Chapter 609: The Lacing Plan
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
After the meeting ended, Benjamin let the potion mages in the Academy mass produce the antidote. After all, they would need to prepare the antidote no matter what plan they adopted next.
The antidote was quite difficult to produce, and only a few of the mages within Potion Studies could successfully concoct them. Additionally, if they wanted to release the entire Mage Guild from the Queen’s influence, they would need nearly ten thousand bottles of the potion.
Thus, the Potions Department hustled to achieve the goal.
"Senior, I will no longer force you to remain here in the Academy as the research is now complete." Benjamin looked at the old man standing in front of the table in the lab, doing experiments and developing potions. "If you want to go back, I can send somebody to escort you back to Icor."
Instead, the old man just stared at the potion within the flask, as if he did not hear anything.
"Senior?"
"Shut up, don’t bug me." The old man turned to him impatiently and glared at Benjamin. "When I was researching the previous potion, I found out about some new phenomena. I need to study it here."
Benjamin tried to keep the smile off his face.
"Then... Once you finished studying the phenomena, you would leave the Academy and return to Icor?"
"Of course."
Benjamin nodded, no longer able to hide his smile. The old man just looked at him, as if he had no idea why the youth was smiling. Then, he turned away and continued his potion research.
The lab was as busy as usual, and the cat named ‘Miss Mona Lisa’ sprawled herself on the windowsill, yawning lazily.
Benjamin left. He was quite pleased to be able to keep a Potion Master within the Academy. However, after repeated contemplation, he decided to leave for Icor again so he could pass the news about the antidote to the Guild Master of the Mage Guild in person. The matter was too significant to be explained by a letter alone. The letter to the Fulners was only recently sent out, and it was impossible for him to receive a reply anytime soon. He would have an empty window after this.
It was decided. Benjamin informed Varys about his leave, and flew towards Icor using the levitation from the water elemental domain.
Two day later.
"This.... Is this the antidote that would stop the influence of the Queen’s potion?"
In a small town near Regina, Benjamin and the Guild Master met secretly in an inn. The Guild Master held the sample Benjamin gave him. The former inhaled as he asked excitingly.
Benjamin nodded. "We’ve tried it on the dozen of mages from the Mage Guild whom we held captive. The mental suggestion buried in their mind disappeared after they drank the potion. I released them, but it seemed that they did not return to Icor."
"Naturally." The Guild Master shook his head. "In their present state, they would only run into trouble if they return to Icor now."
Benjamin nodded in agreement.
"So... what do you plan to do?"
The Guild Master inhaled deeply again, as if he has not regained his composure. He patted Benjamin’s shoulders heavily and said, "I will not elaborate my appreciation. I plan to pass the formula to Vinci. He has quite a number of Potion Shops around, and is capable of producing the amount of the potion we need as fast as possible."
Benjamin held his chin. He nodded.
He nearly forgot the existence of the Potion mogul here in Icor. Mage Vinci has all his assets located in Ferelden, so there was no worries of information leaks. Besides, with the sheer amount of the potion mages he had working for him could probably produce ten thousand bottles of potions in mere days.
Then, there was no need for his people to do this anymore.
"How then should we distribute this to the mages in the Guild?" Benjamin started to ask the Guild Master about the application problem when the production issue was solved.
The Guild Master was quiet for a while before he answered. "Before, I would have wanted to do this slowly, infiltrating the organization by freeing them one by one. Once over half of the mages in the Guild were free, then we’ll force the other half to drink it using brute force. However, this would not be applicable judging from the situation in Icor right now."
Benjamin frowned. "What’s happening in Icor now?"
"It’s the Queen." The Guild Master sighed. "She recovered from her depression, but she has become more extreme than she ever did. The Mage Guild now functions like some sort of spy organization, where everyone was spying at someone else while trying to prevent getting spied on. It’s very difficult for us to distribute the potions to most of the people without any detection."
Benjamin did not look too surprised by that. That was a natural response; as a political leader, the Queen would definitely tighten her hold over the Mage Guild after she realized that she could not be a real mage. She would do everything to achieve that.
Getting the potion around was definitely not going to be easy, or there was no need for him to be worried about it in the first place!
"I think that this issue cannot be done slowly anymore," Benjamin spoke after some thought. "The Queen would most definitely realize what we’re doing as time drags on. Thus, we only have one shot."
"You mean...."
"As a Guild Master, are you able to gather most of the mages within the Guild in a place?" Benjamin explained slowly. "There was no need for a legitimate, serious reason. Maybe a feast? Or a gathering? As long as we can gather everyone in a place, we could then let them drink it without realizing."
The Guild Master shook his head. "It’s going to be extremely difficult. How could a gathering be logical with the current climate within the Guild? Most of the mages are not particularly jolly people anyways, they wouldn’t attend a gathering."
"... Alright then."
"However, if we’re really looking at the possibilities, there would be an event where most of the mages would be gathered at one place." Suddenly, the Guild Master spoke after he thought for a long while.
A flicker of hope appeared in Benjamin’s heart. "What event?"
The Guild Master looked complicated. "The birthday celebration for the Queen."
"....."
Benjamin was speechless.
Uh.... The act of feeding people the potion must still be done without alerting the Queen’s people. However, how could they lace the potion to everyone’s drinks in the Queen’s birthday celebration?
The Queen was so cautious that it was near impossible for this happen.
Unless.....
"When will the Queen’s birthday be?" Benjamin asked.
"Two months later." The Guild Master answered. "Actually, this was a huge event. We started the preparations a month ago. Aside from the gathering, Regina would be filled with different activities, and there would be a high amount of traffic in the gathering."
Benjamin was pleasantly surprised. "Then, would it be easy for me to sneak in?"
The Guild Master answered. "It’s not difficult to sneak in, but the food and beverages circulated in the gathering is extremely well guarded. It was almost impossible for someone to lace them."
"No worries." Benjamin smiled. "As long as I can sneak in, the mages would have no choice but to drink the potion. There was no need for us to secretly include them into the food."