Chapter 166: The Mermaid Race

Chapter 166: Chapter 166: The Mermaid Race

It took a full three days for Jeremy to clearly grasp his specific identity in the illusion.

During those three days, he almost never left the palace’s library. Lorelin thought her prince was being tormented by the curse to the point of wanting to find a cure in books, so not only did she not stop him, but she also personally brought food right to his table. Thanks to that, Jeremy read almost everything he needed to read without having to ask anyone a single question.

This palace was named the Glazed Sapphire Sea Palace, the territory of the Mermaid royal family belonging to the aquatic race.

The factions in this sea area were currently divided into two major sides.

One was the Mermaid race he currently belonged to. The other was their mortal enemy - the Ice Dragon race.

Between the two races was an irreconcilable blood feud for generations. In the royal family’s historical archives, an entire long bookshelf only recorded exactly one thing: the list of battles between the two sides, stretching across hundreds of generations of kings. The ink on the last page was still fresh.

Mermaid blood could wash away the backlash Ice Dragons had to suffer after awakening their bloodline.

If an Ice Dragon swallowed the heart and life orb of a Mermaid, their bloodline would become purer, and their strength would also increase. ℯℯ𝑙.

The nobler the Mermaid’s bloodline, the stronger the strength, the purer the power in the heart and life orb.

If they swallowed a member of the royal family, the Ice Dragon would seize the most supreme pure ice.

They could even undergo a second bloodline awakening, becoming a supreme demigod, just one step away from the threshold of apotheosis.

For thousands of years, Ice Dragons always took pride in hunting Mermaids. Even the trial in the race’s coming-of-age ceremony was to hunt a Mermaid, and they had to bring the heart back before the ancestral shrine.

The coming-of-age ceremony for the Ice Dragon royal family in particular was even stricter: they had to hunt a descendant of the Mermaid royal family.

However, Mermaids weren’t weaklings either.

They were exactly the same. The coming-of-age ceremony was also to hunt someone from the opposing race. Swallow the heart, snatch the dragon orb.

And the heart and dragon orb of an Ice Dragon could wash away the Mermaid’s innate bloodline curse. Not only was it a miracle drug that extended life, but it also elevated their power intensity, even having a probability of causing them to evolve a second time, transforming into a Flood Dragon.

Both races bore backlashes or curses upon themselves. The heart along with the life orb or dragon orb were indispensable things to break that limit, even helping them become stronger.

For that benefit, the two races slaughtered each other. The fires of war had never ceased.

Every generation of kings upon ascending to the throne swore to end the war, and every generation of kings died in the midst of war.

As for his current identity, he was the Ninth Prince of the Mermaid race.

He found his name in the royal family genealogy, the ninth line, thin ink strokes, next to it a small note: "Bearing the heaviest curse among all generations."

Similar to the rule on the Ice Dragon’s side, royalty was forced to hunt royalty to pass the coming-of-age ceremony.

He was approaching the age. If he couldn’t hunt a descendant of the Ice Dragon royal family before that day, couldn’t swallow the opponent’s heart and dragon orb, he would lose his qualification to succeed the throne.

Not only that, the innate curse would also worsen, making him unable to survive past twenty years old.

Jeremy had no interest whatsoever in the throne. He also never thought about having to lie back in this illusionary space for another two years waiting to die.

But on the third night, the totem on the back of his hand started to heat up again.

After a few days of groping around, he already knew what it symbolized. On the inside cover of the royal genealogy, that exact image was drawn: a six-pointed star, dragon patterns coiling around, an Ashbloom Flower lying in the middle. The annotation below clearly stated - this was an exclusive mark only the Mermaid royal family possessed, carved onto every royal child right from the moment of birth.

That proved the array caster he had once encountered in the F-rank area’s undersea tower definitely had ties to this race.

It was even possible they were a member of the royal family. A slightly bolder speculation: the Mermaid prince identity he currently bore was perhaps the true identity of that array caster.

But currently there was no absolute proof. Everything was just pieces of a puzzle coincidentally fitting together.

Jeremy pushed his train of thought aside. Just as he used magic power to suppress the ache on the back of his hand, the mark in the middle of his forehead began to ache dully again.

