Chương 294: 294： Knowledge is the Ultimate Combat Power

Deep within the underground defensive tunnels of Greywater Village, there was a secret chamber heavily reinforced by magic arrays. Horace stood nervously in the center of the room. The biting, damp chill of the subterranean chamber caught in his throat, forcing him to let out two muffled coughs. His hands—far more accustomed to holding a quill than a weapon—clutched a thick, ancient parchment tome tightly to his chest. It was as if this book was his sole remaining anchor in this cruel, chaotic world. Creak.

The heavy iron door swung open. Carried in by a gust of cold air, Soren strode into the room. He had just stripped off his dark silver armor and was dressed only in a coarse linen tunic, with a black cloak draped casually over his shoulders. Horace's head snapped up. The moment he clearly saw the tall young man standing before him, his breathing hitched.

"Y-you... are you Lord Soren?" Horace asked, his voice trembling with excitement. It was this very man who had slain the arrogant orc Oracle Envoy at Soulbreak Gorge! It was him who had published that resounding oath in The Gazette—the promise to care for the crippled and to never abandon his men! In Horace's mind, a commander who could forge such a terrifying reputation amidst a battlefield of blood and corpses must be a scarred, brutish savage.

Yet the Soren standing before him, though his features were resolute and stern, exuded the calm, quiet grace of a true leader.

"There is no need to be so tense, Scholar Horace," Soren said, keenly sensing the young man's stiffness. He offered a faint smile, intentionally reigning in the chilling aura he had honed on the battlefield, replacing it with a warm, disarming charm. He pulled out two wooden chairs and gestured to one.

"Sit. I've been out in the freezing wind all day, and you've trudged through a thousand miles of mud. We don't need any tedious formalities here. Let's just talk, comrade to comrade." That single word—comrade—sent a jolt of overwhelming flattery and nervous disbelief through Horace. He was used to the haughty, condescending nobles of the royal capital. Never in his life had a renowned commander treated him as an equal. Horace gingerly lowered himself onto the edge of the chair.

His hands were still wrapped in a death grip around his ancient tome, but the rims of his eyes had already grown red.

"Lord Soren, I read your interview in the paper..." Horace began, his voice shaking.

"My hometown was burned to the ground by the orcs. My family... they're all dead. I walked a very long way to get here." Horace took a deep breath, as if hoarding every ounce of his courage, and then abruptly stood up, his voice ringing out.

"Please, issue me a repeating hand crossbow, or even just a longsword! I want to wear that armor too! I want to go to the front lines! I want to fight those greenskin beasts to the death!" However, faced with this passionate plea for battle, Soren did not show a shred of approval. He sat quietly in his chair, his gaze sweeping over Horace. He looked at the young man's frail, painfully thin frame, and listened to the violent fit of coughing that had immediately followed his outburst.

"Horace, you are a brave young man. That is a rare commodity in this rotting era," Soren said, his voice soft but carrying an undeniable weight of authority.

"But giving you a sword and sending you to the front lines to kill the enemy? That would be a catastrophic waste of Greywater Village's resources, and an absolute insult to your talents." The fiery blood rushing through Horace's veins instantly turned to ice. He slumped back into his chair dejectedly, dropping his head in agony as his fingers dug into the leather binding of his book.

"You're right... I'm completely useless," Horace whispered. Overwhelmed by despair and the crushing realization that he had no way to avenge his nation, he began to tear himself apart in self-loathing.

"At the Halycon Royal Magic Academy, I mastered every single ancient rune theory. I can recite the layouts of three thousand different magical energy conduction nodes from memory... but what does any of it matter?"

"I was born a mana insulator! My body cannot store a single trace of magical elements! I can't even cast a basic [Light] spell!" Tears spilling over his cheeks, Horace cried out in anguish, "Lord Soren, do you know what it feels like to watch orcs butcher your family, knowing you have an entire academy's worth of magical theory in your head, yet being utterly powerless to stop them?"

"On this godforsaken battlefield, all the magical theory in my brain isn't worth a rusty sword or a bent crossbow! I am completely and utterly useless!" His grief-stricken wail faded, leaving a heavy silence in the secret chamber, broken only by the quiet crackle of the burning brazier. Soren sighed inwardly.

'Everyone in this era only values direct physical lethality or immediate magical destruction,' he thought.

'They don't understand that once the foundational cornerstone of theoretical science is unlocked, the sheer, world-shaking power it will unleash will dwarf any sword or spell.'

"Horace. Look at me." Soren stood up, crossed the room, and towered over Horace, looking down at the broken young man. Love what you're reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on. He then delivered a statement—an epoch-making concept that would completely shatter the thousands of years of entrenched dogma in this world.

