Chapter 219: Arrival |
When Gillian arrived at the gates of Snow Bear City with the Goddess of the Currents’ party, it caused a major disturbance.
The guards stationed at the gate immediately ran up onto the wall and lowered the gate, stopping just short of ringing the alarm bell.
But the captain of the guard stopped him. He already knew that a party from the Goddess of the Currents was coming here.
If that guard had actually rung the alarm bell, it would have made a complete farce of the situation.
Although the captain of the guard knew that the party outside was most likely the followers of the Goddess of the Currents, he still did not open the gate at once, and instead hurriedly sent someone to notify the lord.
Only when the lord and his knights arrived did the captain finally let out a sigh of relief.
The news that a party from the Goddess of the Currents had arrived outside Snow Bear City spread throughout the entire city.
The mercenary squads that had entered Snow Bear City after being hired by the lord of White Dragon Harbor also all headed toward the gate as soon as they heard the news.
Patrick looked at the tightly shut city gate and frowned. The area around it was already packed with mercenaries, all familiar faces from White Dragon Harbor.
It could be said that the number of mercenary squads gathered at the gate had exceeded his expectations.
“He practically hired every mercenary squad in White Dragon Harbor and the surrounding area, didn’t he?”
Even from a rough count alone, there were already more than a hundred people, which made his scalp tingle.
This was not at all what he had expected when he first came. He had thought that, while that item was important, it was only important.
The lord of White Dragon Harbor should have hired a few skilled people to track it down, not nearly every mercenary he could find.
“Hey, Patrick!”
Patrick turned around and saw a familiar face.
Liam, his mouth wide open as usual, was waving one hand high in the air and shouting to him.
“Liam? Even you came? Weren’t you working out at sea? How did even you end up here?”
Patrick said in shock, his brows tightly drawn together.
“The lord gave my brothers and me a large sum of money and ended our work at sea so we could come here first and help him track down that item.”
Those words made Patrick’s brows twist together even more tightly.
His innate instincts and his many years of experience as a mercenary were both telling him that there was definitely something wrong here.
It was not merely that the lord of White Dragon Harbor valued that item highly.
He felt that the item even involved many forces across the continent. This could practically be called a small-scale war.
The followers of the Goddess of the Currents were not staying in port cities, but had instead come all the way to this desolate corner of the Northern Frontier. And on top of that, the number of mercenaries here was abnormally high...
“What do you think those water ghost followers are doing here?” Liam asked teasingly, without thinking too deeply about it.
“I think they’re also here for the item the lord of White Dragon Harbor lost. Only, they’re not here for the bounty, but for the item itself.”
Liam scratched his head and said,
“Huh? For the item itself? Then are we supposed to snatch it out of those water ghosts’ hands? I heard they brought quite a few people.”
“Perhaps?”
Patrick no longer cared whether he could seize that item or not. The only thing he cared about now was how to extricate himself from this matter without getting dragged into trouble.
He knew why all these mercenaries had gathered here, because they all recognized the Church of the Goddess of the Currents.
The Church of the Goddess of the Currents seemed to have risen alongside White Dragon Harbor.
According to his father, the followers of the Goddess of the Currents had already been sailing across the sea as far back as his great-grandfather’s generation.
And the followers of the Goddess of the Currents had always been active in all sorts of port cities. Though they did not possess a port of their own, nearly every port accepted them.
That was because their followers could accelerate ships, let them ride the ocean currents, shorten the time spent sailing across the sea, and also reduce the chance of being attacked by sea monsters...
Those things made every port welcome the followers of the Goddess of the Currents, especially in this age, when maritime trade had grown more and more frequent.
Patrick withdrew his thoughts. He needed to focus on what was happening right in front of him, not keep thinking about the Church of the Goddess of the Currents.
He took a deep breath and said to Liam,
“Liam, the situation is looking bad. I’ll explain more in a bit... our two squads need to join forces first.”
Liam also caught the meaning in Patrick’s words. He had gone through many dangerous incidents together with Patrick before, so he naturally trusted him.
“Alright. Is there something wrong with those followers of the Goddess of the Currents?”
By this point, Liam was no longer calling those believers “water ghosts.”
“It’s not that the followers of the Goddess of the Currents are the problem. It’s that today’s situation itself is the problem.”
Liam heard the unease in Patrick’s voice and became tense as well, his eyes drifting again and again toward the tightly shut gate.
At that moment, accompanied by the sound of mechanical chains moving, the gate rose open.
The instant Patrick saw the party of the Goddess of the Currents, his heart nearly leaped into his throat.
Even among the crowd of mercenaries, some had recognized what was different about this party, and it shook them.
“A Bishop and this many priests!!”
Patrick muttered at the sight before him. It had gone far beyond anything he had imagined, and his scalp went numb.
Before he saw the gate come down, he had thought that the followers of the Goddess of the Currents arriving outside Snow Bear City would number perhaps around a dozen, each one a First-Tier Professional, using those elites to compete with mercenaries like them.
But the people who had come had far exceeded his expectations: one Second-Tier Bishop, nearly fifty priests, and more than twenty First-Tier warriors.
A bead of cold sweat rolled down his forehead, and his whole body trembled. He felt that these people from the Church of the Goddess of the Currents were not here to compete with them for that item. Rather, they were here to fight them.
He knew the combat strength of this force. At this point, it far exceeded the power of all the mercenaries combined. It could be said that the mercenaries had no chance at all.
And this party was certainly determined to get the item the lord of White Dragon Harbor had lost. There was no place for mercenaries like them to interfere anymore.
If Patrick had still held onto a shred of hope before, believing that he might somehow be able to get a share of those ten thousand gold coins, then now, he had completely given up that illusion.
Patrick swallowed and began thinking about the contract he had signed with that lord.
“According to the contract, the mercenaries must do their utmost to track down that item. After bringing the item back, the mercenaries will receive a gift of ten thousand gold coins from the other party, and the mercenaries are guaranteed to receive those ten thousand gold coins.”
“And even if the mercenaries fail to recover that item, they must still pay a fee of seven gold coins.”
“Any who violate the above terms shall incur the hatred of the spirits.”
What he had signed with the lord was a penalty contract. Once either party violated it, they would suffer the punishment set down in the contract.
The lord had deliberately drawn it up that way to ensure that his item would not be secretly kept by the mercenaries.
At the same time, however, the mercenaries did not entirely trust that the lord would truly hand over ten thousand gold coins.
With the contract there as a restraint, the lord’s promise naturally appeared much more credible.