Supreme Magus novel Chapter 3967

Chapter 3967: The Right Direction (Part 2)

Taken individually, these annoyances were a small price to pay to have so much fertile land and the Overlord’s support. As a whole, however, they were a cruel torture to the merfolk.

They hated the feeling of getting dirty while working the fields, the heat of the day, the cold of the night, and the sluggishness of their movements. Without the water supporting their supple bodies, the merfolk were clumsy and slow.

While a single stroke of their webbed limbs propelled them dozens of meters forward at astounding speed in the ocean, one step covered an insignificant distance on the surface.

The Blood Desert’s oasis had beautiful colors and delicious food, but that was it. As the excitement of novelty wore off, many merfolk had started regretting their choice to come to the surface and craved the cool embrace of the sea.

It was the reason fixing the Desert Heart was so important, and Salaark had asked Lith not to intervene too much. If a merfolk solved the problem and their people decided to settle on the surface as a result, they would have gone down in merfolk history.

If Lith solved the problem, instead, it would have been a footnote among his lesser feats, and the merfolk would have moved on to grumbling about the next item on the long list of their grievances.

Lith and the others had no idea how complex the situation actually was and took a nap at the end of the banquet. The sudden change of climate and time zone took a toll on everyone, but especially on the children.

Rem was still working on the Desert Heart when she was notified that her guests had woken up.

’Thank the sea gods I promised Lith I’d teach the swimming technique of my people to his little ones.’ She thought. ’It’s the perfect excuse to spend the rest of the day in the water without looking like a hypocrite.’

Rem was tired, drenched in sweat, and her head hurt. She was no Songster, and her magical abilities outside of combat were limited. Yet she had given her all to lead the other merfolk by example and not let them get discouraged by the endless issues they encountered.

Making the Desert Heart roughly reproduce a single merfolk song like Lith had done was easy. Making it echo a symphony of harmonious sounds without discordant notes from multiple songs overlapping at the same time was another story entirely.

Luckily for Rem, the Songsters were experts in their job, and with each progress they made, they grew more confident in their ability to bring the work entrusted to them to completion.

They had already reached the point where their pride as merfolk and professionals made failure a personal affront.

’Rem is right.’ The Songsters thought, each on their own. ’Our ancestors have left in-depth instructions about how to craft surface Sea Hearts. The problem is that most of the terms used to describe them belong to now-dead merfolk languages.

’If we understand to which modern word those terms correspond, completing the Desert Heart will be a piece of algae. Even if we don’t, I refuse to let Mogar know that while every single gods-damned race moved forward, we merfolk are the only ones who regressed!’

Rem left the dim light of the tent, and the scorching sun of the Desert welcomed her, forcing her to shield her eyes with her hands.

"Change your clothes before you meet my Featherlings. You are indecent." Salaark appeared out of thin air and pointed at the Rem’s desert robe. It was soaked in sweat and stuck to the merfolk like a second skin. "Also, you smell."

Rem looked down, discovering that she could see through the fabric that was supposed to cover her. She wore a special bathing suit underneath, but it was still unbecoming to anyone who wasn’t a beast.

Worst of all, Salaark was right about the smell. Another unpleasant surprise of living on the surface was that the merfolk had discovered that their sweat carried the stench of dead fish.

"You’re right, Overlord. I’m sorry." Rem gave Salaark a bow before jogging towards her home.

***

"Weird. Rem has never been late before." Lith shrugged. "I’ll wait for her on the beach."

"Yes, finally!" The kids shapeshifted their clothes into bathing suits and turned to their parents with an expectant look.

"Why are you looking at me like that, sweetie?" Elina asked.

"Aren’t you going to swim with me like always, Mom?" Aran asked.

"What? No!" Elina turned beet red in embarrassment.

’I’d rather die than show my almost naked body to a bunch of strangers.’ She thought.

’I don’t care about the swimsuit, but I don’t want everyone to draw comparisons between my body and the Verhens’.’ The huntress thought, her pride hurting at the mere idea.

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