Chapter 365

The soldiers, who looked like a dangerous, bristling "sea urchin" of swords and blades, were directly swiped over by the giant cat's paws, as the ground was a carpeted grassland thick enough to reach their thighs, and the cat's little paws were also soft, fleshy pads.

Thus, the soldiers, knocked over by a single swipe, had their armor and helmets scattered, their weapons—swords and long spears—strewn about, and each fell to the ground in despair.

After swiping the tiny soldiers over with one paw, this female Farah Desert Cat seemed to find it amusing; she stretched her massive head, which was like a small castle, in front of the soldiers who had tumbled to the ground, curiously examining these fragile little people with her pupils, which were vertical in the daylight.

Looking at the giant cat head, the soldiers screamed in terror; although they were all Refining Qi soldiers and had followed their Squad Leader to suppress giant monsters on the coast or in the desert,

this thing was simply too big.

No, the Squad Leader, who still had the capacity to think among the soldiers, suddenly realized that it was not that this "cat" appeared huge, but that they had been cursed by an evil Wizard to shrink, making everything in daily life seem incomparably dangerous.

The cat sniffed the eleven soldiers, then suddenly turned her head to look at where she had come from. The fallen soldiers were also drawn by the creature's movement and followed her gaze in that direction.

"Gods above, I pray with all my heart that everything now is a trial You have bestowed." A pious soldier was terrified, for there, three more giant cats were trotting over with a thumping sound.

Among the three cats that followed, one was particularly fat; as it ran across the carpet, its plump, soft belly sagged and rubbed against the carpet, swaying back and forth.

The cats seemed to know each other; after gathering together, they did not romp, but all stretched their heads over, curiously examining the soldiers who were gradually huddling together.

The several giant cat heads were furry, but in the eyes of the soldiers, they did not feel the least bit cute. After all, even a single cat hair was thicker than the shafts of the long spears they had thrown away in a panic.

The cats meowed softly to each other, seemingly communicating something, but unfortunately, the soldiers did not know "cat language," so they did not understand what they were saying. Moreover, the cats' soft meows were more terrifying to these "little people" than the most shocking animal roars they had ever heard in their lives.

Then, something even more terrifying happened.

The four cats seemed to have agreed on something, and suddenly stretched their four giant heads forward, surrounding the soldiers from all sides. Before the soldiers could make any move or react in horror, the cats opened their mouths, extended their nimble tongues, and with a flick and a roll, each scooped several soldiers into their mouths.

"Help!"

"Mama!"

"Ahhhhh!"

After short, panicked screams, all the soldiers were rolled into the mouths of the four cats by their tongues.

"Damn it! I'm going to kill them! They are such cute cats, why do they have to do this!" Not far away, the Squad Leader, hiding in the crevice between a cabinet and the wall corner, had eyes splitting with rage; he had watched with his own eyes as his subordinates were knocked down by those cats and swallowed into their mouths.

A terrifying aura surged from his body, and he wanted to rush out to save his men or kill those giant cats. However, he was held back by a Sun Ring Church priest who was not physically strong.

It should have been impossible to hold him back; after all, even a hundred priests could not rely on physical strength to restrain an angry Knight-rank Warrior. But the one who stopped his companion from acting rashly said a single sentence: "Don't be impulsive! That old man earlier, he must be a Mage; didn't he say he wanted the cats he raised to bring us to him? They are not in mortal danger, really."

The priest weakly pointed at the two of them, then pointed at the transparent barrier not far away that they had been unable to break through no matter what.

"That is not a method an ordinary Mage could employ. Can you imagine that there is such power in the world that could shrink you, me, and the soldiers to such a tiny height?"

The Squad Leader gritted his teeth and took a few deep breaths, finally suppressing his aura: "Then tell me, what should we do now?"

The priest examined the cats that were running quickly into the room and silently pointed them out to his companion.

