Chapter 262: 38. Annihilation Prototype
“Why are you hiding so well? The Phoenix Knights are only interested in Captain Alagina, so you don’t need to worry about being targeted… oh, provided that Helena doesn’t know you’re Alagina’s man. If she finds out, she probably wouldn’t mind sampling the taste of her brother-in-law, in a rather lethal way.”
On the street, Blair glanced at Fischer beside him and said this.
But the main character did not respond; instead, it was the book on his shoulder that kept blinking at him.
“Don’t mind him, he’s worried about another debt of affection, the kind that’s a thousand times scarier than Alagina.”
“…”
After hearing this, both Blair and Alinur beside him couldn’t help but take another look at Fischer, now cloaked in Aoxi’s cape, their eyes revealing a hint of peculiarity.
Aoxi had directly left, so the close-fitting cloak she didn’t take along had to be kept by Fischer. To avoid exposing his identity as a wanted criminal in Nali, he also put the cloak on like Aoxi, raising the collar to cover his face.
The cloak seemed to be frequently washed by Aoxi, leaving no lingering scent, only a fresh wood fragrance. He wondered what Aoxi and her companions used to wash their clothes at sea.
After Aoxi left, Fischer didn’t continue to stay in the room with Blair and the others. Instead, he returned with them to their hidden base, the Cloudtop Café.
According to them, they had been lurking here for almost a month. They initially planned to intercept the goods from the intermediary before Nali arrived, but unexpectedly, the goods had just landed when the Nali Exploration Company showed up.
As they conversed, heading towards the Cloudtop Café, Alinur checked to see if anyone was watching them, but there seemed to be no discoveries.
As mentioned before, the Cloudtop Café was not far from the hotel Alagina had booked, about half a street away. Thus, this café was certainly not a place offering high-end services. Moreover, since they had only rented this room a month ago, the décor was even less commendable.
When Fischer reached the door, he saw the interior decorations were quite rudimentary, probably just a few tables and chairs paired with an ordering counter. It was even worse than the open-air café where he had had coffee with Raphael in Feilon City on the Southern Continent.
With such a shabby environment plus a subhuman-operated café, probably not many people would genuinely visit to drink coffee, so there weren’t many customers when Fischer arrived.
Nevertheless, as soon as he pushed the door open and entered, he immediately heard a sweet and warm welcome.
“Welcome to the Cloudtop Café! What may I get for you… hey, is that you?”
Yes, the one standing in front of Fischer was the cloud cat maid he had seen in the morning buying bread; she quickly recognized Fischer and alternated her gaze between him and Blair, who had just entered, holding his tail.
“Hey, aren’t you supposed to talk to Alagina? Why did you bring him back? Wait, what’s wrong with your tail?”
“Ahem, don’t mention my tail; there’s been a change. Alagina is not in the room, she’s out… damn it, who knows when she’ll be back? Her deputy has already gone to look for her, by the way, send the remaining surveillance machine over to Alagina too. You never know when Helena might come looking for Alagina, at that point, we will have to act.”
“Got it, I’m on it.”
Ailin turned around and left, and Alinur, whose clothes were in tatters thanks to Fischer, hurriedly ran upstairs to the café’s second floor. Blair then went behind the ordering counter, which displayed not a menu but a detailed map of Pat Sulshen Island.
Fischer leaned against one of the café’s tables, listening to their conversation, while he took out the Supplement Handbook for Sub-Humans from his pocket. As he sensed the presence of the cloud cat, a golden text gradually appeared on it.
[Cloud Cat Breed]
Since the opportunity was rare, he decided to bind this valuable research slot on the snow mountain kin first.
[Please select a research subject, available subjects 0/1]
[Alinur, adult female cloud cat]
[Ailin, adult female cloud cat]
[Beixi, adult female cloud cat]
Hmm?
There’s another cat here in the café?
Fischer glanced upstairs in the Cloudtop Café. The Supplement Handbook for Sub-Humans could only detect subhumans, disregarding male subhumans, so he couldn’t tell how many cloud cats were here.
