Michael looked up to see the eagle slowly descending from the sky. The steel cage was on top of the lower part of the eagle's body while two grown men were riding the eagle by standing above its shoulder. The two men were in their mid-thirties and wearing a gold-embroidered toga. They reminded Michael of the ancient Roman noblemen.
These two men weren't radiating zero amount of Arch energy but the amount was negligible. If they tried to walk through a defense array, they would definitely trigger the array however they would be considered as the weakest of the commoners back on the Northern Continent.
Yet here they rode the eagle with a domineering attitude.
Kakaw!
The eagle let out a loud ear-piercing cry, it sounded like a raven somehow rather than an eagle.
Thud!
It landed on the ship, shaking the ship for a few seconds. The eagle then turned its head to stare at Michael and Gaya menacingly.
The one wearing a toga with a purple line stepped onto the ship first while the one wearing a white toga with red lines carried a medium side chest before placing the chest before Lars.
"Trent" Lars signaled the greasy blonde crew member who welcomed Gaya and Michael to the ship when they first onboarded Striker.
Until now, the two noblemen wearing toga did not even look at Michael or Gaya. Trent licked his lips walking towards the medium-sized chest. His skinny hands slightly trembled approaching the chest. When he opened the chest, his face brightened up due to the glistening gold and gemstones inside the chest. Even Michael's eyes sparkled looking at the rubies, diamonds, gold bricks, and various colors of gemstones shining inside the chest.
"3 million, as we agreed" the one wearing the toga with purple lines smiled at Lars. The crew behind Lars were looking at the chest full of goodies like starving dogs staring at the bbq.
Michael folded his arms, leaning back on the ship's foresail wooden beam. Gaya saw his face, totally calm and cool like nothing's going on here. Only his eyes were occasionally gawking at the chest full of goodies.
"Okay guys, what's the plan here?" Finally, Michael opened his mouth after Trent closed the chest.
"Why don't you two piggies save us the trouble and get yourselves into the cage?" the one with the red line toga waved off at them without even looking at them in the eyes. However, the one with the purple line toga who also had a bald head turned his gaze at Gaya. His blue eyes scanned Gaya from her head to toe,
"I heard cultivating women are way better than our southern ladies but it seems like I heard wrong" he shook his head disappointingly.
"That was a big mistake" Michael mumbled as he could already feel a cold killing intent. It wasn't much about what he said but the way he said it. She hated being compared to other girls and he just compared her with northern ladies, a big fucking mistake. Yet, she remained silent.
"Ye 'eard the man" Trent shouted at them. Michael saw no fear in Trent's eyes, the fear he saw when he first met him. One didn't need a genius to figure out that the reason for Trent and every crew members' newfound courage is that Michael and Gaya lost their ability to cast spells.
"We be sellin' ye daft dumb" Trent laughed along with his crew members.
"We can see that" The calm look on his face began to disturb Lars. After exchanging pleasantries with Lars, the one wearing red lines toga turned his gaze towards Michael and Gaya.
"Don't make me drag you into the cage, piggies" the scar running across his face made his warning even more menacing. Michael was still dazed thinking why these Southerners look like Romans of the ancient time back on earth.
He was making connections in his head that he failed to notice the crew members including taking their cutlasses out of their sheaths.
"You should know that even without the Arch energy, we can fuck you up" Gaya cracked her knuckles. Most of the cultivators spend their time cultivating or practicing spell casting or if they had any specialization like Michael, they would use the time to improve their skills. Most of them wouldn't come to the Southern Continent, therefore, they didn't have to think about what they would do without Arch Energy. Besides, ninety-nine percent of the fighting styles required Arch energy, so their combat skills wouldn't be useless in the Southern Continent.
However, Serpent-Maga was not one of those fighting styles. Only four people in the world could use Serpent-Maga, Gaya, Gaya's father, Xanali, and Michael. Among them, with the help of the system's mentor function, he was perfecting the fighting style to unlock its maximum deadliness.
