"Mr., this is?" Finkle asked in shock. He was just staring at the air, opening with admiration, wondering where the warm air come from. When Abel's spell popped out of nowhere, Finkle almost jumped; he thought their carriage was attacked.
"Nothing, I'm just practicing spells," Abel said, and took out a jade from his portal bag and began carving it.
Finkle was not an idiot. He knew that in order to make a spell, you needed to make hand gestures, and Abel did not make any hand gestures. It was not normal for the "frozen armor" to just appeared out of thin air, but it was better for him to keep his mouth shut if he wanted to maintain his position.
Afterward, Finkle watched Abel carefully carved on his jade. Sometimes Abel would suddenly leave a deep cut in the jade. There were even a few times the carving knife was heading straight towards his finger, but it always stopped just in time. Abel never hurt himself.
Finkle had found a pattern. The "Frozen armor would appear on Abel's body every 7 minutes. And every time it was out of a sudden without any spells or hand gestures.
Since Abel's basic carving knife training was distracted by the weak little souls, his progress was very slow. Luckily he was highly aware of the danger as an elite knight. Since he was distracted, there were multiple times he almost cut his finger off, but the elite knight's awareness of danger always stopped himself at the last second.
The bank of the Holy Continent was located in the best region of the Triumph boulevard in Bakong City. The exterior was built with giant Snow White rocks, and every one of these rocks was polished to a mirror-like finish. It made the Bank of the Holy Continent looked dramatically different from any other construction around.
Abel and Finkle walked out of their carriage in front of the bank of the Holy Continent in Bakong City. When Abel was stepping on the Snow White stairs, he was distracted once again. If Finkle did not step up and hold him fast enough, Abel would have done a tumble right in front of the bank of the Holy Continent.
"Mr., the bank of the Holy Continent, don't allow the use of any spells or combat qi," Finkle gently reminded him.
"Really?" Abel had just remembered, all spells were actually forbidden in Bakong city. Luckily he was just in the carriage, and no one had seen him use a spell.
Up to this point, Abel had stopped his "frozen armor" spell through the weak little soul, but he did not stop counting down every 7 minutes. He recalled that only in safe places such as the way from the magic tower to the city, he could try to practice multitasking. If he was in Luka's camp, especially in the wild, there was danger coming from all directions. It was impossible for him to practice multitasking there, so he didn't want to stop practicing now.
"Finkle, go!" Said Abel glancing at Finkle by his side.
There were a lot of similarities between the interior of the bank of the Holy continent in Bakong City and the interior of modern banks. There was a huge counter made by black marble, separating the staff area to the guest lounge. All the guests who were here to take care of their business were waiting patiently at the guest lounge for the staff to call their name.
Abel looked at the interesting scenery. It was more advanced and beautiful than he had imagined. Although it was only a branch, the wall of the bank was filled with Carving of the goddess of wealth, as well as some image from legendary stories. This made the bank came across as very serious and high class. The moment they stepped in, they automatically began to lower their voice.
A bank assistant wearing a white uniform stepped up and bowed. He looked at Abel and Finkle with hesitation. He was not sure which one of the two he should ask. After a while, he asked Finkle gently, "Hello sir, is there anything I can do to help you?"
Abel and Finkle were both wearing grey overcoats with hoods. The only difference was that Abel's coat was made with full cotton while Finkle's one was made lamb fur to combat the cold, so it looked more expensive. Finkle's body also looked to be wealthier, so it was easy to mistake Finkle as the boss.
Finkle turned his head towards Abel, seeing that Abel was not paying attention. Finkle then turned his head back to the assistant and said: "Please take us to the givings for the wizards!"
The bank assistant froze and said with a shaky voice, "Please follow me!"
Seeing the look on this assistant's face, Abel knew the title of a wizard was still very frightening outside the magic tower. As Abel kept thinking, he followed the assistant from the lounge to the second floor with the huge staircase on the left side.
"Mr, please be careful!" Finkle followed Abel with worry. Once Abel needed help, he would be right there.
"I'm fine!" Said Abel waving his hand. Abel paid closer attention to his steps and safely made it to the second floor.
"This was the VIP lounge. Please have a wait here. I will inform our accountant to serve you!" By that point, the bank assistant knew that he had made a mistake. Abel was actually the one with authority, so he quickly bowed and apologized.
"No worries, we'll have a rest here," said Abel with a smile.
After the bank assistant walked off, Abel turned to Finkle and said, "I never thought banks could be so luxurious!"
"Luxurious" was Abel's first impression of the bank of the Holy Continent in Bakong City. It didn't matter where he looked: the polished white walls or the interior filled with decorations, it was the most beautiful place Abel had been to in Bakong City, other than the shrine.
"Mr., the bank of the Holy Continent, was the only bank in every big city. This branch in Bakong City had gone through many years of rebuild and advancement until it became this building in front of our eyes. The banking union was also one of the biggest humanitarian organizations in the world," Finkle explained.
By that time, a servant had already delivered a cup of coffee for each of them. Abel couldn't help but admire the customer service. When he recalled the times he went to the bank in his past life, he had to wait in line every time, and if he wanted a drink, he would have to buy it himself. However, that was only because he never went to the VIP lounge. The service there was pretty good as well.
As Abel was thinking, his hand began to shake, a bit of coffee spilled on to the table.
"Mr., are you ok?" Finkle quickly asked. Along the way, he already noticed Abel looked very odd, as though as he was caught up on something, always make mistakes.
"Ha!" A woman couldn't hold back her laughter and laughed out loud.
Abel turned his head to look, and at the same time, that woman turned her head as well. That woman was wearing a luxurious outfit. She only wore an extra leather jacket under such cold weather. Abel knew this woman. She was the mistress of King Liandre, Ms. Daisy.
"Hello, Baron Abel!" Ms. Daisy did not expect the person she just laughed at was Abel. She was a little frightened as she bowed to Abel. She still remembered the day when her elite knight guard was brutally killed by this young baron.
Abel was not close to Ms. Daisy, and they never talked before, so Abel only gave a slight bow back.
However, the young man beside Ms. Daisy caught Abel's attention. The young man looked pale. He was wearing a large leather coat with tightly netted patterns on the top. Although normal people could see it as decorations, Abel knew that it was a magic pattern for a magic circle. He wasn't sure which magic pattern it was. It was the first time he had seen someone with a magic pattern drawn on their clothing.
Abel's rank as a wizard was not high, but his power of the will was powerful. He could clearly sense that this young man was not an official Wizard. He was probably around the same rank as Carlos, maybe a rank three novice wizard.
The young man noticed Abel was paying attention to him, so he smiled and nodded. He then made a wizard greeting gesture with his hand in front of his chest, seemed like he knew Abel's identity. But it was not hard to guess. In this city, the only people who could dress like Abel and Finkle while still be sitting at the VIP lounge, we're either Wizards of the servants of the gods.
Abel greeted him back with the Wizard hand gesture out of respect. Although this young man came across as very nice and respectful, Abel's elite Knight awareness told him that this young man was not as nice as he had appeared. It seemed like He was not fond of Ms. Daisy bowing to Abel just then.
However, Abel did not care too much. He was so proud of his elite knight awareness. Ever since he began an elite knight, he could see the hidden intentions a lot better. This made socializing a lot easier. Abel continued to think, maybe the two commanders who were friends with Abel, only became friends with him as they saw that Abel was genuine.
"Who's that?" the young wizard gently asked Ms. Daisy from behind.
"He is baron Abel. He is an extremely powerful figure in the Duchy." Said Ms. Daisy. She didn't know too much about Abel; she only guessed Abel was powerful since even the King had paid a lot of respect to him.