Currently binding a cloud cat was primarily to fill out the sequence of the snow mountain kin; as for biological research, he could have chances to discuss further later. Even if they were unwilling, Fischer wouldn’t lose out, since he had Emhart, and he could still gain the 20% stage reward for social research.
With that in mind, Fischer casually selected Alinur as a cloud cat to bind. As the familiar pain surged through his body, several detailed tags suddenly appeared next to the cloud cat in the Supplement Handbook.
[Northern Region], [Beast Kin], [Cotton Candy], [Snow Mountain Kin]
[Cotton Candy: Their soft white fur is a gift from the heavens; just touching it can bring joy. Wait, I mean, what are you waiting for? Why not quickly go collect these adorable subhuman types?]
[Contained Species: Cloud Cat, Sheepkin, Moon Rabbit, Ice Owl]
Collecting…
What kind of weird raising game are you playing?
Seeing the strange new tags, Fischer slightly raised his eyebrows with stiffened movements. Although he knew the Supplement Handbook for Sub-Humans wasn’t serious, every additional piece of information it provided could once again lower his expectations about it.
But it seemed the newly added [Cotton Candy] tag contained very few subhumans, and all three were already existing species in the snow mountain kin. He wondered if he could collect them all and see what rewards the Supplement Handbook would offer.
As the pain in his body gradually faded, Fischer shifted his attention from the Supplement Handbook to Blair, who was studying the map, and spoke,
“The Nali Exploration Company employees have high ring counts and unidentified magic; do you have any cards up your sleeve to ensure you can take back the Crystal Ice from them?”
Blair looked up at him, hesitated for a second, then stepped out from behind the counter and said to him, “Follow me.”
Watching him sway with his half-bald tail as he headed upstairs, Fischer closed the Handbook and followed him.
The area of the second floor of the Cloudtop Café was not larger than the first floor. Typically, shops like this used the second floor for storage or as a storeroom, and this one was no exception. However, the stored items were not coffee beans from the Southern Continent or Shivali but various dangerous firearms and smart mechanical devices.
“The upper management sent us their most elite smart mechanical devices. As long as we have that, let alone high-ring magic, even a few more wouldn’t matter.”
Fischer did not refute Blair’s introduction, as no one understood the terror of the creations from the Handbook better than him. Previously, when battling Feilon, he had burned out the high-ring magic from his staff and still failed to defeat Feilon.
“Hey, bro.”
“Mm, Beixi, Herbo, how’s it going with the Exploration Company?”
Aside from Alinur and Ailin he had encountered earlier, there were two other cloud cats in the room on the second floor. They looked younger than Alinur and Ailin, one male and one female, neither wearing the work attire from Cloudtop Café but dressed in traditional Northern region clothing.
The Supplement Handbook for Sub-Humans only recognized the female cloud cat named Beixi; it did not prompt Fischer that there was a male cloud cat named Herbo here.
Wait, with Blair, Alinur, Ailin, and these two, this means a whole family of five cloud cats joined the Snow Cloud Special Forces for their mission here…
“The Exploration Company has already taken back the boxes containing the Crystal Ice to the hotel. The knights from the Sardinia Kingdom haven’t contacted them yet, so no one has gone out… just don’t know where the officials are hiding; the machinery hasn’t detected anything.”
As they spoke, the pupils of the two seemed to flicker with a series of glimmers, as if something far away was transmitting visuals back, but Fischer did not sense any magical fluctuations at all.
Is this what they referred to as the function of intelligent machinery?
Having heard their conversation, Blair nodded and turned his gaze to Fischer.
“You continue monitoring… come here, the things we’ve prepared are over here.”
Following Blair’s gaze, Fischer finally saw a strange mechanical object at the far end of the room.
It turned out to be a spherical object made entirely of steel. Its surface had several small gaps formed by various parts and screws, but overall it was polished quite smooth; one could even see reflections from the ceiling lights on it.