Seeing that the cats were indeed running deep into the room, the Squad Leader breathed a sigh of relief.

"I think it's best to use our shrunken bodies; it's perfect for avoiding the other party's detection and heading inside to investigate what is going on!" The priest used his long staff to support himself as he stood.

"Fine, I'll carry you!" The Squad Leader grabbed the priest, squatted down on the spot, and leaped, jumping from the crevice near the floor high into the air.

With a few climbs against the wall, he carried the priest to the top of a wooden cabinet located in the entrance foyer where boots and rain gear were kept.

However, before they could do anything else, not far away, following a cat's meow, one of the cats returned.

This cat searched on the carpet for a while, perked up its ears, and looked left and right, searching for the two who had gone missing.

"That was close, it seems it can't find us?" The priest had just whispered this when he was interrupted by the Squad Leader, who had raised cats before.

The Squad Leader looked at the priest with a helpless expression and said: "I forgot to tell you just now, a cat's hearing is excellent; the moment you spoke, it definitely heard you."

"How could that be?" The priest looked unconvinced; he had lowered his voice so much precisely to prevent the cat below from finding them.

Immediately, as if to confirm the Squad Leader's words, a cat meow, which sounded very loud to them, rang out from under the cabinet where they were.

"Meow??"

A moment later, a female Farah Desert Cat leaped up from under the wooden cabinet, placed her two front paws on the edge of the wooden cabinet, and then pulled her entire body up with the force.

The cat looked surprised; after discovering them, she meowed softly and kept circling the two of them on the top of the wooden cabinet, which was not very large.

The Squad Leader drew his Battle Knife, stamped one foot on the ground, and his whole body was enveloped in the Life Energy that erupted.

"Come on, cat, I won't go easy on you!" The Squad Leader crouched low, holding his Battle Knife horizontally above his head. As he finished speaking, he leaped directly from the spot with a bang, striking straight at the cat's head.

But the cat's reaction speed was among the most agile of all animals; the Squad Leader's surprise attack, which exceeded the reaction time of an ordinary person, was blocked by a quick horizontal swipe of the cat's fleshy paw.

The two collided in mid-air; the Squad Leader was knocked away halfway, but he was unscathed after landing, and there was a smear of blood on the Battle Knife held at his side.

The cat let out a cry of pain, pushed off with three feet to leap high, twisted in the air—which was very high for the two of them—and then landed.

With a dull, loud thud, the vibration of the cat landing alone was enough to knock the priest over on the wooden cabinet. The Squad Leader's legs buckled with the vibration of the ground, but his body itself did not shift in the slightest.

However, the groan of pain the priest let out after falling attracted the cat's attention.

"Oh no!" The Squad Leader was about to launch another attack, but saw the cat shift her attention to his companion. He immediately exerted force to dash forward, but the cat simply extended her head, quickly opened her mouth, and scooped up the priest with her pink tongue, which was full of soft barbs.

Then, the cat glanced slyly at the Squad Leader and immediately turned to jump under the wooden cabinet.

The Squad Leader reached the edge of the wooden cabinet and saw the cat running deep into the Noble's suite without looking back.

He had no choice but to jump down as well, then used a combination of running and leaping to try his best to catch up to the cat in front.

In a study deep within the suite, the old Mage was sitting in a chair, leaning comfortably against the backrest, smacking his lips with satisfaction at a pipe. Tobacco leaves from another world were ignited by magic sparks concentrated in the pipe, and after burning naturally, most of it turned into fragrant smoke.

And the old Mage's assistant, Mage Koni, had brought a chair and sat in front of the desk, curiously watching the panicked little soldiers in a high-end glass dinner plate on the desk.

These soldiers from the harbor city were quite disheveled at this moment; everyone's personal weapons had been dropped far away, and the leather armor and helmets on their bodies were all askew. At this moment, these soldiers, who looked like frost-bitten eggplants, were sitting back-to-back in the middle of the dinner plate, all looking at everything around them in terror.

