Lynn surveyed the crew members waiting for his instructions and spoke with ease, "In that case, I kindly ask you all to continue working hard. We won't be truly safe until we're completely out of this sea area."
Under Lynn's command, the sailors in attendance temporarily suppressed their excited emotions and returned to their positions. However, unlike before, they no longer bore worried expressions when facing the vast, Sea of Mist (Misty Sea).
"I never thought that in my lifetime, I would escape the 'Eye of Death' twice," Lame Laut said, feeling quite moved.
"Was the first time because of the assistance of that great wizard?" Lynn asked curiously. He had suspected this when Laut mentioned the Great Whirlpool; it was clear that Laut had faced such danger more than once.
Laut nodded and then recounted his experiences from over a decade ago. At that time, he was just an ordinary pirate, living a life of killing and plundering on the sea.
Because their activities were near the Misty Sea, they didn't have to worry about the Empire's naval fleet pursuing them. If things got too dicey, they could simply hide within the fog. As long as they didn't venture too far in, they would eventually find their way back.
Then, one day, their pirate crew encountered a large ship coming out from within the Misty Sea.
Initially, they thought it was a cargo ship that had mistakenly entered the Misty Sea and had luckily found its way back. They took advantage of their superior numbers and prepared to raid it. But to their surprise, they had met their match.
The ones who took action were not Helram, but two official wizards who accompanied the ship. Even so, they utterly decimated the entire pirate crew of several hundred people, and Laut lost his right leg due to the residual effects of a fireball spell.
If they hadn't wanted to interrogate him, he might have died long ago.
However, it was through this chance that he managed to change his fate completely and became the representative of the great wizard Helram in the Harbor town.
Listening to this, Lynn couldn't help but glance at Laut, wondering what exactly he had done to escape his status as a prisoner and gain the favour of that great wizard.
He had witnessed the cunning of this old fox, albeit in a very limited way. He wouldn't trust someone like that completely. Had Laut been caught doing something?
Despite these thoughts, Lynn didn't interrupt Laut's narrative.
"After taking care of the matters in the Harbor Town, I had the honor of accompanying Master Helram to the Wizards' territory. It was during the sea voyage that we encountered the Great Whirlpool," Laut recounted nostalgically.
Of course, this 'Eye of Death' maelstrom from that time wasn't as terrifying as the one they had just faced. It only covered an area of about one kilometer, and Helram's solution was quite simple: he froze the entire maelstrom (Great Whirlpool).
Even so, this was enough to surprise Lynn. It seemed that the power possessed by the great wizard was far stronger than he had initially imagined.
"By the way, the final destination of our journey this time is Master Helram's domain—Iyeta Sea Port," Laut added.
Lynn nodded, realizing that he would soon be dealing with this great wizard. However, he still had no clue about how to respond to Helram's accusations.
As the two of them chatted, the sail warship beneath their feet had completely left the range of the great maelstrom, and the sailors on board cheered loudly.
Despite the heavy losses when they crossed the Eye of Death, Lame Laut was in high spirits, allowing everyone to eat, drink, and celebrate tonight.
However, life at sea could be somewhat dull. So, this "celebration" mainly consisted of everyone sitting together, drinking barrels of beer, boasting about their heroic exploits of the past, and trying to catch some fish.
Perhaps their luck was changing, as they didn't encounter any more unfortunate events in the following days. The entire sea remained blanketed in white fog. If it weren't for their compass guiding them, Lynn might have thought they had never left their original position.
This was the eerie aspect of the Misty Sea. Even great wizards like Helram could get completely lost in this region if they couldn't find their way. Despite being able to deal with the maelstroms, they could still become entirely disoriented here.
During these days of sea travel, Lynn didn't just sit idly by. Besides practising magic as usual, he spent every day asking Jenny for information about the Land of Wizards. Soon, he had a general understanding of this sanctuary for wizards.
First and foremost was the attitude of the wizards toward the outside world, which roughly divided into two factions.
The first was the conservative faction, who chose to isolate themselves. This was the choice of most wizards in the Land of Wizards. They paid no heed to the outside world and believed that the people controlled by the Church were incredibly ignorant.
Wizards, in their pursuit of understanding the mysteries of the world through magic, cared little about political power or territorial claims. Therefore, the study of magic was the same everywhere.
Moreover, the Land of Wizards possessed an extremely rich reserve of magical ores. Coupled with the blockade of the Misty Sea, even if the Church couldn't break in, the wizards didn't find it easy to leave. They might as well focus on developing various magical theories and directly crush their enemies in the future.
The second faction was the proactive one, such as the Great Wizard Helram, advocating the display of magical power to the outside world. They believed that, despite being a massive island, the Land of Wizards couldn't be entirely self-sufficient, and it needed to continuously absorb new blood from the outside world due to its small population.
However, the downsides were also evident. The more they interacted with the outside world, the greater the danger. Relying solely on the power currently stored in the Land of Wizards wasn't enough to compete with the Church. If the Land of Wizards' location was fully exposed, it could have catastrophic consequences. This was the fundamental reason why most wizards leaned towards the conservative faction.
It was worth mentioning that their mentor, Kora, belonged to the proactive faction and was part of the school created by the Great Wizard Helram.
"So, it's difficult for information to spread between the Land of Wizards and the outside world, right?" Lynn pondered, asking Jenny.
"Seems like it," Jenny nodded. In these four years, she had only been to the Land of Wizards once, and most of her knowledge came from Kora's regular stories.
"If that's the case..." Lynn gazed thoughtfully out of the porthole, as though he wanted to see the Land of Wizards, standing deep within the vast sea, through the endless white fog.
He had already figured out how to handle the accusations from that great wizard.
TL/n -
maelstrom => an area of water that moves with a very strong circular movement and sucks in anything that goes past