Marvel Magic Case Files

Chapter 1652 Kamar-Taj: Preparations for the Counterattack

Not all arcane apprentices come from secluded arcane families; many young arcane mages come from the outside world. Those like Kasirius, who didn't enter Kamar-Taj until they were forty, are a minority. The vast majority are young, and some even come from family businesses that manage Kamar-Taj's secular assets. These young people have no objection to these tactical, standardized equipment, and industrially produced psionic longswords are sharper than the Living Tribunal scepter, which has been used for hundreds of years. Pistols capable of firing psionic ash bullets are more accurate than bows and arrows that release psionic longswords.

Although some older sorcerers say that the Emperor's reforms will deprive young apprentices and deacons of the opportunity to "increase their wisdom" in Kamar-Taj, the Emperor values ​​the lives of his apprentices and deacons and the efficiency of their missions more than wisdom. After all, this is the department that carries out killings, and it is also a touchstone for promoting all sorcerer apprentices. Sometimes, under the guidance of effective tactical thinking, a single molten metal bomb can cause far more damage than a sorcerer who has studied for more than ten years.

This structural change is clearly aimed at the arcane mage family.

The militarization of the executive branch meant the establishment of a violent army; the scientific reorganization of the logistics department meant that Kamar-Taj's resources and manufacturing would begin to rely on external sources; all these reforms meant that the sorcerer families could no longer mobilize resources as they had in the past. The Emperor would firmly control Kamar-Taj's violent institutions and logistics departments, and even the education system would be stripped of the sorcerer families' control, minimizing their influence. Compared to the previous Sorcerer Supreme's use of violence and bloodshed to force the sorcerer families to concede, the Emperor's policies were undeniably mild, but the ruthlessness hidden beneath the simple words was no less. After the meeting, representatives of the sorcerer families approached Sorcerer Hamil and other Temple Guardians, even the notoriously incompetent Sorcerer Daniel. Everyone tried to extract more information about the future from those Temple Guardians who still held key positions in the system.

"In the future, Kamar-Taj will not only have sorcerers."

Master Hamil was also happy to dispel his colleagues' concerns here.

Others might not have realized it, but the Sorcerer Hamil knew that the Emperor's move firmly bound Kamar-Taj to his chariot. The title of "Lord of Kamar-Taj" alone was insufficient to control all affairs of Kamar-Taj; only through deep involvement, infiltration, and interference in all of Kamar-Taj's systems, making it a pillar for his future conquest, would Kamar-Taj truly belong to him. The engineering teams dispatched to Kamar-Taj were the best example; in future plans, it would be transformed into a fortress, capable of resisting attacks not only on the material level from other human realms and alien invasions, but also on the non-material level. Similar projects had begun during the reign of the previous Sorcerer Supreme, but the opposition was so strong that the Emperor could only undertake key projects and move the command center to the Astronomical Tower instead of the Kamar-Taj headquarters.

"We will be a massive department that controls the operation of all psionic affairs on Earth."

Master Wu Guiyue interrupted. As the wielder of the divine artifact, the Staff of Myriad Laws, she wielded immense influence among the Temple Guardians, virtually unmatched by any other psionicist of her level. The current Emperor was no longer the young man she once knew, yet she still sided with him. This wasn't merely due to her loyalty to the previous Sorcerer Supreme and her trust in the Emperor's wisdom, but also because she saw the future he envisioned and the comprehensive solutions he proposed.

This was a vision unmatched by any previous Sorcerer Supreme, not even Agamotto possessed such meticulous thinking and wisdom to propose a system that could operate into the eternal future to regulate and stabilize all psychic affairs. If we were to use her daughter Alice's words, then the Emperor's policies were like those of a post-apocalyptic survival enthusiast suffering from persecution complex, only concerned with skills and equipment useful in the future, his greatest hobby being hiding in a burrow eating canned food. But if anyone interfered with his canned food, he wouldn't hesitate to pull out the firearms he kept in his burrow and fire a burst at the intruder. Sorcerer Wu Guiyue didn't want to see her colleague get riddled with bullets, even though she didn't usually get along with them. After all, it wasn't 9mm small-caliber ammunition, but .50 or even .75 caliber explosive guns; one shot would suffice.

The previous Sorcerer Supreme had already killed a group of stubborn elders from the sorcerer families.

