Poseidon in Arknights

"How are you feeling, Miss Lappland? Are you still experiencing severe pain?"

"There is no obvious pain anymore, Miss Xinyi. Your medical skills are excellent. But there is one thing: could you please take your daughter back to me?"

Lappland smiled with a somewhat broken expression. Only she knew what it felt like when she opened her eyes this morning, found that she couldn't move her tail, and turned her head to see the werewolf stroking her tail.

"Sorry, sorry." Yuuki walked over, reached out and grabbed Red by the back of the neck, and plucked Red off Lappland's tail.

"This child is just throwing a tantrum because the reward that was promised to her has been postponed."

Xi Yue hugged Hong into her arms and patted her head.

Last night, Yuuki and Kurenai said that because Lappland is there, the promise to turn back into our original forms in the wilderness and let her pet our tails will have to wait until later.

However, Xi Yue did not expect that the child would secretly run over and forcibly touch Lappland's tail, and it seemed that the child had been touching it since at least midnight until it was just taken off.

The tail fur had been stroked so much that it was tangled up in clumps, becoming extremely messy. Compared to yesterday's smooth tail, the tail now looked utterly wretched.

Lappland looked at her tail with a pang of heartache. As a Lupo, her tail was not something anyone could touch, and she always took good care of it, yet it had been touched into this state today.

"I'm so sorry." Yuuki looked apologetically at Lappland's tail, thought for a moment, and then snapped her fingers. A ball of water suddenly appeared and enveloped Lappland's tail.

"Hey, what are you doing? My tail is already like this, what else do you want to do?"

"Let me help you sort it out."

The water clump surrounding Lappland's tail trembled slightly, each water molecule inside flowing, helping the tangled fur to straighten out.

"It looks interesting, but it will take some time to dry."

"Don't worry about that, it's just water sublimation and hot fog."

The water clump trembled, and the water molecules inside were heated into hot mist in a very short time, but Lappland did not feel any burning sensation, only a slight warmth.

Lappland could only judge the temperature of the water mass from the constantly boiling surface, which made her itching to reach in and touch it.

Just as Lappland reached out, Yuuki stopped her.

"Don't try to reach in, it's very hot in here."

Yuuki took the room key from the table, dipped it into the water, letting the key come into contact with the constantly surging steam, and after a while took it out and stuck it to Lappland's hand.

"It's so hot!" In an instant, Lappland withdrew her hand, the spot where her skin had touched it already turning red.

"My tail doesn't feel hot at all, so how can it be so hot?"

"It's just a matter of precise control, it should be fine." Xi Yue waved her hand to remove the water sphere, exposing her tail to the air. After being straightened by the water sphere, her tail was no longer as disheveled as before. After being cleansed by the steam, her tail became fluffy and smooth.

"Oh, that's fine. Then let's leave it at that. It's really taken up a lot of time. But how do you plan to get me out of here? I'm a wanted criminal, you know."

"Well, there's no need to worry about that. Come with me."

Yuzuki casually made a comment, then waved nonchalantly to Lampland.

"Don't even think about it. This hotel is also a family property. As soon as I show up, family members will come. They won't give you face, Doctor Xin."

“I’m not so arrogant as to think that my identity as a doctor carries any weight. In the last city, the gangs there didn’t give me any face at all.”

"Oh, what happened? Judging from your tone, quite a lot has happened."

Lappland's curiosity was piqued. He was very curious about what the young lady in front of him had done to warrant such a thing as "selling face".

"It's nothing. Since you know me, you should know that I conduct 15 days of medical activities in each city I visit, just like in the last city."

Upon hearing this, Lappland showed a knowing expression.

"I get it. It's nothing more than a gang that doesn't want you involved in their medical business or something. They might have even set you up with a trap, or as Yan would say, a trap."

"Yes, I found a place to start medical activities. At first, no one came. I thought it was because my reputation hadn't spread here yet. It was only by chance that I discovered that the gang was actually blocking people around."

"They wouldn't let you find them so easily; I think it was intentional. They sent you to look for them. The one you saw being stopped was probably a gangster."

“I didn’t think much about it at the time. I just went there, and as you said, they were waiting for me there. It was a banquet to intimidate me.”

"Look at your expression. It seems you didn't eat anything at that treacherous banquet."

"Yes, because they were a bit angry at the time, they all drowned. In the end, their attitude improved a lot. Okay, let's stop talking."

“Didn’t I tell you? If we just go out like this, they won’t…” Just as Lappland was speaking, she suddenly noticed that the surrounding environment seemed a little blurry.

Lappland was very confident in his eyesight. If his eyesight could suddenly become blurry, then Lappland wouldn't be alive now. So since it wasn't his problem, it was very likely that something had happened to him.

"what have you done?"

"Wait a minute, I need to adjust. This is much more difficult than I thought."

Then Lappland watched as Yuuki's figure appeared and disappeared before her eyes.

"This is?"

"Miss Lappland knows that illusions sometimes occur in the wilderness, doesn't she?"

Lappland was certainly aware of this. She wasn't constantly moving between cities; after leaving her family, she often wandered the wilderness, so she was naturally aware of the illusions that sometimes appeared there.

"The principle behind my trick is similar to that one. By using small water droplets that I place in the air, I can change the path of light and make people appear invisible from a visual perspective."

To Lappland, the evening moon appeared before her eyes as if in a blink of an eye.

