Chapter 1570: Water Ghost

The weather was great today, and the sky above Pu Huo Fu Village was as blue as if it had been washed. On the not-so-large pier near the lake, a group of shirtless workers were busy moving cargo in the warm spring breeze. A pot-bellied merchant from the south was using broken De La Rui Ang language to talk to an old man dressed as a butler. The complaints of sailors washing the deck and the idle chatter of fishermen drying their nets gathered together, making the scene quite vivid.

The scale of this pier certainly couldn't compare to the pier area of Cold Water Port City on the west coast, but it was large enough for a pier on an inland lake. Xia De even saw a few travelers playing Luo De cards around a wooden box by the pier. He resisted his curiosity and didn't walk over, but instead walked toward the Ka Sen Li Ke merchant who didn't speak the language and the person dressed as an old butler:

"Sir, do you need a translator?"

He asked the merchant in fluent Ka Sen Li Ke language. The latter wiped his sweat with a handkerchief: "That would be truly great. I will pay you 10 copper Fen Ni."

1 Crown equals 7 Ou Er, and 1 Crown also equals 95 Fen Ni. Although these three types of currency were the main currencies of Ka Sen Li Ke, due to the chaotic currency relationship before the establishment of the United Kingdom, other currencies existed besides the three mainstream ones. Among them, the value of a "copper Fen Ni" was one-thirtieth of a Fen Ni; this denomination had no paper money, only copper coins.

According to the exchange rate, 1 copper Fen Ni was about 1.4 pence, and 10 copper Fen Ni was about a shilling or more. In terms of translation prices, it wasn't high, nor was it low. Of course, if Xia De hadn't been dressed decently, he might only have received one copper coin.

What the southern merchant was trying to communicate with the butler was about the ale transported from Ka Sen Li Ke. Because high tariffs were levied by De La Rui Ang during customs clearance, the price per barrel had to be increased by a quarter this time. The butler of the local viscount of Green Lake City was trying to make the merchant understand that they had been doing business for so long and had never raised prices for such reasons.

The butler didn't doubt the merchant's integrity; they were acquaintances. He just couldn't accept the sudden price hike. But while the merchant apologized through Xia De, he also helplessly indicated that this wasn't something he could control:

"This is the second boat trip I've made since the beginning of spring. Clearly, at the end of the Month of Rising Wind, the tariffs on alcohol were still normal."

"That's because, at that time, it hadn't been decided to hold negotiations in the Green Lake region, nor had it been decided what to use as one's own trump card."

This was what Xia De added beyond the translation. Both the merchant and the old butler deeply agreed, using not-so-civilized sentences to curse the politicians in their respective languages, and then, under Xia De's mediation, they barely reached an agreement on the price-hiked deal.

The old butler went to arrange a carriage, so he left in a hurry. While the fat merchant paid the bill readily, Xia De also curiously asked the question he wanted to ask:

"Sir, I just saw people from the church in the village. Are there so many clergy members in this small village?" In fact, he hadn't seen any at all.

"There was originally only an elderly priest in the village. I heard from the villagers that a group of clergy members came from the city the day before yesterday to preach in the countryside; it seems they are from the Peace Church. They are temporarily staying on the east side of the village, and for the past two days, they have been taking a boat to the central island of Green Lake every day. When my boat arrived this morning, I happened to see them taking a boat to the central island of Green Lake. Isn't that island already empty?"

The merchant didn't think too much and told Xia De these things. "The church really did land on the island. I wonder what they can find."

Xia De thought to himself. After accepting his payment, he asked with some confusion:

"Since you run the trade route between Ka Sen Li Ke and De La Rui Ang, why didn't you prepare a translator for yourself? Language barriers can delay many things."

"I know that too. I had a translator when I boarded the ship, but when I accepted a random inspection at the Ka Sen Li Ke pier on the other side of the lake, contraband was found on that guy, and then I didn't have a translator."

He told Xia De with a bitter face exactly what the contraband was:

"A collection of poems complaining that the An Ru royal family is extravagant and licentious, the Upper House is exploiting the people, nobles are lying on the people to suck blood, and civil servants are all fat-headed, big-eared idiots. I really don't know why he wanted to find trouble for himself like this. I didn't see him behave abnormally usually... I heard that someone deliberately distributed this kind of book in Mi Kai La Blast Furnace City. It's getting more and more chaotic... I won't say anymore, I have to go arrange for unloading. Thank you for your help, I wish you a happy life."

He waved goodbye to Xia De, leaving the outsider, who was sighing, standing by the pier watching the lakeside scenery in spring.

Xia De didn't delay too long on the pier. After confirming the church's movements, he left the pier along the lakeshore. After walking to a quiet place where no one was around, he first put away his shoes and coat, and only then did he walk into the lake.

"So cold!"

Shivering, he plunged into the water. Relying on the "Underwater Breathing" spell, Xia De didn't even need to surface occasionally to breathe. He swam toward the depths of Green Lake like a big fish. While observing the biological community in the lake under the water, he didn't forget to pay attention to whether there were any fish that Mr. Ai De Meng De wanted.

