146 Chapter 16

There were all kinds of strange creatures living in this world, and there were several kinds of them that could charm people with songs.

As it happened, both mermaids and sirens had this ability and they all lived in the sea. Therefore, people who had a scanty knowledge of the facts compared the two, or even confused the two.

In this matter, the sirens certainly had no objection. What they cared about was eating people. As for what people thought; well, when you ate bread, did you care about what bread thought?

But mermaids had objections; big ones!

"Eat meat?! This is a smear to us!"

Well, what they really cared about was of whether or not they ate people, but the dignity of being a vegetarian.

In marine creatures, the mermaid was one of the few vegetarian species. Perhaps there were one or two exceptions that ate meat, but most of them were vegetarian. They were keen to study the flavors of various seaweeds, which led to the famous dining genre, 'sea combo.' Because of the difference in living conditions, this dining genre had only been circulated among aquatic species, and human beings rarely tried it.

Sui Xiong learned about the existence of the dining genre from Vieille, who was specialized in food and drink. He was also surprised because he thought that the mermaid would eat fish and shrimp at the very least.

Putting aside the question of diet, there were still some differences between the song of the mermaids and the song of sirens.

The siren's song was soft and mellow, full of teasing, and people felt tempted. Young men especially, except for a handful of determined ones, could hardly resist this temptation. Whenever ocean-going sailors heard their songs, few people could turn them down. Often the entire ship would, panted, rushed into the water, and tried to swim in the direction of the song.

As a result, they became windfall food.

Singing was a predatory mean for Sirens, and all that were tempted by their songs would be eaten by them.

The mermaid's singing voice was free and natural, far-away and lingering, so that people would feel their heart flying, and fell into a kind of daze as if they were half-awake and half-asleep. When they woke up, they often felt physically fatigued, but mentally very refreshed.

This was because the singing of mermaids was essentially a spell unique to their group. This spell could regulate the spirit. Although the cost was the consumption of a lot of physical strength that made the body tired, there were no other side effects. After all, tiredness could be easily restored.

Therefore, there were often powerful mages who flew to the deep sea to record mermaid songs with magical props, as a means of relaxation and recovery. This kind of thing was rarely made public, and the price was quite expensive.

As it was today where at least ten thousand people listened to the voices of mermaids together was a rare case even throughout the long history.

Many people in the square were particularly resilient, or they wore props that could resist charm. The mermaid's song could not make them intoxicated. However, the thing in itself puzzled them.

These people were well-informed, and naturally able to distinguish between the voices of mermaids and sirens. But even the most educated one had never heard of a mermaid who ran to the shore to sing...

The mermaid family was not only temperamental, but full of masters. Even the king of a country or a legendary strongman found it impossible to secretly catch a mermaid to sing to him. On the contrary, there was even someone who was so obsessed with the ethereal voice that he moved to live in the deep sea.

A mermaid sang ashore; this kind of thing seemed to have happened only in legends. But all involved in this kind of thing were none other than those heroes who left master strokes in history.

For a moment, many pairs of eyes stared at Ray. Even those with malicious intentions could not help but correct their attitudes, or respect, or want to kill him. Everyone understood that if there was someone in Gars City qualified enough to become a big hero in history, it must be this handsome knight!

The chief priest of the Church of Goddess of Harvest was certainly not charmed by the voice of mermaids, but his face suddenly became gloomy. Everything was going smoothly. How could the mermaids jump out right before the city owner was about to surrender?!

What was even more troublesome was that everybody was enchanted with the mermaid's singing from its begining and got tired when it eneded, which gave the celebration a natural end, and left no room for prayers.

He had no doubt that Ray would seize this opportunity. The city owner had no strength, but the governor did. The governor would not have been a Watchdog of Gars City if he did not seize this chance.

'Watchdog of Gars City' was Ray's nickname, which someone who hated Ray had come up with. It meant that he was as loyal as a dog, guarding the gates. No one could take advantage of the city.

Originally, everyone thought that the city would be full of adventurers, taking advantage of their own wrongdoings. Many "dynamic social organizations" sent personnel to compete for territory and carve up profits. As a result, they either fled in a flurry or died under Ray's sword.

