Adjusting a rune matrix is something that is normally quite complicated, making a real modification to a rune set or a rune matrix and something that demands not only a great amount of knowledge about the exact area that your target belongs to and a lot of time. It is necessary to know the limits of the possible, modifying her to do something that goes against her exact nature is impossible as well as strengthening her to the highest level is a critical mistake that can become the last mistake of an idiot.
Powering up a rune set is not just about increasing the energy that powers it or increasing the output of the runes' effect, powering up a rune array is about changing the intent that was used on it which is something extremely difficult to do.
When a craftsman changes the fundamental intent of his rune arrays, he causes the rune array to become unstable this usually causes the runes' lifespan to be fatally shortened and usually a rune array that finds its end in this way ends up causing an explosion violent.
When a craftsman tries to change someone else's work, the rune arrangement becomes a bombshell that usually goes off in the face of the suicidal craftsman. Only a very select number of artisans should be able to buy enough time to escape before being blasted by the runes.
But luckily for me today I wouldn't do something so stupid and irrational, in fact I'm going to do it in this rune arrangement that is the heart of this base is the exact opposite of strengthening the runes. I'm going to restrict his energy flow by making it necessary for many runes to be turned off so that he doesn't malfunction.
Obviously, I'm going to turn off any sort of alarm and message capability, I'm going to focus the energy that the core supplies to the defensive runic arrangements of the base structure, unfortunately doing that will make us run the risk that the smuggler's leader will notice that the first energy barrier that served as an alarm is not active.
This may indicate that something is wrong, but considering that the interior of the base is well destroyed, luring him into the base has become impossible. Best time for an ambush and on the surface taking advantage of our advantage to cause a high level of destruction on the smugglers.
I'll take this plan to Ana later, though I think the idea of blowing up smugglers should improve her mood. I want to blow up the entire cabin and all surrounding terrain when the smuggler's leader's group is in or near the cabin. I doubt she has a problem with my strategy other than her possible concern that the underground base will be affected by the explosions.
Nothing that a fortified earth layer and the base structure runes can't fix.
I spent a lot of time adjusting the rune sets so that when the core was released from its seal there wouldn't even be a problem with the energy flow. My concentration was interrupted when I heard footsteps coming down the stairs, Ana entered the floor, but I kept hearing footsteps on the stairs.
"Everything is fine? I've already finished tweaking the basics here you can collect...."
Before I could finish my sentence, Ana motioned for me to be silent placing a finger over where her lips should be, this sign got awkward with her sweating a closed helmet that only reveals her eyes, as she walked towards me quickly. I got up to walk away as she picked up the parchment-shaped magic tool.
It seems she doesn't want the scroll's existence to be known to the rest of the team, and getting an intense glare from Ana the message was pretty clear.
Carmilla, Nolan and Tania went down to this floor by the stairs, it looks like the rest stayed upstairs. As they approached Tania nearly removed her mask, but when she placed her hand on the mask the silence in the room was broken.
"What do you think you're doing, Blast! Clueless girl, even though the enemies have been neutralized no one should see her face even the slaves. Only take this mask off when I tell you to."
That was a bad mistake, but it must have been because of the nervousness she must be feeling. Now that she should feel relaxed, taking off the masquerade must have been more of a reaction than a decision, but it was still a dangerous mistake.
These examples of idiocy that I am witnessing are making me very nervous, this team is made of elites, but it seems that they are suffering a curse of stupidity or nervousness that makes them wrong.
After letting out a deep sigh of disappointment, frustration, and probably a little anger, Ana recovers.
"The slaves will recover from their appearance shortly and it will be your task to calm them down and it's not worth using the chains to paralyze them like the smugglers did. Lobo and I are going to take the smuggled smugglers upstairs, the slaves will get really loud if they end up seeing the smugglers. Just to be clear, you must not release the slaves now or promise that they will be released soon."
I feel they were a little surprised by Ana's order, but in my opinion, it makes a lot of sense. At least this time they didn't question the order or ask what it meant.
Helping Ana I sinned the light element mage who is completely off, Ana must have been quite violent with her. The moment I put her over my shoulder she groaned in pain.
It didn't take long for us to reach the top floor that was being cleaned by the rest of the team, only Quinn was sitting in the center of the room releasing spells to repair the walls and reinforce the damaged structure of the room.
With the mana and elemental energy and resistance runic arrangements of the room structure, her task should have gotten a lot easier. As we waited for the smugglers to wake up, I asked a question that has been on my mind since the moment I saw the slaves.
"Have you noticed the mystery we have now, Shield?"
"Yes, most slaves were beast folk and then dwarves. These slaves are not people from our kingdom, there are very few families of black dwarves and fawn tribe members living in our kingdom and not one of them is in the northern region, those slaves are from the neighboring kingdom and will be smuggled into our kingdom. "
"Yeah, but as far as I know it's not worth doing, is it? Our kingdom's slave law is very strict and enforced, it's not worth smuggling cheap slaves like that, some of the beast tribe women may be worth a little more, but it's not enough to make this operation viable."
"You're thinking too narrowly, Wolf, just because slaves aren't worth selling merchandise to smuggle into the realm doesn't mean the scenario you imagined is wrong or incomplete. Think about it a little longer and you'll realize that we ended up in mine with an even bigger problem than we expected."
If selling slaves as slaves is not feasible, they must be in storage to be sold for a different purpose. From Ana's tone she is not at all happy with this development, that is to say that the slaves' role must be bad or unpleasant.
They are all fighters of different races and sex, not mages and they are all well fed and well bound from what you can tell from a cursory glance. Shit!
Warriors have strong bodies and with great vital force, they are great for evil god cultists. The smugglers are storing the slaves to sell them to the cultists, probably a necromancer so he can make a small army in a short period of time to attack the villages in the north.
With the attention of the realm and the temples on the battlefield on the other side of the realm the necromancer or necromancers will have a good opportunity to kill innocents in the north to create strong undead.
If they attack at the same time as the rest of the cultists who are interested in the southern battlefield, they should have good cover to party in the northern region.
By the time the kingdom and temples realize the dead in the north the necromancers should have had enough time to kill countless small villages and flee the north. Whoever thought of this plan is pretty smart, but they failed to keep the smugglers under their control.
"The smugglers really helped us a lot this time. As far as I remember, we only discovered the existence of this base because the smugglers were preparing a lot of goods to smuggle into our kingdom."
"Well, it seems you understand our situation well, Wolf. If it weren't for the smugglers' greed to profit even more, we wouldn't have gotten this clue about a group of cultists, the problem now is to keep this base running and capture the leader of the smugglers."
"I hope the necromancers have already scheduled a meeting or date to hand over the base to the cultists. If not, the kingdom's intelligence team will have big problems cashing in on this chance, after and interrogating them, I want you to do a thorough search of the entire base."
"Any secret compartments in the base or furniture should be found, if you have any clues that we can help with the cultist problem we can earn a lot of extra credit for this mission."
"I understand, but it is very unlikely that any document will act that can help us at the base. But maybe there is some form of signature in the base's rune arrangements, maybe we can identify who made these runes, it would be great if we found something that linked these smugglers with a group of cultists."
"Perhaps, but I think this possibility to find a clue in the runes is smaller than finding some documents that help us."
"Looks like they're waking up."
The mage's mana started moving faster inside her body showing that she is awake now, not that she has any chance to use her magic tied up with these strings that interfere with her ability to use her mana to control the elements outside of her. body.