Sure enough, since there were no "rotten-tailed fish" in the local black market, it was still too difficult for Xia De to find them just by relying on his own eyes. Fortunately, Grandma Na Ta Li had given him bait that could lure rotten-tailed fish. After confirming that he was far from the shore and there were no boats nearby, Xia De took the bait out of a sealed small bottle.

That pill-like bait slowly released its scent in the water, while Xia De kept moving toward the center of the lake. He waited patiently for a while, and movement came from the deep lake bottom. Xia De closed his eyes to listen, but what he heard was not the heartbeat of a fish—rotten-tailed fish were semi-undead, so they also had heartbeats:

"What is coming? The heartbeat is powerful, but the heart rate is only ten beats per minute? What is this?"

In the water, vision would be severely obstructed, so it wasn't until the humanoid thing got closer that Xia De saw its full appearance.

It was a monster with a fish head and a human body. Its body was covered in dull blue-gray scales, its limbs had sharp claws, and its open mouth contained extremely sharp teeth. Between the upper and lower rows of teeth, there was a very long gray tongue in its mouth that could extend outward.

"Fishman?"

Xia De thought subconsciously, then realized this wasn't a fishman he had seen before. After reacting for a moment, he immediately realized what he had actually encountered:

"Water ghost?"

Water ghosts were relatively common undead creatures, born from the bodies of the drowned, possessing some fish-like characteristics due to the influence of water. Apart from their habit of living in water, they were not much different from the ordinary resurrected ghouls commonly seen on land.

This kind of monster was very flexible in water and was almost indistinguishable from a fish when swimming rapidly. They usually liked to lurk in the water, waiting for prey to arrive. Attacking lone small fishing boats was also a way these monsters hunted.

Of course, water ghosts could also walk on land, but this would significantly reduce their speed and strength, so this situation was very rare.

Among the "Three Evil Gods of Cold Water Port" that Xia De had heard of in Cold Water Port, the followers of that "God of the Drowned" loved to manipulate this kind of undead creature. And water ghosts and the fishman population protected by the "Lord of the Scarlet Spiral" were sworn enemies.

Seeing the water ghost attracted by the bait, Xia De was not surprised at all; instead, he revealed a smile and then hurriedly closed his mouth to prevent water from being sucked in.

As the main habitat for the semi-undead creature "rotten-tailed fish," Green Lake would naturally give birth to true undead like water ghosts. Although the church would conduct regular cleanups, it wasn't very rare for him to encounter one or two himself.

And since he had encountered a water ghost, it meant that there must be "rotten-tailed fish" nearby. These fish loved to follow water ghosts and gnaw on the leftovers of their meals.

Xia De was thinking that he was lucky, and the water ghost was getting closer and closer to him. He hadn't prepared silver-plated crossbow bolts and a hand crossbow for himself, so he waved his arms in the water, and four silver rings that illuminated the lake water flew out, successfully looping around the water ghost's limbs.

"Moonlight Slash!"

Following that, an arc of moonlight swept through underwater. After the light disappeared, the corpse of the water ghost, split into two, sank downward. A large amount of green liquid flowed out from the water ghost's body and mixed into the water. This was a liquid formed by the mixture of corpse oil contaminated by elements and the body fluids of the undead "water ghost" itself. If Xia De were willing to collect it, it was actually an alchemy material that could be sold for a good price, just like the "water ghost brain" he had destroyed. "No, I absolutely will not touch this kind of thing, otherwise, when I get home, Xiao Miya will definitely not come near me again."

Although he thought this, he didn't swim away; instead, he followed the corpse from a distance as it continued to dive. After the water ghost's corpse hit the bottom of the lake, there was no more movement. Xia De threw the bait toward the corpse and waited for a few more minutes, and sure enough, he saw five or six fish swimming over "sneakily," using the rugged terrain of the lake bottom as cover.

Using "sneakily" to describe fish wasn't very appropriate, but those fish were indeed deliberately hiding themselves. They hadn't discovered Xia De, who was higher up, but quickly swam around the corpse of the ghoul and began this meal. Although rotten-tailed fish liked to follow behind water ghosts and eat their food scraps, they would also feed on the water ghosts themselves.

This could also be considered a very wonderful ecological chain.

Even underwater, dealing with a few fish wouldn't lead to any accidents. Xia De waited until they started eating before he took action to capture them, thinking to himself with amusement that he didn't know if Xiao Miya, who now possessed slight supernatural power, would like to eat this kind of fish.

However, this time he didn't use "Light of Imprisonment," but instead used the non-aggressive Chains of Sin to pierce through the abdomens of those fish one by one, stringing them all together, so Xia De didn't have to reach out to grab them. ===== CHAPTER 1571 =====

But this time, he didn't use "Light of Imprisonment," but instead used the non-aggressive Chains of Sin to pierce through the bellies of those fish one by one, stringing them all together, so Xia De didn't have to reach out and grab them himself.