When A Mage Revolts

Time quietly passed, and the night slowly took over.

"They should be launching their attack tomorrow."

Benjamin and a few mages stood on the north city gate, watching the camp of the royal army from a distance. The moon was not visible tonight, and as time elapsed, the lights in the camp went out one by one, quickly becoming one with the dark night. They could see the patrolling soldiers around the camp; the royal army looked extremely cautious.

However, the Black Nightmare Army was also well prepared. Benjamin was very thankful that the enemy had not mobilized their attacks today. Otherwise, they would have had to receive the invasion in an extremely hasty manner.

"Be prepared at all times, the enemy might attack at any moment," he spoke slowly. "We know nothing about the situation of the enemy's camp. Who knows what kind of battle plan they might have."

Hearing that, Morris frowned, "Have the spies we sent in the evening discovered anything?"

Benjamin shook his head, answering, "No, they were unable to get close to the royal army's camp at all."

Facing a battle against the Church this time, the intelligence they possessed was much worse than the last time; they were completely ignorant even about the structure and composition of the enemy's soldiers. However, there was nothing they could do about it. No one, except for Miles, could sneak into an army camp where Grant was personally in command. Needless to say, no one had the confidence to be able to bring the intelligence out alive as well.

They could only maintain a high level of alertness at all times.

"How about we launch a sudden attack first tonight, taking advantage of them being unprepared?" Thinking about how they would soon be entering battle, Joanna seemed to be somewhat unable to restrain her excitement, so she put forth such a suggestion.

Morris immediately shook his head.

"...I don't think that's a good idea."

Benjamin also expressed his agreement, "With Grant around, I'm afraid we won't be able to take advantage of anything."

However, having said that, he rubbed his chin and mulled over the matter for a while. As though he had suddenly thought of something, he opened his mouth again, "But… Right, I remember, hasn't the Rune Research Department come up with a sort of failed product in their researches before? Those pigs who could self-explode, do we have those here?"

Hearing that, those few mages were dumbfounded.

"This kind of thing… No one would specifically bring those over," After a moment's hesitation, Morris shot back with a question. "What are you asking this for?"

"I'm considering that suggestion for a night attack," Benjamin explained, "the enemy is so vigilant that a sneak attack in the ordinary sense would definitely be unsuccessful. But if we were to have some self-sacrificing means, perhaps we would be able to blast them before Grant could react and catch them unprepared."

He also wished to defeat the enemy head-on, instead of involving all those showy, gaudy tricks. However, they were lacking in both the size of their forces and information. Perhaps they really should create something like a backup plan to increase their own chances of winning.

An attack at night had its risks, of course; with Grant being personally in charge, the people who would go on the sneak attack were likely to never return, ever. However, if they thought about it from another perspective… they might as well just never come back. If they could use a suicide method of attack to exchange a smaller sacrifice for a bigger loss on the enemy's side immediately, it would be profitable for them.

"Most of the people from the Rune Research Department have still remained in the Academy they never came over. But… if you really have that idea, there are two right in the city. You may go and ask them," The mages exchanged looks amongst each other for a while. Finally, Morris could only reply as such.

Benjamin nodded.

It was late. In actual fact, they should be resting, but the great war was imminent, and Benjamin's emotions had calmed down somewhat right then, so… he might as well go and make his inquiries.

There was a small hut near the city gates. Two mages from the Rune Research Department stayed inside as non-combative mages in charge of looking after the condition of the Runic Defense technique. After five minutes, Benjamin pushed through the doors from the outside. They lifted their heads and, upon seeing who it was, immediately had surprised expressions marked on their faces.

"Sir Director? What's wrong?"

Benjamin walked in and smiled at them. He cut off the pleasantries and went straight to the point by asking what he had wanted to ask. When the two people heard 'self-exploding pigs', their faces twitched in unison. However, after they had listened to Benjamin, they immediately returned to their solemn and serious states, nodding.

