A part of me was sorely tempted to venture into the so-called Blessed City, as I had learned the local Sunna worshippers called their town. Quite bombastic for a collection of largely wooden buildings, but I wasn’t too surprised. Lorgar and the others had left a city called ‘New Dawn’ behind, so I had a feeling any name with the word ‘Dawn’ would be out from the start, or maybe even any direct allusion to the Sun. That made naming a city built to honour a solar deity quite tricky, though I might be wrong about their motivations and hangups. Their group of five, the original Bearers of Lady Sunna’s Word, were the one party I hadn’t even tried to spy on, just in case they had some unexpected skills. My plan had the best chance of succeeding if they, and Sunna, remained unaware for as long as possible, so tipping them off by spying on them would be quite foolish. And while I had done a few foolish things in the past, I didn’t want to think myself a fool.
Instead, my efforts had been focused on the various townspeople, with a particular emphasis on those who seemed to simply play along. Those who didn’t seem overly invested in the religious worship, who didn’t volunteer for extra drills, who were simply living in the Blessed City, a name I couldn’t even think without chuckling, those were my targets. They didn’t have the fervent faith some of the others possessed; they didn’t truly believe in the concept of the Blessed City; they simply enjoyed the benefits living there brought them. That left them open to attack.
What’s more, their relative lack of faith in a community dedicated to faith was a logical shatter point, to borrow a phrase from a movie —a point at which I could bring pressure to bear and shatter their community. Historically, groups had often broken along theological lines, for reasons outsiders would deem utterly irrelevant. Granted, I was well aware that such schisms didn’t just happen because of a single disagreement. No matter how amusing it was to think that the Christian Church broke into Catholic and Orthodox due to a dispute over baking recipes, there was undoubtedly more to it. But I wasn’t just pushing one issue within the Blessed City; I was pushing a multitude of them, and collectively, they would bring it to a breaking point.
My efforts were already yielding great results. While I couldn’t exactly venture into their city, despite being tempted, and get a feel for their atmosphere directly, I could observe from a distance. What I observed showed me that these people were heading towards a breaking point, although I wasn’t quite sure what it would look like. I thought there was a certain air of paranoia in the city, just as I had purposely engendered, and that paranoia would eventually boil over. Something would happen, maybe some utterly minor event in the grand scheme of things, and all of a sudden it would all come crashing down. Maybe that would happen before the longest night, maybe after. Probably after, especially as the plan Lia and I had made had us ramping up the attacks afterwards, actively trying to make these people break.
Once night fell, I noticed Lia ghosting through the forest, moving towards the Blessed City herself. While we had both been working on destabilising the people within, our efforts didn’t always overlap, with her using alchemical concoctions as her primary attack vector, whereas I used Mind Magic. The results were overlapping, but the methods didn’t, not really. Additionally, I was often working during the day, staying in the forest as much as possible and hiding myself, while she could only attack at night; however, the timing didn't truly matter when it came to tainting their water supply.
“Hello, Mother,” Lia greeted me when I let my concealment slip as she drew near, “How are you doing?”
“Quite well, our efforts are starting to pay off,” I replied, “I’ve seen two actual fights today, and I only had to instigate one of them. Things are heating up in there.”
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“Any progress when it comes to circumventing their wards? You said you had a few ideas,” she prodded, making me scowl.
“Less progress than I’d like,” I had to admit, annoyed with myself, “The wards, at least as far as I understand them, are stupidly simple, that’s what’s annoying me so much. They are basic, but that basic nature, combined with Sunna’s divine power, makes them also incredibly powerful. In theory, I should be able to use simple concealment magic to slip through them without issues. But practically, I have no idea if my concealment magic will be able to stand up to the sheer power imbued into the wards. It’s completely hit or miss,” I explained, my voice getting heated as I spoke.
“And if you miss, you’re toast, right?” she asked, just to clarify why I didn’t want to put my ideas to the test.
“Exactly,” I nodded, “I’d guess that I’ve got a seventy-five per cent chance to make it work, but a chance of one-in-four to get incinerated by an angry sun isn’t something I want to put to the test.”
“That sucks,” she snorted, “And no, I can’t fault you there. Any other possibilities to put the theory to the test? Some sort of construct, or maybe you could imbue your power into an animal, or even somebody else and have them test it? I mean, if you could manage to conceal another while they are sneaking around in there, you should be able to conceal yourself, right?” she asked, her points making some sense. However, she failed to take one important thing into account.
“Not quite,” I had to burst her bubble, “You forget that the two of us are uniquely vulnerable to these wards. And uniquely identifiable, making it even harder to conceal either of us from them. We’re both cursed by the power these wards are composed of, making us basically allergic to them.”
“Ah, right,” she nodded, “That really sucks, and it’s just about impossible to get rid of that curse.”
“Exactly,” I agreed, “Though I do have an interesting idea that I could try one of these days,” I told her, a grin on my face.
“You see, I managed to scoop up a bit of blood a few days ago, nothing fancy, just the results of a massive row between the women in there. Quite amusing to watch from afar, it was an utter mess. Those samples should give me a few interesting options, I’m just not sure how to make the most of them,” I looked over into town, my mind going through possibilities.
“What can you do with that blood? What could you make them do?” Lia sounded quite excited about the idea, making me wonder what she had in mind.
“Depends on a few factors, some of which I don’t know just yet, I’d have to test. However, I generally think I could manage a fair amount, although they might notice if I tried to do something too egregious. The less obvious and the fewer traces they come across afterwards, the better.” I shrugged, not sure what to tell her, “What do you have in mind?”
“Well, you see, I managed to make something I call Rage Powder. Or maybe Dust of Annoyance would be a better name, I’m not sure,” she shook her head, as if chasing away the thought, “Anyway, it’s basically a powder that makes people irritable and induces anger. However, it has a similar consistency to salt, but it’s not water-soluble. If I tried to pour it into their brook, it’d just sink to the bottom and sit there, doing nothing. Not terribly useful,” she shrugged once more.
“But if you could make one of those women mix it into their food, maybe into their salt reserves, things will get terribly interesting in town. And I doubt they’d manage to figure it out, especially if they have some sort of primary storage for their salt; the stuff looks almost exactly like coarse salt to the naked eye,” she explained, and now, I was grinning widely. This was just about the perfect idea, something untraceable, chaotic and, going by the wide grin on her face, quite devastating.
“Sounds great,” I admitted, “We’ll have to be a little creative when it comes to getting the stuff to them. I doubt I’d be able to make one of them walk to the wardline in the middle of the night without notice. It’s just too cold for that. But I’m sure we’ll manage if we put our heads together.”
With that, the task for the rest of the night was decided. To get the small bag of magic powder into town, to the woman I wanted to influence and have her add it to the town’s supply of table salt. Then, we’d have yet another thing we could watch and enjoy from afar.
