Volume 1 Chapter 17 Arrival at Scuropolis

Chapter 17 Arrival at Scuropolis

I

At first, the four decided to circumvent the city, but they have been run out of food and eating those brown weeds to satisfy their hunger was obviously not an optimal solution.

Therefore, they made an adventurous decision – raiding foods in the city. They could rob some restaurants and put all their foods into Aislina’s Pocket Dimension.

It was during the night hours now so robbing would be much easier.

According to the map on the street, the name of this city was Scuropolis. Although Starsha, Floria and Yanni were barbarians, they still had some cultural knowledge concerning Normania and thus they had already heard of Scuropolis.

As far as they knew, Scuropolis was one of the most prosperous city in Normania and it was a wonder of civilization, and they also knew that this city had already been controlled by the Grey Factory.

Walking in the city, they spotted a dishevelled girl standing on a bridge, her eyes fixed on the river beneath the bridge. The skin of that girl was as grey as a vampire in the horror legends.

“I’ll ask her where the nearest restaurant is,” announced Starsha.

She walked towards the girl and patted on her shoulder.

“What are you doing in this place?” asked Starsha.

“I am going to jump into the river,” answered the girl, her eyes blank with mere hollowness.

“Are you going to swim inside that river?” pursued Starsha.

“No, I’m not going to swim inside it,” the girl shook her head, “I want to let the water fill my lung, stop my breath and finally I will die.”

“You want to suicide?” inquired Starsha with a look of slight fear appearing on her face.

“Yes, in this kind of world, many people want to suicide, but they’re coward who fears death. To be honest, I fear death too, but the pain of life outweighs my fear for the death,” whispered the girl in a ghastly voice.

“But your life matters …” retorted Starsha.

“No, life means nothing. I live in hunger because. I cannot survive in this city,” muttered the girl.

“Why? Aren’t there foods in the city?” queried Starsha.

“There are foods but I don’t have a job. I don’t want to bend over for others. I’d rather die. In the past, we can live by farming. Now it’s impossible. The wilderness has been occupied by weed and the soil has been polluted by necrology,” replied the girl.

“How about your parents? They won’t want you to die,” questioned Starsha.

“My parents? I am just their tools to get fame and fortune. They train me hellishly strictly as if I were a machine, while machines are in fact more valuable to them than I am,” complaint the girl quietly.

“No, you’re their daughter and you’re irreplaceable,” argued Starsha.

“You don’t live in this city, do you? In this city, nothing cannot be replaced, and of all the things, humans are the easiest to be replaced. Doctor Fames has conquered the locusts that used to bring the famines, but he has created a new kind of famine. This city has been taken over by famine,” the girl didn’t continue talking with Starsha but jumped into the water before she could respond.

She didn’t struggle in the water at all. On the contrary, she just let herself drowned in the water and let those water fill her lung.

Just as Starsha was about to jump into the water and save the girl, a stranger had already done that. That was a boy with grey vampiric skin who was tall and thin. After taking off his shirt and trousers, he dived into the water.

Clearly, he was fairly good at swimming and soon he dragged the girl who had already been in a coma out of the water.

Before the boy jumped into the water, he had taken off all his clothes except his underpants, and now, under the moonlight, his body can be seen. His skin was as pale as the moon on the night sky and to some extent, he looked like a ghastly zombie.

There was water dripping down from his hair and his emotion was as empty as that girl who intended to kill herself. However, there was something that could be seen in his eyes, some kind of sparkle, which was perhaps anger.

He walked towards the adventurers with the moonlight shining silver on his grey skin. His steps were like those belonged to demons which only existed in his hell. There was some sort of cynical aura emanated by him, which was going to burn this world, at least this city.

The drowned girl was still in a coma but obviously she hadn’t died physically. Perhaps her soul had died, but maybe there was something that could possibly save it.

“Hello!” greeted the boy, his eyes brimming with curiosity.

“Hi!” returned Starsha.

“Who are you four? You don’t look like citizens. Are you from a tribe of barbarians?” probed the boy. While talking to Starsha, he was trying to save the drowned girl at the same time.

“Yes, we’re. In fact, we want to know something about the restaurants in this city,” replied Starsha.

“Restaurant? You must be hungry. I can buy you four some foods if you want,” the boy invited.

“No, thanks. We can get some foods on our own,” Starsha shook her head.

