Chapter 158: Dealing with Sander

In an instant, all the windows that still remained intact broke apart. Rushing to the corridor from all possible sides and rooms around, all sorts of experts of Jeff's hire instantly overwhelmed those few men that Martha brought along, reversing our position in the standstill. 

"I will leave the rest to you, okay?" Turning my head to Jeff who was slowly gathering himself from the floor, I fluttered my shirt before turning around and decisively leaving the place. 

I simply couldn't be bothered to wait until the experts of my faction would turn my judged punishment into reality. With her aggressive appearance and attempt to force me into meeting with her, Martha now made sure that whatever sympathy I had left for her due to the truth behind the entire situation between the two of us, was now gone. 

"Sure, you can go back to your matters now. I will make sure to promptly deal with this problem." Finally bringing himself back to a proper standing position, Jeff threw a cold look at the Sarate's men. 

Given how they treated him just a moment ago, I could only wonder whether our men wouldn't have troubles counting when it would come to cut those people's fingers out. 

But as sudden and disturbing as this situation was, it had its own positive sides. Given how reckless Martha's attempt to force me into talking was, I was now sure that it wasn't the Sarate family that prompted this damned white intel to leak to the public. 

Sadly, it didn't make guessing the real perpetrator any easier. With the only lead that I had now gone, it would be even harder to figure out just who was bored enough to try to uproot whatever power that I managed to build from the scratch.

That's why, rather than bothering myself with this one, particular problem, I decided to focus on the matters that I actually had some influence over. 

And the first problem to deal with was centred around Sander. Because even though we met during the commercial shot already, the matter to discuss was simply too important to talk it over in the middle of a huge crowd.

After a short trip through several corridors and connectors, I managed to reach his place, only to actually find out that he was no longer working in the space I designated for him. Only after asking around for a few moments did I manage to learn that a production hall that I scheduled to be built a long time ago, was already finished, stalling all the production of the stones due to the process of moving all the machines and stuff between places.

Swallowing this waste of time without a word, I followed after the directions of one of the cult's clerks, quickly reaching Sander's new playground.

"You are here! I thought I would break apart when I wasn't able to talk with you earlier on. What took you so long?" 

As soon as the middle-aged man noticed me, he instantly dropped what he was doing only to rush towards me with an excited face. But since I knew what made him so excited, I couldn't share his happiness and expectations.

"Sander, I need you to listen to me very carefully." While I could just give the man my order and forget about the topic, I didn't believe it would be a good idea to do something like this. With this man being practically the father of the modern approach to magic-stone carving, if I were to just tell him to stop doing something for no apparent reason, it would be only a matter of time before he would do it to check the effects of those recurring stones himself. 

"Wait, did something happen? Which one failed to work? I know you don't pay it any attention, but I made sure to add a serial number to every…" Just as Sander was about to explain his way of operating, he finally noticed the tense expression on my face. Silencing himself down, he then finally allowed me to speak. 

"From this day onward, burn all the materials and procedures for creating recurring stones. Only two sets may remain, both of which we will hide in the deepest vaults we can find." Resting my back against the wall, I threw a tense look to the craftsman before adding. "If you told the method to anyone, make sure to bring them to me. If not… Then I will need you to come up with some excuse that will stop all the amateurs from ever trying to carve this kind of stones." 

Allowing my back to slide down the wall, I sat in the corner of a corridor. Just this alone appeared to be enough for the craftsman to understand how serious this matter was.

"Did something bad happen? Did those stones tragically fail?" With this question, Sander managed to strike the exact crux of the matter. The crux that I couldn't really explain without revealing my time in the apocalypse world. 

"They worked, they worked even better than I expected them to work. And that's actually a problem." I didn't know whether what happened back in the war camp of Ayda's world could be replicated by any random person on earth. Maybe the disaster that the stone brought could be activated by anyone with the stone? Maybe the person activating it had to be as powerful magic-wise as me?

Without the answer to those questions, I couldn't allow anyone to figure out a way to create the proper recurring stones. 

And the entire set of tutorials that Sander was created to spread the knowledge of carved stones was actually aimed at making sure others wouldn't even know that the possibility to create this kind of stone existed in the first place!

"I understand. Actually, no, not really. But I get what you mean." Scratching the top of his head, Sander breathed out a sigh of relief before clasping both of his hands against his face. Only then did his expression of defeat disappeared, replaced by a new bout of energy. "I get it. I will burn all the records and come up with some story of a dangerous accident. If I just may…" 

When I noticed a strange gleam in the craftsman's eyes, I sighed in defeat before pointing my hand outside of that window. 

"Let's say that I would aim it at that fountain out there. Can you see it?" Even though I was only using the place as a referencing point, I actually didn't expect to see this kind of decorative piece already installed on the outside. 

While the noise of the building machines doing their work accompanied everyone in the already finished part of the compound ever since the first people started to move in here, the general construction was still far from being finished. Just the fact that Sander only received a single workshop rather than an entire factory was the best testimony to the fact. 

As such, I didn't expect the space around the first compound to already bear the signs of groundwork aimed at beautification of this place!

"Yeah. But from here to that fountain… It would truly be a disaster if random people could get their hands on such firepower." Making some kind of strange assumption, Sander shook his head with apparent understanding, only to earn a sigh of amusement from me in return.

"From here to that fountain? No, that's wrong. Listen, if you take the direction of this fountain to be the direction in which I aimed that stone at…" Closing my eyes, I recalled the moment when the massacre at the camp ensued. The moment when my finger pressed the activator on the stone. 

And then, the delayed storm of mana that completely changed the lay of the ground for as far as my eye could see. In fact, the real range of the disaster only fully dawned on us when we reached the edge of the disaster on our way back to the village.

With all those projections, I finally managed to calculate my answer to Sander.

"If you see that fountain, then imagine a cone stretching about seven to eight degrees in both directions. Everything within this cone for about twenty kilometres… Gone." That was my answer. In fact, the disaster from back in Ayda's world almost managed to reach all the way to the village of witches! 

Hearing my words, Sander's face whitened. For a moment, he appeared to imagine this kind of widespread destruction, before his body twitched and sentience returned to his eyes.

"I understand. I will get rid of every single piece of knowledge about this kind of stones that I have written. I will bring two last copies directly to your hands later on."

With that said, the absolutely worst part of my today's duties was over. While there was still a lot of walking and talking further in my schedule, the only part that filled me with anxiety was now over. 

After all, by forcing Sander to abandon an entire branch of this newborn technology, I was kind of risking his loyalty to my cause!

Thankfully, as long as I would deal with the opposition for the next two projects that I already had in mind, he would never dare to as much as think about changing sides again!

"I can't wait to learn just who dares to challenge me." Muttering to myself, I walked into my private study. In the end, even with how packed my schedule was, I still had to take some time off to keep myself off. Opening the doors, I could tell Ayda was inside even before her figure revealed itself atop one of the sofas. 

"Are you ready?"