Chapter 739: Accidentally In Love
Moments ago, while Zhen Liu and Jinju Ren were in Library of Nowhere.
…
“Hey…do those guys look familiar or am I going insane?”
“Uh…maybe? I mean…they don’t look threatening…weird maybe, but that’s about it.”
“Hmmm.”
[Think those two guys are gonna try and check us?,] Su Bing(Spring Brawler) asked.
[Doubtful,] Nefera(Nepherage) answered. [They don’t see us as a threat for some reason.]
[Maybe it’s because we are sexy as fuck?,] Hurricroak proposed, causing several of the other kaijin to roll their eyes in disbelief.
Due to it being their free time once more, the kaijin opt to do a game of chicken again despite how “well”, the last game turned out.
However, unlike last time where they pretended to be crewmen fishing, they decided to don their human disguises, with fake names added, and see how long it would take the Zhen Clan to ring an alarm or check to see who they were.
Surprisingly though, there weren’t many takers for a very strange reason.
“To be fair, even if they do look weird, it’s probably like the time the Seventh Elder brought back that anima wielder and that alchemist. Or, most recently, that former slave girl the Fifth Young Master.”
“We do seem to pick up a lot of…what’s the term here…vagabonds? Strays?”
“Meh, who cares.”
[I’m not sure how to feel about that assessment…oh by the realms of Chaos, is this how the ringmaster feels?]
[Probably.]
[Most likely.]
[Duh…]
[Hey! Eyes forward.]
[Bah, it’s fine.]
The group of disguised kaijin had managed to get through at least half of their plan run around the Zhen Clan flotilla, with nothing more than a quick glance in their direction. In all honesty, it was a little disappointing to them.
They honestly couldn’t tell if this lack of interest in their group was due to external circumstances, a lack of discipline from the Zhen Clan or the fact that they were just that good when it came to their disguises.
[Seriously, you’d think by now they’d at least pull my ass over for an interrogation,] Nefera commented to the group as they continued walking. [Well, me or Frosttusk, at least.]
[Por que?,]Harriet (Hurricroak) asked.
[Because out of the five of us present, Frosttusk and I are the most intimidating looking of the lot. He’s a six foot something viking and I look like what our lord would refer to as a “biker chick”. That or a “sukeban”.]
[Agreed…,] Frederick(Frosttusk) nodded. [Two…of…us…are…indeed… intimidating.]
[Wait, what about the rest of us?,] Harriet protested. [I know I ain’t intimidating looking but I am downright adorable and sexy. If anything, attractiveness is more suspicious on a setting like this than rough and tumble types like you two.]
[Preach,] Raquel(Razorstella] approved with a small snap of her fingers. She would’ve clicked her knife claws in approval, but she was “human” right now and wasn’t able to do that in the moment.
[Beauty is its own form of intimidation, because humans are more afraid of things they consider untouchable than they are of unpunchable.]
[Uh…where do I fall under this debate of toughnesss vs beauty debate?,] Su Bing asked.
[Well…you currently have the physique of a boxer while having a surprisingly strong case of baby face…I think you fall under neither.]
[Ah…okay…wait a minute do y’all hear that?]
[Hear…oh, that’s not a good sound.]
[I’m fairly certain our lord would tell us to go and check on that, so let’s go.]
[Aye.]
…
“I’m telling you, I saw something poke out of the water that was significantly bigger than a frog.”
“I…sincerely doubt that, Xiao Tai.”
“You sure it’s not something in this pipe?”
“Yes, I’m sure…probably.”
In a corner of the flotilla, away from most of the perimeter guards and elders, Zhen Tai, Zhen Guo and Zhen Feng were passing the time in a mildly clandestine manner. Without sharing too many details, Zhen Feng had acquired some alchemical compound that, when ignited and the fumes inhaled, made the person who smelled it feel incredibly relaxed in small doses while having powerful visions at high doses.
This compound wasn’t useful for most aether cultivators, but it was a damn good way to pass the time when there was nothing better to do.