"Yes, there was such a thing, it should be the product of a research we did a very long time ago," one of the mages gave a few dry coughs, saying. "There should be some living specimens in the Academy, but based on their nature, there had never been a way to take them on long journeys, so we did not bring a single one."

For a moment, Benjamin looked crestfallen.

"Alright… Then forget it."

The young mage hurriedly waved his hand, stopping him as he was about to leave, before continuing, "Wait, Director. Although we did not bring them over, we've done some improvements on it after that and simplified the production process. We can produce them here as well."

Benjamin's eyes lit up. "Can you make them now?"

"En," the young mage nodded. "As long as we have enough materials and pig… experimental subjects, we can basically produce five in an hour."

"Then let's get going immediately!"

"Understood."

Thus, Benjamin added a new little branch to their battle plan. In actual fact, he had just remembered how the Academy had produced these sort of living organism bombs. Was it not… Was it not something that had happened a year ago? At the time, even the Law of Runes and Meditation had not yet been discovered, and the Rune Research Department had not been a 'department', but merely a small group.

If it were not for Joanna's suggestion, he might not even have recalled that.

"You mages are really insane," the System emerged and spat out, saying. "What on earth is wrong with you, doing things on a whim, and you even have to freaking drag the pigs into this."

Benjamin shrugged.

In merely three minutes, sufficient Magic Beast Materials and five pigs were sent into that small wooden hut. No one knew what went on inside. Quite a number of families in the western region of the city were also unclear about why the Black Nightmare Army had suddenly knocked on their doors, willing to exchange a few sacks of grains and food for the pigs in their houses that were ready to be slaughtered.

Whatever it was… After an hour, five unidentified, mysterious animals with flaming red fur and sluggish eyes were quietly transported out of the small hut.

Benjamin also found five volunteers.

"There is no possibility of surviving this mission for you. I hope you understand this," he looked at the five soldiers who had walked out. "it doesn't matter if it's successful or a failure. Even if you are lucky enough to survive the explosions, the members of the Church would definitely never spare you, and you might even be subject to extremely frightening torture."

The soldiers nodded, their expressions firm and determined.

"I feel it's worth exchanging the lives of the few of us for the hope of victory!"

Hearing that, Benjamin patted them on their shoulders and said nothing more.

It was not difficult to detonate the self-exploding pigs; the soldiers had already been informed that it would only take a certain magic oscillation or a direct hit on their bodies by a blade. Thus, in the pitch black night, a small opening was quietly made in the Runic Defense Technique, and five people stealthily climbed out through the west city gate, carrying sacks with pigs in them.

They would need to take a longer route if they wanted to blast the enemy.

Benjamin and those few other mages came once more to the city wall and looked at the enemy camp, waiting for the loud explosions that were to come. The soldiers had special magical instruments on them that emitted weak magic oscillations so that they could be located easily. In Morris' hands was a round disc on which they could see the locations of the small self-exploding team. They were currently at the west city gate, inching bit by bit towards the camp in the north.

They could only use such a method to spectate from afar.

After approximately fifteen minutes…

"Wait, why have they stopped?"

Benjamin looked at the five tiny dots on the round disc that had suddenly halted. He frowned, feeling a bad premonition.

The location of the tiny dots was about six hundred meters away from Worchester, in the northwest direction. They were obviously still quite a distance away from the royal army's camp.

However, it was at this moment that a sudden loud blast rang out from a place to their west!

Everyone was shocked and turned their heads to look. The next second, they discovered, in even more bafflement, that an explosion had happened at the location where the tiny dots were on the round disc, followed by a highly intense activity of fire elements. An extremely dazzling and fiery light immediately erupted from there!

How could it be there…

They were shocked at first. After that, Benjamin and the others were stunned.

In actuality, under the light of the flames, they had suddenly discovered a huge group of soldiers at that location. They were dressed in black, and even their shields had been painted black. They did not know when they had snuck over. They were looking as though they were about to secretly close in on the west city gate.