While the captain was returning to the ship, he grimly reflected on the local rules: I am so sick and tired of everything here. Mount Slick has so many stupid rules and formalities! You can't even just recruit a crew. As soon as you moor, they imdiately co with disease checks. If they find sick people—that's it, taken to quarantine without questions or argunts. And without these damn papers and docunts, they don't let you out at all. So many questions, so many questionnaires... In any other port, I would just gather people from the street, like a flock of sheep, and cast off. But here—fines, penalties, fees... Just need to pass the last two stages now: the crew check and docunt inspection.
"Thank you, Luck," the captain whispered, ntally bowing to the sea gods. "Because at sea, luck decides everything."
He returned to the grotto. During his absence, the first mate had already managed to divide the novices into day and night watches and harshly explain their duties to them. The captain looked at the ship and couldn't believe his eyes: the bunkers were already loaded to the brim. Wow, what speed... he thought. Well, then we can move on.
That sa stocky dwarf approached him again. "Will you be taking mages for an escort?" he inquired businesslike.
"Yeah, I know your rates," the captain grimaced. "How much does an escort cost nowadays?"
"Six hundred gold for one Magister-level mage."
"GO TO HELL with your prices!" the captain lost it.
The dwarf wasn't offended in the least, rely shrugged. "The workers have already attached the acceleration cables to your ship. We will give you a quick starting impulse now so you can sail out of the grotto smoothly and without making smoke. Yes, you are lucky today," the dwarf added, consulting his papers. "Usually there are queues for this grotto. If there were a jam here, I would slap you with such a fee for downti and parking..."
"Yeah, thanks for the kindness," the captain threw out sarcastically and strode up the gangway onto the vessel.
The ship had already begun a slight movent, guided by the shore cables.
At that mont, Aurora was standing on the pier nearby. She looked at the dwarf with hope.
"And they won't take anyone either?" she asked disappointedly.
"Alas. Refused." Aurora sighed heavily. Can't slip away... she thought with vexation.
And suddenly, through the clanking of chains, the noise of the water, and the shouts of the port workers, she heard a painfully familiar lazy voice: "WHAT IS THIS crap?" ca from the departing ship. "You could break your teeth on these lollipops..."
Aurora's face instantly twisted with wild, uncontrollable anger. "WHAT THE...?!" She bolted from her spot. One, two incredibly powerful steps—and she vaulted over the widening gap between the pier and the side, landing on the deck of the departing ship.
"OH YOU!" Aurora swiftly approached the relaxed Zenkhald, who was just trying to crack a lollipop. "SO YOU'RE THE REASON I DIDN'T GET TAKEN?!"
Then she turned sharply to the bewildered captain. "AND FOR HOW MUCH? HOW MUCH DID YOU TAKE HIM FOR?!" she growled angrily, advancing on him. The captain, having seen her incredible jump, decided not to be rude.
"...for a handful of candies."
"WHAA-A-AT?!" Aurora spun around to Zenkhald, grabbed his dirty, matted black hair with a death grip, and hoisted him into the air with a jerk.
"Ow-ow-ow-ow! That hurts, actually!" Zenkhald hollered, dangling his legs.
"HOW I HATE YOU!" she hissed right in his face. With these words, she forcefully hurled him aside. Zenkhald crashed into the wooden bulkhead with a thud and slid to the floor.
The captain cautiously took a step forward. "Ma'am, I will ask you to leave the vessel..."
"I AM NO WORSE THAN THIS FOUNDLING!" Aurora barked, breathing heavily. She was about to add sothing else, but suddenly rembered Mira's recent words: 'Keep an eye on him, please.' Aurora gritted her teeth until they ground and looked with disdain at this riffraff rubbing the back of his head.
"I am coming with you," she declared in a tone that brokered no objections.
"Well, alright..." the captain hesitated. "And what can you do?"
"And what do you think this freak can do?! I can do the sa thing!"