Zhen Feng had been the initiator of this “good time”, with Zhen Guo and Zhen Tai joining him shortly after. The former turned out to be surprisingly hardy when it came to this stuff, while the latter two, especially Zhen Tai,were light weights. Which is why Zhen Guo and Zhen Feng had a hard time believing their violence proned snake cousin was telling the truth when he said they had saw something in the water.
“I’m telling you man, there is something long and slithery in the water. Like a…River Serpent or some kind of tentacle,” Zhen Tai reiterated while pointing at a random spot in the water. “I think it’s probing us to find a weak point and then it’s gonna try and drag one of us underwater to drown.”
“Bro, there’s absolutely no way, something would be dumb enough to attack us while we floating in a big whole group like this,” Zhen Feng countered. “We got two Aether Lords, a whole bunch of Aether Grandmasters and even more Aether Masters. Whatever creature of these shallow depths would be absolutely insane to try and-”
*SPLOOSH!”
“OH SHIT!”
“HE WASN’T LYING!”
“FUCKING TOLD YOU-BAH!”
As if the universe decided to punish them for their hubris, a surprisingly large tentacle shot out of the water and immediately grabbed Zhen Tai by the ankles and tripped the man up moments before dragging him into the water
Both Zhen Guo and Zhen Feng tried to stop the tentacle from drowning their cousin, but both were rather mentally and physically impaired in their reaction times. Before they could have even levy an attack and cut their cousin free, it was too late.
“Ah shit!”
“No!”
“GODSDAMM-SPLASH!”
Zhen Tai disappeared under the water before either of them could do anything to stop it.
“Ah fuck, what do we do, what do we do, what do we do?”
“Well, neither of us can go after him because we are too high to be competent fighters right now, so we gotta go and get help! You go that way, I’ll go this way and-”
“Out of the way, you stoned morons!”
*Splash!*
“Huh?”
Before either of them could come up with a solid plan, a blonde woman with sharp features suddenly rushed pass the two of them and dove straight into the water, cutting through the surface like a hot knife through butter.
Needless to say, the two of them were absolutely flabbergasted at this turn of events and had no idea how to process any of what had just occurred.
Granted, they had enough mentally faculty to ask each other a single question, technically two.
“Who the hell was that girl and where did she come from?”
…
‘OH SHIT, OH SHIT, OH SHIT, OH SHIT! I AM SERIOSULY SCREWED!,’ Zhen Tai thought to himself as he tried to break from the tentacles currently trying to drown his ass.
The creature that had grabbed him was something that was charmingly referred to as a “River Drowner”, a 3rd tier aether beast that looked like the cross between an octopus and a limpet, with diamond crushing teeth to match.
Despite being ranked as strong as an Aether Grandmaster though, River Drowners were notoriously lazy and their tentacles could easily be cut through via an empowered slash from an Acolyte. In essence, Zhen Tai and his cousins should’ve been easily able to prevent such an attack from occurring, but alas, they were too stoned out of their gourds to actually be competent in the moment.
Thankfully, Zhen Tai managed to have enough of his wits to at least strengthen his lungs and take in a big gulp of air before going under. Unfortunately, it wasn’t going to last long enough.
The tentacle constricting Zhen Tai was slowly retracting into the River Drowner ‘s mouth, giving Zhen Tai a full view of the deadly row of teeth that could crush his skull as easily as a watermelon.
‘Oh, I am so-huh?’
Just as Zhen Tai was about to accept his mortal fate, a sudden fluctuation in both the water and aether grabbed his attention, causing him to turn his head to the side. If he could breathe in this moment, it would’ve been taken in that exact instance.
‘Whoa…’
A sharp featured beauty with dazzling blonde hair and movements as elegant as a mermaid had suddenly appeared to his right and swam towards the River Drowner.
Zhen Tai had no idea why she was doing this until it happened.
The sharp featured beauty had used some unknown aether art to create a blade of energy that not only sliced through the tentacle that was holding Zhen Tai in placed, but also the River Drowner itself.
‘Whoa…’
Needless to say, there was more than the Drowner’s life being stolen in this moment.
CREATORS’ THOUGHTS
Mizako
Reminder: If you see WIP as the title, the chapter isn’t finished yet, but it will be shortly after midnight.
Unless y’all want to see it evolve before your eyes, wait until that title changes.
