Chapter 287: The Trouble of Distribution
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Although Benjamin already knew what to do, he did not rush to make his move.
He was busy with the concurring problem of a small cult with ulterior motives that had started a fist fight with the powerful local tyrants, and made it look as though the world needed their saving. To avoid him from being exposed, he did not dare to be too hasty.
It was better to do it one step at a time.
His issue with the mage Vinci Master could take a backseat first. After all, all he was doing was spread rumors about him behind his back. As for his connection with Icor, Benjamin was not affected by it — the people of Icor would not cross the border to arrest them.
At the same time, he should really start investigating the Head of the Knight, Lance. He needed to pick up the pace.
So, for the rest of the day, Benjamin did not go out, but instead wrote a letter about his long-prepared plan.
After writing it, he kept the envelope nicely. He used water vapors to pick up the wind, quietly blew the letter to the streets outside their house, right into a hidden crevice in the side of a building.
—This was the way Jessica and Benjamin contacted each other.
Benjamin was getting more and more famous. In order to avoid coming to a bad end like the "eagle", they decided to meet as little as possible and instead use this method to communicate.
Afterwards, he continued like nothing happened: stayed in the room, concentrated on his meditation, etc. He even accumulated drops of water element energy in his space of consciousness.
The next morning.
As Benjamin was just waking up, some members of the Mercenary Association came to visit him and brought him the benefits exclusive to mages in the association.
"Sorry to bother you, but one of your mercenary has been promoted a level. Therefore, we are sending the bonuses over." A middle-aged mercenary was leading them, and he politely explained to Benjamin, "Because there’s a lot of mages in your team, according to the rules, every mage will get a sharing of the bonus, so it took us some time to prepare for all the mages."
Benjamin stood outside the door, and slyly took a glimpse at the crevice on the street.
Not bad. The letter had already been taken by the "crow".
Benjamin smiled and replied the Mercenary Association member, "It’s not a problem, we understand."
The middle-aged mercenary nodded, turned around, and commanded his underlings to move the four big boxes into the house, "This is the stuff; it’s a little heavy, do you need help to move it?"
Benjamin shook his head and simply casted a spell. The water vapors lifted the box up and steadily moved it in through the door and into the corridor.
"Incredible." The middle-aged mercenary said with admiration, "You can check it, there should have twenty-three pieces of material and twenty-three laws of meditation. In addition, because there’s more than twenty people in your team that are part of the association, we also present you a small fire element crystal."
Oh? Benjamin was a little surprised.
The mercenary association’s benefits were beyond his imagination.
Originally, he only wanted some magic beast material, which was worth a lot of money. As for the laws of meditation, the mages already had their own rules, so these new laws were not helpful to them. What he did not expect at all was to get fire elements crystals.
Fire element crystals were not something that could be bought with money.
Using the water element sensing technique, Benjamin scanned through the insides of the four boxes. Yes, there was indeed a deep red crystal, quietly lying in a box. Its surroundings were radiating with heat.
Although this was of no use to him, but other people might need it!
"I have checked it, there’s no problem. Thank you for your hard work." Benjamin replied.
The middle-aged mercenary nodded and said: "Then we will take our leave."
Very quickly, the people from the mercenary association turned and left. Benjamin shut the door, and turned to look at the four boxes in the corridor.
From the living room, the mages overheard Benjamin’s conversation with the mercenaries. Many of them came out, eager to see what was in the boxes.
Other than a few potion mages who were not in the mood and some mages who were not interested in the fire magic, the rest of the group stared at the fire element crystal like dogs watching their master eat.
Seeing this, Benjamin smiled helplessly.
"Don’t worry, I don’t use fire magic. The crystal is for all of you."
They were understandably happy to hear this but quickly discovered a problem. "Then... ... who does it belongs to?"
Everyone went silent and looked at each other, not knowing what to say.
Now, Benjamin had a new headache.