"Who ever told you that theoretical knowledge isn't as useful as a sword?" Soren punctuated every single syllable, his voice ringing with absolute conviction.

"Horace, I want you to carve this truth into your very soul. Knowledge is the ultimate combat power!" Boom! Horace felt as if a thunderbolt had struck his mind. He sat there, utterly dumbfounded, staring up at Soren.

"Intellectuals have a far higher calling when it comes to serving their nation," Soren said, beginning to pace across the stone floor. His words struck Horace's mind like hammer blows.

"In frontline melee combat, an elite heavy infantryman might trade his life to kill three orcs. But in my army, your mind—your ability to deconstruct runes and energy arrays—is enough to directly wipe out the entire main force of the Orc Alliance on a massive scale!" Soren halted his pacing and locked eyes with Horace.

"You cannot cast magic. To you, that is a crippling flaw. But to me, that is precisely what makes you an irreplaceable asset!"

"Because you lack mana, you are entirely immune to the mental backlash of chaotic magical elements! You don't need to feel magic the way traditional spellcasters do. You can coldly, objectively dismantle the underlying logic of the spells!" Soren did not hold back his praise.

"When it comes to pure magical theory research and the deduction of runic logic, your value far surpasses that of a Silver-tier Mage!" Horace's jaw went slack in absolute shock. Surpasses a Silver-tier Mage? How... how is that even possible? Before Horace could even process the psychological bombshell that had just been dropped on him, Soren reached out and grabbed him by the arm, pulling him to his feet.

"Come with me. I'm going to introduce you to someone and show you something. Once you see it, you will understand exactly where your battlefield lies." They walked down a long, heavily guarded stone corridor, traveling deeper into the subterranean tunnels until they reached the very end. This was the top-secret magical laboratory of Chief Mage Victor. Pushing open the heavy double doors, a thick, pungent wave of ozone and sulfur washed over them. The laboratory was a chaotic mess.

Discarded parchment scrolls, drained and blackened magic crystal dust, and chalkboards densely crammed with formulas were scattered everywhere. Silver-tier Mage Victor was currently sporting two massive dark bags under his eyes. His hair was completely unkempt as he stared obsessively, almost maniacally, at a magic array blueprint laid out on his workbench.

"My Lord? What brings you here?" Hearing their footsteps, Victor turned around wearily, casually swigging a mouthful of bitter wormwood extract to keep himself awake.

"I've brought you a helper, Victor," Soren said, gently pushing Horace forward.

"This is Horace, an advanced runic energy scholar from the Halycon Royal Magic Academy." Victor cast a deeply suspicious glance up and down the young man. Sensing absolutely zero magical fluctuations coming from Horace, the mage's brow furrowed into a deep scowl.

"My Lord, I am currently engaged in highly dangerous reverse-engineering calculations. I don't need a mundane apprentice who doesn't even possess a drop of mana..." Soren ignored Victor's complaints entirely. Instead, he walked over to a secure vault and brought out a heavy obsidian lockbox, its surface entirely covered in restrictive sealing runes.

"Horace," Soren said, turning back to the scholar, his expression more solemn than ever before.

"I am now officially entrusting you with a mission that will determine the very survival of the human defensive line." He reached out and slowly unlocked the seals binding the box.

"We are going to reverse-engineer... a Forbidden spell." The moment the lid was lifted— Vrrrrm! Even in its dormant state, a terrifying, hyper-violent wave of Fire and Earth-attribute mana instantly exploded out, washing over the entire room. The ambient temperature spiked by over ten degrees in a fraction of a second, rendering the air stiflingly hot. Resting quietly in the center of the obsidian box was a single parchment scroll, pulsing with an ominous, dark red luster.

"T-this... this energy signature...!" Horace lunged forward, slamming his hands onto the edge of the workbench. His entire body began to tremble violently. He had no mana of his own, but his innate talent—[Eye of Truth]—allowed him to clearly visualize the spell. Above the scroll, he could see tens of thousands of microscopic energy nodes, intricately woven into a geometric matrix so dizzyingly complex it defied mortal comprehension!

"[Meteor Shower]?! This is a Strategic-tier Forbidden Magic Scroll!" Horace couldn't help but scream. He whipped his head around to stare at Soren, his face contorted in sheer, absolute shock. A weapon of mass destruction that only existed in ancient legends! A strategic-level spell capable of reducing an entire city to a sea of ash and molten slag! Greywater Village actually possessed one?! And judging by the looks of it... they were actually insane enough to try and dismantle it?!