During the daytime, somewhere on the vast sea.
The sky was clear, the sun was bright, and the sea was surging. In the vast expanse of the sea and sky, a huge white passenger ship was cutting through the blue waves and sailing forward. On the deck of the passenger ship, countless travelers were gathered, enjoying the sea view and having afternoon tea in the good weather.
Somewhere on the large platform of the stern deck of the cruise ship, next to a fixed outdoor dining table with an umbrella, Miss Dorothy, dressed in a white dress in the style of a sailor's uniform and with her hair in a single side ponytail, was sitting here, enjoying the sea breeze while having the desserts prepared on the ship and leisurely drinking afternoon tea. Across from her was Naifnis, wearing sunglasses, a plaid shirt, and light-colored clothes, who was currently sitting with her legs crossed, looking at the vast sea in the distance.
"I didn't expect... after only a year, I would have to go to North Wu again... Being an Extraordinary feels similar to us who study archaeology, often going out for fieldwork..." Naifnis said while drinking tea, and Miss Dorothy, who was listening to her, couldn't help but raise her eyebrows slightly, then asked in return.
"Oh, then Senior Nefelnis, do you think being an Extraordinary is more tiring, or attending university classes is more tiring?"
Miss Dorothy asked this, and listening to her words, Naifnis couldn't help but tap her chin with her finger and think for a moment, then answered.
"Well... I feel that being an Extraordinary is more difficult. First of all, there are too many dangerous things, not to mention that. Secondly, every time I go out, it's a long trip, the kind that goes abroad, and the round trip alone is very tiring. I feel that the various experiences I had last year were more than the sum of my experiences in the past decade or so, and almost all of them were terrifying. When I came back in the second half of the year and attended classes normally, I felt so relieved and comfortable...
"If it weren't for the curse problem in my family, perhaps I wouldn't have deeply involved myself in the Extraordinary field, at most it would just be a hobby, but my family's curse is destined, and I was probably born unable to enjoy such a comfortable life..."
Neff said with some emotion, and Miss Dorothy, listening to her words, slowly spoke after taking a sip of tea.
"It's okay, after your family's curse is lifted, you can choose whatever life you want, but by then, having deeply entered the hidden world, it will probably be a bit difficult to fully return to a normal life."
"Ha... as long as the difficult problem of that pharaoh's curse is resolved, there is no difficulty in this world that I cannot overcome. Anyway, I hope that this trip to North Wu will find clues related to lifting the curse. I have been on leave for a long time and have definitely missed many classes. It would be too much of a loss if I went back empty-handed."
With a light laugh, Neff said this to Miss Dorothy, and Miss Dorothy also responded with a smile after listening to her statement.
"Don't worry, your academic career is the least of your worries. If you really can't let it go, I can spend some time self-studying to the level of your professor and then give you special tutoring. I absolutely guarantee that you will not fail to graduate."
"Ah... really..." Listening to Miss Dorothy's words, Naifnis couldn't help but be slightly stunned, then scratched her head and said. At this time, she remembered the experience of being taught by Miss Dorothy hand in hand before, and to be honest, the pressure at that time was much greater than when she was attending classes normally.
Seeing Neff's reaction, Miss Dorothy continued to smile and turned her head to look at the endless sea beside her. Then, at this moment, she was also thinking about what she would encounter when she went to North Wu again this time.
...
After returning to Tivian for a brief period of preparation, Miss Dorothy, with the "school documents" given by Beverly, found Grego again and said that she was going to be an exchange student for a semester at another famous foreign university, so she would not be in Tivian for some time in the future.
Since the matter concerned Miss Dorothy's academic career, and Beverly had also invited an influential figure in the education world who had a relationship with Crown University and had enough weight in the mundane world to support her sister's future, Grego agreed to Miss Dorothy's exchange student plan without much thought and was even more proud of his sister's excellent academic performance.
The reason why Grego so readily agreed to Miss Dorothy's travel proposal again, in addition to his sincere concern for Miss Dorothy's academic career, was also because he felt that Tivian had become increasingly unstable in recent times.
