Dragon Raja 5; Chapter 231: For Your Majesty (46)

Dragon Raja 5

“I don’t mind looking at naked men for a while longer, but aren’t you cold?” Jiude Mai said coldly, throwing the ice pick into the crack in the ice.

A moment later, a small fire was lit on the endless ice surface. Caesar, Finger and Jiude Mai sat around the fire. Caesar and Finger were wearing cold-proof clothes as hard as stone and were shivering.

Jude Mai’s initial killing was intended to intimidate the dangerous predators, saving them the effort of bringing down the entire pack. But the dead bear proved useful. Sprinkling its rich fat onto the solidified fuel in the oil stove, they finally ignited the fire, where the bear’s own steak roasted on top. No one had expected such a barbaric bear fat to be tasty, but as the charred aroma permeated the cold air, even Caesar swallowed subconsciously. Calories and protein were what they desperately needed. A twenty-minute winter swim drained as much energy as a marathon.

Jiude Mai’s condition was not so comfortable either. She wrapped herself tightly in a felt coat and cleaned the ice shell on her body.

Her method of escape was similar to Caesar and Finger’s, but slightly easier. Winter swimming was commonplace for ninjas, and the ninja suit also helped a lot. Its fabric was highly technological, tight-fitting and thermally insulated, just as warm as a diving suit.

“So you have been hiding on the YAMAL, right?” Across the fire, Caesar stared into Jude Mai’s eyes.

The two had met in an ice cellar a few years ago. Anyone who had seen Mai Jude could not forget her figure, so it didn’t matter whether she was masked or not.

“Are you going to ask me for the boat ticket money?” Jiude Mai raised her eyebrows.

“For Leviathan?” Caesar continued.

“Could it be that I’m here to fish on the boat?”

“Everyone is looking for Leviathan, but what exactly is Leviathan?”

“I’m not sure, but I’m sure you know nothing about Leviathan.”

“Can we share intelligence? Can you hunt Leviathan alone?”

“Master Gattuso, you’re overthinking it,” Mai Jiude glanced back at the dark sky behind her. “Our cooperation should start with survival.”

She exposed herself to save Caesar and Finger not out of pure humanitarianism, but because in such a harsh environment, even she might not be able to survive alone.

The ice storm stopped, but the polar day continued. They had to trek in the dark. The abandoned scientific research station was about 60 kilometers ahead, and the YAMAL was also about 60 kilometers behind.

Unfortunately, they were stuck right in the middle, facing a life-or-death choice: to move forward or backward.

Neither advancing nor retreating was easy. They had been sailing against the wind, which had been their navigational guide, but now the wind had died down. Leviathan and the giant snakes were probably still around, but they had lost most of their supplies.

“It’s fate that we all met in a place like this, with a bear roasting on the fire,” said Finger. “We’ve survived such a disaster and are working together sincerely. Are we still worried about not being able to get out?”

Jiude Mai snorted coldly, and Caesar stared at the fire with a frown.

“That whale wasn’t just passing by.” Caesar looked up at Finger, then at Jude Mai, “It came to kill someone, one of us.”

The three of them were stunned for a moment and then fell silent.

Caesar’s logic was obvious. Their encounter with Leviathan certainly shouldn’t be seen as accidental. Just like the mysterious expedition, Leviathan sought them out because they had been to the Sunset Land. Anyone who had visited the realm of the gods deserved death. To say that Leviathan targeted the crew that had followed them was a bit far-fetched.

Three people sat by the fire, grilling bear steaks in harmony. They belonged to three completely different factions: the heir to the Gattuso family, the mysterious ninja beauty, and the even more mysterious Finger. He remembered how he had tried so hard to refuse before departure, nearly throwing a tantrum. But then he recalled how he had led Caesar so narrowly avoiding Leviathan’s extreme cold, as if he had been prepared for this polar journey.

What do they all know about Leviathan? If they put the three versions together into a puzzle, they might know more, but they don’t trust each other that much.

“Perhaps it wants to kill all three of us,” Jude Mai said, “or perhaps the three of us sitting here can all be cleared of one crime; none of us are Leviathan’s allies.”

Finger used Dictator to cut the bear steak and put it in the hands of Caesar and Jiude Mai. The whiskey that had been frozen into an ice block had thawed after being roasted by the fire for so long. The three of them drank it one after another from the bottle.

“Now God must think that the three of us are dead. We are invisible men. We can hide in the dark and jump out to defeat him at the critical moment!” said Finger.

“That’s right,” Jude Mai nodded. “Come to think of it, haven’t you ever thought about the relationship between God and Leviathan?”

Caesar was stunned. God, Leviathan, and the great white whale were all code names for a certain Dragon King. This was how they had always understood it.

“According to mythology, Leviathan is a creation of the gods, a giant creature with no intelligence. And don’t you think that big fish just now is indeed quite unintelligent? If it had circled this area a few more times, we would all have died, but it actually retreated like that. This is very consistent with the characteristics of the Dragon King. Those with great power often have limited wisdom, like Fenrir, while those with great wisdom are the opposite, like Jörmungandr. No individual has ever possessed both wisdom and power. But on the other hand, this god is extremely mysterious, as if some mysterious hand was guiding us into the Arctic Circle, taking this mysterious route, and ultimately losing ourselves.”

“You mean there are actually twins in the Arctic Circle? God and Leviathan!” Finger widened his eyes.

Jude Mai bit into a sizzling bear steak and shook her head. “I’m not sure. I just feel like I’m fighting two different enemies. One is secretive and dangerous, setting trap after trap for us; the other is powerful and terrifying, freezing the sea wherever it goes. In fact, if it really wanted to kill us, it could just swim under the YAMAL with that extreme cold field, and a nuclear-powered icebreaker would be trapped in the ice. But the strange thing is, it found us only two days after we left the YAMAL, but it didn’t show up once while we were on the YAMAL.”

Caesar froze for a moment, a strange thought crossing his mind. Leviathan had found them since they entered the Arctic Circle, swimming alongside the YAMAL. The reason it hadn’t attacked was because there were people on board it couldn’t harm, like the other twin! Snow? Abbas? Even Captain Rebalko? But what was the twin’s purpose aboard?

On the other hand, the three guys sitting by the fire, each with their own ulterior motives, were the purest of all. Their friendship was a life-long one.

“Boss, should we go forward or backward?” asked Finger.