was just bluffing because it fears strangers. How could it actually hurt somebody? We certainly won’t violet any of the rules.”
Gui Three frowned once again. With his rich experiences of traveling around the Southern Wasteland, he didn’t feel right about these five men. However, he failed to find any actual problems with these five men, on closer observation. Staying silent for a while, he put the five jade tablets into his sleeve then raised his head and said a few words to the gigantic turtle.
“Turtle ancestor, please take care of us on the journey!”
The gigantic turtle slowly lowered its head and took a measuring glance at the five men, then responded with a muffled voice, “Relax, my little turtles, it’ll be just fine. Hm, you won’t be needing me actually, is there anything that the ten Magus-King-level guard commanders can’t do for you?”
Gui Three let out a loud laughter, then turned around and leaped back onto the tower.
Ji Hao looked at the five men with a smile while slightly shaking his head. The conversation between Gui Three and the old turtle was very smart, and seemed unintentionally to have mentioned the great power of the caravan, but actually warned the five men to not cause any trouble here.
Furthermore, Gui Three even incidentally warned Ji Hao that the caravan had ten Magus-King-level guard commanders as security; if Ji Hao didn’t want any trouble, he and his friends better stayed still, especially that violent little girl.
The five men made no move, but their bodies slowly rose into the air above the city wall. They flew past Ji Hao, each taking a glance at him with their ice-cold eyes, which were nothing like eyes of humans, then flew into the city like real ghosts.
The tiny monkey remained having a fierce look and glared at Ji Hao, without even blinking its eyes.