1592 Get the hail out of here!

"A raft really is good enough," said the helpless mercenary as he saw Lex putting in unnecessary effort and energy in designing the vessel they would use to cross the liquid.

"You really don't need to do all this."

"Trust me bro," said Lex as he moulded hardwood under his arms as if it was clay. "Where I'm from, it's all about the arks. You're going to be saving a bunch of people and crossing a body of water? Then you gotta go with an ark for a design. It's like giving up free good luck if you don't."

"Luck is just a derivative law of Karma, and I'm not so sure it has anything to do with vessel design," the mercenary said reluctantly.

"Don't worry about it. I'm the one putting in the extra work, so why are you so stressed?" Lex asked.

As he ran his hand over the wood, shaping it into the outer frame of the ark, he was also imbuing it with various techniques, preparing it for the final outcome.

There would be two arks, one for the mercenaries and one for the tavern, and for the sake of effectiveness, both of them would be identical in design and function.

After nearly frying his brain, it was good to work with his hands and do something simple, like design the ship that would have to face the elements, the locusts, and anything else that Abaddon had to throw at them, and survive long enough to get them across the body of purple hallucinogenic liquid.

As it turned out, high temperatures burned the vapors of the liquid straight out of the air, so the best protection would just be a heated barrier separating the inside and outside of the vessel, keeping them safe.

Of course, the ship would also have to tolerate locust attacks as well, so it couldn't be flimsy. It would also be best if it enabled those on it to fight easily if it was required.

With that in mind, Lex quickly designed and built two arks using the wood from the trees on the island they were on. It didn't take nearly as long as the mercenaries feared it would take, mostly because Lex was quite skilled in making relatively simple treasures using extremely valuable materials.

True, if someone else more skilled did it, they would be able to get more out of the same materials than Lex. But his own skill was good enough that no one could complain, either.

With the vessels ready, everyone got into position, and Lex finally deactivated the castle. The castle shrank, returning to its form as a snow globe, leaving everyone exposed once again.

The mercenaries were more than ready to face the locust armies up ahead, but those from the Inn had to be more strategic about it. Originally, Lex had planned to immediately have everyone use the battalion formation that allowed them to transform into a mech.

But since they would immediately be entering the ark, which they would need to control anyway, that was unfeasible. That meant that, for now, the weakest and most vulnerable of the workers were in the center, while the rest surrounded them.

In fact, Fenrir even used his ability on the weaker staff workers to make them less visible. The problem was that Fenrir's ability was more suited to individuals than armies, so the more people there were, the less effective it would be.

In their situation, the best it could do was make them less likely to be targeted.

Everyone was already in position before the castle was withdrawn, so the moment it disappeared, the two groups started to move. They cut through the locust armies, focusing more on pushing them aside and moving forward than killing them.

The Inn, too, had numerous members who could have wrought absolute havoc, but doing such a thing would be a waste of energy. It had already been decided that they would move in the most efficient way possible, which required dividing the work up over a large group, and doing only what was absolutely necessary. Killing an additional locust would not help them at all, so they all restrained themselves. Z, along with Leonidas, led the Inn through the locusts, following the mercenaries closely. It barely took a couple of minutes before they reached the purple liquid, and the two armies summoned their arks and quickly boarded.

The arks didn't actually float in the water, flying just over the liquid itself. That didn't stop the locusts within the liquid from going into a frenzy, and attacking the arks in a craze.

But the Inn staff, even the weaker ones, were extremely professional, and showed not a hint of fear. They immediately spread out throughout the ark, activating its many formations that relied on numerous people to run.

The first wave of locusts was instantly repelled, and the vapors of the purple liquid seemed unable to affect them at all.

"See, what did I tell you," Lex yelled over to the other ark, a wide smile on his face. "Using an ark is good luck!"

Before he could get a response, though, a clap of thunder shook the skies itself, as if a sign of divine retribution. The clear, red skies of Abaddon seemed like they were almost instantly covered in black clouds with ferocious lightning beasts flying through them, all glaring

at the arks.

The locusts, too, as if invigorated by the weather, resumed their

attack on the arks, hungry for the souls on board.

Lex felt as if he personally was being targeted. This wasn't a complaint

- it was his ability. He could see that Abaddon was specifically

targeting him for reasons he did not understand.

Before he could come to a proper conclusion about why he was being

targeted, a storm began.

It started with a single drop of rain - an insignificant drop of water,

falling alone in the vast heavens. But what followed was not more water. Instead it was hail, all of it seething with a devilish hunger as if

the hail itself craved their souls.

Oh, and the hail was the size of a Land Cruiser - or rather, 48,344

hamburgers!