The Eight Point Nest's penetration into the official Extraordinary institutions was deeply rooted and could not be eradicated for a long time. After returning to Tivian, there were traces of their activities everywhere in the city. Last year, there was even a situation where a cult openly attacked the Church. The original Archbishop of Prit was seriously injured for unknown reasons and forced to return to Holy Mountain to recuperate. The director of the An Yin Bureau here was also injured in the cult's open attack, St. Yong Cathedral became a battlefield, and large-scale Extraordinary phenomena raged outside the city.
After experiencing all these periods, Grego felt that Tivian, the capital of Prit, was no longer safe. It was targeted by various Extraordinary forces, and even Extraordinary of the Crimson Tier could not absolutely protect themselves here, let alone ordinary civilians. Although there have not been large-scale Extraordinary disasters that have severely affected civilians, Grego, who has seen various signs, believes that it would not be surprising if such things happen now.
Therefore, Grego is now very inclined to have Miss Dorothy temporarily leave Tivian and live elsewhere. It is not too late to return after this dangerous period has passed.
Thus, after Miss Dorothy obtained Grego's consent and was ready, she immediately bought a ship ticket to North Wu and took Naifnis with her to embark on the journey again. Since this journey might involve contacting a Necromancer Lord like Hafdall and there was a chance to find a way to lift her family's curse, Neff also directly agreed to start the journey with Miss Dorothy again.
Miss Dorothy and Naifnis set sail from Tivian by ship and transferred at various coastal ports in different countries along the way. After spending about two weeks, they finally arrived in North Wu again, this hot sand continent they had set foot on before.
Like the previous time and many other travelers who came to North Wu, the first stop for Miss Dorothy and Naifnis in North Wu was still Kankdar, known as the gateway to North Wu.
In this largest port city of North Wu, Miss Dorothy and Naifnis temporarily stopped their journey and stayed here. While resting peacefully and alleviating the fatigue of the journey, they were also revisiting the old place and feeling the recent changes in the city. Of course, their wait was not purely for rest, but genuinely waiting for someone.
...
The sky was clear and the sun was shining brightly. It was an afternoon a few days after Miss Dorothy and Naifnis arrived in Kankdar. At Kankdar Port, it was bustling and lively at this time, with a lot of noise.
On the wide dock, countless Kankdar citizens were gathered at this moment, filling almost all the free space on the port. Among them were people from the Main Continent in the foreign district, as well as many dark-skinned North Wu locals living on the outskirts of the city.
On this fine afternoon, these citizens of Kankdar were gathered together, holding banners and looking expectantly towards the sea under the scorching sun. Amidst the noise and excitement, they were waiting for a familiar and distinguished guest to visit the city again.
At this moment, a huge ship had docked on the water of the pier. It had thick iron armor with various religious story reliefs printed on it, densely engraved mysterious inscriptions, scriptures hanging everywhere like signal flags, twin-barreled thick cannons mounted on the front and rear decks, a shocking ram... This massive warship weighing tens of thousands of tons, with extremely distinct Church characteristics, was quietly moored at the largest berth in the port.
The people of Kankdar had seen Church warships, but this was the first time they had seen one of this magnitude. This warship was much taller than ordinary buildings and significantly larger than the warships usually docked at Kankdar Port. Even experienced merchants at the scene had rarely seen such a warship. Only a few nobles, officials, and experienced sailors knew the general origin of this warship.
This is the main battleship of the Church fleet, the true core force of the Church fleet, and the cornerstone of the Church's naval power. Although these main battleships have multiple levels and are deployed in different fleets, they rarely appear in the eyes of ordinary people because they rarely participate in escort missions. They only sail and are maintained between military ports and usually only perform annihilation missions.
In fact, the Church's main battleships do not completely avoid participating in escort missions, but they rarely do. If a main battleship can participate in an escort, the escorted object must be an extremely distinguished and noble existence. Under normal circumstances, only heads of state and the Church's own Archbishops have such treatment. However, the main battleship participating in the escort this time was precisely carrying out such an escort mission, and it has now completed the mission.