Xi Yue shrugged and said helplessly, "Unfortunately, this move has little practical value in combat. A sudden burst of bright light can easily break the refraction path that I painstakingly set up."

"I see. With this trick, there won't be any problem getting out."

"As long as your luck isn't extremely bad, there shouldn't be any problems."

As Yuuki spoke, she raised her hand, closed her eyes, and adjusted the refraction path to achieve invisibility. The difficulty was much greater than Yuuki had initially thought, and it was also meaningless.

This is only the difficulty when the light source is relatively stable while standing. If it's to take Lappland down later, Yuuki might even have to have Kurenai lead her slowly forward.

She had to concentrate on controlling the water droplets around Lappland to ensure that her movement wouldn't change the position of the light source, thus giving Lappland away.

Fortunately, he didn't need to do that; the Water Illusion Body could solve this problem for him.

After several days of practice, the appearance of the Water Illusion Body is now identical to that of the real person. All it takes is giving the Water Illusion Body the command to follow Hong, and it will be indistinguishable from the real thing.

Then I can have the water illusion return along the same route, and then I can go out again. It's a bit troublesome, but compared to the potential problems that Lappland might cause if she's discovered later, it's better to be a little troublesome now.

After a while, Xiyue breathed a sigh of relief and tossed the carriage key to Hong: "Hong, I'm counting on you from now on."

"Red, I understand."

"Be careful, and Miss Lappland, please don't stray so far from Red. You're making things difficult for me."

Yuzuki turned her head to look at Lappland, who was keeping a meter's distance from Hong in the mist.

Lappland, enveloped in the mist, twitched at the corner of her mouth. "You've made me feel so awkward, haven't you?" I got goosebumps all over.

Fortunately, Lappland was not a pretentious person, and could only suppress the panic emanating from her entire body and stand behind Red.

As Xi Yue walked around the two, a ball of water appeared behind her. The ball of water slowly wriggled and transformed into a water figure in front of Lappland. Then, after another tremor, various colors slowly appeared on the water figure's body.

Lappland carefully examined the water creature in front of her. Apart from its strange-looking eyes and the overly obvious reflection on its body, there were almost no other flaws.

Xi Yue sat on the bed, closed her eyes, and began to concentrate fully, not allowing herself to be distracted for a while.

Red looked at her mother sitting on the bed with her eyes closed, then turned to stare at Lappland, who was standing behind her and whose tail had been in a state of frizzy fur ever since.

"Alright, Miss Red, stop staring at me and lead the way." Lappland wagged her tail uneasily.

Presumably, the Lupo tribe hasn't been watched by werewolves for as long as the Lupo tribe has.

Haha, I'm really looking forward to finding Texas after we get to Lungmen. I'm definitely going to let her see it too. I wonder what kind of expression she'll make.

...............

Xi Yue climbed into the driver's seat, tapped her head, and felt slightly dizzy from the precise operation she had just been performing.

"If it's absolutely not necessary, never use this trick again. It's completely useless and will only give you a headache afterward."

Sitting in the passenger seat, Hong saw her mother propping her head up and reached out to touch Xiyue's head. Her mother often touched her head like that, and it made her head feel comfortable.

"Hmm?" Xi Yue turned her head, looked at Hong who reached out to touch him, smiled, and also reached out to touch Hong's head.

"Is Lapland in the back carriage?"

Hong nodded.

"Alright, let's go, let's set off!"

...Longmen...

"Achoo!" Texas, who was driving, suddenly sneezed.

"Hey Texas, watch out! Watch out!" Croissant shouted urgently from the passenger seat. They were on an overpass!

Texas attempted a drift, but at their previous speed, it was too late; the rear of the car crashed directly into the guardrail of the overpass.

The car shook violently, prompting Exusiai, who was leaning out of the window to shoot backwards, to pat the roof in displeasure.

"Texas, get serious! You almost threw me off balance! Wow! You even dared to fight back!"

Texas glanced in his rearview mirror at the railing that had just been knocked askew by their car, and sighed inwardly, knowing he'd have to pay another ticket soon.

Although Penguin Logistics engages in shooting, fighting, and sometimes gets involved in certain explosions, and sometimes those explosions are actually their doing.

However, they are still legitimate businesses because they always pay the fines on time and also pay a portion of the damage caused by other people involved in the incident.

Suddenly, the rearview mirror on Texas's side was shattered by a flying arrow and fell to the ground.

"What a hassle!" Texas swerved the steering wheel, fishtailed, crashed through the guardrail, and drove into another lane against traffic.

Since I'm going to have to pay a ticket anyway, I figure paying an extra one won't make the boss say anything.

It looks like today is going to be another eventful day for Penguin Logistics.

…………wilderness…………

"How meticulous! I never expected Miss Xinyi to bring so many spices to the wilderness."

"Why not eat well? I'm not short of money. Besides, as I said, just call me Xiyue. As for Xinyi, to be honest, I've always felt that name sounds a bit strange."

Xi Yue squatted by the fire, stirring the iron pot on the stove with a spoon.

"I think it's pretty good. How much longer?"

"It'll be ready soon, until then..."

Xi Yue suddenly raised her hand, conjuring a huge water curtain in mid-air. Several arrows suddenly flew into the black night sky, but they just fell into the capture range of the water curtain and lost their momentum.

"You could do some exercise to aid digestion first. I think you'll feel better by the time you get back. What do you say, Miss Lappland? Are you interested?"