The Magus Era

The terrain of the Evil Dragon Bay was not precipitous.

A few great rivers were flowing slowly and windingly through there, transporting sand and sediments to this area, which had accumulated into this paludal wetland. One could see muddy pools all over this area, densely scattered in this wetland. Rose willows, Robinias and other few types of trees, which had only sparse branches and leaves, were standing disorderly around those different sized pools, looking like tired people, who were weak due to sickness.

A water clattering noise lingered in this area, seemingly never stopping. Occasionally, extra large, long and fat unknown creatures would appear, roll in those muddy pools and raise big water blooms. On the thick layer of aquatic plants floating on the water surface, large groups of unknown, poisonous creatures were gathered, cosily spurting poisonous mist or smoke.

The Evil Dragon Bay was covered almost entirely in soft and sticky mud, and one could barely find a path for safely passing it. In this Evil Dragon Bay, which was nearly ten-thousand miles in radius, only tens of small hills had solid soil layers that could bear all kinds of buildings.

Therefore, the human army took over these small hills. They built military camps and stationed a large number of warriors here, guarding this strategic point.

Qian Tan was wearing a grey armor and sitting in a metal boat, seeming to be very upset. The boat was slowly moving forward along a muddy branch river in this Evil Dragon Bay area. Surrounding his boat were another nearly hundred boats; same as Qian Tan’s boat, all these boats were around ten-zhang long and shaped like a shuttle. Around ten Jia Clan warriors stood on each of these boats.

Spell symbols were sparkling on the tails of these boats. Large pieces of magic crystals were filled in the magic formation set on each boat, allowing the magic formations to manipulate the water current, and to push the boats forward. In this way, these boats could move in the river at an especially high speed.

But at the moment, a string of rafts was dragged by each boat; a large group of frog-like, non-humankind slaves, who had dark-green skin that was thickly dotted with black pimples, were huddled up on each of those rafts. These lowly slaves looked just like human-shaped frogs; they had enormous feet and webbed toes, and were all excellent swimmers. These slaves were the best cannon fodders, often used by the Yu Clan in water-based battles.

‘Coo, coo’, following this noise came from far away, a few extra large sized frog slaves dashed through the water surface. Their bodies seemed nimble and light, this dangerous swamp zone not causing any effect on their movements at all. They ran on the surface of the swamp as easily and quickly as human beings walking on flat soil ground.

Those few frog slaves rushed up to Qian Tan’s boat, directly thudding their chests and faces against the muddy river water, saluted to Qian Tan, then gasped deeply for air while saying, “Lord, the frontal area is safe. Within a hundred miles from here, we didn’t see any human warriors, but the number of water boas living in this area is huge. Quite a few of our brothers were swallowed.”

Qian Tan frowned, grabbed a leather whip and lashed heavily on the body of the frog slave, who seemed to be the leader of this group of slave and had just reported to him, then yelled impatiently, “Idiot! Look at your ugly faces! If those water boas don’t eat you, what are they supposed to eat? The mud?! Piss off, continue exploring this area! I don’t believe that the humankind doesn't know that we’re already here.”

Being lashed by that thick leather whip, the frog slave leader burst out a loud howl. A deep, bleeding slash appeared on his smooth skin, sticky drops of blood dripping down into the river. The other frog slaves lowered their heads, daring not to make any noise. The frog slave leader then hurriedly gave a loud yell, followed by which, another ten frog slaves leapt down from a raft, following behind this group of frog slaves. Again, these frog slaves ran deep into the Evil Dragon Bay.

Qian Tan wielded the leather whip hard in the air. He was upset to an extreme degree.

He was sent away! Yes, he was sent away. Because of a mistake he made back in the Chi Ban Market, his family had suffered a great loss, and the family’s glory was disgraced severely. Therefore, he was sent away from the Chi Ban Market, a dreamy place where he could attain great wealth, to the battlefront, where the Qian Family’s army forces were stationed. He was now the commander of a troop of warriors.

