Chapter 309: The Reunion

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5 PM.

5,976,820 Essence harvested.

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Zena was sleeping with her head on Lee Shen's back when the notification appeared.

"Hey, be a good girl and move please."

Just like Earth, every wild animal grew faster than humans. The humans were a race known for their slowest growth rate.

Zena was not as big as to hurt Lee, but she had surpassed him in size. When she placed her head on Lee Shen's back, he felt a sudden pain on his spine.

When Lee Shen tried to shake her off, she coiled and placed one of her wings on him along with her tail.

Thus, Lee Shen's blissful basking in the evening sun turned into being a pillow for his familiar.

When he struggled to move, he felt a faint tingling sensation running through his body.

Purr!

The voice has an embedded threat in it. Lee Shen did not dare to move any further as he knew what was that crept up his body like an impulse.

There were elves and dwarves on the ship. The passengers also had a few orcs and beastfolks among them. Lee's closeness to his familiar was quickly renowned among them all.

Elves, as people with excellent affinity with nature, were very attracted to the unparalleled beauty of Zena. She initially expressed her shyness but was enthusiastic later.

The bond that shared between Lee and Zena was something unique and special, an elf commented. Others agreed with the comment and feasted their eyes on this unique connection between a human and a beast.

They also evaluated Lee Shen as an aberrant human when they considered the existence of the triplets.

The dwarves were curious about their origins. Thus, they initially burdened Lee Shen with questions, but soon understood their breach of privacy. They asked for Lee's forgiveness and quickly left the scene.

The Draconic Wyverns had peculiar behavioural patterns related to their affinity. Cryo was chill and interacted with others with vigour. Aero was more actively social as he displayed his aerial manoeuvres that made everyone drop their jaws in awe.

But Pyro was the most annoyed. Not that it was his behaviour, but the aquatic environmental surrounding him made him uncomfortable to the core. This made his anger seep through his skin and emit a rather hotter sensation.

Dwarves found this sensation comfortable to them. As beings with an affinity of fire and earth, they found Pyro's hot-headedness to their liking.

Though the triplets varied in the magnitude of social interaction, they shared an innate communication channel between them. This was an exclusive transmission route for them and it was somehow impenetrable. Its existence was the greatest advantage for the trio and its range was vast and surpassed any heights and lengths.

When Pyro and Aero felt hungry, they asked Cryo to fetch something. They were intelligent enough to not ask Lee Shen to expose the existence of the system or the subspace.

Cryo immediately dove into the water and came up with a Spotted Shark in his jaws. He threw it to Pyro who swallowed the fish as a whole.

He repeatedly went underwater and caught many kinds of fishes. After sharing with Aero, he produced some fishes for the sailors and the passengers.

The orcs were the happiest to receive fish on board. Apparently, that race has developed a love for seafood but rarely comes across a chance to enjoy it.

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6 PM.

5,976,680 Essence harvested.

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Lee Shen took a glance at the display before closing it. It has been almost an hour and he was accustomed to the weight of Zena over him.

The Perrafin's periodic soft purr was beautiful to hear and it was like a lullaby to Lee Shen. But before he fell asleep, she rolled down from his back and he was liberated.

Quietly standing up, Lee Shen tiptoed to the edge of the deck. The setting stars had painted the ocean with a vibrant golden hue. The ripples of the ocean had attributed an incomprehensible aesthetic beauty to the ocean.

The twin setting stars could be seen on the horizon. They exhibited an urge to hide under the blanket of water. With every second, they sunk further and moved to take rest.

A gentle breeze blew across Lee caressing his face. At the moment, everything seemed to have stopped in the temporal progression. The serenity of the ocean and the refreshing presence of the wind had pulled off a mind-soothing combo.

Perhaps it was because of this peculiar timing and setting, he did not sense three people approaching him. His senses failed to detect their presence as his back was facing them. Furthermore, their footsteps were gentle and almost inaudible.

The unending loop of beauty that Lee Shen savoured was disrupted by a masculine voice.

"Lee Shen, wasn't it?"

A fraction of a second before the question fell in his ears, Lee Shen detected their presence. As he was about to turn around, the question was raised. He stood there for a second wondering who they are and then slowly turned around.

Eyes went wide as Lee Shen almost screamed out loud-

"Darwin!"

The surprise was enormous! The scene made him reluctant to believe his eyes for a moment. But after making a double-check, he almost was on the verge of ecstatic tears.

Darwin was alive and was now standing in front of him. This was quite a surprise for Lee as he searched for his presence everywhere and even felt that he had died.

Even when he had Map, D and Hudson failed to track Darwin's aura which finally ended them concluding that he had perished.

At a glance, the former mercenary group leader was fine. But it took Lee Shen a second to detect that his sturdiness had weakened and almost vanished. The Darwin now was a lite version of his former self.

Wearing a commoner outfit, the Mana user stood like an innocent man.

Suppressing his welling up eyes, Lee Shen noticed the presence of two more people next to him. One of them wore a hooded cloak and the person's face was obscured from vision.

But Lee recognised the woman next to Darwin.