Translator: AnubisTL
As they gradually approached and finally stopped at a wide pipe junction ahead of Jieming, he could finally make out their figures.
They were similarly cloaked in various disguises, but the distinct witchcraft resonance emanating from them made it clear they no longer intended to maintain the pretense.
Abandoning his concealment, Jieming slowly emerged from the shadows, his footsteps echoing sharply in the silent sewer.
The four figures, who had been warily watching each other, froze at the sound of his footsteps and whirled around.
"I knew there were many wizards in the royal capital, but to think you've infiltrated such high positions... Truly, you deserve to be called geniuses."
Jieming stepped forward, breaking the tense silence. "We don't have much time. Since you're all hesitant, I, a mere nobody, will take the lead..."
"You're hardly a nobody," a clear, melodious voice interrupted him. Jieming turned toward the smaller figure.
The speaker wore a black robe that concealed their face, but their voice and slender frame suggested they were female.
"Surely no one would consider the person who topped the contribution ranking a nobody, would they? Am I right, Mr. Jieming?"
The other three members of the group were slightly taken aback by Jieming's identity, but their expressions quickly shifted to understanding. Several curious glances turned toward him.
Jieming, however, was genuinely surprised by the woman's words.
While the name "Jieming" was undoubtedly well-known among the wizards of the Noren Workshop, he was certain that only the wizard apprentices of Academy No. 13 knew his true appearance and circumstances.
Moreover, he had altered his appearance and was currently using the guise of an adventurer named "Jack."
But when the woman removed her black robe, revealing her true face and radiating a comforting aura, understanding dawned in Jieming's eyes.
"So it's Miss Mary... no, I should say Miss Anya."
"Eh?"
The human viscount's daughter, Miss Mary, known for her extraordinary charisma, abruptly withdrew her soothing aura, revealing her ethereal and vibrant true nature—Anya!
Anya had likely discovered his true identity by sensing the unusual life force emanating from him through her innate talent.
After all, she had recognized him instantly in the crowd at the Noren Workshop plaza using the same innate perception.
She turned to Jieming, her eyes filled with curiosity. "How did you recognize me?"
"The aura you radiate is too familiar," Jieming replied with a smile. "Though you've disguised yourself, that unique affinity for life force—I've only ever sensed it in you."
Anya frowned. "That doesn't make sense. Is my disguise really that poor?"
Jieming remained silent.
He would never reveal that the key to recognizing her lay in her gaze.
At the banquet, when "Miss Mary" had thought she was discreetly observing him, Jieming had already noticed.
The longing in her eyes for experimental subjects was far too obvious to a cultivator like Jieming, who had been frequently absorbing Mortal Dust Qi recently.
With Anya and Jieming leading the way, the remaining three members of their group abandoned their disguises as well.
The tall figure's disguise dissolved like a wisp of mist, revealing her exquisite face—the proud chief of the elven delegation.
A flicker of surprise and understanding flashed in her eyes before she smiled faintly, her voice tinged with amusement as she murmured, "Jieming? What a surprise... I never expected to meet the number one ranked genius here. I'm Seraphina."
As she spoke, Seraphina's form flickered like an unstable image before reverting to her true appearance as a tier 10 genius.
"I haven't held that rank in ages. I'm nearly out of the top ten now," Jieming waved dismissively. "Your reputation precedes you, Your Excellency."
Seraphina's words served as a signal. Without hesitation, the other two members of the group shed their disguises as well.
The burly orc warrior's bestial fur and savage aura faded, revealing the refined features of a scholar—Kaelen!
He grinned, a hint of self-deprecation in his voice. "Finally, some company! I thought I was the only fool here pretending to be a brute."
Next, the hearty, rugged dwarven woman's characteristic stoutness vanished, revealing an unfamiliar male figure.
Jieming looked at the man with uncertainty, but Kaelen recognized him immediately. "Rex? It's been ages since I've seen you without your alchemical construct."
Rex?
Jieming subtly assessed the man's demeanor, unable to reconcile it with the towering mechanical figure he remembered.
