While the settlement of mermaids was not a secret thing very few wizards actually knew the sheer size of it in truth. Just from the overhead view of it he had Nick could tell it went on in at least two miles in every direction from the trident wielding statue at it's center. It's residents weren't beautiful by any stretch of the imagination with fish tails below their waists and pale blueish skin along their humanoid portions. Each of them had faces much more like fish than humans with massive eyes and protruding faces.-
Along the sides of their torsos were a set of six slits that opened and closed in unison. Many of these mermaids had heard him splash into the lake but had ignored him until now but were starting to hide as he descended. Mermaids were fairly weak creatures in terms of strength and as a result had been seriously bullied by wizards over the years into the timid species they are now. "Halt outsider!" a shrill voice spoke up from the side and Nick turned to look at the one who spoke. It was a merman with short green hair and a scar under his right eye wielding a stone spear and sea rope whip.-
Sea rope is a strange type of woven kelp that was decently strong and cut through water with no issue due to the merfolk's magic woven into it. Nick just smiled at the merman "I mean your people no harm." he said calmly once he felt his language ability kick into action. Clearly his fluent speech in the merfolk language caught the merman off guard for a moment. "Why do you seek entrance into Azba then?" the merman recovered and asked with a now lowered spear.-
"I was rather curious about your peoples culture and craftsmanship and figured this would be the fastest way to get your attention." Nick said honestly. With the system unusable Nick didn't want to do anything even remotely related to it and thus figured he would focus on minor curiosities like this instead. The merman squinted at Nick to look for any sign of deception or trickery but found none as Nick even had his wand holstered. "Remain here while I go bring one who may make that decision." the merman said before swimming down and to a specific direction.-
'Well this is going well so far , hopefully I can learn something interesting for these people.' he thought while doing as instructed and hovered where he was about ten meters from the surface. It wasn't hard really as he was slightly lighter than the surrounding water and merely needed to breath in or out depending on if he was sinking or not. As he waited he noticed the kraken that had jump scared him the last time he was in the lake approaching. Now that he had night vision and sharper eyesight he could finally make out the entire body of the creature.-
It was nearly the length of a foot ball field from tip of tentacle to the top of it's head and very similar to a squid in appearance. The difference however was that it had nearly fifteen tentacles and slightly rounded head but still cone shaped unlike an octopus. It was rather chilling to see how quietly the behemoth of a cephalopod moved through the water. There was no disturbance at the top of the water nor any current from it's movements. Even when the thing got right next to Nick he couldn't feel it move at all.-
"I admit that's actually a pretty cool ability for a predator to have." Nick said completely relaxed since the thing hadn't snuck up on him. He could have sworn he saw a flash of disappointment in the things massive eye but it seemed to be replaced with curiosity. "You are probably trying to figure out why I am here right now." Nick said amused at the actions of the massive but gentle creature. It was strange however as the kraken actually seemed to nod at what he said. 'Can't believe I am actually having a somewhat conversation with a monster that can probably kill me on accident.' he thought amused before explaining his reason for visiting the lake.-
A flash of understanding flashed through the giant eye before the creature seemed to bid Nick farewell and swam away. It was nearly right after that that the previous merman returned with a much older looking mermaid with many beads and strings of shiny stones on her person. "I was told of the reason for your visit , what do you have to offer for our knowledge?" the elderly mermaid asked without any fear at all. Nick grinned "What do you want for it?" he asked thrilled about where this may lead.