Zenkhald, sitting on the floor, scratched the bruised back of his head. "That hurts, actually," he mumbled. And then he looked at the furious girl and smiled widely, insolently: "But you are beautiful. Haven't seen anyone prettier yet."
Aurora rely flashed her eyes furiously.
"Do you know him?" the captain asked warily.
"I do! So what? ANY MORE QUESTIONS?" she looked at the captain defiantly.
The captain decided not to escalate the situation. This girl jumped onto a departing vessel with incredible ease, and then lifted a guy into the air with one hand and threw him—a guy who lit eight steam fireboxes in seconds. "Alright... let's see you in action," the captain said placatingly.
Aurora imdiately cald down, pulling herself together. The icy mask of indifference hid her emotions again.
"Right, then," the captain began, "let's start with what Zenkhald did."
They went down into the stuffy boiler room.
"These four furnaces here. Light them."
The stokers and trimrs (as the workers who shoveled the coal were called) were just scattering fresh black stones over the grates. Aurora silently walked up to an open firebox and placed her palm right against the coal.
A continuous stream of fla struck from her hand with a roar.
Zenkhald, standing nearby, lazily watched the process.
"Ha, I was better," he drew out. "I lit everything at once."
The captain nodded actively: "Yes, he imdiately gave it his all..."
The captain didn't have ti to finish. Aurora narrowed her eyes, and such a powerful fiery tornado burst from her hands that all the workers took a step back in horror, covering their faces from the unbearable heat.
"Hey!" Zenkhald imdiately grabbed her by the wrist. "You'll burn yourself!"
He squeezed her palm tightly in his and began to channel healing magic, genuinely not understanding why she was straining her body so much.
Aurora, whose gaze had beco terrifying, intercepted his hand. She squeezed it with inhuman strength and, with one furious jerk, hurled Zenkhald right inside the red-hot furnace.
"Wow, it's warm in here," Zenkhald's calm voice ca from the very center of the flas.
The entire boiler room was dumbfounded.
"A-are you alright?!" the engineer squeezed out, looking into the fire.
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"Well, the coal hasn't really flared up much yet," Zenkhald responded carelessly from the firebox. "She kinda roasted it weakly."
"HOW WEAKLY?!" Aurora roared.
She thrust her hands forward again, and a new, blindingly white stream of primordial fire struck the firebox.
Zenkhald, sitting in the epicenter of the hellish inferno, only laughed quietly to himself. Strange, he thought, looking at her distorted face through the tongues of fla. I completely do not feel that you want to kill . You are just very angry at . But for what?
A minute later, Zenkhald calmly stepped back out onto the iron floor of the boiler room. Absolutely naked. All his torn clothes, soaked in blood and soot, had burned to ashes.
The captain imdiately tore off his long uniform coat and threw it over him.
"Cover up!" he commanded.
"Why? What for?" Zenkhald was genuinely surprised. "It's hot. This is even better."
"Cover up, I'm telling you!" the captain barked, blushing in front of the crew. "I bought you normal clothes at the market! And go wash up, finally!"
Aurora, breathing heavily, cald down a bit. asuring the mage with an icy, disdainful gaze, she turned away and silently went to light the next furnaces.
The captain watched this, wiping sweat from his forehead, and thought of only one thing: WHAT LUCK! Two whole mages! And what mages!
"ALRIGHT!" the captain flinched.
Dead ahead, cutting across their path, a fast patrol boat was moving. On its mast proudly fluttered a green flag with an embroidered dandelion banner—the official coat of arms of Mount Slick. This ant only one thing: the final inspection of docunts and the deck before heading out into the open sea.
The captain hastily began collecting papers from the new crew mbers. "Aurora, please give your docunts," he requested. She silently handed him a thick sheet. He opened it: in the "Last Na" field it was simply empty, but there was an issue date, the necessary signatures, and a seal. Then he unfolded Zenkhald's brand-new fake docunt. The inscription "Rootless" flaunted there. But when the captain lowered his gaze, a cold sweat broke out over him. The "Issue Date" field was absolutely empty! That master counterfeiter got so carried away drawing the complex dandelion coat of arms that he forgot to write in the most important thing!
