Chapter 12 - The scram operation OR the supreme stone (1)
648 Words
I'm leaning on my desk while writing on a parchment with a feather, while the golems controlled by my AI are making something, hidden by the sparks.
Slightly distracted, I ask:
-AI, what is the progress of the latest operation?
-Operation "scram" at 69%.
-Good.
I say with a satisfied tone. It'll soon be 3 weeks since the operation started, and I almost finished my parchment. On it are thousands of runes patiently traced with a mix of ink and mana crystals powder. Well, after, I put some colorant, I admit, golden looks much better on a parchment…
But apart from that, my backup rank 5 spell is ready! This kind of parchment is worthing a fortune, after all, in the Empire, officially, the only human at rank 5 is the emperor.
If I prepared this spell, it's for this much talked about hidden order, or sect, or whatever. In fact, while I didn't show it to my hand, this sect scares me, scares me a lot. For a simple sacrificial pawn like the one stored in my mana crystal ball to be of rank 4, and for the weaker assassins to be at the pinnacle of rank 3, it means that their leader is at least of the pinnacle of rank 5.
This constatation also means other questions need to be asked:
How did the imperial dynasty, of which the strongest emperor in its history is at a maximum at the intermediate stage of rank 5, was able to defend itself against a sect led by someone so strong?
To explain this, multiples ideas came to my mind, I kept three of those:
Possibility one would be that the emperor is of higher rank than what he lets people see. But it seems quite unlikely as his imperial mage just broke through rank 4.
Possibility two is that the imperial family has a treasure or a secret guardian that they use only as a last resort. This idea is quite realistic, and moreover, it's absolutely possible that it is something handed down from an emperor to his heir.
Possibility three is that the imperial family is not the real leader of the Empire. It would be unthinkable for an actual member of the imperial family, but I'm coming from a treacherous world full of plots, and this is not improbable. Given the power of the gods, they could be the real decision-makers of the Empire, letting the emperor to taking care of what they are not judging important.
Or it could be that… The sect is the real shadow ruler!
All these hypotheses are seemingly quite probable to me, but this is not easy to obtain information, so I don't have any way to verify my thesis.
There is only one thing I can check: the sect! And this is why I've been preparing for 3 weeks…
[…]
2 weeks, 4 days, 21 hours, and 35 minutes later…
-Master, the operation is finished.
-Hmm!
Good! Besides, the operation finished 1 minute early! [1]
-I should be gone for 1 to 2 weeks…
I take my storage ring, put in it my parchment, food and water for a month (you never know, and I had a bad experience with things longer than expected…), mana crystals (my mana consummation is huge), some spare clothes, and prepare myself to go.
Before leaving, I detach and take my second arm on the experience table, and place it again on my body.
The operation that the AI carried out according to my instructions this last 3 weeks was to separate the kid's soul from my arm! He is now in the ball with the other!
The soul doesn't hold many secrets from me you could say.
[1] Calculating that so fast just goes to show the mental capabilities of a 5th rank mage
- Writer
