Close Combat Mage

Chapter 321 – Encountering Robbers Pt. 2

Prairie Fire City was the origin of the alcohol. It didn’t only produce Blazing Liquor, but sweet rice wines as well, the world famous liquor made from Xiangshui rice. Although Suo Jia was delivering 200 bags of Xiangshui rice, this didn’t give Suo Jia too great of a profit. However, it wasn’t as bad as running around empty-handed, and they were easy to sell.

Suo Jia left Tide City with all the goods, heading full speed towards Prairie Fire City. Throughout the entire journey, SuoJia tried to avoid as many fights as he possibly could. Even if he did encounter a fight, his goal was to run away quickly, and not to get wrapped into it. He definitely didn’t try to eliminate all the magical beasts present.

Originally, avoiding fights like this should’ve been difficult with Suo Jia’s current actions. But fortunately, Suo Jia had the Diamond Dragon with its extremely powerful defense. Every time a fight was encountered, Suo Jia would let the Diamond Dragon loose to hold the magical beasts back while Suo Jia would flee by himself.

Although this trick seemed pretty difficult, it was actually very simple. Those magical beasts that had such powerful attacks were normally slower in speed, so Suo Jia could easily leave them behind, and even avoid them ahead of time. Those that were faster had lower attack power that couldn’t break the Diamond Dragon’s Glacial Armor. Throughout the whole journey, Suo Jia was able to progress with incomparable speed.

Of course, traveling like this through day and night wasn’t something that Suo Jia’s endurance could keep up with. Fortunately…although Suo Jia didn’t dare to eat Magic of Spirit Potions, he was forced to temporarily lift his ban on eating Endurance Potions.

Suo Jia relied on the support of these Endurance Potions throughout the entire journey so that he could race forwards at high speed. When his energy really reached its limit, he’d sit down and meditate deeply and profoundly. At the same time, he’d be able to quickly recover his magic power and spirit power. Like this, Suo Jia was able to charge forwards for 15 hours nearly every day.

However, walking at night meant encountering demons was inevitable. Although Suo Jia could easily escape the encirclements of magical beasts, Suo Jia finally met with a inescapable fight, right when Prairie Fire City was within his sights.

A magical beast’s IQ was extremely limited. Normally, it didn’t understand anything like battle tactics; as long as the Diamond Dragon drew its attention just for a bit, it’d completely forget Suo Jia and allow him to quickly flee the fight. But this mistake was something humans would never make!

After traveling for an entire day, Suo Jia finally found a safe area to put up his tent and begin meditating. However, soon afterwards, the Diamond Dragon keeping guard outside suddenly let out an fretful cry.

Suo Jia abruptly opened his eyes. He knew that something had definitely happened outside. Nobody dared to be careless on the Greater Trade Routes; any kind of disorganization or lack of caution would be enough to lose one’s life.

Not daring to waste any time, Suo Jia hurriedly aroused from his meditation. Although he hadn’t meditated for long, Suo Jia had only been running the whole journey, and hadn’t consumed much magic power or spirit power. His only problem was his endurance, but he could use his Endurance Potions to replenish that. No matter what kind of enemy he encountered, Suo Jia would have to power to face the other party.

Anybody on the Greater Trade Routes had to be prepared to battle at any time. Nobody dared to ever let themselves fall into a drained state. Otherwise, if a battle just broke out unexpectedly, one would die an extremely horrible death. One had to constantly maintain their peak condition, something that the adventurers on the Routes would always consider.

Suo Jia opened his tent flap to see six tall and large figures standing before him. Suo Jia concentrated on these figures; judging from the emblems they wore, Suo Jia could ascertain that since leaving the relay station, Suo Jia had encountered an adventurer group for the first time!

Suo Jia activated Spirit’s Eye and seriously surveyed the other party. Of the other party’s Life Protection strips, four were green and two were red. The four people with green energy levels were all warriors, while the two with red energy levels were a fire elemental mage and a wind elemental thief!

Suo Jia didn’t dare tarry under such circumstances where he knew nothing about his enemy. He quickly raised Water God’s Shield. At the same time, Suo Jia hid the Diamond Dragon behind him. If anything went wrong, the Diamond Dragon would quickly transform, summon its Glacial Armor, and enter the battle.

Seeing that Suo Jia was alone, and the fact that his emblem indicated that he was a leader of a merchant group, the opposing six people smiled evilly. They knew that as long as they got rid of Suo Jia, all the goods he was carrying would become theirs.

After seeing the 10 interspatial rings on Suo Jia’s fingers, especially the peak grade ring, these guys could tell that there were definitely many treasures stored within. Besides…even if the rings were empty, these 10 interspatial rings alone were enough to make them drool.

Under the pressure of numbers, as well as being at such close distance, the group of four warriors, one thief, and one mage could easily kill a single mage without question. No matter how powerful Suo Jia was, there was no way he’d be able to escape.

Seeing the four warriors pull out their weapons with dark grins on their faces, the wind elemental thief concealing his body in the air, and the fire mage raise his staff, Suo Jia knew that this was battle was unavoidable.

Suo Jia said in a low voice, “Diamond Dragon, hurry up and go out. This battle…is one we can’t run away from!”

Hearing Suo Jia’s words, the Diamond Dragon that had been hiding behind Suo Jia the whole time suddenly flapped its wings, and its body leapt up from the ground like an arrow above Suo Jia’s head. At the same time, layers of Glacial Armor appeared one after another on the Diamond Dragon’s body. While this was happening, Suo Jia’s figure slowly vanished in the air.

“Huh?” The four warriors that had quickly rushed forwards to surround Suo Jia all stared at the place he’d disappeared from in confusion. It couldn’t be that….the guy was a thief, and not a mage?

Before the enemy could make sense of the situation, the Diamond Dragon had already fallen from the air and smashed down onto the ground with incomparably imposing force. At the same time, the fire elemental mage raised his staff, and a scarlet cloud of fire suddenly materialized above the Diamond Dragon as fireballs the size of soccer balls began to descend from the fiery cloud one after another.

The Diamond Dragon raised its head to look at the cloud and the corners of its mouth twitched in contempt. This was to be expected…even idiots knew that the water element suppressed the fire element. The Diamond Dragon’s favorite opponents were those with the fire element. Any such opponents would end up decimated miserably in front of the Diamond Dragon.

No matter how hot the flames were, melting a huge chunk of ice 10 meters in diameter wasn’t something that could be achieved in only 8-10 minutes. Before an ice elemental creature, the might of fire magic was at its lowest point.

Seeing the soccer ball-sized fireballs disappear on the Diamond Dragon’s body one after another, the fire elemental mage’s expression couldn’t help but freeze. This kind of result really made him lose face. However…if he knew the Diamond Dragon’s identity, he probably wouldn’t be so depressed. Immunity to fire was a Diamond Dragon’s greatest trait.

While the fire mage was sulking, a sudden bone-piercing chill made him utter a few jumbled cries. He looked around in shock to see that a pale blue mist had at some point materialized around him.

“Hu…”With a powerful shriek, the fire Magister watched with wide eyes as hundreds of ice blades all flew explosively at him from the same point…wildly slicing at his body.

“Ice Roar!” The fire mage couldn’t help but shout in fear. Everyone knew that the Ice Roar was a Great Mage’s trademark skill, as well as the ice mage’s most powerful small ranged attack. Its extreme attack power could easily destroy any defense. Although the fire mage had five companions by his side, he couldn’t feel any trace of security while facing the Ice Roar. In fact, it was the complete opposite; the thought of certain death quickly arose in his mind.