Chapter 441: Rough Stone (Part 1)

“My grandfather has over forty ships, the largest is almost as big as this combat vessel of yours.”

Aesop’s words left Saleen in shock. A pirate had over forty ships, this was a formidable force in the Qin Empire. Did Lianyun City have forty combat vessels? Probably not.

“Over forty ships? Then how did you become a mage and not take over the family business?” Saleen could not help but ask.

He was not ridiculing Aesop. If he had inherited over forty ships back then, he would not have chosen to be a mage.

A fisherman’s roughed up boat was worth hundreds of gold coins, a pirate ship was probably worth over ten thousand gold coins. If he had four-hundred-thousand gold coins, the beggar back then would not have chosen the journey of a mage.

“Back then, my grandfather had a decent relationship with a few big pirate gangs, they started threatening the safety of dozens of countries. The emperor hired an assassin group to deal with them because of that,” he sighed.

Saleen felt that whatever he was hearing was incredibly extraordinary. An emperor hiring assassins to deal with pirates; if such words landed in the ears of the wealthy in Qin Empire, they would be laughing their asses off.

Aesop continued speaking angrily, “These emperors had allowed my grandfather to be pirates back then. They then turned their backs and hired assassins, they are simply untrustworthy.”

Aesop’s words left Saleen reeling, the emperors had actually asked people to be pirates.

This was not actually unusual in the Eastern Sea. There were many countries there and any war between them would hurt the vitality in the region, they would then be taken advantage of by other countries. The emperors would create pirates to harass other countries and steal their goods to replenish their warehouses.

Some pirates’ development was too good and would even take down their own emperor and form their own country.

“My grandfather had a spy in the palace and when he received the news, he ran away with his most trusted subordinate and hid in some other country.” Aesop could not stop talking about the glory of his family.

Saleen quickly interrupted him and said, “Let’s talk about the important matters, how can I get to the Eastern Sea?”

“Uh…” Aesop was a little embarrassed before he quickly stopped himself and said, “To cross the Stormy Sea, the key is changing one’s route during the different seasons. Even then, there is a certain risk to it. Twenty percent of the ships have been destroyed in just this expedition alone, a few of them were struck by magic beasts and had sunk. There would be a temporary flagship among every group that has an alchemy telescope on it to record down everything along the way. All the information is stored within the gemstone in the core of the telescope. Upon reaching the destination, the gemstone will be replaced.

Was this not the same as not saying? Saleen had removed the alchemy telescope that had crossed the Eastern Sea but he had not found anything useful.

“For a large alchemy telescope, the base to inlay the gemstone might have infused with the gemstone itself after many years of usage, however. As long as the base isn’t destroyed, I can recover some of the information. Of course, there wouldn’t be a magic illusion but I can deduce the time, coordinates and the angle of the constellation. This is the special skill of my grandfather.”

“Wasn’t he a pirate?”

“Of course, he was a pirate first before a mage.” Aesop started being a little long-winded.

“It would be very troublesome to calculate it, wouldn’t it?” Saleen did not want to linger on such useless topics, he caught the crux sharply.

“It is a little troublesome, moreover, we set off from the Eastern Sea this time and it took five months to reach our destination. We had changed our routes a few times. To replicate the information from the base, we need to use the Kamar Formula, which is what you all call the Figaro Formula.”

Saleen’s face remained expressionless, he had already grasped the method of calculating it quickly. For other mages, using the Figaro Formula to replicate the original information was a complicated process.

Aesop did not know this and he could use this to get more information from him. Saleen then said, “Five months worth of information would take fifteen years to replicate. Do you think I have a lot of time?”

Saleen was right, replicating magic information would take at least six times longer than the time needed to record it. Of course that was if the information was calculated alone. If there were more mages who had grasped the Figaro Formula, the speed would be much faster. Such calculation did not need to be done alone.

Mages that had grasped the Figaro Formula needed to be at least grade-6. Under normal circumstances, there would not be that many grand mages wasting so much time and focus on a single person.

Such calculation, besides increasing their focus minimally, would not help their magic at all. To let a bunch of people on the verge of becoming a sorcerer waste their focus on that, it was more unbearable than asking them to die.

The boring replication of data was given to the low-grade mages to do. In that case the number of low-grade mages needed would be a horrifying number, even Lex would not be able to provide that many low-grade mages.

“No, no, no, Master Saleen listen to me; such calculations could be helped with a magic array.”

“Magic array? Wouldn’t that waste a lot of magic nuclei?” Saleen asked laughingly.

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“Not necessarily, a rough stone could power the magic array too, especially such low-grade ones.”

“Rough stone?”

“It is a type of calcite that can replace low-grade magic nuclei. I know a mineral vein nearby. The few ships that you had sunk were preparing to take over the mineral vein, if not there wouldn’t be that many mages too.”

