Steampunk Era: Mad Abield
Chapter 550 - 377: Many Tales of the Small Town (1)

Chapter 550: Chapter 377: Many Tales of the Small Town (1)

Malin’s story took a long time to tell, but surprisingly, all the girls listened very attentively. They focused on grasping all the content of the story and also expressed their understanding of why Malin could comprehend ancient scripts and languages—it was true that the abilities of the Sage Sequence included such capabilities. However, when it came to Malin’s ability to intervene in the past, the girls still maintained a very cautious optimism.

As Mages, Faye and Clovis had the most authority to speak. They warned Malin that if he truly could intervene in the past, he must think thrice before acting, no matter what.

Of course, Malin knew what they were thinking. A storm whipped up by butterfly wings was not an amusing existence; he understood this clearly and knew that acting rashly could lead to changes in history. Perhaps one of the girls could disappear because of it, maybe they wouldn’t even realize someone had vanished, but Malin would know.

Such pain... Malin could hardly imagine it.

After all, I am but a mortal, one who fears and hesitates.

With a sigh, Malin continued the story. As Mages, Faye and Clovis naturally marveled at the strength of artificial intelligence from the old times; Jessica and Matilda sighed about the warriors who fought and sacrificed their lives to mend the sky, as heard in Malin’s tales; Maya grieved over the shutdown of Katerina, as she could lose all her memories upon rebooting; and Lillim felt even more moved by Katerina — she was completely immersed in the story Malin told, touched by the artificial intelligence guarding its oath for eight millennia.

While the girls were immersed in sorrow, Malin began preparing dinner, starting with feeding. Backup Food and Spotty nearly jumped out of their skins at the sight of the falcon on Malin’s head, but the four cubs, sensing a familiar scent, eagerly scrambled up Malin’s trousers to play upon spotting the small bird.

The falcon was indifferent and flew up to a perch on top of the carriage.

Malin cut the deer meat, feeding chunks to Backup Food and Spotty. With food in their bellies, the two quickly understood—they were friends since they were all fed by the same master. After eating, Backup Food went back to sleep in the rear carriage, Spotty fed the cubs, and Malin cut the meat into smaller pieces to feed the falcon, who, now minimized in size, had a smaller appetite and was soon full from Malin’s feeding.

"I need to give you a name," Malin said.

The small head of the falcon tilted as it chirped at Malin.

Malin continued cutting the meat, putting it on the grill to cook. Bippo climbed onto the table at this moment, looking at the falcon before focusing on the grilled meat.

Milani hopped onto the table, Malin handed her an acorn, but before she could take it, the falcon pinned her to the table, holding her down with one claw while biting the fruit with the other.

"There’s plenty more." Malin smiled helplessly, then took out a small bag from the Spatial Bag containing at least fifty acorns from the World Tree, which he had produced by casually feeding Spiritual Energy to the saplings—wishing for cows to give milk without feeding them grass was not how the world worked.

With so many fruits available, the falcon released its grip. Milani shrieked a few times, realizing she couldn’t defeat it, and could only angrily pick up a fruit and hop onto Malin’s shoulder to eat.

"How about Little Chirp?" Malin asked the falcon, whose rotating head seemed to look back at him as if he were a fool.

Malin sighed; the name sounded like that of a girl.

This falcon looked fierce, and since it was often said to be a hawks of males, it was likely a male.

"How about Salis?" Malin asked again.

The mature falcon chirped in response.

"You agree then," Malin was pleased, feeling he truly had a talent for naming.

After preparing food for Bippo, Malin carried dishes on a large tray out of the kitchen and placed them on the table.

"Mr. Malin’s cooking skills are really amazing."

"I’m going to get fat again today."

"Maya! Don’t steal my barbecue!"

At every meal, the girls varied their compliments for Malin, making the dining atmosphere always pleasant.

During the meal, Malin introduced Sir Salis to everyone, and the girls all expressed their goodwill, while Salis also enjoyed their offerings.

This made Malin sigh—originally, he had fed it an acorn just to make it healthier, who could have thought he would really see it again after eight thousand years.

-------------

Early the next morning, Malin got up. First, he had Salis scout for a group of deer. After confirming their location, Malin jumped off the train from atop Spotty, a falcon, a man, and a panther crossing the hills. Having confirmed the location, Malin directly controlled the group of adult deer and fawns with a Spell Formation from afar, choosing to kill the three oldest does and tossing the rest into the Semi-Plane.

On his return, Malin saw a troop of Cavaliers. From the flag, they appeared to be from the Anthony family.

These Cavaliers were also startled upon seeing Malin—spirit beasts from the Northern mountains were basically impossible in the Southern Farole. Then they saw the rider atop the beast.

The leading Cavalier did not dare to neglect him—after all, everyone knew that only a brave man could ride a spirit beast; those who weren’t brave were mostly eaten by them.

Malin revealed his identity, then pointed to the slowly approaching train, needing to bypass a cliff.

Knowing that Malin was coming to attend the wedding of their family’s young noble, Anthony, the troop of Cavaliers expressed their thanks, and Malin also shared a yellow deer with them—the Farol Principality was filled with all sorts of animals, a practice not shared by the nobles of Western countries who claim even mud in their fields is part of their estates.

