325 325 Ashcroft Needs Details
Peach cut off their chatter with more details. “Other than Wolfe advancing the Witches, they’ve developed a better magical airplane than most of the renegades are using, but based on the same design. Plus, they have made airboats which skim over the river faster than the APC drives on the road.
Neither is a genuinely new technology, but the advanced magic of having a high-level Demon and Second Rank Witches working together is making them much more useful than the comparatively crude versions they replaced.
The Mana density in the Fae Forest is twice what it is outside, and it feels thick with Nature Magic. Inside the Den, as they call their underground bunker, the mana density is much higher than that. Even at the Second Rank, I can feel the excess mana trying to force its way into my aura.
It’s no wonder that they’re so powerful. Even if they didn’t create a better version of the Familiar Summoning Ritual and get a load of Magical Creatures as Familiars, they would still be force-fed aura increases.”
Ashcroft just stared at her in shock.
“How would that even happen?” She asked.
“One Demon, ten Rank Two Witches, and one very motivated Faerie Familiar. The other developments have mostly been collaborations between the residents to improvise better ways of getting around.
ραΠdαsΝοvεl.cοm
Peach took out the staff and handed it to Ashcroft, who inspected it with a professional gaze.
“This is really good. I’m guessing a Rank Two Witch made it, but these Arrays don’t look like anything I’ve seen before.” She decided.
“Yeah, I have to do those on my own since the Witches can’t do the overlay layer that ties them all together. It allows low mana cost flying, as well as a Mirage and an attack array that only covers the staff. The rest of the abilities on that are added by Mary and Cassie, who are both at the Second Rank already.”
The Professor sighed. “I don’t suppose that you could share that wealth of power, could you? I don’t know if Peach told you anything since she’s on Coven Council duty, but things haven’t been great here.”
“She was a bit light on details, but we have a general idea that there have been a lot of defectors and even more Witches damaged by the Nerve Gas.” Wolfe agreed.
“That doesn’t even begin to cover the rebellion, the situation in the villages, or what has been happening in the Swamps to the west of us,” Ashcroft explained.
Morgana Coven had the ocean to the south and west of it, as well as a portion of the East, with Sylvan Coven covering most of the East and splitting their northern border with Myrrh Coven. The Fortress City was near the Southeastern Coast, and the Academy was Northwest of that, with only scattered villages and wilderness making up the rest of the territory.
“What is happening in the swamps?” Wolfe asked. If it was terrible, it might spread to the Frozen Wastes, and that would never do.
“Nobody is quite sure, but from what we can tell, a massive number of human soldiers have moved in and have aligned with the rebels who fled to the swamps.
Stay away from the western side of Morgana Coven. It’s basically autonomous right now and very dangerous.” Ashcroft explained while Peach gave her a look that Wolfe was very sure meant she should shut up.
“I thought they were purists?” Wolfe asked, somewhat confused.
“That’s the thing, both sides are. They seem to be forming a cooperative of distinct groups, where the Witches wouldn’t marry a Human and a Human wouldn’t marry a Witch, in order to keep their bloodlines pure, but so they could regain their allied status from before the war.
The balance of advanced technology and magic, side by side. Morgana Coven uses more technology than most Covens, but it’s all magic fuelled since the city runs off lightning magic for electricity.
They’re building mundane power plants and drilling oil wells for fuel, so they aren’t planning to go that route. They might only want the Witches for food and protection, while the humans run everything else with their greater numbers.
There are a thousand of them to every Witch on the continent. If you go east, you will see how much more densely populated that side of the continent is.”
Wolfe snapped his fingers as the realization hit him. “I get it now. The soldiers I interrogated said that they were embargoed and running out of basic necessities. It’s because there are too many people for their own territory to support them all without trade.
But here, there are huge swamps that Earth Magic could be used to grow food in. They could gather everything they need and send it back to their home nation for a profit.”
Wolfe considered his own revelation for a moment. “So, the attack on Sylvan Coven was just a distraction?”
Peach shook her head. “No, that was their primary objective. They just happened to manage to work out a deal with the rebels at the moment when it looked like the Morgana Coven and the Families from the city would wipe the rebellion out entirely. Now they’ve got anti-magic weaponry and heavy military gear on their side.
We also suspect that they are holding a lot of the prisoners inside the swamps as well. The only reporting is from the villages, but it’s an open secret that most of them are compromised and harbouring the enemy. The scouts have seen military vehicles moving around in the villages, but the local leaders claim it’s all captured equipment.”
“What a mess.” Wolfe sighed.
“Just wait. It gets better. While the Headmistress was with you, we got confirmation of a new submersible attack vessel in the Human Fleets. It can take the random dunks from the gravity wells in the Ocean, so it can cross the gulf to get from them to the Morgana coast.” Ashcroft added.
“And why did you think that Wolfe needed to know that?” Peach asked.
“Because the primary targets for bombardment by vessels off the coast will be the villages in the Frozen Wastes. If they can clear even a few kilometres from the coastline, they can establish a maintained road to lead them to Sylvan Coven again before next year and not have to move across the open Wastes to attack.
If they manage that, he will have everyone from half a Coven to a wasteland full of furry refugees and half a million human soldiers on his proverbial doorstep before he knows it.” The Professor replied.
Great. That is just what he needed. Not.