Saleen immediately became serious, this information was too important, important enough to exchange for Aesop’s life. On the Myers Mainland, magic nuclei could not be replaced. Although the rough stone that Aesop mentioned could only replace grade-3 magic nucleuses and below, it was these low-grade magic nuclei that mages lacked the most.

A high-grade magic nucleus was rare but not many people used it, there were not many sorcerers on the entire mainland. It was different for low-grade magic nuclei, there were over one-hundred-thousand mages in the Qin Empire and every low-grade mage longed to get their hands on low-grade magic nuclei, not the high-grade ones.

The people from the Eastern Sea had managed to find a replacement! There was a mineral vein near Metatrin City!

This was not just about getting rich overnight, since the people from the Eastern Sea found this mineral vein. They would obviously want to take over it. If he wanted to get his hands on the rough stones, he would need to fight his way past the expedition army of the Eastern Sea.

This information was far more important than the sea routes of the Eastern Sea. If Saleen wanted to send a fleet to the Eastern City, he would need to prepare for more than a decade. With this rough stone, he could start a war right now.

“These few ships, they were sent by the allied army to find the rough stones?” Saleen repeated.

“Not exactly.” Aesop did not dare to hide anything as he told Saleen the truth.

It seemed like among the Eastern Sea Allied Army, there had been a continuous argument on who should be the general. Only one of the country’s royals knew about this mineral vein. They had controlled more than thirty ships among the fleet and had brought with them many mages. They intended to start mining on their own.

These six combat vessels used the excuse of searching for the missing ships to leave Lianyun City. These were the ships that Saleen had gotten rid of. As there were many resources on the ship, especially magic chariots, this act did not raise the suspicion of the other royals.

“How long has this secret been kept?” Saleen looked at Aesop, wanting to get something from his eyes.

Aesop thought for a while before replying, “I am not sure, you guys have sunk the combat vessels that were sent by the crown prince, but one of them got away. He might know about this in a week. Even if he knew about it, he would not start a war. With his character, he would choose to wait for the situation to stabilize before asking for land in Phoenix. Then he would cut up this mineral vein and the land of others. If he continues to send combat vessels here, it would affect his position in the allied army.

Saleen thought in his heart, even if he were to send soldiers there, he would not let him get this mineral vein too. The low-grade magic nucleus was too precious and the magic nuclei used in a war were mainly low-grade ones.

“Aesop, I have considered, you should stay by my side. Now that you have told me all this, you will die if you return.” Saleen did not immediately ask where the mineral vein was, instead he gave Aesop some assurance.

Only then did he have a relieved look. Now that Saleen had said that, it meant he was prepared to let him go.

“Master Saleen, I am willing to sign a contract.” Aesop said sincerely even though his sincerity was not very credible. The signing of this contract had nothing to do with the deal though. He would follow Saleen in the future and not be a free mage. Only with that would Saleen protect him. If not, once the deal was done, Saleen could kick him aside and leave him to fend for himself.

Aesop could no longer return to the allied army or the Eastern Sea, having betrayed his side on the Myers Mainland. If Saleen did not take him in, he knew what his consequences would be. Even though his common language was clear, this war had broken out for a while and any Qin Empire person within the radius of the war could tell he was a foreigner.

Those from the Qin Empire did not know how to speak the common language, but rather, the language of their country. It would be virtually impossible for him to survive in the Qin Empire.

Nailisi stood beside Saleen, her respect for him only increased by the minute. No matter how vicious she was, she would not be able to squeeze out the secrets of her opponents slowly like her master, much less let him follow her after willingly.

She had to quickly get the coordinates of the demon dimension. As Master’s career got bigger, it was getting a little out of hand. Without sufficient manpower, Lex might even ride on top of her in the future, she could not let that happen.

At this thought, Nailisi suddenly said, “Master, if Aesop followed you, it might be a little inconvenient. It would bring trouble to you.”

Aesop was shocked, he had just gotten himself out of death. Even though he had seen these two beautiful women, he had not thought much of them. Saleen had looked at Nailisi after agreeing to take him in, but now that she had suddenly said such words to stop Saleen from taking him in, he was almost scared out of his wits.

“Master!”

Aesop wanted to say something, but Saleen waved his hands to get him to shut up before asking Nailisi, “What is your opinion?”

“Let him follow me, I have some uses.” Nailisi said softly. Aesop was unusually uncomfortable. If he followed Saleen, Saleen could ensure his safety, but following this woman? She had not even trained her sword aura…

Aesop looked pleadingly at Saleen with his brown eyes, Saleen thought for a while before nodding.

“Alright, he will follow you. The next time I capture any prisoner, you will choose first.”