Rebirth of the 8th-Circle Mage

Chapter 213 - Rally (4)

‘There’s no way...?’

Something didn’t add up.

How had Balak found the wizards in Salgaera when the right minister didn't know that there were wizards there to begin with? The funny thing was, Henry had intended to unmask the snitch in order to find out who had informed the other side about the wizards in Salgaera. However, contrary to his expectations, the right minister knew nothing of that.

‘Then what the hell is he?’

Henry was befuddled because, in retrospect, he had actually been suspicious of the right minister for various reasons, and it just so happened that he had caught him red-handed. In a way, he had caught the wrong snitch. The right minister wasn’t the snitch he had been looking for.

‘Then who is it?’

Henry looked at everyone else in the room again with a bewildered face. They were all important members of the Allied Powers, and Herarion had only identified the right minister as a traitor.

‘Huh?’

They were back to the drawing board. They had indeed caught an informant, but just not the one they had been looking for. Because of that, Henry felt that he hadn’t gained anything from the right minister’s confession. If anything, he felt even more uneasy now that he knew there was another informant out there.

‘Have I investigated this the wrong way?’

Henry had used Herarion to uncover the snitch’s identity because Herarion had once said that no matter how hard a person tried to hide their true feelings, they couldn’t do so forever. Thus, Henry had carefully formulated the sentences of the oath so that when everybody said them out loud, the traitors would accidentally reveal themselves.

However, despite all that effort, they were back to square one, the identity of the real snitch still unknown.

‘Well, if this is the case, I guess there’s only one way left...’

Despite Herarion’s abilities, they hadn’t figured out who had informed the other side about the wizards in Salgaera. Thus, Henry knew there was only one thing left to do.

‘I guess I have no choice but to interrogate Balak myself.’

At that moment, Balak was completely frozen and sealed away in Klever’s Chest. Deep down, Henry wanted to go back to the chest and fight him to the death like he had done with Benedick in the past.

However, Balak had defeated the Sword King, Hector, which meant that interrogating him was a last resort.

‘Tsk. Well, at least we got something, so I guess I’ll just have to be satisfied with that for now. ’

Henry knew that when he couldn’t come up with a solution for something after racking his brains, it was better to think about something else. But at the same time, even though he knew what the wise and efficient course of action was, he couldn’t help but feel annoyed.

Henry turned his head to the right minister. He was still bowing down to the members of the Allied Powers, begging for his life.

‘A double agent... Hmm...’

To be frank, Henry just wanted to cut his tongue and limbs off and throw them in the snow in Salgaera, but after thinking about what the right minister had told them, he realized how important that information was.

Moreover, since there was nothing he could do about the right minister’s betrayal, Henry felt like he had to take advantage of him as much as possible, just as Doyle had suggested, to try to make up for his losses.

With all that in mind, Henry approached the right minister, who was still bowing his head to the others.

“Right Minister.”

“Y-yes...?”

“Open your mouth.”

Henry created a black mana ball in his palm. He then compressed it and shoved it into his mouth.

Blergh! Blergh!

“Stop overreacting.”

The black mana ball slowly made its way down his throat, and when it went all the way past his esophagus, Henry proceeded to explain what he had just done.

“What the right minister swallowed just now is a magic bomb I made with my magic.”

“Bo-bomb!?”

“Since it’s made with my magic, it responds to my commands, and since I made it the most powerful wizard in the entire continent, you won’t be able to find a wizard who can rid you of that magic, at least not on this continent.”

Henry did the exact same thing he had done to Terion, with just one extra ingredient. He made it more painful for the right minister.

“Ugh!”

The right minister clutched his stomach and went down on his knees as soon as he felt the piercing pain. He also turned pale.

However, Henry knew he was overreacting, so he just ignored him and continued talking to him the same way he had with Terion.

“I’ll let you live just as we all promised you. You’ll have to work like a dog for the Allied Powers.”

With this, Henry was done talking to the right minister. He knew that there wasn’t anything else he could do or get out of the right minister anymore, at least for the time being.

"And also...”

With a snap of his fingers, Henry summoned the Colt Dagger in his right hand. He then grabbed the Colt Dagger and pointed its tip at the right minister.

“Still, don’t you think you should receive the minimum punishment?”

“W-what? I thought you said you would forgive my sins completely...!”

“Shh. You’ll get hurt if you move.”

Henry swung his blade at the right minister, who cowered in fear, skillfully severing his pinky finger. He did this simply because he wanted the right minister’s missing finger to symbolize that he had broken their trust and that he was a traitor.

Blood splattered on the floor, and the right minister couldn’t suppress his wailing as he wasn’t used to pain. However, no one sympathized with him, not even the left minister and the Taejae, the people from his country.

Henry then walked over and crouched down to pick up the finger, placing it in his palm and...

Crackle!

He cast fire magic to burn it to ash.

Whoosh...

Henry blew the ash from his palm, then got back up and sat back at the round table. Having finished his business, he asked with a grin, “How about we continue where we left off earlier?”

With that, everyone returned to their seats. The right minister was still crying his eyes out, but no one paid attention to him as they were preparing to resume the meeting.

Just as the meeting was about to begin anew, Henry added with a slight smile, "Oh... I believe we have to change the agenda of the meeting since we’ve received some new information in the meantime.”

With that, Henry's chess board suffered more changes, the pieces moving in a more interesting direction.

* * *

As the meeting kept on going in Salgaera, there were other things happening in the continent.

Following the negotiations with Nichel, the commander-in-chief of Caliburn Fortress, Arthus went to other regions like the Woonyo Trench and Pestilence Cliffs to seize control of them.

