282 Destroying the Barrier
The people in the One Hundred Thunder Academy were at a fuss. It would be an important day for them, as they had to win the fight against the Decaying Skull school, or else they might perish in that war.
Even though the attack would only happen at night, they spent the day preparing the things to bring along to the fight, as well as the tactics they would use.
The information Arthur gave them about the interiors and the traps was valuable, but he stated they should not take the traps for granted, as they knew there was a spy who fled, so they might have added or changed the location of a few traps.
“Arthur? Are you there?”
A voice came from the outside of his cabin. It was Laura who came to see him early in the morning.
“Laura? What a pleasant surprise.” Arthur said as he left his cabin, seeing Laura near his garden.
“These plants are incredible! I recently started with alchemy, so maybe that is why I am kind of biased.”
“Oh?”
He did not know why she was there, but presumably was because of the upcoming battle.
“I- I just want to thank you for everything you did, and please take care of the upcoming battle. I don’t want to lose you!”
Laura said that really fast, avoiding Arthur’s gaze, and then she ran away.
“I was not expecting that.” He thought.
Arthur walked around the school and saw someone he knew very well. Elena! She was definitely scared about the fight, and she would not even fight because of her weak power.
“Arthur? A few days away from me and you are already armless…”
“Idiot,” he said, moving closer to her, “are you okay?”
“Yeah, it’s just… I came here to learn, but now everything is a mess and I cannot even learn magic… What if this war takes a long time? Wouldn’t that make my journey as a mage way harder?”
What Elena said made sense. Things would not get any easier, and that was only the start of the war. How could she learn from all of that happening? Arthur felt pity toward her, and wished to help, but how?
The only thing he could do was send her to Odemore when it was ready, and hope that she can learn something there.
“Elena, I might help you. Can we take more privately after the fight tonight?”
“More privately?” Elena said with her cheeks turning red.
“Okay Arthur, no problem.”
~~~~
When the sun was going down, a huge troop left the academy grounds. Most of them were Official Mages, and ninth and tenth circle mages.
As for the rest? They would not make that much of a difference in the fight. Seth went as well, as he had to be the person to take down the rank 2 mage from the Decaying Skull.
Arthur and Seth were at the front, leading the squad. Seth looked at him and said, “Arthur, do you think we can win?”
He looked at him, compared both forces and said, “I do, yes. Even though we have less rank 1 mages, I can count for one hundred. Now, can you kill their rank 2 mage?”
“Ha, what a confidence. About the mage, yes, I can take him down.”
“Good.”
They both smiled and kept moving through the forest, getting closer and closer to the graveyard. When they finally got there, they saw it!
Dark mages everywhere, protecting the tombs as these were the entrances to the school. Only a small force of them was outside, and most were only mages beneath the rank 1.
Basically cannon fodder, which had only one function; die and then alarm the rest of them about an attack.
“How can we proceed? They have a barrier around the school, so we cannot launch a spell to wipe these mages.” Seth said.
They were all hidden behind bushes and trees, watching the graveyard from afar. Arthur was there, and he said, “leave the barrier to me. I can deactivate it.”
“What?”
All the other rank 1 mages around him could not believe such a thing. How could he deactivate a barrier capable of fending against spells from a rank 2 mage? It was impossible.
Well, impossible for them who were dumb. Arthur had spent two days in that graveyard, and he studied the barrier carefully.
He was someone with vast knowledge in that field, and now he was confident in deactivating it. Arthur could not care less if those mages did not believe him. The only person who could give him an order was Seth, but he also agreed to it.
“I believe in you. We will wait here while you deactivate the barrier.” Seth said.
Arthur gave him a nod and then left the area. If he wanted to deactivate the barrier, he would have to be closer to it, but getting close to the position they were in would make the mages see him.
So, he circled around the area, until finding a weak spot where only three mages were protecting it. Even though the barrier could block spells, it could not block Arthur, who still had the token he got from Jester, the student he killed.
He dashed toward these three students, and killed all of them using a dagger, like a true assassin. After he made sure no other mage would patrol toward that area, he took care of the barrier.
A magical formation as big as that one had a core, and that core would probably be in the deepest part of the school, protected so that no one could enter it. How could Arthur deactivate the barrier then?
Well, there was a trick. The first thing Arthur had to do was to destroy a small part of the barrier, and that was what he did.
When he was close to it, a blue barrier appeared with some symbols on it. Arthur destroyed some of these symbols with surgical moves. He had to destroy it in the right order, or else the barrier would react to it, exposing his location.
Sweat came from his forehead, but after a few minutes, he did it. A small part of the barrier was destroyed. The moment that happened, the core of the magical formation pulsed mana toward that location in order to repair it as quickly as possible.
Now, that was when Arthur acted once again, and did something only he could do. The core pulsed mana one time, enough to rebuild the area, but when the mana got near the broken part of the barrier, Arthur opened up his mouth, and devoured the mana!
The magical formation was not advanced enough to think, so it did not occur to it that someone could devour the mana it sent, as that was something impossible.
Then, Arthur used his own mana to ‘repair’ the barrier, giving it a false sense of duty accomplished.
“Done!”
Arthur smiled, returning to where Seth and the others were. He explained to them the small part of the barrier he destroyed.
“You can cast the spell through that, but I think we should all enter through it. It would surprise them, giving us an advantage.”
“All right. Everyone, let’s go kill these bastards!”