Chapter 56: A Rational Decision
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Benjamin almost fainted the moment he saw the small group of the "cleaners".
Just a moment ago he was trying hard to erase traces of magic to fool the church. But now? The church’s team that specializes in catching mages has appeared in front of him, as if the world was trying to play a sarcastic joke on him.
Benjamin once again felt the malice of this world.
Why did they have to come here? Why now of all times?
A meteorite might as well fall down from the sky and crush him to death.
F*ck this!
No, He needed to calm down or else it would really be over. Calm down and think...
What should he do?
Escape from them?
But could he? He recalled the "cleaners" amazing speed when they were pursuing Michelle and came to a conclusion that he could not outrun these people.
Should... should he just fight these people to death?
Truthfully, Benjamin might not even win a group of holy knights, how could he then overcome a team of "cleaners?"
After he successfully escaped from Michelle, he more or less understood the cleaners’ background. The "cleaners" were the elites chosen from among the holy knights and were formed into a team after going through special training regimes. The biggest difference between them and the other holy knights was that they were taught to use the divine arts and special joint attacks.
If one were to take away their deity-like aura, they were just holy knights who were able to use the divine arts.
If one were to look at it that way, they were not that superior at all. However...
How good are they with their divine arts? How powerful were their joint attacks? Benjamin did not know. But what he was clear about was how fearful Michelle was of them, and how the church had absolute confidence in them.
He came to the conclusion that there was no difference between taking them on and committing suicide.
He was a in a dilemma. He could not fight nor escape from them. Benjamin’s adrenaline level was almost off the chart when the "cleaner" pointed his sword at him. Within this short amount of time, it was as if he was a final stage cancer patient searching for a viable treatment everywhere. His thoughts were scattered everywhere while he tried to think of a plan.
What should he do...
He thought of an idea as he was looking at the corpse of the knife-scarred man.
While the cleaners were able to detect the use of spells within a certain range that did not mean that they were able to identify the mage. Based on the way they spoke to him, it was highly likely that they were not able to confirm Benjamin’s identity as a mage.
There was no other way but to push all the blame onto the dead man.
With this idea, he pointed at the corpse of the knife-scarred man and said: "It was this man. He was the bandit leader of Mount North. He had escaped from the previous ambush and he... he turned out to be an evil mage."
Even though this idea was formed in a rush, he could not show any sign of guilt as he had already opened his mouth.
Life is like a play, everything depends on his acting skills!
The leader of the cleaners heard him out and furrowed his eyebrows as he looked at the corpse and then revealed a shocked expression. It looked like they had already heard of rumors regarding the bandits of Mount North. The leader exchanged a look with the other cleaners.
"Lord Lithur, please calm down. Can you kindly tell me what happened here?" He looked at Benjamin and asked.
Benjamin took a deep breath as if he was trying to calm himself down but in reality he was trying to create a fake story.
At that moment, he felt like he was like the poet CaoZhi creating the ultimate poetry, churning his brain and acting with his limbs at the same time. He then created a new story in a blink of an eye:
"I... I was worried about my servant as he did not come back for the whole day and so I went searching for him. It was this man who tricked my servant to Bonnie’s pub so that he could bait me out. Even the honored holy knight died protecting me." With a nervous tone, he continued: "At first I did not know why he wanted to abduct me but the motive was as clear as water as soon as he brought me here. That was when I know he was that witch’s subordinate! That witch taught him magic spells so that he could catch me!"
"That witch?" the leader of the cleaners furrowed his eyebrows, thought for a while and questioned, "Is it the same witch who abducted you last time?"
Benjamin nodded frantically and said: "Yes! It is her! Michelle, I will never forget this name. I obeyed the Bishop’s command to not follow any instructions from that witch. Never in my mind would I expect her to send a bandit to abduct me!"
The cleaners exchanged glances among each other when they finished listening to his story.
Benjamin could feel that their suspicion had subsided as they were exchanging their glances.
By the looks of it, the fake story made up by Benjamin was not half bad. He even managed to relate Michelle to the story plot, hence making the story even more realistic.
The stiffness of his hands due to nervousness finally faded as he finished his story.
"Lord Lithur, did you kill this fallen one?" The leader of the cleaners questioned again.
