CHAPTER 197: DESTRUCTIVE METEOR

Selwyn had originally taken advantage of the Silent Forest curio to target the Stevenson Academy of Magic. It was supposed to have been sucked up into the void with the academy, but had ended up in the possession of the old Mr. "Roland."

Thanks to Wang Yu and Avia's interference, the entire plan had veered off course. The curio ultimately landed in the hands of Aleisterre.

It was a natural antithesis to magicians. Everything magical within its area of effect would be rendered useless. Neither spells nor mana would function.

In other words, all magicians within the bounds of the Silent Forest would be crippled.

Yet the group riding straight for the Selwynian army was composed entirely of magicians from Aleisterre.

The lead rider was none other than the former royal mage, a high-ranking mage who had attempted to ascend to the legendary realm for many years without success.

The riders' objective seemed all the more bizarre. A group of magicians were carrying a curio widely known as the magician's bane and heading straight toward the enemy ranks. Just what did they intend to do?

To be frank, the mad and daring plan they had devised earlier was rather straightforward. It was all a matter of daring and resolve—to carry it through to the end, at least.

The Selwynian camp was coming into view directly ahead. By then, the magicians and their steeds had long been spotted by the Selwynian scouts before them.

A large number of soldiers were already gathering around the perimeter of the camp, swords and shields at the ready. Behind them were archers and crossbowmen, their weapons raised and aimed at the approaching figures.

The only reason they hadn't yet opened fire was that the riders bore no identifying insignias. Their faces and bodies were completely shrouded in black, making it impossible to determine where they were from.

Their bold approach struck the Selwyn soldiers as an oddity. It didn't make sense if they were enemies from Aleisterre—they were far too few in number, and their approach far too blatant.

"Stop right there! Identify yourselves! Stay at least one kilometer away from the encampment. Any closer and we'll strike without mercy!"

An authority shouted sternly at the black-robed riders, warning them not to approach any further or face immediate and lethal retaliation.

The horses obediently came to a halt at the command of their riders.

The lead rider didn't say a word. He merely manifested the Silent Forest from the void above his head and displayed it openly. It was a strategic-class curio that Selwyn had used to seize the upper hand and suppress Aleisterre's magical forces in multiple high-profile confrontations to date.

"That's the Silent Forest!" shouted one soldier with sharp eyesight and good instincts, instantly recognizing the curio in the lead rider's hand.

"They must be from the capital. That curio has always been controlled by those royal scholars who research gods and the void. I always wondered why they hadn't deployed such a powerful tool against Aleisterre yet. Well, it's finally here—not too late, I suppose..."

The soldier's explanation was half to himself and half to those around him.

Now that the other soldiers knew that the curio was the Silent Forest, though they didn't lower their weapons, an unconscious tension left their bodies. They relaxed slightly, perhaps even without realizing it.

After all, the curio was simply too well-known.

In quite a few past battles against Aleisterre, a kingdom far ahead of Selwyn in terms of magical prowess, the Silent Forest curio had been deployed to devastating effect, rendering entire units of Aleisterre's battlemages powerless.

Some of those blasted mages who relied on flight spells for guerrilla warfare and harassment had even fallen straight out of the sky, pulped.

Even so, the authority who had spoken earlier didn't relent. "Although the curio you carry clearly proves your identity, we must still perform routine verification. No offense—it's just procedure."

The man turned to a nearby soldier and ordered them to fetch one of the few magicians stationed in the camp. "Have someone determine whether this is truly the Silent Forest."

"No offense taken. You're doing your duty—that's all anyone can ask for," the black-robed man holding Silent Forest responded calmly.

Before long, a pale, gaunt necromancer emerged from the encampment, his face showing signs of long-term lack of exposure to sunlight. A skeletal soldier shuffled behind him.

Without saying a word, the necromancer sent the skeleton walking toward the black-robed group.

As the skeleton stepped closer, right around the one-kilometer mark, it immediately collapsed into a pile of inert bones. The flames in its eye sockets, sustained by necromancy, were extinguished instantly.

The necromancer's eyes flickered with understanding. He walked forward, reached the place where the skeleton had fallen, extended his hand—and after three seconds, gave a solemn salute to those of higher rank.

There was no doubt about it. "It's the real Silent Forest. These are reinforcements from the capital—excellent news!"

