Disguise

Count Ian's pupils widened dramatically upon hearing this information, and he looked at Fran with disbelief.

All he could see was Fran's faint smile, which froze his expression, his heart darkening as he pondered something.

At the same time, Maeve was not as composed Count Ian. The moment she heard Fran speak, she paused for a moment, and then immediately exclaimed in surprise.

"Huh!? The Transmutation School."

The exclamation drew everyone's attention. Maeve realized she had spoken out of turn, closed her mouth, and froze, unsure of what to do next.

Fran blinked, pretending to scan Maeve, then spoke in a questioning yet curious tone.

"I hadn't noticed before, but there's another monk here, and he's from the same School as me."

Although Maeve was not wearing the robes of the Transmutation School —robes used to identify mages and are quite valuable, Maeve generally wouldn't wear in the Antir Region.

However, a mage's own Mental Power fluctuations are difficult to conceal. Many mages can detect which School a person belongs to by observing their mental energy fluctuations even before they meet them.

Maeve didn't immediately recognize Fran's mental fluctuations because Fran's Order was higher than hers.

Furthermore, the mental fluctuations of mages from different School are easily identifiable because practicing different spells also affects a mage's Mental Power.

As for Fran, she had studied too many other School of magic, so even a mage of the same Order wouldn't know which School she belonged to.

Others would only assume that Fran possessed some kind of device that shielded her Mental Power, causing her mental fluctuations to become like this.

Iris knew that Fran had a talent for learning various spells, so wasn't it normal for her Mental Power to change occasionally when she learned a spell from another School?

However, Maeve hadn't thought of this yet. She hadn't dealt with mages for a long time, and she couldn't think of checking Fran's mental fluctuations for the time being.

"Yes, Lai Mage Lei, it's quite a coincidence."

Count Ian didn't let Maeve speak, but instead took the lead himself and spoke slowly.

"The leader of the Antir Region, the true master of this land, Duke Theodore, has engaged in some cooperation with the Alliance's Transmutation School."

As he spoke, Ian pointed at Maeve and continued.

"This is Maeve, our liaison with the Transmutation School."

"What a coincidence, it turns out we've crossed paths before..."

Fran still had a smile on her face, and then she continued.

"I'm really sorry, I hadn't inquired about things here before coming here, and I didn't know that the School School any cooperation with this place."

"Even so, I estimate that the cooperation School will only involve collecting corpses and providing some environmental conditions."

"This shouldn't affect my ability to briefly use the land in White Flower Territory for my experiments."

Count Ian forced a smile and spoke slowly.

"That's right, our cooperation with the School is limited to these areas only."

"If Your Excellency wishes to use the Antir Region again, you may directly submit a request to Duke Theodore."

"Our Duke will not refuse the mage's request."

Fran blinked; she sensed the hidden meaning in the other person's words.

The other party seemed to have some objections to her bypassing Duke Theodore and contacting Finley directly.

It wasn't appropriate to point this out directly, and if she were in her shoes, she would probably be unhappy too, so she simply skipped the topic.

"Let's talk about it next time... Shouldn't it be time for my people to go to the pre-arranged place?"

Fran turned her gaze to Finley, Finley then realized what was happening and hurriedly began to call out to his men.

"Take them there, and don't neglect them..."

Finley quickly arranged a resettlement plan for the people Fran brought, and everyone on the field remained silent at this moment.

"Since that's the case... I need to go prepare for the experiment first."

Fran broke the silence and spoke slowly.

"Please wait a moment, Lai Rai."

Fran turned her head, a hint of impatience on her face.

"Your Excellency, have you contacted the person in charge of the Transmutation School's mission here? I..."

"I apologize, this was my personal decision; I didn't inform the School before coming..."

Fran interrupted Count Ian, leaving him with a gloomy expression as he watched Fran's figure recede into the distance.

"Let's go, let's find a place to talk to this monk."

Ian emphasized the word "mage" in his words, and even Maeve, who was standing next to him, sensed something was wrong. She looked at Fran's back with curiosity in her heart.

"Do you know this monk from earlier?"

As Count Ian entered, he eagerly asked Maeve the question.

"Ah?!"

