Chapter 36: The S-Rank Patent Controversy 5

First, the refined iron alone had cost around five silver coins.

The magic crystal powder was the truly expensive part—it cost 150 gold coins.

Adding all the other miscellaneous materials together, the total cost was roughly 20 more gold coins.

In other words, this single device cost about the same as the average annual income of a sixth-rank swordsman.

There was no way something like this could ever be mass-produced or widely promoted.

Ordinary countries could forget about using it altogether.

However, as a defensive tool against silent threats such as thieves and assassins, it was still extremely useful.

Now, everything depended on the results of Kent’s two days of work.

In truth, Kent himself didn’t think the device was completely reliable yet.

If someone managed to reproduce it and use it against him in the future, that would be a huge problem.

But this was only a crude prototype.

As long as it achieved the effect he expected, he could continue improving it afterward.

For example:

The magic crystal powder could be replaced with powdered magical cores to reduce the size of the device.

Fragments of refined iron could be added inside to increase destructive power.

Or perhaps fire-element magic crystal powder could be combined with the fat of magical beasts to create a completely different type of explosive.

There were countless possibilities.

But before any improvements mattered, Kent needed to test one thing first—

The actual power of this "landmine."

“Crazy... absolutely crazy.”

Inside the headquarters of the Mage Guild, the same elderly man and middle-aged man were once again standing together.

The middle-aged man held a report in his hand.

It contained the statistics of the S-rank patent sales from the Mage Guild that day.

“The S-rank patent has only been available for two days, and already thousands of mages have purchased it.”

“Hundreds of thousands of gold coins... it’s coming in far too easily.”

The middle-aged man shook his head in disbelief.

“Master, this is only the result from the morning.”

The old man was clearly excited.

“The statistics from the afternoon won’t be available until tomorrow.”

“But this is undoubtedly a massive improvement for the overall strength of the Mage Guild.”

Thinking about the possibilities, even he could hardly remain calm.

How many mages did the Mage Guild have across the continent?

If every mage could increase their combat ability by an entire rank, the result would be unimaginable.

For low-level mages, the impact was already enormous.

But what about eighth-rank and ninth-rank mages?

Their spells might require more time to cast and consume more mana, but the increase in power would still represent a terrifying deterrent.

And the benefits involved...

They were impossible to measure with ordinary numbers.

“The Church of Light and the Dark Church both sent official letters today.”

The middle-aged man looked at his disciple.

“They want to learn this S-rank patent as well.”

“Go handle it.”

“Sell them the authorization directly.”

“But remember—do not lower the price.”

The old man immediately smiled.

“Hehe, Master, don’t worry.”

“We’ll calculate the price based on the number of mages they have.”

“The Mage Guild has never lacked a little extra income.”

His eyes practically sparkled.

Among all the major powers on the continent, the most reluctant to spend money had always been the churches.

In the past, the Church of Light and the Dark Church had practically ignored the Mage Guild.

There had even been agreements between them:

The Mage Guild was not allowed to establish branches inside the territories of the two church empires.

Likewise, the churches were not allowed to build temples within the Alliance Empire.

Of course, those rules only existed on the surface.

In reality, whenever the two churches discovered someone with magical talent, they secretly recruited and trained them themselves.

Likewise, whenever the Mage Guild discovered someone with light-element or dark-element talent, they quietly took them in as well.

Even more interestingly, the Dark Empire would sometimes exchange people with light affinity for those with dark affinity discovered by the Light Empire.

That was politics.

Nothing more.

However, the Alliance Empire was simply too powerful.

Its strength did not come only from population size.

Nor was it merely because of its countless warriors, swordsmen, and knights.

The true reason was the overwhelming number of powerful organizations inside its territory.

The Mage Guild alone was already a force that no one could ignore.

On top of that, there were the Temple of the Nature Goddess, the Temple of the God of War, the Temple of the God of Contracts, and dozens of other large and small temples.

Together, they formed a massive network of power.

As for the royal family...

Compared with these organizations, it was almost insignificant.

Even the smallest Assassin Guild was stronger than the royal family.

But that did not mean the royal family was powerless.

Their role was different.

They acted as the central coordinator that balanced the interests of every faction.

In many ways, they were like the head of a national treasury—collecting resources, distributing benefits, and maintaining stability.

That position itself gave them influence.

