Limited resources.

Just as I feared, after understanding Raven's plans, I knew I would find myself smothered in repetitive work, but I still failed to imagine my new reality. After the discussion with her superiors, Raven sent a letter to her superiors and started preparing what would be my house for quite a while.

Orders don't always have the result the person giving them expected, and Raven has done her best to make that the reality of our unit. We were supposed to be standing in this small village waiting for the stories they would see on a secret convoy; it would be our task to take her across the border and leave her buried for Mathias' men to pick up later.

It would be really bad to be seen giving goods to rebel slaves, especially when pressing observer are templars of a certain bishop who really wants the slave leader's weapon.

So I ended up several feet underground, Volkan did a good job of molding a reasonably large workshop for me to work in, but it's still a dark hole with little ventilation shrouded in red earth.

But I have to admit that I think this red brick wall is beautiful and the light from the magic tool hangs on the ceiling, I'm not crazy enough to use candles in a place with little draft and where I'm creating bombs. It would be deadly if the materials of the fire element were to ignite from a candle falling from a candlestick.

As the materials allowed to be delivered to Mirue's realm are raw materials, they denied any very elaborate products that could serve as proof that they are helping rebel slaves, I think they were a little approachable, but not entirely wrong.

If the slaves show up using too many elixirs, new or whole armor and magic tools it would cause the Mirue kingdom and the Church to discover that they have a new sponsor or that the cult in the kingdom has not been destroyed. Although the scenario where the Church hunts a cult that they have already expelled from the realm is funny, it also has a lot of risk that the men and women infiltrating Mirue's realm will be labeled cultists, that would be bad in many different ways.

But these problems haven't stopped Raven from wanting to turn the rebel slaves into more competent saboteurs, she'll likely make up a lie or excuse like a mad rune craftsman determined to ally with the rebel slaves. Not that this is a lie, but the more accurate description is that a crazy woman is forcing a novice rune craftsman to help a band of slaves blow up their enemies.

Even when the first batch of material had not arrived at the border I was already working, although the materials with me are not enough to do much, but enough to start the first steps in a few dozen bombs.

Raven also sent the rest of the team to collect some materials in this region that would be useful for me to be able to advance my work, not many materials available in nature or in the markets since only small and medium villages near my workshop, but enough to get some materials that will keep me busy for a few days.

Raven had a list of bombs she wanted me to create, nothing really big or complicated like rune arrangements that used materials from the element lightning, earth, wind, water, ice or light and dark. I particularly thought that a wind element bomb can be used well by slaves, but she wants bombs to blow up buildings, set fire to buildings or bombs to screw a large number of weak people.

Yes, Raven wants the slaves to explode bombs in my towns to cause panic and harm the slavers' business. This is the only bomb that has an element other than fire element, deadly poison or a good trick to heal will be added to this type of bomb to maximize the damage done by them.

I found this a bit extreme as the slaves will be doing this while the church templars are hunting them. It only takes a little effort on their part to tax the rebel slaves as forces of a cult that wants to wreak havoc by killing civilians, that would be bad.

I prefer to make a lot more firebombs, and it's a lot easier to make them since you don't have to worry about the poison escaping from the bomb and you just throw it at your target and the destruction will spread over a large area. Burning shipments, camps, forts, slave companies and perhaps some cities as a distraction is much more effective than using poison.

It's also easier to see rebel slaves trying to destroy the government with low level bombs than something complicated like a poison bomb, but Raven still wants some poison bombs delivered to Mathias.

"How long will it take for the bombs to be ready after the rest of the materials arrive?"

"Depends on how many bombs you want me to make?"

"The maximum as possible."

"This will take time."

"It shouldn't, we can't delay delivery too long."

"I can make some and you deliver them with the rest of the resources, the rest of the bombs go on the next delivery."

"How many can you make in three days?"

"Less than ten a day, probably seven well-made bombs. I cannot let them be unstable, they will travel for a long time before being used, the last thing we need is for them to blow up the rebel slaves before they can burn their former owners."

"Well, the last thing I need is for them to be branded as suicidal incompetents for blowing themselves up, that will destroy any chance of cooperation with them continuing. Not a general stupid enough to keep diverting supplies to a bunch of suicidal idiots."

"We have a very big problem, Raven!"

Mia rushes through the tunnel, not caring about more than delivering the bad news to Raven. She even used Raven's real name and not her codename.

"What happened, Lightning?"

"After assembling all the necessary tools like the antenna to be able to receive reports from the intelligence division, I received the latest updates from the war. We have big problems; the bishop made his move and he totally freaked out."

"What did he do?"

"He has declared the group of rebellious slaves to be a seed of an evil cult and their leader and apostle of an evil god who is intent on spreading death and chaos across the realms."

"Did he really do this madness?"

"Yes, the kingdom of Mirue has already given its response to the church promising to focus on eliminating the rebellious slaves who are a threat to order. They also implied that the war will stop and anyone not doing so means they are supporting the evil gods' plans."

"The bishop seems to have more enemies and problems than we expected, to make such a risky move like this makes his desperation very clear. Even if he succeeds and captures Mathias and his sword, the bishop will still have to face some criticism and reprimands from his superiors, but it would still be a victory, but if that doesn't happen it's quite possible, he'll end up deposed or even taxed like crazy."

"I don't know what made him take such a risk, but we have to make him miss his hunt. Mirue's kingdom is in a much better position, if the bishop fails, they will only be seen as too weak to handle the cult within his kingdom, but if he succeeds, they don't have to worry when the identity of the swordsman of the destruction is revealed, the slave rebellion destroyed will only be a minor bonus."

"But that won't hinder our cooperation with Mathias and his slaves, Raven, being branded as a sidekick to cultists and pretty bad for our realm. We are no longer popular in the region, being labeled a cultist sympathizer even for a short time can be excuse enough for the kingdom to be attacked by several enemies or have trade routes blocked."

"Yes and no, Lightning. You might think this move by the bishop made our superior intend to cancel the plan to help the rebellious slaves, but that won't happen when you know what kind of person he is."

"That risk is high, but for him the idea that the bishop is screwing him and interfering in this way with the war he was actually invested in is by no means demotivating. Obviously, we are not going to make a move against the members of the church of the goddess Helena, this is very radical and stupid, but we will be given orders and autonomy to thwart their plans."

"Our situation has improved as much as it has worsened, basically it hasn't changed our provisioning, but it has changed how active our unit is going to be. It is also very likely that we will be reinforced by one or two more units to facilitate our movements within Mirue's realm."

"So, what is going to change for us right away?"

"Don't get too excited, Wolf, you're going to stay where you are for a long time. We will need a lot of ammunition to give to the slaves, we have to make the templars and the army of the kingdom of Mirue suffer a lot to hunt the rebel slaves, even when they succeed, they must suffer, and for that to happen we need a lot of your job."

"I'll even try to get some other rune crafters to help you, don't make that 'that wasn't the deal' face. You're going to be safe and have a huge number of resources to practice your profession, you're earning here, kid, so put a lot of effort into your work."

"Of course, what else would I do."

"Come on, Lightning, we should get our new orders shortly."

So, I was alone in my workshop, I should do something to make this place more comfortable since I'm going to spend a lot of time here, maybe a better chair, one that's not made of hardened earth.