The Vastness of Magical Destiny

"Grand Archon Vazinsky, are we just going to stand by and watch that man strut around so arrogantly?" Onia’s indignation was beyond words, "That guy is clearly a remnant of the Dark Forces. Although he has not openly shown it yet, the tip of the fox’s tail has already been revealed. Claiming ’absolute freedom of religious beliefs’ is purely a way to legitimize those dark beliefs. If we strike back now, not only will the influence of the Church of Light significantly shrink in Nicosia, but I’m afraid it will greatly affect our reputation within the territories of other members of the Northern Alliance."

"Onia, you’re oversimplifying the situation," Vazinsky sighed and shook his head. "Do you really think Komer is still the same rural noble lord from a few years ago? No, you are gravely mistaken."

Vazinsky seemed to be recalling the past; after a pause, he slowly continued, "Who is Rebry? Once the star of hope of our Church of Light, he merely chose the wrong path. However, his magical expertise has not stagnated due to his different path; on the contrary, it has advanced further. Now he is the chief Grand Mage under the Komer Mage Corps."

"That Mihailovich, others might not know his background, but I do. His full name is Freud Mihailovich. Remember now? The Puppet King who roamed Prague over a decade ago, a magic puppet maker who made both mages and swordsmen tremble, back in Bohemia who knows how many mages and warriors died at the hands of his magic puppets. He is now also a significant figure in the Caucasian Mage Group; and that Newman, don’t tell me you don’t know how adept he is at magic arrays. Had he not gone astray, he might have been a top member of our Church’s research assembly by now."

"Besides these guys, the Caucasian Mage Group has also imported many dark magic practitioners from those regions to the south where the Dark Forces are rampant. We don’t even have full details on these guys now. What can we possibly do under such circumstances? Are we to hastily march against Komer? The battle at the Tower of Imprisonment has already served as a precedent; if a similar situation were to occur again, I’m afraid the Church of Light would no longer have a foothold as dominant as the St. Vasily Cathedral faction."

Vazinsky’s words left Onia drenched in cold sweat; he fully realized that Komer was no longer the simple country bumpkin from Versailles who obediently followed his arrangements. The power and resources that this man now possessed were not something commoners could easily provoke. Besides having an army’s strength, he was equally backed by a formidable force of mages.

Noyola and Lorenzo got nothing but trouble from him, and with the current strength of St. Vasily Cathedral, it was really not advisable to provoke him carelessly. Perhaps Frenster and others were just waiting for him to make one wrong move; although they themselves were unwilling to provoke that flourishing man, they secretly yearned for the St. Vasily Cathedral faction to engage in a deadly struggle with the Nicosians. Grand Archon Vazinsky had long seen through this and hence decided to bear indignity and bide his time. Yet, it seemed Onia was completely blinded by hatred and rage."