Back at the train, as usual, Matilda processed the deer while Malin took care of feeding.

Today Maya joined in as well, since she was very fond of Salis, so Malin left the task of feeding it to her.

After gobbling down two acorns, Salis circled around Maya chirping away.

```

After feeding the family of pets, Malin noticed the car slowing down and glanced out the window to discover the train passing through the city gates.

The portal to Pozzuoli, gateway to Naples, the main base of the Southern faction, had arrived.

Well, speaking of which, the name Naples evoked more memories for Malin than any other place, all thanks to Ayu’s "Creed of Assassins," it’s just a pity that Malin couldn’t access this series anymore before the Great Destruction.

It’s likely long submerged by the river of time.

Carrying a tinge of regret, Malin got off the train with the girls and warmly conversed with the local nobles—By now the entire Farol Principality should have known about their princess’s imminent marriage to Malin. These Farole hillbillies might be indifferent to life and death, but when faced with Malin, a high-dosage, human-shaped killing machine, they felt somewhat daunted.

So Malin faced no slander and graciously accepted the invitation from the lord—A first invitation in the circles of nobility is generally hard to decline, unless there’s a significant difference in status. Malin, currently an Assistant Priest in red robes, was not yet a Prince, but anyone with a brain understood that it was just a matter of time before Malin became one. On this issue, although the nobles of the north and south of Farole had their differences, they stood united in the matter of the princess marrying Malin.

Of course, should Malin find the food unpalatable, that would be a very legitimate second ground for refusal.

As a gourmet, Malin had already established a certain reputation in the Farole region. This lord particularly mentioned that in his family, there were two Thanan cooks, descendants of a pair of Thanan people his grandfather had saved back in the day.

Very beautiful cooks.

The lord said this with evident pride.

Malin glanced at the girls behind him, feeling that the man might have been boasting a bit too much.

However, the girls felt their beauty was being challenged, and even the ones least adept at dressing up, Maya and Matilda, chose this face-to-face battle.

Malin wasn’t swayed—As it turned out, he was right. After all, the lord was well into his fifties, and in his eyes, the beautiful cooks of yesteryear were now in their forties, with arms thick enough to race a horse and strong enough to bear a person standing on them, their silhouettes reminiscent of Black Orcs from the back.

However, the food they made was truly delicious. Malin made a point to visit the kitchen and found that they were more hygienic than any non-Thanan cook he had seen—this was important, evident from the moment Malin saw that the lord’s entire family looked healthy.

Then, during the meal, Malin met their daughter... Hmm, quite pretty.

It turns out that the so-called beautiful cook the old man referred to should have been his daughter.

Still, she couldn’t compare to Malin’s girls.

.........

As Old Ding Qi escorted Malin’s party back to the train in his carriage, he turned his head and looked at his old buddy, a member of the Mage Tower, with whom he had shared a friendship of over sixty years.

This visit was also a favor he owed, made specifically to meet Malin.

Of course, it wasn’t for the sake of love and friendship—Initially, the Southern noble Union was somewhat eager to have the princess marry a Southern noble, but Malin’s sudden emergence had caught them off guard. Some of the younger members had been ready to do away with this new prince, yet very quickly, everyone realized that this... was truly someone they could not defeat.

With just the four World Tree Saplings alone, nobody dared lay a hand on him—The entire Farol Principality relied on the Church of Justice to withstand the Black Orc troops from the Eastern Region; no matter how foolish, they wouldn’t jeopardize their relationship with the Church of Justice over some trifling gain.

Then more intelligence flooded in, and people began to see just how extraordinary this young man was.

Unable to defeat him, they could only accept the situation.

Meanwhile, the information about Malin had Old Ding Qi somewhat troubled—he thought that the young man might be prone to exaggeration, so today’s visit was essential to probe further.

"A Sixth Circle Mage, with at least two long Sequences, and indeed multiple World Tree Saplings," Ding Qi’s old friend sighed after speaking, "Trust me, don’t make an enemy of him."

"I understand," Ding Qi replied, and glanced at a young man who was approaching: "By the way, have you found the target you were pursuing?"

"Not yet, but we have a good lead on the general area. Do we need to make a move now, Grandpa?" the young man asked Old Ding Qi, who smiled and nodded in response: "Go ahead."

The old mage cast a glance at his old friend: "What are you hunting?"

"A little thief," said the elder, smiling. "Laiyale, have you heard of her?"

"I have, the traitor from the Thieves Brotherhood in Naples, truly a little thief," laughed the old mage, shaking his head. "How did you get mixed up in this? It’s too dangerous."

"My old friend, what’s so dangerous about it? She’s just a petty thief." Ding Qi said, noticing his old friend was opening a portal, "Right, I haven’t paid you yet."

"Just take the money tomorrow when I come back, it’s not like it’s going anywhere," said the elder before stepping through the portal.

.........

"That old man was scouting you," Faye whispered to Malin as they walked a distance away.

"I know," Malin admitted, well aware of what the old man was looking for—probably wanted to check the merchandise.

This was normal. If it were Malin, Malin wouldn’t trust these guys either, nor know what this Malin was all about.

```

Search the lightnovelworld.cc website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.