Rex's eyes gleamed with a penetrating wisdom. "I never expected to find you all here. It seems we're all kindred spirits."
Five wizards, each hailed as a genius at the Noren Workshop, now reunited in the sewers beneath the Royal Capital of Elosia.
Jieming studied the four familiar yet unfamiliar faces before him, suddenly chuckling softly.
He recalled his earlier musings. It seemed this world hadn't secretly updated its version; the threats he sensed were all from geniuses of his own caliber.
His laughter, however, drew everyone's attention.
Jieming cleared his throat, covering his awkwardness with a dry cough, then said with a hint of sentiment:
"It seems our goals align. Truly, great minds think alike."
"No, no, no... you flatter me."
"Who would want to think like a madman like you?"
"I'm not as crazy as you..."
"Hey! Don't slander me! I'm not that crazy!"
To Jieming's surprise, his words made the other four bristle like they'd been pricked by needles. One even involuntarily took two steps back, distancing himself from Jieming.
"?"
Jieming tilted his head. "What's with you guys?"
Kaelen, ever the peacemaker, pursed his lips and said, "You know we're just first-tier wizards, right?"
"Yeah."
"Then how can a first-tier wizard scheme against hundreds of creatures ranging from fourth-tier to seventh-tier? Don't you think that's a bit... insane?"
"Huh?" Jieming's mind struggled to process this. "Forget the fact that you guys are plotting against divine beings too! What's there to be afraid of? Are you even proper wizards?!"
"Exactly because we're proper wizards, we wouldn't do something so reckless!" Seraphina couldn't help but retort. "As wizards, shouldn't our priority be rationally calculating the costs and benefits of our actions? We're not mindless brutes from the Combat Department..."
Kaelen's expression was tinged with helplessness.
"While both involve scheming against divine beings, the nature of our plans differs greatly. Our original intention was merely to secretly poison them, but judging by the magic formations you've set up, you seem to be planning to feed them shit right in front of their faces!"
"Uh..." Jieming involuntarily choked.
As he recalled the magic formations he had discovered, his expression twisted into something peculiar.
It seemed... he might have indeed misunderstood.
Ever since being thrown into the Elosia Plane, Jieming had been haunted by a persistent question: how could a group of wizard apprentices possibly exert a meaningful, let alone decisive, influence on the course of the war within such a vast mid-tier plane cluster?
He knew that even if they advanced to first-tier official wizards within the plane, their combat prowess would at best match that of legendary powerhouses in this world.
That sounded impressive, enough to crush anything in the mortal realm.
But let's not forget that the Elosia Plane, beyond its mortals, teemed with tens of thousands of angels, backed by hundreds of divine beings.
Even a single angel equivalent to a third-tier creature could push him to the brink of death.
If a divine being personally led the angels to descend, their group of wizard apprentices, even combined, would be treated like dogs by the angels under the divine being's command.
Their contributions from mere destruction and combat would be negligible, barely worth mentioning.
Therefore, Jieming realized from the start that they couldn't approach this Planar War with traditional combat strategies.
He needed to find a clever breakthrough, a way to leverage a small advantage into a massive impact, a key to unlocking the plane's core.
After thoroughly studying the Elosia Plane's Divine Power Faith Network and the complex relationship between its divine beings and faith, Jieming conceived a daring plan: he could find a way to corrupt the faith, indirectly influencing the divine beings!
In the Elosia Plane, apart from the sole primordial god—the Supreme God—all other divine beings were not primordial gods but faith gods.
This meant that the foundation of their power stemmed entirely from the faith power of mortals, making them highly susceptible to the purity of that faith.
Even the Supreme God, the sole primordial god, had passively absorbed a considerable amount of mortal faith over the years due to the divine beings' deliberate indulgence and indifference.
While this had significantly enhanced the Supreme God's power, it also compromised His transcendence.
Jieming's plan was simple: by manipulating the faith power, he aimed to influence the entire pantheon of the Elosia Plane.
The higher the divine being's rank, the greater the amount of faith they had accumulated, and thus the more vulnerable they were to corruption.
