Chapter 244: The Central Sea
"A leviathan?!" Kyana nearly ran below deck after hearing the name of the creature. She didn’t know what they looked like, but there were stories of sea monsters with the name Leviathan.
Cornelia nodded. "That’s right. A leviathan lives in the sea, and if people get too close, it attacks. Because of this, the truce between the Navy and Pirates is very crucial. One time, there was a conflict between the two forces. It was a devastating battle, and the conflict woke up the leviathan. Both sides suffered heavy losses, and ever since that day, conflict on the central sea has been very scarce."
"So even without mining the ore, you can still upset the creature. Man, I wanna go back home to where water isn’t all around us." Kyana grabbed her knees, holding them close to her chest.
"What are you talking about? Water is all around us." Cornelia chuckled.
"We’re not from this continent," Nadya told her.
"Huh?"
Gwen explained everything, leaving out a few details, but giving her the rundown of everything that happened.
To say that Cornelia was more shocked than before was an understatement. Information travels fast, so she knew about the foreigners from another land, but she didn’t expect to run into them.
"I should have known, with your accents and the Blue Tower crests you’re wearing. I can’t believe I’m speaking to people from another continent! The legends were true!"
Kai liked her energy. He already felt like she was a great addition to the crew. "Have you ever wanted to visit other continents?"
"Sure have. But I didn’t really put that dream at the forefront of my list of things to do. The open sea is literally full of danger, and there is a barrier keeping us from leaving the continent while doubling as protection from the open sea."
"Stick with us and you’ll get to visit all of them. We sailed the open sea to get here. It was fun as fuck."
"Kai, don’t lie." Gwen stared at him with a straight face.
"W-What?"
"It was not fun," Sasha recalled herself puking most of the voyage.
"That was one of the worst times of my life!" Kyana hated thinking back to that time.
"We were constantly attacked by sea monsters. And you were thrown overboard like three times." Nadya reminded him.
"Okay, true, but it wasn’t that bad. We handled the monsters with ease." He reminded them.
"Wasn’t easy for me," Sasha grumbled.
"Well, yeah. You were too busy throwing up."
"Hey!"
Kai raised his hands. "Did I lie?"
"Whatever." She pouted and went below deck.
Cornelia smiled at their interactions. It reminded her of her crew before they were unfortunately separated permanently. She was already liking the vibes of Kai’s crew and wanted to stick around. Not like she would leave anyway.
---
Thanks to how fast Kai’s ship was, they were able to arrive at the central Sea within a day. They might have cheated here and there by flying over checkpoints, but it wasn’t a big deal.
Although this place was called the central sea, it was more toward the lower part of the kingdom since the capital, the main island, sat directly in the middle of the continent. The central sea wasn’t that far away from the capital, probably like a few hours by boat, so Kai planned on stopping there first.
"We’re here," Cornelia said with excitement. "The central sea."
The place was booming with activity. Tons of boats were going in and out of the many ports, trading goods, carrying soldiers or sorcerers. The rest of them were pirates.
On the left was the nice, booming, good-looking area where the kingdom held its influence. The docks were clean and pristine, and soldiers patrolled the area at all times.
On the right was where the pirates set up their area. It wasn’t a rough-looking spot in the slightest, but it was clearly not as well-kept compared to the kingdom-ruled side. The docks needed to be clean, scam artists were running around, and people selling rotten fruit were advertising their stalls as if they sold the best fruit on the market.
Other than that, the whole place was beautiful. The water glistened in the sunlight, its clear surface allowing people to see some of the ore that wasn’t touched by both pirates and the kingdom. The water was also kept clean to ensure that the leviathan didn’t get upset, not to mention that every river came from this sea, so it was used as cleaning and drinking water for the people.
Cornelia docked on the kingdom side, not wanting to stir up trouble on the pirate side with such a nice ship.
"I’ll stay with the ship while you do your business." She told them.
"Actually, you’ll come with us." Kai teleported everyone off the ship and then sent it back into his inventory.
Tons of people who saw this had their jaws drop on the floor. For a ship to have such an ability, it had to have been a relic. At least that’s what they thought.
"Wow, that was amazing! You don’t even have to worry about people taking your ship."
He smiled. "Yup. Now, let’s go."
Kai and crew walked over to the gate that would lead them to the capital. The guard asked for their information, and after confirming it, he let them through.
"Just letting you know, the capital is still a few hours out." Cornelia pointed off into the distance. "We can purchase a carriage at a stable shop nearby."
Gwen elbowed Kai. "Or we can take our carriage."
Kai chuckled. "Cornelia, have you even been in a flying carriage?"
"N-No, I can’t say I have."
"Well, there’s a first time for everything." Kai brought out his carriage. "Hop in."
"What the hell? How many cool things do you have? And how can you do all of this?" She jumped into the carriage and looked around, getting excited to fly in it.
"It’s a cool story, actually. You see, my father is a god and-"
Kyana rested a hand on his shoulder. "Kai! Please! It’s getting old at this point."
"But...Fine."