Lin Li and the representatives of the various forces of the Breezy Plains might have their own forces in the Breezy Plains, but they were seen as a team of envoys of the Breezy Plains by the people of the Gilded Kingdom. Hence, the king of the Gilded Kingdom did not only receive Lin Li, but all the representatives of the forces of the Breezy Plains too. Of course, he mostly paid attention to Lin Li. After all, everyone knew how prestigious the Tower of Dusk was in the Breezy Plains.
Lin Li didn’t put on airs or act pretentiously, either. After sending someone to inform the others from the Breezy Plains, he made some preparations, and brought everyone to a carriage to head to the palace.
At the dock of Helena Port, the Gilded Kingdom held a welcoming ceremony, which was extremely grand as well.
In front of the main gate of the king’s palace, there was a red carpet laid on the ground that led all the way to the inside of the palace. The royal orchestra on both sides was playing melodious music, while some important ministers of the Gilded Kingdom, including some royal family members, were waiting for the arrival of Lin Li and the other envoys of the Breezy Plains.
The carriage stopped in front of the red carpet, and Lin Li led all the people of the Breezy Plains to alight from the carriage one by one. With the guidance of Forcus and the Foreign Affairs Minister Jorbus, they walked down the red carpet, all the way to the main gate of the palace. Forcus then began introducing Lin Li and the others to the members of the Gilded Kingdom who had come to greet them, including the chancellor of the kingdom, the various ministers, army commander-in-chief, and some princes.
However, the princes and ministers all had interesting expressions on their faces as they didn’t expect the distinguished guest the king wanted them to receive to be such a young mage. Fortunately, they could still get their priorities right, and no one stood out at this time to create trouble.
After meeting the people one by one, a palace guard came out from the royal palace, and read out loud, “His Majesty would like to see the envoys of the Breezy Plains.”
Next, Forcus led Lin Li and the others along the red carpet, while the princes and ministers who greeted them previously also followed behind the people of the Breezy Plains. Soon, Lin Li and the others arrived at the palace where the king of the Gilded Kingdom received the foreign envoys.
On the other hand, King Bradlor got up and stepped down from his throne when he saw Lin Li and the others enter. In everyone’s memory, the king would only ever get up to personally welcome the esteemed elders of the Illuminati.
In fact, not to mention the princes and ministers of the Gilded Kingdom, even the expressions of people of the Breezy Plains—except for Lin Li—changed slightly. After all, they were just representatives of the local forces of the Breezy Plains. Although they usually disregarded the royals of the various kingdoms, they couldn’t help but feel flattered at this moment.
Of course, the people of the Breezy Plains could tell that the Gilded Kingdom should probably be inclined to resorting to milder methods, which was also in line with the interests of the people of the Breezy Plains whose main purpose this time was to maintain peace with the Gilded Kingdom.
However, that was nothing to Lin Li, because Bradlor was just a king of a human kingdom. No matter how grand the ceremony might be, it wasn’t enough to make a Sanctuary powerhouse feel anything.
Next, they engaged in some diplomatic conversations which were none other than just some friendly words and declarations of their interests in cooperation and common development. It was basically impossible to talk about anything too practical during such occasions.
After the personal reception of King Bradlor, the guests attended a grand welcome party that was prepared by the Gilded Kingdom. However, King Bradlor only made a brief appearance before leaving. The ones left behind were the princes and ministers of the Gilded Kingdom and the representatives of the forces of the Breezy Plains, who took the opportunity to discuss the cooperation. All of them had made considerable gains.
Despite being the star of the banquet, Lin Li did not stay for long. As soon as King Bradlor left, he also bid farewell to Forcus and others who had accompanied him. He left the banquet hall.
Although Lin Li seemed unapproachable, Forcus was secretly relieved after Lin Li left. To him, the greatest mission was to prevent the people on his side from provoking those of the Breezy Plains as much as possible. He wished he could just lock them up in a tiny black room, and make sure that they never come into contact with anyone of the nation.
After meeting the king, the representatives of the various forces of the Breezy Plains immediately got busy, and started negotiating with the Gilded Kingdom about the cooperation in various fields. At the same time, they were also waiting for the founding celebration to begin as well as the opening of the sea market that would happen only once in a decade.
Lin Li was relatively free the past few days, and apart from talking to Englos and the others about pharmaceutics, he spent most of his time taking a tour around the capital of the Gilded Kingdom. Being on tenterhooks, he kept his guard up against the famous scions of the various kingdoms[1].
Fortunately, Forcus had also notified the princes and ministers in advance to take their children in hand. Otherwise, if they got into trouble, they would face more than just some scolding. Forcus had a high status in the Gilded Kingdom, and the king had also issued an order, so those princes and ministers naturally did not dare to defy the orders. Hence, in the past few days, Forcus did not encounter much trouble even though he accompanied Lin Li to many places.
Forcus accompanied Lin Li to a lot of places, and when he watched Lin Li step through the gate, he finally felt like a stone was lifted off his chest. However, just as he was rejoicing in his heart that they were going to be safe today, he saw a man dressed in the costume of *The Star’*s crewman rushing in from afar.
“Wait a minute, you’re a sailor from The Star, aren’t you? Why are you so flustered? Did something happen?” Forcus’ heart tensed up again, and he hurriedly stepped forward to stop the sailor.
When Forcus had received Lin Li previously, he had boarded The Star, so the sailor remembered him. Hence, he stopped with a frown, and said, “Lord Forcus, don’t you know that your subordinates have broken into The Star and seized all the people on board? Please move out of the way, I have to report to the captain of the ship immediately.”