At this moment, it did not emit the light he had seen before; it seemed not to be fully activated yet.
It simply lay there in the corner of the room, like a harmless sports ball, quietly observing Fischer, who was looking at it.
Clearly, there were no eyes on that object, clearly it was just a lifeless piece of machinery, yet seeing it gave Fischer a strange feeling of being watched. This heightened his vigilance, making his fingers silently grip the handle of the Fluid Sword hidden in his sleeve.
But throughout the room, it seemed only Fischer sensed that odd feeling; neither Blair nor the other cloud cats reacted at all. Blair, fearing that Fischer might question the power of this object, explained to him,
“This is called the [Annihilation Prototype], reputed to be the most expensive intelligent mechanical device bought internally; it has helped us execute missions twice already, and each time it was a huge success… To put it simply, magic and firearms will barely scratch it. It has been tested internally; it can withstand up to seven rings of magic without injury, so you get the idea.”
“Counting the Annihilation Prototype, we have three combat-type intelligent devices, so of course, you don’t need to worry about combat. As soon as Helena makes a move and the Phoenix Knights’ attention is drawn away, we’ll immediately activate the prototype and clean out the Exploration Company people, bringing back the crystal ice.”
Fischer did not bat an eyelid, walking towards the window on the second floor and looking out at the bustling street. The view here was quite good, just at the intersection of two streets, allowing him to take in the situation on both streets simultaneously.
He observed the situations outside, constantly pondering the current state of affairs, then praised the intelligent machinery in a flat tone, asking,
“Yes, impressive. If that’s the case, why don’t you use it to charge straight into Nali and the Sardinia Kingdom’s trading site, kill them all, and bring back the items?”
“… This thing has limitations, do you think it can be used continuously? It can only be activated three times at most, and it only works for fifteen minutes each time; it shuts down once the time is up. I estimate that after this use, it will fall apart directly, and with only 15 minutes, even with the other two intelligent devices, it will hardly be enough for us to handle both parties at the same time.”
Blair went to a nearby wardrobe to put on a spare set of Northern clothing. Then he took a box of medium size from a nearby shelf to the Annihilation Prototype and awkwardly stuffed it inside. Afterward, he picked up a card-shaped item and handed it to Fischer.
“What’s this?”
“It’s an intelligent device to keep in touch with you. Don’t get me wrong; it’s not a gift for you. Once it’s over, remember to return it. Helena will definitely act against Alagina soon; we siblings need to prepare for the Nali people. We can contact each other with this item no matter which side resolves first; just push here, and there will be a display.”
Fischer took the metal card he had handed over. The card was very light, made quite thin, and it shimmered with a bit of flowing light. It seemed like all creations from the Supplement Handbook possessed this property; however, he was unsure where such a small card housed its core, resembling a heart.
To demonstrate, Blair pressed the card and then brought it close to his mouth, casually saying something. One of the intelligent machines in the corner of the room opened up, mimicking what he had just said. The display on Fischer’s card would also respond the same way.
Fischer nodded and pocketed the card. Blair and the others were planning to deal with the Nali people, which was something he couldn’t wish for more. He preferred not to show his face there, and if they could resolve the issues around the Iceberg Queen without him, all the better. Perhaps he could even obtain the Cangniao tribe’s marks from them.
“By the way…”
Just as Fischer was ready to leave the Cloudtop Café, he suddenly thought of something and turned back to remind Blair and the others.
“The precious ice you’re searching for might not be in the boxes brought back by the Nali Exploration Company. The cunning rabbit has three burrows; the most blatant one is often a decoy. Remember to look carefully.”
Blair was slightly taken aback after hearing this, exchanged glances with his sister, then said, “I understand. I’ll search carefully; let’s stay in touch.”
“Mm, goodbye.”
With that, Fischer, wearing Aoxi’s cloak, stepped out of the not-so-spacious Cloudtop Café, which fell quiet again, as if it had become just another inanimate mechanical part in the bustling street outside.
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(End of this chapter)
