"So, where are we going now?" Dante said while he and Alister and Arielle were riding on their individual horses heading into the back-gate exiting the palace.
"The queen told me about the 'Guardian Amulets' that could protect you from the salt, she said you can't travel through the salty waters of the ocean. And she told me about the man named 'Hermes' the mage who was buying and selling magical stuff. The Queen believed he had some... Our first destination was 'AnglerPort'." Arielle replied.
The three of them exited the palace and headed along the way into the west part of the MoonGlade towards the jungle where on ahead of it, they can find the road that leads them to AnglerPort.
"Watch your steps, there's a lot of imps out here." advised Alister.
Crossing the isolated jungle of MoonGlade wasn't that easy as there were a lot of tiny mischievous creatures such as nymphs, pixies and imps that sometimes slow down some of the travelers that were crossing in there. Nymphs are male thumb-sized creatures, who just looked like a human with pointed ears like what the elves had, wearing leaves as their clothes through the use of magic. They cultivate the flowers in the jungle, keeping the flowers always look beautiful and when you pick or touch any of their flowers, they will cast their magic pixie dust that will make you sneeze like-forever and the pixies were winged-nymphs, female, not totally harmful unless somebody try to hurt them, they'll led you into a wrong direction or maybe even worse that they'll led you into a troubled-place, sometimes normal humans without a enhanced skill of navigating can't find their way back if it does. The third in the list was the 'imps' were those thumb-sized wingless creatures that wear a pointed hat, peach or brown skin tone, and a pointed nose with a scary crumbled face and an evil laugh that was so haunting to hear. Imps are ground creatures wearing mushroom clothes that if someone stepped on them, they will reshape the size of some part of your body as their punishment like shrinking or enlarging your foot for a period of time.
"Wait, do you hear that?"
The three of them suddenly stopped their horses when Dante felt and heard something. Trying to locate and figure out where the sound came from. Dry leaves from the tall tree were falling on the ground and the small rocks were pounding and jumping as the slight-shaking of the ground at the back of their direction from the palace was slowly coming closer to them as the ground-shaking started to feel stronger. Trees and bushes were shaking as there was something big-creature that was approaching their whereabouts. Arielle gets off to her horse and made her fighting stance. She raised her hand where she wore her magical ring as if ready to cast her ice magic spell to the indistinct approaching danger while Dante and Alister stayed up on their horses for knowing that they're still nerfed. Ready to run away as they both know that they can't fight off whatever that big creature was without their demon abilities because they still haven't reached yet the outside territory that wasn't covered by the runes of MoonGlade.
"Come on, creature!" Arielle uttered.
The creature suddenly came out. Arielle was surprised and she cast her magic spell and she froze up the creature's feet after the creature came out from the bushes, running, and it was just Peebles, the stone giant who recently fought with Dante and Alister.
"Wait, wait, wait! it's just me!" Peebles yelled.
"Holy crap! it's just you...why are you following us? Taneisha sent you to spy on us, didn't she?" Arielle yelled at Peebles, in surprised.
"No, I willfully come to join you in your quest, all my life, I've been wishing to have an epic adventure." explained Peebles.
Hundreds of angry imps, nymphs and pixies were coming towards them because of the disturbing things that Peebles did.
"Run, run!" Alister yelled.
They ran away on their horses swiftly out onto the edge of the jungle where the boundary was. They were chased by hundreds of tiny mischievous jungle creatures. While running, they didn't notice that some of their appearance was reshaped. Dante laughed while riding on the back of his horse when looked into Alister's face, Alister's nose's holes were reshaped into one hole without knowing that his lips and ears were reshaped into increased size as Alister laughed at him too. Arielle was somehow immune to it. Peebles cracked the ice magic that froze his feet and also ran with them until the four of them reached the boundary and finally the tiny creatures stopped chasing them as Dante and Alister felt that their werewolf and vampiric powers as they felt their super strength and senses were getting back.
"Well, you two looked not bad at all." Arielle said, laughing at Dante and Alister's ridiculous faces after being enchanted by imps.
"We were lucky we didn't lose our way." Alister said.
The sun was setting down. They took their rest behind a huge tree. Peebles made a bonfire by converging both of his fists together to create a spark that lightened up the dry leaves, woods and branches that he gathered for it. Alister hunted some wild animals out there somewhere in the forest for their dinner. Alister came back with a wild boar. He already sucked up its blood. Dante did the cooking.
"How did you cook like this as good as MoonGlade's maids?" Arielle complimented Dante.
"Well, I just put a little bit of spices I gathered out there. I'm the best cook in my family, unfortunately I can't eat my own dish, though." boasted Dante.