After 30 days of training, he was at the point where he could survive a fight with Gaya for more than five minutes, taking less beating from her and landing several blows to her.
"The girl got teeth. I will look forward to opening her up" Michael was surprised. There was no lust in his eyes but something evil, he had seen this evil before. It was the same look a notorious mad scientist who tried to find a cure for a brain tumor back on earth. The scientist's cause was noble except he was kidnapping people and doing all kinds of horrible experiments on them until he kidnapped a wealthy person's daughter and ended up getting assassinated by Michael himself. This toga-wearing man had the same look in his eyes as the mad scientist once had.
Though unlike on earth, Michael wasn't disgusted by this look, he felt curious. This time he wanted to kidnap the evil scientist and interrogate him so he could exploit the toga-wearing southerner.
Boom!
Pulch!
Pulch!
Just when Michael was about to really use his Serpent-Maga on these poor crew members, the two roman looking guys exploded into a bloody mist.
It took them a few seconds to realize what just happened.
"Pirates!" Captain Lars screamed as Michael turned back to see a huge ship leaping out of the water like a whale. Seeing the ship that emerged from the underwater, Michael took a few steps backward in fear. He had seen this ship before, the flying dutchman. The ship floating a few hundred meters away from him looked very similar to the flying dutchman in the Pirates of the Caribbean movies.
Boom!
Boom!
Boom!
Three loud booming sounds reverberated the calm sea. The Eagle was still in shock but before it could even react, the iron cannonballs fired by the pirate ship turned the eagle into the third red mist of the day.
"It's the Silent Reaper!" Lars screamed again, rushing to the rudder. Michael and Gaya leaped out of the place where they were standing to avoid being hit by the cannonballs.
Boom!
Boom!
Boom!
"Get the cannons ready to fire!" Lars shouted,
"Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god"
"God saves us"
"Please God, I don't wanna die!"
The crew members were running around scared to death while avoiding the cannonballs and exploding wooden structures.
"Do you see that ship?!" Michael had to shout to overcome the sound of cannonballs exploding.
"Yeah, it's hard to miss!" Gaya replied.
They still didn't use Arch Energy to save time. They were hiding behind the mainsail wood beam looking at the pirate ship that resembled the flying dutchman. The crew members and Lars forgot about them after their clients exploded into a bloody mist.
"Wait here!" Michael shouted,
"Where are, Fuck!" Before she could ask, she saw him running towards the chest rolling on the deck. Lars was turning the ship to avoid getting hit by the Silent Reaper as everything loose on the deck began to roll around. The hull and the seawater clashed to produce waves that soaked everyone and everything wet on the deck. One could doubt that whether it was the seawater or they actually got themselves into a storm as the booming sound was similar to thunderclaps and the light produced by the cannons in the Silent Reaper resembled flashes of lightning.
"Don't!" Trent saw Michael's intention to steal the chest. He came yelling at Michael with a cutlass in his hand. The other crew members were busy with keeping the ship afloat as well as cannons ready to fire once they turned the ship sidewards to the Silent Reaper.
Despite the ship shaking violently, Michael swiftly turned his body away from the trajectory of Trent's cutlass. Trent lost balance when his sword missed its target, when he was about to stumble forwards, Michael wrapped his hands around his neck, instantly twisting it with all his strength.
Crack!
Trent's lifeless body was thrown into the sea when Lars turned the ship suddenly. Once again, the chest rolled away from Michael's grasp as he himself almost lost the balance.
"That's mine!" Lars noticed Micahel chasing the chest and yelled while turning the rudder using all his strength.
Lars shouted but didn't order the crew members to catch or kill Michael because he knew what he was dealing with here, the infamous cursed ship, the Silent Reaper. He never expected he would run into this particular pirate ship on the day that he was supposed to make one last trade before retiring.
Hmmmmmmmmm!
Suddenly, they heard an unearthly humming sound as the Silent Reaper stopped firing.
"It's going to dive again!" some of the crew shouted