Maeve only snapped out of her daze the moment the door behind her closed. She looked at Ian and it took her a long time to manage to utter a single sentence.

"I don't know her..."

"I've never met her, nor even heard of her name, within the Alliance or the School."

Maeve shook her head, then muttered to herself.

"Personal behavior..." Ian seemed to laugh in exasperation as he read this sentence.

"Then she had better have acted alone."

Count Ian read the sentence aloud with a stern face, word by word, which made Maeve look at him in surprise.

"Cough cough."

Count Ian coughed twice, then continued.

"At this point in time, encountering a mage who wants to do his own thing is not a good thing."

"Maeve..."

Count Ian turned his gaze to Maeve, and then spoke slowly.

"I think you should talk to the people from the Transmutation School. If a mage we don't even know appears here, and we don't treat him well, it will likely have a huge impact on our cooperation."

Maeve understood the implication in Count Ian's words. She blinked and then nodded in agreement.

"I'll get in touch as soon as possible, but as you know, this place is quite a distance from the Alliance, so it might take some time."

"No problem, it's not too late for you to contact them now."

Maeve looked up, saw Ian staring intently at her, swallowed hard, and then quickly said...

"Okay, I'll go right now."

Ian watched Maeve hurriedly leave, leaving the wooden door open without closing it, letting it sway gently.

He gently closed the door and began to think about what had happened that day.

It was his first day in White Flower Territory, and just as he had told Finley, he had come with a mission from Duke Theodore.

He set aside the tense situation in the south and came here alone with Maeve for only one reason: to prepare for any eventuality.

Duke Theodore only trusts Ian in this matter, because Ian is deeply bound to Duke Theodore, and the territory he now controls is too large.

He was unlikely to surrender, because he knew that would be suicide.

The task he completed for Duke Theodore was this land of White Flower Territory.

Even now, in terms of territorial recognition, White Flower Territory still belongs to the former Antir, and its lords have long since retreated to the Royal Capital.

Even if the other party wanted to come out now, the Prince of Antir would not let him.

While White Flower Territory has indeed chosen a lord, even if they wanted to replace Finley, they would have to wait several more months.

This meant that although the White Flower Territory was gradually acknowledging Finley's position as lord, the process was ultimately taking too long.

The sudden military intervention from the Kingdom of Lorinvik forced Duke Theodore to consider some more radical solutions.

Their previous collaboration with the Transmutation School, involving a significant amount of manpower in collecting, cleaning, sorting, and transporting the corpses, naturally had its benefits; otherwise, they wouldn't have done this work for nothing.

After agreeing to do a small favor for one of the leaders of the Transmutation School, Count Ian received a powerful weapon that could only be used once.

Although mages cannot receive blessings through their territory, this does not mean that they cannot destroy the Territory Blessing.

After understanding the principle behind territory enhancement, the mages developed specific methods to block it.

After all, there are still many forces in other areas of the Alliance that need the support of their territories, and this method is very effective against those forces.

Duke Theodore planned that if the situation became serious, he would immediately sever the White Flower Territory's blessing, storm the Royal Capital, and kill the prince.

The reason we didn't do it before was that if this thing really worked, it would have a serious impact on the entire territory, not only invalidating the local buffs but also affecting the surrounding territories.

For Territory Knight who regard their territory as a source of power, the price is too high; in the end, this thing still hits them hard.

Moreover, although this thing was obtained from the Transmutation School, they can return it in exchange for something else more useful.

So before this, they had always maintained the idea of avoiding using it if possible, until the current situation continued to reverse.

The reason he asked Maeve to contact the head of the Transmutation School was that the small task they needed to help that person was also within White Flower Territory.

And if he's not mistaken, what this person in charge asked them to do was also a 'personal act'.

"Knock knock knock!!" Maeve knocked twice on the door and then quickly opened it.

Seeing Maeve enter, Ian asked in a deep voice.

"What did they say over there?"

Maeve took a breath and then answered.

"After confirming what happened here with me, that person asked me about the progress of the matter..."

"I only said that I was still cooperating with Count Ian, and then she said..."

Maeve paused, a hint of surprise flashing in her eyes, before continuing to repeat what had been said.

"I don't believe she's a member of the Transmutation School. You should test her..."

"If all else fails, I'll go there myself..."