Preparations on the Ocean

"Deep Sea Golden Dragon, what do you need this thing for?"

Iris looked at Fran with surprise, raising an eyebrow.

Fran smiled and said:

"I heard you encountered this kind of Magic Creature on the Ocean before, so I came to ask you about it."

"As for me wanting to find this thing, that's a personal matter for me; I want to do some research on it."

As she spoke, Fran glanced at Iris again, genuinely curious about this follower of the Goddess of Magic.

After all, after being pulled by Iris to praise the Goddess of Magic, she felt that, in the darkness, the Goddess of Magic seemed to truly exist.

Therefore, she really wanted to talk to Iris, who was practically the only believer in the Alliance, about the faith in the Goddess of Magic.

However, she was already the Proxy of the Lord of Radiance, and she felt that simply praising him and mentioning some prayers was already her limit. Who knew how the ' Goddess of Magic ' would respond if she actually acted as a believer?

Furthermore, it was during the period of the Territory Mage Working Group, and Iris was, after all, Special Adviser hired by other organizations. Her approach with the pretext of wanting to join the faith of the Goddess of Magic was rather inappropriate in the harsh political environment at that time.

Even if the defeat of the other working groups was already a foregone conclusion, basic rules still had to be followed. Otherwise, what if the other side accused you of colluding with Iris to sabotage the region?

"I can tell you, but I think you know that mages are used to giving payment when exchanging knowledge." Iris smiled and winked.

Fran glanced at Iris, then lowered her gaze, knowing that Iris wouldn't take her Gold Coin.

As for what reward Iris wants, it's not hard to guess; it's nothing more than something related to the faith in the Goddess of Magic.

"Could you perform a ritual with me in honor of the Goddess of Magic?" Iris asked directly.

Fran opened her mouth, but that was all she could say.

"That's possible, but if it involves a ritual I can't accept, I think I can pay the fee in Gold Coin."

"That's acceptable, but you should be aware that knowing about the rituals of the Goddess of Magic and the part about the Deep Sea Golden Dragon will cost at least a three-figure sum starting with 5."

Iris said with a slow smile, seemingly thinking that even if Fran was unwilling, she would still have to perform a ritual for the Goddess of Magic for her sake, for the sake of the more than five hundred Gold Coin.

Fran curled her lip, but did not object to the price Iris proposed. The information about the third-tier Magic Creature alone was worth five hundred Gold Coin.

This is, after all, a sighting report of a third-tier Magic Creature. Based on Iris's description, we can locate the location where this Deep Sea Golden Dragon appeared, and might even be able to formulate a specific plan based on it.

So the price is actually okay. It's not like Iris is ripping her off; it's a normal price. In fact, the Deep Sea Golden Dragon is a relatively rare Magic Creature, so the price should theoretically be at least one or two hundred higher.

"I can accept that too," Fran replied without hesitation.

Iris blinked and gave a "that's not necessarily true" smile; in her opinion, Fran was far too young.

Even though she knew that Fran was the researcher in the group with the best performance in the assessment and would probably receive a lot of rewards, five hundred Gold Coin were still too precious for such a young mage.

"Ahem, let me start by explaining why I went to the deep sea."

Iris paused slightly, then began to speak slowly.

"At that time, I received a Ocean exploration project. Apparently, a Third Order Mage wanted to go into the Ocean to investigate the specific state of a certain Magic Creature, not specifically to find the Deep Sea Golden Dragon."

"The Magic Creature in that deep-sea area are all of very high Order, and a Third Order Mage alone cannot handle them. So this Third Order Mage applied to the Alliance for a project to investigate."

"At that time, I was a Second Order Mage. Through my mentor's connections, I boarded this research ship. There were five Third Order Mage and five hired Third Order Professional on board."

"Following the pre-arranged route, we reached a place roughly known as the Bottomless Sea, where we could sense the movements of a Tier 3 battle in the distance."

"Then the leading monk became interested, so he called the ships over, and there they saw a Deep Sea Golden Dragon."

"Its scales are flat and long, covered with sharp spines and protrusions, neatly arranged on its curved body. It coils and circles in the air, accompanied by thunderous roars and crashing waves."

"Its opponent floated on the surface of the water, larger than our ship, charred black, with terrifying angular features, and two very thick limbs with sharp claws at their tips."

"Lightning strikes occasionally hit the black figure, but they did no harm to it at all; it simply remained there quietly."

"At that time, the mage corps hesitated because this was the deep sea, and if they wanted to hunt Magic Creature, they had to be careful of those Magic Creature that moved in packs."

"The Deep Sea Golden Dragon is one example; many people see several Deep Sea Golden Dragon when they see it."

"The mages who were fighting the Deep Sea Golden Dragon didn't recognize it. They made a record of the Magic Creature, but when they went back to check their encyclopedias later, they found that they had never seen such a species in the deep sea."

"So we just stood there and watched, but it seemed they sensed the aura of a group of third-tier beings, and the two third-tier Magic Creature immediately scattered, and the mages didn't chase after them."

"This is the location where I encountered the Deep Sea Golden Dragon. Just the information that the Bottomless Sea contains Deep Sea Golden Dragon should be worth five hundred Gold Coin, right?"

