Chapter 257 257

The Chief glanced at the two city folks with a deep expression on her face. Her thoughts unknown to others

"Who are you people?" She asks the important question. As she is someone that is previously wary of Rezen even though the man is only an apprentice mage, what more for these two that she cannot determine the strength of?

All the Chief want is to protect her tribe and her basic reaction when facing people she is not familiar with is wariness. Even Rezen has to contribute enough to the tribe before the Chief decided to accept him more openly

"Hello, Chief of the Waterside Tribe. I am Philome and my companion here is Wermon" Philome introduced herself and Wermon before starting to explain the same thing that she explained to Rezen

"We came from the only city that we humans built called the City of Hope. Ah, a city is a large place where many tribes gathered and with our collective strength, we fight against the magic beasts to ensure everyone's safety and survival"

"In our City, we have thousands of Junior Mages from the 1st cycle to the peak. We also have mages at the Senior and Great Rank that are above the Junior Rank"

Just like what Philome did to Rezen, she started to sell the City of Hope as if she was some insurance agent

"With the strength of our people, we gathered many resources, consolidated countless magical knowledge, and we also have a lot of instructors making it easy for mages to grow"

"Our city was established a thousand years ago and even now, it is still standing strong. In terms of safety, we can guarantee everything"

"I and my companion here is the representative of our city and we would like to invite your tribe to join us. Together, we could build an even stronger and safer city"

This is the first time that the tribesmen heard the ranks above the Junior Rank. After all, not to mention a Senior Mage or a Great Mage, the nearby tribes don't even have Junior Mages at the 3rd cycle

They can't even start to comprehend just how strong Senior and Great Mages are, it was beyond their understanding

"Is that so? I'm sorry but we don't plan on joining your city" the Chief directly rejected and Rezen almost bit her head

He badly wants to join this city and even if that is not the case, it wouldn't do them good to reject such powerful people

"W-why not? We can offer protection and many spectacular things. Look, this is called a flying stick. By injecting mana into the artifact, one could fly! Even apprentices as long as they have enough mana could fly! This wondrous thing is common in our city, almost everyone has it!"

Philome spoke with a bit of desperation in her tone and she even demonstrated the flying stick. She rode on the stick while injecting her mana

As soon as the flying stick absorbed her mana, it floated and Philome skillfully controlled it as she circled around

All the tribesmen were simply amazed by her demonstration. Some even clapped their hands and some grabbed the flying stick as if they want to experience flying too

Seeing that, Rezen internally facepalmed himself. The second-hand embarrassment was so severe that it might as well be called first-hand embarrassment

It made him feel like he brought a girlfriend home but his embarrassing family was embarrassing him

"Don't say to anyone that you are my neighbor" Rezen thought while staring at the shameless Treen that is one of the people that held the flying stick while Philome was riding on it

Philome herself became uncomfortable and she stopped flying around

"See? Isn't the flying stick great? If you join our city, all of you could have your own flying sticks too! Why don't you want to join us?"

The Chief herself was amazed by the artifact but she is still firm in her decision and she once again displayed intelligence that is not easily seen from tribal people

"If your city is great and even has mages above the Junior Rank, why do you even need us? The strongest mage we could offer is a Junior Mage at the 2nd cycle, your city should have many mages at that level"

At that, Philome winced. The Chief asked the question that hits her on her weak spot

While the City indeed has a lot of such mages, they also have a lot of enemies and many of their mages are also not stationed inside the city itself

Many mages were sent on expeditions to uncover and gather precious resources of heaven and earth

Humans only have one city and the resources around it were already exploited by them. If they want to nourish powerful mages, they must have the necessary resources

As such, all factions aside from keeping the minimum number of mages to defend the city mandatorily send their people outside the city to bring resources back

Even if humans could create gardens to nourish Spirit Plants, the yield would be far from enough

That is one of the reasons why the Elders are against bringing tribal people to the City as they would have to share the limited resources

It's just that they are lacking enough personnel or more like cannon fodders to defend the new city being created

People like Philome and Wermon even know why instead of just recruiting more people from the city, the city opted to use tribal people but the core reason is not something they could say

Even Rezen wouldn't be able to know the real reason why tribal people are chosen without entering the city first

"You don't have a choice" Wermon that was originally keeping his silence suddenly spoke and his words made the atmosphere tense

"Huh?! Are you planning to force us?!"

"This bastard! Come here, I'll skin you alive!"

"I'll feed you to the magic beasts!"

As expected, the temper of the tribesmen flared and they aggressively glared at the city folks

For a moment, Rezen noticed that a lost look appeared on Wermon's stoic face

Knowing that Wermon's words could be easily misunderstood, Philome hit him in the arm with her elbow while smiling awkwardly at the tribesmen

"Ah... hahaha... t-that's not what he meant. A-actually, we are not the only representatives of our city a-and the others are more aggressive than we are"

"Chief, y-you mentioned before that your tribe's strongest mage is at the 2nd cycle, right? The representatives don't lack mages at the 3rd, or even at the 4th and 5th cycle"

"W-we are willing to negotiate and won't force you but if the other representatives come here, t-they might do something... b-bad and force your tribe to accept what they want!"

Philome tried to explain the situation as much as she could but the short-tempered tribesmen seems to not care

"Force us?! Who do they think they are?!"

"Just wait until Stone Head finishes his hunt, he would kill your people!"

"We wouldn't be forced to do something we don't like!"

The tribesmen didn't know how dangerous the situation was but Rezen is different

Rezen doesn't doubt the words of Philome as there is no reason for people like them to lie

If even just a single 3rd cycle mage comes here, the Waterside Tribe is done for what more for mages at the 4th and 5th cycle? A single move might be enough for such people to massacre all of them

"Everyone!" Rezen shouted to gather everyone's attention and all eyes turned to stare at him

"I don't think that Brother Wermon and Sister Philome are lying and realistically speaking, we are not much for a 3rd cycle mage much less 4th or 5th cycle ones!"

"Their offer is rather good and there is also the chance that our people could grow stronger than ever. Why don't we consider their offer seriously? Are we really going to reject the protection from mages above the Junior Rank?"

"Besides, if the other representatives force us, how can we even resist them? We would all die and our tribe would cease to exist!"

Rezen gave them the slap of reality. The truth is they are weak and are far from being a match for the opposing side they might as well accept the offer

"That might be the case but we can't just trust them. Everyone, pack your belongings and food, and we will search for a secluded new home. We have enough food to last until the end of winter, it's no problem if we stay in hiding" the Chief announced

Considering that the Chief's prestige is the highest, even Rezen wouldn't find it easy to change the minds of the tribesmen

They are more stubborn than expected but that is only because they don't understand how dire the situation is

Rezen doesn't know how powerful the representatives are but he knows that they are far from being weak