"Think about the power you will wield in the future. If you are smart enough, you should stop complaining now." Venerable Wu Guiyue waved her hand, trying to soothe the anxieties of those who were still reeling from the passing of the previous Supreme Master with a firm tone. "Everyone who becomes a Supreme Master sees further and is more powerful than we are. There is no need to speculate about things you cannot understand."

“But you saw it too, Guardian,” a sorcerer with short, greyish-white stubble said worriedly. In truth, this sorcerer shared the same anxieties as the others. Because the previous Sorcerer Supreme's term was exceptionally long, the uncertainty of the future had never crossed their minds. Moreover, the way the previous Sorcerer Supreme abdicated was too horrific; possession by an outer-dimensional demon shouldn't have happened to a Sorcerer Supreme, further exacerbating their insecurity. “You saw His attitude towards mortals.”

"That's Kamar-Taj's goal, you fool. If I can't protect mortals, then Kamar-Taj has no reason to exist."

Master Wu Guiyue gripped the Staff of Ten Thousand Laws tightly, her gaze stern.

Master Hamil happily stepped back, leaving the verbal dispute to Master Wu Guiyue. He himself was not skilled in debating and had much work to do—a day and a night had passed since returning from the Attilan base on the moon, and even while others were asleep, he had been handling official business with the officials sent by the emperor and Regent Victor von Doom, so that reorganization could be carried out as quickly as possible when the meeting convened—he was an old man, and fatigue had crept into his nerves; he now only wanted to find a place to meditate and recuperate to restore his spirit and face the even more severe challenges ahead.

"From now on, your missions and actions will be monitored, and there will be no more instances of using psychic powers to gain benefits in the secular world. Don't think I don't know about the petty tricks some of you have played. His Holiness will not punish you for these petty gains, but the Emperor will absolutely not tolerate any behavior that goes against His will. Your abilities are not an excuse to take resources from Kamar-Taj's secular enterprises."

Those sorcerers wisely skipped the topic.

"He is the Sorcerer Supreme, He should remain in Kamar-Taj, yet we haven't seen Him since the coronation, not even the giants in golden armor," the sorcerer cried out. "Why did He take those comrades from the dimensional gaps with Him? Where is He now? Is there anything more important than Kamar-Taj now?"

Venerable Wu Guiyue thought for a moment.

“There’s a lot, a lot more. Keeping this world running is far more complicated than you people who have spent your whole lives studying at Kamar-Taj can imagine,” she said. “If you don’t mind, let’s get to our positions as soon as possible. If you’ve seen the next task list, you’ll know I have to return to the Hong Kong Temple on official business, and you will be used as reserves. Get some rest. There’s another war coming up, unless you’re foolish enough to think there was no one behind the Sorcerer Supreme’s death and that your new master is too mild-mannered. Even though you haven’t had much contact with him in the past, we’ve all seen the news, we know how he dealt with the Yugoslav religious militias, so you should know what kind of person he is.”

The people of the Royal City of Yugoslavia were able to experience that feeling again after a long time.

They were told that the Emperor's return to the castle wasn't accompanied by a massive swarm of fighter jets, transport planes, and gunships, but rather by an indescribable presence. This saved foreign spies considerable work, as anyone in the city could pinpoint the Emperor's location. However, the Emperor was unconcerned with the clumsy assassination plots of foreign spies and intelligence agencies. His return to the castle was solely for efficiency. As messages from the capital reached the three great temples, trucks disguised as cargo ships, laden with weapons and armed personnel, were delivered to the temples. Simultaneously, dimensional rift sorcerers, transferred from the front lines, arrived at the three great temples via portals to replace the sorcerers serving there.

The Emperor demanded that the planetary defense system operate at full power, with him, who controlled the Eye of Agamotto, at its core. Wanda Maximoff had briefly activated all functions of the planetary defense system, but lacking the support of the three major temple subsystems, her system could only protect the Kamar-Taj headquarters itself. The Emperor desired a system that would protect the entire Earth. Even he had only witnessed the global planetary defense system activated once, and the records described that activation as unsatisfactory, with frequent problems such as personnel negligence and lack of skill. Subsequent drills failed to resolve these issues, forcing the Emperor to temporarily assign the experienced arcane mages from the dimensional gaps, now under the operations department, to fill the role.

The emperor declared war on the culprits responsible for the death of the Supreme Master.

(End of this chapter)