"They're from the royal research institute. I wonder if they brought anything else? All I care about is seeing those damned Aleisterre bastards burn in hell."

"Even if it costs me my life, if these researchers' inventions can deal a severe blow to Aleisterre, that's good enough for me."

Now that the curio's identity had been confirmed, the soldiers relaxed completely and lowered their weapons. No one doubted the identity of the riders any further. The curio was better proof than any credentials they could have provided.

"Please be welcome," the authority began, ordering the soldiers to open a path for the riders.

Without hesitation, the riders—the disguised Aleisterre magicians—walked confidently into the Selwyn encampment.

"Gather as many elite troops as possible. Tomorrow evening, we'll launch a surprise attack on the Aleisterre army. With the Silent Forest in hand, we can lead our best warriors straight into enemy ranks and completely decimate their numbers."

The lead rider delivered the "plan" to the camp's authority in a cold, unflinching voice and left him in charge of organizing an elite force.

"Yessir!" the officer saluted, a surge of anticipation welling up from deep within. This was finally happening—Selwyn had finally deployed the Silent Forest, the ultimate anti-magic weapon! They would finally be able to deal Aleisterre an overwhelming blow.

He could hardly wait. After all, Selwyn could ill afford to drag this war out any longer. He had seen the state of the capital for himself.

The poor living conditions for the majority of the citizens, even within Selwyn's capital, was a clear sign of its flagging economy and exhaustion over the war. A kingdom that had initially seemed strong and defiant was now showing signs of collapse. Only a decisive victory could reverse its fate.

"Find us a quiet, undisturbed area nearby. Some of our wizards need to prepare for the upcoming attack," the lead rider said again. As he did so, a stream of fluid darkness flowed from his sleeves and circled his surroundings before returning to his hand.

"The power of forgotten gods...? These royal researchers must have trump cards up their sleeve. Everything they prepared—it must have been for this very moment!"

The officer's excitement grew. The researchers had clearly come prepared, and he was brimming with confidence.

He couldn't wait to charge into Aleisterre's formation alongside the camp's elites and lay waste to their troops.

"At once. I'll arrange for a spot near main command to be cleared out for you immediately—it'll be more convenient for you to give orders and coordinate the elites then."

The officer respectfully led the riders deeper into the camp. When the others were informed that these were visitors from the capital, they quickly cleared out.

"I'll prepare the elite forces right away. Everything will be ready by midnight at the latest."

The officer gave another salute before leaving the command tent and getting right to work.

Within the tent, silence reigned. After a long pause, the lead rider finally spoke up, his voice tinged with relief and satisfaction.

"We did it. I was fully prepared to deactivate Silent Forest and cast spells from a kilometer away if needed—I didn't expect we'd actually be allowed to infiltrate the camp. It seems the intel gathered by the Nightblades spies in Selwyn's capital was completely accurate."

The remaining riders pulled back their hoods. Their faces were weathered and resolute—they were senior scholars, one and all, powerful magicians and deeply learned researchers alike.

"Those researchers from Selwyn prove their identities in precisely this manner—with coded signals and no other documentation to avoid leaving any traces of their involvement. This time, it worked to our advantage.

"It's just as we thought—Selwyn's armies were never informed that the Silent Forest had fallen into our hands. The blow to their morale would have been too severe."

The magicians of Aleisterre got to work.

They were all advanced magicians, fully qualified in their own right. Dozens of magicians at this level, as they were, represented an incredibly elite force, even given Aleisterre's mastery of magic.

Right now, all these magicians were gathered in the heart of the enemy camp. If they were discovered, the consequences would be unimaginably dire—and the current situation seemed somewhat absurd and surreal as a result.

"Let's finish assembling the array. We have enough time—it should be sufficient to complete this pseudo-eighth-tier spell developed by Stevenson Academy of Magic. It's not as precise as an actual one, of course, but might have an edge in terms of raw power."

At the words of their leader, the magicians pulled out piece after piece of metal plating from within their robes. The circuits etched on them were so intricate as to be nearly impossible to decipher.

These uniquely shaped metal plates were forged from an extremely rare material, one only accessible to royalty: colchite metal. Outside of secret dwarven reserves, it was widely regarded as the best conductor of and container for magical energy.

