Sword of Dawnbreaker

Chapter 480 - 479: Fermentation

The thick smoke and flames at the fire execution ground had yet to completely dissipate, and the priests and Church Knights who carried out the execution turned away—this place, filled with the acrid smell and watched by a large number of ignorant commoners, made the priests and knights feel frustrated. Although, usually, they would savor staying at the scene, enjoying the awe and fear of the surrounding populace, they evidently lacked the mood now.

There’s still a heap of trouble to deal with within the church district; the impact of the pamphlets is definitely not limited to the outer city.

The ordinary soldiers at the square also withdrew, and the gathered populace scattered, leaving the square in sparse numbers. This brief execution slightly broke the dour atmosphere of the city under siege but could not lift people’s spirits; on the contrary, the big fire in the square only brought fear and doubts—

The one burned to death was an illiterate vagrant... The church just grabbed anyone... The essence of heretic trials is intimidation and violence.

Whether the things in those pamphlets are true, the common folk might not have originally known, but now the church at least admitted that some of it is true.

The crowd dispersed, leaving only some church menials guarding the execution site beside the fire. They had to wait until the fire was entirely extinguished to clean up the ashes to prevent a fire hazard, while one last small group of sparse civilians loitered at the square’s edge, though the church menials wouldn’t pay any heed to these loitering people—after all, they were merely a bunch of aimless fools.

A few people dressed as farmers and mage apprentices slipped into a nearby narrow alley after leaving the square, easily dodging everyone’s sight, and gathered in a semi-abandoned small house.

A man with tousled hair and sunken eyes spat to the side: "Those bastards... just burned an innocent person to death like that..."

"That’s always their way," another dark-skinned young man whispered, "It’s a pity we couldn’t save that poor person..."

Those gathered in the small house couldn’t help but sigh quietly, and suddenly, a blurry, twisted shadow emerged in the corner of the room, trembling twice before rapidly condensing into a petite figure: "We can’t save everyone. Our mission doesn’t allow us to risk exposure to save people—when things happen, the only way to avoid standing by idly is to utilize the skills we have learned daily, take advantage of every opportunity to spread chaos and division among our opponents."

Seeing the petite figure materialize, those in the small house immediately stood up and respectfully saluted: "Director!"

"During missions, refrain from using titles, even if confirming the surroundings are safe; the next time there’s a mistake, each of you will get a demerit—you still have a lot to learn," Amber waved her hand, causing the faces in the room to change uniformly, then she surveyed the surroundings, "But your actions in the square are still acceptable."

This is a special operations team led personally by Director Amber.

Lu’an City has been locked down, with the last time anyone entered or exited the city gates being twenty days ago. But for Amber, who masters advanced shadow manipulation, sending a squad and supplies into Lu’an City through the shadow realm wasn’t challenging—even if Director Amber doesn’t act, the professionally trained Intelligence Agency agents have plenty of professional skills to help them stealthily enter the city and lie low in the outer city.

The lax attitude of the cathedral’s priests and knights towards the outer city greatly benefited this squad—obviously, those people in the cathedral utterly lack experience in counteracting spy sabotage, or perhaps this era renders almost everyone exposed when facing agents trained by the Cecil Clan.

The temporary Bishop of Lu’an focuses most attention on keeping the church district operational while only deploying the minimum soldiers and Disciplinary Monks to maintain order in the outer city, where numerous ’useless civilians’ gather. This is historically inevitable under the current era background: in terms of this era’s confrontation form, only the transcendents and the surrounding dependent forces hold value. The majority of low-level people neither possess power to disrupt order nor possess active rebellious thought—for the bottom level populace, sufficient force deterrence is adequate to ensure order—this has so far been the most ’cost-effective’ notion.

However, Intelligence Agency agents precisely start infiltration from these lowest regions and gradually spread chaos upwards.

Since five days ago, Amber has brought this team to lie low in Lu’an City, following upper-level orders; they disseminated the first batch of pamphlets in the outer city and constantly relayed the situation inside Lu’an City outside, while the cathedral’s priests reacted even slower than expected to those pamphlets—not until the first batch was entirely distributed did they finally notice it.

Then came the citywide searches and arrests, along with plunder and violence during the process.

Everything was within Amber’s anticipation—the insecurities of Lu’an City’s Church Knights and the exiled Knights who fled here accumulated into enormous pressure, which would immediately convert into disgraceful acts once there was any excuse for release.

Moreover, they wouldn’t see anything wrong in doing so.

Though the situation inside the church district remains unclear, Amber could guess what might happen within the inner city’s walls: part of the materials targeted the interest conflicts within the church, while other parts subtly mentioned the Cecil Clan’s preferential treatment of ’awakened priests.’ Although the level of pamphlets couldn’t immediately rally those borderline low-level priests to the Cecil Clan’s side, inducing a certain degree of destabilization and chaos was sufficient.

The city had been sealed for sixty days; the inner conflicts that should ferment had already started fermenting. Engaging in any form of fanning the flames now would yield extraordinarily good results.

And as the church district’s atmosphere became tense, the Lu’an Grand Cathedral’s leaders would have even fewer resources to focus on the outer city—they might even believe the problems in the outer city were entirely solved by their ’effective purification rituals,’ thereby easing vigilance.