So although the royal family was not the strongest force, it was still an indispensable part of the continent’s balance of power.

“Kent, are you sure this thing actually works?”

Kweilin stared at the metal object in Kent’s hand.

It was dark and covered in a black coating, looking nothing more than a simple lump of iron from a distance.

“Honestly, it just looks like an iron block.”

That night, after the ship docked at the port, Kent and the others went ashore. They found an empty farmland nearby to test the power of the device.

But no matter how Kweilin looked at it, he simply couldn’t understand how such a crude piece of metal could possibly be useful.

“I’m not sure either,” Kent admitted with an awkward smile.

“This thing cost me two hundred gold coins. And that’s only the cost of materials. I just wanted to test whether the idea would work.”

Kent couldn’t exactly explain the true principle behind it, so he could only give a vague answer.

Kent tied a Saru Beast to a wooden stake.

The animal weighed more than one hundred kilograms, and Kent even placed a leather armor covering over its body to simulate a target with some protection.

Then he buried the device within the area where the Saru Beast could move.

After finishing everything, Kent quickly retreated.

He hid himself in a drainage ditch beside the farmland.

The distance between him and the device was a full fifty meters.

Kweilin and his two guards watched Kent’s strange actions with extremely complicated expressions.

There was no need to say how confused they were.

Alice, Delis, and Lucy—the maid serving Kweilin—had been moved even farther away.

They were standing two hundred meters from the test site.

BOOM!

A terrifying explosion suddenly shattered the night.

Under the light of the two enormous moons hanging in the sky, Kent could clearly see what happened.

The more than one-hundred-kilogram Saru Beast was thrown upward by the blast wave.

Its body was launched five or six meters into the air before crashing heavily back onto the ground.

Kent was relatively fine because he had covered his ears before the explosion.

But Kweilin’s two guards were not so lucky.

Although both of them immediately released their battle aura the moment the explosion occurred, they were still struck by countless tiny pieces of metal fragments.

Kweilin was protected because the two guards had instinctively moved in front of him.

However, Kent suffered the consequences.

The golden battle aura released by the two guards was so powerful that the shockwave itself sent Kent tumbling several times across the ground.

“Ninth rank...”

That was the only thought that flashed through Kent’s mind.

The next moment, he lost consciousness.

And this was despite the fact that the ninth-rank warriors had not even targeted him intentionally.

If they had truly directed their strength at him, Kent knew he would never have been able to withstand it.

“Ugh...” Kent slowly came to his senses. The first thing he felt was a burning pain in his hands. As his vision gradually cleared, he saw Dalithis staring at him with her eyes slightly reddened, while Kweilin and his two guards were looking at him with strange expressions.

Fortunately, the two enormous moons hanging in the sky provided enough illumination to rival the streetlights of Earth. This was also one of the reasons why the Twin Star Continent was so prosperous—the land enjoyed abundant sunlight, and in the vast plains, even the changes between the four seasons were not particularly obvious.

Kent looked down at his hands and found that they were only covered with a few small cuts, probably caused by scraping against the ground when he fell. His face was stinging as well, suggesting that it had suffered some minor abrasions too. His clothes were torn in several places. Since Kent was not accustomed to wearing robes like most people here, he usually dressed in ordinary clothing instead. It was not only more convenient for conducting experiments but also much more comfortable and refreshing to wear.

“Big brother, don’t you think you went a little too far this time?” Kent looked at Kweilin, his frustration immediately rising. I already told you all to be careful, but none of you listened. In the end, while testing a landmine, he had almost been injured by his own people. Half annoyed and half joking, Kent complained to Kweilin:

“I didn’t nearly die at the hands of some enemy. Instead, I almost got killed by your own guards! Tell me, isn’t that unfair?”

Kweilin glanced at him, then gave a helpless smile.

“You think I’m any better off? I fell down too. How were we supposed to know that your thing would have such terrifying power? There wasn’t even the slightest warning beforehand.”

“I already told you guys!” Kent replied with a helpless look. “But honestly, you’re something else. If I had known your guards were Golden Swordsmen, I would have just let them test it themselves from the beginning.”

Kent truly did not think the two Golden Swordsmen were anything extraordinary. After all, he had already seen too many powerful people like them. To an ordinary person, encountering even a single Golden Swordsman might be something they would never experience in their entire lifetime. But to Kent, they were no longer as impressive as they seemed to others.