Blazing Sun Kingdom, Evander Kingdom, Brilliant Sky Kingdom, and Soaring Dragon Dynasty surrounds the Eternal Green Valley from four sides, at the centre of Rainbow Continent.
The Rainbow Continent have several continents but these four great kingdoms have managed to suppress all of them for more than thousand kingdoms, this shows there deep foundation but even after that, they could only surround the Eternal Green Valley in between but can't claim it.
In terms of area, Eternal Green Valley can rival two of these kingdoms combined but it is only when the surface is taken into account, and not the underground and the places above the surface.
After experiencing failure several times, the four kingdoms knew that without completely combining their powers it is impossible to claim the valley, but truly combining their power and showing their cards to each other wasn't feasible.
On the surface, they might seem friendly but were all under a tight competition with each other, each one of them wanted to surpass and suppress others.
The Blazing Sun Kingdom focused on the coexistence of science and magic.
The Evander Kingdom focused on the research and study of magic.
Soaring Dragon Kingdom focused on martial cultivation following the old tradition.
The Brilliant Sky Kingdom focused on science and technology.
Except for these, all these kingdoms had their own speciality that others didn't have, all of them also researched the way of other three kingdoms to find ways to counter their weapons and improve their defence, they didn't do it on the surface, and kept a friendly smile on their faces while sharpening the daggers in their hand to stab at any time.
The Brilliant Sky Kingdom had spent most resources on this expect.
***
One month ago…
Brilliant Sky Kingdom, National Research Facility, Secret Branch: Area-13.
From the outer appearance, it was a mountain valley filled with irregular hills and rocks all around, the wild beasts roaming around were like icing on the cake.
The mountain in the centre of the region was very tall, when someone at the bottom raises their head to look at its top, they would feel like its peak is piercing the sky.
Nevertheless, the region looked devoid of any human tribe or society around it but in truth, the government had built one of their research headquarters inside the biggest mountain in the centre.
…Booom.. ..Boom… x 6
Suddenly, several explosions occurred, smoke clouds rose in the sky, the mountain shattered at numerous places near the bottom, rocks splattered and spoke subsided revealing the well-engineered infrastructure of canals inside.
...Swosshh… x 3
Suddenly, several shadows dashed out from different openings created in the vicinity and headed into separate direction they felt were favourable.
Loud sounds of emergency alarm came from the hidden facility inside the mountain.
Just after five minutes of this incidents, a big hidden door opened at the bottom of the mountain, guards clad in a black suit of light armour and a tranquillizer rifle in their hands came out and chased after the escaping figures.
Soon after, two helicopters came flying towards the mountain, when the helicopters were still around 60 meters above the ground, a woman wearing combatant uniform jumped out from one of them, under the flow of gravity she her fall only accelerated with time, but when she landed on the ground there was no sound of the collision.
It was like she and the ground were made of cotton, on impact, all the kinetic energy in her disappeared without a trace.
The woman had an angry expression on her face, she headed inside the facility without giving a second look to the people that landed on the ground after her.
The guards who saw her on her way stopped their work and greeted her, though she ignored everyone and barged into the main control room.
The control room was occupied by many people at the moment, most of them were controlling drones to tail the escapes from earlier while the rest focused on analyzing and dispatching teams to repair the damage caused to research faculty.
The holographic screens all around the room were showing their progress and data on their current situation.
An old man in a white coat was standing at the centre of the room, he was observing all the information shown on these windows with a solemn look on his face.
The woman approached him and shouted "Dr Rinchen do you have any idea what impact this accident can have on our kingdom? You let a group of practitioner criminal's escape, even if they are crippled, once they come in contact with someone, not only the location of this place would be out, our image will waver in masses, the opposition parties can also use this incident to oppress us,"
"If it isn't Defense Executive Miss. Nolan, don't worry, it was an unexpected mishap but the situation is still under control they would get caught in the next 24 hours," Dr Rinchen said without turning his head to look at her.
"I will decide that after seeing the reports," Miss. Nolan snorted, she took an empty seat and started looking through the data on one of the computer, because of her position she had access to all the information hence Dr Rinchen could do nothing whether he liked it or not.
Miss. Nolan was reading an experiment report when her eyes got widened in shock, the shock was then replaced by anger, she turned and shouted at Dr Rinchen "The reason behind this incident is a Second Generation Summoned Hero? What The Hell, didn't your last month's report said that even after 143 tries, we failed to achieve success in Second Generation Hero Summoning? Now, what is this?"
Dr Rinchen sighed, he was very much reluctant to answer the question, still, he had no choice but to reply "There were 143 failures, I didn't lie, but 144th was a success,"
When Miss. Nolan heard these words, she almost jumped out of her chair and punched him in the face out of anger.
Failures until 143 and success at 144th, wasn't it too confidential? She wasn't a fool, she easily guessed that he had already done 144 experiments before sending the report, she was familiar with his nature and that's why she could guess that the reason he didn't reveal this news was that he wanted to research the gifted Hero, and if he had revealed the news then the Hero would have been taken by the government as soon as possible. He did it, and in the shadow of selfish greed, he underestimated the capabilities of an otherworldly Hero!
She was furious because these 144 tries weren't done in a few months or years, it was the work of the many generations that took hundreds of years to show a successful result. The number of resources spent on doing that was simply too much.
