Chapter 283: Husbands Reunited

The sea journey did not encounter too many difficulties. Except for encountering a small storm and three pirate fleets having eyes but being blind, aerial magical beasts and marine magical beasts did not dare to approach the boats.

The journey of more than half a month was shortened to ten days.

The first thing the Lyra Maritime Fleet did upon going ashore was to drag the entire pirate nest to the Guild to claim the reward, then leisurely consider finding a place to eat a hot meal.

Two hundred and seventy-one pirates were tied up, herded into three neat rows in the middle of the Ashmere port Guild’s courtyard. The on-duty clerk counted while recording; reaching the fortieth person his hands started to tremble, reaching the ninetieth person he put the pen down running to call the team leader, and by the time the counting finished, the team leader himself had to hurriedly run inside to invite the Guild Master out.

The Ashmere port Guild Master was a one-eyed old man, his white hair cropped short, his left arm amputated right up to the elbow. He leaned on a cane walking from the head of the row down to the end of the row, slowly examining every single face, finally stopping before a man having a scar running long from the corner of his eye down to his chin. The old man looked at him for a very long time, so long that the subordinates standing behind also started to anxiously exchange glances.

"Mud Snake Ackley." The old man finally uttered.

Mud Snake Ackley’s wanted poster had hung on the Guild’s wall for exactly eleven years, the paper yellowed, the four corners curled up, the reward stated eight hundred gold coins. In those eleven years, the Guild had dispatched four bounty hunter teams, and not a single one of them returned.

Adding all three pirate fleets together, the reward amount reached up to two thousand one hundred and forty gold coins. The Ashmere port Guild’s safe could not possibly dig up that much physical gold in one day; ultimately they had to pay half using the Merchant Guild’s promissory notes. Godfrey held the stack of promissory notes flipping through them once, seeing the seals and signatures were all valid he nodded in agreement, only requesting the Guild to step forward helping him exchange those promissory notes for horses and carriages.

The Guild Master happily accepted, but his eyes could not possibly leave the three rows of people kneeling in the middle of the courtyard. Only a while later did he speak up asking:

"Who caught them?"

Godfrey turned his head, jerking his chin towards the courtyard corner, where a few rope coils just unloaded from the boat were piled up. On the topmost rope coil, a small purple snake was lying coiled up sleeping soundly, only the tail protruding out, occasionally flicking once.

The Guild Master looked at the snake, then turned to look at Godfrey, then looked at the snake one more time.

"Are you kidding this old man?"

"I wouldn’t dare kid you." Godfrey answered nonchalantly: "Those three pirate fleets tailed us for exactly three days. By dawn on the fourth day, those fools disturbed His sleep."

He only spoke up to there and stopped, because even if he said more the old man would not believe it anyway. That dawn, the sun was still a dim haze, the sea was originally churning fiercely, however when the purple snake poked its head out of the cabin, the water surface immediately became as flat as a tabletop, and it remained flat like that for exactly half an hour.

Finishing that half hour, two hundred and seventy-one pirates were already lying stacked in layers on the decks of their own three boats, tied up using their own halyards, not missing a single soul and also not a single soul dead.

The reason they could survive until now was because before the Divine Envoy took action, Godfrey had blurted out that catching them alive would yield a higher reward.

...

Two days later, the Ashmere port horse market was swept completely clean without a single horse left. The price of a draft horse was inflated three times, the price of a four-wheeled carriage was inflated four times, however Godfrey still spent money buying them all clean, making those horse merchants in Ashmere have the most prosperous winter of their lives that year. By the morning of the fifteenth of November, the caravan left the port, slowly advancing towards the north.

Traveling by land route for three days, Sane could not hold it in anymore.

That day the caravan had just stopped by a stream for the horses to drink water, he immediately transformed into human form, calling Godfrey to the front of him.

"I must go one step ahead." He said: "From here to Lyra, the entire caravan is handed over to you."

Godfrey was startled, hurriedly clasping his hands: "Lord, if something happens along the way, what should this subordinate do?"

