Chapter 189: A Visit from the Mage Guild
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Time almost passed into night when Benjamin finally left the forest.
When the last remaining Priest committed suicide to secure the secret, there was nothing Benjamin could do. There was no way he could discover the Church’s plans. He could only keep this incident in his heart, reminding himself to behave more warily in Icor.
In fact, the whole process of fighting against the three Priests completely differed from Benjamin’s expectations and he was not even sure if it was a good difference or a bad difference.
When he thought about it, the Priests had probably discovered his position the first time he attacked. But at that time, Benjamin’s distance was still a little far away so they pretended that they had not found him, thinking they could lure Benjamin into their trap and thus, wasted half of their Crosses of Protection.
If it was not for the Priests wasting their crosses to make their act seem more genuine, Benjamin would probably be faced with many obstacles if he had to go against them without the act, even to the point they might be able to escape.
They kind of roped themselves into their own trap.
Unfortunately, Benjamin underestimated that last Priest’s determination. However, even if he did think that he would commit suicide, there was nothing he could do. If a person really wanted to die, there would be a way, and not to mention, with a religion fanatic like him; whether it be self-combustion or tongue biting or starving to death, it was very hard for Benjamin to stop them.
Thus, after he died, Benjamin helplessly shook his head and in the end had to put this matter aside. He crouched down and touched the corpse.
--- No matter how many crosses these Priests had detonated, there would be some leftover useful items.
Through these three Priests’ divine arts, Benjamin managed to find seven functioning magical instruments in total, all of which were crosses which could boost spiritual energy, aid the recovery of spiritual energy and others of that sort. He kept these items properly. Even if he would not use them himself, he could distribute them to other mages who would definitely want these.
The only regret was that he did not find any strange letters again.
After collecting his reward from the battles, Benjamin hastily left that area. The smell of blood had slowly faded and to avoid the added troubles of surrounding attacks by magical beasts, he had better leave first.
Furthermore, he had a task at hand.
After leaving that area, Benjamin used all his energy on locating the Hidden Snake. After all, it was a creature with a transparent body, so the search for it would be difficult. But luckily, Benjamin had his water particle detection spell so the search was less difficult.
After spending about three hours, walking through a small half of the whole forest, only did he finally discover this mythical magical creature in the hole of a tree trunk. The combat skills of a Hidden was not very strong so Benjamin promptly made a block of ice, froze it inside and then kept it in his own bag.
Just like this, there was nothing else to do within the forest. Benjamin turned around and left.
Under the quiet night sky, he flew swiftly to the Town of Hank, all ready to hand over the item and receive those two books from the old man in return. He could read it in bed tonight before sleeping.
However, when he was about to arrive at the Town of Hank, there came a small sudden incident.
Mid-air, he bumped into another mage in his small mage group – Frank.
"Sir Benjamin, what a coincidence, I was just heading to the forests to look for you!"
Benjamin was a little confused, and asked, "Why are you looking for me? What happened in town?"
"Don’t worry, it’s not a big deal." Frank shook his head and replied, "Just that two mages suddenly came to the hotel, saying they’re people from some Mage Guild and wanted to meet you for a bit."
Mage Guild?
Benjamin felt this to be a little difficult to understand.
Having his whereabout located by the Mage Guild was not anything odd. But ... Why were they looking for Benjamin? Could it be that the Queen wished to forcefully recruit them? There should not be such need since they had already left the military long ago, and just two mages could not possibly force it upon them.
As he thought about the old man’s description of the Mage Guild and the secrets of the Mage Guild which were spoken about by the young stranger, Benjamin felt things were even weirder.
But they were here in person already, he could not decline to meeting them. So, Benjamin nodded his head and said, "Sure, I’ll see them right away."
In fact, he was also a little curious. How would the attitude of one from such a big organization within the land of Icor, the Mage Guild, be like.
Thinking along those lines, Benjamin and Frank flew back to the Town of Hank together.
However, unexpectedly, even before they stepped foot into the front door of the hotel, they could already see quite a number of people surrounding the entrance of the hotel. Various cacophonous sounds were heard, as if there was some interesting drama worth watching going on.
Confused, the two approached for a closer look, and discovered as result that there were quite some familiar faces in the crowd. Boss lady, Varys, Augustine ... The mages who escaped from Crewe Town were all squeezed into this crowd.
There was an empty space, surrounded, inside the jam-packed crowd. Two people stood in that space; one was a mage in the small mage team, Joanna, and another one was an unfamiliar face.
Benjamin could not help lifting his brows at this scene.
"What’s going on?"
Upon witnessing this, Frank too wore a face of puzzlement as he shook his head, and said, "I don’t know ... Everything was still fine when I left. Why did everyone run out here all of a sudden?"
Benjamin had no way about it, so he pushed through the crowd and walked in. He walked to the space in the middle of the crowd, to Joanna’s side, patted her on her shoulder, and asked, "What’s all this? What happened?"
Joanna turned around with some delight and surprise. "Teacher Benjamin, you’re finally back?"
Benjamin nodded without an understanding of what was happening.
What the hell? Could someone explain to him what exactly was the situation?
At the same time, the stranger standing on the opposite side of the clearing heard that and directed his gaze at Benjamin, displaying an expression of surprise.
"You are the Master Benjamin?" He asked.
Benjamin nodded but was even more confused now.
"Can someone tell me, what exactly is going on right now?" He looked around. Except for the mages in the team, there were a lot of pedestrians, all of them staring at him curiously, making him a little speechless.
Finally, Joanna responded. Her expression became somewhat awkward as she explained everything softly to Benjamin. It appeared that the stranger standing opposite her was the mage from the Mage Guild. He and another one said they were here to meet Benjamin but Benjamin was not present, so they had to wait in the hotel. But, they ended up striking up a conversation with other mages.
Having just escaped from the kingdom, the mages were still very curious about the outside world. As the conversation progressed, somehow, they spoke of the difference between the magic on both sides. Immediately, the mages became more curious and felt a little competitive .
Coincidentally, the two mages from the Mage Guild were adventurous mages. So, they were invited to the entrance of the hotel to compare notes and to see if magic beyond the kingdom had developed to an unimaginable standard.
That explained the scene before Benjamin.
After hearing the whole story, Benjamin felt that there was nothing he could do about it. But it was still fine as the atmosphere seemed quite amiable. He predicted it would just be a spontaneous exchange of combat abilities; quite useful for the mages within the team as well.
So, after some thought, he did not express an opposition.
"Alright ... Then, all the best to you, fight well, don’t embarrass us."
Benjamin did not expect anything of the sparring outcome. He was very clear on the extent of the abilities of his lot of mages. They had not even touched on Meditation Skill for very long, how could they think of becoming a proper opponent for someone educated by the Mage Guild?
Just take it as training.
But…...
"Teacher Benjamin, since you’re here, then I can’t fight because you should be the one fighting!" Joanna looked excited, "You’re the best amongst us, so you should be the one to represent all the mages in the Kingdom of Helius and duel with them!"