When A Mage Revolts

After entering the city grounds, Benjamin hailed a few horse carriages to help him transport his cargo. A few days later, he arrived at the Academy with the entire haul from his adventure.

"Wha… what is all this?"

In a secret laboratory, Morris, along with the elders from the Magic Potion department and the ‘relics’ from the small rune research team, basically Benjamin’s most trusted researchers, gathered around.

They all looked at the piling boxes of fractured remains and couldn’t help but feel appalled. One of the elders picked up a fibula fragment, examined it in his hands, raised his eyebrows and asked in absolute confusion.

Benjamin took a deep breath in response.

"Now all of you may be rather shocked by what I’m about to share." He spoke slowly, "Prepare yourselves, for this will definitely be something unheard of for all of you."

Everyone heard this, then looked at each other. Perhaps due to the fact that Benjamin’s usually uninterested demeanor was nowhere to be found, but some of them already had felt cold sweat dripping down their foreheads.

"Whatever it is, speak up already," an elder said impatiently.

Benjamin nodded. Then, he began sharing, from the secrets of the Skyfall Mountains, to the spirits in the depths of the Valley of the Abyss, then the World of the Revenants… he shared his journey in detail to everyone present.

It was only when he retold this that he realized that his journey was filled with bizarre experiences.

Who knew this was going to happen…... When he first departed, he was only involved in Fulner Family’s plan for rebellion!

On the other hand, as they followed Benjamin’s tale, the expressions on everyone at present shifted from doubtful to astounded. In the end, everyone sat there wide-eyed, faces filled with utmost disbelief, not a single word leaving their mouths.

"... After that, I brought these revenant remains back to the Academy." Benjamin ended his journey’s tale on this note, took a few steps back, said, "What all you see before you, are the corpses I recovered."

Everyone then took a deep breath, then cast their gazes on the fractured remains.

The abyss which parted lands... the Revenant World....

This wasn’t a laughing matter at all.

Some had already hastily made their way to the front, and in their professional researcher attitude, they examined the fractured remains. The elders even retrieved the existing boiler setup from the laboratory, dropped a few fragments into the potion brewing broiler, filled it to the brim with special potion concoction, then carefully boiled it.

"Wha… What about the revenant?" Morris thought for a while then piped up.

"In here." Benjamin laid the parasite-infected bird on the table, said, "Do not underestimate it, it is only weak due to its current condition. Once it regains its strength, the illusion it conjures could cast us all in a deep trance, right before it attempts to consume us."

In truth, the revenant within the bird had already greatly recovered over the past few days. A huge mass of dark elemental energy had converged in the bird’s body, turning it into a sort of magical beast, fortunately enough, its physical body hadn’t exhibited any peculiar changes.

Similar to what Benjamin had pondered before — when the revenant recovers, it would take over the bird’s body and cause radical changes. However, this kind of scenario had not yet happened.

The bird had been unconscious since then, and the revenant remained peacefully within it as well, sucking away its host’s lifeforce at a rather slow rate. As such, Benjamin had not moved it to another host, intending to observe it further, curious to see what would become of the bird.

However… this certainly was Benjamin’s most dangerous find; it required the utmost caution in handling it.

"Didn’t you once say that its illusions are achieved through the use of sound?" Morris took out a few small pieces of wood, "This is something I came up with a while back, it’s called Silence Lumber. By nailing it on the ground, the area it encloses within it will block any sounds from escaping."

Benjamin listened and furrowed his brows, "You want to release it?"

"If it isn’t released, it will continue to reside in the bird’s body, and we won’t be able to research it properly," Morris nodded and said.

"The problems are not limited to sound-proofing alone." Benjamin frowned, "Its body is an apparitional form of spiritual energy conjuration, it can freely enter any kind of living beings; we need to create a truly infallible cage, only then can we even consider such dangerous actions such as releasing it."

Besides, it was even more unlikely they could create a suitable environment for revenants to survive.

On hindsight, Benjamin had not put the possibility of releasing the revenant into consideration.

"Trapping a spiritual entity, eh… that’s something to consider." Morris gave it some thought as he said, "Actually, before this, the Church had done some research on magical tools for spiritual energy isolation. I managed to learn bits of it without their knowledge, I could attempt to forge a few of the products."

"Then go and have at it." Benjamin shrugged, "Oh, and another thing, we have to isolate light elemental energy while simultaneously accumulating dark elemental energy... If we are unable to create such an environment, then the revenant won’t be able to survive."

"That is child’s play." Morris laughed, "The Church did similar experiments in the past, only in reverse. I can get it done by today."

"... Very well."

Benjamin scratched his head, he felt that the Church had really tried their hand at all sorts of things.

He suddenly recalled that he had previously encountered a few priests that could conceal themselves as commoners. That kind of technique had probably required them to isolate their spiritual energy to a certain degree - perhaps that was why no one could detect them.

But, when it comes to the Church...

As Morris turned around to leave, preparing to head back to get started on what he had promised just now, Benjamin followed and hollered after him. Then, he took a tree leaf out from his pocket.

"For you to stay in the Church for so long, do you know... what the secret door that this key opens, is all about?" He lowered his voice greatly, to the point that only Morris could hear it.

Morris raised his eyebrows, "This is..."

He gazed at the jaded ginkgo leaf in Benjamin's palm, uncertain for a moment, then suddenly stood stunned at the spot.

"The Church’s invaluable key." Benjamin said slowly, "Because of it, the Church sent an unimaginable number of men after me, I had to resort to traveling through the Skyfall Mountains, which led me to the discovery of the Revenant World."

"This thing... I’d only heard rumors of it." Morris took in a deep breath and said, "For those of us who are trained as undercover mages, we naturally do not gain the trust of the Church, and as such, it is nigh impossible for such an immense secret to come to our knowledge. Yet... I had once overheard a conversation between a bishop and a paladin about the key and the Realm of God."

Benjamin was excited and quickly asked, "What did they say?"

"They said that, through the ages, the popes multiplied in power upon ascension, with the majority of the power being inherited from the Realm of God." Morris’s eyes burned intensely as he continued, "This key, is apparently the Church’s lifeline to the inheritance."