Its exceptional magical conductivity and its almost absurd ability to convey vast magical currents made colchite metal unimaginably expensive and nearly impossible to acquire.

Only royalty could have supplied the dozens of colchite plates forming the base of the magic array.

"Assemble it. Bring the mana crystals over." The lead mage began piecing together the foundation of the magic array while the others dragged over the crates strapped to their horses. When opened, the crates revealed a large quantity of exceptionally pure mana crystals.

The purity of a mana crystal determined how much magical energy it could store. The purer the crystal, the greater the energy within.

The increase wasn't linear—rather, it scaled exponentially with purity. Each of the exceptionally pure crystals that the magicians were uncovering contained magnitudes more magic than those in Wang Yu's Spellweaver Tome.

Likewise, the magical aura radiating from such crystals would have been incredibly intense, strong enough for magicians a few kilometers away to detect with ease.

Yet these mana crystals had been smuggled into the very center of the enemy encampment without raising a single alarm, all thanks to the curio known as the Silent Forest.

This peculiar artifact not only nullified all magic but also completely blocked any magical fluctuations from being detected.

To magicians, that was extraordinary. It wasn't just anti-magic—it could erase every trace of a magician's presence, right down to their mana signature.

This was total, flawless concealment.

With the help of the Silent Forest, these magicians from Aleisterre had successfully brought their spell array and mana crystals deep into Selwyn's ranks.

What remained was simple. The Silent Forest's effect nullified magic, but didn't erase mana from existence. The magical energy contained in the mana crystals was intact.

As long as everything was assembled correctly, once the curio's effects were disabled, the spell array would activate and manifest the powerful spell it was designed to cast.

"Is everyone ready?" The senior magician smiled faintly at the completed array and the piles of mana crystals nearby.

Everyone chorused in agreement as they each pulled out a vial and downed its contents.

"For Aleisterre and the truth! To magic and to us!"

Their voices weren't loud, but they burned with passion. The senior magician dispelled the effect of the Silent Forest, causing all the suppressed magic to return at once.

The potions burned within their bodies. These were vials of Mana Burn, a potion that only magicians could use. In exchange for completely destroying their spirit and magical potential, they would gain an overwhelming boost in power for a short period of time.

"Is this what it feels to be a legendary magician...?" The senior magician glanced at his hand. The searing pain his body was experiencing was insignificant compared to the awe of stepping into an entirely new world of magic.

"It's a shame. I worked hard all my life, only to barely glimpse what could have been at the end of my life—but it was worth it."

Magic flowed like a song that spread to the core of his soul. Drawing on mana was as easy as plucking a string on a harp. With his own body as a medium, the senior magician linked up the array with the surrounding mana crystals.

Spell arrays needed mana to function. While there were mana crystals around, there was nothing connecting them to the spell arrays—nothing save the magicians themselves.

The magicians, burning with the potions they had ingested, would serve as the conduit themselves.

The moment the Silent Forest's effect was dispelled, incredible fluctuations of mana swept through the entire encampment. The resonance from the dozens of ultra-pure mana crystals in such close contact distorted reality itself from raw magical pressure.

Selwyn's necromancers jolted awake in horror. They had no idea what was going on, but the insane surge of magical energy was wreaking havoc with their bodies.

Their spirits were affected as well. The pain was unbearable. They reeled with dizziness. Only a few—the more fortified—managed to crawl out of their tents as they clutched their heads, limping and trying to understand what was happening.

And then, they saw the most terrifying sight they would ever behold in their lives—and for many of them, the final sight.

Above the Selwyn encampment, a massive boulder of solid rock, a meteor far larger than any mountain, was crashing down from the sky.

Its surface blazed with hellish flames born of incomprehensible heat, causing the stone to melt into molten magma.

As the meteor continued to fall, it grew even brighter. Fire and earth surged around it at a shocking level of density.

The pressure of the wind reached the ground even faster than the meteor itself, tearing up tents and sending soldiers flying into the air.

"Wh-What in the world..." a Selwynian officer muttered, stunned. Her eyes were wide with despair as she watched the flaming meteor descend from the heavens. She had just summoned his elite troops to head to the center of the camp. It was too late to run.

Pseudo-Eighth-Tier Spell: Meteor of Annihilation.