hotmtlnovel Chapter 127: - Mages of the Tower (5)
Chapter 127: - Mages of the Tower (5)
༺ Mages of the Tower (5) ༻
“Zollin that stupid fool...!”
The leader of the Red Cult, Elder Admelech, released his blazing mana in an attempt to quench his burning fury.
He used to call the mages of the Black Cult fools and mocked them when they had gone missing, but he didn’t have the room for that anymore.
He might have ignored it if it was a mage from a lower floor, but the problem was that Professor Zollin, the hostage, was a direct disciple of Elder Admelech.
Zollin was in the 7th floor, which was right beneath Elder Admelech’s 8th floor, and that in turn meant that he was the future elder of the Red Cult. Although most of the mages in the Tower treated their disciples like trash, head disciples of elders were a different story. They were extremely valuable successors.
He was the disciple hand-picked by Elder Admelech out of dozens of prodigies with enormous mana capacities, raised and nurtured carefully for dozens of years. Elder Admelech could not afford to lose him just like this.
“I do admit that Zollin’s a fool, but we must still save him!”
Admelech genuinely admitted Zollin’s mistake and requested the help of the Black Cult, which was not received very well by the black mages.
The head disciple of Elder Morushtan, Arkai of the Black Cult, opened his mouth.
“This is something that concerns the Red Cult. There is no responsibility for us Black Cult to...”
“Shut up, brat. I am not talking to you.”
Admelech turned his gaze to the leader of the Black Cult, Elder Morushtan. The ones in charge of making decisions were the elders of each cult, and Elder Admelech did not see the need to listen to the peasants below him.
“...We will help.”
“M, master?”
“This is not... an issue concerning one specific cult. He... has figured out our goal.”
“It is as you say. Who in the world is he?”
There were too many unanswered questions.
Who was the clown inside the footage, and did he tell others about it? That was when one of the medium-level mages of the Red Cult carefully raised his opinion to Admelech.
“Master... Since he’s requesting gold coins, how about we try putting together funds...”
“Nonsense! The Tower will not negotiate with such scoundrels!”
His pride as one of the elders of the Tower of Mages did not allow him to obediently give him money. Even though saving his head disciple was very important, Admelech did not want to bend his pride for it either.
“If he leaks the information... That will ruin our great plan...”
“I know that already!”
Although Admelech didn’t mention it because of his pride, gathering enough money wasn’t that easy either. They had traveled a long distance from the Tower of Mages to get to the Academy. Where would they find and prepare that much money?
“We still have time... We must look for him.”
“We will need people to look into this guy’s whereabouts. Fortunately, the 2nd Princess has entered the Academy, so... I suppose we should request the princess for some aid.”
“I agree.”
There was still some time left in their hands.
The mages of the Tower decided to find the clown before anything.
****
Now, they must be feeling rushed and hasty.
There were mainly 3 things that the Tower could do at this stage in time.
Ignore the video and move in groups and discard the hostages. Prepare enough money as requested. Find the clown and settle the score.
As for Number 1, it was impossible. At least not for Elder Admelech of the Red Cult.
Zollin, who was currently in my hands, was still the one and only successor of the Red Cult despite appearing rather stupid.
After entering the tower, the mages would discard their surnames and display themselves by their names and their cults. For Admelech, the Red Cult was his family, and his asset as one who had dedicated his life to the path of magic.
There was no way that he would abandon his successor that easily.
Number 2 wasn’t a realistic option either.
The mages of the Tower were elitists and personified versions of ego and pride. For them, this kidnapping incident would be one that brought about fury and thoughts of revenge, and would not see the clown as someone to negotiate with.
‘And that’s why I gave them a week.’
Inevitably, the only option they would choose was Option Number 3. Looking for the clown and making the clown pay for their actions would probably be the only option in their minds.
And that raised a question – how would they try looking for me?
They might request the Intelligence Guild or look for clues themselves, but... the easiest method was going straight to Princess Miruam.
“Can you please do that for me, junior?”
“...”
The boy in front of me, the descendant of Hasassin, replied after a short silence.
“Asking me to monitor a princess of the royal family all of a sudden... Is this not a serious offense that might drop my head?”
“That is why I am asking you specifically, junior. If it’s you, you’ll never be caught and you will be alright.”
“...I swear I remember you telling me to walk the path of a knight just recently, though.”
Rashid seemed dumbfounded by my request, but it was understandable, considering how I suddenly came to him and was asking him to monitor Princess Miruam and tell me what conversation she would have with mages from the Tower. It was a rather illegal request.
“My dear junior!”
I shouted while grabbing tightly onto the shoulders of Rashid Ad Din Mustali.
“What exactly is a knight? What is the heart of chivalry?!”
“What are you talking about all of a sudden?”
“Saving the weak, doing what is just, and keeping justice is what chivalry is all about. Doth thou disagree?”
“What is wrong with you...”
“Doth thou disagree?”
“...No. You’re right.”
“In other words, it’s okay for the procedure to be slightly cowardly.”
“Like, umm... isn’t that pure sophistry? Isn’t being righteous and fair also a part of chivalry?”
“Righteousness to righteousness. But evil to evil. That’s how it is.”
“But still, surveilling a royal princess is...”
“No, no, no. That’s not it. Your job is not about surveilling a princess. It’s about monitoring the mages from the Tower.”
“Isn’t that the same thing?”
“Everything depends on how you phrase it.”
Taking out a pouch of gold coins from my pocket, I placed it in his hands.
She was the harmony of pure white and gold – the one and only of the New Faith.
