’85 degrees latitude to the north is near the place where the sea monster attacked Sid!’
The merchant’s guild seemed to think they lost contact with the transportation fleet because of pirates. But after hearing Sid, Ark was convinced that the disappearance of the transportation fleet was related to the sea monster. No, such a thing didn’t even matter. If he participated as a mercenary in the armed fleet then couldn’t he strike against the sea monster?
‘Besides, they’ve already gathered 785 applicants. They’ll probably leave after a few more minutes!’
Ark immediately visited the NPC in charge and asked for an application form. After the NPC checked the submitted application form, the NPC stared at Ark with surprised eyes.
“A-A nobleman?”
“Yes?”
“Why is nobleman doing the work of a mercenary……?”
The NPC looked at him with confused eyes. This was a game but the situation would’ve been absurd in real life.
‘What the? Is there a penalty when applying for something like this as a nobleman?’
Ark was anxious about this so he explained.
“Actually a ship I own went missing from near here. I’ve asked for help from Reuben’s navy but at the moment they can’t promise me anything. So I’ve decided to apply after seeing the merchant’s guild recruitment advertisement.”
“Ah, I see. Um…..please come with me.”
The NPC said after thinking for a while.
“Then I’ll go.”
“Yes, be sure to find it.”
Ark then parted from Isyuram. Isyuram had wanted to go with Ark but he had promised to meet the criminal organization who was meeting again. Ark separated from Isyuram and followed the NPC towards the dock dedicated to the merchant’s guild.
‘Amazing!’
Ark’s mouth opened absent-mindedly as he saw the dock. Eight battleships were anchored at the dock. But the eight battleships were a completely different standard from the ones Ark had seen so far.
“This is the new armed fleet of the merchant’s guild. It is 1.5 times bigger than ordinary battleships and the endurance is 30% more. The exterior walls are also made of padded steel sheets so it won’t even be scratched by weak attacks. When just sailing normally, it won’t even get a scratch. The ships also have a separate magic engine that can be used in emergencies.”
The NPC looked at the battleships with pride filled eyes. Then the voice of another NPC could be heard from the back.
“Hey hey. You will continue exposing all the secrets if you keep on chattering like that.”
A youth wearing a flashy badge on his armour approached. Then the NPC coughed and introduced the person.
“Ah, this is the admiral of the fleet Wagner-nim.”
Then he approached Wagner, pointed towards Ark and whispered something. Wagner looked at Ark and smiled pleasantly.
“Ah, you are an aristocrat of Schudenberg kingdom. Well, then there is no problem if you know confidential information about the armed fleet.”
“Confidential?”
Ark couldn’t understand what the person was saying. Wagner just laughed and explained.
“Actually, this battleship is a joint project between the Schudenberg navy and the merchant’s guild. These battleships took several years to make.”
That’s right. Then battleships in the dock were Schudenberg’s next generation battleships. No matter how much influence the merchant’s guild had on the continent, they weren’t powerful enough to build such strong battleships. Anyway, the battleships anchored at the dock had been completed not long ago. Now the only thing left was to test out the performance of the battleship. Then the incident with the missing transportation fleet occurred. So the Schudenberg navy decided to test the performance through this search operation. That was why an aristocrat of Schudenberg was the admiral. But several problems had occurred at this point. The ships were newly built so there was a lack of sailors. So they had to hire mercenaries to solve the problem and the captain of the battleships was responsible for them. So not anyone could be the captain.
“Normally the merchant vessels will have someone from the merchant’s guild in charge of them. But entrusting the battleships to merchants is a little worrisome. Now we don’t have time to find a qualified person.”
Wagner sent the NPC an arrogant look and muttered. Then he moved his eyes back to Ark and the arrogant expression faded away.
“Shouldn’t an aristocrat of Schudenberg have the honour of such an important task? You became an aristocrat through your military exploits so please take control of the battleships.”
“Huh? Me?”
“An aristocrat has the obligation to maintain the glory of the nobility. So how can a Schudenberg aristocrat possibly work like a common mercenary?”