Whether it was the other three giant cats playing in the study, or the young Noble who looked like a sky-propping giant and was watching them with curiosity.

Or the old man who was shrouded in a thick but rather pungent smoke. At this moment, he looked like a god who had descended into the world, whether it was the old man's face full of majesty or the mysterious power that had shrunk them.

Several of the soldiers had already fainted from fear; the rest who had not yet fainted were now summoning all the Yongqi they had in their lives to encourage the others. After all, it seemed that although these two had placed them in a dinner plate, which was nerve-wracking, they did not seem to have any intention of killing them.

"Teacher, aren't you going to start talking to them now?" Koni did not use the Empire's common language, but used the remote dialect of the Kingdom where his home was located.

Knowing that there was no language under the sun that his teacher did not know, he was not worried at all that his teacher would not understand his words.

The old Mage exhaled a puff of smoke and answered his student's words with a smile: "Wait a moment, the two with the highest status haven't arrived yet."

Koni blinked: "Do you need me to help? If it's just ordinary cats, I don't know if they can handle a shrunken Knight-rank Warrior and a priest."

Before the other cats playing in the room could speak to refute, the old Mage extinguished his pipe, tapped it, and said: "Aren't they here now."

As soon as the words fell, a nimble female Farah Desert Cat darted in from outside the door, hopped onto the desk in a flash, and anxiously opened its mouth to spit out a tiny human figure.

At the same time, a great deal of flame erupted from its mouth, but as its eyes rolled, the flames in its mouth were suppressed into nothingness by a strange magic it cast.

The figure spat out by the cat landed right on the soldiers in the middle of the dinner plate; thanks to the flesh cushion, this priest, who had been restless even inside the cat's mouth, was not injured by the fall.

"Ouch, that hurts."

"Who crashed into us?"

"It's the Priest, my lord, are you alright?"

The priest wiped the cat saliva from his face, pressed his hands together, and a white light vibrated over his body, clearing away all the cat saliva from head to toe.

He was just about to open his mouth to answer the soldiers, but as soon as he opened his eyes, he saw Koni the Mage looking at him with curiosity.

"A giant? No, it's that young Noble!" He turned around and saw the old Mage, who looked like a god: "Great Sun above, who are you people? Why attack us? This is a grave crime! Also, was the earlier assassination incident related to you? You said you had an answer, what exactly is it?"

Although the priest was shocked by everything around him after being shrunk—such as the cat that was as huge as a Magic Beast, the young Noble who was like a towering giant, and the old Mage who was like a god descended to earth—he was not controlled by the sensory stimulation brought by these magical powers and asked the key questions directly.

After all, this was a city on the Farah Peninsula controlled by the Sun Ring, and a lone mage could not stir up any trouble. But when two massive forces with surging undercurrents were rubbing against each other, what exactly did this mage with magical powers intend to do?

The old Mage did not answer the tiny person's question, which sounded like the buzzing of a mosquito; he pointed at the entrance of the study, and a similarly tiny Captain of the soldiers flew over through the air.

No matter how the Captain struggled in the air, he could not shake off this power.

The Captain was quickly pulled through the air and stood in the high-end glass dinner plate with the others.

Seeing their Captain arrive, the soldiers knew he was no match for this mysterious mage, but they still woke up those who had fainted, stood up with difficulty, and stood behind the Captain.

He was their backbone; seeing his companion arrive, the priest also consciously stood with him.

Although he knew the Battle Knife in his hand was useless, the Captain still drew it and held it with both hands.

The group gathered together in a sorry state; the priest looked at everyone, then faced the huge old Mage in the distance and asked his previous question all over again.

The old Mage sat up from his chair, tidied his clothes slightly, and then walked forward. Even though he was only half a step away from the desk, as he walked slowly forward, he shrank smaller and smaller. In just two breaths, he became the same size as those tiny people, only about one centimeter tall.