“Since that, give me your map please, I can mark the nearest restaurant on your map,” proposed the boy.

“Thanks,” expressed Floria gratefully, handing the map to the boy.

“By the way, why did the girl say that Doctor Fames has brought a new kind of famine?” queried Starsha.

“Many people fail to adapt to the society, get jobs and feed themselves. We’re not living in the ancient time when farmers could live carefreely and independently. Now we need to be subordinate to more powerful ones in order to earn money and the whole city is like some sort of hive mind. You’re barbarians and you won’t understand, ” the boy narrated and inquired, “By the way, who is this charming girl with blue hair?”

“I am Aislina,” purred Aislina shyly.

“You’re not human, aren’t you?” speculated the boy.

“Yeah, I am an elf, but how did you know that I wasn’t a human?” breathed Aislina.

“My gut told me that. You’re an elf but you are travelling with three humans … That’s strange. Where are other elves?” questioned the boy.

“Gone. I am the last elf in this world,” sighed Aislina.

“Since that, you’re the last elf … So what bring you to our city? Are you here to revenge us humans?” inquired the boy.

“He knows too much, we must deal with him …” advised Floria.

“Deal with me? What will you do? Kill me?” demanded the boy.

“No, I won’t kill you and we don’t kill the innocent. It’s just, uh, forget it. Let’s go to rob this restaurant,” stuttered Floria.

Ignoring that curious boy, the adventures set out towards the restaurant that the boy marked on the map.

“Wait, travellers!” the boy called to them.

Floria looked back at the boy with confusion.

“I won’t tell others your presence!” yelled the boy, “but be careful, you four are wanted here!”

“Thanks,” Floria smiled.

Quietly, the boy left the scene with the girl he just saved carried in his arms. The four didn’t know what his name is, but their guts told them that they were going to see this boy again some time.

During the night hours, the city was immersed in an atmosphere of tranquillity. On the street, some stray cats were mewing, eating something filthy inside trash bins. There were also some bloody corpses of tramps who had been starved to death because of failed social adaption.

II

Inside the restaurant, there were four stealthy figures searching for foods. Starsha had used her toning fork to create a silence barrier, so that she and her friends would not make any noises and no one would discover them.

However, what they didn’t know was that there were employee dormitory on the second floor of the restaurant while the restroom was on the first floor where the four were searching food stealthily right now.

Unluckily, one of the employees woke up and wanted to pee at the moment. He walked down to the first floor and ran into the adventurers.

“Hey, what are you doing here?” demanded the employee.

“Oops, we’ve got caught,” whispered Starsha.

“Wait, it’s you four. I’ve seen your portraits on the arrest warrant. You four are wanted!” yelled the employee.

“Our portrait?!” Starsha frowned.

Just at that moment a paper with four portraits came into her sight. She took it off the wall and began to read it.

Wanted - Yanni Greyson, Floria Greyson, Starsha Deane, Aislina the elf. They are four dangerous criminals who have stolen the Cube of Necrus, which is a significant property of the Grey Factory. Anyone who helps us to find them can get a reward of ten million gold coins!

“Wow, is that our portraits? They’ve drawn us beautifully,” joked Starsha.

As the attention of the four was drawn by the arrest warrant, the employee pulled a lever on the wall and some sort of alarm went off, with shrill piercing sound beginning to fill the air.

“Hey, what have you done!” shouted Starsha to the employee.

“It’s the warning sirens. Soon the patrols or some kind of stronger being will come here and arrest you four! After that, the Grey Factory will reward me with ten million gold coins! Ten million gold coins! I will be a millionaire. For so many years, I struggle in this restaurant and work for my arrogant boss. He uses my pathetic salary to enslave me like some sort of animal. But now, I will be rich, even richer than him! You four are my saviours, my saviours, my saviours! I’ll be a millionaire! I will never be starved in the future!” blurted the employee with incurable madness.

“So the patrols are going here, we shall act quickly now!” Floria clutched the neck of the employee and demanded, “where is the storage! We need foods, a lot of foods!”

“Oh, go into that corridor, turn right, and then you will see the storage where we keep our foods. Thank you, girl, you make me rich, and you give me my new, life!” exclaimed the employee.

“The world is burning. No matter how rich you’re, your heart will be always hollow,” muttered Yanni.

Aislina went inside the storage and opened a portal which looked like a transparent whirlpool. The others helped her to throw those foods inside her portal, inside which was her Pocket Dimension.

