When A Mage Revolts

"... This is not an excuse to laze around. Go back and filter that five billion incantations."

Benjamin turned around and strictly reprimanded, The System was rendered speechless and, in the end, obediently turned and aggrievedly ran off.

As for Benjamin, he knitted his brows and sank deep into thought.

What happened... earlier?

He controlled the water elements to display the shape of the rune. An uncontrollable water magic tornado conjured out of a blue and almost wounded him and the System.

There was no doubt that the rune signifying the element of destruction would require such a strong ability to control. Within a short amount of time, such a large amount of water elements needed to be amassed and a magic form needed to be constructed... If this process was done by only one mage, the consumption of Spiritual Energy would be deadly. This couldn’t be accomplished just by any regular mage.

After drawing and dispersing that rune off, Benjamin did not feel any of his Spiritual Energy drained.

What did this mean?

This meant that if Benjamin could control that out-of-control magic that the rune summoned, then he would have repossessed readily available magic combat ability, and it would be more powerful and require a lesser consumption of Spiritual Energy as compared to before.

He also did not think that these runes were embedded with such a huge potential.

The destruction rune was four intertwined lines, its shape akin to that of an octothorpe. However, its length was tidier and in order, in a way, that it had been measured with a ruler before. Benjamin thought about it before trying to control a few water elements to draw this rune in the air.

In the blink of an eye, the rune was formed and the initially calm Space of Consciousness was invaded with a turmoil of mad magic.

This time, Benjamin was mentally prepared and remained at a distance beforehand. He then started to use his Spiritual Energy to instruct this seemingly uncontrollable magic.

However, he realized that the magic would not come to his bid.

The water elements seemed as though they were unrestrained by anything. Owing to of a certain energy, they could come in the form of ice crystals, water currents, and other various forms. They did not carry anyone’s Spiritual Energy imprints. In other words, they were naturally mutated elements, classified under "natural disaster" which no one could control.

This left Benjamin with a massive headache.

He needed a fairly stable and controllable summoning ability, not a ticking time bomb with an unknown timer.

After giving it much thought, Benjamin fixed his gaze on the rune he used the water elements to draw. In most circumstances, the water element would be formless and colorless. However, after the drawing of the rune was completed, these water elements had glowed without a reason. It formed a light, pale glittering rune in the darkness that looked both illusory and mysterious.

The rune was the source of the magic windstorm. If there was really a way to control this crazy magic, then it would definitely be using the rune.

He looked at that uncontrollable magic turbulence from afar. He then controlled the rune to slowly advance towards him.

However, as the rune moved closer, Benjamin realized that the magic turbulence was also headed his way. Benjamin couldn’t help but instruct the rune to move to the side, and the magic windstorm followed the run in changing its course of direction.

Slowly but surely, Benjamin felt he was able to dig up some clues.

The rune and the turbulence kept a distance of approximately twenty meters, and the mouth of the octothorpe-shaped rune was the direction the turbulence would move towards to.

It was unfortunate that, apart from this, he could not find any other regularity.

The range of magic turbulence did not start large, but as time passed, Benjamin found that it had been slowly built up, just like the "Door of Oblivion". It wouldn’t be long before it became a horrifying, grade-ten windstorm. Just a little longer and it would swallow Benjamin into it.

Benjamin had no choice but to wipe away the Rune and draw another. It was then the magic turbulence started from a small scale whirlwind, building up.

If it hadn’t been stopped midway, Benjamin suspected that this unmanageable magic would have developed into a typhoon and wipe out an entire city. It would be too terrifying.

Throughout this process, Benjamin did not even have to do anything. It only took him a minimal Spiritual Energy to maintain the rune.

"How terrifying..."

In the end, he dispersed the rune and magic turbulence, sighing. Having been somewhat familiar with it, he could grasp the range of summoning so when the magic turbulence appeared again, he wouldn’t be sucked into it.

However, this thing... could not be maintained too long. Otherwise, disasters are bound to happen.

It could be considered a pretty grand tactic.

And so, he was equipped with a tactic to take down the enemy anytime. Although Benjamin did not have good control over it yet, he did feel an added sheer of confidence. Switching of usage between the destruction rune and water element control should be able to handle a lot of outbursts.

Next, Benjamin started to experiment with another few runes.

Those that represented the fire element, wind element kind of runes that were drawn with water elements naturally came to nothing. They, in fact, produced a sort of repelling friction. As for the triangular rune representing the water element, what he had here was a rune that was merged from three of them. Outlining it had also caused no reaction.

He had found the three runes that had an impact.

They were the elements of defense, healing, and agreeability. When Benjamin drew all three of them, it was definitely safer than the element of destruction. The water elements amassed either formed an odd barrier and sealed off a certain direction, or formed a unique structure, conjuring into cooling water silk and distributing life energy stronger than that from the healing water ball by multiple folds...

As for agreeability, once the rune had been drawn, the water element started to accrue around the rune and became easier to control. It could increase Benjamin’s meditation speed. At the moment, nothing had been found that could be used in battle.

In conclusion, these runes were not easy to control and, compared to Benjamin’s slick tactics before, the difference was like comparing between the heaven and the earth. However, the force they could create was not something Benjamin could easily reenact.

They... were like rebellious soldiers that were excessively spirited. Benjamin could lay down simple instructions and they would comprehend and execute their way. Benjamin would not be able to butt in in the process of execution.

Rigid, yet powerful.

This was a tactic that Benjamin currently possessed.

Putting in some thought, he decided to bestow them with a cool name. Elemental Order - Destroy, Elemental Order - Defend... Calling out these name have him imagine himself to be the controller of elements.

Luckily, he had dismissed the System. For the time being, nobody would be dissing him for the ditziness of these names.

And the other one that has a cool-off period of an undefeatable ten minutes, Benjamin decided to name it the "Descent of Water". He also believed that it wouldn’t take long for this lame name to be spread throughout the land, becoming every priest’s worst nightmare.

Overall... Benjamin slowly found himself getting used to this new Space of Consciousness.

Losing the three original magic art, he still gained a few new abilities. Although it may take a long time for him to get accustomed to this magic, the number of runes he could use would not be limited to these four.

If more runes could be found, then Benjamin’s magic abilities would slowly return to its original vigor.

Just the thought of it sent him beaming with confidence.

He thought to himself that he seriously should reconsider doing something about the runes research team that currently only comprised of the old mage.