This would make the Intelligence Agency agents’ upcoming activities even smoother.

Amber stroked her smooth chin—this impressive thinking gesture was something she learned from Gawain, giving herself a sense of authority: "How’s the Magic Web Terminal working? Is the image transmitted back?"

A tall and skinny Intelligence Agency operative patted the black metal box at his feet, "The condition is good—and the miniaturized Magic Web Terminal is much lighter, making it very convenient to use."

This tall and skinny operative was the person earlier carrying a burlap sack in the square.

The black metal box at his feet was obviously an ancient magical device—Its one end was slightly narrow, with crystals embedded at the front and top of the shell, the entire box measuring less than half a meter, which could perfectly fit into a burlap sack when surrounded by straw and similar materials.

Though it still had a considerable size and weight, not quite portable, for those who had seen the prototype of the Magic Web Communicator, this device was already mind-bogglingly compact black technology.

"Be careful when using it—the Mechanical Scholars worked hard to make it this small," Amber nodded, "This is key to defeating those zealots. Our aim is not just to crumble Lu’an City, not just to drive them out of the Grand Cathedral; more importantly, we need to drive them out of the southern borders, and whether we can achieve this... depends on our next actions."

The Intelligence Agency operatives rubbed their hands, their morale high: "Yes!"

"Very well, now to assign the next tasks—Skinny, you and the hounds continue to operate in the Outer City District, document any scene unfavorable to the Holy Light and send them back to headquarters; Buck Teeth, you continue to spread news near the church district about the peculiar behavior of Bishop Leimont, but be mindful of your own safety. The rest, follow me into the shadow realm to move things."

The well-trained operatives quickly sprang into action, while one of them designated to enter the shadow realm asked casually: "Boss, what are we moving?"

"Leaflets and picture albums," Amber grinned slightly, "another twenty thousand have been sent over—and more are on the way."

"Whew—" The operative couldn’t help but whistle, his face lighting up with joy, "They burn them slower than we print..."

...

After more than ten days of non-stop traveling day and night, Witch Giply finally returned to this long-separated homeland.

She still remembered the scene days ago when passing through the gates of rocky ridges Fortress in the north—a grand rocky ridges Fortress had transformed into a massive construction site, scaffolding and engineering machinery everywhere, the entire fortress undergoing thorough renovation, workers tirelessly reinforcing the northern walls with steel panels and shock-absorbing frames, Mage Technicians and Mechanical Sergeants installing various sizes of magic cannons on the walls’ tracks and bases, and a new Magic Web Array along with various unseen ancient magical devices filled the view, nearly dazzling Giply and her companion Pierce.

Upon seeing the scene at rocky ridges Fortress, the two operatives, who had been executing missions outside for over half a year, realized that their return trip was correct: the speed of development at home was simply incredible, living in the sluggish and backward Anzu capital, watching nobles hold balls and socialize daily, couldn’t imagine how their homeland evolved day by day; if they’d stayed in the capital for three or five years, upon returning they’d hardly be on par with even children.

But even with such awareness, when walking into the princely capital, Cecil Castle, the two operatives were still rendered stunned for a long time.

This city... had not only doubled in size since they left, but the layout of many streets had also changed.

Originally temporary workshops and public sheds were moved to the eastern industrial zone and perfected into massive factory facilities, while streets originally with mere brick houses, occasionally a few small brick buildings, had transformed into bustling districts, residential buildings rich in Anzu style yet emphasizing practicality lined the various areas like city guardians, and between these regions emerged commercial districts rapidly developing driven by a thriving economy...

The two Intelligence Agency operatives probably couldn’t imagine that there was an even larger new Inner City District construction plan on the northern banks of the White River already in the groundwork phase—because of ongoing population migrations and village-town consolidations in the southern borders, Cecil Castle’s population was set to double again...

Giply and Pierce thus entered the city with a mix of astonishment and pride, and completed their reporting smoothly at the Intelligence Agency building—thank goodness, at least they didn’t get lost in the military area.

"Director Amber is on an overseas mission," the reception staff at the Intelligence Agency registered the two away operatives while speaking, "However, she knows you’ll be returning soon, and has already arranged your upcoming plans."

After completing the reporting and registration, the young female clerk serving as the receptionist handed them new identification and a pouch of documents, then stood up straight, solemnly saying, "Thank you for your contributions to Cecil—you worked hard!"

Pierce and Giply were momentarily bewildered: they’d really been away too long, and missed too many crucial stages of organizational perfection so that they didn’t know how to react, only able to smile awkwardly and sheepishly, fortunately, the receptionist seemed to anticipate the seniors’ reaction, resolving the brief awkwardness with a smile as well, "Please don’t be reserved, this is your home. While Pierce operative, you can now disband for rest, Giply operative... there’s a special mission for you."

Giply widened her eyes in surprise, "Mission?"

She couldn’t help but mutter internally: No vacation...?

"Relax, it doesn’t require field work, the task is relatively light," the receptionist seemed to discern Giply’s thoughts, displaying a slightly mysterious smile, "assigned by the leader—you may rest for half a day, please report to the feudal lord’s mansion at four PM sharp."

(Surprise! Joy!!)