Wandering Storm

In the next morning, the man woke up and went outside for breakfast instead of ordering one from the hotel he was in. He was still wearing the old brown robe for some unclear reasons. After all, such fashion style is very common in this city.

He chose a random restaurant, which looked a bit extravagant. Despite his clothes which might seem low-class for such a place, the waiter still greeted him formally and led him to a vacant table.

Unsurprisingly, the food here was the same as in most human worlds. The man chose to try rib-eye steak with green-pepper sauce, together with some tomato slices and a small bowl of salad. All of these costed him 1 gold coin.

“Hmmm, the steak tasted good actually, but nothing notable, it’s like any other places.” He commented.

After finishing the meal and paying the price, he took a stroll to learn a bit more about the city, also to kill his time until the schedule of the recruitment.

Dong!

The time of recruitment was here, and the man got to the place just in time. And again, people were lining up in front of the gate.

“People here always line up for everything huh? Well, that is to be expected from the City of War…”

There were all kinds of people, strong bulky men with imitating sharp weapons, slim assassins being edgy and cold, mages who were wearing robes of various colors discussing about magic and scholarly stuff, etc,… They formed a line in front of a gray tower which connected to 2 yards. The man was just waiting for his turn leisurely, looked at the sky or at the people around.

Finally, it was his turn. He was led into a yard, in which several guards were stationed, and a man sitting on a table scribbling papers. The brown robed walked towards the table and sat down, faced with the scribbling man, who has weirdly shiny blond hair.

“Name and affiliation?”

“My name is Damian, I’m a lone mage.” He replied curtly.

The blond man didn’t say anything else or even lifted his head up and told a guide to lead Damian towards the door on far right behind him. Damian was puzzled as how simple the recruitment procedure was, thinking that they might just be recruiting disposables, not that this was the first time he saw this though.

In the room, he saw a woman, who was wearing a blue robe. She had brown long hair and a pair of glasses.

“Such a young man, and a brave and ambitious one at that… But you came here on your own accord, so be responsible for the future. Now show me what you can do.” The voice of the woman was neutral, yet a hint of alluring could be felt.

‘Is it because of my brown robe?’ Damian wondered.

He started displaying his magic. First he conjured a fire ball about the size of his head, then twisted it into a diamond shaped one with pointy heads. There were training dummies on the other side of the room, Damian tried to hurl the spell towards a dummy’s head. The dummy flinched and the damaged spot was charred, but it soon recovered to the original state.

“That’s really good for an apprentice, now I know why you are so ambitious hehe. What else can you do?”

‘So the real apprentice level is supposed to be lower than that huh?’

Then Damian continued with the assessment. This time he conjured an icicle about 30cm long, then he broke it into smaller pieces which were only the size of a sewing nail. Again he launched the icicle barrage towards a dummy.

Most of the nails managed to shallowly pierced into the dummy, at most 5mm only. Then the nails melted and the dummy was back to normal.

“I’ve never seen such fine shaping and control of an apprentice before. Who is your teacher, I may know him or her.”

“My teacher was dead long ago, and he was kind of an eccentric secluding kind, so many would never heard of him. In fact, I didn’t even know his name.” Damian replied with a soft chuckle.

“I see, although there are a lot of elemental mages, less than half of them concentrate on practicing shaping and controlling the spell. The majority usually try to increase the spell’s damage or constantly find new, fancy spells. Alright, anything else or this is your end?”

‘Should I show her something fun or just some more elemental magic?’ He tried to decide.

After making the decision, he nodded at the woman and resumed his assessment. White blue electricity started to swirl around his hands, which grew more and more intense.

“This…” the blue robe woman muttered.

Having reached the desired intensity, Damian shot the electric ray at the forehead of the dummy. Just like when the fireball hit, the dummy flinched backwards and a deeper charred spot on its forehead could be seen.

“That’s all the 3 elements that I can control, Ma’am.” Damian spoke before her.

“I see, you… No, your assessment is done here, you may return to the hall and wait to the confirmation.”

“Thank you.” Damian bowed and walked out of the room.

“Looks like we’ve found another useful pawn…” The woman smiled while looking at Damian’s back through the window.

At the waiting hall, Damian sat on the row just like any other. Some glanced at him because of his carefree demeanor, but he didn’t care about them at all and just patiently waited for the results.