That's absolutely true. Many people know that the Deep Sea Golden Dragon, a third-tier Magic Creature, lives in the deep sea, but the deep sea is so vast, where can you find it?

This information is even hard to find within the Alliance, because such rare information is usually locked away by mages in their personal Notebook and doesn't appear in encyclopedias.

If it were a matter of exchanging 500 Gold Coin for this information, Fran would definitely be willing.

"Also, by the way, let me tell you something: that Magic Creature confronting the Deep Sea Golden Dragon, it wasn't actually Magic Creature?"

"?" Fran was a little curious. According to the definition of Magic Creature on the continent, they are generally creatures that have not formed large-scale intelligent clusters. This definition is actually quite broad.

Those powerful beings, who could become third-tier beings upon reaching adulthood, were all very intelligent, but they fell victim to this intelligent cluster, and their numbers were few; even a double-digit number was considered a lot.

The Deep Sea Golden Dragon race is considered large among Magic Creature, but according to the mages' rough estimates, the number of Deep Sea Golden Dragon will never exceed three digits at any given time.

Such a small number of intelligent beings, even if their Adult Form is at the third level, are not enough to be classified as intelligent beings.

So what was that charred black creature that Iris saw? It wasn't even Magic Creature.

Iris noticed Fran's curious gaze and, without keeping her in suspense any longer, said directly:

"It's actually very simple. It's a Demon, a third-tier Demon."

"Demon appeared in the deep sea?" Fran was somewhat incredulous. Although she could connect it to the charred skin and bizarre appearance, Demon?

"Why not? We mages can't go into the deep sea. Who knows what's inside? Who knows if there's another Abyss Mouth inside?"

"However, to this day, no complete habitat for Demon has formed on our continent. This is probably because even in places without intelligent races, those Magic Creature can still block the Abyss Mouth."

Fran raised an eyebrow, suddenly realizing that this seemed to be good news, because the Abyssal Overlord needed to hold a three-day ceremony at the border between the Abyss and the continent.

In this situation, the infamous Abyss Mouth on the mainland is practically unusable, as it's frequented by representatives of various factions. If you could blind all of them for three days, you could create a Continental Peace Prize.

If those Magic Creature ' habitats have places similar to the Abyss Mouth, they wouldn't be as large as the Abyss Mouth, because if they were that large, the Alliance would probably have discovered their exact location long ago.

Fran might be able to use this place to advance to the Fourth Order, but that requires careful consideration, as she doesn't yet know what the price will be.

That's all I can say, now...

Iris turned her gaze to Fran and said, word by word:

"Isn't it time to pay out the rewards?"

Fran raised an eyebrow and answered.

"Then just tell me what you want to do."

Iris led Fran back to the Divine Statue in the square and slowly explained:

"It's actually very simple. You just need to stand here, and I'll hang something on you."

"It's that simple?"

"It's that simple. It's just a simple initiation ceremony, presided over by a follower of the Goddess of Magic to a mage."

"That's exactly what my mentor did to me back then, but I didn't have the chance. Now I want to give it a try."

Fran blinked. If that was all, then there was no problem, and it was only five hundred Gold Coin.

She touched her waist, where she carried a whole gold bar. However, the Alliance's gold bars were clearly not enough for five hundred Gold Coin, so she would either have to go to the Spirit Realm or her residence to get more, which would be quite troublesome.

"Let me betray the Lord of Radiance one more time," Fran thought indifferently.

Iris moved quickly, holding a pre-prepared ornament, a diamond-shaped red object that felt like stone and was somewhat cold to the touch.

"Red Seal Stone." Fran recognized this stone material; it could be considered a kind of alchemical material. Using it for jewelry decoration shouldn't cause any problems.

Iris's process was also quick. She released her Mental Power, constructed several spell models, and then directly dispersed them with her Mental Power. These dispersed Mental Power particles materialized in the air, like blue cotton wool fluttering around, but they looked somewhat heavy and flew slowly.

Amidst these intermittent blue flakes, Iris murmured a few words that Fran couldn't hear before placing the ornament on Fran.

Fran then realized why she hadn't heard Iris's words clearly, because before she could put the ornament on her body, she felt dizzy and her vision went dark.

The feeling was familiar; it was the sensation of activating the Star Gazing Art, but for some reason, it ultimately failed to activate.

Fran seemed to jolt awake. Her vision hadn't completely gone black; she could see Iris putting the ornament on her, but she couldn't react.

"Oh, what's wrong?"

Although Fran didn't collapse immediately, Iris was somewhat worried when Fran seemed to suddenly pause and then her expression turned serious.

Fran forced a smile and replied.

"There is nothing."

Then she turned her gaze to the Divine Statue of the Goddess of Magic, but this time it was different from when she recited the prayer last time.

Just like last time, she sensed that it was directed towards an entity of a ' Goddess of Magic '.

The difference is that this feeling has now greatly diminished to the point of being negligible, and it's hard to explain why it has changed so much in just over a month.

Her face grew increasingly serious as a sudden yet logical thought popped into her head.

"This is due to the actions of the Gods on Number Three Floating City."