"Hey, you should be thanking me first for hunting your dinner. And I'm a good cook too. I used to cook long time ago." a narcissist Alister jealously said after a beautiful lady gave her honest compliment to Dante.
After dinner, they rested the whole night behind the bonfire as Alister volunteered to be the night watch for knowing that vampires don't need a beauty sleep. They rested peacefully the whole night. Crackling insects, hooting owls and a glowing yellowish white of the moonlight loomed large above the darkest sky surrounded by billions of twinkling stars which that makes it a perfect night.
The dawn is breaking-in. The cool morning breeze touched their skins as the last flame of the fire from their bonfire was blown away. Awakened by the rays of the sun that lit up their faces.
"Hey, wake up... Everyone, where's Alister?" Dante uttered.
Dante got up on his feet and sneaked around to look for Alister. He followed Alister's demonic essence using his super senses and enhanced hearing. On ahead of their whereabouts, there were two roads that heads south and western part of the GreatLand. Between the two roads, he heard some loud noises, he hurriedly followed the sounds.
When he got there, he saw four merchants lying on the ground tied up and Alister was fighting the man that wears a black pirate coat with a hood in it, face covered by a pirate shoal, holding a violin case on his left hand and a black-powdered device on his right hand that was called a pistol, maybe he's one of a pirate-thief. Alister was shot on his left thigh that made him fall to his knees as Dante suddenly came along and chased the pirate-thief that robbed the helpless merchants but he couldn't get him because Alister was severely injured and much needed his help because the pistol's bullet was made of silver that prevents him from healing back that if it's not taken off from his thigh immediately, he'll slowly suffer pain to death because silver was poisonous to demons. The pirate-thief has got away with the treasures that he robbed from the merchants. Dante untied the merchants, and called for help as Arielle got in there and she took off the silver bullet from Alister's thigh using her dagger. Alister now has been relieved.
"What kind of bloody weapon does that man have? asked Alister.
"It's a pirate weapon, they call it a pistol." Dante replied.
"That man... he fights like hell though he's a human." Alister said, opened up his own opinion about the pirate. "He beat the shit out of me."
After the incident, they resumed their journey to AnglerPort. They took up the west road. A few hours later, it was an early afternoon when they reached AnglerPort. There was a village where maybe hundred population of different races that lives in there. One of their main livelihood was fishing and transporting passengers from here to Atlantis. Dante and Alister can't make it to cross the border because the whole town was surrounded by human-sized rock salt, it protected AnglerPort from demons for a long time and recently.
"You three, you have to stay here. Just wait here until I get back." Arielle said. Commanded them to wait for her as she sneaks out for some Guardian Amulets, an items that could help Dante and Alister to go inside without being hurt by the power of sea salt.
"Good day to you mr... Is this Hermes' shack?" Arielle asked to a merchant inside the shack.
"Yes, what are you looking for lady?" the husky voice of an old man, an old merchant who works in Hermes'shack.
"I'm looking for Hermes himself." She said.
"Unfortunately, he's been out for days. I think he's in Atlantis with his brother Poseidon." said the merchant.
"Do you have any Guardian Amulets?" said Arielle.
"Three gold bars each."
Arielle bought two of it. "Do you sell any items here that can help me to shape-shift?"
"Yes, here it is, it's just our only item of it, a necklace made up of Loki's tooth, you know, Loki, son of Odin. He was a naturally born mage, the greatest illusionist wizard in the Alliance. Hermes secretly took one of his tooth when Loki was just a kid, losing some tooth and that's what makes it rare." the merchant offered. "I'll give it to you for the same price like on the first items you just bought." he added.
Arielle returned to them outside with the items. Dante and Alister wore the Guardian Amulets and Peebles wore the necklace of shape-shifting. Arielle told Peebles to shape-shift into a six foot tall muscular human in a brown skin tone as hid disguise and so that he could fit in the ship.
When they entered the village, they looked for someone who might could help them to reach into Atlantis. A villager told them to look for an Admiral named Luther Sharpeye.
They went into a port where the ship of the man named Luther Sharpeye was. They went up into the ship to talk to him for his service ride. It was so strange when they got into the ship, it was so quiet like nobody's in there as they saw not any single crew of the ship working in there. They heard someone was playing sweet-sound music from a violin on the front of the ship, at its bow. When they saw him, a bearded face of a man of his middle thirty, had long black hair that made him a good looking appearance with a fair skin tone wearing black pirate coat, with a pistol on the side pocket of his belt. "Welcome aboard my dear passengers." Luther said as he made his eye contacts with them. They were petrified from what they've just figured out by looking at Cardell's fiery brown eyes.
"What the bloody hell!" Alister and Dante uttered at the same time.