"OH CO ON... ZENKHALD!" the captain bolted from his spot and dashed into the hold as fast as his legs could carry him.
He burst into the engine room, where the mage was lazily watching the fire. "Zenkhald! Hide imdiately! And don't co out! Let's go!" He dragged the guy to an open coal bunker. "Can you burrow into the coal? Quickly!"
"Eeeeh..." Zenkhald looked with obvious displeasure at the mountains of dirty black dust. "But the clothes are new. And I just washed up."
"THIS IS A MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH!" the captain hissed, breaking into a panic.
Zenkhald looked at the terrified captain with disbelief, but didn't argue. He sighed heavily, jumped into the bunker, and obediently burrowed headfirst into the black stones. "Sit here until I tell you to co out!" the captain commanded and closed the iron door.
At this ti, the ship pulled level with the boat. They moved side-by-side, and n in Slick uniforms deftly jumped onto the deck right on the go: stern inspectors and port healers.
The inspection began. The healers examined every crew mber from head to toe: looked into mouths, checked tongues, felt bodies, examined nails and fingers for signs of scurvy, plague, or cholera. The inspection went the full nine yards; no one could avoid the examination.
Finally, the chief inspector approached the captain, gloomily checking his notes against the ship's papers. "It says here that there are fifty-one sailors on board. Including you and the first mate—fifty-three people," he said dryly. "But we only counted fifty-two. One is missing. And there is a man listed who we do not see."
The captain swallowed, thinking feverishly, and pointed a finger toward Aurora, who stood nearby with her arms crossed over her chest. "Ah, see the girl there? Aurora. The scribes simply made a mistake in the docunts, wrote male gender. You know how it is, made a mistake with the count. And anyway... well, there are so won who you can't tell at first glance—is it a man or a woman. So they mixed it up, things happen!"
The inspector only sighed tiredly and made a note in the log. "Alright."
The patrols continued inspecting the ship and went down into the boiler room, where the red-hot furnaces breathed heat. The inspectors looked into all the corners, swept a glance over the closed bunkers, and addressed the sared workers: "Once again, we strongly recomnd wearing special masks! Breathing coal dust is extrely dangerous to your health!" they snapped out the morized phrase that they had already repeated a thousand tis that day.
In the end, the inspectors went back up to the deck, nodded in satisfaction, stamped all the permits on the waybill, and jumped back onto their boat.
"Phew... That was close," the ship's captain exhaled, wiping his wet forehead with a trembling hand as they began to move away. The ocean was finally open.
The captain, having made sure the patrol boat had retreated to a safe distance, rushed to the coal bunker and hastily knocked on the iron door.
"Zenkhald, that's it! Co out!"
Zenkhald's crown appeared from the black pile. He opened his eyes and lazily rubbed coal dust from them, saring black dirt all over his face.
"You're a strange man," was all he said, looking at the captain.
Zenkhald sniffed his new, but already thoroughly smoked clothes, and added sadly: "You stink awfully. It's insulting, actually."
He reluctantly rose from the pile of coal and shook his hands. Thick black dust flew in all directions. "I WASHED UP, ACTUALLY!" the mage was loudly indignant. "And my new clothes got dirty!"
The captain got scared. He thought the guy would get angry and burn down the ship, but it turned out... "I had to, Zenkhald, understand!" the captain waved his hands placatingly. "It won't happen again, I swear! Go wash up for now."
Zenkhald angrily strode toward the stairs to the deck. Coming up top, without slowing his pace, he walked to the side and, paying no attention to anyone, simply jumped right into the churning water of the ocean.
A water vortex imdiately enveloped him obediently, carefully wiping the soot from his skin and washing the dirt out of the fabric. While the water whirled him in the air next to the ship running at full steam, Zenkhald pondered: How annoying he is. He doesn't have normal candies, slipped so stones... Why should I even travel with him? If it weren't for Aurora, I would just leave right now.