“I shouldn’t be treated in this way! This is… is, just sorrowful.” Qian Tan looked at the grey and cloudy sky, seeming to cry but failed to shed any tears.

A palm-sized poisonous bug was slowly flying across the air above his head. This strangely ugly poisonous bug abruptly puffed out a stream of yellow-colored poisonous gas from its butt, which then gradually spread out above Qian Tan.

The erect eye in between Qian Tan’s eyebrows opened, releasing a stream of blood-red light. Immediately after that, the poor poisonous bug suddenly froze in the air; its entire body turned blood-red in color, then fell down silently from the air, into the water, and melted into a faint stream of blood-red water.”

“I shouldn’t be here!” Qian Tan gnashed his teeth, turned to his deputy commander, who also looked quite upset, and yelled in anger, “I should be in the Chi Ban Market, dealing with big piles of treasures, drinking delicious wines, arms around beautiful ladies.... enjoying my life!”

“Even if have to come to the battlefront and fight against those lowly, nasty, stupid goddamn human beings, with my status… with my father’s status, I should, at least, be a deputy commander of an official army. I should at least have the elite warriors of half an army under my command.”

He then disgustedly threw a glance at those Jia Clan warriors standing on those boats, glanced through those marked armors worn by them with his picky eyes, and complained, “Warriors under my command should all be elite warriors of the main forces, instead of these substandard things. I should be sitting in the headquarters, commanding my army to fight the war, instead of wearing a cr*ppy armor and coming to this shit hole, gathering some bloody information.”

Swoosh! From the water surface afar, a muddy wave rose into the air, from within which, an over ten-zhang long, gigantic bone-tongue fish darted up, widely opened its mouth and showed its sharp teeth, directly snagging a Jia Clan warrior down into the water.

Surrounding Jia Clan warriors instantly fell into chaos. They wielded their weapons and tried to save their fellows. But as they were standing on small boats, once their heavy bodies moved even a slight bit, the boats would sway intensely, almost turning over.

Fortunately, they had those frog slaves dragging behind them. Tens of frog slaves screamed out while diving into the water, desperately fighting for a while, and finally killed that bone-tongue fish, carrying that Jia Clan warrior, who had nearly sunk to the bottom of the river, up into the boat. However, during this quick but intense fight, three frog slaves were swallowed by that bone-tongue fish. Until the other frog warriors sliced the fish’s stomach open and dragged the three frog slaves out its body, the skin and a layer of muscles of the three poor things were already digested by the fish, which made them cry hysterically in pain.

“What a damnable place!” Qian Tan yelled furiously at his deputy commander, “Do those family elders actually want to launch the attack from here? I bet their brains are all damaged!”

Qian Tan’s deputy commander looked at Qian Tan with an expressionless face and responded with a powerless, bland tone, “Lord, we’re already hapless enough. If you don’t want to wear a leather armor and be sent directly to explore this place by yourself, I think you should maintain respect for our family elders!”

Qian Tan opened his mouth but didn’t say anything. He raised his head, looked at the sky and seemed to cry again; a short while later, he gave a heavy sigh.

Around a hundred boats quietly slipped across the water surface, continuously heading south along that muddy branch river, with a great number of rafts in tow.

They moved past countless pools and swamps, which were left behind by them one after another. Six hours later, they had already moved into the Evil Dragon Bay for whole three-thousand miles from the entrance. During these few hours, they had seen immense groups of poisonous bugs, countless fierce and enormous water boas, giant fishes, crocodiles and other water beasts, but failed to meet even a single man; they didn’t even see a silhouette that was shaped like a man.

The Qian Family had sent out a hundred troops in total, all of similar standard as this one led by Qian Tan. All these troops had headed into the Evil Dragon Bay shoulders to shoulder, yet none of them had seen even a single human being.

From a great distance, Qian Tan saw a hill in front of him. A small town with seemingly strong and solid walls was built on that hill.