After work, start to speedrun the other world-Chapter 41 - 26 The Origin of Sky City_2

It wasn’t for justice, nor was it to protect the princess; his initial goal had been impure—to seize the Iris Flower Kingdom.

"On your own, you could never capture the Iris Flower Kingdom!" He wanted to persuade further, but the silver-armored knight still didn’t stop his advance.

He involuntarily stepped back, though the other’s armor and weapon resembled those of a protagonist in a hero’s tale.

Yet it felt as though he was facing a crazed demon.

"Since you won’t listen, I’ll have to kill you," the assassin leader sighed with regret, drew a dagger, and threw it forcefully at Xi Mu’s face. Accompanied by the whooshing sound of the dagger, he swiftly turned and leaped towards the open window, diving through it with the grace and naturalness of a diver.

A purple arrow then pierced his brain mid-flight; his body lost control in the air, flipping and dropping onto the street below.

"..." Xi Mu stood by the window, watching the convulsing body of the assassin on the street, calmly retracting his gaze.

"Forget it, the experience points from these guys are just so-so anyway." He shook his head, left the inn, and took Letixia and Jed with him to find the city guards to report the night’s events, casually mentioning that he was Siegfried’s disciple.

The aftermath was easily dealt with; the city guards brought buckets to clean the bloodstains from the inn and disposed of the assassins’ bodies along the way.

They then moved to a safer residence, spending a secure night under the protection of the city guards.

Meanwhile.

In a secluded alleyway.

"As I thought, not an easy target to kill," a woman with long brown hair, leaning against a wall, curled her lips into a sneer of disdain.

"I’m giving up; I don’t want to die here," she said without hesitation, turning to leave. The assassins who had attempted to kill Ahtal were nothing more than a bunch of reckless fools.

After she acknowledged the difficulty in dealing with Ahtal, she had no intention of making a move on him; after all, being an assassin was about making money, there was no need to bet her own life.

Unless the second princess of the Iris Flower Kingdom added more money to the offer.

...

...

The next day.

Dawn.

The sky began to lighten, and the whole town came to life: carriages passed through, and shops opened, emitting the fragrance of tempting food.

By the lake, a pure white boat was docked.

"Lord Ahtal, this is the boat to Sky City," a man in a suit said to the silver-armored knight:

"Once you arrive there, a designated official will receive you and take you to meet His Majesty."

"Hmm." With a slight nod, Xi Mu boarded the boat with Letixia and Jed, sailing away under the man’s watchful eye, riding the reverse flow of the waterfall towards Sky City.

...

...

"It’s really amazing; even though we’re ascending, it feels no different than standing on solid ground," Jed looked out at the scenery from the boat, noticing the town below getting smaller and the view expanding, as if intending to take in the entire world.

She had been to the Sky City station before but never actually ascended to Sky City itself. The cost was too high, not to mention the expenses in Sky City were significant.

There was no need for her, as an adventurer, to actively visit Sky City.

"Letixia, do you know much about Sky City?" she suddenly asked, with an expectant look at Letixia.

As far as she was concerned, Letixia seemed to know about everything except being upfront about her own feelings; her only flaw seemed to be a lack of openness.

In response, Letixia smiled faintly: "I don’t know much about Sky City either, but I do know some information."

She paused, organizing her thoughts.

"Sky City was originally a city on the ground, but then a Sage appeared. He performed a secret magic and lifted the entire city into the sky."

"And the reason for doing so was to escape the plague that the God of Plague had brought upon them. He believed that Sky City, being secluded from the world, could avoid the plague’s reach by severing ties with the outside world before the outbreak spread to his own country."

"However, it was precisely for this reason that many wealthy nobles, seeking security from the plague, spent a fortune on real estate in Sky City, leading to its extreme prosperity."

"Every inch of land worth its weight in gold; this isn’t a mere adjective, it’s the actual state of affairs in Sky City. Aside from the original residents who were allocated property, it would be impossible for outsiders to obtain a residence in Sky City even if they worked hard for three or ten lifetimes."

"By the way, the mainstream belief in Sky City isn’t in gods, but in the Sage who hoisted the city into the sky. People believe the Sage is a manifestation of the gods."

"For this reason, the residents of Sky City built a grand temple for the Sage."

At this point, she looked towards Ahtal with a faint smile.

"When we’re free, we should visit it. The Sage’s temple is quite worth seeing."

"If we have time, we’ll take a look," Xi Mu replied somewhat unenthusiastically, showing little interest in the so-called temple of the Sage.

He had visited that place numerous times; aside from the initial shock, each subsequent visit was to complete side quests, completely uninterested in the grandeur of the temple.

Sometimes he would even complain about why the NPCs had to build the temple so huge—it was somewhat strenuous to run around and wasted a lot of his time.

"Boss, you seem... not in the best of moods?" Jed keenly sensed Xi Mu’s lack of enthusiasm, even though it was supposed to be a happy occasion.

To this, Xi Mu casually explained:

"I’m not good at dealing with that group of nobles and the king; just the thought of it is vexing."

This was a lie; he simply found the lengthy intermission in the story too long, and he was merely bored because he couldn’t skip it. 𝓯𝙧𝙚𝒆𝙬𝙚𝒃𝙣𝙤𝒗𝓮𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

If it weren’t for the sake of acquiring Siegfried’s magic, he would never waste much time on such meaningless intermissions.

But since the game developers wanted to enhance the sense of immersion, he could only make the effort to traverse the map until he could unlock the anchor teleporter.

That is, the ability holder who could teleport instantly with someone in tow.

However, that ability holder was in another country, and subduing him would take a considerable amount of effort, obviously too late now.

"If Lord Ahtal is not good at dealing with them, how about I take over?" Letixia offered proactively, her emerald eyes slightly aloof, "As long as I’m nominally your girlfriend or say, fiancée."

She used as calm and objective a tone as possible.

"Then I could deal with the nobles on behalf of Lord Ahtal, I’m quite good at this."

The atmosphere grew subtly tense.

Jed covered her mouth with both hands; this was definitely a confession and a proposition. Although it wasn’t explicitly stated, anyone with a slightly higher EQ would understand.

However.

"Thank you," Xi Mu sighed in relief, smiling at Letixia, seemingly oblivious to the hints in her words.

Meanwhile, Jed’s expression fell. She wondered whether her boss truly didn’t get it, or was pretending not to. It was practically a confession, and he could have easily won over Sister Letixia and reached the pinnacle of his life.

No matter from the standpoint of appearance, knowledge, personality, or ability, she found Sister Letixia impeccable. She couldn’t understand why the boss had shown so little reaction.

"What’s wrong, are you feeling unwell?" Xi Mu looked at Jed’s slumped face, curiously inquiring.

Jed shook her head and sighed, "Boss, a man who is too upright can miss out on a lot of wonderful things."

"Is that so?" Xi Mu nodded slightly, then turned to Letixia again, "Well, since we’re pretending to be a couple, we might as well make it convincing. Let’s start with exchanging gifts."

He handed her a gemstone necklace he had scavenged in Forge City.

"It’s not a very expensive gift, but it looks quite lovely."

"This is a bracelet from my mother," Letixia said with her head lowered, taking off a bracelet and exchanging gifts with Ahtal.

Jed watched the scene unfold and became a bit lost. Was her boss truly oblivious to Letixia’s feelings, or was there some other reason for not reciprocating?

If she didn’t know her boss to be trustworthy, she might have thought he was deliberately keeping Letixia hanging on.