Walking onto the desk, the old Mage stood still, and the dinner plate under the people's feet automatically moved toward him.

Stepping onto the dinner plate, the old Mage approached the group standing tightly in a row.

"Everyone, wasn't everything before quite interesting? This magic was inspired by a piece of folklore about monsters. I presume it gave you all some marvelous experiences?" the old Mage said in a relaxed tone.

The group, having passively experienced the terrible ordeal of being shrunk, dared not show the slightest dissatisfaction toward the old Mage, who had also shrunk to their size.

They were clear-sighted enough to know that the situation was stronger than the people.

The old Mage beckoned, and somehow, the four cats playing in the distance came running over, hopped onto the desk, and sat obediently to the side.

He beckoned again, and Koni the Mage nearby pulled his chair, sat closer to the desk, and leaned his huge head over.

"Everyone, please introduce yourselves to our friend." The old Mage stood with his hands behind his back and looked at Koni.

Even though Koni tried his best to keep his voice soft, the shrunk people still felt it was deafening: "Greetings, everyone. I am from the Northern United Kingdom, specifically the Talin Abyss Kingdom, of the Aobosi family. Koni Aobosi, Earl by rank. I am a Magic Apprentice currently studying at the Northern Magic Society. I am a student of the great President of the Northern Magic Society, and I am currently accompanying the President on a holiday mage tour with my companions." (In terms of his position at the Society, Koni is a formal Mage, but among his companions, he is actually still on the path of learning and does not call himself a formal Mage for fear of losing face, as he has not yet shed his apprentice status.)

After hearing this, the shrunk group had different expressions.

The old Mage ignored them and looked at the four cats.

If it weren't for the fact that these four mages didn't want to change back from their cat forms, he wouldn't have needed to go through all this trouble. When people see little cats as his attendant mages, they only find it funny. But when they are shrunk themselves and look at the huge cats, it is a very different matter.

To everyone's astonishment, the four cats opened their mouths and spoke in human language: "We are formal Mages of the Northern Magic Society. As students, we studied under the very great, very great President of the Northern Magic Society, meow. Now that we are on holiday, we followed our teacher from the Northern Border, across the ocean, to come here for a mage tour. We four are experts in animal transformation; we are not Farah Desert Cats, meow."

"Then?" the priest looked at the old Mage, who was the same height as them, and asked with his heart pounding.

The old Mage did not speak; he simply took his hands from behind his back, stretched them out from bottom to top, and performed a standard mage salute.

Beside him, Koni the Mage and the four mages transformed into cats said in unison: "This is the person of long-lasting years, spanning many millennia, once hailed by the Empire as the greatest Mage, founder of the Northern Magic Society, and the one who has served as the Society's President to this day, Heart of Flame, the Mage who transcends all human mages, 【REDACTED】 Captain, the one who stands shoulder to shoulder with gods, breaker of Space Magic, the legendary Mage—Lord Du Ying Matthews." (The characters typed are not insults, but the relevant names were erased by magic; Koni and the cat mages said them, but ordinary people without the corresponding authorization could not understand the meaning of the terms even if they heard them.)

There was no suppression of power, no mental discomfort, and no soul-level hierarchy. This great Mage in the eulogy stood before them, peacefully performing a simple mage salute to them.

Of course, that is if one does not consider that they had been inexplicably shrunk by nearly two hundred times.

After being stunned for a long while, the priest finally reacted and hurriedly performed the audience ritual for meeting the Patriarch of the Sun Ring Church. The other party was the greatest mage in the world, and this ritual was appropriate. Moreover, unlike others, no one would dare to impersonate a legendary powerhouse of this level.

After the priest began the ritual, the Captain and the other soldiers in the squad hurriedly followed suit.

After the ritual was completed, the old Mage smiled and said, "Everyone, please sit." After saying this, he sat down in mid-air.