That was a wise decision because Woonyo Trench and Pestilence Cliffs also had their supply lines cut off, just like Caliburn Fortress. On top of that, since both special forces were located much farther away than Caliburn Fortress, they couldn’t have found out that the Eurasian Empire had collapsed. This made it much easier for Arthus to persuade them. It was a piece of cake, really.

After he seized control of the two special forces by promising them supplies, Arthus returned to the imperial palace with a satisfied smile. Upon returning, he received reports that the messengers he had sent all over the continent had returned. The messengers were resting after their traveling, but as soon as they heard that Arthus had returned, they quickly gathered in the throne room.

Arthus was back after a long trip. The messengers were getting nervous as they saw the emperor sit on his throne with a solemn expression.

“I’ll receive reports in order.”

“Yes, Your Majesty!”

Arthus had sent across the continent a total of fourteen messengers. He had sent five to the Central Powers, four to the special cities, and three to the free cities. Lastly, he had sent two of them to track down the two former Grand Marquis whose whereabouts were unknown.

Excluding the messenger sent to the special city of Killive, and Terion, who had already returned, a total of twelve messengers had gathered to report to Arthus.

The messengers proceeded with the reports, the ones from the special cities being first. They had returned from the Holy City, the Mercenary City, and the Art City.

“The Holy City of St. Hall hopes to become the religious capital of the Aenia Empire.”

“The Mercenary City of Faesiling wishes to establish friendly relations with the Aenia Empire. As proof for that, they said that if war breaks out, they would fight alongside us at any time.”

“The Art City of Musereal also said they want to sing to the new history of the Aenia Empire.”

The messengers had come back with positive messages. Arthus thought it would have been better if Balak had returned as well, but since he had left for Salgaera under his orders, he decided to wait a little longer.

Arthus nodded in satisfaction at the reports. However, the next messengers were the ones whom he had sent to the Central Powers.

As they lined up in front of him, Arthus was stone-faced.

“I’m guessing everyone rejected.”

The messengers lowered their heads in silence. However, the one who had been dispatched to the Sore Empire raised his head and confidently said, “No, Your Majesty! The Sore Empire said that they would like to establish friendly relations with the Aenia Empire.”

He was even more enthusiastic because all the other messengers had failed in their negotiations. However, Arthus merely sighed and shook his head.

“Next,” said Arthus drily as he waved his hand.

“...?”

The messenger was visibly confused, not knowing why the emperor was so indifferent to the good news. He thought it was unfair. However, the messenger reacted this way because he had no idea that the right minister had come here after betraying the Taejae.

As the messengers from the Central Powers stepped back, the messengers that had come from the free cities stepped forward, and just like the previous ones, they weren’t particularly enthusiastic.

"Hmm?"

Arthus frowned anxiously as he saw that the messengers were reluctant to speak. Just as he expected, the messengers had bad news for him.

“Your Majesty, the free cities of Vivaldi, Enkelmann, and Monsieur have declared independence.”

“What did you just say...?”

Arthus had been apprehensive about the free cities, but he never would’ve guessed that all of them would declare independence. At the messenger’s report, he went through all sorts of calculations through his mind.

‘How dare they declare independence when they’re just some free cities?’

Arthus was aware that those free cities had originally been kingdoms that had been taken down and transformed into cities. However, he couldn’t understand why all of them suddenly declared independence after decades of being cities.

Arthus wondered if they even knew what it took to declare independence. Above all, doing that during times like this made no sense to him.

‘Just thinking about it is giving me a headache.’

Despite how troublesome this was, Arthus knew he couldn’t do anything about it since it had already happened. He merely frowned in frustration and decided to finish up with the reports.

"Next."

Lastly, the messengers who had been tasked to track down the two Grand Marquis stepped forward.

“So?”

In a way, this was the report that Arthus looked forward to the most. However, hoping for a lot often led to more disappointment.

These two messengers didn’t look particularly happy either.

“It is said that Marquis Eisen’s whereabouts became unknown after the Fief War, and following his disappearance, the Shonan region also fell apart.”

“The same goes for Marquis Alfred. He also went missing after the Fief War, and then the Etherwether region collapsed as well.”

‘Tsk, so that’s what happened...”

All of this wasn’t that surprising for Arthus. He had sort of anticipated this, but had still hoped that perhaps things could turn out differently. However, now that he knew how things were, he decided he would quietly wait for Balak to bring back Aubert.

‘I guess the only positive outcomes are the Mercenary City and the Holy City, huh...?’

Among the special cities, he had acquired the Church of Peace located in Saint Hall. The church worshiped Irene, the goddess of peace and abundance, and was under the pope’s authority.

Arthus thought this alone was a big achievement, as religion was the best tool for calming down the masses during chaotic times. In addition, despite being a small city compared to the other special cities, the military power of the Holy See itself, along with the power of priests, paladins, and monks, was considered to be on par with that of the Imperial Knights.

‘And the Mercenary City.’

Faesiling, the Mercenary City.

Although Vivaldi Town had attracted a considerable number of mercenaries, it was primarily a hub for lower-class individuals who had dedicated their lives to gambling. Of course, they were a good stream of tax, but when considering the numbers of the mercenaries and their aptitudes, Faesiling was overwhelmingly superior.

‘I have the Paladins, the Mercenary King, and the Punishment King under my command. I’m fully prepared.’

Arthus had also planted the right minister as a spy on the enemy side and had more tricks up his sleeve in Killive that no one knew about. He was done with the preparations.

After contemplating for a while, Arthus finally said, “Gather the entire army right now.”

After concluding that he was fully prepared, he issued a call-up for all the troops under his command because he thought there was no reason to further postpone his conquest of the continent.

From this point, a new chapter in the history of the Eurasian continent was about to be written.