By the time Hoffman led the group to the plains in the heart of Norn, it was already the latter half of the night.
They crouched behind the low bushes on the reverse slope of a hill, using the cover of night to look down at the distant camp.
The entire camp was brightly lit, with fully armed soldiers patrolling back and forth. A bastion-like magic fortress stood every five hundred meters along the defensive line, the magic searchlights atop them sweeping across the wilderness so thoroughly that not even a mouse could slip past.
Just looking at it from afar was enough to make one feel a suffocating sense of oppression.
This was the core trump card of the Norn Empire—the main research base for the God-Making Project.
Ansu floated silently beside everyone, his gaze sweeping over the defensive deployments on the upper levels of the base. With his and Hoffman's capabilities, sneaking in was not impossible.
However, if they wanted to make it out alive, they would need someone to cause a distraction on the perimeter to draw away the troops, as well as someone to meet them along their escape route.
Hoffman's gaze was calm, as if he were waiting for something.
After a long while, Falco lowered his voice and asked, “Teacher, are we waiting for someone?”
“We are waiting for our allies,” Hoffman whispered.
After waiting patiently for nearly another hour, an extremely weak fluctuation of mana suddenly rippled through the grass below the hill. It was gone in a flash, so fleeting that only a high-tier mage would have been able to detect it.
“They're here,” Hoffman said in a low voice.
Everyone immediately looked toward the sound, only to see numerous figures quickly making their way up the slope under the cover of darkness.
Leading them were two gray-haired old mages, each followed by a dozen or so young apprentices. Every one of them looked tense, their hands gripping their staves tightly.
They looked somewhat familiar to Ansu, who realized they were acquaintances from the secret meeting a year ago.
Under the Empire's suppression, the Rationalist faction had grown smaller and smaller. Those standing here now represented the absolute last of their remaining strength.
“We don't have many people; only those who could make it are here,” one of the old mages whispered. “But everyone is a high-tier combatant. No one will hold us back.”
“That is enough,” Hoffman nodded.
The other old mage beside him gazed down at the brightly lit, massive base, suddenly sighing softly as he muttered to himself, “If things go poorly, this might be our final charge...”
The air fell silent for a moment. No one replied.
Hoffman pulled out several palm-sized brass compasses from his robes and handed them to everyone one by one. The faces of the compasses were engraved with intricate magic runes, and the needles in the center were trembling slightly.
“No one wants to die in vain,” his voice was steady, carrying a reassuring strength. “Our goal this time is only to weaken the divine spark and stabilize the God of Magic once more. As long as we achieve this, our world will be safe for a long time to come.”
“Fortunately, He has been in a state of slumber recently, so the situation is not as dangerous as you think. Once the mission is complete, everyone must immediately use their Homing Compass to disengage from the battlefield. Do not linger.”
“I have already arranged for our escape point to be in Lenaya. We will meet there.” He paused. “We still have a chance to regroup. There are still many in the academy willing to follow me. Once the storm passes, it is not impossible for us to build a new magic academy in the future.”
Everyone listened in silence.
Hoffman swept his gaze over them and added, “Did everyone hear that clearly?”
They all nodded in unison.
Standing to the side, Ansu could clearly sense the weight beneath Hoffman's calm tone. No matter how thoroughly Hoffman planned, this journey was still a narrow escape from death.
Before long, an earth-shattering explosion suddenly echoed from the military barracks on the west side of the base, followed by soaring flames that dyed nearly half of the night sky red.
The originally orderly camp instantly fell into chaos. Sharp alarms and the humming of magic barriers intertwined into a clamor.
“Go!” Hoffman made a split-second decision, barking in a low voice.
The group quickly slid down along the shadows of the slope. Taking advantage of the chaos among the perimeter guards, they swiftly slipped into a blind spot in the base's defenses.
Hoffman had clearly mapped out the terrain and defensive patterns here long ago. He guided them with agility through the firelight and the shadows of the buildings, brushing past patrol squads several times without ever being detected.
The deeper they ventured into the base, the colder the air became. Yet, the concentration of mana in the atmosphere was astonishingly high, carrying a heavy, sluggish feeling when inhaled into the lungs.
The group crossed three blockades in succession, finally coming to a halt before a massive alloy gate.
Hoffman had long since been expelled from the research team by the Empire, and was even forbidden from stepping foot near the base. Yet, he had somehow managed to obtain an identity badge belonging to the current research director.
He stepped forward and pressed the badge against the identification crystal beside the gate. A moment later, accompanied by the heavy grinding of machinery, the thick gate slowly slid upward.
A stifling breath of metallic rust mixed with dense mana washed over them.
“Let's go in.”
Ansu paused slightly at the gate. Although he had been here twice before, every time he entered, he was still awed by the sheer scale of this underground structure.
It was an underground hall of unimaginable proportions, its ceiling so high that the borders were barely visible, as if an entire world had been hollowed out deep within the earth.
The floor was flattened into a broad circular platform, with dense networks of pipes converging from all directions, ultimately connecting to a massive metal sphere suspended in midair at the center.
On the ground beneath the metal sphere, a massive circular magic circle was inscribed. The sphere itself was covered in layers of intricate runes, glowing faintly like a living pulse.
“This is... the true form of the God of Magic?” Falco tilted his head up. “It's actually just a... metal sphere?”
“You could say that,” Hoffman's voice echoed in the cavernous hall. “When the God-Making Project first started, we only had theoretical foundations. Since it is not a naturally born deity but a man-made one, we had to rapidly accelerate the gestation process that would normally take hundreds or thousands of years. Thus, we gathered the power of faith and poured all of it into this vessel, which condensed to form the initial divine spark.”
He gazed at the slowly rotating metal sphere, his eyes filled with complex emotions. “Once its divinity is completely stabilized and its consciousness fully ascends to the Astral Realm, it will no longer require a vessel in the physical world.”
Without saying more, Hoffman walked straight to the circular console below the hall and pressed his palm onto the identification crystal at its center.
The circular magic circle on the ground slowly lit up. Countless layers of runes emerged from the floor, unfurling like the scales of some giant beast, enveloping the entire hall in a blinding blue light.
“Keep watch on our surroundings. Once the ritual begins, the guards will find this place soon,” Hoffman commanded without looking back, his attention entirely focused on the console.
“Yes!” Arnold immediately looked toward Falco and Talier.
The disciples tightened their grips on their weapons, keeping a close eye on the other passages surrounding them.
Ansu guarded the area while observing Hoffman's operations.
He knew what Hoffman was trying to do. While this false god was still slumbering, Hoffman wanted to weaken its core strength first, or at least separate a divine spark fragment from it.
“Alright... this way, it will enter a stable state again,” Hoffman muttered in a low voice while rapidly adjusting the runic parameters. “At least it will buy us a few decades.”
However, the massive mana fluctuations of the ritual also completely exposed their location.
Before long, the sounds of hurried footsteps and battle cries echoed. A large number of base guards rushed in with weapons in hand, heading straight for the console.
The battle erupted instantly.
Ansu floated in midair, a deep, profound light flashing in his eyes. Then, an invisible and immense spiritual power swept out like a tidal wave.
The large group of soldiers rushing at the forefront didn't even have time to scream before clutching their heads and collapsing. Ultimately, they died wretched deaths right there, blood pouring from all seven facial orifices.
Ansu's attacks had no light or shadow, and not a single fluctuation of mana, making them impossible to guard against. Wave after wave of spiritual power swept through the crowd, forcibly clearing out a blank zone among the guards.
But right at that moment, Hoffman's movements suddenly stiffened, and his expression changed drastically.
Rate on N.U.