Wagner was a human who believed that status was everything. Frankly, Ark disliked that type of personality whether they were users or NPCs. But now wasn’t the time to question it closely. Ark’s purpose in participating was to rescue his Gold Dream and the shipment. It was the reason he flew to Reuben.
‘If I participate as a simple hired soldier then it will be difficult to get an opportunity to recover the ship.’
That was the part Ark was worried about. But that wasn’t a problem if he was captain of a battleship.
“If you believe in me then I will do my best to return your expectations. Wagner-nim!”
Ark grasped Wagner’s hand and replied. There was a ringing sound and the information window appeared.
-You have accepted the request from Admiral Wagner to become the temporary captain of a ship.
As a captain, you have decisive power over the corresponding battleship. All soldiers on the battleship will by automatically added to Ark-nim’s attack party. In addition, as captain of the battleship you have a variety of skills able to be used.
‘Okay, things are being arranged better than I thought!’
He was delighted about being able to become captain thanks to his barony.
“Hahahaha! Are you worried about suddenly becoming a captain? There’s no need to worry. You just have to obey my orders. The pirates are called losers of the sea so defeating them is as easy as peeling off a woman’s underwear in bed.”
Wagner laughed roughly and struck Ark’s shoulder………Ark suddenly felt like beating him up.
————————————————————————————————————-
‘I’m really going crazy.’
A sigh flowed from Ark’s mouth as he sat on the dock. As Ark expected, the remaining mercenaries were quickly gathered. With so many gathered then the fleet could also depart early. After distributing the troops between each battleship and arranging the necessary supplies, they finally departed. Until now there had been no problem. The actual problem was the bat sitting on Ark’s shoulder.
“……..Hahahaha, this is so great I want to die. You are an aristocrat of Schudenberg. No matter what kind of situation it is, you must not despair and fight with honour. After all, your life is trivial when compared to an aristocrat’s honour. No matter how injured your body gets, you must not defile the honour of the nobility when righting pirates…..hey, are you listening?”
“Ah, yes yes. I’m listening.”
‘Damn! This is complete torture!’
Ark scratched his head with irritation. But who could he blame? This whole situation started from one mistake…..
The bat sitting on his shoulder and making noise wasn’t Racard. The existence of the bat occurred while Ark was invading the secret dungeon. Ark had found a lot of magic ingredients that he had never seen before. At that time, he had needed Racard’s help with scouting more than Razak or Radun. Therefore he had concentrated on making food for Racard. Thanks to that, Racard’s stats reached an equivalent of level 380.
-Your summon Racard has manifested a new vampire ability.
Racard has absorbed Karakul’s strength and abilities and has been reborn as a high ranking vampire. However, Racard lacks the ability to properly absorb Karakul’s blood flowing through his veins. When this blood is perfectly absorbed then Racard will obtain all of Karakul’s power and knowledge.
Once Racard reaches a certain level, he is able to awaken some of Karakul’s abilities.
+ Summon Stud: The vampire is able to summon his blood relatives who made a contract with him.
Once Racard’s abilities reached a certain level then he would absorb more of Karakul’s blood and sometimes a new skill would occur. Then skill that occurred was random and depended on certain conditions. There was a reason Racard developed the Summon Stud skill. In fact, during the secret dungeon invasion Racard had been the busiest person. Reconnaissance and contacting the different troops scattered around had been entrusted to Racard. So Racard had really been busy flying all over the dungeon. Naturally Racard was dissatisfied so he had created the Stud Contract skill. The Summon Stud skill allowed a high ranking vampire to summon lower ranking vampires from their territory. All of Racard’s lower ranking relatives signed the contract and were summoned into the cave.
‘What is this? The bats are only level 20 so what use will they be? Furthermore, summoning just one costs 50 Spiritual Power? Doesn’t that mean I can only summon 15? Is this a joke?’
It was so pitiful that Ark couldn’t even laugh about it when the skill first occurred. However the summoned bats were surprisingly useful.
“Count!”
“One, two, three, four….fifteen!”