Zenkhald finished washing. The vortex gently lowered him onto the deck, leaving his new clothes absolutely clean and dry. Stretching, he looked up: at the very top of the mainmast, away from everyone, sat Aurora. With one light jump, Zenkhald flew up to the enormous height and calmly landed on the narrow wooden yardarm right next to her.
"Oh, hi. How are you?" he greeted her carelessly, settling in more comfortably and dangling his legs over the abyss.
Aurora didn't even flinch. She ignored the greeting but asked a question: "How do you heat objects without touching them? How did you light the coal without lighting a fire?"
Zenkhald scratched the back of his head, examining the horizon. "Well... coal is coal, and it should burn," he began cheerfully, but, eting Aurora's questioning look, sighed. "Alright, listen. There are different ways. You know that this whole world consists of molecules, right? They are like little bricks, imagine. Everything is made of them: air and water. And they are moving all the ti. The faster they move, the more heat there is. I simply force them to vibrate harder, and that's it—fire is ready."
Aurora listened silently, trying to wrap her head around it.
"And the second way is harder," Zenkhald continued, looking at his palms. "You need to compress the air. If you gather pure air and compress it into one point—there will be a huge BOOM! And how do I know this? Although, probably every fool knows..."
"But how do I do that?" Aurora asked sharply. "I don't understand your explanations."
Zenkhald cheered up again, dangling his legs over the deck: "That I don't know..."
Aurora frowned, looking down at him. She wasn't interested in molecule-bricks, she needed practice. "Better tell this: how do you blow up opponents?"
"What?" Zenkhald blinked, genuinely surprised. "Blow up opponents? Don't rember ever doing that."
Aurora started to boil. She was irritated by this eternal amnesia or stupidity of his. "Enough! You're annoying. How do you tear them apart from the inside, without even touching them? I've seen it."
Zenkhald froze, puzzled, rhythmically swinging his legs over the abyss. He put a finger to his lips, calculating sothing in his head. "Hmm... Ah, I think I know what you an. Well, you can blow things up in different ways. With wind magic, water, even telepathy—a bunch of possibilities."
"Wind magic," Aurora cut off. "How?"
"Oh, well that's quite simple," Zenkhald stretched lazily. "Wind magic isn't just whoosh-whoosh, you know. You just take and fill the opponent's lungs with your air. Just a tiny bit. And then you create excess pressure inside. And that's it—boom."
Aurora, from the unexpectedness and simplicity of this terrifying thod, stood up abruptly on the narrow yardarm. Imdiately, without warning, she thrust her hand toward Zenkhald, trying to apply what she had just heard.
Zenkhald laughed ringingly, childishly, and wagged a finger right in front of her nose: "Ah-ah-ah! Won't work on . I automatically regulate my internal pressure. If I didn't do that, every second mage would be able to blow up on the very first day."
Without waiting for her reaction, Zenkhald suddenly fell sideways, leaning his whole weight on Aurora. Due to the unexpected maneuver, they both lost their balance and toppled backward.
"But knowledge must be paid for!" he declared cheerfully, sprawling nearby.
Aurora, finding herself underneath him, growled with fury: "Well I never... Knowledge must be paid for? You never asked for anything before!"
"I don't understand what you an by 'before'," Zenkhald waved it off carelessly. "But here, on the ship, that's how everything is set up. Money goes there, services go here... Sailors, the captain—everyone gives sothing to each other. That's how the world works, isn't it?"
Aurora shook him forcefully, throwing him off herself, and stood up with a jerk at the very edge of the mast. She looked at him with such a mixture of hatred and bewildernt, as if she saw a completely alien creature before her. "And what, you are going to behave the sa way too? Like these... people?"
She didn't wait for an answer and simply stepped down into the emptiness, silently jumping from the enormous height onto the deck.
Zenkhald remained sitting on the mast alone. He scratched the back of his head, looking after her, and muttered quietly: "And how else should I behave?"
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