Boom! Forcus was instantly dumbfounded, as if a heavy hammer had hit his head hard. He was racking his brain for fear that someone might end up causing trouble. After so much deliberation, he didn’t expect something to happen at The Star.
It turned out that two days ago, the sailors were repairing the damages of The Star when she was docked at Helena Port. All of a sudden, a few alchemical battleships belonging to the Fifth Fleet of the Gilded Kingdom broke into the port and surrounded The Star before aiming their cannons at The Star.
Before the sailors on board The Star could react, Delano led a group of elite warriors and boarded The Star aggressively. This time, on top of the elite warriors, Delano also brought more than a dozen level-20 Legendary-mages and Sword Sages.
There were only a few sailors left on The Star, and although they were not weak, they were at most only at about level-15. Besides, the sailors were very familiar with ships only, and even if their strength was on par, they probably wouldn’t be able to compete with the well-trained soldiers.
At this moment, Julio and his brother Jack were in charge of The Star. Due to their rich sailing experience, Julio was temporarily appointed by Lin Li as The Star‘s first officer, while Jack was his assistant.
Upon sight of Delano charging onto the ship aggressively with his army, Julio had initially thought that trouble had struck, and it was obviously too late for him to hide. However, after waiting for a moment, he discovered that none of the people on Delano’s side had even noticed him. Only then did he remember that he had shaved off his thick black beard long before entering the waters of the Gilded Kingdom.
When Julio was a pirate, one of his most prominent features was his thick black beard, which was the reason for his nickname, Black-beard. Now that he had shaved his beard clean, there was a drastic change in his image, and no one would think of the famous pirate Black-beard when they saw him.
Seeing that no one on Delano’s side recognized him, Julio was slightly relieved, but he also thought about the fact that since they were not there to nab him, they were obviously there to create trouble.
At this moment, Julio, the first officer of The Star and the main person in charge of all the ship for the time being, immediately had a change in expression, and he relaxedly greeted, “Hey, it’s you, Lord Delano. Is barging onto our ship how you treat your guests?”
Although Delano was the commander of the Fifth Fleet, he didn’t care much about the fleet’s affairs. Besides, Julio had had a huge change in image after shaving his beard. Hence, he simply did not recognize that the man in front of him was the pirate who was a fugitive wanted by the Gilded Kingdom.
Hearing Julio’s question, Delano raised his chin and humphed contemptuously without paying attention to Julio at all. However, the eagle-eyed adjutant who stood next to him loudly said, “We have received information that The Star is sheltering the most wanted criminal of our nation. We have to search The Star now, and anyone who tries to stop will be considered an accomplice.”
“Wanted criminal? What a joke. After we entered the port, no outsider has ever stepped on The Star. You’re just using a random excuse to check. This is utter nonsense.” Hearing the adjutant’s words, Julio couldn’t help but frown. It wasn’t that he was worried about the ship being searched. Anyway, he was the fugitive that they were looking for, but none of them recognized him.
However, Julio knew too well that if he let them search The Star, they’d definitely create a huge mess, and perhaps even cause some damage to The Star. That would be really troublesome. Besides, The Star was not just a ship, but also represented the Tower of Dusk. Wouldn’t the Tower of Dusk be insulted if they were allowed to search however they wanted?
“There is because I said so. Do I still have to explain this to you!?” Delano sneered and waved his hand. “Someone, search them. Don’t miss anything!”
“Wait, Delano, The Star belongs to the Tower of Dusk, and according to diplomatic regulations, every inch of space on The Star is the territory of the Tower of Dusk. You are now trespassing, and that’s tantamount to invading the Tower of Dusk. Are you looking to start a war!?” Although Julio was a pirate, he was definitely not an ignorant boor, since he could dominate the Endless Ocean for so many years. He could argue well too.
Julio’s words might be effective on ordinary people, but Delano was the son of the high priest of the Gilded Kingdom, and all laws and regulations were invalid to him.
“Start searching. Anyone who dares to stop us will be considered accomplices and get arrested!” Delano didn’t care about the law at all. Most importantly, he just wanted to vent his frustration. Besides, he also knew that there was almost not a single Legendary powerhouse on The Star; hence, the crew couldn’t resist him.
Seeing this situation, Julio did not let the sailors get into a conflict with Delano and the others, because he knew that they couldn’t stop Delano. Hence, Julio could only let the sailors stop resisting. They weren’t afraid of dying, but they just wanted to avoid unnecessary casualties, and not give Delano and the others any more excuses.
However, when Delano and his men were arrogantly trying to search The Star, Julio had also secretly activated the internal defenses of The Star so as to prevent the core from being damaged. After being sealed by the internal defense mechanisms, some important compartments were well protected, and even the most senior shipbuilder might not be able to see it. Hence, the losses could at least be minimized.
Initially, Julio thought that Delano was simply there to mess things up. After all, the Gilded Kingdom had already held such a grand welcome ceremony, and they clearly valued the envoys from the Breezy Plains. Therefore, in his opinion, even if Delano was unreasonable, he would at most just create some trouble to irk him, and not blow things out of proportion.
However, the truth proved that Julio had still underestimated Delano’s audacity after all. After the search, Delano’s subordinates actually really brought a person out of the cabin—someone whom Julio and the others did not recognize. They claimed that the person was the most wanted criminal of the Gilded Kingdom.
[1] This sentence is probably about Forcus considering the next paragraph, and probably refers to scions of the Gilded Kingdom only.
