Chapter 604: The Mysterious Siege
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
The situation was quite awkward.
Benjamin never expected these spies would directly direct their accusations at him. Of course, he was not afraid that he would be thought as a spy, but if he was required to produce some sort of identification, the circumstances would complicate itself further.
It would be terribly awkward for him to announce his presence to his students like this.
However, judging from the expressions of Lara and her students, they seemed to not suspect him. Thus, Benjamin used the typical tactic in formulating his defense - he stuttered in fear and looked perfectly innocent and naive, as if he was an innocent townsfolk caught in the game of the Mafia.
"What..... What are you talking about? I don’t know what is going on."
As expected, Lara’s response was satisfactory.
She controlled the shadow and put more pressure on the binds around these people. "Trying to change the subject?" She asked, "There’s no need to worry about someone else’s business. You better start answering my questions."
Benjamin could not help but suspect if Lara had managed to identify him. Her actions seemed to be supporting his show. However, the situation changed again when these people were tortured by magic. A blurry silhouette appeared from the horizon. It walked towards them, and when the students looked around, they realized that no matter where they looked, silhouettes started to appear one by one.
At that moment, Benjamin quickly realized the problem.
These people did not come for the information on the Academy. Instead, they came to scout.
As there were only a few travelers in the area, the opposition laid siege once they understood where the students were heading. Maybe because they could not be sure about the exact route the students will take, their encirclement was extremely large, and it coincidentally avoided the detection of Benjamin’s Water Elemental Sensing Techniques.
Benjamin did not realize that they were surrounded even if he was walking with the students.
Now, once these ‘pedestrians’ were exposed, they seemed to have used some subtle method of communication to alert their counterparts in the encirclement. Hence, their partners closed in, and their accusations towards Benjamin were only a tactic to buy some time.
Now this will be interesting....
Benjamin was not worried.
After all, this was just a siege; it would be a great lesson for the students. On the other hand, he was really curious about the mastermind behind the siege. Was it the church?
"What’s going on, teacher? There’s so many people out there..."
"We caught the small fry, and the big fish finally appeared. We seemed to be surrounded." Lara frowned as she gave the spies a once over. "Don’t worry. At least, we still have some hostages in our hands."
As the crowd from afar rapidly approached, the students quickly realized that the crowd was bigger than they expected. As they approached from all directions, they seem to have a few hundred people among them.
Thankfully, they found out that these people mostly were ordinary people. They did not sense much spiritual pressure from them, and the only few did not seem to be priests anyway.
Benjamin was slightly perplexed.
There might be some strange methods in play, but he could only sense the presence of mages within the crowd. He did a brief count, and concluded that there were only around a few dozens of mages. Actually, the amount of mages within the hostile and themselves were almost the same.
What was happening here?
If it was not the church, who would it be?
"Halt your steps. If you take even a step forward, I’ll show you a lesson."
As the crowd approached, Lara was forced to chant a spell and summoned several shadows to form claws that formed a defensive circle around the students. She took a step forward and announced a warning to the incomers.
The crowd finally stopped.
"So, you’re the people from the Academy of Magic, no?" A mage who looked mature stepped out and narrowed his eyes. He scanned the students with cold eyes as he posed the question.
Lara did not answer. Instead, she pointed at the people she had bound using her magic and said, "So, these idiots are with you, no?"
The middle-aged mage shot a glance at them, obviously displeased. He replied, "A useless bunch. You can do whatever you want with them. In the meantime, I shall get straight to the point. Our master wishes to invite all the mages present to follow us."
The students exchanged a look among themselves. Lara looked quite confused.
"Who are you? The betraying mages that were trained by the church?"
"Nope. You’ve misunderstood." The middle-aged mage shook his head, as he seemed to not want to explain further. "You will know who we are once you’ve reached your destination. First, you shall follow us."
"What if we do not want to?" Lara asked.
When the middle-aged mage heard that, he shot a look to the people beside him. After that, those ordinary men withdrew their swords and blades before rushing towards the students, as if they have been waiting for this. Meanwhile, he led some of the other mages and started to chant.
Benjamin’s eyebrows rose to his hairline.
Who exactly are these people? Not only did they show up at the borders of Ferelden, they somehow made an encirclement. They even intended to drag them off to meet their master! There was no doubt that these people must have been observing the Academy for quite a long time.
Are they from the other mage forces within Ferelden?
He did just establish his influence around the area, though, so there should not be any other mage authorities that would dare to attack their Academy.....
As Benjamin was thinking, the people were already right before them, waving their swords and knives. Lara led the students to formulate an attack, and her offence were merciless, killing a person every second with each swipe of her Claw of Shadow.
Blood spurted all over the place like fountains of water, and these students with little to none real-world experience were scared to bits.
"T-Teacher...."
"Focus. Death is the prettiest drawing in the world." A small smile graced Lara’s lips. "If you don’t want to become a part of that drawing, you’ll need to muster up your courage to fight them till the end."
Most of the students here never killed anyone, but these people before them slashed and hacked with their blades, and bellowed while they tried to barge into them. Thus, they had no choice but to embrace the wave of emotions that rolled over them, and as they were overcame with adrenaline, they finally casted their worries and inhibitions aside.
However, these ordinary people did not cower before magic; they continued to march to their death, successfully delaying Lara and her students and occupying all their attention.
Then, the magic from the opposing mages arrived.
Strong winds blew over the area after an immense magical oscillation rolled over the site. It was as if a tornado appeared out of nowhere, and it managed to break the barriers that were summoned by quite a number of the students. Lara immediately summoned a black wall to surround the students and provide them protection.
"What... What a terrifying power! Is this a High-Level Magic?"
Lara shook her head as she answered, "It’s just an Intermediate Magic. It is this powerful because they casted dozens of the same spells simultaneously."
She still looked composed, and even though the black wall trembled terribly under the assault of the wind, it remained standing as it wrapped around the students like a gigantic photo film. The students immediately chanted spells to summon new barriers and fill in the gaps. They barely withstood this attack of the strong wind.
However, quite a number of the students were nearly blown away in the process.
"I’ve underestimated you." The voice of the middle-aged mage was heard from the exterior of the black wall. "A bunch of students under training for merely a few months should never have grasped this level of magic. Maybe there’s some errors in our information..."
"Your information is too outdated!" A student finally exploded in anger and shouted. "Do you know who our Director is? How dare you attack us here? All of you combined will never stand a chance against the Director!"
"That might be the case...." The middle-aged mage responded coldly. "However, no matter how strong he might be, he could never save you now."