When they arrived at the Mayor’s home, it was surrounded by a huge moat of water with guards stationed all around the place.
"Hault! State your business!" One of the guards demanded, holding up a spear.
"H-Hello, sir. I was tasked with taking these Sorcerers to see the Mayor."
The guard nearly choked on his spit after hearing that sorcerers were here. His attitude quickly changed, and he stood at attention.
"My apologies! Please, right this way! We’ll take you to the Mayor."
All of them stepped out of the boat, Kai summoned it back to his inventory, and they followed the guard.
"Ah-un, not you. Only the sorcerers." The other guard stopped Carlo from following.
"O-Oh, okay. I’ll just be here...waiting."
The inside of the mansion wasn’t anything Kai hadn’t seen before. Sure, the look of things was different, furniture had a different style, and the architecture was different from that of Sarkylla, but money was universal, and Kai knew what money looked like.
Amaya looked around, rubbing her hands on the walls, chairs, and other things. "The vibes of this place are so different. I feel so weird here."
"This is a different continent we’re on, so that’s to be expected." Sasha pointed out.
"Yeah, but..I don’t know how to explain it, but I’m feeling..."
"Homesick?" Kai asked, "Or is it wanderlust, the feeling that makes you excited when you experience new things in different locations?"
"The second one." She confirmed
Kai agreed. "Me too. I’m really excited right now and I can’t wait to start working."
"So we’re mercenaries this time, huh? Seems fitting." Sasha chuckled. She remembered their mission when they went after Kyana’s enslavers and when they attacked the Cheston estate.
"That’s too bad, I wanted to see if the monsters here were different." Gwen was leaning on Kai’s shoulder, resting her eyes.
"Nah, I’ve had enough of monsters. I’m just happy we’re back on land. I’m okay fighting or protecting people for our main lines of work right now."
"It probably won’t even be that." Nadya said to Kyana.
"What do you mean?"
"Kai made us Bronze III mercs. We’re starting off at the bottom of the barrel. We’ll probably get fetching jobs. for all of bronze. Then jobs that have us steal things in silver. As for gold and beyond, that’s when we’ll start getting the ’fun’ stuff."
All of them glared at Kai in anger.
"We could have started off doing the cool stuff!"
"But nooo! You want to be a fucking completionist!"
"Now we have to do all the boring shit!"
"Haha, girls, girls, calm down. I promise everything will be worth it. Just trust me." He tried to calm them down, but it didn’t work.
Amaya jumped on his head and started yanking his hair. Gwen was making fun of him, Sasha was pouting, Kyana was talking about how inefficient starting at the bottom was, and Nadya was just laughing her ass off.
Someone then knocked on the door, and everyone returned to their seats, looking professional and acting as if they weren’t fooling around.
"Hello, sorcerers, it is an honor to meet you all." The mayor was a tall, lean man with a scruffy beard, white hair, not from age, and a monocle on his right eye. He had his servant give everyone some snacks to eat and tea to drink.
"The pleasure is all ours, Mr Mayor."
"Thank you. Now, what can I help you with?"
"We’re just looking for information. Do you perhaps have a church or temple of the goddess on this island?" Kai needed to reach a temple so he could speak with the goddess of this land. While he wasn’t in any rush, he still wanted to know where it was.
"A temple of Lady Aquaphina? No, unfortunately, there isn’t one on this island. A-Are you associated with the church?"
"No, but she has requested my presence. It seems like I’ll just have to visit her later. Say, is there a map of the continent that you have?" Kai could fill out locations on his minimap if he had an actual map in his possession. He would still have to travel to the location if he wished to teleport to and from those locations, though.
"Yes. I’d be happy to give you one." The mayor snapped his fingers, and his servant left the room to get a map.
"May I ask you a question?" The Mayor shifted in his seat as if asking them a question could cost him his head.
"Go ahead."
"W-Well, I have two questions."
"Ask them both."
The mayor nodded. "You’re not from around here, are you. Your accents are very strong. I’ve traveled all over the archipelago and I’ve never encountered an accent like yours."
Kai wasn’t surprised he asked that question. It was obvious to tell if someone was a foreigner by the way they spoke and sounded.
"Yeah. We are. Would you believe us if we said we’re from a different continent?"
The Mayor paused, then busted out laughing.
"Hahaha! That was a good one! I haven’t heard a good joke like that in a while! You are the best sourcers I’ve ever met!"
That was information. All of them gathered that the people here didn’t know of the existence of the other continents, or they thought it was a legend. Even if they wished to find out, they would be blocked off by the barrier created by the gods.
"Haha! Yeah, I get that a lot. No, we’re just from a rural village on the southern islands. Our tribe doesn’t really mingle with the outside world, but the six of us wanted to explore. We became hunters and adventurers."
The mayor nodded. "That makes sense. We get a lot of travelers here. Not many of them are sorcerers, though. You kids have a bright future."
"Thanks."
Just then, the servant came back with the map of the entire archipelago and handed it to Kai.
"Thank you." The map vanished from his hands, and it filled out every island on his minimap.
"Well, that will be all. Thank you for your time. We will get going now."
The mayor stood up to shake Kai’s hand. "Anytime. If you need anything, just let me know."
"We will, thanks."