Translated by XephiZ

Edited by Aelryinth

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Time passed quickly as Mo Fan and Zhao Manyan had a pleasant conversation with the girls along the journey. On top of that, they had successfully attracted enmity from the rest of the male students.

It was obvious that their mentor had gone to talk to Heidi. Even though they were interested in Heidi too, they did not dare offend their mentor, and they could not flirt with Mu Bai, either. The girls on their side were constantly giggling after being teased by Mo Fan and Zhao Manyan; this was a great blow to their dignity!

Men were usually able to get along with one another, but when there were women involved, they would immediately glare at one another, and had the urge to compete to show who was better!

"May I ask why are you going to Cairo? Are you tourists? You should be more careful, Cairo isn't the safest place now. The undead occasionally dig their way out of the ground. You made the right choice by following us; at least you are safe with us," a man with a seemingly noble aura behind Zoey exclaimed. He was well-dressed: boots, gentry hat, a huge coat, with a well-mannered bearing. "Oh, I'm Ferrero. I'm from the Golden Rose Clan in Provence," Ferrero finished up.

"Ferrero, isn't Provence where the biggest sea of flowers in the world is? Can we all go to your house after we graduate?" Zoey smiled.

Zoey seemed quite popular in the group. She was close to everyone there.

"My pleasure! When you're there, you will feel that everyone in Provence is as elegant as the flowers. People are raised differently in different places. I once went to the east, and I noticed that the uncivilized, barren land normally raised uncivilized, ill-mannered people too, so I did not have a good impression of the place… Of course, meeting you all changed my mind a little. At least your courage to dare approach anyone you come across is rather impressive," Ferrero said. His words immediately grabbed the attention of the rest of the travelers.

Zhao Manyan and Mo Fan were no retards; if they could not tell the guy was talking down to them, they could really go die!

"Oh, I almost forgot," Ferrero knew how to secure the limelight. He noticed that many of the women were looking at him. He immediately took out a few small bottles and said, "I brought these from my home, I was planning to give it to the strangers I met along the journey. It is called Magical Dew. With just a little drop, it will give you the fragrance of golden roses, which lasts for a week. The golden rose is a friendly flower. Even demon creatures don't want to trample them. Therefore, the Magical Dew might help prevent demon creatures from attacking you..."

The convoy of camel riders consisted of around eighty people. Ferrero's action immediately gave every woman in the convoy a good impression of him!

When Ferrero was done with his show, he glanced at Mo Fan and Zhao Manyan proudly as if he was trying to say, You two country bumpkins are nothing when it comes to picking up chicks!

"Mo Fan, I have a strong urge to curse someone," Zhao Manyan was almost at his limit. He grunted, "That son of a b**ch!"

"We all have different skills when it comes to picking up girls. There's no need to curse him. If he really gets on your nerves, just find a chance to beat the crap out of him. Make sure his face is fully swollen," Mo Fan replied.

There was no need for an argument if one could settle it with a fight. It was a principle that Mo Fan strongly adhered to!

The joy of a journey didn't come just from meeting beautiful strangers, but the chance to teach some self-assured idiots a lesson too. It was their motivation to travel extensively!

"Don't do anything reckless, I can tell that they are no weaklings," Mu Bai interrupted.

After a brief observation, Mu Bai noticed that these students were most likely the elites of the European University Institute; they are at least on par with the national team!

"Even if you can beat the students, can you beat their mentor?" Mu Bai added, continuing to pour cold water on them.

"Mu Bai, why can't you ever learn? We are meant to be on the same side. Don't you know that? Think about it; if we really beat the crap out of them, do you think they are still going to be friendly toward you?" Zhao Manyan said.

"I just don't want to cause any trouble," Mu Bai emphasized.

"How can you say that we are trying to cause some trouble? First of all, wasn't their shameless mentor trying to flirt with Heidi first? Zhao Manyan and I have only gone to flirt with their girls so we won't suffer any losses, but they start to humiliate us because of how narrow-minded they are. They humiliated our entire ethnicity as Asians; do you really think we should tolerate it? You really lack the sense of belonging to part of an ethnic group if that's the case. Do you know what Chairman Shao Zheng told me? He said, 'It's inevitable to meet people that like to pick on the Asians when we are traveling. We, as the representatives of the younger generation, should get our minds right. We shouldn't assume that they did not mean it. Perhaps they really deserve a beating in the first place. If we tolerate their actions, they might continue to mock on our people. However, if we punch them in the face and knock a few of their teeth off, they might go easy on us Asians next time'," Mo Fan said righteously.