“Saintess Estelle...”
Estelle Hadassa El Rath. She was here to intervene in the volatile situation.
“What is this about, Your Highness Estelle? Is Your Highness planning on harassing us, the Tower of Mages?”
Professor Arkai, the head disciple of Morushtan, raised his voice.
The Tower of Mages was by no means weaker than the New Faith in both strength and authority. It was impossible for them to arrest a leader of a cult based on allegations alone.
“Of course, I, as the Saintess, fully acknowledge the prestige and rights of the Tower. However, there has been a heavy allegation against Elder Morushtan. Since there has been a report, there is a need to look into the matter.”
“You cannot do this without even having proof...”
“Of course, we do have proof.”
With a wide smile on her face, Estelle took out documents and a recording stone. They were the evidence and a recording of the place that Korin Lork had told them about.
“This...”
Even Morushtan was dumbfounded looking at the obvious pieces of evidence sitting right before his eyes. This was the footage of his secret laboratory that no one should know about. He only visited the laboratory with the help of his familiar and made sure nobody knew about his presence or the location of the lab, so how did the New Faith know about it?
“Y, you’re framing...”
“Be quiet. Our order carries out rightful inquisitions in accordance with the rules forged by the lord and the royalty.”
When Estelle said that out loud with a cross in her hands, blinding light surged out of her body and threatened to blind their eyes despite the sun being high up in the sky.
It was a radiant yet warm ray of light – a cleansing miracle cleaning everything evil in existence. The light emanating out of Estelle was the very proof that she was being loved by the gods.
Saintess Estelle.
Just from a single prayer, the necromancers walking down the evil and wicked path were made to swallow their pain.
“Uhuk...!”
Staring at them, the saintess of the New Faith, Estelle, said with a sadistic smile on her face.
“Are you coming? Or do you need to be bashed up first?”
Her last words were truly unbefitting of a saintess, but were enough to make the mages of the Tower surrender.
****
“Those damned bastards of the New Faith!!”
The mages of the Tower were very down.
The leader of the Black Cult, Morushtan, had been seized by the New Faith for allegations of human experiments, which was on a whole different scale to third-rate mages and the head disciple being kidnapped.
“How bad is our luck?!”
“We need to stop our plan!”
“How dare these scoundrels interrupt the great path of magic?”
The hot-tempered mages of the Red Cult were infuriated whereas those of the Black Cult appeared extremely gloomy. Losing their leader Morushtan was a big blow to their confidence.
More importantly, the problem bigger than the blow to their confidence was their lack of power.
Their targets, Marie Dunareff and Chairman Eriu Casarr were both powerhouses at the Unique Grade. Having several mages at the level of an elder was a must when capturing such individuals and besides, it was originally supposed to be Elder Morushtan’s job to capture Marie Dunareff and hence they were lost as to what to do.
“Professor Arkai... What do we do now?”
“...”
Morushtan’s head disciple, Professor Arkai was agonized. He could only think of one plan that could save them out of this trouble.
“We must... continue the plan with haste. Before master gets taken to the sacred lands of the New Faith... we need to burn the Academy and save him in the midst of that chaos.”
“Shut your nonsense! Professor Arkai! We already had our hands full with that stupid clown; what plan is there to continue with at this point?! We must quickly return to the Tower!”
“The foremost reason why our plan was revealed was because one of your professors revealed everything to that clown! You have your side of the responsibility to this matter, Red Cult!”
“What was that? You filthy necrophiles!”
“Is that all you have to say, you damn arsonists?!”
The quarrel between the two cults escalated as they started raising their voices. No longer able to leave them be, Elder Admelech created soaring flames that settled both parties down.
“Kuuk?!”
“E, Elder Admelech?!”
His flames emerged without him even chanting a spell and yet they were powerful enough to almost break through their defensive robes.
It was an overwhelming display of firepower, capable of suppressing dozens of mages at once. What was even more surprising was that the flames were focused only on the mages without affecting anything else in the room.
“This is not a marketplace, you fools.”
“S, sorry sir!”
“Please... have mercy!”
All the mages yielded at the face of Admelech’s flames. It might have been possible for them to withstand the spells of a professor-level mage, but someone at the level of an elder had the power to wipe most of them out as if they were ants.
After settling the mages down, Admelech quietly looked into the eyes of each and every one of them before shouting with a sonorous voice.
“Lord Adelene!”
There was a reason why the higher ranked mages, who considered the low-grade mages as insects, had been letting everyone participate in the conference. It was because the Great Golden Mage was in disguise as one of the lower-grade mages.
Admelech shouted, with not a single doubt that Lord Adelene was among them.
“Now that Elder Morushtan has been arrested, it is impossible for this old man to do this alone. I will have to ask for your direct assistance!”
“...”
“...”
The room turned silent. No one stepped up calling themselves Adelene, but that was natural because Adelene wouldn’t have even bothered to go under disguise if he or she was going to reveal themselves this easily.
– Creak!
– Tadak...!
It was then. Every metal in the room starting from pens, badges to staves and everything with even the slightest hint of metal started to move by themselves.
“W, what is going on?”
“Who’s using magic...?”
They turned to one another, but none of them were able to even guess who the one using magic was – not even Elder Admelech.
– Click!
Soon, the metals stopped moving in the air. They formed a sentence giving a direction to the mages of the Tower.
『Seal the Witch.』
The plan was revealed and key personnel were captured but the central figure of this great plan – the Great Golden Mage gave a simple command.
Carry on with the plan.