The others also unconsciously followed the other's words and sat in mid-air. Some soldiers curiously twisted their bodies and bottoms, discovering that no matter how they moved, they could remain seated in the air.

"Everyone, let us begin. I must first apologize to you; the chaos in the city earlier was indeed caused by one of our accompanying traveling mages."

Everyone's eyes widened, feeling it was unbelievable.

"Please do not be like this; it was all a misunderstanding. As my student said, our trip is indeed for a traditional mage tour, seeking a land rarely stepped upon after long periods of work. As for coming to the Farah Peninsula, I heard that the Great Sea Storm here is very interesting, and that the Farah Peninsula has a mysterious and long-standing history. It is a history far older than my birth, far older than some of the Empire's research, involving the early history of human development and the history of magic development."

When the old Mage said this, he took a pipe out of his mage robe sleeve, took a puff directly, slowly exhaled the smoke, and continued: "I've digressed. My follower previously had some connections here, but he did not expect that after returning here many years later, it would still be full of saturated, violent Magic Power that could easily hurt others and himself. Therefore, he carelessly clashed with the local military commander. Fortunately, no one died in the conflict; this is good luck in misfortune."

"As for myself, I originally did not intend to reveal my tracks so directly; after all, my identity might make the situation on the Farah Peninsula even more unpredictable. But since things have come to this, it is not good to hide after causing trouble; after all, judging by the current situation, even greater conflicts might erupt later. The net of struggle is already buried under the water, ready to be pulled up to catch its prey at any time."

At this point, the priest stood up and said, "My lord, since you have said so, may I have my Prelate visit you to verify this?"

At the same time, the Captain also spoke up: "My lord, since that is the case, please allow that mage to explain this matter publicly with our General? With your guarantee, I believe this matter will have a result that satisfies all parties."

"I have the same intention. Although it is a bit late, we mages did not do the relevant paperwork when we came to the Farah Peninsula; you can come to find me at any time." Having said this, he looked left and right.

The cats were wagging their tails, licking their fur, or kneading their companions, pretending to be lazy cats.

The old Mage could only look at Koni and say, "You can come to find my student Koni at any time. He is an excellent young man with a good personality; you can find him to handle the paperwork for us mages who are visiting and traveling so abruptly."

"In addition, if some harmless, marvelous events occur later, please do not be surprised or impulsive; those are just the interesting travel processes of my students and followers, and they will not hurt anyone. They are all sensible and well-behaved mages."

The group looked at the cats nearby with strange expressions, but they had no choice but to agree.

Afterward, the old Mage sat in his chair and restored his size. Then, he also restored the other soldiers, the Captain, and the priest to their original sizes on the open space of the study.

The soldiers, having returned to normal, breathed a huge sigh of relief. Looking at the cats transformed by the mages now, they felt not a shred of their previous fear.

Seeing that the mages no longer paid them any mind, the group immediately bid farewell.

At the entrance of the Noble suite, they found the various weapons and equipment they had dropped earlier. The priest looked at the burn mark on a small rug at the entrance.

His face was full of embarrassment and bitterness.

As a battle priest, he had used all his strength, yet he had only managed to leave a burn mark on the rug slightly larger than a footprint.

The group slunk down from the sixth floor of the inn. After coming down, they withdrew the soldiers surrounding the inn, leaving only two clever fellows to guard the entrance. After instructing the innkeeper not to disturb the distinguished guests on the sixth floor, the priest took some of the soldiers who had witnessed the event and walked toward the Sun Ring Church in the city, while others headed toward the military castle in the city.

Upstairs, the old mage first instructed Mage Koni to organize the basic information of the mages who had followed them to the Farah Peninsula this time, after which he would arrange for them to receive travel permits officially recognized by local powers.

On the other side, he summoned four mage cats and instructed them to find the half-elf Mage Donilafa to do some work for pacifying the local situation later.

However, before Mage Donilafa could appear, he had to meet the two people in charge of the local Sun Ring Church and the military first.