Throne of Magical Arcana
chapter-177

On the other end of the aisle, the Kuo-toan murlocs were shouting and crying when they got in the cabin, and the water was still flooding in.

Lucien felt more difficulty to breathe when the air got very humid.

Some apprentices had already lost their footing. Now, they were sitting on the water-covered floor and crying, while others were shaking out of great fear. They were just like how Lucien felt when he first got into the sewers and faced the red-eyed mice. There was no way that they could stay calm.

There were so many plans flashing through Lucien’s mind. However, no matter how much Lucien wanted to both protect himself and the other apprentices and hide from the pastors and knights on the ship, obviously, it was not likely to happen at all.

At the fork of the aisle, the Kuo-toans divided themselves into two groups: most of them followed three bigger murlocs and ran toward the main cargo cabin, while the rest of them, also following a leader, were aiming at Lucien and the apprentices.

As they were dragging their tridents and quickly coming to Lucien and the teenagers, Lucien got many thoughts in his mind:

"It looks like their target is the cargo?

"Maybe there’s something that interests the Kuo-toans? That’s why they attacked the ship?

"If that’s their real purpose, most of the murlocs should be coming to this floor, or the captain’s cabin or the viscount’s…"

And then Lucien got more determined, "Then we still have hope!"

Lucien quickly turned around and ran into his own cabin. As he was running, Lucien bent his knees and jumped up high using the momentum, and his right fist fiercely punched through the wood ceiling.

"Bang!"

After the wooden planks fell on the floor, there was a big hole in the low ceiling.

"You all, climb up through the hole, and hide in the nearby sailor’s cabin!" said Lucien to the startled apprentices.

Although his tone was serious, Lucien was not panicking.

Since Tom dared let them live here, Lucien was pretty confident that the people who lived on the floor above should be people that Tom trusted, or the noise the apprentices made could easily expose them.

If the Kuo-toans’ purpose was not killing but robbing, hiding in the sailors’ cabins should be a good choice, and they could also hide from the pastors and knights.

Lucien quickly took out his Alert and rushed out of the cabin to stop the murlocs to earn time for the apprentices.

"Annick, Oimos… You two take charge. No panic." In the last second, Lucien decisively commanded the apprentices without looking back.

He had to kill the Kuo-toans, or they would follow the apprentices to the above floor.

"Yes, Mr. Evans…" said the two apprentices together. Although Oimos was quite frightened, he tried his best to function properly, while Annick, who had been trained by Lucien for a while, was encouraged by Lucien’s equanimity and started to think how they could get onto the floor above through the hole in the ceiling.

The two apprentices exchanged a look between each other and came up with the same strategy, "Using the hammocks… and Mage Hand. Also, spells improving agility and balance…"

Then Oimos and Annick hurriedly started to collect the hammocks, and Katrina, Sprint, Layria and Heidi were either helping them, or trying to comfort the other apprentices.

At this critical moment, the apprentices were united together under the leadership of Lucien.

Outside the cabin, when Lucien, who was holding his knight sword with his both hands, was almost right in front of the Kuo-toans, there were sudden green waves coming out of him.

The green waves quickly reached the Kuo-toans, and most of them slowed down their pace as soon as they were touched, lost their balance and fell asleep on the floor. Even the murloc leader was influenced: for a second, it felt very exhausted and sleepy.

However, the first circle spell, Sleep, was not powerful enough to get the big one to fall asleep as well, and, currently, it only worked on those ones who were not yet of a real knight’s level.

The whole aisle suddenly quieted down quite a bit. There was only Lucien, the Kuo-toa leader and a bunch of mulocs who were sleeping on the floor.

When the murloc leader realized that the human being they were facing was actually a sorcerer instead of a knight although he was using a sword, it quickly cast its own magic, Water Ring.

As the murloc leader was regaining his consciousness when it was surrounded by rings of waves, Lucien sensed the great difficulty of breathing as if he was overwhelmed by water, since the air quickly got so moist that Lucien felt he was intaking water beads into his nose and lungs.

Lucien did not panic, however. He held his breath and then shot three flashing ice blades at the murloc.

Although the murloc leader was seemingly only about ordinary knight level, Lucien still activated his magic item, since he needed to finish this creature as soon as possible.

