When A Mage Revolts

"Director, this is the latest report from the netherworld expedition team. Please take a look when you have the time."

After he was done with experimenting with the abilities of the water elemental sprite, Benjamin kept it away in the space of consciousness and returned to the Director's room feeling satisfied. Not long after that, Varys walked in and placed a copy of the report on his table.

Hearing that, Benjamin nodded.

"I know. Go and handle your other matters."

Thus, Varys turned around and left the Director's room. Benjamin took up the report and began to browse through it with interest.

The task of exploring the netherworld had been charged by him to Miles and some mages with free time. They had packed with them a huge amount of materials and supplies because it would be a long term expedition, and they would not return if they did not discover any secrets. Benjamin was happy and at ease, as he did not have to go personally.

Of course, as feedback, they would send a report every week to describe all that they saw and heard in the netherworld.

The contents of the first few reports were roughly the same as what Benjamin had experienced before. They had encountered attacks by some revenants, and beings such as skeletons and corpses had crawled out from the ground, but all these had not been too much trouble for them. Because of that, Benjamin had put the reports down after perusing them, not thinking much of it.

However, this time, after he had flipped the report open, there was a shift in his expression as he read on.

"...Higher intelligence revenants which possessed spell casting abilities?"

After he was done with the report, Benjamin slowly closed it up, and could not help but mutter those words under his breath.

This was interesting.

In the report, it was mentioned that after they had gone through the swamplands, they had entered a forest made up of white bones. There were gigantic skeletons towering up to the skies everywhere, and dark, strange plants that grew out from the ashen white earth. It was thick with dark elements. In the forest, Miles had used his innate ability to hide, to discover very quickly a few abnormal revenant beings.

—They had the appearance of skeletons and rotting corpses, dressed in torn and tattered robes and living in houses made of white bone. Their behavior, however, was completely different from the instinctively mindless revenants, and possessed a certain degree of regularity. A few times, Miles had even observed grey flames lighting up in their hands to initiate attacks on the other revenants in the forest.

These were all the characteristics of sentient beings.

Benjamin's interest had been perked by a single sentence of description in the report.

"When these kinds of revenants meet another of the same, they would look at each other, eye to eye, in silence for a few seconds, before leaving as though they had seen nothing."

It was an extremely obvious sign of socialization, and it seemed to be socializing based purely on the spiritual level, like some robots with a secret network conveying messages to each other.

Benjamin also realized that there could be an entire civilization in the netherworld.

It seemed… That it was now necessary to go and take a look there.

He then directed his attention to the other matters at hand in the academy. Everything was back on track. Most of the senior students had begun their practicals, and the new students were not yet accustomed to life in the academy. Temporarily, there were no other important tasks. The Kingdom of Helius was extremely quiet, as the Church was still slowly processing their losses with the worshippers from across the sea.

As for Benjamin, his magic powers had just been upgraded, so naturally he had the desire to get out and have a few fights.

And so, under the influence of various factors, the Director of the Academy of Magic who had just returned from overseas began to sneak out of the main gates after just a few days back in the academy.

"May I ask… If the Director Benjamin is around?"

About five hours after he had left, a few mysterious figures shrouded in cloaks arrived in the guest room of the academy.

"I'm so sorry, the Director is still meditating, and may not have the time to meet you in these few days." Varys walked over with the often used excuse, speaking with a smile on his face, "If you may, please leave your contact details. I shall inform you when the Director is available."

However, one of the mysterious figures in the cloaks suddenly spoke. Her elderly voice sounded extremely impatient.

"Young people nowadays, getting more and more haughty." She drawled on with a scoff, "Enough… Just a teacher, what is there to meet? Let us go, why must we come to this stupid place?"

Saying thus, she shook her shoulders and acted as though she was about to leave. Another cloaked figure stopped her, and muttered in a low voice. It was unknown what he said to her, but he finally persuaded her to stay.

Following that, the cloaked man took out a letter from within his sleeves, passing it to Varys.

"We were introduced to this place by the Guild Master of Icor." He spoke slowly, sounding extremely old himself. "We have come to meet Director Benjamin this time on an extremely important matter. Please accommodate us."

Taking the letter, Varys looked at those few people with his eyebrows furrowed.

Meanwhile.

In the north of the spirit abyss, about two thousand miles away from the Academy of Magic, there was a stretch of dark forest filled with white bones. Under the moonlight, a few figures quietly moved behind a tree.

"...Do you guys really intend to catch that sort of revenant as some research specimen for the academy?"

Lara crouched behind the tree, asking hesitantly as she looked around. Her forehead was scrunched up in deep worry, and on her face was a very clear expression of disapproval.

"Isn't this the Director's orders? We must bring at least the remains of every type of revenant." A male mage spoke in a low voice, "If he hears that there are intelligent revenant beings here and we bring nothing back, the research teams would kill us!"

"But… I think the risk is a bit too much. These are undead creatures with high intelligence. If we attack them rashly, there might be some unanticipated results."

The male mage laughed, however, and pointed at Miles, who was walking in the forefront, saying, "Why do you worry? Who among us have weaker spell casting abilities than those revenant beings? Furthermore, we have this legendary mercenary. Have you seen him get hurt at all during the entire trip so far? Those revenants can't do anything to him."

Hearing that, Lara's scrunched up forehead did not ease up, however.

After a few moments' of silence, she suddenly spoke, "How about this… We send someone to stand guard here, and use the magical instruments that the Director had given us to create some revenant traps. If anything happens, and we need to separate, there would be a safety net at least."

When the other mages heard this, they looked at each other, not comprehending Lara's concerns. However, it did not hurt to be extra cautious, and so after some discussion, this suggestion was agreed upon.

Miles turned his head around, speaking in a low voice to the mages, "Move quickly. In another hour, there might be another revenant passing through here. We must end this within an hour."

Hearing that, the mages nodded hastily, and began to work faster at the traps. It was a simple disturbance technique, using spiritual energy, and could cause the revenant to temporarily lose its direction. It was a small item created after some research on revenants by the magical instruments department.

Finally, they decided to let Lara stand guard, as the others went ahead to capture the intelligent revenants.

"You have battled too much during the past few days, and your spiritual energy has been depleted, so you're quite tired and will raise a lot of worries." The male mage consoled her, saying, "We will return very soon with the remains. You can take a good rest here, no need to worry."

Lara was expressionless, and after being quiet for a moment, nodded somewhat cautiously.

"...Alright, you guys go ahead."

Seeing this, the other mages turned around and followed Miles from behind, sneaking quietly towards their target: The white bone house where the revenant being lived.