Suddenly, some strange but familiar sounds came into Starsha’s sharp ear.

“The locusts!” shouted Starsha.

Starsha was right. It was the sounds of the locusts.

The instant her voice broke off, a cloud of locusts flew into the storage. There were thousands of locusts in the swarm flying towards the four.

Aislina began to vibrate, releasing green poisonous gases. The gases killed all the locusts inside this room like some sort of pesticides.

All locusts in this room fell to the ground and died, but Aislina was also exhausted because of the powerful spell she just cast.

Though all the locusts in these room had died, there were still sounds of locusts flipping air outside the room. Clearly, there would be more waves of attack.

“Have we gotten enough foods?” asked Yanni.

“Obviously we have. The foods have nearly filled Aislina’s Pocket Dimension and such amount of foods can feed us for three weeks. Anyway, let’s leave here, it’s not a place to dawdle!” commanded Floria.

“Yep, let’s go,” consented Yanni.

“I am too tired … That spell of poisonous gas has drained all my vigour,” moaned Aislina.

Yanni didn’t say anything but picked Aislina up in his arms and kicked the door open. The employee was still laughing in the corridor, dreaming about his upcoming reward which would make him a millionaire.

Ignoring that crazy employee, the adventurers escaped the restaurant and began to run, because there was at least three clouds of swarm composed of locusts patrolling around them.

When those locusts noticed their presence, they flew towards them with dreadful sounds coming out of their mouthparts.

“There were locusts everywhere!” screamed Starsha.

“Follow me! Let’s run to the reservoir in the city and hide inside the water!” Floria shouted and began to lead the way while others followed. Hiding inside the water in the reservoir was a good idea, because most locusts were not able to dive inside the water.

Because of her experience as a huntress who always hunted in the wood, Floria was quite good at directions. Soon she found the right way to the reservoir successfully.

After about five minutes, the reservoir came into their sights while those fearsome locusts were still chasing them.

When they were about to dive inside the water, Yanni stumbled over a stone. Because Aislina was too weak to run on her own, Yanni held her in his arms all the way, but now since Yanni had fallen over a stone, Aislina fell on the ground too.

Since Aislina was, without a shadow of doubt, the strongest one among the adventurers, the locusts, or whoever controlling the locusts, decided to kill Aislina first.

The swarm swallowed Aislina whole. Encased in the swarm, Aislina was screaming in extremely pain.

“Aislina, no!” roared Yanni. He got up to his feet, charged towards the swarm, hit the swarm with his shield forcefully and dragged Aislina out of the deadly swarm.

Aislina was still alive but after being stinged by those locusts, there were pustules all over her. Yanni picked her up in his arm once again and ran desperately towards the reservoir.

Floria and Starsha were already in the water, and as they were about to help Yanni, he had already helped Aislina get rid of the swarm temporarily and started to dash towards the water with Aislina in his arms.

He dived into the water and the locusts didn’t follow because they were afraid of water.

This reservoir was not completely artificial and there was a small islet at the centre of it. After one minute of swimming, the four arrived at the islet and the locusts were already gone at the moment.

“Aislina, Aislina? Answer me, please ..” whispered Yanni.

“Yanni …” groaned Aislina.

“Without doubt, those locusts were poisonous and there are locust venom inside her blood now. We must find a way, perhaps some kind of anti-venom to cure her, or she may … die …” muttered Floria.

“Yes, anti-venom … But where can we find those anti-venom?” queried Yanni.

“I don’t know. I’ll look at my map. Wait, the Scholomance was located beside this reservoir,” Floria pointed out.

“You’re right, the Scholomance. It was the greatest academy of necrology on earth and there must be laboratories containing anti-venom,” speculated Yanni.

“That’s true. It’s dawn now and we have to act quickly before most students and teachers arrive there,” advised Floria.

“Since that, let’s go to the Scholomance right now! There’s no time to dawdle!” proposed Yanni.

“Calm down, Yanni. One of us have to stay here taking care of Aislina in case of some dangerous accidents,” purred Floria.

“You two go to Scholomance. I’ll stay her playing some light music for her to keep her awake. Music therapy sometimes help patients mentally,” suggested Starsha.

“Good idea, Starsha. Since that, Yanni, let’s go,” commanded Floria.

“Just be quick about it. Aislina and I are waiting for you two here,” breathed Starsha.