About an hour later, a young man in armor came to the hall, holding a piece of paper. He announced out loud the candidates who had successfully recruited. Damian’s name was obviously on the list.

“Cool, I’m in.” He chuckled.

The recruited stood up and followed the young man upstairs. They were led into a spacious room, in which sat 4 figures, 3 of whom were the ones who assessed the candidates, and the 4th one was a middle-aged man in noble attire.

“Congratulations on being formally recruited into the defense force. Or should I say the raid team…” The noble man stood up and said solemnly.

“Raid… what?” A bulky man with a war axe was puzzled.

“Yes, we are going to launch a raid, but also a defense campaign. As the City of War, Derenal was chosen by the Emperor to be the base of the raid, since the target is on its way towards this very place, and the city will also act as a fort in case the raid runs into troubles.”

Soft mutters could be heard in the room, clearly everyone was surprised and puzzled by such a news.

“Sir, may I ask who or what is the target?”

“An Unholy Beast.” the noble man replied curtly.

“AN UNHOLY BEAST???!!” the bulky man blurted out loud, so loud that the others had to cover their ears before expressing the same confusion.

“Yes, you didn’t heard it wrong, our target is one of the five unholy beasts. Zergish, the Wandering Storm. That is the disaster that we have to stop no matter what.”

Fear seeped into the recruited, even the bulky shivered. Except for Damian, who was trying his best to act scared like others, and a female assassin whose face was fully covered. All of them, including Damian, had the same question in their minds

‘How the hell are they going to fight against an Unholy Beast??’

The noble man signed and said again

“I can see clearly what you are thinking. Of course we are not that stupid to recruit a bunch of outsiders for the raid. Accompany you will be the mages from the capital, the paladins and priests from the churches, and many other knights of royalty. Moreover, countless powerful weapons have been brought and built to server their purpose. And lastly, His Excellency, Sir Hidain will join the battle himself.”

“Sir Hidain?! He too will join the raid??” The young orange robe mage standing next to Damian blurted out before the bulky guy this time.

Although he could just dump the info of Zergish and Hidain into his mind. Damian still decided to ask out of curiosity anyway.

“Excuse me, sir. May I ask what Zergish is and who is Sir Hidain. My apologies, I’m from a distant land which barely have connections with the world.” He said in a monotonous tone.

“Wha… Fine, I guess we can spend some time to inform this young man here.”

‘Huh? He’s quite polite, no? In other cases, they would have called me “country bumpkin”.’

“Zergish is one of the 5 unholy beasts, along with Luma the Deep-sea Terror, Ihn the Endless Labyrinth, Laquan and Ouco and Parents and finally Ao the Undying Death. These infamous legendary monsters had been around since ancient times, except for Ao who had only appeared less than a century ago. They boast enormous power and reign as the absolute forces of nature. One can call them walking disasters.” The noble man informed Damian in a neutral tone.

“I see…” Damian muttered and nodded.

The other recruited looked at him in disbelief, wondering which hole did this young man just crawl out. But seeing that the noble man didn’t do anything rude to him, they too didn’t dare.

The noble man continued “His Excellency Sir Hidain is the current leader of the paladins. He can be called as the pinnacle of virtue and chivalry. Although he has lived for centuries, his formidable martial arts and divine power is still on top of the church, his divine power is only behind the 5 grand cardinals and the pope. He gained his fame and title in the battle of Blanc, in which he himself had slain Yzra the Archlich who ruled over the death zone for more than 200 years.”

“I see, thank you for your patience, sir.” Damian bowed and replied sincerely.

“Alright, anything else that you want to ask?”

The orange robe mage raised his hand “Sir, may we know when the raid commences?”

“About 3 months from now.”

“Only 3 months??! How can we have enough time to prepare??”

“Haaa…” the noble man sighed again “You are recruited at the final stage of the preparation. The diviners had foretold the awakening of Zergish long ago. So rest assure and prepare to your limit. If there’s nothing else to ask, you may leave. Remember, we have a meeting tomorrow morning, whoever absent will be marked as deserted. So this is your last chance to withheld.”

None of the recruited left the hall immediately, showing that they had already chosen this path firmly.

“Good, then leave now.” The noble man shoo-ed them away with his flicking hand.

All of them bowed and bade farewell, then left the tower.

Damian returned to his accommodation, set the alarm for tomorrow morning and went to bed.

“A raid of such a figure already, huh? My arrival in this world has really good timing, hehe.”