"Be careful everyone, there’s a group of people up north in the woods."
It was in the afternoon and Benjamin and his group had just left a village and were headed down a remote pathway to their next village. Suddenly, he raised his arm to signal to the group to stop before speaking in a lowered voice.
The King had a scare and quickly asked, "Is... is it the Church?"
Benjamin nodded.
He could sense that the group had a total of thirty men dressed as regular merchants. Within them were quite a few priests, all of them bearing crosses. No doubt they were from the Church. The group was a couple hundred meters away but neither party had spotted each other yet due to the thick foliage.
Right now, Benjamin and gang were headed straight towards them.
These people... were after them.
But Benjamin had already predicted such circumstance.
It has already been half a month since they first started, no doubt occurrences and news of the villages would have slowly leaked out. Although this area was remote, the Church could not simply ignore rumours of the ‘appearance of the real king’?
Moreover, the Church had already been hunting them regardless.
He thought about this before turning to speak to the mages, "They may have been sent by the Church to investigate us. But since their numbers are not great, we can just take them out here."
Benjamin’s mages naturally nodded and rubbed their palms together in anticipation.
But this struck a nerve with the remaining forty apprentices.
They hadn't been mages for long and hadn't used magic in battles before. This was their first battle and they were already facing the Church. No doubt it would be nerve wrecking.
"There’s nothing to be afraid of. Just toss some fireballs from behind us."
Benjamin motivated them a little before flying with the town mages towards to the Church’s convoy.
"You keep looking here and there. What are you searching for?"
The Church’s group heard this mocking remark and raised their heads towards the sky to look for the source. However, their jaws dropped when they did.
"You... really were working around this area," The priest who was heading the group glared at Benjamin and spoke calmly.
Benjamin briefly frowned.
However, before he could say anything, the group of Church underlings glanced at each other before scattering. It seemed that they did not expect that they would actually have to do battle with Benjamin.
However, just as they were prepared to make their run for, a magic oscillation vibrated over the area. A large earth wall rose from the ground and blocked their path.
"Shit..."
The priests’ face turned to an ugly shade of purple and they hastily began to chant.
But of course, Benjamin didn't plan to allow them to continue.
A sky full of fireballs, ice arrows... the attacks weren’t limited to the mages in the sky, the apprentices made their way over and started casting magic towards the inside of the earth wall. It was like shooting fish in a barrel as the Church’s men were utterly annihilated.
The crosses couldn't save them - It wasn’t long until they were totally wiped out.
The mages then dispersed the earth wall.
"Clean up the battlefield and do not leave any traces," Benjamin ordered.
Since the Church sent such a small team to investigate, it meant that they were not clear on Benjamin’s whereabouts. To prevent the Church from sending a large team, Benjamin naturally wouldn’t leave them any clues.
The Church would sooner or later determine their location, but it would be better to stall them for as long as they could.
The ten elite mages moved swiftly to clear the battlefield, but the newly joined apprentice merely stared at the mound of corpses with discoloured faces.
"... First time killing?" Benjamin saw this and walked towards them.
The apprentices were stunned and a lot of them nodded in hesitation.
"The first time is the hardest to take in, but you’ll get used to it," Benjamin gently comforted them, "Reality is harsh. If we do not first kill them, then we would be the ones getting cleaned up."
The apprentices nodded. Although they remained silent, they still walked over to help clear the battlefield.
Benjamin prayed that these people could quickly grow...
They quickly left after handling the scouting group, Benjamin initially planned to head south to comb through more villages, but he changed his plan and started to move east.
— The Church was already aware of their movements. He had to be more cautious.
Over the next one week, Benjamin’s plan went on smoothly. They did not bump into any of the Church’s men again after changing course. They went on to another ten villages and their influence continued to spread as their apprentice team expanded to just over fifty people.
However, it was a shame that not every village fell for their ruse. They once entered a fishermen’s village who did not care at all about Kings and the kingdom. They believed in some wacky religion that was unheard of. Benjamin wanted to show them the power of magic, but they chose to simply ignore him. It was an awkward sight indeed.
Benjamin decided to move on, however. Because, since they were a village with a belief, they would not simply take the Church’s side.
As they continued to capture the locals’ hearts by digging wells and banishing thieves, they were slowly moving away from Carretas’ mountain range borders and moving towards the southern coastal area.
These places were not as remote as the villages in the west.
"Sir Benjamin, how many encounters have we had with the Church’s underlings now?"
It was a pitch-black night and they had decided to ambush over ten of the Church’s scouts. Tony couldn't help but frown as he cleared the battlefield.
"Number eight - a total of a hundred and thirty-one men," Benjamin depended on the System for the numbers which he merely regurgitated.
The Church’s control was more evident in areas that were economically developed. A few of the larger villages had the Church’s snitch in them, causing Benjamin to be extra careful to avoid them and ultimately disrupting his plan.
For various reasons, they could only pick villages that the Church did not have influence over.
But while in these villages, Benjamin heard some news.
The Church had used a substitute King to announce a few new decrees.
The first was to place an arrest warrant on Benjamin and his group. The warrant had labelled Benjamin and his gang as vicious bandits that had stolen the crown and emblem from the palace. It also said that they were now off cheating and stealing from the people of Carretas.
This impacted Benjamin and the rest to a certain extent, but, it didn’t carry much weight after Benjamin assisted the locals in their daily lives. He would easily win over their trust regardless.
After all, one was a group of royal officials far away from the capital that did nothing to help them while the other was smiling in front of them and personally helped them solve all kinds of problems. The people were realistic, they would not bite the hand that fed them. It was clear whose side they were on.
The other news was about a new ‘state religion’ of Carretas.
The Church couldn’t stand out in broad daylight. There was a ban on them, after all. Therefore, they changed their identity and gave themselves a new name and shell before using this shell to build Churches around the cities.
Their substitute King had also apparently been struck with a new deadly disease. By saying that they had treated him of it, he could provide a reason behind announcing a new state religion. Not only it was to be funded by the government, but they were also given keys to political conferences, to guarantee its developmental growth.
Benjamin was helpless in this situation. He wished to put a stop to all of this but alas, they could not even enter the city gates. They could not even repeat what they did in Fereldan, where they caused havoc for the Church’s.
Hence, they could not do anything apart from spreading their influence among the villages.
The Church’s rapid, yet effective, actions had made this silent power struggle a lot more intense.