Sane thought for a moment then instructed: "First, from now on absolutely no more robbing, whatever is needed just spend money to buy, even if people shout high prices just buy it, anyway in your hands you are holding enough gold to buy an entire small city. Second, if anyone blocks the road just show them the Maritime Guild’s certificate to see, and if they still make things difficult then it is better to take a detour rather than cause trouble. Third, and this is the most important thing, every morning and every evening you must count enough heads, you must not let even a single person go missing."

Godfrey hesitantly asked further: "Then if someone strikes first?"

"Then beat the mother out of them, you even have to ask that?" Sane said grumpily. He truly missed his subordinates in Crimson, those guys did not need him to say much to understand what they needed to do themselves. As for this group, the humans had too many cumbersome etiquettes, the non-humans were as timid as crabs, completely untrainable.

Seeing the Lord Divine Envoy get angry, Godfrey immediately shrank his neck, automatically stepping aside to dodge.

The Fox clan kid shrinking behind the White Tiger clan Beastman guy’s legs heard that and timidly stepped out, grabbing his coat lapel: "Lord... are you not going with us anymore?"

Sane looked down at the girl. On her neck there was still a circular scar, the trace of the iron collar she had to wear since she was three years old.

"I am going to find someone." He rubbed her head, his voice softening significantly: "Over ten days later when you guys arrive at Lyra’s city gate, someone will come out there to open the gate welcoming you guys."

"Who is that person?"

"It is my mate."

Those three words he had kept hidden in his heart for half a year. Today saying it out loud in front of other people, his throat choked up again, having to clear his throat several times to stop.

Finishing speaking, his figure shot up into the sky. That figure kept growing larger, growing larger, until it covered an entire cloud patch, then the wind also rose along. Four thousand people standing on the ground looked up following that dark purple long body wrapped entirely in lightning, following it forever until it was only a faint thin streak at the northern horizon.

Half a month by land route, he intended to fly it all within one day and one night.

That morning in Lyra, the sky was very clear.

Kaelen woke up when the sky was not yet bright, went up to the City Hall’s bell tower like every day, rolled up his sleeves then sequentially transmitted mental power and Magical Energy into the Star Steel bracelet. The blue light ring ran around his wrist one lap, then two laps, then three laps, then gradually dimmed and went out completely, leaving the cold bracelet like every morning for the past two months.

He disappointedly rolled down his sleeves covering the bracelet, went down the stairs to wash his face, wore the golden mask on then started a working day as usual.

This morning the City Hall discussed three important matters. One was the price of winter wheat; two was the second brick kiln in the southern area; three was forty-two naturalization application forms of the weavers who had just fled Fairden running over.

Brian hugged the ledger standing beside presenting, his mouth speaking his hands calculating, three numbers at the same time without missing a single unit. Elric sat opposite reporting troop numbers and expenses for the new recruitment batch. Cadfael stood at the end of the table, his two wolf ears drooping, presenting two brawl cases in the East market where in both cases, the troublemakers were humans, while the beaten side were all non-humans.

Ivy stood beside Kaelen, quietly arranging each application form for him.

Right when Kaelen was holding the pen approving the umpteenth application form, his left wrist suddenly burned hotly.

He looked down. The green silk sleeve layer puffed up slightly, and beneath that silk layer a light was shining out. Kaelen hurriedly rolled up his sleeve. The array lines on the Star Steel bracelet were all glowing brightly; the light ring ran completely one lap, then ran another lap, then the third, the fourth lap, yet still completely having no sign of dimming.

The pen in his hand dropped down, rolling across the ledger page, trailing a long ink streak.

From the bracelet echoed a wind sound. That wind sound was very loud, howling as if someone was pressing their ear against the mouth of a deep cave.

Then within that wind sound, someone spoke up.

[Hello. Hello?]

The entire room immediately fell dead silent. Brian dropped his entire abacus, while Elric reflexively sprang up, his hand already resting on the sword hilt.

