Chapter 48: There’s Nothing Here
If a mage uses illusion magic to prevent people from noticing things in a certain region, the illusion might work properly, but the ambient magic in that area would spike since illusion spells require a high mana output. And any mage who could see raw magic would be able to easily tell that there was illusion magic around that area!
And as the guard used his [Magic Scanner] spell to look over the valley, he felt his brow furrowing in shock as he noticed that the ambient magic was much higher than normal!
"Sir, there’s a spike of magic around there. I think it might be illusion magic."
The guard pointed his hand down the valley, and Serevas immediately narrowed his green eyes in that direction! Serevas couldn’t pick out anything using his regular vision, but Serevas knew that this was exactly how illusion magic worked, and he activated a communication spell to call for backup!
[Compulsion]!
But before Serevas could make the call, a vampire woman shimmered into existence right in front of them and activated a spell that put all three men under her command! The vampire woman was one of the soldiers in charge of patrolling this campsite, and it was through sheer luck that she managed to stumble on Serevas and his two subordinates just before they could call for backup!
’That was close. We would’ve had to kill all of the guards if they found us.’
The woman frowned as she looked at the three motionless guards, and she considered what to do with them. Since the vampire soldier was a fourth Realm Master Mage, her compulsion was strong enough to take control of both Serevas and the other guards, since they were all in Realm three or lower! The three of them were simply standing still with unblinking eyes, and they were waiting for the woman’s orders!
’I could kill them and hide their body, but that’ll only bring more guards in this direction to investigate their disappearance. It’s safer to just let them go.’
The vampire woman made up her mind, and she gave the order to the three city guards.
"Go back and tell your superiors you found nothing. You’ll forget about this encounter the moment I leave."
Once she said this, the vampire woman shimmered out of existence once again, and all three guards blinked rapidly as they suddenly came back to their senses! Serevas frowned as he looked around him in confusion, and the two guards behind him were equally as confused as they wondered what they had been doing!
It took them nearly half a minute to regain their senses, and once they did, Serevas spoke.
"I think we’re done with the investigation here. It was just a false alarm. Let’s report back."
The two guards behind Serevas nodded along in agreement, and the three men walked away without a care in the world.
The vampire woman watched the men from behind her personal illusion spell, and once she was sure that they were gone, she turned around and walked down towards the bottom of the valley.
Once she got down there, she put her hand out, and she slowly sank into a massive illusion bubble that was covering the vampire camp! Inside this illusion bubble, multiple tents had been set up with close to a hundred vampires standing or sitting around fires while talking quietly. Anyone who looked down into the valley from outside would not be able to see the campsite because of the massive magical barrier surrounding the area, and thanks to the constant patrols by the vampire soldiers, none of the city guards had been able to find them yet.
The vampires out here were all low-level soldiers in the Ashton army who were awaiting orders from General Lyra for when they would be able to enter the city and retrieve the second medallion. Right now, all the high-ranking members of the army were in a meeting inside the tent at the center of the clearing.
This tent was significantly larger than all the others since it belonged to the general of the army, and there were more than ten people gathered around a table with the map of Aquinas laid out in front of them. At the head of the table, the leader of the army, General Lyra, had a frown on her face as she spoke to the female soldier named Galen.
"You said he spoke to you through the girl you were compelling? Is that correct?"
Galen nodded with a scowl on her face as she remembered the strange encounter that she had today. For the past two days, the vampires had been scouting the city to try and narrow down the location of the other half of the medallion. But since Aquinas was such a large city, it was taking them longer than they thought it would. The previous day had been a failure, and today Galen had gone out with Tiran and Lyra to scout the city as usual. In order to cover more ground this time, the three of them had split up, and Galen had used the [Compulsion] spell to create multiple minions to help her with her search. This spell allowed a mage to take over the mind of any creature and make them do whatever they wanted. And since vampires were some of the best at the mental arts, Galen’s compulsion was so good that no one in the fourth Realm or lower should be able to break out of it or even notice it!
But for some reason, the librarian had seen right through it! And the librarian didn’t just notice that the girl was under control; the librarian had actually spoken to Galen through the girl’s eyes! It felt like the librarian could see Galen all the way on the other side of the city!
Galen spoke up in a confused tone.
"I don’t know how to explain it, General. I performed the spell perfectly, but he was still able to figure out that the girl was under my control. I feel like he was looking right at me."
"And this man that noticed you... He’s a librarian?"
"Yes, ma’am. I confirmed it earlier. The students in the school said he was only employed sometime last year. They don’t know where he came from, but he has close ties with the headmaster, so some people claimed that he got the job through nepotism."
Tiran scoffed from the side when he finished listening to Galen’s explanation. Tiran had also gone out to scout the city with Galen and Lyra, but he didn’t believe a word Galen had said.
"You want us to believe that some ordinary school librarian managed to see past a vampire’s compulsion? You must think this is some sort of joke. Are you sure you didn’t just make a mistake while casting the spell?"
"Do you want me to test my skill on you right now?"
Galen turned to Tiran in annoyance when she noticed that Tiran was questioning her ability, and Tiran looked at her with a challenging smile! But Lyra cut off their pointless argument before it could even start!
"Silence, both of you. Let’s leave the matter of the compulsion aside for now. Galen, you said you felt a trace of vampire magic inside the library? Do you think it was the runaways?"
Galen turned away from Tiran, and she nodded to Lyra’s question before Galen began to explain what happened during her mission. Galen had taken ten students under her control, and she used them to search through the whole school, but Galen hadn’t felt anything strange in any of the locations until she got to the library.