Amidst the cheers from the dock, a white figure appeared at the edge of the giant ship's deck, surrounded by many people. The moment that figure appeared, the cheers on the dock reached their peak, and the surrounding atmosphere instantly heated up to a boiling point. Many people in the crowd were shouting a title, Sister Vanya.
At the edge of the giant ship's deck, Vanya, in her iconic white nun's habit, saw the magnificent and enthusiastic scene before her and couldn't help but freeze in place, seemingly shocked by the enthusiastic and magnificent scene.
In fact, she was not unfamiliar with this kind of scene. She had seen it about a year ago, but the scale and enthusiasm at that time were far less than the current one.
Although there were not few people who came to welcome Vanya at that time, it was only a few hundred people organized by the Kankdar municipality, mainly to give the Church some face, which was more of a ceremonial nature. But this time is different. At least tens of thousands of people are here to welcome her on this spacious dock, and most of them are ordinary citizens. Their enthusiasm doesn't seem to be organized, but spontaneous.
The difference reflects the significant increase in Vanya's popularity within this short year. In the consecutive events in Adus and the subsequent events, Vanya's influence is expanding greatly throughout the world, from being just a nun publicized in the Church's newspapers to the level of a world star.
And this change is particularly evident in Kankdar, because of the Kankdar incident, the citizens here have associated Vanya more with this city. In the incident, Vanya's experience of being framed for assassination and being wronged has been legendary here and has given rise to many different wonderful or bizarre legendary stories. Some of the scenes of the assassination incident and the hotel room where Vanya stayed have now become small attractions, and countless local or foreign tourists are vying to visit them. The scene before us is a true reproduction of Vanya's popularity in Kankdar.
'So many people... are they all placing their hopes on me?'
Looking at the enthusiastic sea of people before her, Vanya thought in her heart with some astonishment. Being loved and hoped for by so many people made her feel at a loss, and even a little afraid. Her current position was too high compared to before, so high that she was a little scared. She was afraid of what it would be like if she accidentally fell.
"Lord... please protect me..."
After silently praying in her heart, Vanya mustered up her courage and stepped out, walking down the long gangway with a smile amidst the enthusiastic welcome of the crowd below.
And at this moment, a thin iron chain was hanging around her neck, extending into her clothes. Inside her clothes, an old Holy Mother pendant was hanging there, swaying slightly with Vanya's steps.
...
"Ah... Sister Vanya's popularity seems to have increased significantly again. It feels like it's almost comparable to Miss Adele..." At this time, at the edge of the welcome site on the dock, Naifnis, wearing a North Wu robe, was looking at Vanya in the distance walking down the gangway surrounded by countless people, and couldn't help but sigh, while Miss Dorothy, also wearing a smaller robe, slowly responded beside her.
"Adele's popularity is probably only higher than Vanya's in Tivian. Vanya's popularity worldwide is much higher than Adele's. The Church's propaganda ability is not comparable to that of an entertainment company."
"Hmm... is that so? But I think, if Miss Adele directly asked Miss Dorothy to be her agent, perhaps her fame wouldn't be much worse than Sister Vanya in the end. After all, if you spend a long time with her, you will always encounter something big that can make headlines, and if you handle it well, you won't have to worry about exposure." Neff said to Miss Dorothy with interest, and Miss Dorothy also smiled and spoke after hearing it.
"In a sense, I've long been your and Vanya's agent, haven't I? I've specifically and seriously designed your public images."
"Ah? Mine? When?" Listening to Miss Dorothy's words, Neff said with a surprised expression, while Miss Dorothy replied directly without changing her expression.
"Of course, Thief K~ Your fame in this identity is not inferior to any ordinary celebrity, and this public image of yours is my proud work."
Miss Dorothy said this, and Naifnis was directly awkward after listening to her words, then scratched her head and continued to speak.
"Uh... let's not talk about this topic anymore... By the way, Sister Vanya has arrived, how should we arrange the next step?"
"Naturally, we will follow Vanya's group to Adus, and then transfer to Buserite there, but before officially going to Buserite, we also need to meet some old friends in Adus first." With her hands crossed in front of her chest, Miss Dorothy said this, and Naifnis nodded silently and murmured after listening to her words.
"Old friends..."