Mu Bai clearly admired reputable leaders. He was easily convinced if a statement was made by some authoritative figures.

"Did Chairman Shao Zheng really say that?" Mu Bai asked curiously.

"Of course, you can ask him when you see him next time!" Mo Fan said.

"Mo Fan, why do I remember the chairman only told us to be more careful when we were out of the country?" Zhao Manyan said softly after recalling what the chairman had said when they were on the national team.

"Precisely, he was asking us to be careful of these narcissists!" Mo Fan answered.

"They are always people that are proud of themselves. Just ignore him," Mu Bai said.

"It's so boring to hang around with someone like you," Zhao Manyan sighed.

---

While Mo Fan and Zhao Manyan were discussing how they should teach Ferrero a lesson, dark clouds gradually showed up ahead of the convoy. They gathered into a huge mushroom blossoming between the sky and the ground. The cluster of clouds gradually grew bigger as the convoy proceeded with their journey. It felt like the clouds were constantly growing and spreading.

"We will reach Cairo soon. The area below the clouds is the battlefield. It covers a wide area, so it's very likely we will bump into some demon creatures around the outskirts if we are trying to enter the city," the aged leader of the convoy, Halla, informed everyone.

Halla was an average Intermediate Mage. He would normally see how many powerful Mages were coming along before deciding on the capacity of his convoy.

He was quite experienced, and knew how to avoid the undead and demon creatures. As a matter of fact, experience was more important than strength most of the time, since they could never kill all the demon creatures...

After the convoy traveled another three kilometers, Halla's expression suddenly darkened. He asked everyone to stop and said sternly, "I'm sorry, we might have to turn around."

"Turn around? Are you being serious? We have come all the way here!"

"Yeah, what do you mean by turning around? Can't we just avoid the battlefield?" a Wind Mage asked.

There was Mo Fan's group, the students of the European University Institute, and around eight other Mages; the rest of the people were all merchants, or people that had to go to Cairo for urgent matters.

These merchants mainly focused on businesses related to war. They were constantly walking on deadly reefs, risking being swept away by the waves.

Half of the Mages that had tagged along were hired by the merchants. They were mostly Intermediate Mages. The scale of the business that these merchants were doing was quite big if they could afford to hire Intermediate Mages.

A plump merchant stared at the thick clouds on the horizon.

Even though he was scared, it was not enough to drive him away. He said to Halla, "I will pay you double the money, bring us into Cairo through a safer route. I can't afford to wait any longer. The value of my goods will drop by half if I wait another day. Those unscrupulous businessmen won't hesitate to take advantage of me!"

"I'm responsible for your safety. Judging from the clouds, every route we can take will be crawling with demon creatures. Turning around is the wisest decision here. Your business might be important, but staying alive is more important, brother," Halla said.

"I will pay triple!" the merchant clenched his teeth and raised three fingers!

"You didn't get what I mean, it's really too dangerous..."

"Four times!"

"Deal," Halla agreed decisively.

It took Mo Fan some time to collect his thoughts after hearing the conversation between the two.

Holy crap, ploys everywhere!

"Brother, you don't have to fawn upon him. We are students of the European University Institute. Do you really have to worry about the demon creatures if you follow us into the city?" one of the students named Leon spoke up.

Leon was the guy who spoke up when Zhao Manyan approached Sofia. He was a lot worse than Ferrero, nothing but a hot-headed person with a jealous nature.

"I'm indeed less worried knowing that you are with us, but Halla is still very reliable when it comes to choosing the safest route," the merchant said.

The European University Institute might be impressive, but they were still going to die if its students led them right into the demon creatures' nest!

"Students of the European University Institute, everyone that we meet is a friend of ours. If there's any danger ahead, please try your best to protect the others," their mentor Vani told them.

"We'll do our best!" the students responded.

It was a very common way to build up the reputation of a school. Vani was smart enough to advertise for his school, as something like this would spread easily among the common people!