However, the power of Fire Weaver’s Bracelet was too destructive for Lucien to use right now.

At the same time, Lucien dodged to the other side to avoid the trident thrown forward by the murloc.

As soon as Lucien got back on his feet, he activated the magic model in his soul.

The water in the air suddenly could not affect Lucien at all, since he was covered with a layer of an invisible barrier, which filtered the water out.

First circle magic, Element Endurance.

Although this magic did not work well when one was facing a direct elemental attack, it was quite useful when dealing with elementally imbalanced environments, such as this very floor on the ship, which was being controlled by Water Ring.

The cold air brought by Palmeira’s Frost Blades froze the waves surrounding the murloc, which also trapped the murloc itself. It was severely hurt by the three blades.

However, although there was dark-blue blood coming out of its head, chest and arm, the wounds were healing in a visible speed.

The healing power of a Kuo-toan was no inferior to that of a troll, but it could not regrow its broken limbs like a troll.

At this time, a sharp light flashed on the murloc leader’s neck, and then its head fell down on the floor half a second later.

It was Lucien’s knight sword, Alert, and Lucien hacked it right at the wound cut by the frost blade.

As soon as it was affected by the spell, Sleep, the Kuo-toan already lost its control of this fight, especially when the sorcerer who the murloc was facing had better magic items than most of his peers.

Of course, this edge was more about the level of Lucien’s magic items, instead of the completeness of his equipment. Lucien was still wearing ordinary shoes, which were always easily worn down because of his speed, and besides, he still had no magic robe neither staff, which were basic symbols of a sorcerer.

Lucien took several leaps forward and came behind the murlocs. When he was about to cast another spell, he sensed something from the main cargo cabin.

It felt like the strong waves in the ocean.

"There was no one in the main cargo cabin, so this feeling could not be from a fight. Maybe… maybe this is the thing that the Kuo-toans are looking for…" Lucien quickly thought to himself.

That feeling was strange but also familiar. Lucien felt that once he read something like this in one of the books.

"Wave… Stone…" Lucien murmured, "Wave Stone!"

Wave Stone was a kind of not rare but still precious magic material, which Lucien once encountered in the book named Common Magic Related Materials Illustration. It could be used in making magic items and weapons that were over level three to bring magic effects to them such as breathing in the water, water elemental damaging, and spells such as Storm and Ice Storm.

In addition, the best quality Wave Stone could be used to make really powerful items, and it could be used in many potions to improve the growth of many water creatures.

Lucien was guessing that, since the power he just sensed was great, there was either a great amount of Wave Stone on the ship or the stones were of top quality, which should be worth at least tens of thousands of Thales.

According to Lucien, as Wave Stone was a kind of magic material, quite possibly it was being shipped to Allyn, but he had no idea whether this was a secret shipping arranged by Granneuve, or it was actually allowed by the Church. And if it was neither way, the fleet was definitely in trouble for shipping such a great amount of magic material, and there would be greater risk facing Lucien, Tom and the apprentices as well, since the Church was for sure going to thoroughly check the ships.

Another thing Lucien was quite sure was that the people who were arriving here first should be Tom and his trusted sailors.

As he was thinking, Lucien did not stop casting. He murmured sophisticated and weird spell and then suddenly pushed his hands forward.

An invisible strong blow was summoned, and all the asleep murlocs together with the Kuo-toa leader’s body were pushed by the blow back into the ocean again.

First circle magic, Force Wave.

Lucien had not built the magic model of Force Wave in his soul yet, hence he still needed to cast it.

At this time, all of the apprentices had already got onto the upper floor and hid in the nearby sailors’ cabins.

After Lucien quickly cleaned up all the evidence of the fight and was about to get onto the upper floor as well, his heart suddenly sank for a second as he sensed the danger.

The bracelet that Lucien was wearing flashed a streak of red light and flames were summoned to protect Lucien.

Then a head-sized water ball hit the flames right away, and the water and fire disappeared at the same time.

At the fork of the aisle, a murloc whose scales were shining light red light was staring at Lucien with its cold eyes.

Unlike other murlocs holding tridents, this one was holding a colourful coral staff.

The thunder stopped for a moment, and Lucien heard many heavy footsteps on the deck of the ship.