The chief priest also originally had an axe to grind like this. Fortunately, he had good luck. When he arrived, he saw Ray pursuing a group of believers of the God of Fear: a group of thugs. At that time, Ray rode the Wyvern and traveled nearly a hundred miles to kill these thugs, among which were all Warriors, Mages and Priests and two of them were high-level strongmen and the bodies were brought back to the public.

The chief priest was scared. When he entered the city, he found out that they were accused of forcing residents to borrow money and then plundering their wealth with terrifying interest rates. After confirming the news, he was silent for a long time. He eventually gave up all the plans he had originally drafted, and became a priest who was reclusive.

The knight who called himself "Ray" must be a tough guy, because he made a big fuss about this trivial thing and large numbers of believers of the God of Fear died from it! I shouldn't confront him!

After that blow, he was already discouraged, and once again used his friends' persuasion to raise his courage...

But the result was this.

"God's plans supercede our own... Perhaps this is fate." The chief priest sighed deeply, apologized to Ray without any relaxation of his stern expression, and retreated in dejection.

Ray was relieved and knew that he had tackled a major crisis.

After this day, Kasalie and the Church of the Goddess of Harvest fell out officially. The Church of the Goddess of Harvest was to behave itself for a long time. However, time was in their favor: The longer the delay, the less attractive the Church of the Goddess of Harvest would be in Gars City. Maybe next time, they would no longer have to rely on the help of His Majesty the Void Mask; they could handle it on their own.

"Your Majesty, your power is really unfathomable!" Ray heartily praised. "Even the nobles of the deep sea followed your assignment!"

Sui Xiong chuckled and silently agreed.

Well, it seemed correct: this matter was to his credit, and that was why the mermaids came to congratulate him and showed due respect to him.

After a short pause, the song stopped and a mermaid girl dressed formally went to the square to send gifts to the revitalized Gars City, guarded by several men with obvious aquatic characteristics.

"Governor, you, who live in this world, speak for His Majesty who is our guide. Knowing that you are working hard to promote the revival of the city, I hereby wish you success on behalf of the people of the Sea of Storm."

Ray nodded with a smile and accepted the gift with his own hands. The gifts were not precious, but the meaning they represented was not trivial.

The distant sea was governed by the sea kings. Each sea king had his own name. The Sea of Storms was the distant sea of the east, stretching roughly from the dead desert to the Kingdom of the Blue Moon.

The Mermaid congratulated him in the name of the official representative of the Sea of Storm, which undoubtedly meant the goodwill and support of the king of that sea. With the support of this strong demi-god who had survived from ancient times to the present, the revival of Gars City was really just around the corner! Simply being able to safely conduct maritime trade was a huge point of economic growth.

But Mermaid hadn't finished her words yet. After Ray accepted the gift, she said, "We are merging all the people of the sea, and will soon develop our power onto the seashore. In order to strengthen mutual cooperation, I hope that we can build an embassy in Gars City to facilitate the exchange of information. Of course, if you don't mind, I also hope that we could establish a business center again, so that we can trade goods."

Ray nodded with a reserved smile. He casually agreed to this matter as if it was nothing serious. However, the businessmen who were knowledgeable next to him were already excited. If they had not considered the occasion, they would have already cheered.

Formal diplomacy! Business center! Oh God! The former meant that Gars City had been qualified for an equal exchange with the Sea of Storm, while the latter meant an enormous and incredibly amazing profit!

To synthesize the two factors...

"Maybe Gars City would not only revive; but expand even further," a loyal official from a branch of the Riley family excitedly told Kasalie after the celebration. "What the late city owner had not been able to accomplish will be realized in your hands!"

Kasalie was confused, and couldn't understand what he was really excited about. "The status would be high and the money would be more. This is certainly a good thing. But isn't that what we were like before?"

The official explained to her with excitement, "For all its prosperity, the Gars City was after all a subordinate of the Kingdom of Blue Moon. But now, as long as we can get support from the Sea of Storm, we could break away from the Kingdom of Blue Moon and become an autonomous territory!"

"What good does that do?" Kasalie asked.

The official was silent for a long time and sighed helplessly.

She is really dumb. Maybe I can only count on the next generation of city owner. That knight is perfect. The next generation of city owner could only survive even if he has half of his talents.

So, he immediately felt relieved, and had much hope for the future and his absolute confidence in the city owner. Then he enthusiastically returned to work...