Chapter 156: Felipe's Tyranny
When Lucien was under Felipe's gaze, all of a sudden, he thought of something.
Since both the viscount and Felipe thought that the reason why Professor was here was to disturb the gathering, if Lucien decided to just wait there and watch until the end of the feast, that would be very suspicious of him.
Lucien felt that he had to bring some trouble to the feast in order to make his presence reasonable. However, he needed to be very careful about keeping the balance and the degree to which he would piss Felipe off. Ideally, the problem caused by Professor should be troublesome but still within Felipe's capability to be solved.
Lucien had to carefully think about how to do it.
While Lucien was occupied by his own thoughts, on the stage, Cessy, the most powerful necromancer on the territory once belonging to Wilfred, asked, "Mr. Felipe, since the rules of the organization you represent are very strict, I don't think that the four of us can make the decision for everyone present. It is really an individual thing."
As he was speaking, Tess, Sidney and Quentin were also nodding. Seeing that there was a cold smile on Felipe's face, Cessy hurriedly added, "Of course, I personally would like to follow you to the congress and join the Hand of Paleness, but before that, what I want to ask is whether I can collect bodies in the nations controlled by the congress without needing to hide all the time?"
Felipe smiled to Cessy, who was the first one willing to join the organization, "Mr. Cessy, according to the agreement reached by the congress and the several kingdoms, you can't destroy cemeteries or kill ordinary people to get the bodies you want, you need to have an agreement with a person who's willing to let you dispose of his or her body after the person's death. But, of course, if you kill your enemy, any magic creature or beasts, they're all yours."
"Well... I'm afraid it won't be enough," Cessy frowned, "unless your organization can provide us with enough bodies for our research."
The rest of the necromancers and apprentices felt the same way. For these sorcerers who were the inheritors of the ancient magic system, without bodies, they could not see any possible progress in their magic researches.
Seeing that all the necromancers and apprentices present were hesitating, and Professor still remained mysterious and calm, Felipe became irritated, and he started to rise his tone, "You guys can never imagine the great progress made by arcana and magic within the past hundreds of years, just as you can never imagine, without your filthy bodies, how you can grow stronger and more powerful!"
The people present in the hall got a bit confused with Felipe's emotional thing all of a sudden.
However, Felipe continued furiously and regardlessly, "What's more, through the collision of the two theories —'Waves of Spiritual Power' and 'Particles of Spiritual Power', a series of highly efficient, high-level meditation have been broadly applied with lower requirements. Most of the meditating methods on your books are out of date!"
Lucien was listening to Felipe's speech carefully, while other people were now shocked.
Felipe was almost yelling now, "Can you believe that the meditation which was only available for senior-rank mages is now accessible to any sorcerer?
"Can you believe that there are new spells coming out every month?
"Can you imagine a middle-rank mage who's only twenty years old?
"Can you imagine a senior-rank mage who's only thirty years old?
"Can you imagine an archmage who's fifty years old, or a legendary archmage who's eighty?
"Only in the headquarter of the Congress of Magic you can know how advanced arcana and magic are right now!"
Lucien did not know what other people were thinking right now, but he was certain that he would go to the congress one day. Although he was very profound with his spirit library, the biggest challenge facing him was the channel to turn his knowledge into real power. In this new era of magic, Lucien knew that he needed to make progress all the time in order to be strong!
Then, after taking a glance at Lucien in contempt, Felipe said to them, "There's no worry that you might be discriminated by other sorcerers in the congress, my necromancers. The School of Necromancy is right now one of the most popular fields following Force and Electromagnetics, since it specializes in studying the secret of life and prolonging people's life-span. And as for the School of Element, it is not even close to us. Although a human body is composed of all different kinds of elements, without the power of life, the elements cannot turn themselves into any part of a human body, neither blood, or muscle, or organs... anything! The attempts trying to prolong people's life-span based on the theories of the School of Element all failed!
"The secret of the origin of life and the key of prolonging life-span can only be revealed and showed by the School of Necromancy. No other schools can compete with us!" declared Felipe.
All the necromancers and apprentices were nodding out of pride and yearning feelings for the congress.
Meanwhile, Felipe's words reminded Lucien that, in this world, it seemed that the School of Element was still not advanced enough to synthesize organic materials.
Because of the School of Necromancy, the theory of Life Force was more dominant than the other theories in Element. Based on Lucien's current knowledge, human body, soul and life force were not the same thing, but these three were integrated together in a way that Lucien could not figure it out right now. Despite all of that, Lucien believed that it was still possible to synthesize different parts of a human body.
"Maybe I can start from here..." Lucien thought to himself.
When Lucien's brain was working fast, Felipe raised his hands up and said loudly, "In the new era of magic, joining the Hand of Paleness can bring you the great fortune of knowledge that you can't even imagine, and the Hand of Paleness can thrive because of all of you joining! So, I propose here: sign the magic contract with me, all of you."
Felipe took a step forward and started to act crazily, "That's my proposal. Who agrees? Who opposes?"
After a while of silence, Quentin, the young necromancer, said to Felipe politely, "Mr. Felipe, thank you. But I think I still prefer my free life, instead of being constrained by an organization."
After all, there was still another gentleman from the congress, there might be other ways with lower cost to get to the congress.
Felipe turned around and stared at Quentin with his cold eyes, "You sure, Mr. Quentin?"
"...Yes," answered Quentin with some kind of alertness.
"All right." Felipe nodded. Then, the pale fire appeared in his eyes and he pointed at Quentin with his right hand. Immediately, the black smoke surrounding Quentin, which should protect him from the great danger, was driven away, and Quentin's body was totally drained, as if all the water in his body had evaporated.
Felipe killed him within a second. Felipe killed a third circle sorcerer within a second!
Countless faces of revenants appeared surrounding Felipe and built up a transparent wall around him. Then, he asked again, "My proposal. Who agrees? Who opposes?"
The protection Felipe was wearing was a standard fifth circle spell, Revenant Wall. And the spell he had just used to kill Quentin looked like the single target, lower-level version of the eighth circle spell, Wilting, which should be something new that was developed by the congress.
People were afraid of him. They were afraid of that crazy man, and they would rather die later, instead of right now.
"One more time. I will ask again. My proposal. Who agrees? Who opposes?"
No one dared look at Felipe's eyes.
"I oppose," said a calm voice from among the crowd.
This was not a surprise to Felipe. Professor walked onto the stage in his black hood.