[Baby, can you hear my voice?]

Kaelen opened his mouth, yet his throat could not possibly emit a single sound. He had to try a second time before finally managing to ask out loud:

"... Where are you?"

The other end fell silent for a beat. Then that voice rang out, sounding both like laughing and crying:

[Go out to the large square. Once out there, look up.]

Kaelen dropped both the pen and the ledger, spun around running straight outside.

He ran through the long corridor, ran past three rounds of guards who had not even had time to bow greeting, ran across the grass courtyard that he himself had forced people to pry all the jade up to plant. When he set foot on the stone steps before the large square, the sky suddenly went pitch-black.

Black clouds from the south rolled over, rolling so fast that the pigeon flock perching on the City Hall’s roof fearfully scattered. The alarm bell on the watchtower rang continuously; Cadfael ran while shouting ordering his people up the city wall, while on the market side someone had already screamed loudly that the ninth legion was marching over again, and that scream spread across all the streets as fast as fire catching straw.

A purple lightning streak tore across the sky, exploding with a sound making all the window frames in the city rattle violently.

Immediately after that, an immense pressure descended straight down.

All sixty thousand Lyra city citizens dropped to their knees at the same time. Horses lay flat on the road surface; some vegetable selling women fell face down amidst the cabbage piles while their hands still tightly gripped the vegetable bunches without having time to let go. Elric was originally a Holy-level Knight, yet he also had to lean his sword against the stone floor, his two arms trembling violently yet unable to stand up straight at all.

In the middle of an entire prostrated square, there was only one person still standing.

Kaelen stood straight in the middle of the square, looking up at the sky, his coat lapels fluttering in the wind.

A giant shadow slowly pierced through the cloud layer appearing. Its body was long like a snake, on its head having horns, behind its back was a large pair of wings, its entire body wrapped tightly in purple lightning streaks crackling back and forth endlessly. It gradually descended, and while descending its body also shrank, coiling one round, then two rounds, then three rounds, until touching the stone surface it had transformed into a purple-haired man, barefoot, his cloak shoulder torn losing a large piece.

The pressure dissipated in the blink of an eye. Across Lyra city immediately echoed the sound of people taking a very deep breath.

Sane stood exactly three footsteps away from Kaelen. He opened his mouth, and the first sentence he said after half a year of separation was actually:

"I am sorry, baby. I am late."

Kaelen stepped forward, swinging his arm punching straight into his chest very forcefully once, then a second one, then a third one. Sane did not dodge a single one at all. By the fourth one, his hand only tightly gripped his coat lapel rather than punching anymore.

"You bastard! I even thought you got a new mate forgetting me altogether already!"

"How could I bear to." Sane pulled him into his embrace, his arms tightening so much that both of their ribs cracked: "I cannot even love you enough, how could I bear to let go of your hand."

Kaelen buried his face in his shoulder crook. The golden mask got caught so it slipped off, falling onto the stone floor making a "clank" sound then rolling several rounds, stopping right under the feet of a bread selling girl. The girl bent down picking it up, hugging the mask tightly to her chest, completely not knowing what she should do with it.

On the square, sixty thousand people having just scrambled up all saw the true face of the Holy Son they had worshipped throughout the past few months. The pale green hair flowing down, on top of his head were two snow-white leopard ears dotted with a few black spots twitching slightly, while behind his back, a long tail protruded out from the coat lapel, wrapping tightly around that purple-haired man’s wrist.

However, not a single person shouted, also not a single person threw stones.

Cadfael was the first person to kneel down, one knee resting on the ground, his hand pressed against his chest. Behind him, the entire Squad Seven knelt along. Then came the Dwarf worker crowd at the forge, then came the three thousand people just dragged out from the sixteen cities, then came the old woman who years ago had her son’s leg broken by the slave owner.

Even the butcher at the East market, the person who once insisted that sooner or later the Holy Son would reveal his true face, ultimately also slowly knelt down following everyone.