Dr Rinchen knew what she was thinking so he added "It's not completely my fault, that Hero acted like a completed naïve and idiot teenager until today, she easily revealed two of her gifts and pretended like she didn't hide anything, showing absolutely no battery power, although the vessel we used to summon her also had a blessing but without knowing how to fight even that was useless…
Sigh… Only today we came to knew how deceitful she was, in the morning, a mishap occurred, she used the third gift out of nowhere to escape from her cell and free all the death row prisoners making her escape with them,"
Miss. Nolan was fuming in rage, Dr Rinchen sounded like he was sad about it but he was using this chance to reveal all the other hidden information he kept until now, like how he used a previous subject that already had a blessing, to summon a Hero within it.
All the prisoners that escaped were severely weakened and couldn't use their full strength but the guards chasing them were also weakened, the reason? It was because of the place this facility was created at.
The mountain range was under the effect of a natural magic array, anyone below Tier 5 would experience a big suppression in their power, the government utilized this effect to their advantage and used weaker guards to keep in check the stronger prisoners without wasting precious drug to weaken them. They couldn't permanently cripple the prisoner practitioners because if they do, then they will become useless test subjects.
Furthermore, practitioners above Tier 5 were far more precious than becoming full-time guards at a place, that's why it was left to normally armed guards.
Today, their advantage turned into their disadvantage.
"Until now, if it wasn't for you being a capable scientist then you would have been rotting into some prison cell. If that Hero escaped today, don't think that you can also get away this time," Miss. Nolan said while gritting her teeth, she then turned on her communicator and gave a new order to the guards "All units, don't waste time on normal prisoners, kill them if they don't surrender, I want everyone to catch the preparer behind this incident alive.
The girl in her twenties, she is tall, has shoulder-length black hair and deep black eyes, her skin is similar to dark elves, tanned and glossy, although she hadn't started cultivating, her body- she is from a barbarian clan famous for frontal combat and assumed to have at least three gifts and one blessing, so don't underestimate her, I am sending you further details in a minute, start searching now,"
***
Two days later…
At Carran Town, morning time.
The three caravans passed the wooden town wall and entered the town after a rough identity checkup of the everyone in the group.
Kale stepped out of the caravan and looked at his surroundings.
The road he was standing on was paved with stone tiles, the buildings around were made with either wood or brinks, the architecture style as not from the modern world but something of the past, when compared to earth.
The townsman walking around in the town all had simple getup similar to the adventurer's who accompanied him.
The air in the atmosphere was fresh and refreshing, there was no sound of automobiles, several birds that are uncommon in the city were casually flying around or sitting on the edge of buildings.
'Just as the information on the net said, a place made without the use of any electronical equipment, how nostalgic,' Kale thought, he had lived in Kazeer for a long time, although the infrastructure of the town was different from there but due to the lack of gadgets of science it felt familiar to him.
"Little brother, I have to go now, take care of yourself," Koya approached him to bid farewell.
Now that they had arrived at the town, their mission was complete, they needed to go to the guild and submit their mission.
"You too," Kale said.
His two words were enough to make her smile, she extended her head and patted his head before leaving to meet up with her group.
'I seriously don't like it,' Kale thought, he then turned and headed on the road in front.
In last two days, he had gotten a lot of information about Carran Town from Koya during their dinner chat, he faintly knew the location of the Adventurer's Guild, actually, it was easy to find it as the Adventurer's Guild was the tallest building in the town after the Town Hall.
Normally, a small town doesn't have Adventurer's Guild, but Carran Town was special, it not only has two dungeons but was also located near the border of two kingdoms which made it a commonplace for people who normally travel between these two kingdoms.
Kale arrived near the Town Hall, most of the inns in the town were present around Town Hall, he wasn't planning to leave in a day so he needed to decide on a staying place before making any further plans.
It was still morning, so he slowly walked through the street observing his surrounding passing by the inns on his way.
'Where is it... That one,' Kale stopped in front of an inn with a nameplate having 'Crescent Moon Inn' written on it.
It wasn't the best inn in the town, but something recommended by Koya for low cost and better service.
Kale entered the inn, he found himself in a hall with several wooden tables arranged on the left with a beer cabinet at the corner, the reception counter was on the right side just after the entrance door, a middle-aged woman present there, she looked back at him.
The woman had an ordinary appearance, she was a bit fat but her smile was amiable, she gave off a warm feeling.
"A young customer? How unusual," The woman said in a muffled voice.
"Are young customers not welcome here?" Kale raised his eyebrow.
The woman chuckled at his words and said "Haha… I didn't mean that young guest, please make yourself comfortable. It is late, but anyway, I am Anna, the owner of this inn, what can I do for you, dear guest?"
Kale felt troubled due to being treated like a young child everywhere, if it was a hotel they would still treat him like an adult due to their professionalism but things here were different, it was an inn in a town, he decided to later buy equipment and gear that would at least make him look a little older and adventurer like.
He replied with a sigh "What are the prices for staying?"
"5 Silver coin for a whole day, 2 meals and breakfast included, or 3 Silver coins only for staying the whole day, meals excluded," Ann said.
An inn is several times cheaper compared to a five-star hotel in the city, it was an advantage. The prices were the same as what Koya told him. Kale took out a pouch from the pocket and gave her 50 Silver coins "I want a room for ten days,"
"Got it," Anna kept her smile, she then led him to a room on the second floor.
The room was better than what Kale expected, it was quite spacious, it had a wooden bed with a mattress, a table with a chair near the window, and a separate toilet.
Although there was no private bathroom, the inn had a combined bathhouse with a hot spring for both men and women, which included separate rentable rooms.