The thing with fire element crystal was that there was no way to use it separately or to take turns - it could only have one owner. Now that a dozen mages were looking at it, who should he give it to?
"This thing, can it really only be used by one person?" Joanna said hesitantly, as though thinking of giving up.
Benjamin nodded, "After all, this is a pure fire element crystal. After it is activated by spiritual energy, it will only follow the one who activated it, so, the one who activates it will become the owner of the element."
Many people members decided to step back and give up on trying to claim it.
"There are people who go on daily missions, however, I’m not doing anything so I’m too embarrassed to take this. I’ll leave it to them to take it." One mage suddenly said.
After hearing this, the rest of the people who wanted to fight for it, suddenly lost interest. They saw how everyone gave up out of modesty, so they too were too embarrassed to take it.
"Everyone... why are all of you giving up?"
Unconsciously, everyone shone away from the few boxes, as though the burning fire element crystal had become haunted, and would bring bad luck to anyone who owned it.
"Well then ... I don’t want it either." Even those who would in truth like it were now too embarrassed and awkwardly took a few steps back.
Suddenly, the room was silent. Everyone had a strange look on their face, some were looking at the boxes and others were looking at the floor. The atmosphere was stiff.
Benjamin felt horrible. He had to say something.
"We don’t have to be like this, it’s just a piece of fire element crystal."
He got up, opened the box and took the crystal out.
The crowd was stunned, he was holding a precious fire element crystal in the hands but handled it as though it was nothing. He casually threw it around, "Who are we? We are not afraid of the church, yet this small crystal got us all worked up about it? If we can get one today, we can get a second one tomorrow, isn’t that right?
After hearing this, everyone looked Benjamin, with mouths gaping.
"Te, teacher... ... are you serious?"
However, that awkward atmosphere had now cleared.
"No matter who this small crystal ends up with, none of you need to feel guilty." Benjamin saw how they reacted, and smiled, "After all, if any of you took it this time, you most won’t get it the next time. Therefore, no matter who gets the crystal now, all of you should sympathize with him/her, do not laugh at them, they’re really pitiful, okay?
"Pftt..."
The group couldn’t help but laugh out loud.
Benjamin opened his hands and said, "What’s going on? Why is no one answering me? Please be sympathetic, do not make fun of the one who gets the fire elements crystal, okay?"
Most probably due to his eccentric performance, but most of the mages were laughing and helpless shook their head. The sound of discussion finally started again, and the whole awkward atmosphere from before was replaced with an excited, cheery one.
Benjamin was relieved. He was glad he had resolved the issue.
To maintain a good team atmosphere, was not an easy thing to do. The situation just now, although out of goodwill, if not handled properly, might have caused some hidden trouble.
Fortunately, he was shameless enough and solved the problem by being silly and playing a fool.
"As for the one will get this crystal... ..." After thinking about it, he picked up the piece of crystal that was the cause of all the small chaos and continued, "Well then, we will host an activity. The backyard is relatively spacious; we can hold a competition, and everyone can compete using magic, the person to win the competition will get the fire element crystal.
The gathering of mages gave him some inspiration. He felt that he could host an activity to boost the team’s combat skill, whilst at the same time solve the problem of the distribution of the fire element crystal, killing two birds with one stone.
A few competitive mages cheeringly agreed to it and everyone else nodded, showing their support of the idea.
After all, there seemed to be no better way to do it.
So, under Benjamin’s organization, everyone went to the backyard. Although the backyard was not huge, but it could still occupy all the mages. Only George screamed from time to time:
"Be careful! Do not step on the stone flower in the backyard! Do not get too close! Be careful! I’ve taken care of those a long time, they will soon be matured... ... Be careful! Do not lean on it! Ah ah ah!
The whole scene was slightly chaotic, but there was no way around it. However, under Benjamin’s guidance, the competition proceeded in the specialized area used for sparing in their back yard.