Benjamin nodded and answered: "He was very delighted when he killed the Holy Knight and he did not realise I have a gun with me. As I have been training with the King’s army in the regiment for the past few days, I took out my gun when he turned his back against me. However, he was alerted by it and immediately turned towards me. I triggered the gun and... and he has been lying there since then. I was afraid that the gunshot would attract his underling here so I planned to leave this place immediately with Jeremy. Then you guys arrived the moment I picked Jeremy up."
To turn against the tide and kill the knife-scarred man might sound a little too dramatic for this story. Benjamin could only describe the events in more details to ensure that his story was as realistic as possible.
However, how much detail could he describe within this short amount of time?
He had no confidence in himself at all by the time he finished his make-believe story. He did not know if this story could convince the cleaners or the church.
"I see." said the cleaner while nodding his head. The hostility between the cleaners and Benjamin had finally subsided. The cleaner continued: "Lord Lithur, we can not simply make decisions on our own for this incident as it involves the death of a holy knight and a fallen one. Could you possibly come along to the church and meet the Bishop with us?"
Benjamin immediately agreed with the proposal.
"Okay, I would also like to meet the Bishop as well."
This was all within his expectations. The church would definitely bring the people over and scan their brain whenever mages and magic are involved. It was no surprise to Benjamin at all.
When he was busy building his story, he already had the System create fake memories for him. While the System was reluctant to do it, it had no choice to follow Benjamin’s order as the situation was very critical.
If reading someone’s memories was the church’s most dependable and trusted method in obtaining information, then it could be safely assumed that Benjamin has successfully evaded this crisis.
It could not be helped that the bishop had too much faith in the information obtained from the memory.
However, unexpected situations tend to occur to Benjamin whenever he gets into a tricky situation. Once he positioned all his flags, things started to go against his will.
"Thank you for your cooperation Lord Lithur. Can you please wait for a moment while I purify the fallen one’s corpse as it still has a strong evil force attached onto it? I will bring you to the church once I am done with the body."
The leader of the cleaners said that while walking towards the corpse.
A strong evil force? What was that?
Benjamin started to have a really bad feeling about this.
The knife-scarred man was definitely not a mage, hence his body would definitely not contain any "strong evil force". If the cleaners were to find out while purifying the body, then...
The cat would be out of the bag.
There were only Jeremy, Benjamin and the knife-scarred man in this premise. If the knife-scarred man is determined to be not a mage and Jeremy is unconscious, then the spells the cleaners felt previously was definitely casted by.... That was the only conclusion every cleaners will come to.
They would definitely purify Benjamin on the spot.
Damn, who would have thought that these people had such a card in their hands? Why did nobody tell him that one can determine if someone is a mage by examining their corpse?
Oh sh*t oh sh*t...
The leader of the cleaners approached the knife-scarred man and Benjamin. He nodded at Benjamin and proceeded to squat down, preparing to examine the body.
What now?
Countless thoughts passed through Benjamin’s mind.
Since this cleaner was in the attack range of the ice needle, should he take the upper hand and kill him now?
Benjamin had confidence in the power of the ice needle. Even the cleaner could not possibly negate the effect of this spell. However, if he were to kill this cleaner, what about the rest of them?
The cleaners always moved in a team and their battle strength would be significantly reduced if the team leader was not available. Even so, was he strong enough to fight against all the remaining cleaners? Would he be able to escape from them?
Within this short amount of time, he had a hard time in his mind, deciding whether he should fight or flee. He felt that his body was about to literally split into half, with the first half telling him to attack the cleaners and the other half convincing him to give up as there was no point in struggling since he would die regardless of the outcome.
He could come out with a better plan if he had enough time to calm himself down. However, he did not even have the time to hesitate.
In a blink of an eye, his sudden urge to stay alive took over and decided to fight back.
F*ck it, let’s do this!
He decided to fight with all his might. Since the cleaners were human beings, it meant that they could be defeated as every human being definitely had a weakness.
As he was preparing to use his spells to kill the unsuspecting team leader of the cleaners, someone appeared and stopped all of his actions. The team leader stopped examining the corpse as well.
"I finally found you guys! The church is in trouble! The bishop requests all of you to return immediately!"
A holy knight ran down into the sewers and shouted at the top of his lungs.