Chapter 272 — The Prologue of the Offensive

Cecil Territory was like a machine running at full power: once the order was given, every gear and every part of that machine began to spin at breakneck speed. Not everyone knew what was about to happen, but almost everyone knew what they ought to be doing at that very moment. Clear orders, rules, and regulations were the greatest bulwark that set Cecil Territory apart from other nobles' domains. People needed only to follow the orders and see to matters within their own scope, and this vast machine would run flawlessly, unleashing a force that left everyone dumbstruck.

In the space of a mere three days, the southern defensive line of the domain was once again reinforced and expanded. The great expanse of open ground between the Dark Mountains and the city walls was layered with barricades and fences, and between those barricades and fences minefields were sown everywhere. Of the thousand-odd soldiers, sixty percent were dispatched to the southern wall, while the remaining forty percent served as reserves and mobile forces patrolling the other defensive lines. A separate peacekeeping corps maintained order within the domain and stood ready at all times to relay new orders from the lord. Though a crisis was closing in, everything in the domain appeared orderly and disciplined, and this atmosphere of "everything is under control" swiftly calmed the faintly panicked mood within the city.

Cecil Territory's population had grown explosively. The great tide of refugees from outside had never lived through a first territorial defense, nor through a complete disaster drill; even with people reassuring them, they could not help but fall into panic. Under ordinary circumstances, nobles did not care whether these "lowly wretches" fell into a panic, for the only ones a noble trusted were the knights, mages, and private soldiers under his own command. Yet in Cecil Territory, the Civil Administration Hall issued clear instructions to everyone at the very first moment and had the peacekeeping corps broadcast the situation without pause—and the effect of these measures was astonishingly good. Even the panicked new immigrants quickly settled down once they received clear guidance from above. This transformation left even Hetty astonished.

On the southern wall of the domain, Gao Yang was inspecting the arrangement of the final line of defense with Hetty and the others at his side. When he heard the civil official's report on the situation within the city, he smiled and looked at Hetty: "In the end, people's fear comes from the unknown. It is precisely because they do not know what is about to happen that fear is magnified without limit in their hearts. And at such a time, so long as you give them some definite news—or even definite orders—they will easily settle down. Even if you tell them all to go move bricks, they will feel at ease. Having something to respond to means, at the very least, that the situation is still under control."

Just then a figure brimming with arcane radiance appeared upon the wall. The soldiers parted to make way, and Kamael walked straight through the crowd to stand before Gao Yang: "The two arcane obelisks have been activated. The entire stretch of wall is now covered by a mana field."

Gao Yang nodded. "Good work. It can't have been easy, adding two obelisks in such a short time."

"Actually, it wasn't too bad. Those mechanical devices you invented are all very easy to use. I had originally thought that without the Gondor Empire's arcane foundries, manufacturing things in this era would be rather more difficult for me. The situation now is far better than I expected," Kamael droned, then rose slightly into the air and gazed out over the whole stretch of wall. "This is truly... a sight I have never seen before."

Beside him, Hetty asked curiously, "You've never been on a battlefield?"

"I am a researcher. Though as an arcanist I have had my share of combat experience, I have indeed never experienced a true battlefield," Kamael admitted frankly. "And the era I lived in was the period of the Gondor Empire's greatest strength. In those days, no nation on the entire continent dared to go to war with us."

"Then you're in for a good look at what a battlefield is like," Gao Yang said with a smile. "A battlefield of the new era."

"How convenient—I am also rather curious about these aberrations you mentioned," Kamael said, the arcane radiance about him brightening. "Monsters that appear during a mana tide... they should be well worth studying."

Gao Yang nodded, then glanced around and suddenly grew curious. "Where's Rebecca? I haven't seen her since a while ago."

"She left the wall this morning, said she was going back to prepare equipment for battle," Hetty said. "She isn't much good at commanding, but she can serve as firepower well enough, so I let her go."

"Equipment for battle..." Gao Yang blinked. "I wonder what that girl is up to now..."

In the lord's manor, inside the "laboratory" Rebecca had set up for herself, a certain stubborn-headed girl was carefully fitting a pile of rune plates together.

As a third-rank mage who knew only the great fireball spell and had not the slightest notion of experimental practice, Rebecca had no laboratory of her own. Yet after she had displayed her gift for mathematics and repeatedly distinguished herself through inventions and creations, Hetty had relaxed her surveillance over this human self-propelled fireball launcher, and Rebecca had secretly cobbled together a laboratory for herself. Laboratory was a grand word for it—in truth it was merely a workshop she had arranged in the storeroom of her own suite. There were few spell-related devices here (she couldn't use them anyway), but plenty of mechanical machining equipment, such as a small drill press and a machine tool. Here Rebecca had tinkered together no small number of useful things—and freakish things.

Tyr lay coiled in a corner of the laboratory, watching as Rebecca joined those rune plates together with red copper hinges, assembled them into a wide metal band, and fixed it onto her body with hooks and straps. He could not help but ask, "Is that some new kind of armor?"

"Armor? This is a battlemage amplifier, my own invention!" Rebecca said, lifting her eyes to glance at Tyr, who was yawning, as she struggled to fasten the rune plates securely. "Why do you look half-asleep again? Didn't you say you'd entered some kind of excited state? That it would last a month or so..."

"Misjudged. Underestimated my own laziness," Tyr said carelessly, stretching out in a long stretch (for his waist was truly long), the tip of his tail twitching comfortably throughout the stretch. "By the way, aren't you all about to go to war? At a time like this you're still fiddling with toys here—aren't you afraid your great-great-grandfather will give you a beating?"

"What do you know? This is combat preparation!" Rebecca said with a stern face, and at last fastened the final clasp of the "battlemage amplifier." "What about you? Do you really plan to go back to sleep? Are you really not going to the wall to help?"

"We'll see, we'll see..." Tyr was already on the verge of dozing off as he spoke, yet he still tried hard to keep his eyelids open. "By the way, what exactly did you call me here for... surely not just to find an audience to watch you strap yourself up with some weird iron belt?"

"Of course not. I asked you here to be my safety measure, because I don't know how far this amplifier's effects will go," Rebecca said as she placed her hand on a trigger device set among the rune plates. As she pressed the controller, all the rune plates began to light up one after another. "Keep an eye on me—I'll run a test first..."

Tyr watched lazily as Rebecca picked up the staff beside her, watched lazily as she rubbed a fireball into being, and lazily—then let out a startled cry: "Holy—what the hell is that fireball of yours?!"