Of course, Jieming knew that even with his utmost efforts, the impact he could inflict on the divine beings would be minimal, perhaps lasting only a fleeting moment.
But he didn't need to cause significant damage; all he needed was to divert their attention.
Even a momentary distraction would suffice!
For beyond the Elosia Plane cluster, the high-rank wizards of the Noren Workshop were waiting!
With the power of high-rank wizards, a single seventh-tier wizard could easily sweep through the entire plane cluster, crushing mortals, angels, and even faith gods into dust.
The reason for their prolonged inaction was to prevent the divine beings of the Elosia Plane from resorting to desperate measures, triggering the plane origin, and dragging the entire plane into mutual destruction.
Mentor Clark had once told Jieming that in such a stalemate, wizards typically employed three methods to seize the plane origin: seeking a higher-tier wizard to handle the situation, weakening the origin power permeating the plane, or having a wizard directly advance to the sixth-tier within the plane.
Essentially, all three methods aimed to prevent sixth-tier or higher beings within the plane from immediately activating the origin power to destroy the plane.
Jieming's plan operated on the same principle.
As long as the corrupted faith power could divert the divine beings' attention, even for a fleeting moment, it would suffice!
The high-rank wizards surrounding the plane could then seize the opportunity to suppress and capture the divine beings of the Elosia Plane.
Despite having no direct communication with the outside world, Jieming believed that the high-level wizards, with their intelligence and understanding of the Planar War, would not miss this opportunity.
Especially after his preliminary study of the Elosia Plane's Divine Power Faith Network, he deeply understood the wizards' burning desire for "divine beings" as advanced experimental subjects.
This desire was so intense that they would seize any fleeting chance that arose.
Until now, Jieming had assumed the other four present shared his mindset, each striving toward this common goal in their own way.
But now he realized something was amiss.
"Initially, we only planned to stir up negative emotions among the plane's mortal races, making their faith power impure," the others explained to Jieming as they journeyed toward the formation node.
Rex, who had previously impersonated a female dwarf, couldn't help but sigh. "For example, I've already incited most of the dwarves' 'laziness' to a fever pitch."
Seraphina and Kaelen nodded in agreement, having similarly manipulated the negative emotions of the races they had disguised themselves as.
"So those three magic formations..." Jieming's lips twitched.
"They were simply energy diffusion formations," Anya sighed. "Their purpose was to spread the energy from the artifacts on their bodies throughout the human kingdoms, thereby amplifying the negative emotions of humanity."
"And to think they painstakingly stalled negotiations to buy time for setting up those formations," Jieming muttered. "I moved a little too late, so I was planning to hitch a ride on their scheme. But I completely altered the essence of the formations."
"So now we're stuck on your pirate ship," Seraphina said. "If we don't want to abandon all our previous efforts, we have no choice but to follow you to the end."
Currently, novice wizards on the Elosia Plane had four primary methods for earning contribution points:
First, simple slaughter and destruction. However, given the limited strength of new wizards, this method yielded few contribution points, and there was a high risk of being killed in retaliation.
The second approach involved considering the overall situation and finding ways to encourage the various races of the Elosia Plane to provide more troops for the Wizard Camp to eliminate.
The third method, similar to what geniuses like Anya and Kaelen had initially proposed, focused on influencing the mortal world to indirectly affect the divine beings.
While the impact was limited, given the inherent importance of the divine beings, the contribution points earned were still substantial.
The fourth approach, exemplified by Jieming, also aimed to influence the divine beings, but through far more extreme and aggressive means.
"Ah, this..."
Jieming finally realized that few serious wizard apprentices would spend so much crucial time studying the Divine Power Faith Network when they should be earning contribution points.
Having calculated the energy diffusion effects of the three magic formations, he had subconsciously assumed everyone else was thinking along the same lines. He hadn't realized it was a misunderstanding.
He had even thought the others' formation skills were lacking and kindly helped them enhance and modify their runes—"just a little bit."
(End of the Chapter)
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