The pain wasn’t intense, but persistent, like a tiny needle slowly drilling into his frontal bone.

Just as he was wondering what devilish trick this was again, a blue light flashed right in front of him.

The light dispersed, revealing a few lines of Wasteland text in front of him, hovering in the water, each stroke radiating a pale blue light.

[Dying wish one: Dispel your own bloodline curse. Time limit: one month.]

Below were two choices, neatly arranged like two buttons.

One was [Confirm]. The other was... [Death].

Jeremy: "..."

What the hell is dying wish one.

Meaning there’s also dying wish two, dying wish three?

And giving choices like this was no different from pressing a knife to someone’s neck and asking if they agreed.

He sighed, pressing confirm.

The text dissipated. The pain in the middle of his forehead also subsided along with it.

To avoid trouble - and to avoid Lorelin suddenly appearing to inquire - Jeremy stood up and went to the garden behind the bedroom, leaning back on a swing woven from seaweed, and unfolded the map he had secretly taken from the library this afternoon.

It was entirely covered in Wasteland text. Some bizarre runes Griffin hadn’t even taught - characters with more curves, arranged vertically instead of horizontally. But for some reason, Jeremy could still read them, as if that knowledge was already sitting in his head from before.

The spoken language of the Mermaids here was also completely different from Sylvanor’s. The intonation rose and fell like the sound of waves, with many trills at the end of sentences. But when it entered his ears, it was automatically translated, clear as the empire’s language.

And of course he didn’t know how to speak the Wasteland’s Mermaid language. For the past three days, what he used was still Sylvanor’s empire language.

Yet none of the Mermaids at the bottom of this sea detected anything. Lorelin still nodded and obeyed. The guards still bowed in greeting. No one had ever shown even half a trace of abnormality.

It was probably also due to the illusion’s influence. It auto-corrected everything to match.

After fully memorizing the map, Jeremy folded it up, beginning to dissect the situation.

This palace was clearly different from what he saw when he entered the Wasteland. There, only dead coral and a headless statue remained. Here, everything was intact, alive, in its most prosperous period.

The timeline he was standing in, even entirely what he saw, was perhaps a projection from billions of years ago - when the Wasteland hadn’t yet been crushed by magical beasts, when that murky gray sea area was still a blue ocean.

As for the ruin’s trial, it still hadn’t revealed its face. Naturally, there was also the possibility it would never state it directly, but force him to comprehend it on his own.

When the examination task was unclear, he could only follow the dying wish the array caster left behind.

To dispel the curse, he was forced to hunt the Ice Dragon royal family.

The map was drawn extremely meticulously, purposed for Mermaids to clearly grasp the enemy’s territory - every city, every seabed forest, every patrol route was marked with dotted red lines.

Royal descendants were mandated to pass the trial personally, not allowed to bring guards.

The way realms were named in the Wasteland was different from Sylvanor, but they were also divided into ten tiers, and all cultivated using elemental magic power.

Through a few days of observation, he clearly felt: no adult Mermaid was below tier four. Even Lorelin - a maid - was at the threshold of tier four.

For Ice Dragons to confront them for all those years without being crushed, that race’s strength was definitely no less either.

With his Intermediate Stage cultivation level, sneaking into Ice Dragon territory, he feared he’d be discovered right at the first guard post.

Let alone the Ice Dragon royal family was located in the central core area, deep inside fourteen cities. Going alone meant double the risk.

The thought just kindling, a ring immediately appeared in front of him.

It was ice blue, smooth, without patterns. Just hovering there, rotating slowly.

Before he could touch it, the ring flew over on its own, slipping straight onto his right index finger.

The moment it touched his skin, Jeremy clearly felt a surge of power from the ring flood backwards into his body. His meridians felt as if expanded several times over. The magic power within his body skyrocketed, surging up like a tide.

If converted to Sylvanor’s realm classification system, he could absolutely be called tier five now.

Before he could think about what this was about, two more things appeared in front of him.

A long flute, white mixed with blue, the flute body smooth and polished as jade, the seven finger holes inlaid with seven small beads.

And a bone blade, the blade thin and curved, wrapped entirely in water wave patterns, glinting with a chilling dark blue color.

Engraved on both were totem lines exactly identical to the one on the back of his hand.